Wikispaces will allow teachers greater freedom in creating lessons for student that can be accessed anywhere. Teachers and students can work together to make great learning pages. Teachers can create lessons that integrate technology into the Wikispace. Students can go to the site and then create their own Wikipage to go along with the lesson and create their own project, using their strengths and learning styles. It also allows teachers to create lessons that can be started at home and finished at school, or vice versa. There are some design issues with Wikispaces though. It does not give you a lot of freedom to create a visually appealing site and some of the tools are a little complicated the first time you use them. I created a 10th grade American History lesson using Wikispaces. My Wiki lesson can be found by clicking here. The students will start on the WWII Propaganda Homepage. Here they will view a screencast I made explaining what they need to do in order to complete the lesson. I also included a few website links that the students can use in their research. My calendar is also on the homepage. The students are able to see what is coming up and due dates. I think it is extremely important to keep the students informed of everything, so I have also included my lesson plans along with the SLOs and standards we will be covering. This includes students in the learning process even more. Next the students will go to the WWII Propaganda page to start the lesson. Here they will begin their research on WWII propaganda. After they have researched what propaganda is and why it was used, I want them to begin to analyze different forms of propaganda. The students then will need to create a presentation to demonstrate what they have learned. Along with facts, I also want to students to form educated opinions and share their thoughts and feelings on WWII propaganda. Finally I want the students to think of some propaganda used today and if it is as effective as it was during WWII. Students will create their own Wiki page with their "blogs" on the information they are learning. This will act as a collective place for students to go to and learn more from each other. I also want the students to post their presentations to this page. The final part of this lesson is the Lesson closing page. I want my students' opinions on the lesson. I want them to have a say in their own learning. This information will help me create better lessons in the future. It also helps the students own their learning by allowing them to have input in the lesson. I chose this lesson because I have always been fascinated with propaganda throughout history, but especially during WWII. I also prefer to focus on the human focus on WWII. I understand the importance of learning about the war, and all of the politics behind it, but it is the human stories that actually shape history. I want my students to learn this too, so I put the emphasis on how propaganda is supposed to influence and effect people. I will share my grandfathers' stories to make this lesson even more personal. My Grandpa Shirey (my father's side) and my Grandpa Houck (my mother's side) were both in WWII. My Grandpa Shirey was a pilot in the Army Aircorp and flew bombers. My Grandpa Houck was an infantryman and fought in the Battle of the Bulge. Making connections to history is also very important and I want my students to see this as well. This video discusses the benefits of flipping a class. This video gives basic instructions on creating a Wikispace for the classroom. Always use a tiger in Inquiry-Based Learning. Calvin and Hobbes was created by Bill Watterson
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