Longest Ride Cake

Ms. Pietan:

The goal of this project was to give students autonomy over their learning. I also wanted to show them that reading can be fun. I gave very few requirements; I gave them a list of the Common Core standards, explained what they meant, and gave them a few ideas. Everything else was all them! They even made their own rubrics to go with their projects; that’s what I based their grade on. I was pleasantly surprised at how invested students were in their projects. They came up with such creative projects! I have a student baking a cake; I had two students bring in animal hides to put quotes on. 

Overall, my goal as an educator is to give students the opportunities to be creative; the best way for students to learn is to simply get out of their way

Student: Averi Ransom

When Ms. Pietan told the class about the assignment she told us to choose one book we have read 1st semester and choose a standard, for example I did CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.9-10.3 Analyze how complex characters (e.g., those with multiple or conflicting motivations) develop over the course of a text, interact with other characters, and advance the plot or develop the theme. Then she told us to create a creative and unique project to present. For my final English assignment I did a character analysis of the main character in The Perks of Being a Wallflower. I wrote letters in the format of the book and described how Charlie the main character changed throughout the book.