Cognitive Rigor Matrix & Project-Based Lesson Plan

Topic: Time Travelers*
Grade 7 World History

Project Prompt: As "time travelers", you will investigate social issues of different times throughout history to determine those that would be relevant and potentially interesting to today's youth.

Students will be divided into groups of four members, hetergeneously grouped by ability.

Content Standards & Objectives:
RLA.O.7.1.6, RLA.O.7.2.1, RLA.O.7.2.9, RLA.O.7.3.6, 21C.O.5-8.1.LS1, 21C.O.5-8.2.TT2, 21C.O.5-8.3.LS1

• Students will be able use appropriate resources to investigate, gather, paraphrase and summarize relevant information.
• Students will relate themes from text to themselves and real-world connections.
• Students will collaborate with peers to create and present a media product.

Materials:
Printed and non-printed informational resources
Assignment handouts and rubrics
Student notebooks/journals
Class-set laptops or computers; computer lab

Levels of Thinking and Questioning:
DOK Level 1- Recall of Information
Students will begin the project by deciding on the time period that they are interested in researching. They will identify or describe features of places or people, key figures. Some questions they will consider as they gather information:

1. Where does this time period geographically take place in?
2. Who were the key figures during this time period?

DOK Level 2- Basic Reasoning
Students will dive deeper into their chosen time period by considering questions such as:

1. Identify and summarize major events, solutions, conflicts and problems during this time period.
2. Describe the cause-effect of particular events during this time period.

DOK Level 3- Complex Reasoning
As students have gathered enough information and notes, they will start to:

1. Explain and connect ideas using supporting evidence from different sources.
2. Analyze the similarities and differences between major events, issues and/or conflicts of their researched time period and of the modern day.

DOK Level 4- Extended Reasoning
Once students have finalized their research and begin to organize their findings into a media product for presentation, in their presentation, they will analyze and explain using supporting evidence and inferences to why they chose their time period and why it would be relevant and potentially interesting for today's youth.

Source:
*http://wveis.k12.wv.us/teach21/public/project/Guide.cfm?upid=3599&tsele1=1&tsele2=107

Examining Depth and Rigor in Student Learning

Webb's Depth of Knowledge & Bloom's Revised Taxonomy
Webb's Depth of Knowledge consists of four levels that categorizes tasks according to the complexity of thinking required to meet the objective. These four levels can act as a guide for teachers to create an in-depth and rich learning environment for students to receive high-level learning:

• Level 1: Recall & Reproduction
• Tasks that does not require cognitive effort beyond copying, computing, defining, and recognizing.
• Level 2: Skills & Concept
• Tasks requiring more than one mental step such as comparing, organizing, summarizing, predicting, and estimating.
• Level 3: Strategic Thinking/Reasoning
• Tasks requiring multiple responses with justification such as solving non-routine problems, designing an experiment, or analyzing characteristics of a genre.
• Level 4: Extended Thinking
• Tasks that require the most cognitive effort such as synthesize information from multiple sources, transfer knowledge from one domain to solve problems in another, designing a survey and interpreting results, analyze multiple texts to extract themes, or writing an original short story.

Similarly, Bloom's Revised Taxonomy consists of six levels of skills and abilities in increasing demand that guides in clarifying objectives of student learning. These levels help teacher plan and deliver instruction appropriately, implement valid assessment tasks and strategies, and ensure that instruction and assessment are aligned with the objectives:

• Remember: recognizing, recalling
• Understand: interpreting, exemplifying, classifying, summarizing, inferring, comparing, explaining
• Apply: executing, implementing
• Analyze: differentiating, organizing, attributing
• Evaluate: checking, critiquing
• Create: generating, planning, producing

Application of Webb's DOK to Teaching Practices
Teaching to Webb's Depth of Knowledge to engage students in richer discussions, learning experiences, and rigorous tasks can positively impact their learning in all content areas.