I Have a Dream, Dr. King! – 7402

Summary

This social studies and language arts lesson throws students into the shoes of the great American, Martin Luther King, Jr..  Students complete a KWL chart as a class in order for the teacher to:  1) find out what they already know  2) find out what they are interested in learning, and  3) enable inquiry based learning to occur. Students perform research in Pebblego to fulfill a Research Quest which will familiarize them with Dr. King in order to find out why he was such an important part of our nation’s history. Students solve authentic problems by picking their own groups, assigning their own jobs within the group, and writing a book in StoryKit on the iPads about MLK, Jr. This book is first to be shared with the class and then each of the books will be posted on our classroom blog for parents, students, and staff to learn from and comment on. Finally, students reflect on what worked within their groups and throughout the lesson, what didn’t work, and how we can improve our collaboration, information fluency, and all other aspects of our learning.

 

TIPC Ratings

Approaching – I modeled strategies to guide student investigation in Pebblego, and facilitate that investigation. I designed a challenges that promoted synthesis of resources to address the authentic tasks of working as a collaborative group and writing a book. I supported students as they acquire, evaluate, and apply information by being a facilitator and getting more involved with hands-on assistance as needed. The students construct questions to guide research with a little guidance from me. They select the most appropriate digital tools (ipads) and information sources, in this case, Pebblego. Students assemble and organize the information gained about MLK to address the authentic tasks of working on a team and writing a book.

Ideal/Target – I facilitated and formatively assessed the authentic tasks where students were engaged in meaningful communication when they were assigning jobs within their groups and discussing ideas for each page they wrote of their books. Students selected appropriate digital tools (ipads) to communicate and collaborate with their peers. They know they can take pictures with the ipads and use a keypad to write words for their book. At the end, they reflected on their roles as communicators and collaborators through the use of a promethean flipchart, and set goals for future growth.

 

Approaching – I modeled a range of critical thinking and/or problem solving strategies, the biggest one being questioning. I discussed the possibility of utilizing each digital tool we have access too, and allowed students to make the decision which tool would support our goal best. My whole plan was to design instruction that promotes solutions to an authentic task, in this case, writing a book. I facilitated and supported students as they engaged in challenges and solving problems because after I modeled various problem solving strategies, I then allowed students the opportunity to utilize those strategies without my involvement.

Students were in charge of creating a “Research Quest” by generating and responding to their own purposeful questions. Students applied the use of iPads to think critically and by solving the open-ended authentic task of using knowledge from research, and then deciding what the important points were of their research in order to write a book, pose and take photos for each page they write, and work out what this would look like and encompass within their group.

Approaching – Prior to this lesson, students have witnessed the teacher modeling strategic risk taking within the confines of an activity, so they have become familiar with the benefits and sometimes consequences of taking these types of risks. I have helped them learn how to utilize their creativity and craftsmanship in this lesson by allowing them to become ‘actors’ who depict various scenes from the life of Dr. MLK, Jr., and then describing those pictures in their very own book. I designed opportunities for students to synthesize research by using our class created KWL chart, Pebblego, library books, and two short videos in order to communicate and collaborate in order to write their digital book. These books were incredibly special to students because they they were similar to books they read during language arts on the iPads, but were instead self-created!

 Students conquered the task of creating meaningful, original work within the assignment parameters, and actually read these digital books over and over since they have been added to their language arts library on the iPads.

Download Files

Dr. King


Contents:

  • Lesson Plan
  • Student Research Directions

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