The last American Literature Unit English 10 students studied this year included Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild. For the culminating activity, students tested out a variety of Web Presentation Tools to display their knowledge of the themes and motifs in the novel. A RAFT is a culminating activity that allows students to choose how to show their own learning. For this group project, students chose a role (a character or entity they would “be”), an intended audience (the person or group the piece would address or “talk to”), a format, and a theme or topic. Students were required to use new technology tools to present their projects. I have included links to several student presentations along with student descriptions of the projects and the web tools. Here is a link to the assignment document itself. Credit is given to Karie Lynch for the assignment idea. Here is the RAFT assignment.
Journey of Chris McCandless
By Tyler R., Abby M, Tannner W. Maria W.
For this project our group used a site that was new to all of us, it is called timetoast. Our project was to make a map of Chris McCandless's life journey. Timetoast made it very easy to create an event that happened in his life or add a time span of something he had done. This site made it very easy for first time users to quickly and easily add our information into a timeline. I would recommend this site to anybody that needs to make a timeline because it is very easy to learn and makes it much easier to view the information in chronological order. http://www.timetoast.com/timelines/the-life-journey-of-chris-mccandless
By Tyler R., Abby M, Tannner W. Maria W.
For this project our group used a site that was new to all of us, it is called timetoast. Our project was to make a map of Chris McCandless's life journey. Timetoast made it very easy to create an event that happened in his life or add a time span of something he had done. This site made it very easy for first time users to quickly and easily add our information into a timeline. I would recommend this site to anybody that needs to make a timeline because it is very easy to learn and makes it much easier to view the information in chronological order. http://www.timetoast.com/timelines/the-life-journey-of-chris-mccandless
Public Service Announcement for Runaways
By Annika E., Hannah A., Emily F., Tori B,
My group chose to take the role of a parent of a runaway. Our directed audience was to Chris McCandless. The format we chose was a public service announcement, and the theme we chose was how to reconnect with a family you have abandoned or run away from. We used PowToon to create our presentation. It was a great tool to use because it enhanced the presentation with cartoon characters and creative props. I like using PowToon because it is very user friendly and easy to work with. The only thing I disliked about the program was the time limit on each presentation. http://www.powtoon.com/p/bTBBjPN1FiT/
By Annika E., Hannah A., Emily F., Tori B,
My group chose to take the role of a parent of a runaway. Our directed audience was to Chris McCandless. The format we chose was a public service announcement, and the theme we chose was how to reconnect with a family you have abandoned or run away from. We used PowToon to create our presentation. It was a great tool to use because it enhanced the presentation with cartoon characters and creative props. I like using PowToon because it is very user friendly and easy to work with. The only thing I disliked about the program was the time limit on each presentation. http://www.powtoon.com/p/bTBBjPN1FiT/
Parenting Handbook
By Hunter L., Maya H., Amanda C,
For ours, we used the web program, Hello Slide. Hello Slide is an online PDF Reader that you can add a voice over to. For ours, we made a powerpoint then converted it to a PDF file so the website could use it. Our RAFT was role: Ron Franz. Audience: Chris McCandless. Format: Parenting Handbook. Theme: how to reconnect with a family you have abandoned or run away from.http://www.helloslide.com/presentations/nk7oz9hugf/handbook-to-parenting2
By Hunter L., Maya H., Amanda C,
For ours, we used the web program, Hello Slide. Hello Slide is an online PDF Reader that you can add a voice over to. For ours, we made a powerpoint then converted it to a PDF file so the website could use it. Our RAFT was role: Ron Franz. Audience: Chris McCandless. Format: Parenting Handbook. Theme: how to reconnect with a family you have abandoned or run away from.http://www.helloslide.com/presentations/nk7oz9hugf/handbook-to-parenting2
Psychology Newsletter for College Students
By Amber L., Abby B., Ethan M., Jaxson F.
For the Into the Wild R.A.F.T my group chose to be psychologists talking to college students about the dangers of conformity. My group decided to make a newspaper written by psychologists to college students teaching them the dangers of conformity and using Chris McCandless as an example.We used newspapertemplate.net which was not user friendly. This site made it very hard for users to easily download the template and construct the newspaper. I would not recommend it nor would I ever use it again./uploads/1/4/7/0/14709396/student_project_into_the_wild_ms_word_newspaper_template_1.doc
By Amber L., Abby B., Ethan M., Jaxson F.
For the Into the Wild R.A.F.T my group chose to be psychologists talking to college students about the dangers of conformity. My group decided to make a newspaper written by psychologists to college students teaching them the dangers of conformity and using Chris McCandless as an example.We used newspapertemplate.net which was not user friendly. This site made it very hard for users to easily download the template and construct the newspaper. I would not recommend it nor would I ever use it again./uploads/1/4/7/0/14709396/student_project_into_the_wild_ms_word_newspaper_template_1.doc
Artwork Analysis
By Jade D.
The RAFT that I chose for the Into the Wild project was painting. I drew five pictures about maintaining healthy relationships and put them in a Prezi presentation from the perspective of a psychologist to college students. I have never used Prezi before so this program was new for me. I find the program annoying, but it was more user-friendly than any of the other programs I tried. It only took me an hour to create my presentation, so it ended up being slightly convenient. http://prezi.com/ixb1oos9fnfe/maintaining-healthy-relationships/
By Jade D.
The RAFT that I chose for the Into the Wild project was painting. I drew five pictures about maintaining healthy relationships and put them in a Prezi presentation from the perspective of a psychologist to college students. I have never used Prezi before so this program was new for me. I find the program annoying, but it was more user-friendly than any of the other programs I tried. It only took me an hour to create my presentation, so it ended up being slightly convenient. http://prezi.com/ixb1oos9fnfe/maintaining-healthy-relationships/
Songs from a Sister to her Brother
by Sierra F., Ann Jean I., Destiny M., Bonnie H.
The RAFT that our group chose was the relationship between Chris McCandless and his sister in a series of related songs, and what it means to live an ethical life. We used a website called bite slide which was very effective when it came to uploading YouTube videos and Google images directly from the slide. It was simple to use and very helpful for this project. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNagUfjIWNA http://www.biteslide.com/albums/view/120533
by Sierra F., Ann Jean I., Destiny M., Bonnie H.
The RAFT that our group chose was the relationship between Chris McCandless and his sister in a series of related songs, and what it means to live an ethical life. We used a website called bite slide which was very effective when it came to uploading YouTube videos and Google images directly from the slide. It was simple to use and very helpful for this project. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNagUfjIWNA http://www.biteslide.com/albums/view/120533
Video Journal
by Alex L., Kayla M., David M., Ashley P.
We did our Into the Wild project as a personal philosophy for Chris McCandless. We inferred from facts in the book what his virtues were and recorded them as a video journal. We tried to have him being the speaker for college students. We used the web tool Final Cut Pro to link the videos into a sequence. The program was effective and served us well for all of the needs of our project. http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PBkJHJFZ4Ew
by Alex L., Kayla M., David M., Ashley P.
We did our Into the Wild project as a personal philosophy for Chris McCandless. We inferred from facts in the book what his virtues were and recorded them as a video journal. We tried to have him being the speaker for college students. We used the web tool Final Cut Pro to link the videos into a sequence. The program was effective and served us well for all of the needs of our project. http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PBkJHJFZ4Ew