Lesson Plan for Implementing

NETSSTemplate I
(More Directed Learning Activities)
Template with guiding questions
Teacher(s)
Name Daniel Warzon

Position Teacher- Special Education- Social Studies

School/District Collins Hill High School- Gwinnett County Public Schools

E-mail Daniel_warzon@gwinnett.k12.ga.us

Phone

Grade Level(s) 11th

Content Area US HISTORY- Resource

Time Line November 9- November 16

Standards (What do you want students to know and be able to do? What knowledge, skills, and strategies do you
expect students to gain? Are there connections to other curriculum areas and subject area benchmarks? ) Please
put a summary of the standards you will be addressing rather than abbreviations and numbers that indicate which
standards were addressed.

Content Standards:
SSUSH9 The student will identify key events, issues, and individuals relating to the causes,
course, and consequences of the Civil War.
b. Describe President Lincolns efforts to preserve the Union as seen in his second inaugural
address and the Gettysburg speech and in his use of emergency powers, such as his decision to
suspend habeas corpus.
c. Describe the roles of Ulysses Grant, Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, William T. Sherman,
and Jefferson Davis.
d. Explain the importance of Fort Sumter, Antietam, Vicksburg, Gettysburg, and the Battle for
Atlanta and the impact of geography on these battles.
e. Describe the significance of the Emancipation Proclamation.
f. Explain the importance of the growing economic disparity between the North and the South
through an examination of population, functioning railroads, and industrial output

NETS*S Standards:
1. Visionary Leadership
a. Contribute to the development, communication, and implementation of a shared vision for the comprehensive
use of technology to support a digital-age education for all students
3. Digital-Age Learning Environments.
a. Model effective classroom management and collaborative learning strategies to maximize teacher and student
use of digital tools and resources and access to technology-rich learning environments
b. Maintain and manage a variety of digital tools and resources for teacher and student use in technology-rich
learning environments
e. Troubleshoot basic software, hardware, and connectivity problems common in digital learning environments

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g. Use digital communication and collaboration tools to communicate locally and globally with students, parents,
peers, and the larger community
5. Digital Citizenship
a. Model and promote strategies for achieving equitable access to digital tools and resources and technology-
related best practices for all students and teachers
b. Model and facilitate safe, healthy, legal, and ethical uses of digital information and technologies
c. Model and promote diversity, cultural understanding, and global awareness by using digital-age communication
and collaboration tools to interact locally and globally with students, peers, parents, and the larger community

Overview (a short summary of the lesson or unit including assignment or expected or possible products)

As a part of the US History content standards, students are required to analyze the events of the Civil War. The
class will be exploring these events through classroom instruction, labs, and research. To assess the students
knowledge of the Civil War, they will be creating a Google Tour or a virtual timeline covering the important events,
peoples, places, and battles. The assignment will be introduced after exploring a Civil War lab which looks at
different Civil War artifacts such as uniforms, food, and primary documents. The students will then be introduced
to different medias for creating there projects. The students are required to incorporate the causes of the Civil
War, key players in the Civil War, descriptions of the two sides and their differences, strengths and weakness of
the two sides, letter from a soldier, the major battles of the Civil War, and key legislation established during the
Civil War. The students will be divided into groups that they will collaborate with to complete the project. Along
with their choice of production tools, the students will also use Google Drive to store their work and collaborate
with their group members. The students will also be required to create a screencast to record/ present their
projects that will be shared on the class website. From the website, the students will comment and share ideas on
each others group projects.

Essential Questions (What essential question or learning are you addressing? What would students care or
want to know about the topic? What are some questions to get students thinking about the topic or generate
interest about the topic? Additionally, what questions can you ask students to help them focus on important
aspects of the topic? (Guiding questions) What background or prior knowledge will you expect students to bring
to this topic and build on?) Remember, essential questions are meant to guide the lesson by provoking inquiry.
They should not be answered with a simple yes or no and should have many acceptable answers.

Essential Questions: What caused the Civil War? Could the Civil War been prevented? How would our country
been different today if the Civil War would have not been fought?
Guiding Questions: Who were the important people involved in the Civil War? What important changes came
from the Civil War? What was it like being a soldier during the Civil War?
The students will bring a general knowledge of the Civil War as well as knowledge gained from the opening
activities.

Assessment (What will students do or produce to illustrate their learning? What can students do to generate new
knowledge? How will you assess how students are progressing (formative assessment)? How will you assess
what they produce or do? How will you differentiate products?) You must attach copies of your assessment and/or
rubrics. Include these in your presentation as well.

The students will produce an interactive virtual tour and/or an interactive virtual timeline. The product will be
assessed along the way through checkpoints. The first check point will include assigning of group member
responsibilities, primary research, and the tools of choice.
The projects will be assessed using a rubric that will be given and explained to the students when the project is
assigned. The projects will also be assessed by peers with a simple peer rubric. Each group member will also
assess the other members of their group on their participation. The culmination of these three grades will reflect
the students overall grade on the project.

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Resources (How does technology support student learning? What digital tools, and resourcesonline student
tools, research sites, student handouts, tools, tutorials, templates, assessment rubrics, etchelp elucidate or
explain the content or allow students to interact with the content? What previous technology skills should students
have to complete this project?)

The students will have access to computers, tablets, and smart phones throughout the project to facilitate their
research and produce a product that would not be possible without twenty first century tools. They will explore
databases like ABC CLIO and Galileo to access information on the topics. They will spend 30 minutes with the
media specialist that will explain how to access these data bases and where to find helpful information on their
topics. Google tools such as drive, groups, and docs will allow for enhanced collaboration amongst the group
members. The class D2L website will facilitate discussion on the projects that the students present. The students
will have access to screencasts explaining how to use GoogleTour, Google drive and TikiToki (virtual timeline).
The students have already used the class D2L and have been exposed on how to use discussion format.
Students will need basic knowledge how to navigate the internet and use the functions of Google Docs.

Instructional Plan
Preparation (What student needs, interests, and prior learning provide a foundation for this lesson? How can
you find out if students have this foundation? What difficulties might students have?)

The students will have prior knowledge from an overview in class, completing a note packet, and completing a
Civil War lab. This will provide a base knowledge to begin their further research thus producing a quality product.
Students might have difficulty with filtering all the information that they find and reporting the important information
that pertains to the product.

Management Describe the classroom management strategies will you use to manage your students and the use
of digital tools and resources. How and where will your students work? (Small groups, whole group, individuals,
classroom, lab, etc.) What strategies will you use to achieve equitable access to the Internet while completing this
lesson? Describe what technical issues might arise during the Internet lesson and explain how you will resolve or
trouble-shoot them? Please note: Trouble-shooting should occur prior to implementing the lesson as well as
throughout the process. Be sure to indicate how you prepared for problems and work through the issues that
occurred as you implemented and even after the lesson was completed.

The students will work in groups (2-3) and will save their work on Google Drive which will be shared with the group
members but also with the teacher. The teacher will be able to access the group work at any time and be able to
see who makes what additions to the research. The students will be provided will computers, either in the
computer lab, media center, or in the classroom through the laptop or tablet cart. Students also will be asked to
download the Google Drive and docs app to be able to work from their smart phones if available when needed. If
students are not able to access the internet or a computer at home they can go before or after school to the media
center or reserve the class computer with the teacher. If the computers or internet access does not work, the
students will result to using their phones and could hand-write their research for that day and scan it into their
Google Drive portfolio.

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Instructional Strategies and Learning Activities Describe the research-based instructional strategies you will
use with this lesson. How will your learning environment support these activities? What is your role? What are the
students' roles in the lesson? How can you ensure higher order thinking at the analysis, evaluation, or
creativity levels of Blooms Taxonomy? How can the technology support your teaching? What authentic,
relevant, and meaningful learning activities and tasks will your students complete? How will they build knowledge
and skills? How will students use digital tools and resources to communicate and collaborate with each other
and others? How will you facilitate the collaboration?

Students will be collaborating in small groups throughout this project. The students take on the role of explorer,
producer, and teacher. The project is challenging and requires the students to use higher order thinking skills to
apply their knowledge and produce a product. The students will use each other to ensure they are on the right
track but also use their teacher as a guide or a facilitator. There are also many tutorials to help guide the
students through basic functions in using technology. They can also ask their peers and the teacher for help
with using the tools if necessary. The project aligns with the standards set forth by the state of Georgia and
also for the NETS standards with the technology that is incorporated. The different tools that are being used
(Google Tour or Tiki Toki, Google Docs/drive, eClass (D2L), and screencast allow the lesson to be
multidisciplinary thus covering not only the social studies concepts, but also requiring the students to write.
Students will have an authentic learning experience by using research tools and presenting using screencast so
that the cast can be shared to enhance the learning of others. The students will be graded and evaluated
throughout the project through checklists and performance rubrics. Technology is a great tool that helps provide
a way to research and present a product but also a way for the students to communicate and collaborate
through tools like Google Drive and eCLass (D2L). The students will be able to store and share their
information in a central location that allows them to access it anywhere. The collaboration will be facilitated by
the students having assigned roles within the group. The Google Drive and Docs will be shared with the teacher
to monitor the collaboration of the groups. The presentation tools allows the students to create an interactive
timeline or map that can be used to enhance others learning as well.

Differentiation (How will you differentiate content and process to accommodate various learning styles and
abilities? How will you help students learn independently and with others? How will you provide extensions and
opportunities for enrichment? What assistive technologies will you need to provide?)

This plan is designed for special education students in the resource setting (small, separate class). All students in
these classes are receiving special education services. There are many different ways that the students can
complete their research. Research usually contains heavy reading. The students can use Ispeak, a Google
Chrome add on that will read the content to the students. These students will also need more guidance in their
resources and will be given a recommended website list. The students also struggle with writing and can record
audio files to add to their interactive timeline and/or video to reduce some of the writing. Enrichment opportunities
are endless with the flexibility to make the timeline or map as simple or enhanced as the students want. The
students have the opportunity to use any digital tools to enhance their product and make it more complex.

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Reflection (Will there be a closing event? Will students be asked to reflect upon their work? Will students be
asked to provide feedback on the assignment itself? What will be your process for answering the following
questions?
Did students find the lesson meaningful and worth completing?
In what ways was this lesson effective?
What went well and why?
What did not go well and why?
How would you teach this lesson differently?)

The students will post their projects to a discussion board where others can view. Each student will be required to
reflect on the other groups projects. They can comment on what they liked about the other projects, something
new they learned, and/or something that could be added.
Students will also complete a survey using Google Forms to gather information on how to make the project better.
1. Did this project increase your learning and guide you to answer the essential questions?
2. What did you enjoy about the project?
3. Was there anything you did not enjoy?
4. If you could change anything about this project what would you change?

Closure: Anything else you would like to reflect upon regarding lessons learned and/or your experience with
implementing this lesson. What advice would you give others if they were to implement the lesson? Please
provide a quality reflection on your experience with this lesson and its implementation.
Overall the lesson/project was successful and was full of positive feedback from the students. The students
enjoyed working with the digital tools and enjoyed working in small groups to divide up the doughty task and
collaborate. The students also enjoyed the flexibility of being able to choose and create high quality work. I would
recommend to reserve as much computer time as possible for students. The students were able to work on their
phones but were much more productive on the computers. Another idea is to assign a small project on both
Google Tour and TikiToki to allow students to have some basic use of these tools before attempting this project.
The learning curve for the students was not as fast as I had hoped it would be.

THE CIVIL WAR GONE DIGITAL

Project
Area Unacceptable (0-3 pts) Acceptable (4-7 pts) Target (8-10pts)
Content (2x the points) Project is off topic and Project shows evidence Project is rich with
not very clear with the of research. Lacks in content, sources are
ideas presented. some clarity. cited
Content is very surface
level
Map/Timeline (2x the Commercial is not well Evidence of some Well planned, easy to
points) thought out, hard to structure in the follow, engaging, relates
follow, Off topic commercial, ideas to topic
present, may not
engage audience
Creativity and Little to no creativity, Either create or Both creative and
organization thoughts and ideas organized but lacks the organized, a well
were not well organized other thought out project with
original ideas.

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Peer Review (Evaluations will be averaged)
Area Unacceptable (0-1 Acceptable (2-3 pts) Target (4-5 pts)
pts)
Content Project is off topic, Project is on topic, Project is on topic,
provides little or no some evidence of has evidence to
evidence of research, research evident, support ideas, sources
Content is no some sources cited. cited, content
conveyed to audience. conveyed to audience
Creativity Project is not very Shows some Very creative,
thoughtful, creativity, but does engages audience
presentation and video not engage audience.
was very plain

Group Evaluation
Area Unacceptable (0-3 Acceptable (4-6 pts) Target (7-10 pts)
pts)
Contribution Member was off task/ Member made Member made
Minimal contribution, minimum substantial
did not complete contribution, did contributions,
tasked assigned contribute many new contributed many
ideas. ideas.

Response post to peers

Area Unacceptable (0-1 Acceptable (2-3 pts) Target (4-5 pts)
pts)
Response to others No response or Response is Response is
limited response- Ex respectful, expands respectful, expands
nice post or I upon the original idea upon the original idea
agree, Does not with some depth, with new evidence,
expand on the original some evidence present invites further
idea, off topic, rude discussion
in nature, or
disrespectful

Step Points
Check list /20
Project /50
Peer Eval /10
Group Eval /10
Post /10
Total /100

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