Diane


 * FINAL PROJECT: //Challenge Based Learning//**


 * Challenge:** Individual Identity
 * 1). Essential Question:** Who am I and who do I want to be?
 * Overview:** Are you prepared for you journey through college? Do you have the tools you need to succeed? With any journey, careful thought needs to go into the tools and resources you plan on using. Therefore, you are challenged to identify your inspirations, examine your challenges, explore passions and goals, and create a virtual portfolio of resources that will help you be successful. The culminating activity will be to write a reflective essay about the discovery of yourself and who you want to be.


 * 2). The Challenge:** Create a virtual portfolio for success.

· Who am I? · What is my passion? · What are my challenges? · What are my goals? · How do I solve problems? · How do I learn? · What resources do I have? · What resources do I need? · What talents/skills do I have/need to develop?
 * 3). Guiding Questions:**

· **Virtual Brainstorming**: students will create a map of themselves starting with their name in the middle of the page and describe themselves/their interests. · **Blogpost**: students will do an inventory of one item that is essential to them and write a blog post about what the essential item says about them. · **PowerPoint** **Presentation**: students will identify what they are passionate about and take a photo of it and create a PowerPoint presentation. · **Podcast:** students will research, interview, and create a podcast about a person who inspires them. · **Reflective essay:** using the above discoveries on their individual identity, students will write an essay about their goals for this semester, three years, and five years.
 * 4). Guiding Activities:**

**5). ASSESSMENT FOR GUIDING ACTIVITIES:**
 * Virtual Brainstorming
 * Blogpost
 * PowerPoint Presentation
 * Podcast

Before students begin to work on the Guiding Activities, a model of each will be presented and discussed in class. As students work on each activity and become more familiar with the medium, feedback will be provided to point out questions about, problems with, and comments on that particular activity. And finally, based on a 4-point scale, students will receive points for each guided activity.

**6). REFLECTIVE ESSAY EVALUATION**
 * **SKILLS** || **ADVANCED** || **PROFICIENT** || **BASIC** ||
 * Depth of reflection || * Demonstrates a conscious and thorough understanding of the writing prompt. || * Demonstrates a thoughtful understanding of the writing prompt. || * Demonstrates little or no understanding of the writing prompt. ||
 * Use of textual evidence and context || * Uses specific and convincing examples to support claims, making insightful and applicable connections. || * Uses examples to support most claims with some connection. || * Uses incomplete or vaguely developed examples to only partially support claims. ||
 * Language use || * Use stylistically sophisticated language that is precise and engaging, with notable sense of voice, awareness of audience and purpose, and varied sentence structure. || * Uses basic but appropriate language, with a basic sense of voice, some awareness of audience and purpose and dome attempt to sentence structure. || * Uses language that is vague or imprecise for the audience or purpose, with little sense of voice, and a limited awareness of how to vary sentence structure. ||
 * Conventions || * Demonstrates control of the conventions with essentially no errors, even with the sophisticated language. || * Demonstrates partial control of the conventions, exhibiting occasional errors that do not hinder comprehension. || * Demonstrates limited or no control of the conventions, exhibiting frequent errors that make comprehension difficult. ||

 [|Apple.PLN]

__Reflection__: After reading the first two chapters in the textbook, I was reminded of a similar situation when I started teaching at a community college a few years ago. Common sense warned me of the challenges that loomed ahead; however, intuition cried out that I may be over my head. The transition from teaching high school sophomores to the diverse population of a community college definitely required some adjustments on my part. Yet, when I was told the English classes were held in computer labs, I especially recall a slight panic setting in, since teaching with computers was all very new to me. I remember thinking that I had fallen into the deep end of the ocean without any kind of floatation device, but soon realized, it was either sink or swim. However, blame it on my “old world” mindset and that I wasn’t totally convinced using computers in the classroom would help students become better writers. In fact, part of my narrow-mindedness was due to my somewhat successful, technology-free lessons I implemented in my high school classroom that made me certain paper and pen were suitable writing tools. In fact, I even wondered if classroom computers were more of a distraction than beneficial. But in order to stay afloat, I knew I needed to make some adjustments in my teaching, and so I did. Fast-forward three years, and with a little bit of creativity and innovation, I have managed to incorporate some sort of computer work as well as other technology into my classroom. Whether it be Internet searches, peer review, or group discussion, the overwhelming student response clearly indicates increased productivity and rampant participation. Undoubtedly, the authors cast a new light of the direction our technically infused youth are following; however, in order to stay afloat, we, too, may just have to take the plunge. With that being said, I look forward to acquiring new knowledge from this class that I can use in my now "technology friendly" classroom.

__Student Inquiry Questions:__ 1). What kinds of technology (ie. computer, cell phone, iPod, video games, etc.) do you use everyday? On average, how many hours per day do you spend using these kinds of technology? 2). In what ways are these different kinds of technology an important part of your everyday life? 3). Since technology plays such an important role in your life as well as the lives of others, how is technology being used in the classroom? Can technology be used more in the classroom? How? 4). If a new law was passed stating that in order to graduate, all students must spend at least two hours during the school week (after school, of course), "disconnected" to any kind of technology. How would you make use of that time?

__Response Blog Post__: [] [] [| 3] http://jtspencer.blogspot.com/2010/06/ten-technology-tools-my-children-will.html?