This week, we’re helping a South Carolina second grade read stories that will sharpen their inference skills, and a Mississippi high school class grow some carnivorous plants. We hope that readers who support quality public school education will help by sharing or supporting our featured projects.
The Inoculation Project is an ongoing, volunteer effort to crowdfund science and math projects for red-state public schools in low-income neighborhoods. As always, our conduit is DonorsChoose, a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit corporation that facilitates tax-deductible donations to specific, vetted projects in public schools.
We helped Mrs. Mixon with another book project back in January. I encourage you to go to the link for cute photos of the kids with their books. DonorsChoose has since quit posting kids’ pictures, and I get why, but I do miss seeing them!
As often happens, we made so much progress with this project last week that I am moving it up to the top spot.
PROJECT #1
Resources: Help me give my students get some amazing read-alouds that have an emphasis on "inferring."
Economic need: An Equity Focus School; nearly all students from low‑income households.
Location: Bay Road Elementary School, Hartsville, South Carolina
Total: $231.55
Still Needed: $133.02 Completed, thanks! Please consider project #2.
Teacher’s Comments from Mrs. Mixon:
My Students: My students are bright, full of energy, and they love school! They will walk into my classroom in the fall with a zest for learning and I do my best to ensure they continue to have that passion for learning by the end of the year! I am always amazed by how much they have learned and grown!
They walk in the door every day with a smile on their faces and are ready to learn!
The students at my school are from single-parent, low socio-economic homes who receive three free meals daily. I firmly believe that a child's background does not predict his/her future.
Our school has limited funds to provide valuable materials to help my students reach their full potential. My hope for my students is to have access to valuable resources to develop their literacy skills and get them ready for 2nd grade!
My Project: After analyzing data from a recent test that my students took, I realized they were all low in inferencing. What could I do to help them master inferencing? Find amazing read-alouds that have an emphasis on inferring! The ability to make inferences helps students develop an understanding of the author's perspective by grasping the underlying meanings in a text. This is a power standard so they have to master it! So here I am reaching out for help! Please donate to my project and help my class reach their full potential in inferring!
Donations of ANY size can make a BIG difference!
The Caldecott-winning books of David Wiesner are perfect for working on inference, because they contain almost no text, just beautifully-detailed illustrations. Nothing about the story is ever directly stated, so readers must infer what is going on. Here, someone has brilliantly set the illustrations in the requested classic Tuesday to Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries.
Here, Mr. Wiesner talks about another of his picture stories, this one using his cat as an artist’s model. After an introductory page of text, it contains words only in an alien language of his own design.
We’ve helped with projects in Kiln, Mississippi before. It’s a Gulf town on Bay St. Louis, pretty near New Orleans, that has been through several boom-and-bust cycles (timber; moonshine), and currently relies on casino-based tourism to provide jobs.
Mrs. Swilley hopes to have her high school students raise and study an assortment of carnivorous plants, because what kid is not interested in carnivorous plants?
PROJECT #2
Resources: Help me give my students a tank with potting soil and carnivorous plants to create a biome habit. An identification book for wildflowers and insect labels and mounting boxes to display our specimens.
Economic need: Nearly all students from low‑income households.
Location: Hancock High School, Kiln, Mississippi
Total: $271.72
Still Needed: $271.72 $88.19
Teacher’s Comments from Mrs. Swilley:
My Students: My students live in an area of the highest poverty. Many come from single-parent families and some are even helping to raise their own siblings. More than 70% of the students at our school receive free or reduced-price lunch. A lot of times students are unable to buy their own school supplies.
Our students are smart and willing to learn, but because they lack resources, it is not always easy for them to focus just on learning.
I encourage hands-on projects because the students don't always realize they are learning if they are having fun! I always encourage them to have the "I can" attitude and not to let anything stand in the way of their success.
My Project: My students are very inquisitive when it comes to the Carnivorous plants! We will use the tank and soil to create a biome with the carnivorous plants. We will plant and watch the growing process while studying the habit of a biome. The wildflower book will be used to identify other specimens that may live in our biome. The insect labels will be used along with the display boxes to present our pollinator specimens.
Our classroom will come alive with our hungry eating plants!
The students will learn how to plant and care for these special plants and see how they contribute to the biome.
Donations of ANY size can make a BIG difference!
Here’s a five-minute overview of carnivorous plants…
… and here’s more detail for those who have 11 minutes of interest.
Okay, okay, here it is. The great Levi Stubbs, of the Four Tops, as the world’s most famous carnivorous plant:
Our main project from last week was completed, even after exhausting the matching funds, with the help of our readers.
Project #1, A Classroom Full of Video Game Designers and Animators!: Mr. Lang teaches STEM classes to the 1st and 2nd grades in his Alabama school. He needed a product that makes it possible for very young children to design and create video games.
He writes: I can not express my gratitude enough in your contributions to this project. I was cautiously optimistic when posting this project, as it was more than other projects in the past. However, your generosity has made it so that these children will have resources that will ignite a spark in them that wasn't there before. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.
DonorsChoose has developed a new designation for schools that submit projects. Equity Focus Schools meet two criteria: at least 50% of students are Black, Latinx, Native American, Pacific Islander, or multiracial, and at least 50% of students qualify for free or reduced price lunch, the standard measure for school economic need. You can read more at the link about their efforts to address the longstanding inequity in education. |
Founded in 2009, The Inoculation Project combats the anti-science push in conservative America by funding science and math projects in red-state classrooms and libraries. Our conduit is DonorsChoose, a crowdfunding charity founded in 2000 and highly rated by both Charity Navigator and the Better Business Bureau.
Every Sunday, we focus on helping to fund science or math projects, preferably in neighborhood public schools where the overwhelming majority of students come from low-income households. We welcome everyone who supports public school education — no money is required!
Finally, here’s our list of successfully funded projects — our series total is 941! The success-list diary also contains links and additional information about DonorsChoose.