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A Collaborative Video Conference Project for Grades 4-6
=**Project Dates**: March 28, 29, 30= = = =**To Register**: **@http://tinyurl.com/MarchMadLib**= = = =**Registration Deadline**: March 16=

Please use the agenda and resources below to help you through this project:

1. Separate your students into groups of 4-6
 * PRE-CONFERENCE**:

2. Have each group collaboratively write a short story about one of the following topics: - Basketball (or any sport) - School - A brand new superhero - Directions to their favorite game - A book review - Or use an existing piece of writing, a fairy tale, etc...

3. Then each group removes **up to 7 words** from their stories and replaces them with blanks. List the parts of speech they will ask the partner class to provide on another piece of paper.

They will need to know if each word is a: - (Common) Noun; Plural Noun; Proper Noun - Verb; Verb ending in -ing or -ed... - Adjective - Adverb - Interjection

[In the game, Mad Libs, they ask for other types of words to fill in the blank (i.e., Location, Person in Room, etc...). Communicate with your partner teacher to determine which parts of speech the students should be sure to include in their Mad Libs.]

4. Practice the Mad Libs with other groups in your class first, to see if they make sense.

1. **5 Minutes**: give students time to introduce themselves
 * VIDEO CONFERENCE CONNECTION with partner class:**

2. **5 Minutes per Group**: each group asks for the parts of speech missing in the stories; and then they read the story with the words offered by the partnering class (**approx. 40 minutes total**)

Before the connection: - Choose who will ask for parts of speech (group members can take turns) - Choose who will write down responses - Choose who will read the Mad Lib (group members can take turns reading parts of it)

3. **5 - 10 Minutes**: debrief about this project - What did you like about the project? - What could we do next time to make it better, or go more smoothly? - How did your groups collaborate while doing the writing for this project? - What did you learn?


 * RESOURCES**: check out the resources below for help

Fables, Fairy Tales, Stories & Nursery Rhymes - use this site for ideas, or to have students remove words from the stories

Parts of Speech Game - use this to practice parts of speech before having students write and choose the words to make blanks in their stories

Play Mad Libs with your students so they understand the concept of the game: media type="custom" key="8138196"


 * Things to communicate with your collaborative partner teacher**:

1. If you want to keep your connection short:

- You could work as a class on one or 2 Mad Libs to share with the other class and decide who will ask for missing words.

- You could have a collaborative document set up online where students list the missing parts of speech for the other class to fill in: http://www.typewith.me/ (then the groups will only need to read their Mad Libs during the connection)

2. Decide which parts of speech you will use, so that both classes know what they are and can give examples.

Project developed by Cheryl Tice, GST BOCES