We just finished a Storyline about Crater Lake. The students became junior rangers and learned all about our only national park in Oregon. Many incidents happened, including trash left in the park, an invasion of Mountain Pine Beetles and a small forest fire. The students responded in role as their ranger characters to research solutions. The highlight for the students at the end of the Storyline was to receive their very own junior ranger badges and a personal note from Ranger Kate (see pictures below)! All 10 ELP standards were integrated into this Storyline.

“Rewilding is a progressive approach to conservation. It’s about letting nature take care of itself, enabling natural processes to shape land and sea, repairing damaged ecosystems, and restoring degraded landscapes. Through rewilding, wildlife’s natural rhythms create wilder, more biodiverse habitats. Rewilding is about: nature’s own ways, bringing back wildlife, ensuring wellbeing, delivering for the future.” -Rewilding Europe

Here are some photos from our rewilding Storyline this spring. Students rewilded a fictitious city in the Storyline as gardener characters. As our culminating project, we rewilded part of our school campus by creating a native plant pollinator garden.

The International Storyline Conference in Gothenburg, Sweden this March was done in a hybrid format. Therefore, many of the recordings of the presentations are available online. This is a great opportunity for some Storyline professional development without having to travel! Here’s the link:

https://storyline.education/events/conference-in-gothenburg-1

As I’ve mentioned before, Storyline is a great fit for Oregon’s English Language Proficiency (ELP) standards. Below are examples of ELP standard 4: construct grade- appropriate oral and written claims and support them with reasoning and evidence. The students were helping the main character in the book, Wesley, to sell his sunscreen/mosquito repellent. For more information about this Storyline in general you can take a look at my original blog post about it.

This Storyline is based on the book, Old Rock (is not boring) by Deb Pilutti. It’s about a rock named Old Rock and his adventures through time. The students created rock characters and experienced the same events as Old Rock: blasting out of a volcano, observing lumbering dinosaurs, being frozen in a glacier and getting sat on by a mastodon. We were able to incorporate a lot research, discussion, presenting and even drama activities into this Storyline. We were visited by a geologist to help us with our rock research. Additionally, we were able to explore the geology of Central Oregon through a series of virtual field trips. All 10 of Oregon’s ELP standards were incorporated into this Storyline. *This Storyline was written by Colleen Vallerga. I adapted it for ELD and virtual learning.

Like I’ve mentioned before, Storyline is a great fit for Oregon’s English Language Proficiency (ELP) standards. Below is an example of ELP standard 6: analyze and critique the arguments of others. This was part of our Big Orange Splot Storyline that we just finished during distance learning.

Please consider joining us at the 8th International Storyline Conference in Gothenburg, Sweden. The dates are March 25th-27th, 2022. For more information, go to the conference website: https://storyline.education/outputs/conference-in-gothenburg

Here’s a picture of our completed frieze for the Eric Carle Storyline for K/1. I tried to keep it as simple as possible for distance learning. The students drew their characters, houses and other items for the frieze and then dropped them by the school. A KG student exclaimed, “I want to go there!” when he saw the completed frieze for the first time.

Right now we’re working on an ELD Storyline based on the book, My Heart is a Compass by Deborah Marcero. It tells the story of a girl, Rose, who wants to find something extra special to bring to her class for show-and-tell. She embarks on an imaginative journey, creating maps to help her locate that one special thing. The students join the story as readers and create maps alongside Rose. It has been a great fit for distance learning. All 10 ELP standards are included in this ELD Storyline.

Here a couple of student quotes that illustrate how Storyline ignites curiosity and imagination:

“If she drew the wind, she would know exactly where to go. It would lead her to the mountain.” -3rd Grade ELL Student

“It’s always sunset in my land because there’s always a bit of unicorn magic.” -1st Grade ELL Student