Project Description:

This project based unit will be directed towards an eighth grade science class. The
standards for this project can be found on the grant proposal website. The standards cover
climatic interactions among earth, ocean, and weather systems. The standards also cover
dependency of organisms and populations in an ecosystem. Students will be able to explore
environmental changes of organisms and traits in populations and they will also be able to
explain how human activities affect global warming.
In order to guide the students to the development and completion of the objectives,
driving questions have to be addressed. On the first day of the project, the students will be
presented an entry document which is also available to view on the grant proposal website. The
students will work with the teacher using their entry document to figure out what they know as
well as what they need to know to implement their projects. Out of the knows/need to knows, the
students will be able to form driving questions which will guide the students to stay on task over
the project. The driving questions can also be found on the grant proposal website.
The students will be able to comply with the objects through the development of their
presentations, the research they will conduct, mini projects throughout the lesson (class
discussions, barometer lab, field trip, global warming individual papers, debates, and an
interactive global climate board game). Each day will focus on a mini assignment along with
project time. On the final day of the third week, the groups will present their topics in a unique
way. This will make it more exciting and each group will have a different topic. This will ensure
that the students learn from one another. The project will give the students freedom on how they
would like to implement their projects, whether through videos, Prezis, skits, interviews, etc. The
students also have the ability to use research and learn how to find content worthy websites that
are reliable. The responsibility of the project will belong to the administrators, the teacher, and
also to the students.