Famous Individual Project: A Great 5th Grade Research Project With Tons of Activities and Rubrics

Recently, our students in 5th grade completed their first oral project presentation of the year, presenting their individual state posters, the project they did in the 50 states unit,

in front of other students. We asked students to dress for the occasion, and graded them on everything from their posture, the volume of their voice, and the way they dressed. This ended up being a great experience, and we've decided to build on that during the school year.

Next up, we will be doing a Famous Individual project. In this project, students will be completing research on a famous individual of great character. They will be analyzing their individual according to the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, a program that my school began following this year. Below you will be shown the requirements for this project, including links to all necessary forms. To download everything in one packet, click here:

DOWNLOAD THE ENTIRE FAMOUS INDIVIDUAL PROJECT IN PDF FORMAT HERE

This project will ask students to:

• Choose a famous individual, either living or dead, who is not fictional. Once they have chosen their famous individual, they must complete the Justification Page to explain why they believe their individual showed good character and lived a life that benefited others. 
• Once the students has successfully justified why they have chosen an appropriate person for this project, they will begin research. Students will be taught how to properly cite sources and create a bibliography (this is a big step for 5th graders, but they can do it). First students will learn how to take notes and keep track of sources. I came across a great packet online to help with Note Taking that I will be utilizing. They will use the blank bibliography cards to cite sources, and then will be given the biography outline packet, which will guide their research. Students research papers will be scored based upon the 5th grade research paper rubric.
• Next, students will be creating a computer based presentation that will supplement the speech they will be giving. We will be doing these presentations in the computer lab with the assistance of our schools computer lab instructor. They will be scored on their computer presentation based on the computer presentation scoring rubric.
• Finally, in the final step of this project, students will create a short speech to go with their computer presentation, and they will be presenting these projects before other students, parents, and community members. The speeches will focus on the character of their person, their major accomplishments, and how they fit the 7 Habits. The speech will be scored based on the oral presentation scoring rubric. 

I am very excited to see our students continue to step up. They did a great job on the 50 state projects (as you can see HERE), and I expect great results on this project. 

I have all of these forms available in Microsoft Word format, if you would like any of them, please let me know and I'll get them to you. As always, this is available freely, I believe that teachers should share our resources with one another free of cost if at all possible, and will continue to share everything I make without cost to anyone.

Election Day Teacher Resources

The 2012 Presidential Elections are right around the corner. It seems like not long ago millions of Americans watched Barack Obama's historic inauguration. I watched that moment with my 5th grade class, and to this day, those kids remember witnessing history.

Of course, each Presidential Election is a major historical moment, and this upcoming one will be no exception. I came across a great online learning game a few days ago while doing one of my resource searching sessions, and it got me thinking about how I'm going to teach the election in my class this fall. 

In 2008, my school participated in the National Mock Election. I have contacted them to see when they will begin the 2012 Mock Election, their website currently isn't showing anything. I will certainly update my blog when I hear back from them or they start accepting school coordinator names again. Let me know if you've heard something I haven't!

**UPDATE**
I heard back from the people at the National Mock Election. I received this email on July 24th:

We are delighted to announce that the 2012 National Student/Parent Mock Election will be run in partnership with the Pearson Foundation.  There are some very exciting plans for moving the Mock Election into the interactive digital world of the 21st century.  We will be updating our website and trying to keep you posted as all this develops.  Please go forward with your own plans and keep us informed if you can.  We will get back to you very soon with more detailed information.  We are waiting for word from the New Mexico Secretary of State re:  continuing as the New Mexico state coordinator.

We are grateful, indeed, for your help in keeping the nation’s largest civic education project and the world’s largest national mock election alive.

We look forward with great pleasure to working with you in 2012 and to having the assistance of the foundation created by the world’s largest educational publisher.

Our website will be reorganized for 2012 next week. Hope you can start with the curriculum already up.  More soon on the exciting ways we will be expanding for 2012.

The Road to the Capitol is a flash based game that is on the National Mock Election website. It's fun, informative, and completely learning based. It can skew a little to the difficult side for your average 5th grade, but there's no reason they can't rise to the challenge. The site also includes a short 3 page teacher/parent guide in pdf format with some suggestions for mixing up the game play or enriching it.

iCivics offers a downloadable pdf activity that is a mock election classroom activity. I'm considering using this in the weeks leading up to the election, or incorporating parts of it into my schools student council elections that usually take place around the beginning of September (we'll already be in our third week of school by then). 

I came across a page of downloadable resources at Teacher Planet that all relate to the election, or could provide assistance to a school mock election.

Education World has a comprehensive word wall list of election related vocabulary. 

Finally, over at Pearson Publishing, there is a great listing of classroom ready resources that students can utilize right from their site. I will be using a few of these to guide us in research and learning about the candidates.