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Steve Sapere FRIT 7136: Reference and Information Sources Dr. Judi Repman Information Literacy Lesson Plan Fall 2010

Pathfinder URL: http://theunquietlibrary.libguides.com/kennedy-romanticism

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Action Example Template GRADE/TEACHER(S): 11th Grade American Literature & Composition: Mr. Sapere (Media Specialist), Ms. Kennedy (Language Arts Instructor) and Ms. McArthur (Special Education CoTeacher) CONTENT TOPIC: American Romanticism Group Project STANDARDS FOR THE 21 -CENTURY LEARNER GOALS: Standard 3: Share knowledge and participate ethically and productively as members of our democratic society. Standard 2: Draw conclusions, make informed decisions, apply knowledge to new situations, and create new knowledge. Skills Indicator(s): 3.1.4 Use technology and other information tools to organize and display knowledge and understanding in ways that others can use, view and assess. 2.1.4 Use technology and other information tools to analyze and organize information. 2.1.5 Collaborate with others to exchange ideas, develop new understandings, make decisions, and solve problems. Benchmark(s): -Use a variety of media and formats to communicate information and ideas effectively to multiple audiences. -Participate in discussions to analyze information problems to suggest solutions. -Work with others to select, organize and integrate information and ideas from a variety of sources and formats. -Use online environments or other collaborative tools to facilitate design and development of materials, models, publications and presentations. -Use web-based and other technology tools to show connections and patterns in the ideas and information collected. - Use locally available and web-based interactive presentation and production tools to enhance creativity in effectively organizing and communicating information.
ST

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Dispositions Indicator(s): 1.2.3 Demonstrate creativity by using multiple resources and formats 3.2.3 Demonstrate teamwork by working productively with others Responsibilities Indicator(s): 1.3.4 Contribute to the exchange of ideas within the learning community Self-Assessment Strategies Indicator(s): 3.4.1 Assess the process by which learning was achieved in order to revise strategies and learn more effectively in the future. 3.4.2 Assess the quality and effectiveness of the learning product. CONNECTION TO LOCAL OR STATE STANDARDS ELAALRL1 The student demonstrates comprehension by identifying evidence (i.e., examples of diction, imagery, point of view, figurative language, symbolism, plot events and main ideas) in a variety of texts representative of different genres (i.e., poetry, prose [short story, novel, essay, editorial, biography], and drama) and using this evidence as the basis for interpretation. The student identifies, analyzes, and applies knowledge of the structures and elements of American fiction and provides evidence from the text to support understanding; the student: a. Locates and analyzes such elements in fiction as language and style, character development, point of view, irony, and structures (i.e., chronological, in medias res, flashback, frame narrative, epistolary narrative) in works of American fiction from different time periods. b. Identifies and analyzes patterns of imagery or symbolism. c. Relates identified elements in fiction to theme or underlying meaning. d. Analyzes, evaluates, and applies knowledge of the ways authors use techniques and elements in fiction for rhetorical and aesthetic purposes. e. Analyzes the influence of mythic, traditional, or classical literature on American literature. f. Traces the history of the development of American fiction. The student identifies and analyzes elements of poetry from various periods of American literature and provides evidence from the text to support understanding; the student: a. Identifies, responds to, and analyzes the effects of diction, tone, mood, syntax, sound, form, figurative language, and structure of poems as these elements relate to meaning. i. sound: alliteration, end rhyme, slant rhyme, internal rhyme, consonance, assonance ii. form: fixed and free, lyric, ballad, sonnet, narrative poem, blank verse

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iii. figurative language: personification, imagery, metaphor, conceit, simile, metonymy, synecdoche, hyperbole, symbolism, allusion b. Analyzes and evaluates the effects of diction and imagery (i.e., controlling images, figurative language, extended metaphor, understatement, hyperbole, irony, paradox, and tone) as they relate to underlying meaning. c. Traces the historical development of poetic styles and forms in American literature. ELA11LSV1 The student participates in student-to-teacher, student-to-student, and group verbal interactions. The student a. Initiates new topics in addition to responding to adult-initiated topics. b. Asks relevant questions. c. Responds to questions with appropriate information. d. Actively solicits another persons comments or opinion. e. Offers own opinion forcefully without domineering. f. Volunteers contributions and responds when directly solicited by teacher or discussion leader. g. Gives reasons in support of opinions expressed. h. Clarifies, illustrates, or expands on a response when asked to do so; asks classmates for similar expansions. i. Employ group decision-making techniques such as brainstorming or a problem-solving sequence (i.e., recognizes problem, defines problem, identifies possible solutions, selects optimal solution, implements solution, evaluates solution). j. Divides labor so as to achieve the overall group goal efficiently. OVERVIEW: This unit was designed for an 11th grade American Literature class, specifically a CoTaught class consisting of both regular education and special education students. The students are beginning a unit on the Romantic period of American Literature. In order to expose the students to a variety of Romantic works, including short stories, poetry and art, the class has been divided into groups, each group focusing on a single work by one Romantic author or artist. Within their groups, students will be reading and analyzing a work by their assigned author, as well as completing a variety of activities. Key among these tasks is the identification of the Romantic qualities of the work, as well as the significant literary elements present in the work. Additionally, students will be responding to comprehension and analysis questions about their chosen work. The culminating task for each group is to create a presentation using a web 2.0 presentation tool with which they can organize and display their findings to the class at large. Student presentations will then be evaluated by the instructors and the media specialist. Additionally, students will be asked to reflect on their own learning process, as well as evaluating the effectiveness of their own and their classmates performance as a member of a group.

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In order to accommodate the needs of the broad spectrum of learners in this co-taught class, students will be placed into ability groups. This will be done in order to differentiate instruction, challenging all students, including those who currently exceed curriculum standards, those who currently meet standards, and those who are currently performing below grade level, as well as those with a variety of special needs. The object is to increase the pace and raise the level of instruction for high achievers and to provide more individual attention, repetition, and review for low achievers. All students will be working on skills such as working independently, being an active learner, and analyzing a text for meaning. Each group will be assigned a task that is equal to their reading and skill level and given activities that will meet the learning goal, but also challenge them at the same time. Finally, the same consideration will be used as a rationale for assigning the various presentation software tools to each group. Before coming to the media center, the classroom teacher will introduce the students to the Romantic Period of American Literature. The teacher, in conjunction with the media specialist, will then introduce the project to the class, using Washington Irvings short story The Devil and Tom Walker as an example. The teacher will show the students a sample presentation over the work, which was done using Prezi presentation software. Via the classroom SmartBoard, the media specialist will orient the students to the resources available on the pathfinder page, which was constructed by the media specialist with input from the classroom teacher. The media specialists role in this process will be to teach students how to access the information they will need to complete their projects. More importantly, the media specialist will be instructing the students in a variety of ways to effectively organize and display their knowledge using web 2.0 presentation tools. Students will be using a number of online presentation methods, including Juxio, Prezi, Mind42, Mindomo, Mindmeister and Glogster. FINAL PRODUCT: Students will develop presentations based on the information they have gathered about their assigned author and work of literature or art, including the key facts of the work, literary elements, author background, and the Romantic characteristics of the work. Students will use the presentation method assigned to their group (either Juxio, Prezi, Mind42, Mindomo, Mindmeister or Glogster) in order to organize and share their new knowledge with the class. LIBRARY LESSON(S): Students will work with the media specialist in a series of 7 8 55-minute class periods. In the first of these sessions, the media specialist will orient students to resources available on the pathfinder page, as well as sharing a sample of a completed presentation. In the remaining sessions, the media specialist will work with individual student groups on the creation of their presentations. The students will work collaboratively within their groups to gather the

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necessary information, discuss, plan and organize that information, and create their presentations. At the conclusion of the sessions, students will evaluate the performance of their group members, as well as reflecting on their learning experience in this unit of instruction. ASSESSMENT Product: Instructors (lead teacher, media specialist and special education co-teacher) will evaluate the final products of each group following a simple rubric designed collaboratively by the teacher and the media specialist. The rubric includes criteria on organization, subject knowledge, mechanics, presentation, identification of literary elements and effectiveness of technology use.

A copy of this rubric is available in Appendix A of this document, in addition to being linked from the pathfinder page. Process: Instructor and media specialist observe student groups as they work and do informal spot checks against portions of the final product rubric to gauge student progress. Instructor and media specialist are continually available to coach students and answer questions throughout the process. In addition, teacher and media specialist examine student work (questions, worksheets, graphic organizers and other assigned activities) each day to assess student understanding of assigned readings, Romantic characteristics and literary elements. Finally, students have the option of submitting question slips upon exit each day as a way of asking for help with any aspect of the process they were having difficulty with.

Student self-questioning: All students will respond individually to the following reflective questions:

1. Name one thing you learned from the project that you didn't know before. Do you think this will help you in the future? Why or why not? 2. What was the hardest part of the project? Why? 3. What was your favorite part of the project? Why? 4. How did you feel about the Technology that you used (Glogster, Prezi, Mind 42, etc.)? Was it helpful? Why or why not? 5. If you could change one thing about the computer program that you used what would it be? Explain why.

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Student responses to these reflective questions are available at the following link: http://kennedy-period2.wikispaces.com/message/view/Romantic+Projects/30042433 Additionally, video interviews of student reflections are available on a separate tab of the pathfinder page. Students were also asked to evaluate their own performance, as well as that of their group members across several criteria, including their contributions to the group and their effectiveness as a group member.

A copy of this rubric is available in Appendix B of this document, in addition to being linked to the pathfinder page. INSTRUCTIONAL PLAN Resources students will use: Research pathfinder (created by media specialist using LibGuides software) Websites, including presentation software sites Subscription databases Course textbook Non-print materials Other: handouts, worksheets, graphic organizers provided by teacher and media specialist; *copies of all of these are available on the pathfinder page created for this unit of instruction

Instruction/activities: Direct instruction: The media specialist introduces and orients students to the features and resources of the research pathfinder which was created by the media specialist with input from the classroom teacher. Additionally, the media specialist briefly demonstrates the assigned presentation software for each instructional group. Modeling and guided practice: The media specialist works with each instructional group to facilitate their learning and use of their assigned presentation software program. This process may include further demonstration, but certainly will include responding to student questions, critiquing students presentations in progress, and making suggestions for additions or changes to presentations in order to take best advantage of the features of the groups assigned presentation software program.

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Independent practice: Student groups use independent time to read and analyze their assigned work of literature, gather biographical information about their author, and identify the characteristics of Romanticism within their assigned work. Using this information, student groups work collaboratively to create a presentation using a web 2.0 presentation tool which is organized and effectively employs technology to display their new knowledge in an accessible and useful way. Sharing and reflecting: Student groups will present their final products to the class at large via the classroom SmartBoard. Instructors and media specialist will evaluate student presentations against the rubric, while class members will provide informal critiques of other groups presentations. ASSESSMENT OF STUDENT LEARNING Student learning was assessed both during and after the unit by a variety of means. Informal spot checks and examination of daily work provided opportunities for the instructors to determine what parts of the assignment needed to be re-taught. Students tended to need reminders about including complete information in their presentations. Additionally, many of the groups had difficulty with at least a few of the tasks that required analysis of their assigned work. By examining their work in progress and questioning them, instructors were able to lead students to the correct information, resulting in a stronger final product. The final product of each group was evaluated against the project rubric (available in Appendix A). By and large, students met or exceeded the standards of this rubric, particularly in the areas of organization, subject knowledge, literary element identification and information literacy. Final products exhibited adequate-to-effective use of technology (in this case, the assigned web 2.0 presentation software) to organize and present the required information in a usable format. A common area of struggle for most of the groups was presentation/delivery. Students also responded to self-evaluative reflection questions as a further assessment of their learning. A majority of students reported that they came away from the experience with some new knowledge, and that the use of technology was a helpful tool. As a final assessment, students were asked to evaluate their effectiveness as group members, as well as their classmates. The feedback here was interesting. The majority of students rated their classmates very highly across all categories on the rubric. Many students gave higher ratings to their classmates than they did to themselves. By and large this feedback from the groups reinforced what we, as collaborating instructors observed: most of the groups worked together effectively to arrive at their final products.

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REFLECTION When I first looked at this assignment, my initial plan was to work from my area of academic comfort and experience, which is English/Language Arts. Fortunately, I have been in the same school for five years now, and for the last three of those years have served in the role of a special education co-teacher. This has allowed me the opportunity to work with and get to know many of our English teachers. I approached several of them back in the early stages of the semester to see who might be interested in incorporating my assignment needs into their classroom instruction. As luck would have it, a teacher with whom I had a previous successful co-teaching experience had an idea for a lesson in which she wanted to incorporate technology, and she and I made plans to discuss the possibility of collaborating. Fortunately, this teacher is very comfortable with web 2.0 technologies, and is willing to take risks and step outside the box when it comes to using technology as part of her instruction. Because we had worked together successfully before in teaching the American Literature and Composition GPS curriculum to two different co-taught classes, our collaboration on this project almost felt like cheating. She and I work very well together, and planning and delivering this lesson proved to be a very enjoyable and productive experience. I wish I had some pitfalls or disasters to write about regarding the collaboration to make this part of my reflection more interesting, but everything went very smoothly. Lisa and I communicated regularly via e-mail, as well as having several face-to-face meetings both during and after the school day, as well as daily during the implementation of the lesson. I supplied her with the link to the pathfinder page so that she could access it as I created it and make suggestions and provide additional materials for me to add to it. Lisa was also able to use the pathfinder with her other American Literature sections, which wound up being a bit of a bonus for her. We discussed the assignment she had in mind, and brainstormed about the best way to incorporate web 2.0 presentation software as a means for our students to organize and display their work. We also discussed assessment, and worked together on developing a rubric to evaluate the students final products that would meet our individual needs. As part of our assessments, we worked together to develop self-evaluative reflective questions and a group effectiveness self-and-peer-assessment. We arranged to work together with her 2nd period class, a co-taught section of American Literature. This period is my planning/prep period, so I was available to come to work with the class on 8 of the 9 days over which the unit lasted. As far as the actual delivery of instruction and the instructional process itself, this also went very smoothly. Lisa and I did a good job (if I say so myself) of reprising our previous roles as co-teachers. We shared instruction and interacted with the students equally on each day but the one I was not present (I had to attend a meeting during my planning time). We also had the assistance of the special education coteacher for the majority of the class periods. Students were receptive to my instruction, and felt

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comfortable asking questions of both the teacher and the media specialist. Fortunately, the majority of the class was genuinely interested in the project, in large part due to the incorporation of the technology component (in my opinion). The arrangement of the class into ability groups wound up being an effective strategy. Interestingly, the top group seemed to lose focus often and needed to be redirected. By contrast, the lower groups seemed to work together better and try harder, perhaps because they were not in a situation where they could rely on a smarter classmate to carry the group. It was amusing to watch one of the lower groups deliberate over who would take on each role in the group: well, somebodys gotta do something one of them commented after they spent literally 5-8 minutes staring at each other and the assignment handout. Ultimately they worked things out, and wound up doing a good job on their assigned task. All of the groups made frequent use of the pathfinder, taking particular advantage of the links to analysis of their assigned literary works. A few students needed a little direction with the pathfinder, but these were isolated incidences; the LibGuides program really makes creating a user-friendly pathfinder easy (my access to LibGuides was another part of this experience that felt like cheating, quite honestly). Fortunately we did not suffer any major technical difficulties with computers, websites or our schools network, which has been known to be uncooperative at times. Most of the troubleshooting I did was specific to the various web 2.0 presentation tools the students were using. To be honest, I probably learned as much as the students did about some of the tools I was quite the novice with a couple of the mind-mapping programs, not having had much previous experience using them. This was a nice by-product of the unit. I also learned a few things from Lisa, as she maintains wiki pages for each of her classes and I am still a bit inexperienced in the wiki arena. We were very pleased with the outcome of the unit. Ultimately, the students produced quality products which consisted of well-organized, accurate information. The one area where many of the groups fell short of the mark was presentation/delivery. As Lisa and I reflected, it might have been better to include some dedicated guided rehearsal time for the students before they delivered their final, graded presentation to the class at large. We could have done some informal dry runs with each group at their individual computer stations to give them some practice in presenting their products and work some of the bugs out. This might have resulted in a higher quality of performance than we actually saw when the students presented. Throughout the process, though, the students were (on the whole) engaged and asked insightful questions about the work they were doing. The majority of the groups were very functional, interacting with each other positively, collaborating and sharing responsibilities. We received some excellent reflective feedback from several of the students. Granted, not all of the responses we received (which you can read for yourself by following the link to the reflections contained in an earlier portion of this document) were this insightful, but I felt it important to share a few of them here:

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I learned that there are many other ways to present information besides doing a power point. My favorite part of the project was learning to work with the new programs. I thought the new program we used organized our thoughts and ideas well. Also I thought the program was helpful because it was easy to use. The Prezi was my favorite part because it opened my eyes to a new form of presentation besides power point and I like how Prezi changes things up in the presentation and makes the presentation more interesting and nowhere near as boring. I would probably change how one could add in more text in between what has already been placed in the Prezi because it gets confusing on how to reorganize the order in which you want the Prezi to flow, but other than that I would rather use prezi than power point. I learned how to make a Prezi. I believe that this will help me in the future because I will have to do a presentation in my job and in college. My favorite part of the project was listening to the ideas of my fellow group members. The Mindmapping was difficult to get used to because all the information was used in branch type form, but it is very helpful once it's all done.

Overall, I would rate this experience as a success. I think that the entire process from planning to implementation to evaluation was mutually beneficial for the teacher, media specialist, and most importantly, the students. Follow the link below to see our students final products as posted on Lisas 2nd period class wiki: http://kennedy-period2.wikispaces.com/Romantic+Projects A couple of technical difficulty notes: The presentation over Poes The Raven using Mind42 cannot be viewed full-screen as it is on the wiki page. The Ministers Black Veil Juxio presentation will not open/load.

In both of these cases the students were able to share their work by logging into their respective accounts directly and opening their presentations. Im sorry that you wont be able to view them.

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APPENDIX A Project Rubric

1 Audience cannot understand presentation because there is no sequence of information. Student does not have grasp of information; student could not provide a basic overview for the class. Student's presentation has four or more spelling errors and/or grammatical errors. Students mumble, incorrectly pronounce terms, and speak too quietly for students in the back of class to hear. No literary elements are identified or all elements are identified incorrectly with no examples. Handout does not give accurate information or provide a valid overview of the material. Inadequate use of technology and other information tools. Knowledge and understanding poorly organized and not displayed in ways that others can easily view, use, and assess. 2 Audience has difficulty following presentation because student jumps around. 3 Student presents information in logical sequence which audience can follow. 4 Student presents information in logical, interesting sequence which audience can easily follow. Student demonstrates full knowledge (more than required), provides the class with explanations and elaborates on the topic. Points

Organization

___/10

10 pts.

Subject Knowledge

20 pts.

Student is uncomfortable with information and is only able to provide a basic overview of the topic.

Student is at ease with the subject and provides a well planned overview of the topic.

___/20

Mechanics

10 pts.

Presentation has three misspellings and/or grammatical errors. Student's voice is low. Student incorrectly pronounces terms. Audience members have difficulty hearing presentation. Literary elements are identified, but some are incorrect or lacking valid examples from the text.

Presentation has no more than two misspellings and/or grammatical errors.

Presentation has no misspellings or grammatical errors.

___/10

Presentation

10 pts.

Student's voice is clear. Student pronounces most words correctly. Most audience members can hear presentation.

Student uses a clear voice and correct, precise pronunciation of terms so that all audience members can hear presentation. Literary elements are correctly identified and explained, and examples are provided with an in depth explanation of each. Handout demonstrates full knowledge of the subject matter and provides an overview that is clear, concise, and informative. Effective use of technology and other information tools. Knowledge and understanding are clearly organized in ways that others can readily view, use, and assess.

___/10

Identifying Literary Elements 20 pts.

Literary elements are identified correctly using valid examples from the text.

___/20

Handout or Guided Notes 10 pts.

Handout does give some accurate information, but does not provide a credible overview of the material. Minimal use of technology and other information tools. Knowledge and understanding are somewhat organized, and displayed in ways that others can minimally view, use, and assess.

Handout provides accurate information and a valid overview of all material.

___/10

*Information Literacy (Skill 3.1.4) 20 pts.

Adequate use of technology and other information tools. Knowledge and understanding are organized and displayed in ways that others can view, use, and assess.

___/20

Total Points _______/ 100

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APPENDIX B Group Member Evaluation

Final Group Member Evaluation Form 11th Grade American Literature Romantic Projects

Evaluate each member of your group (including yourself) in each of the areas listed below using a rating scale of 1 to 10. Group Literary Work ____________________________ Period ___________ Group Member Name: Group Member Name: Group Member Name Group Member Name

Group Member Evaluation Form Evaluation Items (1 to 10 Rating Scale): Group Meetings 1) Attendance at Class Meetings 2) Willingness to Cooperate at Meeting 3) Positive Attitude in Meetings

Your Name:

Group Member Name:

Effectiveness in Helping Complete the Project: 4) Understanding of Project 5) Skills in Helping with Problems and Suggesting Improvements

6) Personal Contribution to Project 7) Willingness to Contribute

Effectiveness as Member of Group: 8) Enthusiasm and Commitment 9) Teamwork and Cooperativeness 10) Carried Fair Share of Workload

Total Evaluation :

Additional Comments (use back if necessary): ______________________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________________