Project Connect! Opening a World of Education Opportunities for NHSD Students
As part of the district’ s wide-ranging and multi-year Innovations in Education Plan, Project Connect put iPads into the hands of all sixth-, seventh- and eighth-grade students across all district elementary schools and at North Hills Middle School this school year.
Project Connect embeds project-based learning throughout the curriculum and utilizes technology as a tool for personalizing instruction for every student. Through Project Connect, we are striving to present our students with a world of possibilities by cultivating an innovative and problem-solving learning environment that incorporates vital skills for college and career readiness such as communication, collaboration, critical thinking and creativity.
We’ ll be sharing photos and stories throughout the year about the activities and lessons made possible for our students by Project Connect on the Project Connect website at www. nhsd. net / projectconnect. aspx.
Team Heinz Research Projects Transformed by Project Connect
Eighth-graders on Team Heinz at North Hills Middle School are using iPads from Project Connect to tackle the grade’ s expansive research project in a whole new way! Combining their American history, English and library classes, students are learning that history is happening around you, all the time. Large and small
events affect your everyday life, just as previous events affected the lives of those you know.
To start out, students researched a historic, impactful event and then recorded an interview with an individual who experienced that event or whose life was directly impacted by this event. Topics include Mao’ s rise to power in China, desegregation of South Africa, closing of local steel mills, the 1996 Olympic bombing, wars in the Balkans, Vietnam and Korea, air traffic control issues during Sept. 11, West View Park and various natural disasters such as the Blizzard of 1993, Hurricane Katrina and tornadoes in 1985.
They are integrating these personal stories into their larger research of that event and experience.
Each student will have their own section with exploratory essay with narration from their first-person interview in a Team Heinz iBook that will share these oral histories with others around the world. We’ ll keep you updated and share this amazing book when it is available!
STEAM Tunnel Books Combine F & CS and Art Seventh-graders at North Hills Middle School worked on a cross-curricular STEAM project combining components of their art and family and consumer sciences classes taught by Johannah Brawdy and Megan Ward. Each pair of students wrote a children’ s book inspired by topics discussed in their English class on their iPads using the Book Creator app and brought their digital story to life by designing and creating a tunnel book in the STEAM( Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Mathematics) iMac lab in the building’ s STEAM Center. The middle school students then visited our elementary students to read their books and complete fun, literacy activities orth Hills School District
NORTH HILLS SCHOOL DISTRICT NEWS
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