Abigail

Hi, This is Abigail. I work at Amata Anangu School in the APY Lands. I teach a girls senior secondary class (years 9-12) and I am the ICT co-ordinator, which up until now has mainly ment dealing with servers crashing and the tec side of things!

Activity 4: Sharing Project Ideas for Your Unit

Ø The tourism industry and its effects on the Australian Environment in terms of sustainable futures. Ø How the Australian Environment can generate a tourism economy.
 * What real-world connections are you considering?

Ø Students need to first of all gain knowledge of the different Biomes in Australia. Ø They then need to use this knowledge to create a responsible tourism ad for one of the biomes.
 * What would be the role of the students?

Ø This project explores Australia biomes in relation to tourism and sustainable futures.
 * What project scenario are you considering?

Activity 6: Sharing your results (page 6.24)

I tried an idea out from my main unit of work – however I am still undecided as to whether or not I will continue with the unit of work I am currently looking at. I have found that even though I am splitting my unit up into assessment tasks – rather than looking at the whole semester – there still seems a lot of material to cover in order to answer the unit questions which I have identified.
 * Did you try out an idea for your main unit or for a different project idea?

I didn’t really receive feed back on my tool (which could be a little worrying) however doing someone else’s activity has alerted me to some areas where I could improve my own in terms of giving instructions for how many comments need to be given, and changing the project outline to more student friendly language. I think that I will keep this activity in my unit plan as it might help to show students how Environmental needs need to be balanced with industry needs and how not all factors which effect one area effect the other to the same extent.
 * Considering your test results, do you think you will keep this tool in your unit plan?

I think that this tool, in this example will help students move toward the 5th outcome of my unit plan (   communicate understandings of socially just and environmentally sustainable futures for all Australians ), but will not demonstrate this alone. That is why it is important to use a variety of activities and assessments to check whether students will achieve an outcome – the tool, I feel at this level will be more helpful in checking whether students have processed information and can reuse it to form their own opinions.
 * How do you see the use of the //Visual ranking tool// fitting in with the objectives and standards you are trying to target - and your overall plan for your unit? How will the use of this tool help students meet those requirements?

I think, especially if students need to add comments – the //Visual Ranking Tool// will help students to evaluate and analyse the thinking behind their decisions – being web based, this might mean my students contribute more than they would usually – we shall see!
 * How do you see the //Visual Ranking Tool// enhancing your students’ higher order thinking skills, as well as collaboration and communication in your classroom?

I think most of the questions I have are questions I need to work through in my head, in terms of working out how this form of planning fits within my current planning and SACE, how I can make deeper thinking more accessible for my students and how ICT can do this for me. I am still getting me head around the unit plan template and how things can be linked back to the specific SACE outcomes.
 * What questions do you still have about this project’s design, implementation or assessment?

Activity 5: Sharing your results (8.15) Reflection on using the seeing reason tool… I used the tool as part of my plan, I think that it fits in quite well with the plan and the learning outcome 5 in the unit ( communicate understandings of socially just and environmentally sustainable futures for all Australians). The only trouble is that my students may not have the literacy skills to use the tool. I think that in order for students to use the tool successfully much of the discussion will need to take place in the students’ first language, and lots of brainstorming and scaffolding will need to take place. I think that the tool might work better as a class activity rather than a small group activity. I am still having trouble knowing how big this unit plan needs to be – although there are four standard outcomes that this assessment piece needs to fulfil, deep thinking only really takes place in two of them as the first two outcome involve understanding and remembering.