Evidence of standards, 21st-century skills, and effective pedagogy in the digital assignment exemplar Standards Reading (2): Determine

a theme or central idea of a text . . . including how it emerges and is shaped and refined by specific details . . . Writing (6): Use technology, including the Internet, to produce, publish, and update individual or shared writing products, taking advantage of technologys capacity to link to other information and to display information flexibly and dynamically. Writing (9): Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research. (The VoiceThread includes links to informational texts.) Speaking and Listening (1): Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions . . . with diverse partners on [grades 9 10] topics, texts, and issues, building on others ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively. Required Element 21 -Century Skills Critical thinking Creative thinking Collaboration & Communication Students analyze and evaluate book jacket design based on their understanding of literary and design elements. Students synthesize their understanding of literary elements in the novel with their understanding of design to create an original book jacket. Students build a collaborative understanding of design and literary elements through VoiceThread discussion; students collaborate on their original book jacket design. The analysis and evaluation stage of this assignment scaffolds the second stage, when students create original designs; the entire assignment scaffolds visual literacy for future multimodal assignments. Students apply their understanding of familiar literary elements, such as symbolism, mood, theme, and characterization, to visual texts. Students interact via the social medium of VoiceThread. Measures all target standards and skills, including collaboration, process (design decisions), and product (effectiveness of design in communicating meaning to target audience).
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Evidence in Assignment

Pedagogy Scaffolding

Rhetorical context Social context Assessment

Note: The standards are taken from the CCSS for ELA (NGA & CCSSO, 2010); the numbers in the parentheses correspond to the numbers of the standards. The secondary ELA comprise hundreds of expected outcomes spread over seven grade levels; this project is just a small sample of ways that digital literacies and other 21st century competencies can integrate with standards. The standards listed are particular to this assignment; many more would be addressed during the novel.