Objective of Activity Students will be able to recognize social problems that exist in today’s world and utilize their knowledge of politics and how a bill becomes a law to draft a new bill that would solve the problem they’ve identified.
Standard Justice 12 - JU.9-12.12 - I can recognize, describe and distinguish unfairness and injustice at different levels of society
Assessment – Describe how you will assess and provide a Rubric Students will be assessed using this rubric. Students will also peer assess using this peer assessment rubric.
Student Activity Description – List steps
Students will be placed into groups by the teacher. Students will, with their group, identify a social justice problem going on around them.
With their group, they will draft a bill that attempts to remedy the problem they’ve identified.
Groups will use their knowledge of the political parties (gained in previous lessons within the unit) to determine who might vote on this, who their target audience is, how they can refine an ad campaign to sway congress people or the public (depending if it was a ballot initiative or a bill in the California Assembly).
Students have the option of using a variety of media types to promote their proposed law. They will be responsible for addressing the counterargument to their bill in the ad.
Students present their proposal and their ad campaign to the class and complete peer assessments.
Variety of Content Levels - Address Needs for 5 different students: EL, Sw/SN, Low, Middle, High & EL:
EL students will be partnered with students who are strong with academic vocabulary. They will be writing to fill out a graphic organizer, and will have to participate in group discussions which will address ELD Standard 1. Exchanging information and ideas with others through oral collaborative discussions on a range of social and academic topics.
Sw/SN: Students will be grouped by the teacher so that SWSNs are matched with groups where they have students to help them. By giving students a project menu for the actual product of their project (video, radio commercial, speech, etc.) SWSNs will be able to choose appropriate projects to meet their needs. Each project choice will need to be okayed by the teacher, which allows the teacher to guide each project towards the needs of their students.
Low: Low students will be grouped with students who are strong in the content area. This allows low students to participate in aspects of the project, and gain support from their peers in areas outside of their strengths.
Middle: Middle students have a rubric that will help to keep them on track and set high expectations for their projects. They have graphic organizers and examples which will set specific standards which they must meet.
High: High students will be grouped with low students so that they will exercise their abilities to explain content, presenting a higher level challenge for them. Additionally, the open nature of the project and the rubric grading allows high students to use their creativity to find their own challenges in the project.
Vocabulary Development – Vocab Needed for this lesson:
Students will make vocab squares for the words. (wherein they fold a white paper into squares with three columns. In the first column they write the words in the far left column, they write the word’s definition in the middle (that they have re-written in their own words) and then draw a graphic that goes with it in the far-right column.
Graphic Organizer – Students will use this graphic organizer to guide them through the brainstorming portion of the project as well as show them what an example is.
Coöperative Learning Components - PIGS FaceS P - Positive Interdependence 1.) What are the mutual goals? : The students are working together for a social justice movement. Being able to learn about how to initiate a bill’s movement and sway Congress will empower the students. 2.) How will labor, materials, roles and resources be divided?: Ideally, the students will work together as much as possible on each part of this assignment.Students will form the idea together, then delegate amongst themselves who will bring the materials needed. Potential role division: research, choice in bill, presentation, creation of the media. 3.) What roles and responsibilities will you assign?: One role that will be given to the groups is that everyone needs to speak during the presentation aspect of the assignment. If they are creating a commercial, then each student in the group must be present, and speaking, on the commercial. If the students are creating an ad campaign, then they will all be required to speak in front of the class to explain their ad. 4.) How are all the roles connected?: All of the roles are connected because they are working towards the final media advertisement of the groups chosen bill. Each student will work towards the creation of the bill. 5.) What joint/common rewards will you provide?: The group members will all receive an external reward of a group grade. This is the grade that will be given for the complete presentation of the bill. 6.) What are the consequences if not all participate?: If not all of the students participate, then their individual grade will go down. Both the group total and the individual total will be added together to give each student their individual grade for this assignment.
I - Individual & Group Accountability 1.) How will roles be assigned?: Students will be put into groups by the teacher, and will be given the freedom to delegate their own roles. They know that they are being graded on their involvement, which should help to push the students to work accordingly. 2.) How will you hold each student Individually Accountable for learning?: Each student will be required to take part in the presentation aspect of the assignment. If it is speaking in front of the class, then each student must take part in speaking. If the group created a commercial, then each student is required to be in the commercial speaking. This will hold each student accountable for being prepared and taking part in the final product. 3.) How will you hold each student responsible for the whole group’s learning?: The students will each provide a peer assessment at the end of the project. In this assessment, they will grade each other on the work they did and the amount of help they provided. This will allow the students to have control over each other’s grades, which will push the students to understand how they affect the whole groups total.
G - Group Processing - How will you guide meta-analysis of individual and group processing? 1.) Observation: The teacher will watch and listen to each group as they work. They will be able to see and hear if the group is on task, and which student is not on task. At the end of the presentation, the teacher will give the students their group/individual grades, which will reflect how the student individually contributed to the group learning. 2.) Reflection: The students are able to reflect upon the group activity in their peer assessment. What went well, what didn’t. How did each group member, including themselves, take part in this activity. 3.) Goal Setting: Students will then write in their peer assessment what they would do better next time, and how they could improve their collaborative efforts.
S - Social Skills 1.) Trust Building Activity: The students need to trust each other when discussing difficult topics. When deciding what social justice action they want to act upon, they will need to partake in some difficult conversations. Being in an open environment and feeling safe to mention their personal beliefs will help the students to build trust between each other. 2.) Communication Activity: Students need to hold discussions about whether they are for or against present laws. They need to decide which social justice topic they are interested in, and they need to discuss how they will go about creating a bill to change the law. This will allow the students ample opportunity to involve themselves in discussion and facilitate the learning of proper communication. 3.) Decision Making Strategies: There will be many decisions the students will encounter in this assignment. They will need to decide what bill to create, how to create it, how they can use techniques to sway their audience...These are all decisions that they need to make as a group. 4.) Conflict Resolution: Students will try to dispute conflicts themselves, however, the teacher will become involved in deciding conflicts if needed. 5.) Leadership Skills: - Identify How Leaders Are Assigned: Students select their own roles within the group. - How will Social Skills be Self-Assessed: Students will give themselves a grade during the peer assessment. They will be prompted to give themselves a letter grade, and a reason why they would choose that grade.
FACE - Face-to-Face Interaction 1. Grouping: Students will be placed into groups of 4-5 by the teacher. This will allow us to choose which students will work together, pairing low, middle, high, ELs, and SwSN together. 2.) Room Arrangement - Room will be clusters of four desks. 3.) Group Seating - Students will be sitting in groups of four, face to face.
S - Specific Task Students will be given a rubric and a prompt that tells them specifically what the teacher is expecting out of them and their group members.