"It Costs What?" Projects

We have been working on our "It Costs What?" projects today and on Tuesday. Yesterday the 4th years went on a field trip to the NC Museum of Life and Science to see the RACE Exhibit. Check out their website about the exhibit at NCMLS.org. The exhibit looks at race from cultural and scientific viewpoints.
The "It Costs What?" project is looking at an everyday object like a tee shirt and tracing its path from natural resources to finished product that we buy in a store. Along the way different resources are used and pollution is created, these are the hidden costs of the product. Students are working individually and in pairs to research their products and then will create a poster of their findings. Here is the project outline and rubric.  Last Monday we did a values line up called "Where do you stand?" in which I read a statement and then we lined up according to how strongly we agreed or disagreed with the statement. This sparked some good discussions. Here are the questions, we had time for 4-5 of them. We finished that day listening to a radio program from the show "Marketplace" from American Public Media about a "Well traveled Breakfast." The author traces the sources of the foods that his family eats on a typical morning. You can listen to the story and read about it here: Marketplace, A Well Traveled Breakfast.