Project description
- 1. Project Description We started planning this unit with a problem that we needed to solve. How are we going to actualize our new social studies curriculum? The curriculum requires students to analyze the evolution of Canada as a multicultural nation. We quickly realized that our small rural school isn’t very multicultural. Our students haven’t had many experiences with people of other cultures. We wanted to make the learning more meaningful and authentic for students. This would be a timely pursuit so we decided to integrate the English Language Arts and Social Studies curricular outcomes. Objectives: English Language Arts: CC5.1 Compose and create a range of visual, multimedia, oral, and written texts that explore, identity (e.g., What Should I Do), community (e.g., This is Our Planet), social responsibility (e.g. Teamwork) and express personal thoughts shaped through inquiry. CC6.9 Prepare a teacher-guided inquiry report related to a stand on a topic, theme, or issue studied in English language arts. CC6.8 Experiment with a variety of text forms (e.g., a peer interview, presentation at an assembly, poem, letter to parents, short review, poster, tableau, graphic organizer) and techniques (e.g., surprise ending). Social Studies IN5.2 Analyze the evolution of Canada as a multicultural nation. Students built knowledge through inquiry. They were required to synthesize and evaluate the information through a performance task that had them create a documentary as the final product of their learning. The Students self-assessed using a student / teacher created rubric to monitor their progress. They provided specific feedback to their peers to help them “bump up” their work to the next level on the rubric. The overall project lasted 6 weeks.