Science
Lesson 9
Lesson Title: Discovering the Planets - Part 3
Synopsis:
Students will compile a soundtrack to connect with their PowerPoint presentations that they developed in a previous lesson. The goal is for students to connect tune to each planet to capture the mood of the characteristics of the planet. This will serve as the planet’s theme song.
Authors: Valerie Ordway and Stefani Langol
Interdisciplinary Pairing:
- Primarily Science
- Secondary subjects include:
- Music
- Multimedia
- Technology
- Graphic Design (Art)
Objectives
- Students will convert their informative presentations on the planets of our solar system to a multimedia presentation using music as a tool to increase information retention.
Intended Grade Level:
Middle School
Prior Knowledge & Skills:
- Knowledge of PowerPoint program, sequencing or recording software such as GarageBand (Mac), Home Studio (PC) or Cubase (Mac and PC), and basic computer skills are required. Knowledge of our solar system and its planets will have been gained in a previous lesson.
Equipment:
- Computer with PowerPoint or other slide show software
- Digital camera or scanner to scan printed photos.
- Optional: Digital photo editing software such as iPhoto, Photoshop Elements, etc.
Duration:
Students will require approximately 3 or 4 class periods to compile their presentations. One class period will be needed for the final presentation.
Materials:
- PowerPoint presentation from a previous lesson
- Music track with no lyrics
Procedure:
- Have students bring up on their computers their previous PowerPoint presentations.
- Students will select a theme song (without lyrics) for their assigned planet, or they can create an original sound track using sequencing or recording software such as GarageBand (Mac) Home Studio (PC), or Acid (PC).
- Students will create lyrics, a poem, or rap from the text information in their PowerPoint presentation.
- Students will convert their PowerPoint presentation to a QuickTime movie.
- Students will open their QuickTime movie in sequencing or recording software and will record their lyrics/poem/rap on one track and put the music on a separate track.
- Students will save the sound track and the lyric/poem/rap track to the QuickTime movie.
- The teacher will save every group’s QuickTime movie and load them into a video editor such as iMovie (Mac) or Windows Movie Maker (PC). The teacher will then create one movie out of the separate QuickTime movies. Titles and credits can be added to the movie.
- The teacher will show the class the resulting movie.
Evaluation:
- Use attached rubric as a guideline for assessing student work.
Lesson Extension(s):
- Students will learn about posting multimedia presentations such as video or slide shows (PowerPoint), on such Internet sites such as TeacherTube, Google Video, and/or YouTube
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