Category Archives: cross curricular

Saving The World

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 “So many climate and health calamities are colliding at once. It’s not just the pandemic that keeps people inside. It’s poor air quality,” Biden said of one of the many effects of climate change. “Folks, we’re in a crisis. Just like we need a unified national response to covid-19, we need a unified national response to climate change.” (Washington Post)

Now that our government is on board, what better time to begin a school wide capstone project focused on saving the world?

For the past several years my capstone project in Economics has been “Saving The World.” Economics, specifically consumer capitalism, has been destroying the world since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. Humans have the ability to make endless amounts of stuff. For example, last year humans made 23 billion pairs of shoes. That’s three pairs of shoes for every living human on earth. Who needs three new pairs of shoes every year? This is just one example of how our insatiable desire for stuff is gobbling up all the resources our earth has to offer.

Another example of how rich a saving the world topic can be; a group of my students decided that moving to electric cars would greatly reduce the amount of air pollution. But then they began looking into how much energy it takes to make batteries, and the environmental cost of making batteries. It also takes quite a bit of energy and raw materials to make any car. Are electric cars really that much better? Maybe people should use fewer cars. Mass transportation is a possible solution. So is working at home instead of going to the office. Students were spinning off with ideas in all directions. One student even presented a report on the possibility of piezoelectric cars. Where did that come from? It’s real. Experiments are being done. Look it up.

More and more my students tell me they are studying similar topics in science classes, in religion classes in HPERD classes and in English classes. I don’t know about math class, but there are plenty of numbers to crunch in finding ways to save the world. So, why don’t we all get together and make saving the world our CHS capstone project?

Every department at CHS can find a way to get students seriously involved in saving the world projects. Students are really into it. They have been for years. To quote one student, “It’s totally drip.” And saving the world is a real thing. Our president elect said it is real. We know that presidents always tell us the truth. So it must be a real thing. Maybe we should save that last idea about truthful presidents for a different blog. But, about saving the world, what do you think? It’s going to be a problem of survival for future generations. What could be more important than the survival of future generations?


Cross-Curricular Projects: How??

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I always want to show the students how math is connected to other subjects and the real world.  Frankly, one of my big dreams for our math program is not to get more girls to calculus (but YAY! if that happens).  Rather my dream is that it starts to blow up the idea of “time” and “school day” enough that we can start to incorporate cross-curricular time in the day.  How cool would it be if instead of teaching dimensional analysis in physics and again in algebra, we taught it concurrently in the context of a bigger problem?  But how do we inch towards this?

This year I have tried two cross-curricular projects:

  1. Math (Financial Algebra) + College and Career: Ginger helped me design a unit about the realities of paying for college.  She taught the introductory lessons (on block periods) and popped in as I continued this mini unit through the following week.  The feedback was very positive and many thought that all of their junior classmates should have access to this unit too.
  2. Math (Algebra Readiness) + Religion: Adam and I got our classes together in the Innovation Center to explore examples of the Fibonacci Sequence in nature and discuss the implications.  Is this mathematical pattern proof of a common creator?  This was really fun, but the feedback that I got from my freshmen students was that it was awkward to work with a different class of students (in this case a mixed-gender class of seniors), especially for just one class period.  My personal feedback is that the lesson we designed should’ve been spread out over a week or more — it was really dense.
Moving forward I have questions:
  1. What is the most logistically efficient way to do a unit/project with another teacher/department?  Working with Ginger was easier than with Adam (no offense Adam!) simply because she did not have a classroom full of students that were expected to collaborate with mine.  I know my colleagues all have prep periods (which would eliminate the concern of having to join classes) but that’s a big ask and I’m just not there yet.
  2. Does a cross-curricular course make more sense than a cross-curricular lesson or project?  Yes, if the only concern is finding overlapping time and a similar student population.  No, because creating a new course feels like a huge barrier to cross-curricular work.  Also, if we keep increasing our course offerings do they eventually get watered down?  
  3. Anyone want to try another cross-curricular project/unit with me?

Inspiring Woman–Barbie?

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As a child, my mom never bought me a Barbie Doll (or a Cabbage Patch Doll) however, I was gifted with several as birthday presents from other family members or friends.

It was what started me on my path to creating and sewing clothes. My mom wouldn’t buy me the store bought clothes for my dolls–it was too expensive and we didn’t have the money–so I started to make the clothes that I saw for Barbie in the stores or at my friend’s house. Later, as neighbors and cousins out grew their Barbies, my collection of dolls and clothes grew.

Which is why I was excited by a 2016 cover article from TIME Magazine about Mattel’s new looks for Barbie, (Mattel updated the Barbie line by introducing a new variety of body types, skin colors and hair. Basically they tried to follow what American Girl had been successfully doing–selling to the individual.) I decided that this needed to be part of the discussion in my Costume & Fashion Class.

So at the end of Unit 1 I have my students read the TIME article and respond to questions (to me and to each other) on Schoology and then then ask my students to create their own Barbie doll.

You will create a your own personal Barbie. (Think “Build a Bear”–only its a Barbie) This will be an original design but can be influenced by contemporary or historical images.  
The design must include:

    • Name–give her a name
    • full-figure sketches of your doll.
    • Images of clothing–2 complete outfits
    • Accessories or other items she needs (for a job, sport, activity).
This year, I have updated my assignment to go along with what most of the girls are doing in English 2 (I teach mostly sophs with a few seniors). Currently the English 2 students are researching and writing about issues important to women. (ie: “pink tax” or female inmates) So while I still have my students the read and respond to the TIME magazine article, I wanted it more updated for today. Then I found out that for Barbie’s 60th Anniversary Mattel has introduced the Barbie Inspiring Women line (currently available & story behind their idea). So this year my students will design for this line.
You will create/design a Barbie for Mattel that would fit into their Inspiring Woman line. (Visit Mattel’s website to see & read more about it)
The design must include
    • Name–Who is she? (Should be based on a real person)
    • Story–Why should she be included in the “Inspiring Women” collection? (4-6 sentences)
    • Full-figure sketches* of your doll:
    • She needs 2 outfits with at least 1 accessory for each outfit. 
    • Include 2-3 reference images of your real-life inspiring woman.
*You can hand draw/color images and then take a photo to include on the page with your other images. I will not be judging the quality of your drawing, but looking at the ideas you are expressing and how you are representing the woman you have chosen.
After everyone has presented their ideas to the class we will vote and decide if we want to let Mattel know who we think should be included in their Inspiring Woman line.
So far, the students are really excited about designing their Barbies–maybe a little too excited, since they want to jump right to designing and drawing and not read the article, but we will get there. 
(Stay tuned–I will post images once all the students have submitted their designs.)

Millennials don’t know about Holocaust, according to survey

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April 12th was Holocaust Remembrance Day. Sadly, people are
forgetting about it. See the sobering NY Times article
linked here.
We are so blessed to host a survivor here at
Carondelet Friday, April 20th, during 5th and 6th periods, in the Garaventa. The
number of living Holocaust survivors dwindles as the years go on. As
the article states, “Holocaust remembrance
advocates and educators, who agree that no book, film or traditional exhibition
can compare to the voice of a survivor, dread the day when none are left to
tell their stories.”
Our guest, Hana Berger Moran, is
in her 70s and was born in a concentration camp. She will be here to tell her
and her mother’s story, as chronicled in the recent book, Born
Survivors by Wendy Holden.



Our freshmen learn about the Holocaust in their history
curriculum, and the English department teaches it with the classic graphic
novel Maus by Art Spiegelman. Church History classes also
address the Holocaust. Thank goodness our school continues to educate youth
about the horrific events of the Holocaust. The Catholic faith is immeasurably
linked to the Jewish people. Let us never forget.

Thank you for supporting this important event. I know that
losing instruction time gets tricky. I welcome all of you to attend along with
our freshmen, if you can make it. Please
join us even if you can’t stay the whole time. 
Particulars: Hana will start at 12:30 and continue through the
end of 6th period. Fifth period teachers of frosh: please take attendance
before escorting (or sending) girls to the Garaventa Center. Sixth period
teachers of frosh: The girls won’t be checking in that day. Students have been
given Teacher Notification forms for you to sign.

The Fibonacci Sequence = Math + Religion

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An Introduction to the Beauty of the Fibonacci Sequence

Recently we’ve been talking a lot about cross-curricular projects and classes: math + science, English + history, religion + history, etc.  What about math and religion?  Where is the intersection?

Last year, a colleague shared a video with me called “The Fingerprint of God”.  In the video the narrator shows many examples of the Fibonacci Sequence (and spiral) in nature, including spirals in nautilus shells matching the spiral curve of a wave matching the spiral curve of our galaxy, and comments that this spiral is like a fingerprint of a common creator.  It blew my mind when I first watched it.  God does math?  Math came from God?  How does this all work?

The Fingerprint of God Video

I desperately wanted my students to have that same enlightening moment so I tried to design a project/activity that would allow them to have that experience.  I asked Adam Chaffey to help me and together we planned our Fingerprint of God activity which spanned the Monday and Tuesday before Thanksgiving break.  The girls were definitely confused when I told them we would be doing a religion + math hybrid activity, but getting to “break the silos” and show them that math and religion can work together was exciting.  On the first day, I showed the girls the Fibonacci Sequence (my students had already “discovered” this earlier in the year) and some examples of the sequence and spiral in nature before sending them out to find examples of their own.  On the second day, Adam showed the Fingerprint of God video and we discussed how seeing this “fingerprint” affected our faith.  Finally, the students were tasked to create a song/video tying together all that we had talked about over the last two days.  (I’ve attached a couple below)


Things I have to figure out how to improve for next time: 

  1. Make it a more discovery-based project instead of a discussion-based project.  I think I was so excited about sharing this with the students that I front-loaded this activity too much.  The discussions were good, but it felt anti-climatic.  There didn’t seem to be any “ah-ha!” moments.  The students did everything we asked of them, but didn’t really figure anything out on their own.  How can I guide them without giving them too much?
  2. Figure out how to collaborate with another class/teacher more smoothly.  I know this was made more difficult by the fact that I have the same group of students 1st and 2nd period, but the logistics of collaborating with a two religion classes was a real challenge.  Adam and I both had girls that were in both of our classes in different periods and therefore ended up hearing the same information and doing the same activity multiple times–not ideal.

…any ideas?

Student Submissions:

…thanks for your help Adam!

Genre–What?: Creating a more Student-Centered Library

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Our Library has gone through several transformations since the January.

First, the Fiction was broken out into 10 subject-based genres. These topics were decided on based on student request of books for their outside reading in English.

Genre Fiction: Realistic (orange) & Made Me Cry (blue)

Genre Fiction: Touch of Magic & Historical

Now fiction books are sorted into Faith, Mystery/Suspense, Horror/Thriller, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Touch of Magic, Romance/Relationships, Historical, Literary Classics, Realistic & AWW/Made me Cry.

Second, the library physical space was reorganized. Eliminating the rows of computers and adding more chairs to the existing tables encouraging more student interactions.

Third, new furniture was ordered and finally arrived (this week!). The taller bistro/cafe tables are a big hit in the library and the perfect height for helping students with their work.

Finally, the books are moving again as we begin to make cross-curricular and interdisciplinary connections between non-fiction and fiction topics. One example is in 940.53 (World War II) memoirs and first-person accounts of the Holocaust, Japanese Interment or life as a solider are paired with novels on the same topics. This necessitated adding new stickers to the books so our students could clearly determine if the book they picked up is non-fiction or fiction.

Soon additional sections that will appear in the non-fiction are Books based on Shakespeare and Serious/Terminal illnesses (think John Greene’s The Fault in Our Stars).

Chaos in the Library

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This week we have been having Frosh English classes into the library for a short library orientation and to choose their outside reading book.

During third period on Wednesday, as the students swarmed the stacks,  I became overwhelmed with answering questions and checking out books. Mary Beth Dittrich who was working at a table during her prep started to help students locate books and answer questions.

Thanks to her several students found the books they wanted and also had an interesting conversation along the way.

In the end, over 50 books were checked out to students for their outside reading enjoyment and our shelves have more space. Which the interns like–it is easier to re-shelve the books.

First cross-curricular activity: Making a pinhole eclipse viewer in French!

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Last Friday in my French 3 Honors’ class we constructed our own pinhole eclipse viewer in preparation for today’s eclipse.  To make our first cross-curricular activity relevant to our French class, I provided students with step by step instructions in French and basic vocabulary around the phenomena.  After reading the instructions in groups and checking for understanding, students traced, cut, glued and assembled their viewer out of a cereal box en français. 
It was a fun experience for the students to figure out instructions in French, make their viewer, and share with classmates this special moment.
As for me, I am looking forward to incorporating cross-curricular activities in my units!
Nadine