Tell Them What You Want
Methods of establishing criteria for evaluation of possibilities
Objective: The students will be able to explain why it is important to develop criteria before starting to work on a project or evaluate other projects, speeches, etc.
Materials: None
Steps:
1. Divide the students into three groups of however many kids you have.
2. Have the students draw something (the school, a dog, a cow, a house, anything simple.)
3. When they have finished (give them 5 minutes) have them bring their pictures to the front of the room.
4. Start grading their pictures based on whatever you think of.
a. If the first picture has grass then decide that you will be grading on grass.
b. If the cow is facing to the left on one picture say you wanted all the cows facing left.
c. If none of them used color, say you wanted them to use color so they get no points.
5. The point is, you established no criteria for them and then graded them on things they weren’t aware of.
6. See if any of the students get upset and bring up why they don’t think what you’re doing is fair.
7. After this activity, talk to the students about the importance of using a specific criteria when working on group projects, or evaluating other people’s projects or speeches. Understanding criteria is something that they will need to know for many things further on in their lives.
Results: The students will understand what criteria is and why they should think about it when doing different activities. For homework you could have the students come up with their own criteria for giving speeches and then combine everyone’s criteria to make one for the class and they would be held accountable for those things. This way the students are actively coming up with what is expected from them and they are taking part in their learning.
Abbie Weidner
Fall 2009
By George, I think I’ve got it!
Invention
Objective: From an in-class activity, students will be able to identify their next speech/research paper topic.
Materials: No special materials are needed for this assignment.
Steps:
1. Before the class enters the room, the teacher will write five topics from step four on the board.
2. Once students enter the room the teacher will introduce invention to them expanding on these points:
• Aristotle
• Logos
3. Explain to students that invention is used to help others gather ideas for speech/research paper topics.
4. Ask students to write down the first three things that come to mind when they read the topics on the board. Have them write these down. Topics may include:
• Vacation
• Weather
• Sports
• Transportation
• Entertainment
• Future
• Past
• Politics/Government
5. Once all of the students have completed this, explain to them that these are potential topics for speech/research papers.
Results: Students will be asked to choose from the lists they created a topic for their next speech/research paper.
Katelyn Klute
Fall 2009