My next step is to figure out how I will know if the kids got what I wanted them to understand (assessment). In school that would mean tests and maybe a few reports or projects. Home Schooling we have a lot more options!Because a central goal is for the kids to understand how history fits together, we will be doing 2 (or more) time lines. These will be on the wall for the length of the megaunit. One will be from 20,000 BC to the present, the other will be from around 1490 to the present.
We will also be making a time line of sorts out of dioramas which we will make for each smaller unit (Pre Columban, Colonial, Revolution, etc.). We will be keeping these in the museum (after we do something to make the door "little guy proof")! The ability to make and answer questions about the dioramas and time lines will be major assessments.
Then we have the wild and crazy idea: I have a cheap digital camcorder which I would like to use to have the Zoomlians make "how to" movies. The idea is that when we do cool projects, I can have a Zoomlian show how we did it, and explain it's significance. We'd then post the movie on You Tube and embed it back here in the blog.
There are a few tech hurdles there for me to figure out... But I'd like to give it a try!
Incidently, The Emperor informs me that the technical term for Reverse Engineering is Backwards Mapping (which may be more appropriate in a Social Studies unit).
2 comments:
I like the multiple timeline idea--great way to deal with that challenge of knowing so many more events in recent centuries.
I believe construction of such projects requires knowledge of engineering and management principles and business procedures, economics, and human behavior.
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