1. Teacher Guide
This lesson is designed to teach kids to ask a critical thinking question that you can’t just put into a search box to solve. To do that, we encourage them with smaller questions that search can help them answer. Make sure that you read the notes for each slide: they not only give you teaching tips but also provide answers and hints so you can help the kids if they are having trouble.
Remember, you can always send feedback to the Bing in the Classroom team at You can learn more about the program at bing.com/classroom and follow the daily lessons on the Microsoft Educator Network.
Want to extend today’s lesson? Consider using Skype in the Classroom to arrange for your class to chat with another class in today’s location, take a Skype lesson on today’s topic, or invite a guest speaker to expand on today’s subject. And if you are using Windows 8, the panoramas in the MSN Travel App are great teaching tools. We have thousands of other education apps available on Windows here.
Ja'Dell Davis is a Los Angeles native who currently divides her time between New York City and Madison, Wisconsin. She is currently a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, pursing a PhD in Sociology. Ja’Dell previously taught high school in Philadelphia public schools, and implemented college access and academic enrichment programming in Chester, Pennsylvania and New York City in Manhattan’s Lower East Side neighborhood. Ja’Dell received her B.A. from Swarthmore College with a special major in History and Educational Studies, and a minor in Black Studies. She completed her M.S.Ed in Secondary School Education at the University of Pennsylvania.  In addition to her studies and work in the education field, Ja’Dell is a dancer, musician, avid people watcher, and Scrabble enthusiast.
This lesson is designed to teach the Common Core State Standard: Reading: Informational Text
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.7.1Cite several pieces of textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.7.2Determine two or more central ideas in a text and analyze their development over the course of the text; provide an objective summary of the text.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.7.3Analyze the interactions between individuals, events, and ideas in a text (e.g., how ideas influence individuals or events, or how individuals influence ideas or events).

2. What aspects of your life would you have to think about when considering whether to live in a big or small city or town?
© F1 Online/REX
© Matthew Kuhns/Tandem Stills + Motion
Having this up as kids come in is a great settle down activity. You can start class by asking them for thoughts about the picture or about ideas on how they could solve the question of the day.

3. What aspects of your life would you have to think about when considering whether to live in a big or small city or town?
About 15 miles east of Innsbruck in southern Austria lies the Alpine village called Tulfes. In this popular stretch of the Alps, both Tulfes and Innsbruck thrive as ski resorts in winter and as home bases for hikers in summer.
Though Innsbruck might seem quaint to big city visitors, by contrast, Tulfes is positively tiny, with a 2011 census showing fewer than 1,400 residents. But it’s that remote Alpine village charm that draws visitors. And this photo, showing how the sun has melted the frost on only one side of the valley, neatly illustrates the allure: rolling green hills in the summer, snow-covered peaks in winter.
Depending on time, you can either have students read this silently to themselves, have one of them read out loud, or read it out loud yourself.

4. What aspects of your life would you have to think about when considering whether to live in a big or small city or town? 1
Thinking/Web Search
What is the size of your city or town? Is it comparable to the size of the Alpine city town of Tulfes (1,400 residents!)? 2
Thinking
What are aspects of daily life that people should consider when deciding to live somewhere? Consider your daily activities and how you move through the world as you focus in or what is important. 3
Thinking/ Web Search
What does the size of your city or town have to do with how you relate to other people? 4
What does the size of your city or town have to do with what you do in your free time? 5
What does the size of your city or town have to do with basic costs to every day living?
There are a couple of ways to use this slide, depending on how much technology you have in your classroom. You can have students find answers on their own, divide them into teams to have them do all the questions competitively, or have each team find the answer to a different question and then come back together. If you’re doing teams, it is often wise to assign them roles (one person typing, one person who is in charge of sharing back the answer, etc.)

5. What aspects of your life would you have to think about when considering whether to live in a big or small city or town? 5
Minutes
You can adjust this based on how much time you want to give kids. If a group isn’t able to answer in 5 minutes, you can give them the opportunity to update at the end of class or extend time.

6. What aspects of your life would you have to think about when considering whether to live in a big or small city or town? 1
Thinking/Web Search
What is the size of your city or town? Is it comparable to the size of the Alpine city town of Tulfes (1,400 residents!)? 2
Thinking
What are aspects of daily life that people should consider when deciding to live somewhere? Consider your daily activities and how you move through the world as you focus in or what is important. 3
Thinking/ Web Search
What does the size of your city or town have to do with how you relate to other people? 4
What does the size of your city or town have to do with what you do in your free time? 5
What does the size of your city or town have to do with basic costs to every day living?
You can ask the students verbally or let one of them come up and insert the answer or show how they got it. This way, you also have a record that you can keep as a class and share with parents, others.

7. What aspects of your life would you have to think about when considering whether to live in a big or small city or town? 1
Thinking/Web Search
What is the size of your city or town? Is it comparable to the size of the Alpine city town of Tulfes (1,400 residents!)?
Students can search for their particular city or town to see how big it is and compare it to the size of Tulfes.

8. What aspects of your life would you have to think about when considering whether to live in a big or small city or town? 2
Thinking
What are aspects of daily life that people should consider when deciding to live somewhere? Consider your daily activities and how you move through the world as you focus in or what is important.
Students should consider what they do each day and how living in a city or town of different sizes would affect how they operated in the world.

9. What aspects of your life would you have to think about when considering whether to live in a big or small city or town? 3
Thinking/ Web Search
What does the size of your city or town have to do with how you relate to other people?
(Possible Search Queries: ”importance of city size” “small city vs. big city”)
Students should think through the implications of living in a small or big city and their relationships with others, coming up with insights of their own.
For reference: Beyond the Rhetoric (

10. What aspects of your life would you have to think about when considering whether to live in a big or small city or town? 4
Thinking/Web Search
What does the size of your city or town have to do with what you do in your free time?
(Possible Search Queries: ”importance of city size” “small city vs. big city”)
Students should think through the implications of living in a small or big city and their opportunities for entertainment and accessible activities, coming up with insights of their own.
For reference: Beyond the Rhetoric (

11. What aspects of your life would you have to think about when considering whether to live in a big or small city or town? 5
Thinking/Web Search
What does the size of your city or town have to do with basic costs to every day living?
(Possible Search Queries: ”importance of city size” “small city vs. big city”)
Students should think through the implications of living in a small or big city and the amount of money they would have to spend to do essential things, coming up with insights of their own.
For reference: Beyond the Rhetoric (

12. What aspects of your life would you have to think about when considering whether to live in a big or small city or town?
This slide is a chance to summarize the information from the previous slides to build your final answer to the question.