Activity+and+Rubric+Evaluations

1. I really like the random, game like approach to the writing assignment in Mark's activity when the student's press a button to determine their intended audiences and topics. I think that students would find the novelty of it quite appealing. Plus, I think it's an engaging way to teach a topic that can sometimes be a bit dry. As for inquiry based learning, I agree with Mark - I think it ranks at a medium level. It's not necessarily low, but not that high either. Perhaps this could be more inquiry based if the lesson asked a stronger essential question or had more multifaceted steps to increase the process of learning. I think the activity I reviewed was more inquiry based because it was more process centered (many, many steps) and asked a strong essential question (What is the American dream?).

2. I also like my rubric for inquiry based activities. As for the format, I am truly impartial so I can go either way - although, I must admit, the cell format looks nice! I think research is an integral part that I didn't stress in my definition. However, I think that we should keep something about linking the new research with the outside world to align with an interdisciplinary approach. In light of this, I added a few worlds on linking information to the components of the "research" cell.