Lesson+Plan

= Lesson Plan Day 1=

Introductory Activity (10 minutes)

1. Have students begin creating a K-W-L chart by brainstorming what they already know about the familiar historical figure, Christopher Columbus. Ask them: Record students' responses on the board and have students make notes in the Know column of their chart.
 * Who was Christopher Columbus?
 * Why is he famous?
 * When did he live?

2. Once students have created a substantial list of their prior knowledge, move to the Want to Know column. Encourage students' curiosity by asking questions that focus on Columbus' life: Have students make notes on their K-W-L chart as they brainstorm as a class the things they would like to know about Columbus. Model writing questions in the want column of the K-W-L chart.
 * What would you like to know about Christopher Columbus?
 * When and where was he born?
 * When and where did he die?
 * What was his family life like?
 * What were his accomplishments?
 * Did he earn any titles or awards as a result of his explorations?
 * Did he have any disappointments?

Learning Activity (40 minutes)

3. Before beginning the scavenger hunt, instruct students to follow the directions on the wiki page: Getting To Know Columbus. Students will begin by using the site: [|Looks Are Deceiving: The Portraits of Christopher Columbus] to select a picture of Columbus they would like to use for the report they are going to create. Explain to the students that they will be looking at portraits of Columbus and must select one to use in their final report. The portraits can be found by clicking on the links labeled Figure 1, 2, 3 etc. Monitor students' progress.

4. When students have selected a portrait the teacher will model the procedure for copying a picture from the Internet to your desktop. Go to the same website and link to a picture of Columbus. Slowly demonstrate the following steps: Press the Ctrl key and click on the picture. A drop-down menu will reveal choices. Click Save image to the desktop. Show students how to find the image on their desktop (It will be label fig#.jpg). They should drag the image to their Hdrive. (Globe with their name)

5. Monitor students' progress as they save their own pictures of Columbus to their desktop and to their Hdrive.

6. Pass out the Guided Scavenger Hunt worksheet. This worksheet includes many of the brainstorming questions from the Introductory Activity. Students can add other questions that interest them.

7. Start the activity by telling the class: Today we are going to be internet explorers as we search for information about the well-known explorer, Christopher Columbus. We will use Links to access websites and gather information. In addition to your K-W-L chart, you'll use the Guided Scavenger Hunt worksheet to takes notes as you read through the Internet sites.

8. The remainder of the session should be devoted to completing the scavenger hunt. Students follow the directions on the home page of this wiki and take notes on their Guided Scavenger Hunt worksheet. Direct students to the "Hints" provided on the worksheet and to keywords, such as born, voyages, and Pinzon. Assist students in identifying visual text differences, such as text size, position of text on the page, color, and style, all of which provide visual reading clues. Monitor effective reading strategies as well.

9. End the session by commending your explorers on their hard work. Tell them that they will be using their findings from this activity to create a timeline and summary report on the following day.