BEYOND-THE-BASIC

PRODUCTIVITY TOOLS

Name: Matthew Kaplan

Grade Level: 4th
Content Area: Social Studies
Beyond-the-Basic Productivity Tool Used: Timeline
Standards Addressed:
SS4H3 The student will explain the factors that shaped British colonial America.
B. Describe colonial life in America as experienced by various people, including large landowners,
farmers, artisans, women, indentured servants, slaves, and Native Americans.

Blooms Level of Critical Thinking:

Remembering Understanding Applying Analyzing Evaluating Creating
Description of how to implement in the class:

In order to effectively utilize beyond the basic productivity tools into the classroom, Timeline will be used
in order to allow students to drive their own learning. The lesson that this BBPT will be used for is a social
studies lesson tied to standard SS4H3, focusing primarily on the American Revolutionary War in the mid-
1700s. An important aspect to any lesson plan is to have the students complete at least one formative
assessment and one summative assessment. Both assessments are used to judge whether or not a student
understands the material that is being taught. For the purpose of the lesson on the Revolutionary War,
Timeline will be used as a formative assessment.

The lesson will be split up into two days; however, the formative assessment will take place at the end of
the first day. The students must take at least eight pieces of information that they learned and create a
timeline. Under each event, the student must include information and an outside resource (such as a
YouTube video or an article) to provide more information on the event. The students are able to organize
their timeline any way they want: by date, event, battles, people. They can choose to include graphics or
not. This formative assignment is really student driven and allows them to have creativity (with
limitations).
Level of Technology Implementation (LoTi):
When using Timeline as a BBPT, the LoTi level that is being reached is at least a level four. This is mostly
due to the fact that the students are able to take their own coursework and notes and organizing it in
whichever way they want. They are able to use visuals, videos, articles; it is up to the discretion of each
student on what to do with the information. Therefore, this specific BBPT is also a LoTi 4 because it is
more student than teacher instruction. This gives the student creative freedom.
Description of the sample BBPT file provided *:
When viewing the sample BBPT, you will see an example timeline from the BBPT called Timeline. On the
actual timeline, there are eight different events. Each event includes the following: (1) name of event, (2)
year, (3) image, (4) description, (4) outside resource (either article or YouTube video). This is an example
of what the students timeline should like.
Other comments about your proposed BBPT Activity:
Overall, this lesson utilizes Timeline in such a way to promote a student-driven atmosphere. This is
extremely important because when students have power in what they are learning, they put more effort
and show more effort in what is being taught.