So the fourth grade teachers Angie Harris, Christy Zuck, and Kelly Meadows teamed with Kim Jared to roll the program out to fourth graders.
Their Task: Create a vehicle restraint system.
When they finished, teachers felt better about the PLTW steps, but they also saw the opportunities to easily layer-in even more standards.
And Harris said they soon learned that, just like in the regular classroom, some students finished sooner. So they tweaked the assignment. In this case they tweaked it to, "Now that you have successfully tested your system, try to reconstruct it using fewer materials. In industry, constructing an equally safe product at a lower cost is a big deal." And the students began again.
This links you to an animoto of their experience:
https://animoto.com/play/lM9VXCGfvjPqgkdsi4CADQ?auto#
Their Task: Create a vehicle restraint system.
When they finished, teachers felt better about the PLTW steps, but they also saw the opportunities to easily layer-in even more standards.
And Harris said they soon learned that, just like in the regular classroom, some students finished sooner. So they tweaked the assignment. In this case they tweaked it to, "Now that you have successfully tested your system, try to reconstruct it using fewer materials. In industry, constructing an equally safe product at a lower cost is a big deal." And the students began again.
This links you to an animoto of their experience:
https://animoto.com/play/lM9VXCGfvjPqgkdsi4CADQ?auto#