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What Does "Student Choice" Really Mean?
by Grant Zimmerman


 

Guiding Your Students' Product Selections 
I do not dust. I mow the yard and take care of the taxes, but I don’t dust. All I can think about while waving the magic wand is knocking over one of the many antique Staffordshire figures living in our home. Besides the real fear of destroying something that is difficult to replace, I just do not have much interest in moving dust. I am also interested in staying alive a few more years.
 Our students are just like us. They may lack significant interest in a particular academic topic or, they may be fearful of not doing well enough to please everyone in a subject in which they hold little interest.  In either case, as teachers we understand how to motivate students to learn. One of the best ways to motivate students is to provide opportunities to self-select academic ideas and topics in which they express interest.
We think, and therefore learn, (apoligies to Descartes) when we are interested in what we study and, at the same time, are expected to demonstrate or present what we have learned to an audience.  This simple idea guides active learning. Teachers position their units and lessons to guide students’ learning.  The Science Product Planning Guide can (and should) be used with all subjects and topics. Customize the Guide to match your classroom.
 
 
Give the students both the Planning Guide and the Recipe Guide. Explain that they will create three different products on three different topics. Collaborative teams document how they will generate work that represents each team member’s ideas, thoughts, and efforts. The rubric you will create should address academic accomplishments, style and presentation expectations, as well as, productive collaborative work behaviors.
Guided Student Choice
There are two different copies of the Product Planning Guide. This link shows how the Guide is adapted for a Social Studies class. Instead of topics in the sciences, such as:
·         Weather systems
·         Water cycle
·         Volcanoes, earthquakes and sink holes
·         Kinds of energy; Power production
·         Plants and Animals
·         Oceans of the World
·         Solar System/Stars/Galaxies
·         Sound and Hearing
·         Structure of Matter
·         Motion.
Social StudiesThe Social Studies Guide show different topics:
·         Pre-Columbian America
·         Colonial America
·         Revolutionary War
·         United States Constitution
·         Selected Presidents
·         Selected Famous Americans
·         Civil War Reconstruction
·         Westward Expansion
·         World Wars
·         Selected Decades
 
Recipe GuideStudents select the topic that interests them the most. They choose the Product, such as Creating a Game Show or Presenting a Mock Trial. Each Product contains at the minimum, five different Ingredients. Naturally, some ingredients work better with some products than with others. For example, the Ingredient “Draw poster size pie charts” works better with the Product “Conduct a Debate” than with the Product “Make a counter balanced mobile.”
What makes the Recipe Guide work as a vehicle for active learning is the high level of student choice. We learn better, when we are engaged in the ideas and topics. After all, I do a much better job with the taxes than I do dusting.
 
Grant Zimmerman is a National Faculty Member of the National Paideia Center at the University of North Carolina. He leads educators in Professional Development sessions on the Paideia Seminar and the Paideia Project. Grant is also a Senior Education Consultant with Knowledge Network Solutions—Leaders in Technology Integration in schools. You can reach Grant at gzimmerman@northcarolina.edu.        

 

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