Deciding on the 'How'

The past few weeks we have been slowly, but surely, chipping away at our Human Rights Design Challenge. Students have presented on their group's right and grades are finally posted on how their presentation went. Mrs. Soblo and Coach K were in Austin last week at SXSWedu and so Mrs. A and Mr. Mayes (Coach West's long term sub) were with the students. They worked diligently on a children's book for Mrs. Soblo and their first drafts have been submitted. Here is that information. She is working hard to get feedback on those so that students can make revisions and hopefully get those into the hands of elementary schools students for even more feedback.

 Mr. Mayes began a Middle East culture project and the rough draft of that is due today. Here's that assignment again, in case you need it. 

For the Human Rights challenge, students were asked to put together a proposal for Coach K on their top 3 preferred methods of delivery for what they have learned. Essentially, students have spent weeks talking about why their human rights are important, why they are worth teaching about, and proving that they have a solid understanding of both of those points. Now that they have achieved those things, they have to think about HOW they want to inform their peers and community about human rights violations both locally and internationally. So, while Coach K was gone students worked on putting together presentations that talked about their top 3 choices of how to present their information. Students, on the whole, did a great job of selling their preferred method of delivery. There were some really great ideas and some not so great ideas. Students were able to give feedback via Google Doc to air out any questions they might have about the presented ideas.

As of Monday, the top three group favorites were a game show, a documentary or film, and a scavenger hunt. Just because they're student favorites doesn't mean that they're the teacher picks, but they will definitely be taken into consideration.

Later on in the week students will get their feedback from Coach K as to which methods were presented the strongest, and which, as a group, we will be moving forward with in the very near future.

Today students are also taking a quiz on The Book Thief (surprise!) and continuing with our bi-weekly EOC practice for the English 1 EOC.

Presentation Rubric for Campfire Presentations on 2/4

This is the rubric you will be scored with on Tuesday, Feb. 4th, for your campfire presentation. Don't forget your are receving two grades: an individual grade on your presentation, and a group grade on the content you present. Please make sure that you are rehearsing accordingly. The presentation must be a minimum of 3 minutes long and a maximum of 5. No reading from materials is allowed. 

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.

10.21.13 Prototype Defense

This morning we're spending time putting the finishing touches on our Prototype Defenses. Student groups will present to the entire class and defend why their prototype should be the one we build to put in our outdoor learning space. Students have been working for the past two weeks on their prototypes, building plans, and 3-D sketches.

Requirements for Presentation:

1. Title
2. Scale of Prototype
3. Materials (What they want to use to build with)
4. Plans on graph paper with scale
5. Defense Prepared
• Why does this design meet the needs of the users?
• Why is this design the most sustainable of its category?
• Why is this design the most functional of its category?
• Why is this design the best in its category?

Students must put together a Google Presentation with pictures of their prototype- 5 slides in total. One picture of each of the four sides and one bird's eye view.

Students will use this link to access the form.

After presentations, students should complete at Stop-Drop-Reflect on what they just saw.

Answer these questions on a separate piece of paper. Name and Group Title at the top.
1. Based on what you saw, how feel your group compared to other groups? Were you as prepared? Was your prototype as detailed and complete? How well thought out was your design in comparison to other groups' design?

2. Based on what you saw, what changes, if any, would you make to your design? Be specific. What elements were frequently combined in the different prototypes? Did these combinations make sense? What combinations might we make that we did not see already?

3. Were there any prototypes that you would rule out automatically because they were too complex for the space, too labor intensive for our deadline (Dec. 20), or you felt they did not make sense? If so, explain what traits about that specific prototype makes you want to take it out of the running.

These go to Coach K.

We'll see how it goes!