“Welcome to Great Blue!” From the Forward to the 2007 Issue of Great Blue
"Great Blue is 'a journal of student inquiry.' This year over 80 students from five classrooms in Madison and 23 students from various classes in Seymour, Wisconsin have turned their unique questions into research projects, and their results are the 100 articles that follow. These student writers, scientists, artists, mathematicians, critics, and ethnographers study themselves and their classmates, books and games, numbers and art, families and neighbors, and nature found outdoors and in our classroom labs. Here are our original observations, surveys, stories, experiments, interviews, analyses, and reflections. . . .
"Great Blue is a doorway to inquiry, a new world of learning. We find good questions from our imaginations, old Great Blues, and other sources, use our best ideas and skills to set up procedures to answer these questions, and struggle to make sense of the data we collect. We learn a lot about the topics we study—and also about our ability as learners. When we finish our projects, we are very proud of what we have accomplished—and excited about the big world we discover."
Sections of Great Blue
The five sections of Great Blue are metaphors. Instead of dividing the journal into the traditional subjects (reading, writing, math, science, social studies), we refer to that extra dimension that emerges when students engage in inquiry.
Kid-to-Kid: Outside of school, culture is learned most readily in dialogue with others. We ask, we observe, we imitate others. Here kids tell other kids what they have learned about culture, sometimes from books, but often directly from observation, interviews, and surveys.
It Figures!: Clerks add, subtract, divide, and multiply. Young mathematicians go beyond these operations to puzzle over numbers and shapes and data. When we solve difficult problems, or notice new patterns, we exclaim: Got it! Yeah! It figures!
Critics & Fanatics: Even beginning readers are reaching for more than decoding and vocabulary, as they move towards understanding, enchantment, and assessment. Kids who love books would sooner tell you what they love--and what is less than perfect--than fill out a worksheet. Some students also write about their “reading” of other media, such as oral language, ads, games, and web sites.
The Gallery: Many kids love to draw, dance, act, design, write poetry, and take pictures. When they choose what and how to display their creations, and reflect on their work (products and processes), their sense of art becomes more profound.
I Wonder: Science begins and ends with wonder, a movement from curiosity to delight. Here kids are attempting to make sense of nature, sometimes with books, but most often with observations, experiments, and models.
NEW 2008 Great Blue Journal will be available for download soon