Making and using bar graphs to generate interest

I wanted get my students curious as to why there are still hungry people in the world even though there are enough calories for all to eat. My CT said that in the past, her students have hardly been very interested in it. I tried introducing the topic by two simple graphs, and it worked.

First, I showed them this graph which shows that India's calorie intake per capita has gone down since 1970. Then, I pulled up the next graph which shows how India's food stocks have gone up. I could tell that the graphs had achieved their purpose when every student seemed excited to read first what the textbook had to say about the issue and then what an article I printed said. 

I finally took the time yesterday to figure out how to make a graph for myself in Excel. While it's still easier to find one online, I can often find the data much easier online. Now that I can make a graph myself in just a few minutes, I no longer have to search and search for graphs online.

Skype

I have loved using Skype in class. It engages students like few other things can. Just don't forget to give students expectations :). 

In my 7th Grade Geography, we have twice skyped with people in different countries that we were studying (Mexico and Canada.) My goal for both was to allow students to put a face to the places that we are studying. Similarly, I hypothesized (and was right) that students would be engaged if they heard information from someone who actually lived in a place.

My first experience was asking a person from Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, how living in Yellowknife affected him. (It was really nice that he had also lived for a long time in Hamilton, Ontario, which, in climate, and in some ways culturally is similar to West Michigan. Our guest was interesting and spoke in terms that my 7^th grade students could make sense of. Several students asked questions. I assigned the students to write a question for him as homework, and to write down three things they found interesting, both of which worked fairly well, although I edited them for the next time.

The next time we Skyped with a school teacher in Mexico DF, who herself was an immigrant to DF from the country (we are studying spatial inequality and urbanization). I changed the tasks for the students; asking them to do a KWL. What do they know, what do they want to learn, and what did they learn. I gave specific areas for the KWL: rural decline, population density, and one that the students chose. Having more guidance helped the students to see that the activity tied directly to our learning targets, and is something I will do in the future. Our guest was also very engaging, explaining concepts well to students from a very different culture. It was more of a challenge for me as she didn’t speak English, so I had to interpret - tiring but very worthwhile. Since the students filled out a KWL, it gave a great chance for them to discuss in groups what they already knew, and then the groups decided on the questions to ask her.
Overall this second time went much better than the first, mostly because the student were held more accountable for their input to the process.
 I plan to use Skype chats in the future, perhaps including some of the ideas I found on Skype's website.