Kate Campbell Angelo Law Carina Crescenzi Lesson Plan Handout: Geographical Amazing Race Learning Objective: To understand

how physical and human geography influences worldviews. The focus is on how humans interact with their physical landscape and with various social factors, and how these factors impact the way they perceive the world. Purpose: The purpose of this activity is to integrate all aspects of the Alberta grade 8 social studies curriculum (the European Renaissance, Japan and Isolationism, and the Aztecs) into an engaging experience. By having this Amazing Race simulation near the end of the year, it will act as a summary of the key points of the curriculum covered more in depth throughout the school year. [Additional Uses]: Though we used this activity to teach grade 8 social studies, it can be used to teach any geographic area (e.g. Alberta or Canada), and can be tied to various social studies curricula such as:

Grade 4: getting students familiar with the unique geological features of Alberta (e.g. hoodoos, oil sands, Rocky Mountains, foothills). Grade 5: understanding the geographical regions of Canada. Grade 7: understanding the role of geography in Canadas founding.

Scaffolding: This activity is another way for students to make connections with the information they are learning. Rather than being taught in a lecture format, this activity gives students the opportunity to partake in hands-on learning. Students will already have partaken in classroom style learning throughout the year, and this activity gives students the chance to view things in a new perspective and make new connections. It gives students with diverse learning styles the chance to succeed. Activity Details: The two main sources consulted in the creation of this activity include the Alberta Grade 8 Social Studies curriculum and the accompanying textbook for the course, entitled Worldviews: Contact and Change. The Alberta Education curriculum played a fundamental role as it allowed us to focus in on some of the most important topics of each unit and base the activities used during the simulation on these topics. The grade 8 textbook was another valuable resource as it provided the bulk of the information and research used to created the activities. It also enabled us to gain a better perspective on what specifically the students of that grade are learning in greater detail. This was crucial for the creation of the activities because they were intended to be as relevant to the students age group as possible. Please see the annotated bibliography at the end of this handout for a list of resources you can use in your classroom. Let us take a deeper look at the activity of each countrys station: Renaissance Europe:

For this unit the Alberta Education curriculum has as an outcome that the students understand how the Renaissance sparked the growth and exchange of knowledge across Europe, and the textbook emphasizes that the students understand how and why the Renaissance started where it did and when it did. Therefore, during the activity at the Italy station students will learn about the origins of the Renaissance and will explore the role that the geography of Italy had in the birth of this exciting era; focusing on different geographical aspects such as the physical geography (where Italy and its cities are located), and the political and cultural factors of Italy at the time. The activity incorporates another geographical aspect as the students will be touring the Italian peninsula, taking stops along the way in major cities to test their knowledge about the role that these destinations had during the Renaissance.

Kate Campbell Angelo Law Carina Crescenzi

Instructions: The activity will begin with a mini lecture based on the grade 8 textbook briefly teaching about the origins of the Renaissance in Italy. Each team will start off by answering a trivia question based on what they have learned about the cities. When they have answered correctly, they will be allowed to move to that city (given in the answer). They will then receive the next clue. This process continues until the teams reach the finish line where they have to answer a final question to complete the race. Due to time constraints we have used two teams in our simulation with a list of 3-4 questions to be asked, but in a regular lesson the activity can be expanded to include more teams, and incorporate more questions. Required Materials:
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Map of Italy used as a game board, marker pieces, list of questions relating to the origins of the Renaissance in Italy

Japan and Isolationism:

In the grade 8 curriculum, one of the general outcomes is for students to understand and appreciate how beliefs, values, and knowledge shape worldviews, and consequently how they may lead to a societys isolation or adaptation. One aspect of this involves appreciating how the time period and geography of a society can shape its worldview. In this particular activity, the goal is to incorporate key features of Japans physical geography and understand how they affect the societys worldview. Instructions: In this challenge, each member of the team will take turns transporting a grain of riceJapans main foodaround the Table Island using only chopsticks. You must walk only on the blue line that symbolizes the sea, which was the geographic factor that contributed to t he peoples sense of social homogeneity as they mostly lived along the coast, and the sea was their primary means of exchanging and transporting ideas, beliefs, and values . You cannot travel on the tables, which symbolize the natural barrier formed by the rugged mountains that run down the middle of Japan, nor can you walk in the small gaps between the tables, which symbolize the unnavigable rivers of Japan. The team that transports all their rice first will assert their riceproducing dominance, and determine their social rank and wealth. Alternative instructions: If you prefer to make this a fixed-time event, you may change it so that the team with the most grains of rice at the end wins. You will need to adjust the planned amount of time depending on the number of students in each team. Or, you may adjust the size of the obstacle course to provide the appropriate difficulty level and time required. Required Materials:
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Tables or chairs to represent the mountains, blue tape to represent the sea, rice, chopsticks

The Aztecs:

In this portion of the curriculum, students should have an understanding of the differing beliefs in both the Aztec and Spanish cultures. They will also learn how these beliefs were effected after the Spanish Inquisition. The Aztec society was rich in resources which allowed artisans to create

Kate Campbell Angelo Law Carina Crescenzi fantastic designs. Many of these resources were presented to the leader of the Spanish inquisition upon his arrival at Tenochtitlan.

In this activity, students will be provided with a large variety of materials that could be found in the Aztec Society. During the time period, it was the artisans who created the elaborate and fantastic head dresses, so students will be playing the role of an ancient Aztec artisan. Using the materials provided, students must attempt to recreate a traditional Aztec head dress using the goods provided. Teams will be provided with an image of an example of what one of these head dresses look like. The team with the most creative head dress will win this leg of the race. This particular activity used in our class activity gives students an idea of the different precious goods available to the Aztecs, however there is a lot more that could be done for this activity if there is more time available. One possibility would be a roadblock, in which teams would have to pick one task to complete. One task would be to create a traditional Aztec item (such as a headdress) and the other task would be to create a traditional spanish item (such as weapons, etc.) This would be a good way for students to compare and contrast the different values of each society. This Activity would work best if teams had approximately 20 minutes to complete the challenge. It would also be best for teams of two, as it would give more chance for participation. Required Materials:
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headbands, beads, shells, glue gun, stones, feathers, paper

Inquiry and Collaboration: In your classrooms, a way to encourage inquiry would be to divide the students into groups and allow for them to design one stage of the race instead of designing the entire activity yourself. As we experienced, this will engage them to do some background research into the geography and history of their countries, and to work together in creating the station. This approach will allow the students to be active learners, inquiring further into what they have already learned, and to put their knowledge into practical use. Instead of learning for the sake of memorization, students are creating a lasting memory of the subject matter. It also allows students who excel at being creative to have an opportunity to express themselves in ways not usually available in a traditional classroom style of learning The Use of Technology: This activity presents a great opportunity for many possible ways in which technology can be incorporated. Powerpoints and prezis are effective in presenting the material as they are also great ways to incorporate visuals for the students. Youtube is another great technological source to use for this activity to research culturally relevant music and videos, as we did. This approach allows the students to learn about the countries by allowing them to experience the sights and sounds associated with the countries. This activity can also be altered in a number of ways to incorporate different modes of technology. One such way would be to allow the use of smartphones or laptops at certain stations to assist the students in completing the activity. In the Amazing Race, there is a Fast Forward feature that allows teams to skip a challenge. In your activity, however, you can change this Fast Forward feature so that the students can use the aid of their technological devices. Also, if you as a teacher decide to allow your students to create their own activities, you can incorporate the use of iMovie or any similar program by letting the students create videos that introduce their activities and presents some prevalent facts about the countries they have researched.

Kate Campbell Angelo Law Carina Crescenzi

List of resources/bibliography: Alberta Education. (2005). Social studies kindergarten to grade 12: Program rationale and philosophy. Retrieved from http://education.alberta.ca/media/456082/sockto3.pdf This reference was used as a starting point. We looked through the curriculum and decided what part we wanted to incorporate into our presentation. Once we decided on grade 8, we were able to look at what the students would be learning in each section. Berdan, F. F. (1992). Economic dimensions of precious metals, stones, and feathers: the Aztec state society. Estudios de Cultura Nahuatl, 22, 291-323 This scholarly article was used to further our knowledge about the artisans in the Aztec society. It provided in depth information about the precious stones and resources that were available to the Aztecs, as well as information on what the Aztecs presented to the Spanish when they arrived at Tenochtitlan. Central Alberta Regional Consortium: Social Studies Project. (2012). Grade Level Websites: Grade 8. Retrieved from http://www.carcpd.ab.ca/social/classroomResources/gradeLevelSites.html This website was used to look further into the history of Japan as learned at the grade 8 level. The website is designed for students and would be a good resource for future teachers. Fitton, A., Goodman, D.m., & O'Connor, E. (2007). Worldviews: Contact and change. Toronto, ON: Pearson Education Canada We found this source to be very valuable. One we had decided on our topics, we found a copy of the grade 8 social studies textbook online. This textbook let us see exactly what the students were learning, and most of us were able to choose our activities based on chapters in the textbook. Hale, J.R. (1965). Renaissance. New York, NY: Time Inc. This book was used for a more in depth look at the Renaissance particularly exploring the various factors contributing to the periods origins in Italy. It was very useful in helping us create the minilecture used at the Italy station. Henshall, K. (2004). A History of Japan: From Stone Age to Superpower. United Kingdom: Palgrave Macmillan. Kalman, B. (2001). Japan: the land. New York, NY: Crabtree Publishing Company. This article goes into depth about the history and worldviews of Japan. It was a useful source for filling in the information we found in the grade 8 textbook. Kalman, B. (2001). Japan: the land. New York, NY: Crabtree Publishing Company. We used this article for further information on Japans geography. This was especially useful for us because we created a station where teams had to travel through Japans complex river systems.