TIPC Ratings

Developing: The students assemble and synthesize information related to water conservation gained through research. The students choose their internet resources to determine average water usage statistics and strategies for water conservation. The students use various resources and tools of their choice and display their information and suggestions for ways in which they and their peers can conserve water. The teacher formatively assesses the students completion of tasks related to the project. This includes research, brainstorming, documentation, and execution of ideas. The teacher provides guidelines for research but the students have an unlimited amount of resources for gathering data and creating unique ideas for water usage and conservation.

Approaching: The students select technology resources and digital tools to collaborate with their team members and develop their campaign. They are able to choose their own tools for researching water conservation and usage. They have the freedom to communicate with their group members and determine the most effective digital media format to portray their ideas. They are able to assign roles within the group to maintain effective collaboration. They determine ways to share their ideas with other classmates and the rest of the school. They work together to set up goals for future growth in the field of water conservation. The teacher monitors group interaction and facilitates tasks with the students are working together. This is done through research, brainstorming strategies, and discussion of how to best create a final product.

Approaching: One of the key goals throughout the course of the lesson is to engage in problem solving and come up with solutions to the problem of water usage. The students respond to questions related to usage statistics and evaluate suggested strategies for cutting back on water usage. The students work together and engage in critical thinking and decision making based on which area to highlight in the public service announcement, which strategies to include in their complete project, and which form of digital media to use. The teacher supports the students as they engage in problem solving.

Approaching: The students use existing and self-generated knowledge by completing the water usage survey and analyzing the results of the survey. They brainstorm ideas as a group and reflect on their creative and innovative suggestions for water growth as well as determining more effective ways to promote their ideas. They have complete freedom to choose which conservation ideas to highlight, create their own public service announcements and creatively decide how to portray their ideas. Some groups used their creativity to create commercials using ideas, visual displays, and props to enhance their ideas. They were able to further enhance their products using audio accompaniment.

TIPC Ratings

Students utilize the Big 6 research method to determine accuracy and authority of sources. Students select their own tools in order to synthesize and present information.

The teacher provides some opportunities for students work in groups. Students are instructed on how to locate and contact experts in the field for their specific products as they seek information.

The teacher has posed a difficult question requiring lots of research and thought. The students must develop questions to guide research. They will select appropriate digital tools and address an authentic problem. The solutions can be applied to everyday experiences. Students must reflect on the inquiry process and set goals for future growth.

Students are asked to analyze a wide variety of information as they complete a cost-benefit analysis. Students have the opportunity to create original products that exceed assignment requirements.

TIPC Ratings

Approaching: Even though the students only briefly research the events of the BP Oil Spill, they did so independently and used individually-generated questions created from the ActivEngage activity. They evaluate the sources for authenticity, cite their work, and share their findings with their peers through the use of the blog–establishing a common location for findings that students can reference throughout the activity.

Students work in teams and collaborate with one another to brainstorm different ideas. They design and construct their solutions in teams, form the groups based on individual strengths and weaknesses, and determine norms and roles to maximize success. Additionally, they communicate through a blog with their teachers and peers.

Ideal/Target: The students work on an authentic problem that is related to current events. They are challenged to think critically about the task at hand and design a solution. They are also asked to reflect on their chosen solution and state what they would change to make it better. While working through the design brief, the students go through every step of the problem-solving process. They use digital and physical technology to problem solve and innovate, relying on their creativity while justifying their decisions.

The students are asked to use their prior knowledge of materials and think about them in a new way. They combine and alter materials to create an innovative item that serves their needs at the time. No two solutions to the problem are exactly the same. There is a great deal of creative risk involved, as the designed solution might fail miserably and they will need to “go back to the drawing board” to completely redesign their product. Some of their solutions might look similar to the ones the engineers attempted for the BP oil spill, but others are completely innovative and unique. After they have tested their solutions, they reflect on what parts of their item worked and where it failed.

TIPC Ratings

Approaching:
Some of my classes used the Britannica Elementary website and then were able to choose from a list of recommended sources. Other classes reviewed Britannica Elementary and then had free reign to choose another 2 sources that they cross-checked as reliable.

Developing:
Students gathered their own research and then worked together in student-selected groups to revise their products and finalize their projects. These projects will be shared with the class. In order to more effectively communicate their ideas to people outside of our classroom, they would need to upload their projects to an online source. This is a possibility, but has not been completed at this time.

Approaching:
Students used multiple sources to bring together a variety of information about a given topic and drew conclusions as to how that issue affects the environment and how that issue impacts the world through their relationship to the environment.

Approaching:
Students could choose the mode of presentation of their research, and they collaborated and played with different functions of the Promethean and PowerPoint programs to try to communicate their ideas to their classmates in the most creative way possible. Some of them used layering, revealing tools, and sound effects to accentuate their Promethean flipcharts, while others created unique transitions, graphics, and sounds in PowerPoint, and others played with creative language, imagery, and hooks in their essays. They all tried to include solutions to their environmental problems, some gathered from research and some self-created.

TIPC Ratings

This lesson falls into the entry level research and information fluency. Students used digital resources including websites, Read Out Loud, and the Promethean Board to perform teacher-led research into recycling.

This lesson falls into the low approaching level of communication and collaboration. Students collaborated in groups to carry out tasks, create products and author recycling slogans to be used at Henrico High School. The definition of the role depended on the intellectual disability of each student. They also communicated with the community at large sending letters out informing them of the initiative and requesting support for the project. The community collaborated by sending in recyclables that were used to create the school mascot.

This lesson falls into the developing level of critical thinking and problem solving. Students used digital tools to gain information about a concept and answered an open-ended question about that concept. During the process they developed their own questions about the concept of recycling which led them to create the original marketing campaign.

This lesson falls in the developing level of creativity and innovation. Students responded to the open-ended question: “What can you do in order to promote recycling?” by launching a full scale, school-wide campaign to raise awareness about recycling They created an original school mascot, adopted a slogan, and placed recycling containers around the school.

TIPC Ratings

Developing. Students selected websites to collect information needed to create banners and presentation to demonstrate why Lifestraw are needed in developing countries to provide the people with clean, safe drinking water.

Approaching. Students communicate beyond the classroom in collaboration with students from Romania and Germany using Elluminate. They use satellite images that are accurate for learning, but not in real time. Students share knowledge globally as they discuss their thoughts and answers regarding a biome in Brazil with the international students in the virtual lesson. Students work together in groups with a computer, select the appropriate tools for the Elluminate lesson, and discuss in class how it is not easy to solve real-world problems in regards to global impact on the environment. After the lesson, students coordinated a fundraiser to raise money to send Lifestraws to people in third world countries who have poor quality drinking water. Students collaborated and created a presentation along with an informative tag to attach to silly straws to be sold for a one dollar donation to go towards purchasing Lifestraws.

Approaching. Students answer open-ended questions about misconceptions of climate change, and use a variety of resources (satellite images, map coordinates, handout of information, Nasa website) to draw conclusions based on clear evidence. Students use the information they have learned about climate change to organize a fundraiser to sell silly straws to purchase Lifestraws for third world countries. They create presentations to encourage purchases of the Lifestraws by the student body.

Students collaborated in groups to create an original presentation that will inform the student body of their fundraiser to sell silly straw to encourage donation to purchase Lifestraws. Students also worked in groups to create their logging map in order to determine where illegal logging was taking place, and assess the damage done by illegal logging.

TIPC Ratings

Approaching – one of the cross-curricular benefits of this lesson is that it exposes the student to World Geography. The reason I rate this low for this category is that there is not a research component to this assignment directly; the Pandemic2 video game is one of the elements I use to introduce students to the concept of disease in order to gain their interest and give them a common point of reference for the unit.

Approaching: students use communication via in-class discussions about game play and then an MS Word document (their assigned paper) to describe their video game choices to me.

Target – As students are the infectious pathogen in this game, this assignment allows them to think like a pathogen: “how do I most effectively infect people,” “what are the most effective means of spreading,” “how can I mutate,” etc. Students use their evolution points earned by game play to spread their pathogen and infect the world.

Target – Students learn about pathogens by approaching the learning process using one of the most creative venues I can find: a video game. Every game is randomly selected, thus unique, so student play for each game is original and unlike anyone else’s gameplay in the class.

Student Artifact

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Contents:

• LESSON PLAN
• STUDENT HANDOUT AND QUESTIONS
• WRITING ASSIGNMENT

TIPC Ratings

Approaching: Students will research Maymont Park and its attractions. They will also learn how to use Google Earth as a means to share what they have learned. Because this project has a specific purpose, students must be limited in their research possibilities.

Approaching: Students will collaborate with teachers and teams to complete the project. They will need to seek out information from a variety of people in order to complete the project. Once the project is completed, students will need to meet with representatives to determine if sharing their tours online is possible.

Approaching: Students will need to find a variety of ways to get around the park. These paths need to cater to a variety of individuals who are at different levels of ability. Students will need to assess the path they originally planned and make changes as needed to keep with their initial group (leisurely, moderate, brisk)

Approaching: Students will create tours that can be used by anyone to plan a trip to Maymont. This process allows alternative students to experiment with new programs and create products that can be utilized by people who want to start a walking program or who just want to see what the park has to offer.

TIPC Ratings

This lesson is an example of the Approaching level of Research and Information Fluency. Students determined which digital tool(s) they would use in order to assemble and present their issues. While developing their product, students had to evaluate and use unbiased information or explain the biases that were discovered. Students learned how to use library search tools and data bases in order to use advanced research tools to obtain current information from scientific journals (peer reviewed). Students evaluated web sites to locate authors and years updated.

This lesson is an example of the Approaching level of Communication and Collaboration. Students provided evidence of their ethical communication skills in the projects that they created. All students shared their information with their peers while some shared their works globally through WikiSpaces. In collaborative teams, students created original works. These works evaluated the need to solve ecological global problems.

This lesson is an example of the Approaching level of Critical Thinking and Problem Solving. Using multiple resources, students determined the impact of their issue on our world. Suggestions were made for improvements in human activities in order to better protect our resources. The open-ended question of what will happen to our world if ecological issues are not improved was answered by each research group. In determining the world leader on each issue, students evaluated solutions to real world problems of environmental degradation.

This lesson is an example of the Approaching level of Creativity and Innovation. As student groups developed their presentation product, creative skills were used to include attention grabbing techniques. Suggestions for improving our environment were provided in each product. Several products could be used as teaching aids in high school biology classes.

TIPC Ratings

Ideal/Target: Students conduct hands-on experimental research as they measure and calculate the surface area of their tissue boxes, and internet research to find more data about tissue brands.

Approaching: Students work in pairs and later in groups to measure, calculate and research, as well as creating and performing commercials together. They need to communicate and collaborate to complete these tasks. The teacher also collaborates with the ITRT and librarians to teach the lesson.

Ideal/Target: Students apply many mathematical concepts and skills to an authentic problem. As with most authentic tasks, this one proves to be complex and multifaceted, requiring students to think critically and consider many factors that could make tissues more or less friendly to the environment.

Approaching: This lesson incorporates technology in many ways and connects the physical hands-on to the abstract.