Literacy+(3-4+Week+Happiness+Unit)

This unit will be based around the text 'Brave New World' by Aldous Huxley (of which we need many more copies - about 13 in the library) The general aim of the unit is to explore the concept that "ignorance is bliss" using the text as guide for online forum discussion.**
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__**1. Acquiring Prior Knowledge**__: (what do the students bring to this topic? How can you text prior knowledge?) Discuss where the term originated and our perceptions of what this term can mean.

__**2. Clarify Expectations:**__ (What will the students be able to do at the end of the unit? What are the essential teaching aims?) English: //Reading:// They infer meanings and messages in texts, analyse how social values or attitudes are conveyed, compare the presentation of information and ideas in different texts, and identify cause and effect in informative texts. //Writing:// They write arguments that state and justify a personal viewpoint; reports incorporating challenging themes and issues; personal reflections on, or evaluations of, texts presenting challenging themes and issues. Communication: Students use the communication conventions, forms and language appropriate to the subject to convey a clear message across a range of presentation forms to meet the needs of the context, purpose and audience. ICT: //Visual Thinking:// students select and apply ICT tools and editing functions that support the filtering, classifying, representing, describing and organising of concepts, issues and ideas. They use rule-using software to assist with problem solving and decision making. //Creating:// When creating information products, students prepare designs that identify the structure and layout of the products, the evaluation criteria, and the plans for managing collaborative projects. Students independently apply a range of processing skills, functions and equipment to solve problems and create products which contain minimal functional, typographical, formatting and readability errors. //ICT for Communicating:// Students share their ideas through their blog, website or other public forums, which are correctly formatted, comply with ICT conventions and demonstrate an awareness of the characteristics that contribute to products meeting their purpose.

__**3. Tuning In**__: (How can you hook the kids in and get their interest? What rich materials could be used to introduce this topic?) Begin with a debate in the class: 'I'd rather be stupid and happy, than intelligent and miserable' to develop discourse on how elucidation can often lead to a greater perception of inequity. Encourage students to discover through wider reading examples of the rich and beautiful using escapism to enhance what seems to be the perfect life. Look at the 'Happiness Index': http://worlddatabaseofhappiness.eur.nl/

__**4. Information Producing:**__ (What resources are necessary for modeling end products and assist learning?) 'Brave New World'; rrfreeman.wordpress.com

__**5. Information Processing:**__ (How can you assist students understanding your resources?) Use the forum as a guided space for textual discourse. Unpack the meaning of the text, explore the content and link to the wider question of happiness and contendendess.

__**6. Applications/Doing:**__ (What will students do in terms of authentic tasks to demonstrate the skills they are to learn - ALSO - what parts of the content must be taught explicitly?) Contribute a minimum of 5 entries to the blog - responses to others and criticisms of the text and opinions are encouraged: 5.5: Questions are answered and opinions provided using a general understanding of the text, some quotes to evidence - minimum of 5 entries met. 5.75: Questions are answered, responses to others are provided. Some criticism of the text and debate with others - evidenced by the text and wider resources. Minimum standards are met, but in total it is a greater body of work. 6: Exceeds the minimum standards, leads debate and references a wide range of resources, including the major text. Uses an academic style prose and cites appropriately. Encourages further research among the group, providing links and examples for others to follow up.

All will ultimately provide in their posts, a discussion on 'happiness in today's age'. How can we achieve happiness in our lives?

__**7. Reflection:**__ (Have the students reached the learning goal? How can they assess their own work? How do you assess your own planning?) They will invite one peer to assess their contributions to the blog, they will assess their own in terms of frequency of contribution, style of participation (respondent/critic/antogoniser/leader), level of additional research and ability to evidence opinions. The teacher will also assess according this paradigm along with the VELS progression points identified above.