1-Project+Statement

//**Our proposed project: **// Title: A Great Place to Live Description: To answer the guiding question -- What makes our community a great place to live? -- our students will engage in a comparative study of their favorite community, city, and state attractions. Lesson content will also pull from prior knowledge (obtained from student traveling experiences and classroom field trips) and from collaborative group study. As a culminating, authentic assessment activity, each individual class will create a printable travel brochure and collaborate on creating a VoiceThread to present their information. The National Social Studies Standards for Geography K-12 targeted by this project are: Standards 1-6 (The World in Spatial Terms, Places and Regions, Physical Systems, and Human Systems).

//**How will we improve learner performance by engaging learners in authentic experiences? **// Learning and working in today's digital age requires competency in critical thinking and collaboration. Hence, there's a greater emphasis in classrooms today toward using cognitive/constructivist strategies to create more dynamic learning environments. This shift is based on research indicating that deeper learning is achieved when students are engaged in authentic real-world learning experiences. We've come to recognize the fact that learning-by-doing in authentic contexts is a very effective way for our students to learn. Hence, in this project, we will use the Internet and a variety of emerging communication and visualization technologies to offer our students experiences ranging from designing their own learning and presentational materials to gaining multiple perspectives on their learning through collaboration to creating an authentic artifact that demonstrates the depth of their learning.

//**How will we facilitate learning through constructivist, collaborative learning experiences? **// Learning will be facilitated through collaboration in the various stages of this project. The students will be participating in the field trip together. Collaboration will be used to determine what important information to share about each place. During the creation of the Voicethread, students will work together to find pictures of each place, add music, and add narration. Once all Voicethreads have been posted, students will view all of the completed presentations and post comments and questions. From start to finish, students will be communicating with their classmates while learning more about places in their area and places in other states.

//**How will we create sound instructional materials and learning environments that are based on solid research and learning theory? **// This project falls under the category of Project-Based Learning (PjBL). PjBL is an instructional approach based on authentic learning activities that engages student interest and motivation. These activities are designed to answer a question or solve a problem and generally reflect the types of learning and work people do in the everyday world outside the classroom. PjBL also teaches students 21st century skills as well as content. These skills include communication and presentation, organization and time management, research and inquiry, self-assessment and reflection, and group participation and leadership skills. Hence, the instructional materials and learning environments created for this collaborative project will be based on the constructivist principles of PjBL.

//**How will we facilitate the use of innovations through the diffusion and integration of new technologies and technological experiences for our learners? **// All three of us have acquired much knowledge regarding the use of innovative educational technologies for teaching and learning. Hence, through this project, we plan to expose our students to a variety of innovative technologies such as online mapping and brochure design programs, GPS applications, Google Earth, multimedia tools that incorporate images, sound, text, and video (i.e. VoiceThread, vodcasts), and, various interactive Internet sites.

//**How will we most effectively manage this process? **// Each classroom teacher will monitor the edits and content of their classroom wiki pages. Students and classroom teachers will utilize the discussion board and the Wikispaces’s email to ask questions or make comments about the Voice Thread projects. Through communication each classroom teacher can ask each other any pertinent questions or just share ideas.

//**What ethical considerations will we make to ensure sound decisions are made? **// Each classroom teacher will discuss with students the ethics of conveying information and ideas on the Internet in an open forum. Students will need to be reminded to “do unto others as you would have done to you” when posting comments or questions.

//**What processes and resources will we include? **//
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Eclectric approach to media utilization (applying a variety of appropriate materials, methods and activities)
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Internet (for research, content delivery, interactive learning sites)
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">[|http://voicethread.com]
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Wikispaces to house the completed Voicethreads
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Wikispaces's email and discussion boards for communication

//**<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Describe the learning environment and population that will be engaged in our project: **// //**<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Henry's Class: **//
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Audience:// Leasa's class and Alison's class
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Learner characteristics:// Alternative High School Grades 9-12
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Anticipated entry level skills of audience:// Some computer skills, but will need direction and support.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//School environment:// Supportive Environment, Small public school
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Support for project by community, parents, or administrators:// Support from administrator and permission for field trips from parents. Advocate for support from local government to use the project as an advertisement for tourism.


 * //<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Leasa's Class: //**
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Audience:// Students in Henry's and Alison's classes
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Learner characteristics:// Kindergarten, non-ESL, 18 students
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Anticipated entry level skills of audience:// To be determined
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//School environment:// Public elementary school (PreK-5), Urban, Title I
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Support for project by community, parents, or administrators:// Administration will be asked to approve project-related field trips. Parents will be asked to assist with certain instructional activities and to give appropriate permissions for videotaping, Internet usage, and field trip attendance. The level of support is expected to be very high.

//**<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Alison's Class: **//
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Audience:// Students in Henry's and Leasa's classes
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Learner characteristics:// 3rd Grade, 18 students
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Anticipated entry level skills of audience:// Familiar with programs that can be used for a presentation such as Power Point
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//School environment:// Suburban Title I public elementary school (PreK-4)
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">//Support for project by community, parents, or administrators:// Administrators and parents will be fully aware of the purpose of this project, its progression, and its completion. Parents will fill out permission slips for the field trips, Internet usage, and videotaping.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">References: <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Cennamo, K., Ross, J., & Ertmer, P. (2010). //Technology integration for meaningful classroom use: A standards-based approach.// Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Driscoll, M. P. (2005). //Psychology of learning for instruction// (3rd ed.). Boston: Pearson Education, Inc.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">Januszewski, A. & Molenda, M. (2008). //Educational technology: a definition with commentary.// New York, NY: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">PBL-Online. (n.d.). //Project based learning: The online resources for PBL.// Retrieved July 2, 2010, from [|http://pblonline.org/default.htm]