For the Wicked Problem Project, I chose to develop one strategy that will aide in fostering interdisciplinary, technology-rich projects in my building. It is the goal of my principal to utilize the team structure at the middle school to incorporate interdisciplinary projects among core-subjects. The middle school is organized around the team model, but it has been difficult for teachers to find the support and time to re-vamp curriculum in order to allow these types of projects to come to fruition. For the WPP, I will be focusing on the use of Scratch to bridge the Math and Social Studies classrooms. This project will be done by all 7th grade students, and will involve a total of four teachers (2 Math and 2 Social Studies).
Because I am in a leadership/coaching role within my building, I can help foster these interdisciplinary opportunities. I will be connecting two disciplines (math and social studies) through the scope of technology. In order to successfully create and teach interdisciplinary units, the content and structure must be rich. Scratch is a programming tool used to teach students computational and logical thinking skills, and is shrouded in mathematical concepts. The end result for Scratch projects are animations or games created by students. This Wicked Problem Project will apply the computational/logical thinking skills to Social Studies content focused on the Civil War. By working with these two disciplines to integrate content and lessons, I am laying the groundwork for technology to be a catalyst in solidifying these interdisciplinary relationships. Not only will the teachers involved get scaffolded (with my guidance and co-teaching) practice in truly creating interdisciplinary units, but it can be an example for other teams and teachers as well. I will work to plan the project’s implementation with all of the Math and Social Studies teachers. We will work to create a method for how students in Math will gain experience and understanding of Scratch, programming, and Math’s tie-in to computational thinking. After some time of introductions to the program, students will apply their understanding of the program to create a game or animation to re-live the events of Pickett’s Charge. This interdisciplinary project has the potential to add a new and relatively un-tapped element to quality technology integration through the unique lens of Scratch in a core-content area.
I will begin co-teaching Scratch with two math teachers (both 7th grade). Students will learn some basic functions of the program and begin to gain an understanding of how the different pieces of code directly correlate to each element of their Scratch Project. For one class period per week, we will co-teach the basics of Scratch. After three weeks of Scratch introduction (with math tie-in) in the Math classrooms, the Social Studies teachers will introduce the Social Studies facet of the project. Students will apply their learning from the Scratch introduction lessons to a final project on the Civil War, specifically Gettysburg and Pickett’s Charge. Students will be required to bring those events to life through an animation or game created in Scratch. Once the Social Studies portion is assigned, both the Math and Social Studies teachers will support the building of these final products in their own classrooms. The Math introduction will begin the first week in April and the final Civil War animation/game will be due during the last week in May.
Scratch was developed at MIT and was first designed to help under-privileged youth gain technological fluency through use in after-school programs. Since its creation, the use of Scratch has filtered into schools. Because I knew the background on how and why Scratch was developed, I researched information on Scratch through MIT. In addition to consulting MIT resources on the use of Scratch, I also utilized my own personal learning network to locate resources on the use of Scratch in schools.
My research was successful overall, and I found great information from research studies done at Harvard and UCLA as well as interesting insight on everyday use through my PLN. One of my goals in researching Scratch for the WPP project was to find a balanced view of the program and its impact on learning. By consulting sophisticated research studies conducted at universities as well as blogs and articles written by teachers who have used Scratch in their own classrooms, my research provided me with a truly global view of the tool. The two formal studies I consulted (“Scratch for Budding Computer Scientists” and “Creative Coding: Programming for Personal Expression”) will be helpful to me as I plan and create the project. Both gave insight into actually teaching students to use the program and the rationale behind using it to enhance tech literacy. The articles and blogs I consulted on Edutopia.org and the Classroom 2.0 Ning will be helpful in the implementation and management of the project with students on a day-to-day basis.
I utilized Google as a search engine to preform specific searches in order to locate resources focused on the rationale behind using Scratch with students. Knowing Scratch engages students in computational thinking and logic, I used those as focus areas for my searches. I also searched for resources on Scratch within my PLN. My main focus in researching Scratch for my WPP was to find information on why Scratch is so powerful as a learning tool for students. Knowing the background of Scratch was extremely helpful in my search. Because I’m implementing this project in April with four teachers, (two Math and two Social Studies) I knew I wanted to hone in on why this programming tool is so powerful. Our goal for the project is to foster critical thinking across two disciplines, so I also wanted to gain insight on how the skills Scratch fosters could be beneficial to both the Math and Social Studies classrooms. My search was somewhat hindered by the fact that Scratch’s impact has not been studied from the perspective of learning in core subject area classrooms. Much of the research on Scratch comes from its use in after-school programs, extra-curricular groups, or technology classes.
During this course I will be in the planning stages of this project and will have begun the implementation. The students’ finished animations/games will be due during the last week of May, so upon the conclusion of CEP 812, I will be continuing to work with both Math and Social Studies teachers as well as students to apply concepts and utilize Scratch to bring History to life. I have met with the teachers involved to plan the implementation process and project work schedule. I will begin co-teaching with math teachers during the first week of April, and will work with students once per week. During the last week of April, students will be introduced to the Social Studies component of the project.
This project has the potential to be successful for a few reasons. From the teaching end, it will hopefully result in a project that meaningfully connects two core content areas through technology. From the perspective of the students, we are not only engaging them in technology to apply, evaluate, and synthesize content from two subject areas, but we are also allowing them to access a totally new realm (to most) of technology with the use of Scratch. Scratch teaches students to think logically and in a computational way that is not often fostered in school. Success will ultimately be achieved through the final products. From my coaching vantage point, success can also be measured through feedback from students and teachers, along the way. Since interdisciplinary teaching has become a prominent goal of our school and district, I think actually finishing and seeing such a project through will be success in itself. Teachers in my building feel extremely overwhelmed and have not embraced such projects because they feel as if its one more thing for their plates. Even taking the actions to plan this project is a huge step in the right direction for the teachers involved.
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