Small wiki unit plan

Public Wiki

Hello everyone,
This is just a very quick and small summary of a unit of work that goes for 9 weeks. It details how students can use and create a wiki.

Audience: Grade 6
The lesson outcomes/objectives:
The focus for this lesson is to introduce to the students what
· Students create their own publicly accessible wiki site (groups of three)
· Research the solar system
· Students work collaboratively to detail and add information about the solar system (students will have 1 planet they need to target as a group)
· Students need to post reflective comments on other peers blogs
Learning design ideas:
This wiki will be a progressive assessment piece that students work on through the whole unit of work. I will provide students with 3 hours a week to research and add to their blogs as a group. These blogs will also be used in conjunction with their grade 2 buddies. They will need to teach their buddies about their planet and the solar system (buddies are studying the same unit). Below is just a small unit outline that details what each lesson will target.

Lesson 1: Introduce the unit Solar system unit to students
Lesson 2: Detail the planets, have students create their own solar system on a technology program call ‘Smart Draw’ (this program is found on the internet it is free to sign up, everyone should look into it).
Lesson 3: Have students watch the solar system YouTube clip and answer solar system topic sheet reflecting the YouTube clip. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_RAEESmsrs
Explain the assessment to students, put students into groups of 3
Lesson 4: 75min (double) ICT lesson-Introduce students to the Wikipedia. Show students examples of Wikipedia sites relating to the solar system - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_System detail and help student create a Wikipedia account step by step.
Lesson 5: ICT lesson – give students time to research using the internet and book their planet – give students time to play and experiment with Wikipedia.
Lesson 6: ICT lesson – Students are uploading information and adding to their wiki site.
Lesson 7: ICT lesson- have students watch the Promethean Planet podcast. Students are able to edit and add more to their Wiki page.
Lesson 8: ICT lesson- This is the last lesson for students to edit and add to their wiki pages.
Lesson 9: Give a 5-minute presentation to the class – presenting all findings about their planet. Students need to explain and show their peers their wiki site.


In this unit of work students have access to many technologies that provide students with opportunities to co-construct and collaborate knowledge as well as problem solve, create, decision make and evaluate which are the cognitive processes Kearsley and Shneiderman (1999) believe help engage students in tasks and activities.
This unit of works allows students to fulfil the highest need on Maslows (1970) hierarchy “creativity fulfilment’. This need must be met before students can effectively learn (Maslow, 1970). Because students are expected to teach others about their planet (peers and buddies) they have a retention rate of 90% according to the learning pyramid (2008). These tasks (assessment) are direct and purposeful which is the most effective teaching strategy and method according to dales cone (2000).

Thanks everyone,
Hope this has given you all some ideas,
Sarah.

References

Hall, J. (2008) The Learning Pyramid. Retrieved July 30th, 2009 from, http://www.simulations.co.uk/pyramid.htm

Kearsley, G., Shneiderman, B. (1999) Engagement Theory. Retrieved August 2nd, 2009 from, http://home.sprynet.com/~gkearsley/engage.htm

Maslow, A. (1970) Motivation and Personality. Retrieved August 2nd, 2009 from, http://moodle.cqu.edu.au/mod/resource/view.php?id=580


The Abilene Christian University Adams Centre for Teaching Excellence, (2000). Dale’s Cone. Retrieved July 31st, 2009 from,
http://www.acu.edu/cte/activelearning/whyuseal2.htm