Persepolis Webquest

Project Plans

 

Rationale:  Persepolis is a novel about a young Iranian girl during the Islamic revolution.  In order for students to fully understand the implications of plot events, students need to be familiar with the culture, society, history, and politics of Iran around the time of the Iranian revolution.  The webquest gives students a chance to research one of the items, and the PowerPoint presentation allows all students to gain knowledge of all of them.  This project is meant to be completed before students read the novel.  They will have 7 class periods and about 2 weeks to prepare their presentations.

 

Goals (NCTE):

1.  Students read a wide range of print and non-print texts to build an understanding of texts, of themselves, and of the cultures of the United States and the world; to acquire new information; to respond to the needs and demands of society and the workplace; and for personal fulfillment. Among these texts are fiction and nonfiction, classic and contemporary works.
 3.  Students apply a wide range of strategies to comprehend, interpret, evaluate, and appreciate texts. They draw on their prior experience, their interactions with other readers and writers, their knowledge of word meaning and of other texts, their word identification strategies, and their understanding of textual features (e.g., sound-letter correspondence, sentence structure, context, graphics).
 4.  Students adjust their use of spoken, written, and visual language (e.g., conventions, style, vocabulary) to communicate effectively with a variety of audiences and for different purposes.
 7.  Students conduct research on issues and interests by generating ideas and questions, and by posing problems. They gather, evaluate, and synthesize data from a variety of sources (e.g., print and non-print texts, artifacts, people) to communicate their discoveries in ways that suit their purpose and audience.
 8.  Students use a variety of technological and information resources (e.g., libraries, databases, computer networks, video) to gather and synthesize information and to create and communicate knowledge.
 12.  Students use spoken, written, and visual language to accomplish their own purposes (e.g., for learning, enjoyment, persuasion, and the exchange of information).

 

Assignment Objectives: 

  • Students will research information about Iran during the Islamic revolution.

  • Students will design PowerPointŪ slides.

  • Students will present their findings to the rest of the class.

 

Schedule:

Day 1:  Introduction (part of one class period) (Let's say a Friday)

Students will be given the assignment sheet, and we'll talk through the assignment.  Students will choose groups.

 

Day 2:  In the computer lab (one class period) (Let's say Tuesday)

Students will have the class period to research their areas of the webquest.  If they do not finish (which is highly likely), they should use homework/library time to complete their research. 

 

Day 3:  (a couple of days later)  writing the script for the presentation (Friday)

The assignment notes that the group time/slide number is computed per person (2 minutes and three slides per person).  In theory, each student should have a good idea of the amount of information he or she has to relay.  Students will meet briefly in their groups to determine how to allot this time (maybe one person has 3 minutes of material that MUST be shared, and another has only 1 minute).  After receiving their allotments, students will work individually on their scripts.  Work not completed in class should be considered home/study hall work.

 

Day 4: Lab Day (A couple of days later) (Monday)

Students will be working on their PowerPoint slides.  Again, a brief group meeting will help group members check in with each other about their progress and time/slide allotments.

 

Day 5:  Lab Day again (Tuesday)

Putting the final touches on the slides, recording the script, if possible, combining slides from individual group members into one presentation.  Any work not completed should be considered home/study hall work.

 

Day 6 Lab Day again (a couple of days later) (Thursday)

Final rehearsal/run through/trouble shooting.

 

Day 7 Group Presentations (Friday)

Students will present their findings to the class.

 

Activities and Handouts

Activities are explained in the schedule.  Students will receive an assignment sheet the first day, which will dictate their daily activities.

 

Evaluation:  I will use the following rubric to assess the group presentation.  Student reflections will determine individual grades.

 

Sources: 

Firek, Hilve.  Ten Easy Ways to Use Technology in the English Classroom.  Portsmouth, NH:  Heinnemann, 2003.

 

Reflective Analysis:

The webquest is a project that I have wanted to do since I learned about it, and the novel Persepolis gave me an opportunity to design one.  I tried to make the webquest itself as simple as possible, so I broke down the research areas into what I believe are manageable topics for groups to work with.  I also was able to find websites that I believe are reliable for research purposes without too much trouble.  I relied fairly heavily on wikipedia, which, when I have more time, I will get away from.  I would like to find alternate sources, though the websites I have chosen give students a fairly comprehensive view of the subjects.  One of the problems is that US-Iranian relations are not that great, so government sources are a little biased.  Another is that the Islamic revolution took place in the mid 1970's, and there wasn't a lot online, nor is there a lot that I found is archived.  I suppose I could check CNN's website for archived information, and I will for the next version of this project.

This unit incorporates best practices in teaching in several ways.  Students have been given the authentic task of gathering and synthesizing information from several sources and presenting that information to colleagues.  They have a choice of topics to work with, and a choice of what colleagues they want to work with.  Most of the activities are self-directed.  Students make their own decisions about how to use their time and are given great freedom in the class activities; they are active learners in this situation.  I play the role of facilitator and coach during class time rather than directly instructing students.  Students are also responsible to the group for their work;  they feel invested in their work because of this group collaboration.  Students are also reading real texts in conjunction with the novel; they are reading primary sources and non-fiction material to gain information that will help their reading of fiction.

This project addresses two of the NETS for students: 

3.  Technology productivity tools

  • Students use technology tools to enhance learning, increase productivity, and promote creativity.

  • Students use productivity tools to collaborate in constructing technology-enhanced models, prepare publications, and produce other creative works.

5.  Technology Research Tools

  • Students use technology to locate, evaluate, and collect information from a variety of sources.

Obviously, students are using the internet to enhance learning and productivity.  Because the webquest digests websites for the students, they use time to read and learn instead of to search.  They are also using the internet to collect information for their presentations.  Students are also using technology to collaborate on the presentation, a "publication" and a creative work to convey information to their classmates.  The unit also addresses the three highest order cognitive skills in Bloom's taxonomy.  Students must analyze information to discern fact from inferences as well as to determine appropriate information for their presentations. Students must also synthesize information from several sources in order to write their presentations in addition to synthesizing group members' slides into a coherent presentation.  Finally, students must evaluate the information they present to the class in order to present the most pertinent/valuable information.  They will also be evaluating their group members as part of the grade.

One of the problems with creating a valid assessment concerns the very nature of group work.  While I was able to create a rubric to assess the group presentation, there will always be students who is suffer or benefit from the group grade.  In order to counteract that, I will also assign a group grade by having students write down (in descending order) who did the most work in the group (besides them, of course).  By tallying the responses, I will assign individual grades to complement the group grades.  Not a perfect system by any means, but it's one that has worked for me previously.

In order to adapt this unit for special needs students, I would need to allow more time for completion and work more closely with the special needs student, depending on his or her IEP. 

Based on the feedback that I got from the students who completed the webquest, I am going to change the time/number of slides requirement to be negotiable.  One of the students commented that there was SO much material in her culture section that she could have easily gone over her slide limit.  I agree that the culture section is large, and I could probably even break that up into more than one group.  Another student wrote that some of the websites should be investigated for bias.  I need to look into that more.  I understand that websites written by Muslims on Islam may be overly optimistic.  However, websites written by non-Muslims on Islam may be overly pessimistic as well.  Perhaps taking a more critical look at the websites as a class or at least as a group is in order, or students could note the authors in their presentation so that students can judge the websites' effectiveness for themselves.