student+work+near+east

Near East: As I mentioned in my general reflection on this unit, I was not pleased with the way this project turned out. The students all did a great job; it was my fault in assigning something that was not authentic and not interesting. Sammi actually really enjoyed this assignment. She was partnered with Lance and on other student. Sammi loves history and she really enjoys doing research and learning more about the people we covered. Because of this, a powerpoint research project would still be a great assignment for a student like Sammi. She was just as motivated, she thought it was just as fun, and she was just as engaged as with any other project. Sammi is however not your typical student. While everyone produced very informative presentations that averaged about a half of class period in length, Sammi and Lance’s took almost the full hour, the students were very bored from start to end. They did the research not because they wanted to and were connected to the project, but because as Nick put it, “I didn’t want to look bad in front of the class.” This is not how learning takes place. I was so unhappy about the entire thing, I didn’t even include a section on the final exam that dealt with these two weeks. All the students, with the exception of Sammi, said this was their least favorite project. I really got the feel that once these students started to get the freedom to express themselves in their projects and have fun with their learning that they had no desire to return back to traditional assessment.