Culture Projects

Culture is going to be an important aspect of our curriculum, and I had an idea as I was laying out my curriculum map.  One of the most valuable learning experiences I had was my senior project in high school as well as my capstone class report in college.  What set these assignments and projects apart from the rest of my school experience was the degree of flexibility we were allowed in selecting our subject.  Given loose guidelines, I was able to choose something of most interest and relevancy to me.  For example, in my senior project, I had to choose something I wanted to change in my community, form an opinion, and propose a solution (persuasive).  My capstone class was more expository and I had to select a topic related to any of the themes or ideas presented in any of the literature and media we had read/viewed during the course - the topic was the Dirty War in Argentina, but had many underlying themes like friendship, family, love, and patriotism, so anyone could find something they were interested in if they searched hard enough.  While the subject matter was flexible, the requirements were very specific.  For example, my senior project required a research paper and proposal as well as a presentation in front of a panel of judges, while my capstone class took us through a series of activities and assignments that culminated in a presentation of our paper to the class during which our classmates graded us using a rigorous rubric.

I'd like to give my students this same opportunity.  Since our curriculum will be novel-based, I'm thinking that we'll read one novel each quarter, then students will have time to prepare a "culture project" with specific requirements, but flexibility in what students choose to present.  I imagine I would like to do this similar to my capstone course and require students to choose a cultural theme or idea present in the novel we read that quarter.  Of course, students will need to get their topic approved by me first, but I think this would be a fantastic way to dive into the culture in our books.

Here are a few ideas I have for projects, mostly inspired by the projects I did in high school or college:

• Create an artistic representation of your idea and present/explain it to the class
• Prepare a dramatic piece (can perform a scene, interpretation, monologue, puppet show, etc)
• Create a cultural artifact (food, clothing, tool, model, etc....)

Getting deeper into the book, there are more specific things like creating a political poster, a passport, diary of a character, design a house or market booth, draw a map, etc.  Once I select the books I want to use, I'll make a list of ideas I have but also allow students to come up with their own (approved) ideas for their projects.  I did find a lot of cool ideas on this site!

I'm excited to dive into the books and begin thinking about the culture we could pull in!