Making a scaled map of Lake Titicaca Math, Social Studies individual Provide students with rulers and graph paper. Print the map of Lake Titicaca on transparency paper and project onto a screen or white wall. Ask that students reproduce the map of Lake Titicaca on their own graph paper. Making a Lake Titicaca jigsaw puzzle Social Studies individual, pair, small group Give students maps of Lake Titicaca (a copy of one of their scaled maps would be a perfect use for their work). Ask them to glue them onto strong backing paper or thin cardboard. Give students a template for a jigsaw puzzle or ask students to procure their own. The jigsaw pieces may be small, or medium size, or big: it is important that not all jigsaws use the same maps nor the same cutting templates. Ask students to transfer their template onto their map and cut them into pieces. Cutting must be careful and as precise as possible to make each game unique, interesting and challenging. When all pieces are cut, ask students to place all the pieces of their game in a storage plastic bag and mix them up. Collect the bags. Form groups of two or three students, and hand each group a bag of cut pieces. Give students a set time to complete the jigsaw. The group that finishes their map first wins. Keep complete sets of jigsaws for future fun breaks featuring Lake Titicaca. Playing a Lake Titicaca bingo game Language Arts, Social Studies individual, small group Use the Bingo template to create your own game or print out the bingo cards. Give each student (or group of students) a bingo card and beans. Call out the Spanish words or expressions that you draw from a bag. You may want to get a student to draw the words. The first student (or group of students) to shout “bingo” wins. Making a Lake Titicaca board game Language Arts, Arts/PE/Music small group This activity can be started at the beginning of the unit, and students may be collecting pieces of information to add to the game as the unit unfolds. The games can be played at the end of the unit as an evaluation of children’s learning. Let students form groups of three or four, and let them brainstorm the kind of game they want to create. Students should first submit a contract to you detailing the type of game, the role of each participant and the principles of the game.  Following the contract, have students create the game within the following 2 weeks. The types of games students may be interested in creating can be modeled after ‘Pictionary’ type games, Trivial Pursuit type games, Clue type games, etc. Set aside one class period to play the games. Let students play and switch games, keeping a 5 to 10 minute period for the collegial evaluation of all the games. Students will collegially evaluate the games using the rubric and their critical judgment; the students whose game is being evaluated are not to participate in the evaluation. Deciphering Lake Titicaca anagrams Language Arts individual Give a worksheet to each student. Ask them to place the letters in the right order to form Lake Titicaca-related words. Mapping out all the lakes of Latin America Social Studies, Math individual, class Enlarge a blank map of Latin America to three times its size. Give one to each student. Ask students to label each Latin American country and to research each country for their lakes. Ask students to draw as accurately as possible (in terms of proportions) the different lakes they are able to find for each country/region, and to label them with their Spanish names. Collect and hang on the wall for the duration of the unit on Lake Titicaca Comparing Lake Titicaca and Lake Maracaibo Social Studies individual, small group, class Send students to the library to research both lakes. Ask them to take detailed notes. Once students are back in the classroom, ask students to volunteer information. Use a Venn diagram to find out similarities and differences between the two bodies of water Researching the Uros people Social Studies, Language Arts individual, small group Brainstorm with students who they believe the Uros people are: where they live, what could be their relationship with the lake and its environment, etc. Send them to the library to research the Uros people and their culture, and find specific information: Their mode of living (where, how) Their customs Their relationship to the lake Their relationship to the surrounding villages and villagers Their trade Ask students to write a three-page paper on the Uros, organizing all the information they have gathered. Writing creatively about a day in the life of an Uros person Language Arts, Social Studies individual Once students have researched the Uros people, assign the following creative writing assignment: A day in the life of an Uros person. Instructions: Students must write from the point of view of an Uros person, i.e. through the eyes of an Uros person. The narration is to be written in the “I” person, e.g. “I get up in the morning…”. Students can choose to narrate the day of a male or female, young or older person, etc. The paper is to be no less than 2 pages long and no more than 5 pages long. Writing creatively about the “discovery” of Lake Titicaca Language Arts, Social Studies individual Brainstorm with students what it means to “discover” a land. Raise their awareness about the fact that discoveries usually happened and were related through the explorers’ eyes and languages, for the purposes of expansion and appropriation of riches. Explain that the “discovered” places and societies had a history and a civilization of their own, and that the Uros people were able to preserve theirs. Brainstorm with students what it must be like to have a striving society and be “discovered”. Assign to students 2 creative writing papers from opposite points of view: The first paper is to be written from the point of view of the explorers, who come across Lake Titicaca. The paper is to convey the awe of the explorer and their feelings toward the region and its inhabitants. The second paper is to be written from the point of view of the Uros people, who see the explorers come into their world. It is to convey the feelings the Uros people might have had toward the invaders. Each paper is to be no less than 2 pages long and no more than 5 pages long. Writing a diary about the “discovery” of Lake Titicaca Language Arts, Social Studies individual, pair Students are to imagine that they are the first ones to come to the shores of Lake Titicaca, and to write a series of diary entries (require that these be typed) relating their experiences as explorers. Ask them to imagine what they could have seen and discovered of the lake, its fauna, flora, and its original inhabitants, the Uros. They are to report on their feelings, impressions, and perceptions of their “discovery” of Lake Titicaca. After a cycle of peer reviewing/editing and rewriting, evaluate the papers and include them into students’ folders. Presenting Lake Titicaca’s ancient civilization Social Studies, Language Arts small group Assign this activity as a research project. Give students about three to four weeks to complete the project. Students may work in teams in order to gather information and prepare their presentation. Students are to produce a 5 to 10-minute PowerPoint presentation about the ancient civilization. Students are to find an innovative angle to present the information: they may pretend they are archeologists discovering the ruins, they may pretend they are people from the ancient civilization, an animal from the lake, etc. The presentation is to be original as well as accurate in the information it gives. Making a Uros boat Art/PE/Music, Science, Social Studies individual, pair, small group Show students pictures of the Uros boats and have them read about the significance of the boats and the craftsmanship that is involved. If available, procure real straw. If unavailable, use plastic drinking straws. Assign as a project the making of a Uros boat. Wax painting Lake Titicaca (a Uro person/boat/house/ruins) Art/PE/Music, Social Studies individual Have students pencil draw a scene from Lake Titicaca with objects/people in the foreground, middle distance and background. Students will apply one layer of a particular color over the entire drawing. This color will be the background color. After the first layer of color has dried, they will cover with a wax crayon the areas of the drawing that will remain this background color. They will then apply a layer of another color over the whole drawing, let it dry, and wax the area that will remain the second color. Students will repeat the application of a color, drying, and application of wax to areas of the drawing until objects/people in the foreground are of the desired color and the painting is finished. Making a Lake Titicaca tourist brochure Art/PE/Music, Social Studies pair, small groups Brainstorm with students what usually goes into a 3-fold tourist brochure. Show some examples of design and content. Let students form groups of 2 to 4 people and ask them to brainstorm ideas for a Lake Titicaca tourist brochure. Send groups to the library to gather information. Each student in a group must have an area to research and that student is responsible for that information. When the class reconvenes, ask each group to edit the information and to design the brochure. If technology is available, the brochure should word-processed and pictures should be added. If technology is not available, students can draw and decorate their handwritten brochure. Collect and display the brochures. They can be used for a tourism fair and/or scanned to be included onto the class website and students’ individual folders. Researching Lake Titicaca’s ecosystem Science, Social Studies small groups, individual Lake Titicaca is an ecosystem. As such, it provides for the animals, plants and humans who live from it; reciprocally, it depends on the same animals, plants and humans to survive and conserve its equilibrium. Assign this activity to groups of students to find out what an ecosystem is and what is involved in maintaining an ecosystem; ask them to focus particularly on Lake Titicaca. Assign one or two aspects of an ecosystem to each student to research. They are to become experts in them. These aspects may be, among others: Marine life Land animals The Uros people The impact of modern civilization Fishing and preying Photosynthesis Climate and lake Rivers and lake Environmental policies The day the reports are due, students with the same questions are to gather and exchange information, completing their report. Students are also to decide who is responsible for the oral presentation of what material. Original reports and completed reports will be submitted for accountability.  Allow 10 to 15 minutes for this exchange of information. For the rest of the period, students will orally present their information to the class. Students not presenting are to take notes. Notes will be turned in at the end of the period for accountability. All student work will be scanned or physically included into the students’ individual folders. Creating a Lake Titicaca’s fauna and flora virtual book Science, Art/PE/Music individual Gather all the information that students have found about animals and plants living from and for Lake Titicaca. Assign one plant/animal per student. Ask that students illustrate (drawing, painting, computer morphing, etc.) their plant and animal, one per page. On the same page they need to synthesize and organize the textual information on their animal and plant. Collect all art work, scan it in its entirety to include into the students’ virtual folders on Lake Titicaca. Writing a letter to the Peruvian and/or Bolivian Embassies and Chambers of Commerce Language Arts, Social Studies class, individual As a class, brainstorm questions and requests for the embassies. The questions may concern further information about the Lake, its ecosystem, the countries’ environmental policies, the Uros people, etc. The requests may be about brochures, posters, educational resources, etc. Write one letter as a class or let individual students send personal letters. The student who receives the most information/resources wins a prize. Budgeting a trip to Lake Titicaca Math, Social Studies small group Allow students to form groups of 2 or 3. Give the following scenario to each group: You have $1,000 per person to spend one week in Lake Titicaca. Prepare a budget sheet for your trip. You will travel all around Lake Titicaca. Research online the cost of transportation to, from and around Lake Titicaca, food for one week, accommodations, etc. Keep a record of web addresses and expenses. As a class, have each group give a short presentation of their trip and of their expenses. Have the class vote on the best presentation, the best trip and the cheapest trip Writing an advocacy paper for the Uros people [Language Arts, Social Studies individual, pair After students have extensively researched the Uros people and received information from the Peruvian and Bolivian Embassies, ask students to become a “lawyer” and advocate for the Uros people. Each student is to write an argumentative paper taking into account the current policies in Bolivia and Peru as well as the social, economic, political situation and living conditions of the Uros people. Have students submit their papers to the peer-reviewing process before turning it to you. Peer-reviewing suggestions are to accompany the revised version of students’ papers. Publishing the Lake Titicaca (class) newspaper Language Arts, Science, Social Studies, math, Art/PE/Music class, small groups Toward the end of the unit, ask for volunteers to put together the Lake Titicaca newspaper. You will need students to staff the reporting team, editorial team and publishing team. Brainstorm as a class what sections of traditional newspapers you would want to have included into your class newspaper. These sections include an editorial, sports, horoscope, news, classified, travel, people, arts, weather, etc. Short and long articles will be needed, as well as in-depth coverage and other facts and figures. Assign tasks or let students select the tasks they want to be in charge of. The reporting team will have the responsibility of finding the information and writing it up. The editorial team will be in charge of verifying the accuracy of the information presented, selecting/rejecting articles and making content and form corrections. The publishing team will be concerned with organizing the articles into the newspaper sections and actually publish it. Your role will be that of guide and counsel. Print copies of the newspaper and distribute throughout the school. Each student should also get a copy to take home and another one should be included into students’ individual folders. Working out Lake Titicaca’s  math word problems Math, Science individual If 1 river flows into Lake Titicaca at 6 miles per hour and adds 8 million gallons of water to the Lake in one hour: How many gallons will flow in, in one day? How many liters? How many gallons will flow in, in three days? How many liters? How many gallons will flow in, in one week? How many liters? How many gallons will flow in, in one year? How many liters? If 25 rivers flow into Lake Titicaca at 7 miles per hour and empty 120 million gallons of water to the Lake in one hour: How many gallons will flow in, in one day? How many liters? How many gallons will flow in, in three days? How many liters? How many gallons will flow in, in one week? How many liters? How many gallons will flow in, in one year? How many liters? If the Ramis River drains Lake Titicaca at 4 miles per hour and carries away 48 million gallons of water in one hour: How many gallons will drain in one day? How many liters? How many gallons will drain in three days? How many liters? How many gallons will drain in one week? How many liters? How many gallons will drain in one year? How many liters? Each summer 20 million gallons of water evaporate form Lake Titicaca. If summer is three months long: How many gallons of water will have evaporated in one summer month? How many liters?  How many gallons of water will have evaporated in one summer day? How many liters? What is the difference between the evaporation at the end of one summer week and six summer weeks? In gallons and in liters? Create a Lake Titicaca’s obstacle course Art/PE/Math, Social Studies individual Delineate the periphery of Lake Titicaca on the grounds. You may choose to make this a class activity in itself by asking students to make use of their map scaling to create a proportionally accurate outline of the Lake. Use the students’ creativity to represent all the important landmarks in and around the Lake as obstacles of sort. Examples include: Using labeled hurdles to represent each town around the Lake; students must jump over them. Using rubber tires to represent the islands; students could zigzag around the tires. Having to go from the islands in the middle of the Lake (the tire area) to the Lake’s shores (periphery) by kneeling on a wheeled plank and propelling themselves on the strength of their upper bodies with their hands; Etc. This obstacle course can be timed, can be a relay course, etc.