Under the Waves

In an Oceanography unit, my fifth graders and I learned about more than just what happens under the waves. We learned how to integrate technology with our curriculum in an exciting and practical way. We created Hyperstudio stacks using information and graphics from the Internet, library books, electronic encyclopedias and magazine articles.

The students began by selecting an ocean animal, finding resources in and out of school, and taking notes on information they had collected up to that point. Then Melissa Smead, a graduate student at NMSU, began teaching the students and myself how to create Hyperstudio cards. She also taught us how to capture and import graphics from Websites relating to our animals. In the process, we each learned how to create a branching stack consisting of a title card with buttons leading to other cards for the physical appearance, migratory patterns, enemies, classification, and any other areas we felt were important to include in our sea animals reports. If satisfactory graphics could not be found, students were able to to create their own using the Draw and Paint tools in ClarisWorks The project culminated with oral presentations to the class and other students interested in our projects. Students evaluated each other using a rubric which was formed after we started working on the stacks.

The activity was quite successful because we (including myself!)learned, applied, and improved our skills at researching, online and offline, creating ClarisWorks documents, developing colorful and creative Hyperstudio stacks, and giving oral presentations. The students' learning curve and excitement level soared throughout most of the project. There were quite a few "aha" sounds, as well as "cool". What truly excited me was hearing someone say, "Here, I learned that yesterday, let me show you how."

This project was a wonderful precursor to other activities we did throughout the year. Some suggestions I would like to share with anyone wanting to do a similar project is to have as much planning done on paper, ahead of time, so that students' working time is better spent at the computer. If you, the teacher, can provide a model of what is expected, students will find the planning much easier. In addition, if you are using a rubric to evaluate students , develop it with student input prior to starting the project. This way students know exactly what criteria is expected for a particular score. Lastly, to keep the learning manageable, mini-lessons and time were provided to practice using Hyperstudio 3.0, ClarisWorks 4.0, searching the Internet in an appropriate manner, bookmarking sites, and capturing text or graphics off the Internet. In spite of how much we had to learn and do in a short period of time, we all rated this a fun and worthwhile project!

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