This week, we’re helping an Austin elementary school class with a camera they can use to capture pictures in the school garden, and a Waukesha first grade with math learning aids. We hope that readers who support quality public school education will help by sharing or supporting our featured projects.
The Inoculation Project is an ongoing, volunteer effort to crowdfund science and math projects for red-state public schools in low-income neighborhoods. As always, our conduit is DonorsChoose.org, a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit corporation that facilitates tax-deductible donations to specific, vetted projects in public schools.
Many thanks to all the women who nurture children, as mothers, as other relatives of blood or choice, as teachers and caregivers, and as friends and neighbors. Our society devalues that work, and yet there’s not enough wealth in the world to pay for the love that goes into it. Bright blessings on this day!
We’re still working on this project from last week. It has matching funds available, for now, from the Johnson Ohana Foundation: The Johnson Ohana Foundation was founded by Kim and Jack Johnson to support environmental, art, and music education. As part of the Johnson Ohana Earth Day Match, qualifying environmental and/or earth day projects, including school garden requests, recycling & composting efforts, and plastic free & waste reduction initiatives will be funded. The Johnson Ohana Foundation believes strongly in fostering environmental stewardship and service learning opportunities in the classroom.
If you didn’t get a chance to watch the short video nomandates selected as an illustration for this project, I really recommend it!
PROJECT 1
Resources: Help me give my students a camera to capture all the colors of our school garden. "Nature is so powerful, so strong. Capturing its essence is not easy" Annie Leibovitz.
Economic need: Nearly all students from low‑income households
Location: Galindo Elementary School, Austin, Texas
Total: $548.71 (2x match offer)
Still Needed: $337.76 Completed! Thank you! Please see next project.
Teacher’s Comments from Ms. Merino Gomez:
My Students: There are 21 beautiful minds in my class. Most, if not all, belong to economically disadvantaged families.
They are very curious and they love to be outdoors.
They enjoyed doing a project for the Science Fair. We studied the Tropical Rain forest habitat. They have enjoyed learning about plants and animals, and they would like to learn more about the garden of our school and the monarch butterflies that are attracted to it.
Please, help us with your donation to get a camera and study about the growing plants and animals at our school.
My Project: My students are going to learn in the next weeks the life cycle of a plant and of animals. We just need a camera to capture these processes. We will use it mainly during Science lessons, when we will go to the garden and make photographs every day. I am planning to use technology to see the photos and print some of them to study the plants and animals that grow in our school garden.
The donation to this project will help my students understand nature processes in an authentic and meaningful way.
My goal is to teach Science in a creative way, engaging students in hands on activities. I want them to watch how the plants grow and how they attract insects and other animals. I also want to emphasize on the fact that plants and animals depend on each other to survive.
Finally, nature is associated with numerous benefits including better physical, mental, and emotional health. Your donation will help them connect nature and take care of it.
Donations of ANY size can make a BIG difference!
I really wanted to take up this project to help Wisconsin first-graders with math. I’m not calling it the “long term” project, because it doesn’t have that much still needed, thanks to a matching offer from Charles Schwab Foundation: Charles Schwab Foundation will double your impact when you make a donation to support teachers with the financial education they need to create innovative financial literacy projects in classrooms across America. Together, we can help kids everywhere achieve a brighter financial future!
PROJECT 2
Resources: Help me give my students essential math tools to explore with during math.
Economic need: More than half of students from low‑income households
Location: Hadfield Elementary School, Waukesha, Wisconsin
Total: $222.08 (2x match offer)
Still Needed: $222.08 Completed! Yay, thank you! See you next week!
Teacher’s Comments from Ms. Smith:
My Students: My students are sweet, funny, wonderful kiddos! They come from many different backgrounds, although the majority of my students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunches. Our school serves both of our city's homeless shelters, so for many of my students, school is the place they feel the safest. Yet, even with so much adversity, my students consistently surprise me with what they can accomplish despite the challenges that may be in their way.
Our school is a warm and caring place for our students to come to every day, with staff that works extremely hard to help each child learn and grow.
I am blessed to be their teacher, and I will do everything I can to help them reach their full potential.
My Project: So many of my students tell me that they love math and think it's really fun, which totally warms my heart!
I think part of the reason they love math so much is that we get to be hands on and explore mathematical concepts through math tools.
Rekenreks really help solidify that 5 and 10 are important numbers that we can "anchor to" when solving problems. The way the red and white beads are grouped by 5s helps them to visualize numbers 6-9 as "5 and ___ more" or teen numbers as "10 and ___ more". This connects to financial literacy because counting out money or figuring out change requires students to be flexible with numbers. If something costs 8 dollars, they will know that a $5 bill and three $1 bills is enough to cover it.
The unifix cubes, dice, and transparent spinners will also get daily use, as we LOVE learning through games and those items are used with many of them. So much so, that some items are in need of replacement or are in short supply!
Finally, the number path pocket chart will be very useful in small group, as we are always working on counting forwards, counting backwards, and finding what comes before or after a number. The pocket chart will let me differentiate for different kids' needs (by using different sets of cards), and it will give each number a defined space to help kids organize the number sequence in their minds.
Thank you so much for supporting my students!
Donations of ANY size can make a BIG difference!
Our long-term project from last week was completed, with a big assist from our readers!
Mrs. Harrison teaches third grade in rural South Carolina. Her class will now be equipped to do work based on the “One Small Square” concept, where students frame a 1-square-foot area of a natural environment and focus their study on what is contained within the frame. The project was Pondering About STEM in Spring.
She writes: Thank you all so very much for making this project happen! We are looking forward to the activities this will bring in May. As we are finishing some important testing this week, we anticipate the packages arriving in the next weeks.
The weather is so beautiful right now, and we are going to make use of the gorgeous weather! Thank you all for helping us to enjoy the season full of wonder to ponder.
Our Dollars at Work
Last month, we helped Mrs. Harris’s Oklahoma kindergarten get some interactive math games they can play as a group, to allow them to sharpen their math skills without fear. The project was Smart Math for Smart Kids. (More photos at the link.)
I wanted to sincerely thank you for your donation to this project. My students have become more engaged and excited for math time because of your gift. Students are asking more meaningful questions and expanding their learning in a hands on way. The smart board technology has allowed students to work in small group centers to grow their learning in their math skills.
The students were so excited to see that the games were attached directly to the skills that we were learning in class. Those students struggling with the concepts felt at ease with the math games and have seen a huge improvement in their understanding.
Founded in 2009, The Inoculation Project combats the anti-science push in conservative America by funding science and math projects in red-state classrooms and libraries. Our conduit is DonorsChoose.org, a crowdfunding charity founded in 2000 and highly rated by both Charity Navigator and the Better Business Bureau.
Every Sunday, we focus on helping to fund science or math projects, preferably in neighborhood public schools where the overwhelming majority of students come from low-income households. We welcome everyone who supports public school education — no money is required!
Finally, here’s our list of successfully funded projects — our series total is 742! The success-list diary also contains links and additional information about DonorsChoose.org.