The Incredible Journey at Empire Elementary School by Cora

Wednesday, July 15^th, Linda and I went to Empire Elementary school to teach 3^rd and 4^th graders about the water cycle. The project we did was The Incredible Journey, where you become a water droplet and you start some where in the water cycle. You start out with the sun bead, then you get placed, when you are at your starting point you put on that bead. After you get the bead you roll the die that is there and you go to wherever the die tells you to go in the water cycle. We taught three classes, and after I watched Linda teach the project in the first two classes she decided I was ready to teach the third class. So I would tell the class where you can go if you were in the part of the water cycle and what color bead you get. Then they were off. After all that my job became ‘The Tier’ and I would tie the bracelet off after they had gotten twelve beads and then put the bracelet on their wrists. A few of the kids didn’t follow directions and would roll the die, decide they didn’t like the spot they had to go to and would wander around to get the color they wanted. I caught them in the act and tattled to Linda. Then they pulled off the misplaced beads and put them back in the correct containers. I usually am a good teacher but I cannot keep the attention of little kids. So this was definitely a challenge, not having attention and not following directions. At least it was my favorite activity that I got to teach. I am very glad I got to teach but I wouldn’t do it again unless I was forced to (or Linda asked me to again).