Starry, Starry Nights

“Tweaked” by Jean Napier-Faeih  to fit with our technology, writing, and science goals.  Based on

a Web Quest written by Nancy Kellner.

Just as man has starred up at the clouds during the day and imagined pictures, so has man looked to the stars.  Today constellations still fascinate everyone.  As part of your on going studies on constellations you will  use your imagination, research skills, and technology to create pages for a class book which will be displayed in the hall for all to see!

Step One

You will :

1.      Select a constellation and have your teacher approve your choice.     

1.      Print out the check list to record the information you find.

2.      Discover how your constellation was named. 

3.      Find out:

4.      Write a fictitious story about how your constellation got its name.  This is your creative writing activity.

ˇ        Pay attention to your word choices and use good writing conventions.  You need to be sure that  you choose energetic verbs and specific adjectives.  Also check to see if your story has a main idea,  topic sentences that tells about each paragraph, and a conclusion.  Check your spelling, grammar, capitalization, and punctuation.  Please be sure that you have indented each paragraph!

5.      Find a picture of your constellation and sketch it.  You will need this to recreate your constellation using the shape tools in PowerPoint.

6.      You will use this list of links to locate your information.

Step Two

We are going to use PowerPoint to create the pages of our book.  You are going to be responsible for creating 4 pages.  You will make sure you have your page orientation on landscape.  You will use graphics, word art, insert text, and use the shape tools for drawing your constellation

You will create 5 slides:

1.      Make a title slide with your name, the name of your constellation, and a picture.  I f you are unable to find a picture of your constellation you may have pictures of single stars.  If you take a graphic off a website you must cite your source!

2.      Slide two will have the picture of your constellation which you will create using the shape tool.  There are two star shapes to use to create your constellation drawing.  Be sure that you link the stars together using the straight line tool.

3.      Slide three will be the fact page that lists when and where you can see it, the names of the brightest stars, and any other information you wish to include.  Please put some graphics on this page as well.  You will also write a paragraph about how your constellation was named.

4.      Slide 4 will be your story.  You will use as many slides as you need to type your story.  Please include one or two graphics per page.  Do not use a font larger than 20.

5.      Last but not least, slide 5 will hold your “webliography” slide.  You must cite every web page you found and took information from, this includes images!  If you need an example, please check out this page at Yahooligans.  This link is for 4 – 5th grade students:  http://www.yahooligans.com/tg/45.html.  If you are in the 6th grade, please use this page for citation examples:  http://www.yahooligans.com/tg/678.html.

ˇ        Do not add any animation and sound to your slides.  We are printing them out and not presenting them as a PowerPoint slide show.

Step Three:

1.      When you are finished with your work you must have it peer reviewed.  Check it for grammatical errors and spelling errors.  Does your writing flow? Is it interesting?  Do your graphics enhance your work and are they related to the subject?

2.      Print out a black and white copy of your slides and let your teacher check it. 

3.      Print out a color copy after your teacher has checked your work and given you the okay.

v Teacher note:  Looking for something extra for those early finishers?  Have them make the cover page and contents page.  They needn’t put in the page numbers, just organize the constellations.  You can also have them work as editors!

This page used the following sources:

This lesson plan is based on the work of Nancy Kellner’s Reaching for the Stars  webquest which can be found at: http://www.algonquin.mec.edu/Webquest_copy/WebQuest-Astronomy.htm.  I just played with it a bit to make it fit our goals and objectives.   Nancy very graciously gave me permission to use her ideas!

To find out more about 6 Trait Writing, please read The Student Friendly Guide to Writing with Traits written by Vicki Spandel and Ruth Culham.  Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory.

12/18/2002

Email: Besteacher