Week 11 - Blog 14: Final Project Idea

Week 11

Blog 14: Final Project idea

For my final project I would create a lesson plan titled “Digital Divide”, for Career and Technology 7th - 12th grade level class. In this lesson students will study the "Digital Divide" through comparison with other historical "divides" such as race, gender, and poverty. After studying and comparing a number of solutions of previous "divides," groups of students will propose and implement their solutions to the "Digital Divide." The focus of the first part of this

The lesson will begin by discussing the idea of "divides" with the students. Talking about events in history where one group of people had privileges or access to resources that were denied to other groups of people. Some starting points for students can be: 1) A Time Line of the Civil Right Movement (http://www.wmich.edu/politics/mlk/). The time line presents an overview of the Civil Rights movement in the United States, highlighting such events as the Supreme Court's Brown vs. Board of Education decision and the Montgomery Bus Boycott. 2) Living Legacy: The Women's Rights Movement (http://www.legacy98.org/). Students can research the time line of women's rights in the United Sates as well as a detailed history. These sites and others will be used to help frame a discussion about privilege and access, and how it relates to different groups of people based on race, gender, or socioeconomic status. It is important to develop the idea that there is a history of divides and that they continue to affect a large number of people.

After discussing the issue of divides and whom they affect, students should begin researching a historical divide they are interested in studying. Some questions students should ask as they study previous divides, such as: 1) Who was affected by the divide? 2) Was there more than one group affected by the divide? 3) Does that divide still exist today?

Divide students into groups. Each group will be required to research a different topic of their choice. At this point in the lesson it is up to the teacher to create a divide among the students. For the research, some students should have access to computers, and some should not. Have different groups use different resources to research their selected topics, e.g., the Web, the library, communication with other experts, etc. During research, students should identify and analyze the resources they utilize. Each student should keep track of the resources they were able to locate using the Resource Chart in Organizers for Students, including the author, copyright date or last resource update, what the source of the information was, and whether or not there was sufficient information.

For this lesson, I am planning on having students use Edmodo to provide assignments and have a form secure form of communication between teacher and teachers and among themselves. I will also use Google Docs and Google Drive to provide the platform for the students to submit their work and to collaborate with the class. I will use Evernote, as I learned in this class to be a great tool to keep organized and to manage tasks effectively.