Wood Class
FIRST GRADE: WOOD CLASS
First graders see themselves as learners acquiring important new skills. They build on earlier experiences, making connections and discussing ideas. Academic skills continue to develop, and first graders begin to be aware of their progress and the strategies they are using for learning.
At Berkwood Hedge School the first grade classroom motto is "We learn to do by doing". Whether applied to reading, to writing, to math, to making friends, or to jumping rope, first graders are encouraged to be engaged, reflective, capable and flexible learners and friends.
Project Based Learning Spotlight: Adapt Your Hobbies
In the Adapt Your Hobbies project, WOODworkers learn about physical disabilities and how they affect children’s ability to participate in hobbies/sports/games. They ponder the essential question, How can we as engineers adapt hobbies for kids with physical disabilities? Using the design engineering process, students work in collaborative small groups to design and build adaptations for a favorite first grade hobby using only recycled materials. Along the way, they learn about hobbies around the world, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Special Olympics, and Berkeley's role as a leader in the disability rights movement. Woodworkers travel to the ADA "Barrier Free" wheelchair accessible playground at Roberts Regional Park in Oakland, and they participate in expert visits from local engineers, designers, and disability rights advocates. The project culminates with a "product exposition" at a schoolwide community meeting, where the WOODworkers present their inventions as well as instruction manuals they wrote
