Goals

Learning Objectives:
o To gain background knowledge about Shakespeare's life and work;
o To build a basic schema of life during the Elizabethan Age of England;
o To familiarize themselves with conducting Internet research;
o To demonstrate a basic understanding of using Keynote/PowerPoint.

 

Details

Duration: 120+ minutes

Assessments: Student reflections/journals, Student discussions

Materials: lcd projector Keynote

 

Description

This is a hands-on web exploration of the life and work of Shakespeare. It serves as a means of introducing students to the bard. Additionally, it incorporates the technology skills of creating a basic Keynote. Students also must work in cooperative groups and present to the class.

The second part of this presentation entailed creating and implementing a hands-on activity. Groups brainstormed ideas for leading the class through an activity (directly connected to their presentation topic). The primary aim of this activity was for students to connect their activity directly back to the information presented in the Keynote. This requires students having mastery over their assigned topic area as well as encouraging other students in the class to participate in an active learning experience rather than simply viewing classmates' Keynotes, which is a more passive mode of learning.


Note: My colleague and I did not introduce the project intially; rather, we conducted some exploration of Shakespeare and then co-facilitated a discussion with students about accessing the text.

Introduction to the Bard Rubric
This is a basic rubric for assessing your students' work....
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Shakespeare Group/Class Activity
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Student Guidelines - Introduction to the Bard Research
This handout provides each group with some specific guidelines to help focus student internet research. ...

Teacher Overview
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Author Reflections

I provided students with websites to help direct their online research; however, some students still struggled to find key information. To ensure future success, I would try to compile a more comprhensive website list. I would encourage more web savvy students to model/lead others through web searches.

Students also had difficulty creating activities. In the future, I would do some scaffolding around this. One idea is to include mini-lessons or a detailed discussion of what constitutes a "good" activity...what makes it worthy of doing? How does it connect to learning goals? Perhaps students could participate in and critique other class activities before creating their own.
Note: My students were very familiar with Keynote by this time in the year.