2.4: Higher-Order Thinking Skills:
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Artifact
Game Developers are Readers and Writers Webquest Reflection The Game Developers are Readers and Writers webquest is a three week small group project designed to increase awareness of the relevance of reading and writing to the professional arena as well as to research and explore a career field many students may find intriguing – that of game development. The ultimate goal of the project is to storyboard a game adaptation of their summer reading assignment, then present the game to the class. To encourage quality work, students are promised that the top three adaptations will be spotlighted on the school’s morning news show and that aspiring game developers in the school will be invited to work toward realization of the game. Standard 2.4 requires that candidates model and facilitate the use of digital tools. This webquest, a model project-based unit plan easily accessible online by any interested parties, includes a teacher page with essential questions, a purpose statement, a suggested implementation timeline, differentiation ideas, and standards alignment. Each of these facilitates the implementation of the webquest in 9th or 10th grade English Language Arts courses. The higher-order thinking skills required to complete this project include analysis, evaluation, and creation. During the first week of the project, students must play and analyze game adaptations of the texts the Odyssey and Romeo & Juliet. They must also research and analyze the skillset of a game developer. This information will form the basis of the research findings presentations and game plans due the following week. Creation and evaluation of game storyboards in the final week culminate in a vote to determine which adaptation storyboards will be presented to the school via the morning news show. Throughout the project, problem-solving is a critical process students must follow in order to accomplish the project’s goals. The problem of how game development relates to English Language Arts curriculum is one students must address directly in their research, the findings of which are presented on a graphic organizer and in their game plan presentations. Students must also learn effective marketing techniques in order to market their game storyboards. The mental habits of mind students practice during this project include critical thinking, self-regulation, and reflection. Students must think critically about their novels, their research into the professional game development world and how that relates to the course standards, and their game adaptations. They must self-regulate in order to accomplish the activities required outside of class and to meet the weekly deadlines. The Conclusion slide of the webquest encourages reflection on what career fields might interest them and how the knowledge gained about the relevance of reading and writing to the game development career field relates to the fields they might enjoy. To encourage depth of reflection and exploration, a link to a career ideas site is provided. During completion of this artifact, I realized why the webquests I had implemented prior to the course flopped so disappointingly. The Game Developers are Readers and Writers website required depth of thought, authentic exploration into an engaging career field, collaborative technology, plenty of choice, and an authentic audience. My previous well-intentioned but misguided attempts at webquests did not so; instead, they required and accomplished little more than students could do by copying information from a textbook into a graphic organizer. Looking back on the artifact, I realize that making the career field reflection at the end required and adding an individual research project requirement would provide individual evidence of skill mastery and encourage students to think critically about potential career paths. Because the course is designed for 9th graders, exploring potential futures could be incredibly meaningful to their long-term academic engagement. The assessment of students learning from this project can be gauged using the embedded rubrics; likewise, assessment of student dispositions can be gauged using the embedded survey on the Conclusion page. Data from these assessments can inform future webquest development and implementation, information that can provide collaboration teams with evidence supporting the use of project-based multimedia learning experiences. |