Digging Up the Past
As
a middle school teacher I feel like collaboration becomes
second nature and is a must in the toolbox of competencies.
I teach with a team that consists of a math, social
studies, science, special education and language arts teacher.
We have common planning daily and we try to integrate as much
as possible. This takes time as we do our curriculum mapping
and consolidated plans. We try to pull in as many community
resources as possible as we plan to make the learning more
authentic. I
always felt as a middle school teacher I collaborated pretty
well but during the summer of 2002 in Dr.
Forman’s CSC 570 class entitled Presentations,
Publications and the WWW I enhanced my skills in collaboration
while creating my Digging
Up the Past web
quest.
As
the year begins the science, social studies teacher and I
integrate in a Prehistoric unit.
We take a trip to the
Falls
of the Ohio to study the fossils and to study the
long history of man that took place at the Falls. The students
discuss fossils and geological history before they go to the
Falls in Science. In Social Studies, they discuss why humans
settled at river ways and the progression of man. And in
Language Arts we discuss the research and work it takes to
write historical fiction.
Before
we go we always read an example of historical fiction called Dom
and Va. Dom and Va was written by an English writer by the
name of John
Christopher. The book is set in the Prehistoric time
period when both Neolithic and Paleolithic tribes lived the
savanna of Africa. As we read the book we discuss all the
research Christopher must have done to make the book
authentic. We used Christopher’s book as a model to write
our own historical fiction story set in the Falls during the
Native American or Explorers period. We go the Falls to
experience the setting and to research in the museum for the
time period they choose. We had read the book for several
years and wrote the story. I never felt confident that the
students really understood the research involved or understood
the Prehistoric age before they went to the Falls.
During
the summer of 2002 I was preparing for the first quarter as I
took my last classes of the summer. When I was given the
assignment to create a web site, I decided to create a web
quest to help teach the Falls unit. I decided that it would
act as an introductory project that we would do to first learn
about Paleolithic and Neolithic tribes and the effort it takes
to research to create historical fiction. Before we read
Dom and we do the web quest. The task is set
that John Christopher is trying to research prehistoric man to
have information to write his book Dom and Va. Each
group is given a time period and a focus of social
interaction, diet or living conditions. Each member is given a
role and they must prepare a presentation and a PowerPoint
show to present Mr. Christopher. The students then go to a
score of different websites to research their specialty.
I believe this web quest is my finest example of
integration and collaboration. After creating it I feel I
understand more the meaning of authentic interdisciplinary
instruction that really added to a unit to make it stronger.
After the introductory project we read Dom and Va and
duplicate the process of researching that we did for
Christopher. View
Digging
Up The Past.
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