Explore a Lights On Afterschool Wonder with Wonderopolis

By John MacLeod, community manager for Wonderopolis.

Created by the National Center for Families Learning, Wonderopolis is a website that encourages learners of all ages to use their natural curiosity and imagination to explore and discover new things about the world around them. Every day Wonderopolis poses an intriguing question and explores the answer through a variety of methods.

We’re thrilled to join the celebration for the 20^th Lights On Afterschool. In a recent Wonder of the Day, Wonderopolis explored the history of the Empire State Building and found out the total number of lights it takes to illuminate the tower—and explained how the colors will change to shine for afterschool on October 24, 2019.

Because Wonderopolis is high-interest nonfiction, it’s easy to catch students’ attention and get them reading. This allows them to build background knowledge and improve reading comprehension and vocabulary skills.

Wonderopolis always starts with great questions. That is the key to engaging curiosity which leads to exploration and discovery. By giving students a chance to search for topics that interest them, they will be hungry to learn more and eagerly engaged in wondering. If they need some ideas to get started, try scrolling through the Wonder List on the Explore page until something interesting jumps out (it usually doesn’t take long).

Now that students have found something curious to explore, the next step is a natural one: they want to tell people about it! Fun facts and strange details just have to be shared! Here are three suggestions for how they can share their learning and spread the wonder—in fact, many of these ideas would add a fantastic dimension to your Lights On Afterschool plans.

• Make a simple reflection sheet that includes something like “two things I learned are… one thing I’m still wondering about is…” Give them the option to illustrate their thinking, too!
• Utilize a video app like Flipgrid to record students’ thoughts and reflections on what they learned. It’s a great way to incorporate 21st century skills, collaborate with others, and improve presentation abilities.
• Encourage students to bring the wonder home! Share it with family members and ask if you can view the wonder online together. Wonderopolis can be a great tool to bring families together to read and wonder about the amazing world around us!