Title of Project: Life in the Colonies Project

Subject(s): US History
Grade Level(s): 11th
Abstract: Students will be asked to create video commercials aimed at convincing other classmates and students
from around the school to vote for to see which colony they would want to live in. Students will research both
online and offline important topics about their colonies and present them back to their classmates in their videos.
Students will be required to answer any questions from class about their presentation and the teacher will guide the
groups through the process. The students will be graded on their videos by a rubric.

Learner Description/Context: West Hall High School is located in Oakwood, Georgia. There are over 1,100
students in grades 9-12. Male to female ratio is 52% to 48%. Students receiving free or reduced lunch is 50%. The
student population is over 57% economically disadvantaged. The population is 47% Hispanic, 43% White, 6%
Black, 3% Asian, 2% Multi-Racial, and 0.2% American Indian.

This project will be one of the first assignments students receive in the first two weeks of the school year. They will
be put into groups of three based solely off of grades from their previous social studies class which should be World
History. I will group students so that each group has one strong student based on grades, one student with grades in
the B range, and one student that may need help (anything below a C).

Time Frame: The learning experience will take five to seven class days. We are on a seven period day and classes
last fifty minutes each.
Days one: Introduction to project. Students will receive instructions and a walk through from teacher about
expectations and a copy of the rubric. The students will then videoconference with an actor from the Atlanta Film
Society to talk about what major things go into making commercials.
Day Two: Students will be researching using classroom chrome books to find information about their topics.
Days three and four: Students will be writing out their script to try to convince others to settle in their colonies,
start filming, editing videos, or finishing research as needed.
Day five: Students will use the day for any wrap up activities the groups need to complete before turning their
projects in via google drive.
Day six: Teacher will upload their videos onto Nearpod and create a poll and email the presentations out to faculty
and ask teachers to show it in their classes and allow their students to vote in a poll to determine the winner. Emails
will also be sent to neighboring high schools in the area to see if they would like to participate.

Standards Assessed:

ISTES1. Empowered Learner

Students leverage technology to take an active role in choosing, achieving and demonstrating competency in their
learning goals, informed by the learning sciences

1a. Students articulate and set personal learning goals, develop strategies leveraging technology to achieve
them and reflect on the learning process itself to improve learning outcomes.

1b. Students build networks and customize their learning environments in ways that support the learning
process.

ISTE2 Digital Citizen

Students recognize the rights, responsibilities and opportunities of living, learning and working in an interconnected
digital world, and they act and model in ways that are safe, legal and ethical.
 2a. Students cultivate and manage their digital identity and reputation and are aware of the permanence of
their actions in the digital world.

2b. Students engage in positive, safe, legal and ethical behavior when using technology, including social
interactions online or when using networked devices.

2c. Students demonstrate an understanding of and respect for the rights and obligations of using and
sharing intellectual property.

2d. Students manage their personal data to maintain digital privacy and security and are aware of data-
collection technology used to track their navigation online.

3 ISTES Knowledge Constructor

Students critically curate a variety of resources using digital tools to construct knowledge, produce creative artifacts
and make meaningful learning experiences for themselves and others.

3a. Students plan and employ effective research strategies to locate information and other resources for
their intellectual or creative pursuits.

3b. Students evaluate the accuracy, perspective, credibility and relevance of information, media, data or
other resources.

3c. Students curate information from digital resources using a variety of tools and methods to
create collections of artifacts that demonstrate meaningful connections or conclusions.

3d. Students build knowledge by actively exploring real-world issues and problems, developing ideas and
theories and pursuing answers and solutions.

SSUSH1 The student will describe a European settlement in North America during the 17th century.
a. Explain Virginia’s development; include the Virginia Company, tobacco cultivation, relationships with
Native Americans such as Powhatan, development of the House of Burgesses, Bacon’s Rebellion, and the
development of slavery.
b. Describe the settlement of New England; include religious reasons, relations with Native Americans
(e.g., King Phillip’s War), the establishment of town meetings and development of a legislature, religious
tensions that led to the founding of Rhode Island, the half-way covenant, Salem Witch Trials, and the loss
of the Massachusetts charter and the transition to a royal colony.
c. Explain the development of the mid-Atlantic colonies; include the Dutch settlement of New Amsterdam
and subsequent English takeover, and the settlement of Pennsylvania.
e. Analyze the impact of location and place on colonial settlement, transportation, and economic
development; include the southern, middle, and New England colonies

ELAGSE11-12W3: Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique,
well-chosen details, and well-structured event sequences.

Learner Objectives: The student will be able to need to discuss characteristics that make your specific colony an
ideal place to live and present it in a convincing way. They will learn about Massachusetts (New England Colony),
Rhode Island (New England Colony), Pennsylvania (Middle Colony), New York (Middle Colony), Virginia
(Southern Colony), and Georgia (Southern Colony). They will need to describe characteristics about the economy,
social, and political structure their colony. The student’s videos will be accessed on a rubric:
 Life in the Colonies Project Guidelines

Driving Question: How was colonial life characterized in each of the three colonial regions in North America?

Task: As a group (max of 3), you will create a video commercial aimed to convince your classmates of why they
should come live in your colony. You will need to discuss characteristics that make your specific colony an ideal
place to live and present it in a convincing way. There is a limit of two groups per colony. If you want to work
alone, please let me know.

The colonies you can choose from for this assignment are:
 Massachusetts (New England Colony)
 Rhode Island (New England Colony)
 Pennsylvania (Middle Colony)
 New York (Middle Colony)
 Virginia (Southern Colony)
 Georgia (Southern Colony)

In your video commercial, you will need to describe the characteristics about the economy, social, and political
structure of your colony. Some bits of information you will want to include are:

 Bodies of water in the area * It will count as a project grade and yes we will
 Climate watch them in class! This needs to be a sales pitch
 Landforms video commercial since you are trying to convince
 Natural Resources someone of why they should live in your colony!
 Crops that grow well in area GOOD LUCK!
 Government
 Economy (How people made a living)
 Religious Beliefs
 Native American Relationships
 Colonial Events that occurred there
 Types of people living there
 Leisure (What people did for fun)

You may use your notes, textbook, and online

resources to help you create your video commercial.
The final video commercial you give in class must
meet the following requirements:

 Includes a brief background about the colony

and how/when it was established
 Contains information from AT LEAST five
of the information areas listed above
 Includes accurate details that are associated
with the colony of choice
 Has visuals to support your information…
people need to see what the colony looks like
and specific aspects of the land you are
promoting
 Displays your understanding of the
characteristics that make your colony ideal
 Contains catchy components showing how
life in your colony is better than anywhere
else
 Engaged Learning Project - Thomason, Mark
Group Member Names: ____________________________________________

Life in the Colonies Grading Rubric

Excellent Good Needs Improvement Unsatisfactory
7 5 3 1
BACKGROUND The video commercial The video commercial
The video commercial The video
Comments: gives a detailed gives a background
gives a background commercial is lacking
background adequately about the development
that is missing tons of a background about
explaining the of their colony, but is
important details. Too the development of
development of their missing a few
short. their colony.
colony. important details.
INFORMATION/ The video
The video commercial
UNDERSTANDIN The video commercial The video commercial commercial does not
includes a solid
G includes a sufficient is lacking in include a sufficient
amount of
Comments: amount of information; information. Contains amount of
information; indicates
Indicates strong student some facts, but does facts/information.
student understanding
understanding of not show students Lack of student
of colony, but a few
colony. understand material. understanding very
un-certainties.
evident.
ACCURACY Facts included in
Facts included in video Facts were included Almost all facts were
Comments: video commercial
commercial were all were somewhat inaccurate in video
were mostly accurate.
accurate and well accurate. Indicates a commercial. No
Lacking some
researched. lack of research research conducted.
research.
VISUALS The project includes a
The project includes a The project only
Comments: good amount of There were no visuals
great amount of visuals includes a few visuals.
visuals in the project utilized in the project.
that help support the Does not utilize
that help support No support for
information provided enough to help support
information. Could information provided.
about their colony. information.
use a few more.
CREATIVITY Project is somewhat
Presentation is very Presentation is Project lacks
Comments: catchy, but lacks
creative and catchy. creative and catchy. creativity and is not
thoughtfulness and
Exemplifies innovation Displays catchy or thoughtful.
creativity, which
and is extremely thoughtfulness and is Fails to appeal to
makes it less
thoughtful. mostly appealing. audience.
appealing.
PRESENTATION The video commercial The video
The video commercial
Comments: The video commercial struggled to maintain commercial did not
mostly maintained
maintained interest of interest of the maintain interest of
interest of audience.
the audience. Contained audience. Message audience. Message
Message was
a convincing message was not completely was not convincing or
somewhat convincing
that was clear and clear and there was a clear and there was
and clear. Was
showed organization. lack of organization an extreme lack of
organized.
provided. organization.

Total Points: ____ out of 42 Final Grade: ______

Jo Williamson, Ph.D., Kennesaw State University

 Engaged Learning Project - Thomason, Mark
The “hook” or Introduction:
During the introduction it will be explained to the students they will be making a video where they try to convince
classmates and other students from around the school to live in their specific colony over another colony. By
allowing students to make their own videos, students are making the learning authentic/meaningful. Also by
having the students put hard work into their videos knowing others will vote for it outside of their classroom it
makes the learning experience ongoing.

Process:
The process will begin by splitting students up into groups based on the grade they made in their previous year
history class. Students will be grouped with high, middle, and low scores (the design will not be known to the
students). After grouped, each group will receive a topic. Students will receive instructions and a walk through
from the teacher about expectations and a copy of the rubric for expectations for the groups’ presentation on their
commercials. Before they begin, the students will videoconference on Skype with an actor from the Atlanta Film
Society to discuss what important aspects go into making commercials. Students will then begin researching
using classroom chrome books to find information about their topics. Groups will have one of the following
topics: Massachusetts (New England Colony), Rhode Island (New England Colony), Pennsylvania (Middle
Colony), New York (Middle Colony), Virginia (Southern Colony), and Georgia (Southern Colony). They will
describe the characteristics about the economy, social, and political structure of each colony in their video
commercials. Students will use this information to write out a script in Word to try to convince others to settle in
their colonies. When finished with the script, groups will start filming on classroom IPads and start editing videos
on IMovie (or on technology if they brought a mobile device). During this process the teacher will guide students
through the process of the project, answer any questions, and clarify any questions. When students are finished
videoing and editing they will upload their project to Google Drive and share it with the teacher. The teacher will
load the student videos into a Nearpod presentation and share it with faculty. The presentation will have a poll that
allows students to vote on which video they like the best and which colony they would like to live in the most.
The students will then be able to get feedback in the form of votes from classmates and from the rubric the teacher
graded of their videos.

Product:
The student will create a video commercial aimed at convincing their classmates of why they should come live in
their colonies. Each group will be given a rubric for they will be graded based on the things they should include
on their videos. Students will need to discuss characteristics that make their specific colony an ideal place to live
and present it in a convincing way. They will be expected to write out and turn in the script for the commercial so
their Language Arts teacher can give them a daily grade. In their video commercial, the student will need to
describe the characteristics about the economy, social, and political structure of their colony.
1. Each group will be creating a video that explains the economy, social, and political structure of their
colonies
2. Each group will include information that makes them different from other colonies like: Government,
landforms, religion, bodies of water, Native Americans, etc.

At the end of the project, students will turn their projects in by sharing it on google drive. The teacher will use
Nearpod to make a presentation with all the videos on them class by class. There will be a poll as well that allows
student to vote which is their favorite video.

Student’s videos will be graded on a rubric provided to them at the start of the process. They will also turn in a
handwritten script from the group to their language arts teacher that will grade them on the writing of their
narratives.

Technology Use: Several technologies will be used in this project. Students will use classroom Chromebooks to
research, share, and upload video. Skype will be used to video conference with an expert. The Smartboard will be
used to project the images to the class. Word will be used to write out the final script they will turn in to their
Language arts teacher. Google Drive will be used to share the projects with the teacher. Nearpod will be used to

Jo Williamson, Ph.D., Kennesaw State University

 Engaged Learning Project - Thomason, Mark
present the videos and allow students to vote on a poll. Classroom IPads will be used for filming unless students
want to use their own technology. IMovie will be used for editing the videos.

References and Supporting Material:

Chromebooks
Smartboard with connecting project (skype and to show videos)
Word
Nearpod-https://nearpod.com/teach?utm_expid=.Kf3do8lnQqmxmtLgWvINAA.1&utm_referrer=
Skype App
Internet for multiple computers
IPad for filming and editing
Rubrics
Student mobile devices for filming and editing
Google Drive
Georgia Performance Standards- https://www.georgiastandards.org/Pages/default.aspx
ISTE- https://www.iste.org/
IMovie
Atlanta Film Society-http://www.atlantafilmsociety.org/

Jo Williamson, Ph.D., Kennesaw State University