Politics, Storm Chasers, and the Bermuda Triangle

As a follow up to "Bigfoot and Other Persuasive Writing Prompts," here are a few more examples of ways to use current events, your current studies, and other "everyday" things as ways to jump start thinking, opining, writing, and leading.

Using the latest issues of Parade magazine and Scholastic News, we learned quite a few things about different careers, and/or maybe profitable hobbies, as well as tornadoes. For instance, even at 83 years old, one woman adds to her income by being a professional dog sitter ($7,895 annually). We had no idea that there are people who made a decent amount of money just for standing in line! A professional line sitter in New York charges $25 for the first hour and $10 for each additional half hour to hold your place in line for you. It ends up being $54,470 a year, just to stand in line! Of course, many other professions were represented, and there were even more that were not, which we talked a little about. Then we read about storm chasers who are actually employed by a news station to update on current conditions (rather than just chasing tornadoes on their own simply for the thrill of it). The writing prompt was to write about jobs you definitely don't want to have, and those that you do. 

The Bermuda Triangle falls into a thriller/mystery category, but it can and should also be a part of geography studies. Since we are working on world geography, both "Tornado Alley" (referenced in the storm chasing reading) and the Bermuda Triangle fall into enhancing those studies in intriguing ways, while giving us something interesting to write about. My kids had some fascinating theories on what is going on in the Bermuda Triangle.

It was all too easy to find another of this past week's writing prompts when I opened the morning newspaper to an article all about the upcoming changes to United States currency. The biggest change will be Harriet Tubman replacing Andrew Jackson on the twenty dollar bill. I read the article to my kids and then had them write their thoughts on it. I was surprised at how definite their opinions were, and I think this is a topic I'll want them to practice their expression and persuasion on.

The thing about this type of writing is that it is engaging kids in politics, whether they know it or not. Any time someone writes a letter to the editor of a newspaper, or discusses the goings on in the world, for good or bad, they are engaging in the political process. I'm hoping to help my kids learn to gather good information and come to good conclusions, to recognize that their ideas and opinions matter and that they should be engaged in shaping/changing/helping the world around them, and also to be able to express themselves to the best of their ability so that they can.

An additional benefit is the broadening of my kids' knowledge base. As I mentioned in the other post, my kids are supposed to periodically choose one of these topics to expand on in a full, polished essay. One of my boys decided to write about how he would not want to be one of the first people on Mars and why. He did some research on everything those people going will have to do to prepare as well as what they expect to be doing once there, and also the dangers along the way. At some point, I don't remember the exact context, we were discussing his findings and I mentioned that some people think that NASA faked the moon landings. All of a sudden he quoted, "We're where NASA faked the moon landings," which is a line from the film RV with Robin Williams. He smiled and said, "I never really understood that line before now." I smiled over that because even though we haven't watched that movie in months and months, that question was stored in his head and just a little bit of learning recalled it and answered it.