kidcyber For Parents page
Some advice: How to Help with School Projects
Provide a space where your child can work and keep
all their project materials, free from distractions.
It
is your child's project! Find out how much is to be done at home, how much needs to be done, and by when.
Help
your child plan his or her study time so that project work will
fit in with all the other activities that they are involved in
so as to avoid a last minute rush.
Help gather information:
Help your child 'brainstorm' ideas about what he/she wants to find out about the topic, and then formulate questions that focus research. Sample generic questions to assist them can be found here.
Visit
the library together, and help your child locate resources.
Help
them to make phone calls, write letters, send faxes, search the
Internet, starting with www.kidcyber.com.au.
Read the text to your child if they
are having difficulty and need help. Discuss the text in the context
of the question to be answered, and encourage your child to tell
you what they think it means, then let them write down
what they said.
Read
through your child's first draft, highlight the mistakes in spelling
or grammar, and have them make the corrections. Talk about anything
that doesn't make sense, or which seems to be inaccurate, and
discuss how this might be corrected by the child.
Remember at all times: it is the child's project, not yours! They need to practice the skills.
We believe the school should give students and parents guidelines as to what it expects in the way of presentation and projects. Students should be taught from Prep year all stages of project, starting with posing research questions, effective searching for resources, making notes and drafts and eventually final presentations. Generally these can be booklets, charts, written reports, oral presentations etc. However, some teachers/schools encourage and welcome 'out of the box' thinking in the way of more creative presentations such as drama piece, video making, power point or other electronic presentation, models, sculptures or other ideas related to the topic. However, these are time-consuming, and if project deadlines are coming thick and fast presumably from different teachers/subject areas, then maybe they don't expect anything elaborate.
Projects and your child's school
We have often been asked for a definitive guide on how to do a project. Without knowing your child's school or your child's teachers, it is hard to recommend ideas beyond the traditional because they may not be acceptable to your school.
Ultimately the projects are your child's and he/she should be determining how to present them, choosing a style he/she feels comfortable and confident about (eg if she isn't confident about drawing skills, a diagrammatic flow chart may not be the way to go). Whatever the presentation, the teacher will also be looking for the actual knowledge gained and learning that has taken place and to what extent the information found has been interpreted: is it superficial? or does it go below the surface?
teachers will look to see if the student has explored a variety of resources (are they all listed in the bibliography?)
The final project should demonstrate a sound knowledge of the topic, solid researching of the questions posed, rather than being just a flashy presentation without substance.
If you want some idea of the research skills, check kidcyber's resource at http://www.kidcyber.com.au/researchanythn.htm
Research guide for students - http://www.kidcyber.com.au/researchguide.html
These sites may also be of help:
http://www.super-science-fair-projects.com/middle-school-science-fair-projects.html
http://www.smartdraw.com/tutorials/presentations/tutorial_01.htm
http://www.presentationhelper.co.uk/Forum/showthread.php?t=797
Multimedia presentations
http://www.youthlearn.org/learning/activities/multimedia/presentations.asp
http://eduscapes.com/tap/topic20.htm
Video presentation
http://kidsvid.altec.org/nav_pages/classideas.html
Ideas here include power point presentations, icluding templates (eg see deserts near the bottom of the page)
http://www.teachingideas.co.uk/geography/contents.htm
We suggest parents talk to their child's teachers about their expectations in terms of project presentations. Is there a school policy on hoe projects are to be done? As a parent, it is easy to get anxious (which transmits to the child) so talking to the school is this is the best first step we can recommend.
Available from September 2006
Using the Library Books 1-3
by Ron Thomas & Shirley Sydenham
Providing a structured, sequential and balanced program to develop independent library users.
Order from
Phoenix Education
www.phoenixeduc.com
email: service@phoenixeduc.com
Compiling a Bibliography
Make sure your child acknowledges each source of information in a bibliography. Your child's school may have a prefered format, but if not, here's one way to do it.
For a Book
Name of author/s (last name, first names) Title, Publisher, Place of Publication, Year of publication.
for example:
Thomas, Ron, & Sydenham, Shirley, Using the Library,
Phoenix Education,
Putney, 2006
If you can't find the authors' names, start
with the title. Like this,
Using the Library , Phoenix Education, Putney, 2006
For something from an encyclopedia
Encyclopedia Title, Edition Date. Volume Number, "Article Title," page numbers.
The World Book Encyclopedia, 2004, vol. 8, "Book production", pp. 256-289.
For a CD-ROM
Title [CD-ROM]
Year of publication, Publisher, Place of Publication.
for example:
Animals of the World [CD-ROM] 2003, DK Multimedia, New
York.
For the Internet
Name of author/s,(last name, first names) Year of publication, Title [On-line], Internet address, Date of access.
for example:
Sydenham, Shirley, 2004, Ancient Egypt [On-line] http://www.kidcyber.com.au
23 March, 2006
For a magazine
Author (last name first), "Article Title." Name of magazine. Volume number, (Date): page numbers.
for example:
Thomas, R., "How to make a book". Kidtimes Magazine.
Volume 3, No. 1, (2005): p. 11.
For a newspaper
Author (last name first), "Article Title." Name of newspaper, city, state of publication. (date): edition if available, section, page number(s).
for example:
Smith, Joan, "New Books for Smart Kids." Age newspaper,
Melbourne. (3/1/2004): Books and Writing section, p. 34.
Go here for The kidcyber Research Guide: a ten step guide to researching a topic.
A Research Data Chart suitable for students' note taking
updated February 2007