Graduation+Project

Essential Question: // How do literacy skills, both yours in particular and humankind’s in general, and the literature produced and consumed through those skills contribute to society or facilitate social change? //

When answering this question, you may wish to narrow your focus to literacy in one of the following contexts: academia (elementary, secondary, post-secondary), professionalism (the career you hope to develop), political (how literacy impacts government), historical (how literacy impacted historical events), musical, religious, fine arts, or personal development/growth (the self-help phenomena, spirituality, etc.)

There will be three components to your graduation project: 1. research 2. project 3. presentation. While all three components must be completed in order to graduate, the research component will be part of your class grade.


 * // Research Component: //**

Throughout the course of the year, you will research your topic by finding relevant quality sources that will help you create your final presentation. You will compose four 5 source annotated bibliographies that explore your topic, for a total of 20 sources. The reason these are split into 4 separate documents is because you will be narrowing and/or broadening your topic and research as you experience your hours and learn more about your topic.

Each bibliography will be worth 25 points. Research will be conducted independently. Each annotation should be two to three paragraphs in length per source and use MLA documentation style. We will discuss this further throughout the year.

Use the following guidelines for each set of 5 sources:

Set I: You will want to find sources to help you have a stronger concept of literacy and its influence on the world. These sources may be quite general as you are introducing yourselves to the topic of literacy beyond your current understanding of it. You may wish to research literacy in a variety of contexts in this set of sources to help you narrow the focus of your projects.

Set II: This set of sources should be a bit more focused/specific to your chosen context (professional, academic, etc.). These sources may not necessarily overtly be about literacy in that context but give you more depth of understanding what’s involved. For example, if you are looking to examine literacy in business, these sources might be about the different types of business degrees, different types of business in general. When you annotate these sources, you would want the reflective paragraph to consider how the sources reveal the importance of reading, writing, speaking, and listening.

Set III: This set of sources will be based on where the first 10 sources and your first several hours of observation have led you.

Set IV: This final set of sources will be based on information you need to synthesize the hours and previous research into a complete thesis.


 * // Project Component: //**

In addition to the annotated bibliographies, you also need to complete 20 hours of community service. I suggest choosing a venue that reflects a passion or an interest in what you hope to pursue as a career. While you are volunteering, you will be making observations and analyzing how literacy (reading, writing, speaking, and/or listening) plays a role.

For each hour of your project, you will complete an observation form. The more details you include in this form, the more information you will have from which to pull for your presentation. Each sheet also needs to be signed by the supervisor overseeing your hours.

Former students have chosen:
 * oral histories: spending time with veterans/elderly to record oral histories.
 * political context: attending various meetings of administrative bodies, such as the school board, city council, to observe how literacy impacts government.
 * religious literacy: working with youth groups, Bible clubs, etc. in various activities to observe how literacy impacts faith.
 * music literacy: working with the middle school choir and/or band to observe how literacy impacts musical advancement, tutoring kids with music playing to observe how music impacts literacy.
 * medical literacy: following/shadowing various medical professionals to observe how literacy skills impact health.




 * // Presentation Component: //**

By synthesizing the research and project observations, each student will construct a thesis that answers the posed question and will present and defend that thesis at the end of May. You will need to construct a slideshow that reveals your research, the outcomes of your project, and the conclusions based on the research and project that led to your thesis. Additionally, you will also develop a creative component that reflects your synthesis. Possible creative components include scrapbooks, video montages, composing a song, writing a poem, posters, brochures, etc.

Your presentation will be approximately 10 – 15 minutes in length and will be followed by a 5 minute question session during which you must defend your thesis.



PDF of handbook: