It hasn’t even been two weeks since we finished our last project and our PLP 9 class is already done our second one this year! As I said in my previous post, this year is quite different. COVID 19 still requires the school year to be structured on a quarter system, and out of school restrictions are only getting larger. It is a hard time to live in, but I found being able to go to school and have access to that social interaction has helped tremendously.
Our second project for our 2020/21 school year was titled Storm The Bericades. The main focus of it was to learn all about revolutions and what their impact was on the world. All of the work in this project was lead by the driving question: HOW DO REVOLUTIONS TRANSFORM SOCIETIES? Since PLP is only two classes this year, each class consists of two different subjects and, due to the fact that we only have one project at a time, there are competency’s for all four subjects crammed into this one project. The competencies include:
ENGLISH
Designing Texts: Have I used writing and design processes to plan, develop, create, and refine engaging and meaningful texts considering purpose, audience, and message?
SOCIAL STUDIES
Establish Historical Significance: How do we make choices about what is worth remembering?
Analyze Cause and Consequence: Who or what influenced events to occur and what were the consequences of those events?
MAKER
Creative Communicator: How might I use technology to create and communicate?
Unlike others, this project consisted of a lot of launch and building knowledge work. It seemed like for ever, but, by day 8 we had finally left the launch phase. Although at the time the launch phase seemed endless with not enough hands on working, as I think about what I gained from it, I realize that I wouldn’t have been able to complete all the milestones as well as I did.
In my previous post I covered all that I learned from the first half of the project. For this one it ill cover the last portion as well as the crucial learning pieces throughout the entire project. In the second half, me and my group of four: Keenan, Sophia, and Jakob, really began to get the final knowledge needed to answer the driving question. Since milestone two, we have completed four crucial milestones. Each one unique but also with the same end goal.
Our third milestone was similar to our second except for the outlined question we were trying to answer. The DQ for this piece of work asked us to detail what the causes and consequences of the French Revolution were. For the milestone, we had to not only make another mod to our machine, but we were asked to write a proper paragraph to answer the question of the milestone. At first I thought this was going to be easier than the last the American Revolution and the paragraph that followed. Knowing that the last one was too long and had a lot of unimportant supporting details, I decided that I would try to keep it all in one paragraph, unlike my previous one where I was edging on four decent sized paragraphs. Although I tried, I realized I had learned to much about the revolution and found it hard not include every detail of the event. Lucky enough for me, by the time I had completed my first copy, I still had plenty of free time afterwards. After some harsh but useful feedback from my older brother Luca, I immediately went to work. My final product was nearly half the size of my first, and was much more precise. I ended up getting better feedback from my teacher, and only had a little bit of revising to do. In this milestone I personally learned all about how different aspects of a revolution can be followed from a cause all the way to a consequence.
I thought that our video for the French Revolution showed incredible improvement from the previous one we made. Keeping some common traits such as explanation of Crain Britton’s theory and the sound track that I made, the video also used different pictures from the revolution to represent the different phases.
https://youtu.be/rRjGu3V81Tc
Although some of the class’s paragraph covered the criteria for the milestone, most of them did not answer the DQ or were not well written in some sort of way. This being the circumstance, our teacher thought that it would be better to postpone the essay that was scheduled and dedicate the day to perfecting our Cause and Consequence paragraphs.
The fifth (which really was the fourth) and final milestone was when we exhibited and answered the Driving question using our previos knowledge of revolutions and video skills. As a group, our first line of action was to brainstorm an answer to the DQ: HOW DO REVOLUTIONS TRANSFORM SOCIETIES? With past knowledge from the book “Leviathan” and previous milestones, we immediately got to thinking. By the end of that class we came to the conclusion that there were a few common traits of revolutions. We talked about how they can completely change the social structures as well as the political structure of a society. We also knew that the economy of a society often changes after a revolution. That day, I went home thinking about how we can phrase our answer. Finally we constructed the answer: Revolutions transform the social-political structure of a society, due to the fact that the economy doesn’t fundamentally change 100% of the time. This would be the basis of the final video as well as all the preparation needed. Although we already had a pretty clear idea of how we would make the video, we still needed to create the story we would tell. We began with the story mountain where we planed and wrote down the structure of our plot. This is where I best showed the “Designing Texts” competency. In the story mountain, storyboard, and final video I showed how I can extend at both using different forms of media and audio to best show my answer. As a group we had some ups and downs, but by the final video our collaboration skills helped us work proficiently and productively. To end the video, you will see that I added credits to show how each of us contributed.one thing I took away from this project was how knowing different members strengths and weaknesses could to help make a smooth and well made end product.
https://youtu.be/nEXvMbC9RsQ
Overall, I hope you enjoyed our final video and thank you for reading. Make sure to comment any ideas or questions you have on this post.