What is a Thematic Unit?
What
on Earth is a thematic unit? Um only something I like to call the bomb dot com!
Thematic units are units focusing on a centralized theme and integrating
standards across content areas. Here’s the awesome sauce part, thematic
teaching allows you to easily increase student engagement! Ready to learn how
thematic units ramp up student engagement, create easy celebrations, and
have fun themes? Keep reading!
How to Plan a Thematic Unit
The
first thing you need to do is check your standards. For my pizza themed unit I
started by looking at the Next Generation Science Standards. I knew my next
unit needed to focus on forms of energy. I focused on this standard and its
elements. Solar power was a part I really wanted to focus on, thus I started
building my unit. Now, I was ready to start looking for my theme. As all good
party planners know, you gotta have a theme to have a kick butt party. Now, I’m
not a party planner, but I do try to be a kick butt teacher. I hopped onto
Pinterest and searched for solar power projects for kids. I stumbled across the
perfect project, solar powered pizza ovens. How cool! I now had the Holy Grail
theme for kids, PIZZA! Want to build these in your classroom this year (trust me
you do). Check out the link I used, here.
Now,
that I had my science standards and my theme, it was time to get
interdisciplinary. I started looking at upcoming math and writing standards. In
writing we were about to start poetry. So, why not write poetry about pizza! In
math, many of the upcoming fourth grade standards were focused on fractions and
decimals. Thinking thematically, I decided that I could easily incorporate
those standards through the use of some Project Based Learning.
You can check
out the Design Your Own Pizza Restaurant PBL unit I use by clicking HERE.
So,
let’s check, science standards, math standards, and writing standards all with
a pizza theme. Ding ding ding, we have a thematic unit!
How Thematic Units Make Learning Celebrations Easy
I
like to end my units with learning celebrations. I like to show students that
their hard work is worth celebrating. Classroom celebrations also increase
student engagement, which y'all know is my jam. So, how does thematic teaching
make learning celebrations easier? Well, you already have the theme/ backbone
for your celebration!
For example, my thematic unit focused on pizza. I already
planned on having my students build solar powered pizza ovens as a final
project for their energy science standard. So, it was simple, decorate the
classroom like a pizzeria! I was able to quickly make a sign and lay out the
ingredients. For added decoration, I hung the students Pizza Poetry (their
final writing for the unit) on the wall! My kiddos loved this experience and
having an overlapping theme helped keep them engaged and wanting to learn more
across all subject areas.
Want
to learn more of my student engagement strategies? CLICK BELOW to download my FREE e-book! Here I’m sharing the
secret sauce that keeps my classroom a rigorous and fun learning machine all year long!
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