Extra! Extra! Titanic Sinks

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Students will gain a new perspective when they step back in time to create their very own newspaper page filled with facts about the sinking of the Titanic in 1912. Prior to the lessons in this unit, students will have spent 1-2 weeks reading, listening to, and discussing expository material on the Titanic. In this unit, they assume the roles of reporters, editors, and even survivors in order to put together a comprehensive front-page newspaper report that alerts the world to the disaster. Although these lessons focus on the Titanic tragedy, they can easily be adapted for use with other disasters or world events you may be teaching about in your classroom.

OBJECTIVE
Students will:

1. Retell the story of the Titanic by writing a concise summary article about the disaster
2. Write critical thinking questions about the disaster in order to conduct an interview
3. Listen and take notes during a live interview
4. Be able to answer five interview questions regarding the sinking with factual accounts
5. Compare and contrast different accounts of an event
6. Understand the cause-and-effect relationship that led to the sinking of the Titanic
7. Follow step-by step directions to put their article and interview into a front-page news format

LESSONS FOR THIS UNIT
Lesson 1: Summing Up the Disaster
Lesson 2: The Interview of a Lifetime
Lesson 3: Front Page News

REPRODUCIBLES
River Flow Chart (PDF)
Student Publishing Checklist (PDF)
Five Point Scoring Rubric (PDF)
Note to Students (PDF)
My Titanic Interview (PDF)
Passenger Ticket (PDF)
Sample of Newspaper Layout (PDF)

CULMINATING ACTIVITY

The culmination of this unit is the final display of all the newspapers in the school hallway. My students beam with pride as their hard work is showcased and each year former students stop by to admire the annual display of newspapers and comment on their memories of "Titanic." I realized a few years ago the positive impact these newspapers made when two students I had taught several years earlier told me they still had their papers hanging up in their rooms. There are few 3rd-grade projects that would still elicit pride from a middle-school student!

SUPPORTING BOOKS

Books for Teaching About the Titanic Disaster

ARTICLE	Mathematicians Through History Resources for learning about famous mathematicians, math pioneers, and math inventors, and their influence on history. Includes biographies, a chronology, and more.
LESSON PLAN	Dragonwings: Evaluate Chapters 10-12 Suggests a literary response exercise. Students independently read Dragon Wings and write a newspaper page that depicts events from the story.
ONLINE ACTIVITY	Olympics in Photos Follow the international sporting event in its modern form from its origins as a small competition in 1896 to the world-class headline maker of today.