Look it up!

My students are masters at finding ways to save time. (They would much rather do something other than homework. Big surprise!) For my part, I'm trying to teach them how to find answers on their own, so they frequently hear me say, "Look it up!"

This past week, I gave my fifth and sixth grade reading class an assignment to design a "wanted" poster based on a character in Elizabeth George Speare's Sign of the Beaver, the novel we're reading in class. Because I'm a stickler for detail, I checked the students' work before allowing the project to be handed in.

One student handed his poster to me. After a quick scan, I handed it back. "Sit down and proofread the poster," I said, as he sighed laboriously and hung his head. He parked himself at his desk and his eyes glazed over as he reviewed the paper. "I know I spelled bankruptcy right," he said confidently. "Are you sure?" I asked. "Maybe you should look it up." He dismissed the idea. It's too much work to get the dictionary.

After a bit, he's back up at the podium.  "Can you give me a hint? Can you, like, point at it?" I couldn't resist pointing at the paper from 18 inches away--a completely useless gesture. "Come on, you have ten minutes of class left," I said with a smile. "You can find it." My student slumped back to his desk and sat there for a few more minutes. Desperate, he tried to enlist some of his classmates to find the mistake. "There's no error!" he claimed on another trip to the podium. Finally, my student realized it might be wise to consult Noah Webster. He retrieved the dictionary and realized that "bankruptcy" does indeed have a "T" in it.

I gave him a thumbs up as I turned to the next student, an energetic girl with a ponytail. She's gesticulating wildly, complaining about the extra work I'm causing her."You are so melodramatic," I told her.  She paused long enough to ask, "What does that mean?"

"Look it up."

P.S. She did. :)