Tales, Tall and True, Old and New

I. Briefly review the project form. Discuss the project theme, outline and time line; review the project and curriculum objectives.

Theme: Tales, Tall and True, Old and New. Students were asked to gather stories from their respective communities. A provision was that the stories had to be told to them by some person, rather than found in print form. Students were asked to gather stories by the first week in May, transcribe and produce a fully edited document in WP8 by the end of May, and post to our web page , with assistance, as soon as possible thereafter. All, except for posting, occurred on time. The page went up during the last week of school. It is anticipated that future classes will expand the page.

The objectives of this project were:

• To help students develop concepts relating to the Tale Genre, especially Folk Tales, Legends and local Myths.
• To provide connectivity between student experiences and tales, and between stories and orgins.
• To develop an understanding of the oral tradition.
• Students will speak and listen to explore, extend and clarify information.
• Students will communicate information and ideas effectively and clearly.
• Students will use a range of strategies to develop effective writing.

II. Show the audience the outcome of the project proposal.

Results and a tour of the project can be seen at: http://www.k12.nf.ca/amalgamated/projects/grassroots/4/

III. Briefly comment on any successes or problems that were encountered throughout the life of the project.

Students developed an awareness of the need for editing and proofreading which they had not previously exhibited. They also developed considerable skills in this area. We implemented sound clips of each student to personalize the project - we would definately continue this aspect in the future. Overall, the project was successful.

IV. Comment on any aspects of the project that you would do differently.

In the furture, more thought will be given to developing a naming convention for student files. This year, a technical aid assited in naming the files; teachers should collaborate on a naming convention before students begin for unity purposes. The style of student pages should be kept to a bare minimum,ie. fancy fonts are not necessary. In the future, teachers will provide more guidance in this area.

V. Comment on if and how the project can be expanded next year.

Currently, there is another teacher in the province who has created a similar GrassRoots project. Future plans include collaboration with this teacher to share ideas by linking the two projects together. We would also like to expand the current project into a block project. Some of the communities that are linked into the website do not have developed home pages. We would like our junior high students to work on the development of these pages. In general, we plan to expand outward to other districts, and within our own district as well.