We have been studying polar lands in Being A Writer.  I have chosen to create a Symbaloo on the topic of polar lands and it's inhabitants so that my students can continue to gather facts to create informational writing pieces.  My students enjoy researching and I know that they  will be fully engaged watching these videos and reading the additional information on polar lands.  I plan on making a shortcut to my Symbaloo on my students ipads and my colleagues can access it through my website if they are interested in using it.  I really like the format of Symbaloo and I plan on using it in the future.
The Being A Writer unit is introducing the people of polar lands.  I plan on showing my students this video about the children and people of the arctic tundra.  I feel that the students will relate more to learning about the people that are their own age, however the video covers more information.  I have placed the video on my Symbaloo and the students can access it there, however I think I would rather show it whole class and stop the video and have the students discuss the differences and similarities between their life and the life of the children on the tundra. I chose to use a video that was created instead of creating it myself because I felt it would be more engaging to see the people and learn about their lives firsthand then to simply state the facts to the students in a self made version.  You get so much more from the video of the children and hearing the peoples' stories.  You can read their emotions in faces even when no words are spoken.  I think that is an advantage in itself because we can stop and talk about what the students infer.