West Connector Plan
By:  Kevin Sills

Project at a Glance :

Our school has a large space that will be unused as of next year.  It is surrounded by windows and could be used for many different purposes.  The plan is to have the fourth graders evaluate this space and design a purpose for it that could benefit the students who have access to it.
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​Driving Question:

How can the West Connector best be used by the students and staff at HCS?         

Standards:

•  W.4.1. Write opinion pieces on topics or texts, supporting a point of view with reasons and information.
• SL.4.1. Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade 4 topics and texts, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly.
• SL.4.4. Report on a topic or text, tell a story, or recount an experience in an organized manner, using appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive details to support main ideas or themes; speak clearly at an understandable pace.

Team / Culture Building:

• Use the Skills for Success Card Sorts to narrow down the groups by how they see themselves.  
  

​Entry Event:

• Visit the space being considered for the project and evaluate how it is currently being used and take measurements of the space.  Then create a sketch of what it looks like currently.  

Stakeholders:

• Classroom teachers
• Upper Elementary Students
• School Board
• Administration

Empathy Building:

• Empathy Map
• Stakeholders Map​

Inquiry / Need to Knows:

• Use the Need to Know protocol to answer the following questions: What do we know, what do we wonder, what did we learn? Who is the space for?  How can we use the space?

          Is there an funding available for            changing this space?

Incubation:

• Idea Quota​

• Brainwriting
• New and Novel
• Students will use their classroom journals to document solution ideas.

Checking in:

• Check in with students after the incubation stage.  Each group will be assigned a meeting time to go over what they have discovered through the protocols that we have done.  The teacher will also drop in as they go through the “checking in” protocols that they will share with the class.
• Anti-problem ​

• Yes and Can it…
• Rule of Thirds

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Solution Building:

• Affinity Mapping
• $100 test
• Dot Voting​

• NUF test

Critique and Revision: 

• Where’s the Love protocol
• Poster Session and Gallery Walk
• Seeking a Skeptic

Authentic Audience:

• Administration
• Teachers
• School Board Members

Final Presentation:

• Students will present their solution ideas to an authentic audience.  They may include Posters, a slide show, and/or a prototype that they have created .​

Click here for teacher's full plan.

​Reflection and Feedback:

• Two Stars and a Wish
• Single Point Rubricmail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/FMfcgzQVwnWSFxKvhDdqgDPnZLKmVNNw?projector=1&messagePartId=0.1.1
• Start / Stop / Continue
• Talking Chips​

Click here for the teacher's Journey through PBL on Padlet . . .

Meet the Educator:

Kevin Sills teaches 4th grade at Hudsonville Christian School.

     "Our school challenges kids to use their minds and lives for Christ and that is why I love being a teacher here."