5.+Using+Innovative+Tech.

=Link to Slideshare Slidecast of my "Teacher Talk" for the below lesson plans for a political cartoon wiki.= =media type="custom" key="8503676"= = = =--= = = =Creating Innovative Uses of Technology:= =An Individual Project= =Class Wiki of Political Cartoons Lesson Plan= =By: Martha Ross=

Rationale
While preparing my middle school students for the social studies MEAP this year I used the material provided to help my students gain an understanding of what was to be expected on the test. During this preparation I was confronted with political cartoons. Some of these cartoons were easy to decipher, others took quite a bit of insight and knowledge of the “times” of when these cartoons were written. My students had difficult time understanding the underlying meaning of the cartoons. I thought that developing a class wiki where the students can post a political cartoon found on the internet and then analyze it based on a series of questions would create a class repository. The class wiki will house all of the political cartoons so that students can then go visit them at any time during the class and start to develop and understanding of the concept of political cartoons. The students could then add recent political cartoons through out the year.

1. A brief description of #1 lesson plan.
Lesson #1 will be the introduction of the class wiki of which I will have already created. The students will be invited through email accounts at school. This introduction will go into the premise behind the wiki, using Wikipedia as an example to help them understand how significant a wiki can be. I will show them how to navigate through the class wiki and how to create and edit pages. I will model how to access the MS Word document that has all of the cartoon analysis questions and how to copy and paste between MS Word and the wiki. I will also demonstrate to them how to Google for appropriate political cartoons and copy and paste onto a page into the class wiki. This lesson #1 will lay the ground work through demonstration and modeling that will prepare the students to work alone (or in pairs) to accomplish this project.

2. The technology and resources involved (e.g. facility, network, equipment, software, online program, and websites’ URLs)
The technology for this lesson would require a computer with internet access and access to the wikispaces website ( www.wikispaces.com ). Also, each student would have to an email account. Each student would need to have access to the class wiki with the proper editing rights assigned to their email accounts.

The teacher would also need to have an Epson projector to display the class wiki and to demonstrate how the class wiki is set up and how the students would create and edit a wiki page.

The software that would be required would be MS Word so that the students have access to the cartoon analysis document so that they can answer the questions and then copy and paste from MS Word to their wiki page.

3. What skills, knowledge, and pedagogy are required of teachers?
The skills a teacher would need would be to be able to navigate the internet and create a class wikispace. The teacher must also have the skills to create a MS Word document and be able to copy and paste from MS Word to the wikipages.

Also, the teacher would need the knowledge of how to invite members to join the class wiki based on their email accounts. The teacher must also have the knowledge to give them access rights that allow for the students to edit the wiki and create their own pages.

The pedagogy that a teacher would require is to first determine the skill of each of the students in relation to their understanding of the computer. Once the teacher is confident that the students have the basic skills on the computer then the teacher would need to be able to successfully demonstrate how to use the wiki. Using demonstration the teacher can explain how to access their email accounts and accept the invitation to the class wiki. The teacher can explain on the Epson how to create and edit the wikipages. The teacher needs to strategize how best the students will understand this task. Teachers might opt to put students in pairs to create wiki pages if their skills are not sufficient alone.

4. What prior skills and knowledge are required of students?
Students will need to have common knowledge of computers and their email accounts. The students should have knowledge of the internet and how to navigate.

5. What are students asked to do exactly (product or process)?
Students will be asked to listen to the concept and explanation of a wiki. They will watch the demonstration of the class wiki by the teacher.

The students will need to access their email accounts and accept the invitation of the teacher to the class wiki. The students will then be asked to access the class wiki and experiment creating pages and editing pages.

Students will begin searching for a political cartoon to analyze by using a Google search.

6. What are the procedures of the project (steps to teach the technology skills)?
The procedure to teach the concepts of the wiki would be through modeling the wiki on the Epson projector to demonstrate how to access the class wiki. Then after demonstrating the class wiki go through the steps of creating and editing the pages of the class wiki.

Once the wiki has been sufficiently modeled and all questions have been answered then I would then demonstrate how to search for a political cartoon and paste it into the wiki.

I would finally open the MS Word cartoon analysis document and go through how to answer the questions and save the document under a different name. Also I would then copy and paste into the class wiki.

Once the modeling of the lesson is complete I would then go ahead and let the students’ access their email accounts and accept their invites to the class wiki. I would then let the students explore independently and answer any questions they might have as I circulate through the room.

7. What are the advantages of the project?
The advantage for this project is that the students now have the background behind the concept of a wiki. The student will be well versed in understanding how to use the class wiki and that it can be a repository for several political cartoons that they can look up and analyze whenever they have time in class. They will also know how to copy and paste between applications that can be used with all other types of applications that students would encounter in the future.

8. What are the disadvantages of the project?
The disadvantage of this project is that the students might be exploring instead of watching the demonstration of the teacher. The students should not be allowed access to their computers until the teacher has completed modeling the class wiki, MS Word document and the Google search.

Another disadvantage is that the students might feel overwhelmed by the requirements of this project if they do not have the basic computer skills to start with. That is why I suggest putting students into pairs to accomplish this task if that is the case.

9. What types of effective instructional strategies are included?
Modeling is an effective part of this instructional strategy for this lesson. Students are watching the teacher model the use of the wiki and how to create and edit pages within the wiki on the Epson projector.

Then the next type of effective instructional strategy is independent discovery by the student as they are given time in this lesson to explore the class wiki and the internet for the political cartoons. This discovery helps to aide the students in the learning process for future use.

This lesson #1 will lay the ground work through demonstration and student exploration of trial and error to create and edit pages in the wiki.

10. What are the possibilities that the innovation can be transferred to other teachers, subject content, and different school settings?
The possibilities of the technology innovation of a class wiki are limitless. If a teacher creates the wiki, the wiki could be used by all content areas and various school settings. By modeling the class wiki in this lesson the teacher enforces to the students the ease and flexibility of a wiki in the classroom setting.

1. A brief description of #2 lesson plan
Lesson #2 will be where the students actually apply their new knowledge in the class wiki. After the previous lesson where the students viewed the demonstration of the class wiki and gained access to the wiki with time to explore, now the students will apply their new knowledge. The students will search for a political cartoon through Google. Copy and paste the cartoon onto the student’s newly created wiki page on the class wiki. The students will access the MS Word cartoon analysis document and answer the questions. The students will copy and paste their answers to the class wiki to complete the process.

2. The technology and resources involved (e.g. facility, network, equipment, software, online program, and websites’ URLs)
The technology for this lesson would require a computer for each student (or pair of students) with internet access and access to the class wikispaces website. Also, each student would need to have the proper editing rights to the class wiki.

The software that would be required would be MS Word so that the students have access to the cartoon analysis document so that they can answer the questions and then copy and paste from MS Word to their wiki page.

It would probably be a good idea to have an Epson projector for the teacher to display the class wiki and to be able to demonstrate the class wiki if the students need a re-teach of lesson #1.

3. What skills, knowledge, and pedagogy are required of teachers?
The skills of the teacher would be to circulate through the class and be able to recognize those students that need assistance. The teacher should have the knowledge to be able to show students on their own computer how to navigate to the class wiki and login. Also the teacher should be able to show students how to copy and paste from MS Word or the internet.

Direct instruction would be required for the teacher to re-teach the students on their own computers.

4. What prior skills and knowledge are required of students?
Students will need to have common knowledge of computers and the class wiki. This knowledge would come from Lesson #1. The students will also need to know how to open a MS Word document and save the document under a different name. They will need to know how to copy and paste between MS Word and the class wiki. The students will need to know how to Google an educational political cartoon.

5. What are students asked to do exactly (product or process)?
Students are asked to Google the internet for a political cartoon and then copy and paste that cartoon to their page that they have created in the class wiki. The student must then be able to open the MS Word cartoon analysis document and answer the questions based on their political cartoon. The student should then save the document with a new name and then copy and paste the document to their page in the class wiki.

6. What are the procedures of the project (steps to teach the technology skills)?
The steps to teaching the wiki and copying and pasting have been completed in the previous lesson by modeling and demonstration. The teacher demonstrated the steps and then time was given for the students to explore the class wiki, MS Word and the internet for cartoons.

If students are having trouble completing this lesson the teacher could circulate the room and directly teach the students with the tasks that they are having trouble with accomplishing.

The teacher could also use the Epson projector to re-teach to the entire class a step that is causing problems to several students.

7. What are the advantages of the project?
The advantage of this project is that the students will have the skills to use in other applications and other situations. By actually applying their new skills to the class wiki such as creating a wiki page and copying and pasting the students will know how to accomplish the tasks in the future and may even want to use this technology for another class project. The advantage of hands on learning is significant to the student’s retention of the lesson and their desire to use the technology again. The students should also know how to analyze a political cartoon.

8. What are the disadvantages of the project?
A disadvantage of this project is that the students might only consider using a wiki if they have one that is created for them to use instead of trying to create a wiki for their own projects. Also, if the students are lacking the basic computer skills this project could be too advanced for them and the instead of being successful students might become frustrated with the steps and give up.

9. What types of effective instructional strategies are included?
The type of effective instructional strategy that is prevalent in lesson #2 is independent discovery. Students are given time in this lesson to create and edit the class wiki. They are exploring the internet for the political cartoons. This discovery helps to aide the students in the learning process for future use because they know they accomplished the tasks themselves.

Cooperative learning is also an effective instructional strategy if the teacher has placed the students in pairs or groups to help them complete this project.

Direct instruction is an effective instructional strategy that the teacher would use to help the students that need help through the process of this lesson.

Modeling could be used as an effective part of this instructional strategy if the students need to watch the demonstration of the wiki and how to create and edit pages again.

10. What are the possibilities that the innovation can be transferred to other teachers, subject content, and different school settings?
The possibilities of the technology innovation of a class wiki with student contributions are endless. If a teacher creates the wiki and the student know how to add relevant material to the class wiki it could be used in all content areas. As long as the schools have computers with access to the internet then it could be used in all types of settings from k-12. Having the students actually apply their knowledge and edit the class wiki in this lesson the teacher enforces to the students the ease and flexibility of a wiki in the classroom setting.