What do you need to know to plan for a road trip?
Why?
- Bring together many skills from the Grade 9 Essentials Math Curriculum
- Have students learn skills that are directly applicable outside school
- Interdisciplinary opportunities (business and geography)
I'm starting this entry in a van on the way home from Fond du Lac, Wisconsin This past weekend I was on a road trip with @emnose and her family to pick up her brother from university. Long, long drive but great trip! Their highway bridges are a lot nicer looking than ours (these are the things you notice when you are a Civil Engineer). Maybe we should start tolling more of our highways... another discussion for another day.
The curriculum...
@emnose had the the idea to do an entry based on the road trip so I started to think about some of the things that you need to research when you are planning a road trip. I quickly realized that planning a road trip brings together many of the skills in the Locally Developed Essentials Math courses. I actually taught a Grade 9 Essentials Math course with my AT during one of my practica. I actually think the road trip activity would be an excellent culminating activity for the course.
The Essentials course has a heavy focus on real-world, concrete skills. The Grade 9 course for example had 3 units: money sense, measurement and proportional reasoning. Really, the activity could be modified to fit into any math course but I thought this was a practical activity for the Essentials students.
@emnose had the the idea to do an entry based on the road trip so I started to think about some of the things that you need to research when you are planning a road trip. I quickly realized that planning a road trip brings together many of the skills in the Locally Developed Essentials Math courses. I actually taught a Grade 9 Essentials Math course with my AT during one of my practica. I actually think the road trip activity would be an excellent culminating activity for the course.
The Essentials course has a heavy focus on real-world, concrete skills. The Grade 9 course for example had 3 units: money sense, measurement and proportional reasoning. Really, the activity could be modified to fit into any math course but I thought this was a practical activity for the Essentials students.
In the classroom...
I would start the activity by asking the class what kind of things you would need to research before going on a road trip (I may specify USA because it provides the opportunity to discuss exchange rates and different taxes). Most of the following things should come up in a class discussion:
- Shortest travel time
- Shortest travel distance
- Lowest travel cost
- Exchange rate
- Cost of gas (conversions of volume and currency units)
- Taxes and tipping practices
- Time zone/daylight savings
- Hotel bookings and availability
- Driving rules and other laws
- Vehicle needed and packing allowances
Students could then get in groups, choose their destination and start working on what was discussed. Deliverables should be based around Skilled Communication of their findings and could take the form of an itinerary sheet, a budget sheet including a total cost of trip, a custom google earth map and/or a travel booklet/infographic with all the info in it.
Equity and 21C...
Equity and 21C...
To be a better example of 21st century learning and for the Knowledge Construction to be authentic, the road trip should actually happen. I know this isn't plausible for most high-schools or affordable by many parents but what if there happened to be a school team going on a road trip to a tournament? The class could help with the preparation of that (including creating a budget and booking the hotel).
Because of the equity issues involved, I would probably only do this activity if there were a school trip actually planned that the students that were planning it were able to attend! I think the activity is only worth it (from a 21C perspective) if they actually use the knowledge they construct and the products they create. For a lot of 21st Century Learning (as well as Critical Pedagogy and Global Citizenship Education), I think it is necessary for a teacher to be highly opportunistic based on what is going on in the school and school community. That's one of the reasons why I keep these entries fairly vague and open-ended. I'll post a quick blog entry about this in a bit...
Because of the equity issues involved, I would probably only do this activity if there were a school trip actually planned that the students that were planning it were able to attend! I think the activity is only worth it (from a 21C perspective) if they actually use the knowledge they construct and the products they create. For a lot of 21st Century Learning (as well as Critical Pedagogy and Global Citizenship Education), I think it is necessary for a teacher to be highly opportunistic based on what is going on in the school and school community. That's one of the reasons why I keep these entries fairly vague and open-ended. I'll post a quick blog entry about this in a bit...
1. Collaboration: entry - adoption - adaptation - infusion - transformation
2. Knowledge Construction: entry - adoption - adaptation - infusion - transformation
4. Skilled Communication: entry - adoption - adaptation - infusion - transformation
6. Use of ICT for Learning: entry - adoption - adaptation - infusion - transformation
Cooooooooooooool
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