Hiring Fair

Hey guys!

It's been a while but with the craziness of exams things have been out of whack around these parts. Tomorrow we are having a hiring fair for all the students who were either fired from their groups or who decided to walk away.

Either way, there's an opportunity for you to get rehired! Tomorrow from 9-10:15 we'll be having group interviews. If you're a free agent who didn't get an interview scheduled let me know, but if you did best of luck in your interviews tomorrow!

We watched the awesome short documentary from PBS entitled "Extreme by Design". The film covered Stanford's d.school and one of their classes that focuses on extreme design to create affordable, realistic solutions to problems in the world. There have been some amazing start-ups (get more on that term here!) that have come from this class and our students are doing work very similar to that done at Stanford. It was great to hear a common language between us and know that our students are capable of doing work that can make a change!

After watching the video, students began their Idea Wave brainstorm to look at two different things. The first was what are some possible things we can create to alleviate some of the problems people have that struggle with that group's human right. The second was what are some possible educational tools we can create to better inform our peers about what those human rights issues are. Students presented and got feedback on their first draft of the idea wave and will continue those revisions tomorrow. We're hoping to finish feedback, too.

All in all it's been a good week gang. Glad to see you all back together.

P.S. Go follow @WHS_StudioD on Twitter. I'm feeling lonely.

Creating Infographics

As part of our Human Rights Awareness challenge, students are getting their Geography content with Coach West so they can be better informed about the part of the world their group is (eventually) researching. Students were given their map of Central America yesterday, and will have a map quiz on Friday on the countries and capitals. We wanted a way for them to get more information about each country but also display it in a creative way that could be incorporated into their final presentation.

Each group was given/chose a country to research. Group assignments are as follows:

Honduras- Religion
Cuba- Information
Costa Rica- Children
Haiti- Health
Puerto Rico- Justice
Guatemala- LGBT
Dominican Republic- Protest
Jamaica/Bahamas-Environment
Mexico- Speech
Panama- Food/Water
El Salvador- Women
Belize- Education
Nicaragua- Disabled

Each group is responsible for researching and presenting the following information about their country:
Capital
Government Type
Population
Official Language
Historical Fact
Imports/Exports
Economy
Major Religions

As a class we looked at Piktochart, Infogr.am, Easel.ly- all of these are resources students can use to create their infographic. They are responsible for researching information about their country, keeping track of their sources on a shared Google Doc, and completing ONE infographic for the entire group by Friday. We will use these as a study guide for their quiz on Central America.

11.5.13 Beginnings

Today students began two new chapters of their design challenge. Students are creating a storyboard to showcase their educational tool this week.  The storyboard (due Friday) will be turned into a student created Voice Thread.  This draft needs to include a minimum of 7 panels with an image, the scene (tell me what I'm seeing), the script (write out exactly what you plan to say) & the message you are trying to convey to the user of your educational tool.
At the same time, students are getting familiar with Voice Thread (the tool we'll use to peer evaluate the educational tools) by making at least 3 comments  & 1 drawing of the slides I've shared with them.
Comments & storyboard are due by Friday.

The Voice Thread presentations they'll create from their storyboards next week.  The presentation must include a minimum of 7 slides- 1 that introduce their education tool, & 6 featuring parts of their educational tool they are either really proud of or want feedback on.  These are due at the beginning of the news show Thursday, so we can have a virtual gallery walk.  The plan is to link all the voice thread presentations to my environmental studies page for both teachers, students & parents to look at.  Teachers & students can comment on the slides in order to help create better end products.

With Mrs. A, students took their second vocabulary quiz. Despite the fact that she said it almost every day, some of our students STILL forgot that the quiz was cumulative and could/would include words from their previous quizzes. The jury's still out as to how the class did.

With me (Coach K) students who had passed all of their safety tests started tool demonstrations in the project room today. Students who had not yet passed all of their safety tests had to go in Mrs. A's room and continue those tests until they passed. We had a few last minute additions to the demo as people passed a test or two today, but for the most part the majority of each group had passed as of this morning.

Today we did demonstrations on some of the tools we use most frequently. Students had to make a cut with the miter saw, had to drill a pilot hole for a screw, make a cut with a circular saw while using saw horses, and sand with the grain using one of the handheld sanders. Students were generally excited about working with the tools for the first time, and even some of them who were apprehensive at first were making cuts and holes on their own by the end of the period. Students still need some work with the table saw, Dremel, and a few other tools in the room but they are (mostly) ready to start construction on their designs. We'll spend some time tomorrow making sure the prototypes are as complete as they can be so I can make a Lowe's run to ensure we have all the materials the prototypes call for. Here are a few shots of some of our students with the tools.

10.22.13 Ed Tool/Prototype Revisions

Today students met for the first time in their large groups. It was a somewhat productive day. Most groups finished their bird's eye view of the space that included their design, and some began revising their new prototypes to scale. Some groups had a harder time meshing in their new environment, and spent some time figuring out what their new dynamic would be. Students had to realize that the design doesn't have an owner, and students have to relinquish any idea of ownership over the design so that the new group can have input. It's hard to look at a design for weeks and then listen to someone make suggestions as to how to make it better, but we have to be open to changes for the benefit of the space.

With Mrs. Soblo, students worked on their Educational Tool. Students now are each responsible for 13 organisms in their Educational Tool. Some groups are making field guides and some groups are making games. Students are still working on researching and narrowing down the organisms they want to include, so they should have research to work on daily.