Online

Projects, Collaboration Sites and Publishing Opportunities

Lesson Idea Name: Journey North Monarch Butterflies
Content Area: Science
Grade Level(s): 2nd

Content Standard Addressed:

S2L1. Obtain, evaluate, and communicate information about the life cycles of different living
organisms.

d. Develop models to illustrate the unique and diverse life cycles of organisms other than humans.

Technology Standard Addressed:

Selected Online Project/Collaboration Site/Publishing Opportunity:
Journeynorth.org

URL(s) to support the lesson:
https://journeynorth.org/monarchs


Describe how you would incorporate an Online Project/Collaboration Site/Publishing Opportunity in your
classroom:
I would incorporate an online project, collaboration site, and publishing opportunity into my classroom by
making them apart of our everyday routines. Collaboration sites will be known by the students as resources
they can use to discover new information and get help from someone other than their teacher. The
conversations that happen on these collaboration sites will always be supervised by the teacher, but it will
give the student the opportunity to interact with someone outside of the classroom. Publishing opportunities
will not be used as often, but they will be used to post any videos, audio files, documentaries, or exceptional
work created by the students. This gives the students a purpose and an audience and as a result they will
produce their best work because they know it will be posted for the public to see. Online publishing
opportunities are harder to use because students work is being posted to a platform that is visible by anyone.
Parent permission will have to be given as well as permission by the principal and the teacher will have to do
their best to keep the student’s safety and privacy hidden to the best of their abilities.
Online projects are very valuable to the classroom and can easily bring a lesson up to a Loti level 5. I would
use online projects as a way to allow my students to collaborate with others outside of their school, learn
standards related content, collect data and produce original products, and publish their work to an audience
that will use/care about the results. Because online projects have so many of these characteristics it is
imperative that the teacher assures that all school and district online policies are being followed. The
students’ privacy and online safety comes first and if it cannot be protected then an online project cannot be
used.
What technologies would be required to implement this proposed learning activity in a classroom?
Students would need a tablet or a computer to implement this learning activity in the classroom.

Describe how the following features are addressed in this learning experience (note: all of them may not be
addressed in the project, but most should be if you are reaching a high LoTi Level).
a. Collaboration with peers, near-peers, mentors outside their classroom and often beyond their
school: With the Journey North website, students are able to see data from other students and
collaborate with those students and scientists to track migrations.

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 Online Projects, Collaboration Sites and Publishing Opportunities
b. Student-centered learning and knowledge creation (creating original data and or producing original
products as a result of engaging in a project): Journey North allows students to input their own data
as well as look at the data inputted by other students across the nation.

c. Higher-order thinking: Students must interpret data that they see on the website and make
connections from the data they are seeing. Teachers can ask higher order thinking questions in regards
to the data and information the students are looking at.

d. Students publishing their original work to others who will use/care about their product: Students can
input their own data into the Journey North website to be seen by other students, scientists, and
teachers across the internet.


Bloom’s Taxonomy Level(s):

☒ Remembering ☒ Understanding ☒ Applying ☒ Analyzing ☒ Evaluating ☐ Creating

Levels of Technology Integration (LoTi Level):
☐ Level 1: Awareness ☐ Level 2: Exploration ☐ Level 3: Infusion ☐ Level 4: Integration

☒ Level 5: Expansion ☐ Level 6: Refinement

Universal Design for Learning (UDL):
Journey North offers a UDL experience in the classroom by supporting all of the students in the classroom.
Students who are not technologically advanced can work with other students to input their data into the
Journey North website. The collaboration ability of the website lets students ask questions and receive
answers from students, scientists, and teachers outside of their own classroom. This allows the students the
capability of receiving different, more informed answers from someone other than their teacher that might
be more knowledgeable about the topic. Journey North keeps students engaged by allowing for an interactive
experience that lets them input their own data into the community where other students, scientists, and
teachers can view it. The fact that the students are able to input their own data also allows for multiple
means of representation because each student’s work is represented and important. With this data input, the
students are able to demonstrate their learning multiple ways and eventually do a final assignment from what
they learn from the Journey North Website.

Lesson idea implementation and Internet Safety Policies:
While learning this standard, we will discuss the life cycles of different animals. Eventually we will focus on
the life cycle of butterflies. We will discuss the butterflies’ whole life starting from a caterpillar, moving into a
cocoon, and then hatching as a butterfly. We will move on to talk about how certain butterflies move around
or migrate during different seasons in the year. This will open up the lesson for the introduction to Journey
North and what we will be completing on the website. The students will have a final presentation to show
what they have learned about butterfly migration on the Journey North website. In order to implement this
learning experience I must first go over all of my districts Internet Safety and Student Privacy Policies to make
sure that I am following all of the rules. I will notify the parents of what we are doing and make sure that each
student participating is allowed to participate based off of what their parents want. The students will not use
their last name or the school name while signing up to Journey North and inputting their data into the
website. Any communication that takes place on the website between my students and any other teachers,
scientists, or students will be supervised by me so that I am aware of what is going on at all times. I will be
sure to follow any other school policies that are enacted by my school to protect the privacy and safety of my
students.

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 Online Projects, Collaboration Sites and Publishing Opportunities
Reflective Practice:
I think the activities I created will engage my students and create a fun and interactive classroom
environment. The students will enjoy being able to collaborate with others outside of the school and because
their work will be viewed by other people, they will feel more responsible to produce their best work. I think
that using an online project in the classroom is a creative and different way to get the students involved and
engaged in what they are learning in the classroom.

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