Over the past few weeks, I have been working with a classroom at Fluvanna County High School to solve a problem that was proposed by Superintendent Keller: How do we get student voices involved and sharing positive stories of our school district?
I’ve been updating every so often about how I’m working to get the district together and all schools working to share the positive stories that come from each school. Superintendent Keller loves the idea and wants to take it further. She suggested I work with the economics/marketing teacher and come up with a way to do this with his students. I had never worked with this teacher before, but as soon as we connected, we were both excited with the possibilities that this problem could bring.
In time, we developed a project with a basic plan:
- Step 1: Research 3 marketing brands/companies and explore their use of social media
- Step 2: Research 3 ways Fluvanna County School district uses social media (students would be provided with a list)
- Step 3: Create a project to solve the problem presented by the superintendent.
We fleshed out the plan further, including discussion questions to lead in/exit, presentations before Superintendent Keller and some of the school board members, and the use of Google Classroom for the entire project. We left the final project very open-ended because we wanted to simulate solving a problem in the marketing world. We knew some students would balk at this, as they were used to being told exactly how to get an A. All we did was make sure they knew what parts needed to be answered as part of their proposal. How they created the final presentation, and how they solved the issue itself was entirely up to them.
The only snag we ran into with getting started was students not being able to view any kind of social media on the student wi-fi network. They were unable to view Twitter or Facebook. This was a hurdle, as these students needed to be able to find examples and explain how each company/brand utilized social media. In the end we pooled the teacher devices that we had (2 laptops, a desktop, and a Chromebook) and allowed different groups to use them under supervision for their research, and then return at the end of class.
Currently, students are working on their final project presentations. They were allowed to use anything they wanted, but most used Slides or PowerPoint. Some are exploring Prezi or Powtoons as well. We are making sure that students have tips and tricks to utilize when creating their presentations that will help them create professional ones.
Later, I’ll share some highlights from discussion questions and projects. For now, I’ll continue to update and share images of students hard at work, as well as images of the final presentations, which will be December 9th, 13th, and 16th.