interesting.
1. Book Cover project - this is covered in greater detail in Pamela's
book. Students discuss visual imagery and symbolism in literature.
They then design a cover for "their novel." They don't write a novel
but decide what "truth" they intend to deliver through the story. They
then have to design the cover for their novel. They get a little
instruction in Photoshop from the teacher and go to it. When they are
done a jury of peers or parents are asked to discern the "truth" from
their book cover, without reading the book. The activity reinforces
visual literacy, symbolism and imagery.
2. Ad Campaign - toward the end of the year, the class does an extended
unit on persuasion (however, the power of language is a theme in the
course). Students are put into groups and choose a real or imaginary
product for which they have to create an ad campaign. Students create
billboard designs, magazine ads and newspaper ads with Photoshop or
GIMP, radio spots with Garage Band or Audacity, and TV commercials with
iMovie or Kino. They present their campaigns to members of the local PR
community who vote on a campaign.
In both of these activities, the work is incredible. Also, the
classrooms are so alive during these projects. In both cases, it took
the teachers a few years to master the projects but they are real
powerful units now and the kids look forward to them and work hard at
them.
We did them prior to the laptop program but fought for resources and
ultimately settled on outcome. With the 1:1 program, kids spend more
time on task and produce higher quality work.
Alex Inman
Director of Technology
Whitfield School
St. Louis, MO
314.434.5141
-----Original Message-----
From: A forum for independent school educators
[mailto:ISED-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU] On Behalf Of Patricia Moser
Sent: Friday, December 14, 2007 1:24 PM
To: ISED-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
Subject: Best English lessons with one-to-one laptops
Friends,
We are exploring the possibility of a one-to-one laptop program at our
school. Part of that exploration involves educating ourselves about what
new and great things we might be able to do in our classrooms if all of
our students have laptops. In January, I will be making a presentation
to our upper school English department who are mostly skeptical about
the idea of one laptop per student. I want to show them some great
lessons that English teachers in other schools have done with a 1:1
program. These lessons could be for just plain laptops or for tablets.
If you know of a great lesson, could you send me a brief description?
If you send them to me off-list I will be happy to compile them into one
long list for anyone who is interested: moserp@sidwell.edu. Thanks so
much for your help!
Happy Holidays.
Patt Moser, Director of Information Services and Upper School Head
Librarian
Sidwell Friends School
3825 Wisconsin Ave. NW
Washington D.C. 20016
Tel: 202-537-8164
Mobile: 202-595-4941
Fax: 202-537-8174
Email: moserp@sidwell.edu
Web: http://www.sidwell.edu/upper_school/library.asp
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[ For info on ISED-L see http://www.gds.org/ISED-L ]
Submissions to ISED-L are released under a creative commons, attribution, non-commercial, share-alike license.
