American teachers told children about "Japanese nuclear sewage", and I couldn't believe it

Source: Hanhanusa in the United States (ID: hanhanusa)

01

Yesterday my daughter brought back a few homework sheets from school.

When I opened it, a line of headlines came into view—"My News Analysis," and then a few large round boxes.

"What kind of homework is this?" , I'm a little curious.

"Write a news analysis", my daughter surprised me as soon as she spoke, but even more surprising was still to come.

Their teacher said that "Japanese nuclear sewage" has caused a lot of controversy recently, and there are different views, and she asked the children to go back and do a research, read some news, and then analyze the "Japanese nuclear sewage discharge" and give their own conclusions.

What?

6-year-old, to analyze Japanese nuclear sewage?

Still writing news analysis?

Isn't this a little too deep?

At that moment I was a little overwhelmed.

However, since it was the teacher's homework, I still forced myself to take the child to prepare.

02

I gave her Google News first, and we read more professional news reports, from NPR, a news website in the United States.

The reason for choosing NPR News is that its content is relatively rigorous and objective, and the articles in it are often selected by English tests such as Cambridge and TOEFL.

For example, this year's college entrance examination English test "wisdom of the crowd", the article came from NPR news reports.

Therefore, finding news to read to children in NPR is good for improving her reading comprehension and expanding her worldview.

NPR has published several articles on this matter.

Some are about the causes and consequences of the nuclear sewage incident in Japan:

Some talk about people's concerns about the discharge of nuclear sewage into the sea.

Some are talking about scientists' doubts about this matter.

While reading to my children, I suddenly noticed that there would be two voices in the text.

One voice is that the Japanese government's claim that nuclear effluent is not harmful to the ocean.

Another voice is the questioning and condemnation of this move by Japanese fishermen, neighboring countries, and many scientists around the world.

Because there are two points of view, I think this presents a big challenge for children.

What point of view should she choose and what kind of analysis should she make?

I'm curious too.

03

In order for her to build her own logical analysis framework, I found some extended reading materials to take with my children.

We read "A Brief History of the Earth" published by People's Literature Publishing.

First read about the impact of marine pollution on the planet.

This is a serious oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, and the oil has been leaked into the ocean, causing serious ecological damage.

(The article is from the book "New Generation 4" in "A Brief History of the Earth")

Then we talked about the leakage accident at the Fukushima nuclear power plant in Japan, which is also the source of nuclear sewage today.

(The article is from the book "New Generation 4" in "A Brief History of the Earth")

After that, I also read about radioactive elements and the damage caused by nuclear contamination to human DNA.

(The article is from the book "New Generation 4" in "A Brief History of the Earth")

Finally, I also read about the flow of global ocean currents, the discharge of nuclear sewage into the sea, and will drift with the ocean currents to every corner of the world.

(The article is from the book "Mesozoic 2" in "A Brief History of the Earth")

After talking for half an hour, my daughter suddenly felt very sad.

"Dad, won't we be able to eat sushi, fish and lobster in the future?" I like it the most", she cried as she spoke.

I can only comfort her, saying that the food I am eating now is not salvaged from the Sea of Japan, and the pollution has not drifted to us for the time being, rest assured...

After she calmed down a little, I asked my daughter, "Do you think it is right for Japan to discharge nuclear sewage into the sea?" ”

"No, it will hurt the animals in the sea and harm the earth!" , the daughter gave the answer categorically.

I am very pleased with the child's logical analysis.

I didn't give her an answer the whole time, and there were two different voices in the news outside.

But through this extended reading, children can analyze and generalize, so as to draw conclusions and make their own choices between two different voices.

This is the critical thinking ability I always want to cultivate in my children!

04

Now that I have the conclusion, I will take the child to complete the teacher's homework and write the news report.

This is actually a sublimation from "thinking" to "writing", and children must write out the ideas in their heads in order to precipitate into their own things.

And this news writing is divided into two parts.

01

The first part is the statement of events

Telling the whole incident is a bit complicated, and it is more difficult for children to write, so how can you help children clarify the organization of things?

There is a classic writing technique called the "5W1H rule".

Just like in this table for children:

It has 6 circles, which are Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How.

The initials of these words together are "5W1H", so we call it the "5W1H rule".

Here's what your child does:

This framework actually guides children step by step to do analysis.

For example, the four parts of Who, When, Where, and What are the four parts that let the child talk about when, where, who and what was done?

Then the child in this part can talk about the incident of Japan discharging nuclear sewage in Fukushima.

The How and Why in the back is a sublimation, how do the Japanese do it to discharge nuclear sewage? Why do you want to do this?

This is what makes children think, because "it is the cheapest to discharge nuclear sewage into the sea", this is the conclusion that children come to after reading so much information.

02

The second part is analysis and summary

In order to help children clarify their thinking, we still use the form of diagrams.

It's just that the chart looks like this:

It has 4 boxes: Summary, Facts, Opinions, and Vocabulary.

This is what the child finally accomplishes:

This framework is to guide children step by step to analyze and summarize, and finally extract their own views.

The first thing to look at is "Summary", which is "summary", which is to let the child summarize the ins and outs of the whole event.

For example, her daughter's "Japan's nuclear sewage pollutes the earth", this is her summary.

Then look at "Most Important Fact," which is the "fact," which is the basis for getting your child to write about your science.

For example, her daughter wrote that "nuclear weapons will cause great harm to marine life", which is the scientific fact she references.

Then look at "Personal Response," which is a "personal opinion," and it's asking your child to write down your thoughts on the matter.

For example, the child's writing "I am very sad because I can't eat fish and shrimp in the future", although it is very childish, but this is the real feeling of the whole nuclear pollution incident for a 6-year-old child.

Finally, look at "New Vocabularies I Learned", which is "newly learned vocabulary", which is to ask your child to write out which new words you learned along the way.

For example, the "nuclear" and "pollute" written by the child are her newly learned vocabulary, which is to help her accumulate words.

05

The above is the process of guiding children to write news articles.

The first is Reading

That is, read more and collect different points of view.

The second is Research

That is, do more research, conduct logical analysis, and come to your own conclusions.

Finally, there's Writing

That is, writing with a pen.

In writing, you can use the "5W1H rule" to sort out the context of events, and use the "circle chart" to summarize and summarize, so that you can write a good news analysis article, not only with a description of the facts, but also with your own opinions.

In this process, I think the biggest takeaway is:

The teacher and I did not give the child answers the whole time, but asked her to study and analyze from different points of view, and finally came to her own conclusions.

This is what we want to cultivate most for our children - the ability to think!

Dad, a Silicon Valley engineer dad, shares American education concepts and resources, focusing on English, mathematics, and science enlightenment, which will definitely open your brain! Original public name "Daddy in America" (ID: hanhanusa)