ORC Lesson Plan

Eyewitness Reports Lesson Plan

http://edsitement.neh.gov/lesson-plan/evaluating-eyewitness-reports#sect-extending

I have chosen to pick a lesson plan that involves social studies with high school students.  While searching through the Ohio Resource center I came across a lesson plan that I believe can make social studies actually more fun as well as interesting for older students.  The lesson plan that I have chosen allows the children to get hands on and involved which I believe will make participation fun.  With this plan the students will be looking at how the affects of eye witness accounts can have on history.

Common Core Standards Covered in This Lesson

Critical analysis

Critical thinking

Discussion

Gathering, classifying and interpreting written, oral and visual information

Historical analysis

Internet skills

Making inferences and drawing conclusions

Summarizing

Textual analysis

Using primary source

With this lesson plan I think it would be best if I have the students break into small groups between 3-5 students.  This will allow the group size to not hinder the ability for all students to be engaged with the readings as well as getting the evidentiary notes that need for the discussion and written portion of the assignment.  One problem I could potentially seeing is that with me making this a group effort some of the work will need to be completed outside of the classroom which means that all the participants will need to work together whether they can do it face to face or through a program like Google Docs.  In all I think this will be an exciting way to get students to think about how we know history and what we may not really know about history and how this actually pertains to our lives today.

Ohio DL Schools

I looked through a selected list of five Ohio distant learning schools and of the five the one I liked the most was Ohio Connections Academy. I was looking for my children, who are high school age, and determined that this DL school would be the best fit in my eyes.  At this school they offer the basic core classes as well as numerous electives that are designed to appease a vast difference in type of student.  I also liked the inclusion of AP/honors courses as well as the ability to pursue college courses if that is what the child is interested in.  They also have outings where the children can interact and enjoy each others company.  Another big factor was that the children do get one on one interactions with their teachers and the lessons are built around the child so if a child is thriving in a certain area they can advance them further so that they stay engaged.  My least favorite of the five was the Virtual School House.  First it was not as inviting as the other sites, but also the information given on the site was fairly limited not allowing me to make an informed decision for what I believe to be best for my children.  Also I could not find how they allowed interactions among other classmates unless they were in the blended program.  

My Prezi Introduction

Ms. Kilburns Introduction

This was my first time creating a Prezi but not my first time utilizing the software.  I found it to be very easy to navigate and was very user friendly.  It is amazing how I am more likely to scare myself away from new technology and convince myself that it would be too difficult to figure out.  I am so glad I was given the opportunity to use this technology because I think that it will make class presentations so much more fun with the students.

I think the most valuable lesson that I learned with this project is do not let things overpower and intimidate you.  Sometimes it is very easy to forget how you approached things when you learned them for the first time as a child. I am now more than ever eager to learn about how to incorporate even more pieces of modern technology into my classroom.