Project Narrative

Need for the project

The 21st Century has changed how student interact with peers and
teachers. Students feel more comfortable using and learning from
digital content then from paying attention to lecture from a teacher.
Using technology will catch the attention of students who are falling
asleep during lectures. The New School for the Arts and Academics
lacks the technology to keeps students attention. By putting projects in
all academics classrooms teachers will have the ability to show digital
content to the students. This will allow for all types of learners to be
engaged in the lesson. The projects will also help students collaborate
on projects and present findings and research to the rest of the class.
Using the projectors to conduct a digital lab will help ease the stress of
low budgets for science classrooms.

Project Impact
The impact of this project will be limitless. The project will engage
students, faculty, digital community and surrounding community.
Approximately 150 high school students will engage in the project
based learning. The students will use research skills to find out the
effects of categorization and classification has on communities. The
school facility will collude to support students research, technology,
and presentation skills. During this project I will learn how to use

Glogster and Pbworks to help students collaborate. This will also allow
for better in class discussion and student brainstorming. This project
will also increase student engagement in all subject areas.

Learning Goals and Outcomes

This project attempts to guide student thinking by asking essential
questions. Why is classification important? How does classification
effect society? Students will learn about classification and how it
affects communities. This project will be research based and will
develop students ability to research topics and find credible sources.
This project will also rely of student creation and collaboration.
Students will learn to work as a team to create a product.

Students will also be required to use their observation skills to classify

foods into a taxonomic key. This project will require students to
research and critique scientific finings to develop investigating and
modeling skills. The students will then learn how to logically present
data and observations. They will also support their findings by siting
and referencing research articles.
Standards Covered
AZED Science Standards
Content 1: Observations, Questions, and Hypotheses
PO 1. Evaluate scientific information for relevance to a given problem.
PO 2. Develop questions from observations that transition into testable
hypotheses.
Concept2:ScientificTesting(InvestigatingandModeling)

PO5.Recordobservations,notes,sketches,questions,andideasusingtoolssuchas
journals,charts,graphs,andcomputers.
Concept3:Analysis,Conclusions,andRefinements
PO 3. Critique reports of scientific studies.
Concept 4: Communication
PO 1. For a specific investigation, choose an appropriate method for
communicating the results.
PO 3. Communicate results clearly and logically.
PO 4. Support conclusions with logical scientific arguments.
Activities
Students will be participating in the following activities:
Research community dynamics and how classification affects the
community.
Review scientific articles that discuss taxonomy and classification
of species.
Compose a taxonomic key that organized unknown potato chips
based on observed traits.
Critique historical social structures of past regimes and create a
new social structure to accommodated modern society.
Examine literature that shows how classification of people
affects society.
Collaborate with facility and peers to create a presentation that
demonstrates the students arguments on categorization.
Use research to participate in a class discussion that evaluates
the importance of classification in science.
Assessment
This project will use both summative and formative assessments. The
final group presentation in which students will present arguments on
categorization will be a summative assessment that is graded with a
rubric. Students may also complete essays and other final projects
after teachers have collaborated and developed a interdisciplinary
summative assessment. Students will also be given formative
assessments in the form of outlines and small respond papers to help
monitor student learning. The formative assessments will be graded

using a rubric that will be created will students and facility. All rubrics
will be made using http://rubistar.4teachers.org.

Technology Support
Students will receive support from teachers who will be trained on how
to use the technologies needed for this project. The video production
teacher also has extended knowledge in projectors and software that
students may use to develop presentations.

Sustaining the Project After the Proposal Period

This project will create an impact at this school and will be carried out
through out the first year. Classification and categorization is a topic
that is covered in every subject and is recovered every year. This
project helps students understand the world around them and how and
why things are put into groups. Investing in this technology will also
allow for other projects to be done in classrooms. It will also allow for
more modern classroom that will help develop creative thing among
the students.
Innovation
This project is changing how students approach school. It will engage
students like never before and inspire critical thinking. It makes each
student a researcher and investigator. This project will allow students
ideas and thoughts to be heard and help them develop high level
learning strategies that will help them through out their educational
career and everyday life. It will allow students to develop an argument
and learn how to find supporting research. They will have to observe
and make conclusions based on what they see. This project is more

than just an average school project. It a life lesson the will help engage
students and teach them to think for themselves.
The technology skills that will be taught in this project will help
students at the next level. Students will learn and cover a majority of
the ISTE standards for students. This project teaches students to
collaborate and use 21st century technology to present content to their
peers.
ISTE Standards Covered
1. Creativity and innovation
a.Applyexistingknowledgetogeneratenewideas,products,orprocesses
b.Createoriginalworksasameansofpersonalorgroupexpression
c.Usemodelsandsimulationstoexplorecomplexsystemsandissues
d.Identifytrendsandforecastpossibilities
2. Communication and collaboration
a.Interact,collaborate,andpublishwithpeers,experts,orothersemployingavarietyof
digitalenvironmentsandmedia
b.Communicateinformationandideaseffectivelytomultipleaudiencesusingavariety
ofmediaandformats
c.Developculturalunderstandingandglobalawarenessbyengagingwithlearnersof
othercultures
d.Contributetoprojectteamstoproduceoriginalworksorsolveproblems
3.Researchandinformationfluency
b.Locate,organize,analyze,evaluate,synthesize,andethicallyuseinformationfroma
varietyofsourcesandmedia
c.Evaluateandselectinformationsourcesanddigitaltoolsbasedontheappropriateness
tospecifictasks
d.Processdataandreportresults
6.Technologyoperationsandconcepts
a.Understandandusetechnologysystems
b.Selectanduseapplicationseffectivelyandproductively
d.Transfercurrentknowledgetolearningofnewtechnologies