What is a Hero?- Our CBL Big Idea

This year in the Oneco's Gifted Laboratory have been exploring what it takes to be a hero/ heroine. From the very beginning, I felt that was important that we all have a clear definition of what qualities it takes to make a hero/heroine. 

Our first step this exploration began by pulling out heroes/heroines form a variety of different genres of literature. Students identified and recorded text evidence for the different character traits of each hero/heroine using a Frayer Model.  This graphic organizer is commonly used to define words and concepts. Our Frayer Model was divided into to four sections and served as a visual representation for students for what the character: looks like, thinks, says and does. This first step was done so that we could both get to know our character and compare and contrast the information later. 

  After, we have had time to read about several different heroes/heroines we will go back through our Frayer Models using the evidence recorded to  compare and contrast these traits and generate a master list of common hero attributes. Next we created a T-Chart with our master list of the common attributes on the right and room for text evidence on the left.

  After some practice with this graphic organizer with several more books students were asked to write and prove someone to be a hero or not. 

This hero study has brought about many wonderful discussions in our laboratory this year. It has also severed as the Big Idea of our Challenge Based Learning (CBL) Challenges, which is being heroes/heroines on Oneco’s Campus.