Winter 1999 Course Homework Projects

The following projects were created as homework during a Winter 1999 Leadership Institute Integrating Internet, Curriculum, and Instruction pilot online course.

Elementary School Projects

LInC Online Home Page

Middle School

Adopting an Endangered Species in Our Area
This project involves groups of students in an investigation of endangered species at the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore. Students are asked to take a field trip (either virutal or actual) to discover what species are in jeopardy and what resources are in place to save the population. Students use technology to communicate with experts and research the most current statistics. The ultimate goal of the mission is to adopt an endangered species and disseminate relevant information about the species to the neighboring community. The project can be used as a model to investigate any community's endangered species and provide the community with information.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric

All about Water
This project encourages students to research the drinking water delivery system in the local area, recognize the importance of political action regarding water conservation issues, communicate with a variety of subject matter experts, and collaborate with ninth grade science students in aggregating collected data and reporting findings. Third grade students take water samples and analyze them using test kits. They develop a system to catalog their samples and submit the results to project collaborators, ninth grade high school science students. This science class is to determine if there are any trends in the data. They graph the results of their testing and summarize their investigations in a report to their third grade collaborators. The high school classes locate the source of contaminants and the students identify sources of information that will help them investigate the problem and devise methods to remove the pollutants from the water. The filtration methods are tested, and appropriate officials are contacted if the situation warrants.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages, 3rd Grade Rubric and 9th Grade Rubric

Middle School Projects

LInC Online Home Page

Elementary School

Knowing the Western Hemisphere - A Student-Guided Study of Countries in the Western Hemisphere
A class of 6th grade bilingual students will use the Internet and e-mail, as well as more traditional methods, to research a selected group of countries from Central and South America and the Caribbean. Students will contact real people to learn about the geography, history, culture, current events and other interesting facts about particular countries. They will prepare reports and share them orally and on a classroom Web site. Information will be appropriate for middle school students including other LEP/Spanish speaking students who are studying the Western Hemisphere.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric

Video Game Hall of Fame
Students are asked to investigate what makes videogames popular by a videogame conglomerate with poor sales. Students will produce a report for the company with data, conclusions, and suggestions for designing a new videogame. The students will create surveys and graphs to base their conclusions on. They will use the Internet to communicate with students in other schools in the U.S. and to contact major manufacturers and distributors of videogames.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric 1, Rubric 2

High School Projects

LInC Online Home Page

Teacher

A View with No Slant
Student will compare and contrast how historical events are taught in different cultures. In the process students will communicate with experts and other students of the target culture using high technology such as e-mail and Internet. The final result of what they found will be displayed in the method of their choice such as play performance and Web page. The display will be presented at the annual Foreign Language Festival in the spring.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric

All about Water
This project encourages students to research the drinking water delivery system in the local area, recognize the importance of political action regarding water conservation issues, communicate with a variety of subject matter experts, and collaborate with ninth grade science students in aggregating collected data and reporting findings. Third grade students take water samples and analyze them using test kits. They develop a system to catalog their samples and submit the results to project collaborators, ninth grade high school science students. This science class is to determine if there are any trends in the data. They graph the results of their testing and summarize their investigations in a report to their third grade collaborators. The high school classes locate the source of contaminants and the students identify sources of information that will help them investigate the problem and devise methods to remove the pollutants from the water. The filtration methods are tested, and appropriate officials are contacted if the situation warrants.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages, 3rd Grade Rubric and 9th Grade Rubric

Budget Bonanza
Students will participate in a unit on financial planning that will feature the use of electronic resources, as well as including traditional resources. They will investigate the necessity of sound financial planning. Students will be randomly assigned 'families' and accompanying 'fates' which they will then work with to plan their financial futures. This project will teach the skills, vocabulary, and concepts of personal economics in a 'hands-on' authentic manner that is not as intimidating to students as the traditional 'textbook' approach. Supplemental information and prizes will be provided by professional community experts. Guest speakers from the field of financial planning will also act as judges of the final presentations.

Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric
Project Table of Contents

Community Heritage Project
Learning to be a contributing citizen in ones' community often means learning to make connections. In this project students investigate the idea of connectiveness to their local community. They look at the connections they will make to become contributing members as well as looking at what connections cause people to remain in a community or move "back home." The project takes the idea of connections one step further in engaging students to create a video and/or promotional brochure about their community to help connect it to others in the world. The ultimate goal is for students' contributions to their community help their improve their community's economy.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric

Exploring Our Past: The Revolutionary War
High school students are challenged to explore and research Revolutionary War soldiers buried within our county. During the project, student groups will research and write fact-based reports and multimedia presentations about the soldiers, the era in which they lived, and the effects of war in general. Their challenge is to create Web sites with images and fictionalized stories, letters, journals and accounts of these soldiers based on collaboration with experts, interviews with local historians, research through on-line museums and schools, and interviews with local veterans. These fictionalized stories of war and its effects will be posted on the Internet along with photographs and art relating to their report.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric

Lead It Be
Urban students are seldom interested in anything that does not effect them directly. They can avoid the water in lakes and streams, however, they cannot avoid water which they consume. Water quality in Milwaukee is always an issue. Remember cryptosporidium? This unit will be a collaboration between the Chemistry Department and the Technology Department, as well as, incorporate collaboration between various schools to pool data gathered. Students will be asked to help design and run tests dealing with the concentration of lead that might be found in drinking water.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario 1, Scenario 2 Student Pages and Rubric

Roller Coaster Design
This is an interdisciplinary project that involves industrial technology classes and physics classes in designing, building and critiquing roller coasters and other amusement park rides. The first semester physics class will research the safety standards and the components of a ride that make it "fun" via Web sites and post these results on this Web site. The CAD (computer-assisted drafting) classes will research ride designs on the internet and then design their own based on the safety and "fun" criteria set up by the first physics class. The material processing classes will build the design after researching structural properties of materials on the Internet. The second semester physics class will critique these models by comparing them to the standards determined by the first physics class.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Page 1, Student Page 2, Student Page 3, Student Page 4 and Rubric

We Never Promised You a Greenhouse . . . .
The Greenhouse Project consists of the design and construction of a working greenhouse for the Plymouth Regional High School Science Department. The students will be taking charge of all facets of the project, including needs assessment, greenhouse basics, building design, funding proposal, project proposal presentation, and construction. It will be a multi-disciplinary project joining freshman physical science students and junior and senior vocational building trades students.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric

What Happened to the Nuclear Promise?
This is a unit to last three weeks and intended to be implemented later in the school year. Students will use the Internet and e-mail to communicate with many other scientist, experts, educators, and instititutions around the world. Students will share information with each other to help set and guide their projects.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric

Teacher Projects

LInC Online Home Page

High School

Educational MUVES
The Educational MUVE Project introduces educators to a critical yet often overlooked area of the Internet: Educational Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs). Although a large number of "EdMUVEs" exist in a wide range of subject matters, many have never heard of, let alone visited these important online communities. It is the hope of this project to facilitate, educate and motivate K-12 educators to utilize this vital tool for bringing education into the next millennium.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description (NA)
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric

G. R. I. D. (Guided Relevant Internet Discovery)
K-5 teachers will be active participants in creating lesson plans that interweave technology objectives with the teaching of core curricular areas. The participants will design, select, and construct technology-enriched lesson plans. The results will be an interactive site that contains a grid featuring teacher-selected web sites organized by grade level and subject. Engaged users will have the opportunity to publish critiques, suggest classroom applications and recommend additional web sites for the grid. Furthermore, learners will be given the opportunity to submit lesson plans to the Michigan Department of Education for publication on the "Best Practices in Technology:" CD.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric

Multiple Intelligences and Technology
This is a workshop that provides professional development in instructional technology and Multiple Intelligences. Teachers will meet both physically and virtually. The participants will be challenged to work in teams to develop a lesson for their discipline that reflects the Michigan Curriculum Framework, contains more than two multiple intelligences and involves than two uses of technology including the Internet. Teachers will make a home page as the final project that will be posted to a larger database and shared with educators around the world. The projects will also be submitted to the "Best Practice in Teaching" contest sponsored by the Michigan Association of Intermediate School Administrators and the REMC Association of Michigan.
Summary
Pre-LInC Description
Scenario Student Pages and Rubric

Staff Development Plans

St. Ignace, MI - Budget Bonanza
Carrollton, IL - Exploring Our Past: The Revolutionary War
Green Bay, WI - A View with No Slant
Mahtomedi, MN - Roller Coaster Design
Milwaukee, WI - Lead It Be
Plymouth, NH - We Never Promised You a Greenhouse . . . .  
Paterson, NJ - Knowing the Western Hemisphere - A Student-Guided Study of Countries in the Western Hemisphere
El Cerrito, CA - Educational MUVES
Chicago, IL - Adopting an Endangered Species in Our Area
Detroit, MI - Multiple Intelligences and Technology
Fort Benton, MT - Community Heritage Project
Farmington, MI - G.R.I.D. (Guided Relevant Internet Discovery)

 



Created: April 15, 1999; Last Updated: May 12,1999
URL: /lincon/w99/projects/index.shtml