ND Curriculum Initiative

Subject & Standards

Needs Assessment/Rational

Analysis of Need for a 3rd Grade Math Unit on Circle/Pie Graphs with a Cultural Component: The goals of this unit would be to increase student proficiency in reading and interpreting fractions and graphs (“interpreting data display”), as well as to have students develop a broader cultural understanding of the vocabulary and concepts of genealogy and their own personal history by using a wide array of resources.

Overall, Turtle Mountain lags in mathematical performance with only 28-32% of students achieving proficiency as assessed by the Terra Nova test and reported on the Annual Adequate Yearly Progress Report for 2003-2004. Math is the area in which TMES did not make AYP. An item analysis for the 3rd grade math performance at Turtle Mountain on the Terra Nova indicates that, in the area of Data, Statistics and Probability, students performed as follows: TM Mean Highest Possible; Reading a bar graph .98 1.00; Comparing data .89 1.00; Interpreting data display .66 1.00; Restructuring data display .64 1.00; Interpreting data display (cumulative) .56 1.00
Because of this data, I have been trying to specifically support math instruction through Library lessons this year, mainly through choices of reading selections and recommending materials such as our complete set of Reading Rainbow, Math is Everywhere. I have been searching for a tool to incorporate more Library/Technology skills as well as cultural content. The need for cultural content is expressed in our school mission statement as “respect for the local culture”.  There is an ongoing effort to create learning experiences that are authentic for our students.

Understandings & Goals

Enduring Understanding: 1. When you read and do research about your family or any other topic, know that information is available from a variety sources within a library and beyond, but that each must be evaluated for how accurate it is.  2. When you share your research, there are many effective and visually appealing ways to do so.
Learning Goal(s): 1. Students will understand and access a basic variety of information resources. 2. Students will arrange, organize and present information (and images) to make them useful in the future and to inform an audience.

Questions Answered

Essential questions: 1. Where can we look for information? In the library? Online? In the community? At home?  2. How can we evaluate the information that we find?  3. How can we arrange or organize the information to help make it useful?
Objectives: 1. Presented with a list of terms and definitions, students will recall 100% of ten basic genealogy terms.  2. Presented with a list of terms and definitions, students will recall 100% of ten basic math/graph terms.  3. Assigned the completion of a paper “Family Tree”  as homework, students will gather name and date information from selected resources, identifying at least four progenitors.  4. Given a selection of print sources, electronic sources and personal interview sources, students will identify a variety of resources and correctly cite three of them. 5. Given a selection of print sources, electronic sources and personal interview sources, students will identify a variety of resources and correctly cite three of them. 6. Provided online tools for rubric creation, students will collaborate to create a project rubric that applies at least five evaluation criteria to this project.  7. Introduced to spreadsheet software, students will produce at least three (3) graphs representing their information.  8. Compiling their graphs, students will create a posted group presentation for public viewing.

Assessment

What quiz and test items (e.g. simple content-focused questions that require a single, best answer) will provide evidence of understanding? 
What would be sufficient and revealing evidence of understanding?  1. Students will complete matching quizzes for terminology.  2. Students will answer short fill-in worksheets to demonstrate understanding of the research process.  3. Please see also the performance tasks and projects area.
What academic prompts (e.g. open-ended questions or problems that require students to think critically and then to prepare a response / product / performance) will provide evidence of understanding?
Introductory questions during each session.
What performance tasks and projects (e.g. complex challenges that are authentic, mirror the real world and require a performance or product)will you include that will provide evidence of student understanding?
Students successfully manipulating or restructuring data can create a “publishable” product.
What performance tasks must anchor the unit and focus the instructional work?
Math Related Anchors (essential knowledge and skills) 1. Students grasp and can operate basic mathematical concepts of numbers, addition, subtraction, “doubling” [Assess through math quizzes. Reteach as required]  2. Students grasp the concept of fractions as representing parts of a whole. [Assess through math quizzes. Reteach as required.]  3. Students grasp the concept of percentages as whole being 100. [Assess through math quizzes. Reteach as required.] 4. Students grasp the relationship between fractions and percentage. [Assess through math quizzes. Reteach as required.]  5. Students can represent relationship in a data display. [Open-ended questions. Assess through product. Apply rubric.] 
Social Studies Related Anchors 1. Students perform basic writing skills. [Open-ended questions. Assess through writing product. Apply rubric.]  2. Students define basic family relationship/genealogy terms. [Assess through matching quiz.]  3. Students relate terms within their own family. [Open-ended questions. Assess through paper Family Tree. Apply rubric.]  4. Students grasp the concept of generational timelines. [Open-ended questions. Assess through paper timeline. Apply rubric.]  5. Students grasp the concept that they are part of many events and people that have come before them. [Open-ended questions. Assess through written family stories or oral storytelling. Apply rubric.]
Technology Related Anchors 1. Students perform basic computer operations, i.e., on/off, mouse/cursor movement, open programs, save work, print, etc. [Assess with performance checklist/self-assessment.]
Library Related Anchors 1. Students perform basic online catalog searches and locate library materials. [Assess with performance checklist/self-assessment.] 2. Students perform basic Internet searches. [Assess with performance checklist/self-assessment.]  3. The final product will be assessed by a student-generated rubric.
What other evidence (e.g. observations, work samples, dialogues, student self-assessment) of understanding will you collect?
Please see above.

Instructional Strategies

A. Using a combination of problem based and inquiry based strategies, students will seek answers to essential questions “Where can we look for information about people in our family?”; “How can we evaluate the information that we find?”;  and “How can we arrange and organize the information to make it understandable and useful?” 
Then using project based strategies students will create products for an authentic family and community audience. This project has the following characteristics: it integrates real world experiences—skills, concerns, connections—and authentic assessment; it is multidisciplinary and requires higher order thinking skills through discussions of family relationships and family histories, through writing of family trees and family stories, through mathematical operations and data structuring and restructuring, through creation of the concluding rubric and through planning for the design of the display. It also taps individual student interests and abilities.