Content Tourist Pamphlet

The idea behind this lesson is to have students prepare a pamphlet about the content as if they are a travel agent. This can be used as a review activity, or a summative assessment with an appropriate rubric.

Here's the process:

1. Every student needs a blank piece of printer paper and whatever art supplies you have (colors, rulers).

2. Tell students that they will be creating tour brochure of the content for someone who is "new to the area." 

3. Students will create a tri-fold brochure that has the main ideas, people, applications, or principles of the content you're studying. They will decorate the front fold with relevant artwork and text, and will fill the remaining 5 sections with step-by-step information to guide the content "tourist" through what your class has learned. Your rubric might look something like this:

   • Cover page - at least 3 images with caption, a title, an author

   • 1st interior panel - explanations for why the content is important (how is it useful in today's world?)

   • 2nd interior panel - at least 3 real-world examples of the content (images with captions allowed)

   • 3rd interior panel - basic terms/vocabulary (images with captions allowed)

   • 4th panel, exterior - a step-by-step explanation for how to approach understanding the content ("first, you need to know what Avogadro's number is for the mole, and here's how you find it..." or "you need to know the angle of ascent, so use the following equation to determine that" etc) with examples

   • 5th panel, exterior - examples and practice questions for the reader to do

4. They will have to simplify the information in such a way that someone who knows nothing about it can navigate the content. Step by step instructions are useful, as are examples of the content in use.

5. This would be best as a hands-on art activity, rather than a digital version, though that is one way you could modify or accommodate the lesson for those who need it.

6. When you have the activity completed, students can exchange and evaluate other work, or have a showcase where each student gets a chance to display their finished product.

7. Assessing the quality of work can be done a few ways--first, by the teacher, with a rubric; another way would be to have someone from outside the content rate the usefulness, readability, simplicity, and so on, as if they are the content tourist.

Silent Graffiti Walk

This activity gets students out of their seats while also getting them to ask probing questions and share their own knowledge. This can be a a summary activity, exam review, or preview activity (like the previously shared Need to Knows).

Here's the process:

1. Post a selection of terms, passages, images, or review questions (without answer choices) around the room. The more stations, the more time it will take students to work, and the more meaningful the results should be. It should be a short selection on a piece of computer paper or 11x17 paper (or butcher paper, if available).

2. Instruct students to go to each posted selection and write at least ONE question and ONE response to the content; the response can be an answer to someone else's question, a clarifying thought, or something they noticed about the information/question presented. They should write meaningful questions; the best questions can later be compiled and used as a review handout.

3. Students move from poster to poster silently; this is important so that they have time to process the information and individually respond. 

4. When everyone is done, go through each poster and discuss the information and questions they wrote, and ask them to clarify misconceptions or incorrect information (this is important, since not every student will have seen all of the questions and answers). Once they've discussed, correct as needed and move on.

5. The exit ticket for this could be a 3-2-1 response (3 things they learned, 2 questions they still have, 1 comment on the day's activity), sentence stems (For instance, "The most important thing to remember about this topic is..."), or some other handout that you've developed to wrap up the study (like a review sheet or take-home questions).

Adaptation: Give students a 3-column checklist of each poster station, and have them visit and revisit each poster. They visit a poster once and write on their checklist what they wrote on the poster; they come to you and have you initial their checklist, then they go to another station. Eventually they'll return to the first station, read what's there, and write something that helped them on their checklist paper; you will initial it again. Near the end of the activity, they should return to the station once more, and write one thing they learned from that poster (which you again initial). This is better with a smaller number of posters.

Accommodation: Intentionally pair students based on ELL status or learning level. Provide them with sentence starters or question stems.

Modification: MORE TEACHER PREP REQUIRED - Using a Chromebook cart or iPads, create a Padlet for each poster station. Have students visit each station and view the poster, and type their questions and responses onto the Padlet. This will enable ALL students to see ALL questions and responses using padlet.com or the Padlet app. You will also have an easy-to-compile collection of their work. LESS TEACHER PREP REQUIRED - Have students download the Padlet app in advance, and create accounts. The day of the activity, they will use the Padlet app in conjunction with the posters you've prepared.

Finish The Sentence

This writing activity gets students in to small groups and helps them think creatively about content. Some of the tasks include writing process steps, telling a story, describing a phenomenon, summarizing an article, or recounting an event. 

Here's the process:

1. Put students in groups of 4-5, each with a piece of notebook paper (or you can create a template) sitting in a circle.

2. Pose a question that can be answered in descriptive paragraph form.

3. Each student individually and silently writes a few words (or a complete sentence) to start answering the question (30-60 seconds).

4. After time is up, each student passes their paper to the person on their right. 

5. Students then read what they've been given and think of a way to continue the thought. They write the next few words/sentence to follow what the first person wrote.

6. Students pass papers to the right again; repeat the process until a set amount of time has elapsed, until they've rotated a set number of times, or until you can see (by monitoring in the Power Zone)

7. When the activity is complete, each group has one person read the finished product out loud. You then share the answer you were looking for on the projector (or verbally)

Adaptation: Students can create a shared Google Doc and type collaboratively; you can also assign each student a specific vocabulary term to include in their sentences.

Accommodation: Provide sentence stems to students who need one (per IEPs) and purposefully group them with peers

Modification: Students can write in different colored pencils, and, when finished, each group posts their finished product on the wall and each group reads the other group writings. Post-its can be used for Glows and Grows (write one good thing the group did and one thing the group could improve) on each group's finished product.