Introduction
OTC needs your help!!
As an active member of the student community, the school has asked you to produce a newsletter in order to be used in the marketing campaign. Your project will demonstrate the language skills taught in the EAL department and help the college grow its student population by advertising your classwork.
The project will help you build up your team working, critical thinking and decision-making skills, as well as writing and language development.
We hope you enjoy it.
The EAL department.
Task
The task is simple: you have to create a NEWSLETTER, something like a small newspaper.
You will decide on the topics and what to write about, but the requirement is for your newsletter to have at least 1 small article (100-150 words) or activity from each section. You can include more if you want to. This is a class project, therefore, you need to create 1 newsletter all together.
What sections are there? Well, in a recent reading activity you identified the following 9 sections:
- local news
- international news
- games/ quizzes/ sudoku
- sports
- weather
- advertising
- entertainment
- life
- history of arts
Of course at the end of the project you will be evaluated based on your performance during the project and the quality of the final project.
Best of luck !!!
Process
On each lesson you will be working on a different section. At the end of the process, you would have to put everything together. The sections are the following:
- local news
- international news
- games/ quizzes/ sudoku
- sports
- weather
- advertising
- entertainment
- life
- history of arts
Step 1: Team Roles
This is a class project and everyone should be having a role. Check on the different roles in a team and decide who is who:
http://www.belbin.com/about/belbin-team-roles/
| resource investigator | SIO |
| team worker | TOAN |
| co-ordinator | AMY |
| plant | BARRY |
| monitor evaluator | NIKO |
| specialist | AMY |
| shaper | NIKO/ SIO |
| implementer | TOAN |
| completer finisher | BARRY |
Step 2: Task Allocation
Decide who is doing what regarding the various sections of the newsletter.
| 1. local news | TOAN and SIO |
| 2. international news | AMY AND NIKO |
| 3....games/ quizzes/ sudokus | TOAN AND BARRY |
| 4...sports | NIKO AND BARRY |
| 5. weather | TOAN AND AMY |
| 6. advertising | AMY AND NIKO |
| 7. entertainment | NIKO AND BARRY |
| 8. life | SIO AND BARRY |
| 9. history of arts | SIO AND TOAN |
More than one people can work on one section if you like. It is up to you.
When you have made your decision, you need to tell the teacher so that they update the chart.
Step 3: Research
Focus on the chosen section. With your partner, you should decide on the topic you will write about. Go online and find what is written about in the news these days. Use these websites:
http://www.skysports.com/news-wire
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/england/oxford
http://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/
Check the activities and puzzles as well. Suggested websites:
http://www.independent.co.uk/extras/puzzles-and-games/quizzes
http://www.puzzle-maker.com/CW/
Step 4: Writing
You have to complete the writing task and get feedback from your teacher (100- 150 words) You can work alone or in pairs. It's up to you. Everybody should be working on something.
Vocabulary:
1. how to use words: http://www.macmillandictionary.com/
2. synonyms: http://www.thesaurus.com/
Step 5: Pictures
Are you going to use any with your article? Of course yes! Go online and find pictures that can attract the readers attention.
Step 6: Headlines
Work on your title- Make it interesting for the reader.
https://goinswriter.com/catchy-headlines/
Step 7: Put everything together
With your classmates, decide the order of the sections, where and how you will put the articles together.
If you are using Microsoft Word watch this tutorial to see how you can make a newsletter using this programme:
or this for Mac users:
Step 8: Cover
You would definitely need to design a cover. Hold a meeting with your classmates and decide on the layout.
Ask for feedback or extra support from your teacher .
Step 9: Print
WELL DONE!! You've made it. Print a few copies of your newsletter and distribute it to your school.
Email the final product to your teacher so that you can receive your feedback.
Evaluation
You will be evaluated on a scale of 1-3 for different criteria.
1 = Unsatisfactory
2 = Marginal
3 = Excellent
This Rubric explains the requirements in more detail:
|
Grades |
1 |
2 |
3 |
|
Following Directions |
I did not follow directions and had a difficult time understanding what to do.
|
I followed directions, but had a difficult time staying on task and had to be reminded at times. |
I followed all directions and was always on task. |
|
Working in Your Group/ with your partner
|
I was unable to work well with my group. I did not help my group. |
I had difficulties with my group, but I helped my group somewhat. |
I had no problems working with my group/ peers. |
|
Use of Resources |
I did not use the resources. |
I used some resources well. |
I used all the resources I had to complete the tasks successfully. I also used different websites to look for information, look up vocabulary and get ideas.
|
|
Independent skills |
I was not independent at all. My teacher had to check with me all the time what I was doing. |
I was somewhat independent; my teacher only occasionally had to check what I was doing. |
I was totally independent. I was able to complete the tasks with little monitoring and also took the initiative to help others in my class. |
|
Content and quality of the newsletter |
It was sloppy and missing parts. There was not target language used |
It was okay, but something was missing. Maybe I could have used more descriptive language? Or more pictures? How about headlines? Maybe they are not too effective. Vocabulary was functional and grammar structures were simple and basic |
The writing was neat and all parts were included regarding article writing. The newsletter content was excellent, including a variety of activities and articles. All sections are included and headlines are effective. The cover is very innovative and the general design of the newsletter is fantastic. |
Conclusion
So this is it!!
Well done on completing the project.
It would be great if you could give us some feedback and tell us whether you liked the project or not:
- What did you learn throughout the project?
- What did you like best?
- What was your least favourite part?
- What could have been done better?
Many thanks and we hope you had fun completing this project.
The EAL Department
Credits
The evaluation grid was taken and adapted from : https://www.sesdweb.net/Page/3329
Many thanks to the EAL department for the collaboration and support.
Teacher Page
The Wequest was designed for an EAL classroom of 9 international teenage students (Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese) for the Academic Preparation Programme of Oxford Tutorial College, Oxford UK.
All students were using their own computers and the classrooms were also equipped with IWBs which facilitated sharing the tasks with other group members or for class activities.
The process has been divided into many steps so that learners can better accomplish the tasks.
Students also need to be trained in order to understand the purpose of a webquest= not just simply copying information form the web, but using various resources to produce their own work.
Ideally, each student would produce different end products- although in this case the quest is designed as a class project.