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Handbook of Engaged Learning Projects

SUPPLYING OUR WATER NEEDS

Project Summary

Scenario

Student Pages

References

Index

Subject/Content Area: Physical Science, Social Studies, Mathematics, and Learning Strategies

Target Audience: Thornridge is a comprehensive high school serving approximately 2200 ninth through twelfth grade students living southeast of the Chicago city limits. Student backgrounds vary greatly socio-economically (below the poverty line to approximately six figures), ethnically (7% Caucasian, 87% African-American, 6% Hispanic) and culturally. Mobility and unemployment are high. Steel mills, the auto industry, steel processing plants and the construction trades have been the major employers, however, many no longer exist. Student test scores in all areas are below the state mean. Eighty freshmen, identified as performing well below grade-level in all areas, are targeted to use this water unit concurrently in science, math, and/or social studies, with support from our learning strategies specialist.

Project Goals: The goal is to investigate the problem of "Supplying Our Water Needs," as defined by the students, using a variety of tools: appropriate technology to collect and analyze water data; telecomunications to gather data and for collaborative research with experts and other students; and multimedia technology to report and present the process and results of their research. During the project, each team is responsible for developing a plan for conducting their research and for managing their plan.

Learner Outcomes: After completing this unit in Science, the student will be able to:

• realize the role that chemistry plays in their personal lives.
• apply and use major chemical concepts, vocabulary, thinking skills, and laboratory techniques to gather information required to make informed decisions about issues involving science and technology.
• use chemistry knowledge to think through and develop a lifelong awareness of the potential and limitations of science and technology.

After completing this unit in Social Studies, the student will be able to:

• understand that nations have different kinds of productive resources, and that some nations have more or higher quality resources than others.
• understand the concept of sustainable development and its effects in a variety of situations (e.g., toward cutting the rainforests in Indonesia in response to a demand for lumber in foreign markets, or mining the rutile sands along the coast of eastern Australia near the Great Barrier Reef).
• understand why policies should be designed to guide the use and management of Earth's resources and to reflect multiple points of view (e.g., the inequities of access to resources, political and economic power in developing countries; the impact of a natural disaster on a developed country vs. a developing country).
• understand contemporary issues in terms of Earth's physical and human systems (e.g., the processes of land degradation and desertification; the consequences of population growth or decline in a developed economy; the consequences of a world temperature increase).

After completing this unit in Mathematics, the student will be able to:

• realize the role that mathematics plays in their personal lives.
• apply the process of mathematical modeling.
• answer questions raised in everyday life, in the physical and social sciences; analyze the situation in light of their existing knowledge, develop appropriate mathematical techniques, and subsequently apply those techniques to solve the problem of "Supplying Our Water Needs."
• use computer utilities to develop conceptual understanding.
• accurately use different tools and units for measuring length, mass, and volume.
• use graphing calculators to store, organize, and graph information.
• use estimation skills.
• calculate surface area and volume of various shapes and figures.
• correctly identify and use formulas for surface area and volume.
• use mathematics in communicating results of their research and conclusions.
• know and use the different ways of naming real numbers; integers, decimals, fractions, and percents.

Alignment with National Standards: This project demonstrates elements of the National Science Education Standards:

Science Teaching Standards A, B, C, D, E, F
Science Assessment Standards A, B, C, D, E
Science Content Standards A, B, D, E, F, G
Science Program Standards A, B, C, D, E, F

This project demonstrates elements of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) Curriculum and Evaluation Standards for School Mathematics:

Mathematics Content Standards: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 10
Mathematics Evaluation Standards: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14

This project demonstrates elements of the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) Expect Excellence: Curriculum Standards for Social Studies:

Social Studies Standards and Performance Expectations:

Culture

Time, Continuity, and Change

People, Places, and Environment

Individual Development and Identity

Individuals, Groups, and Institutions

Power, Authority, and Governance

Production, Distribution, and Consumption

Science, Technology, and Society

Global Connections

Civic Ideals and Practices

Assessment of Students: Performance-based assessments that we will use throughout the project include Thinking Logs, Problem Logs, Know/Need to Know Boards, Concept Maps, and a variety of scoring rubrics to assess a variety of skills.

Know/Need to Know Board

Throughout the experience students answer their questions, raise new ones, and find solutions. The "Know/Need to Know" board functions as a map/tool for gathering and sharing information with the class. J. N. Mitchell and P. A. Irwin (1989) have developed a scoring rubric, The reading retelling profile; Using retelling to make instructional decisions.

Search Strategy Logs

Students will keep a log of the information and resources that were used to answer their questions related to the problem, and how they found that information and reflect upon and improve upon their searching strategies.

Concept Mapping

Students develop concept maps to organize their understanding of the problems related to "Supplying Our Water Needs". Concept maps are useful in examining a student's unfolding understanding of the problem, the interrelationship of ideas, and the relationship of parts of the problem to the whole. Contrasting students' maps of the problem is useful to see both how the number of ideas grow over time and how the concepts are reconfigured to illustrate newly identified, increasingly complex relationships.

From the concept map students construct a statement which defines the problem.

Thinking Logs

Students keep a log book and make journal entries in such a way that they generate their own "progress reports." Writing activities are used to facilitate reflections and discussions, to make logs of what they learned, identify problems, and plan their next move. Some log entries are "directed entries," that specifically ask students about their work. Other entries are "non-directed" and occur when students feel the need to write.

Presentation to the RFP Review Committee

Students will present a completed project which they have designed to answer the problem they have been presented. As a final performance assessment, students groups present their "best" solution to the RFP Review Committee after generating potential solutions and analyzing which solutions best fit the conditions for a good solution. A rubric will be developed for evaluation in a way that the student solutions are evaluated according to their "fit" to the conditions of the problem as determined by the students and not with regard to a predetermined right answer.