Children worked
with a partner and used the question matrix to brainstorm what they would
like to find out about their animal.
They used texts, CD Rom – Children’s Encyclopedia, and Internet
to gather further information. They recorded their information in Max’s
Sandbox . Some used a report format and others chose to write a narrative
and include the information in their story.
The following is a draft of one story. As they had written it in pencil
I was unable to scan it so I have typed in their story and had to leave
out their pictures. Max’s Sandbox can not be saved to another file
so I couldn’t copy their slide presentation!
REPORT
ON tadpoles
By : Alice and Anita
| Once upon a time there were some tadpoles. They lived in a pond. The pond was nice and clean and had weed in it for the tadpoles to eat. |
Each day the tadpoles grew and grew. See how I grow.
Twelve
weeks old Four weeks old - 9 weeks old froglet |
| Most animals in the water don’t have skeletons. But as I changed from a tadpole into a frog I grew a skeleton. This is what I would look like if you took an x-ray of me. | I
also started off with gills so that I could breathe in the water.
As I grew I got legs so that I could hop around. I could live on the
land and in the water. I am an amphibian. |
| One day I met a female frog. She laid lots of eggs. She laid them in the water in something that looks like jelly. Here is a picture of all the eggs. | Most of those eggs grew up to be just like me. Some were eaten by fish or other animals living in the pond. |
The egg 
tadpole
