George’s Cosmic Treasure Hunt Interdisciplinary Project
Overlook Middle School sixth-grade teachers and Tony Gleason and Kristi DiSalle submitted a proposal to the Foundation for a project called George’s Cosmic Treasure Hunt, an interdisciplinary project including language arts and science. Their goal in applying for this grant is to purchase a copy of Stephen Hawking’s children’s book George’s Cosmic Treasure Hunt for each sixth-grade student on Team Blue. Students will complete research on our solar system in Science class. They will be using a nonfiction source (their textbooks) to conduct research on each planet in our solar system. While this research is being conducted in science class, students will be reading George’s Cosmic Treasure Hunt, a hunt that takes place on various planets in our solar system, in English class. This book is a realistic fiction story with all of the story elements for a fiction book, yet it includes a plethora of factual information on many objects in our solar system.
There are many benefits to students by purchasing this book and conducting the interdisciplinary project. This project meets Massachusetts State Curriculum Frameworks for both Science and English. Stephen Hawking, regarded as one of the most brilliant theoretical physicists since Albert Einstein, wrote George’s Cosmic Treasure Hunt. Students will experience an interdisciplinary approach to learning. Finally, and perhaps the best benefit to the students is that students get to learn factual cosmic information while reading a fun story George’s Cosmic Treasure Hunt.
Grant Year: 2009-2010
Grant Recipients: Kristi DiSalle, Tony Gleason
Receiving Schools: Overlook Middle School