January 7, 2009 Dear Parents: Our habitats capstone project has begun. This note is going to be lengthy but hope you will take the time to read through and know some of the things that your children will be doing for the project that will be videotaped and photographed along the way. Great websites for Georgia Habitats and Symbols http://homeschooling.about.com/cs/unitssubjgeog/a/susga.htm www.georgia.gov/00/channel_title/0,2094,4802_15173574,00.html www.enchantedlearning.com/usa/states/georgia/ www.newgeorgiaencyclopeida.org www.cobb.k12.ga.us/~bullard/Computer%20Lab/Georgia%20habhttp://naturalhistory.uga.edu/~ GMNH/habitats/habitats.htmitats.htm http://www.valdosta.edu/~mgvaldez/topic.html#One http://www.lilburnes.org/Students/Habitats/index.htm http://museum.nhm.uga.edu/htmldocs/scienceboxes/explokithabitats.htm www.uga.edu/gardenclub/m2s/mountains.html www.valdosta.edu/~lmterry/topic.html Who is doing what diorama and Groups for Powerpoints. (If student wishes to do an individual Powerpoint they will get extra credit). BLUE RIDGE COASTAL PLAIN RIDGE AND VALLEY ISLANDS PIEDMONT CUMBERLAND D’Anne Braydon Connor D. Nicole Emma Jacob Nicholas Camille Faith Maci Mya Ashlea Valeria Kieran J.J. Matthew BARRIER Addison Callie Conner E. Above are websites that might help you complete the habitat diorama project that is due next Thursday, January 15, 2009. Student will use the information that they acquire from the diorama project to complete an individual or group Powerpoint. The facilitator will give the students various projects based on Georgia Symbols (need to do 1/7/09), Land Regions and Landforms (completed a Powerpoint presentation) which will address all standards that will encompass habitats. This will prepare the students for the next nine weeks when we begin to work on the Georgia Habitat unit. The Georgia Habitat project encompasses differentiating between habitats of Georgia and the organisms that live in each of the five land regions. Students will need to research the animals and plants indigenous to a particular area. The instructor will place students into cooperative learning groups, based on their specific interest. They will need to research the five regions of Georgia more in detail as this was a unit from social studies that was previously touched upon. The groups of students will be creating a Power Point presentation of the various regions of Georgia. Students will give a complete description of the characteristics of the habitat. They will give the location of the habitat by incorporating a Georgia map. Students will include information on at least five animals and five plants supported by the habitats, specifically what makes the habitat a good “fit” for the animals and plants. Finally in their presentation, they will discuss the impact that humans and/or forces of nature have on the habitat and its ability to support the plants and animals. A rubric meeting the science and technology standards will be given to the students. Students will need to answer the weekly blogging essential questions in Wordpress. They will write a script and use the podcasting for doing their oral reports on their region. The students will create a daily research journal and then summarize the material into a hard copy using Microsoft Word and will save this material to their flashdrive. The groups will use Photo Story to create a digital diorama of their regions. The student groups will write letters, via Microsoft Word, to the Georgia Wildlife Action Plan and Georgia Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Groups about saving and protecting endangered animals in their specific area. A digital movie, using Movie Maker 3, will be created by the students to document the process of growth in technology as well as, mastery of the habitat standards. The movie will be presented to other classes and their parents. Their work will be linked to the website, via Share Point, for all to view. The teacher will be creating flipcharts of material that will guide the students through the five regions and give them some further insight on the standards that are important. The facilitator will create assessments via the Promethean board and use of Activotes. The Activotes, for a rapid response to the questions, will allow me a further means to evaluate learning while ensuring a high level of engagement on the part of my students. We will be able to graph the results and the facilitator will know who has mastered the standard. The final technology projects will be another way for the teacher to assess the students’ mastery. In the last nine weeks of school we will review what we learned and continue using the technology. The teacher hopes that this capstone project will be a positive, memorable activity for her third grade class. It should help the students make that all important shift toward taking an active role in their own learning. Monthly: Create different digital Photo Stories, i.e., All About Me, Georgia Symbols, and Georgia Habitats. Podcasting –creating oral book reports, resource based papers and writing scripts on various topics which are standard based. Power Point presentations. The groups of students will be creating a Power Point presentation of the various land regions of Georgia, Georgia symbols, Landforms and Famous People. Culminating activity: Power Point Presentation. The groups of students will be creating a Power Point presentation of the various land regions of Georgia. Students will give a complete description of the characteristics of the habitat. They will give the location of the habitat by incorporating a Georgia map. Students will include information on at least five animals and five plants supported by the habitats, specifically what makes the habitat a good “fit” for the animals and plants. Finally in their presentation, they will discuss the impact that humans and/or forces of nature have on the habitat and its ability to support the plants and animals. Students will create a Digital Movie using Movie Maker 3 to document the process of growth in technology. The movie will be presented to other classes and their parents. Their work will be linked to my website, via SharePoint, for all to view. Evaluation/Assessment Procedures: The students will be evaluated over each nine weeks. A rubric for each work to be produced (daily digital journal, blogging, podcasts, digital movies, Power Point project, and digital movie) will be given to each student and posted on my website for the parents to view. These rubrics will state the expectations of the project. Teacher notes, observations and promethean board projected quizzes as well as traditional quizzes will be given. The final project and grade will be based on the Digital Movie created on Georgia Habitats. LoTi Level (beginning of Teach21 program): 3 Perceived LotTi Level of this project: 5 If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to e-mail me or call me. Thank you, Josephine Modica