GRACE WEEK 2: LESSON 2

Remember your theme for this year (unless your group

decides to do another theme) is:

Recommended Theme: CHAMPIONS OF THE

EARTH
Climate Change, Global Warming and Alternative
Clean Energy in the 21st Century.

*** Note: If you decide to do another theme, please obtain the approval
from your teacher.
 GRACE Week 2.
Name:__________ Group Name:_________ Class:_____ Date:_____

Theme: CHAMPIONS OF THE EARTH

Climate Change, Global Warming and Alternative Clean Energy in the
21st Century.

Introduction:

At Maris Stella High School, learning about the environment and the changing
climates in the world will be the subject for project work for Secondary Two
students. In adopting ‘Champions of the Earth’ as the theme of our project work,
students will be given the opportunity to be involved in the study of the climate
changes and its consequences in the next 50 years. In the process, they will
learn about the level of environmental awareness and commitment that many
people have for this world. They will also do a study on clean energy and devise
a small environmental-friendly product or gadget that promotes clean energy. In
the process of producing the product, the students will apply their factual
knowledge and make use of their creativity and imagination.

Rationale:

We want our students to have more than just factual knowledge of environmental
issues and problems from their Geography and Science lessons. We would also
like the students to study alternative energy and apply their knowledge to come
up with a product that helps in their theme of Champions of the Earth.

A. Objectives

1. General Objectives of Project Work

• To provide students with opportunities to explore the inter-relationships of core subjects

namely Science, Geography, English and Mathematics, and Design and Technology.

• To enable students to:

 Apply creative and critical thinking skills
 Improve communication skills (both oral and written)
 Foster collaborative learning skills
 Develop self-directed inquiry and life-long learning skills

2. Environmental Focus

• To inculcate:
 Awareness and care for the environment
  Responsibility in protecting their environment in a practical way through the products
they design.

• To promote environmental awareness to their community (school, home, neighbourhood,

etc)

How it is done - The Processes

A. The Theoretical Discipline

1. Research and Crafting a Proposal

Students in groups of 3-4 brainstorm and research on a particular topic of their

choice related to the theme. This is followed by the crafting of their proposal
subjected to approval by their supervising teacher. Students are guided to focus
on doing a project that allows for application of their final product rather than a
project which is geared towards mainly fact–finding. The project must also be
interdisciplinary in nature encompassing at least any 3 of the following key
subject areas, namely Science, Geography, English or Mathematics to meet the
objectives of Project Work .

2. Information Gathering, Processing, Analysing and Evaluating

Students undertake research and access information from various sources (print
and non-print, interviews, etc) about the topic and analyse and evaluate relevant
information for their project.

Example:

 For the Geography aspect:

Students can do research on the causes of climate change and global warming,
and forecast the consequences in the next 20 years if nothing is done to alleviate
the situation.

 For the Science aspect:

1) Students can go on to study the advantages and disadvantages of

using different sources of clean energy eg solar energy.
2) Students can do investigative work on solar cells and panels to
assess its effectiveness.

 For the Mathematics aspect:

Students can obtain the computer data printout and do a statistical analysis on
the data obtained from our solar panels installed at the Physics laboratory.

B. The Practical Aspect of Project Work

3. Conducting a Survey

Students are to conduct a survey on the following areas:

• To determine how much knowledge the community/members of the public have on the
area of their project work on environment
• To inquire if members of the public are interested to have better/more knowledge about
the areas of their project work.
• To determine how feasible is the end–product that is to be designed to meet the objective
of promoting environmental awareness to the community and showing responsibility of
protecting the environment in a practical way.

4. Devising a product

Students will finally prepare a product on their project.

The products could be in the form of :

• A gadget using solar cells. This is to enable them to understand how solar cells can be
used, and also to encourage them to be creative.
• An educational game on the topic.
• A skit or drama play.
• A documentary on the topic
• Or any other product.

4. Presentation of their Project and Sharing and Testing of their Product

This is the stage where students present and share the entire project to their
classmates for the first time. Feedback obtained about their strengths and
weaknesses results in further improvement of their product.
In your group, sit
in a circle and
brainstorm on the
topic that your
group will be
doing for GRACE.
 There are 66
suggested topics
posted on the
GRACE blog on
Environmental
Issues. Your
group may use
any of these
topics, if you wish.
Task for this week:
Each individual will do his own reflection on the questions below. Fill up
the sheet below and paste them into your individual reflections in your
group blog.

KNOWING WHAT WE HAVE TO DO …

Let’s answer the questions in sequence.

Topic: Clean Energy

in Global Warming
This is our project on
‘saving the Earth’, with
different sources of
energy. Hopefully, we can
deal with Global Warming We can use clean
and convince others to energy as an
use our methods. alternative source
of energy

I can Find my info in

library books or Over
the internet
What is Clean
Energy? O.o

I know we have to use

Science, but I am not
sure about Maths.
Science: Biology and
Chemistry