Uploaded to Flickr on March 6, 2009 by Ati977
In Year 10 History the last component I needed to teach before commencing revision for the School Certificate was the following section of the syllabus:
Post-war Australia
The impact of changing technology on everyday life in post-war Australia:
- housing
- home appliances
- entertainment
- transport
- communications
I wanted it to be fun, engaging and memorable.
Basically, I told the above to my class and said we had 3 x 75 minute lessons to plan an exhibition on the second floor of the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney and supplied a map of the area. As a class we brainstormed some of the components of the task that needed to be addressed, such as target audience, sources of information, catering for a range of multiple intelligences and lastly, the organisational structure of the class (employees).
The students ended up deciding they would have an Exhibition Manager and five Topic Leaders, each with four or so employees. Some of the leaders are not normally the ones who would step into these positions. For example, a tall and shy boy who plays the guitar is leading the entertainment team. A student with Aspergers secured himself a non-group role of Administrator. Once these roles were filled the students just jumped straight in and became animated and excited in their planning. I’m very much looking forward to their presentation to the Powerhouse Museum Curator (me) next week.
