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Jen Kuhl-Peterson
Hammondsport Central School
8272 Main Street
Hammondsport, NY 14840
1.
General Overview of the Project:
My Current
Issues and Events class created movies of living influential people
chosen from different categories. The categories included
scientists and thinkers; artists and entertainers; heroes and
pioneers; builders and titans (from the New York Times list); and an
influential intimate.
2.
Clear Purpose and
Objective:
The purpose of
the project was to expose students to the concept of influence. The
ideas of how, by whom, under what circumstances etc. that we are
influenced and how we influence others are important for us to
become critical thinkers. The objectives included:
·
Students will discover
people who are currently influential in our society.
·
Students will learn how
to use the program Microsoft Moviemaker.
·
Students will present a
coherent, well-organized, well-researched, visibly and aurally
interesting mini documentary about five influential people.
3.
Stakeholders: grade
level, who will benefit, who will participate in this project.
There were five
students – three seniors, two juniors who were enrolled in this one
semester Current Issues and Events course. Two of these students
were learning challenged and consistently unsuccessful academically
for multiple reasons. One of these students was academically and
artistically talented.
4.
U.S. History Content
Area
Many areas were
explored. Some of the people researched and used included: Bill
Gates, Oprah Winfrey, David Beckham, Larry Page, and Sergey Brin.
The research covered influential people who dominate the social,
political, and economic fabric of the United States.
5.
Outline Describing
Content
Determine
influence
1.
Students researched
articles, books, etc. to build knowledge base about the power of
influence on our society.
2.
Class discussion
centered on the benefits and negatives of influence and the role of
the media, politicians, superstars, clergy, friends and family as
disseminators of values and information ergo being “influencers”.
Decide the
specific influential people to include in documentary
1.
Students researched
people nominated in each category (see General overview)
2.
Students used that
research to decide whether or not to select a Time nominee or
another individual for each category.
Become familiar
with Microsoft Moviemaker
1.
Students used tutorials
to familiarize themselves with the program.
2.
Peer interaction
facilitated this process.
Find
information including photos, text, music, videos etc. to use in
documentary.
1.
Students searched the
internet for free files to integrate into their movies.
2.
While searching,
students learned much more about the influential people they had
selected and the areas in which the people are considered experts.
Organize the
information
1.
Organize per
influential person.
2.
Organize flow of
documentary.
Create
documentary
Incorporate all
files in an organized, engaging, informative presentation.
6.
Software to be used,
internet materials, contacts, etc.
Microsoft
Moviemaker
7.
Level of Student
Involvement
Students were
100% involved in the entire project.
8.
Evaluation process
A rubric was
used for evaluation. The students completed a rubric for each
other. I completed one for each of the students. The instructor’s
rubric score was weighted twice that of the students’ scores.
9.
Timeline
This project
took approximately two months of daily 40 minute classes to
complete.
1.
General Overview of the
Project:
It worked well
to use the NY Times list as an organizer for selecting the
influential people. There was extensive information available on
the Times website relative to the selection process, the history,
etc. of the Times list.
2.
Clear Purpose and
Objective:
·
Students had no problem
deciding who they thought were influential. Substantiating their
decisions was more difficult.
·
The program Microsoft
Moviemaker is free which is why we used it. Apparently, there are
other programs that one can purchase which are easier to use and
have additional features.
·
Only one (out of five)
of the students produced a really coherent and organized product.
The rest concentrated far more on the bells and whistles.
3.
Stakeholders: grade level,
who will benefit, who will participate in this project.
This project
appealed at different levels to all of the students.
4.
U.S. History Content Area
Part of the
appeal of the project was the variety of categories of influential
people. The students understood the different levels of influence
dependent upon the field in which the individual participated.
5.
Outline Describing Content
The research
part of the project centered upon defining and recognizing
influence. This was by far to the students, the least interesting
part of the project.
Researching the
individuals was interesting for the students but collecting clips,
photos, video etc. about the individuals and finding music was a
part that I had to curtail because they needed to start production.
Learning the
program was relatively easy for the students.
The students
discovered many free sites for information. Unfortunately, they
forgot to note them and we couldn’t find the specific file name
after the fact.
The
organization was a problem for less motivated students. They didn’t
concentrate enough on the conception of the entire video.
All
presentations were amazingly creative.
6, 7 already
addressed
8.
Evaluation process
The rubric
worked very well for the project. It was adapted from several that
are available on the web.
9.
Timeline
It was crucial
to have as much time as we had. The project took about two months
of daily 40 minute classes. The amount of time directly affected
the quality of the final product.
Kuhl-Peterson Doc
in Word
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