Instructional Management

How will you assess student performance?

Students will be assessed based upon their ability to work co-operatively within their group. I will also be looking at how much effort they put into the project – if they contribute ideas and participate during the class time given for the project. Their pre-reading and writing skills will also be included in the assessment; however, the fact that they are in kindergarten and are just beginning to develop these skills must be kept in mind. I will also assess their ability to turn the verbal description of the monster into a visual picture that matches and contains adequate detail.

What skills and knowledge will students need before starting the project?

For this project, students will have to have basic computer knowledge. They will need to have keyboarding skills as well as a basic familiarity with the Internet. Students will need to be developing basic reading and writing skills to actively participate in this project. They will also need to have the ability to follow basic directions in order to create the monster from the description. Finally, they will need to be able to work within a group of their peers co-operatively.

Classroom Management

Will students work in collaborative groups? How will this be managed?

The students will be working in collaborative groups, or center groups as we refer to them, for this project. In addition to their classmates, they will have an older peer(s) to assist as necessary. Students are assigned groups based upon colors (red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple) and complete their activities in these groups.

Will students need to work independently while you are engaging other students?

Students will need to work independently while I am working with other students. Once the assigned task is completed, they will be able to complete journal entries or choose from a center shelf in the classroom as needed.

Technology Management

What technology resources do you have available in your classroom? In your school building? At home?

There are no computers in my classroom at this time, although we do have internet access in the classroom. We have a computer lab in the school that contains MAC computers complete with internet connections. We also have a scanner in the computer lab, which is needed for this particular project. I have a personal computer at home that I can use to update the project.

How will the availability of technology resources impact on the implementation of the project?

Because we do not have a computer in our classroom, we will have to rely on the use of the computer lab computers and scanner for the duration of this project. This will make implementing the project more difficult because we will only be able to use the lab 2 days a week due to class schedules. Because the computers in our school’s lab are Mac’s and I have a PC at home, there could be problems with my updating the project information from home, as the two computers are not compatible.

Time Management

How much class time will be needed to prepare students before the project officially begins?

For this project, based upon the ability of the students, I feel that it will take approximately two weeks to prepare them. We will need to spend time reviewing internet rules and obtain parental permission for their work to be submitted to the project site. We will also take time reading about and discussing monsters. We will also spend time practicing our descriptive abilities to create them and our reading/direction following abilities to draw them.

How long are your class periods and how will you effectively use this time?

We have two days per week that we can work on this project in the computer lab. We will do the prep work for the project in class as part of our language arts. The students are only in kindergarten, so lessons will be kept to sort amounts of time, maybe around 20 minutes, so that they do not lose interest. Once they are ready to add their work to the web site, the will buddy with an older student who can assist them with the reading and typing as needed. This will be broken into 25/30 minute classes because our computer access is limited.

Additional Comments or Considerations:

For this project, the kindergarten students will need to be partnered with and older student who will assist them with the reading and writing on the computer. There will probably be two older students with each group of four kindergarten student working on one monster. We will have to work out the scheduling with the teachers of the older students who are involved.