2016 Multi-Genre Inquiry Project
This year, since I am looking through the lens of a student teacher, I approached the multi-genre project differently. I decided to create a modified multi-genre inquiry project for my Sheltered High School English 1 class. The class demographics and lexile levels played a huge role in how I created the rubric.
Class Design
This class is made up of 13 students, 5 females and 8 males. Of those 13 students, 85% are English Language Learners (ELL). Since English is the second language for a majority of the students, I decided to have students create 2 genres instead of 7. This decision was also based on the fact that many of the students come from low income households and did not have resources such as computers or art supplies at home to complete the work, so all work was completed during class. The last but most potentially the most important factor was the class' average lexile level. Only 1 student of the 13 students were reading at or above reading level according to Achieve 3000 lexile scores.
The Project Rubric
For this project there were only three requirements:
Class Design
This class is made up of 13 students, 5 females and 8 males. Of those 13 students, 85% are English Language Learners (ELL). Since English is the second language for a majority of the students, I decided to have students create 2 genres instead of 7. This decision was also based on the fact that many of the students come from low income households and did not have resources such as computers or art supplies at home to complete the work, so all work was completed during class. The last but most potentially the most important factor was the class' average lexile level. Only 1 student of the 13 students were reading at or above reading level according to Achieve 3000 lexile scores.
The Project Rubric
For this project there were only three requirements:
- Students could not create a PowerPoint or a poster board
- By putting this limitation on students, it forced students to find creative ways to represent each genre.
- One genre had to represent the point of view of two characters
- One of the main things that we focused on in this lesson was point of view. The most obvious way was to explore the point of view of the narrator, Hiram, and how he chose to retell the story. We also examined the point of views within the story of characters such as R.C, Grandpa, Dad and even Emmett Till. We further explored those views with outside resources including documentaries and the readings of emails sent from citizens after the trial of Emmett Till's murderers.
- We also focused on the change (or lack of change) in point of views of characters throughout the text which is a NC Common Core Standard: CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.9-10.3 --> Analyze how complex characters (e.g., those with multiple or conflicting motivations) develop over the course of a text, interact with other characters, and advance the plot or develop the theme.
- One of the main things that we focused on in this lesson was point of view. The most obvious way was to explore the point of view of the narrator, Hiram, and how he chose to retell the story. We also examined the point of views within the story of characters such as R.C, Grandpa, Dad and even Emmett Till. We further explored those views with outside resources including documentaries and the readings of emails sent from citizens after the trial of Emmett Till's murderers.
- One genre had to represent the main conflict in the story, Man vs. Society
- This story, like many others are full of conflict. But one of the most present conflicts in the story is the conflict between man and society. For this genre students were to research one of the topics that related to the conflict in America in 1955. By doing so, students were able to better understand the way of life including the laws and mentality of citizens in the South.