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Kristin's Millennium
Museum Project

The focus of my project will be to introduce gifted students in grades three through eight (approximately 11 students) to web development and increase their awareness of advancements during the last millennium.

After initial introductions to the gifted program, I will evaluate the students' understanding of web surfing. I will include mini lessons on what makes a good web site and how to find information that is reliable. Each student will then be given a time frame from the last 1,000 years to research. The time periods will be 50 years for the students in grades three through five and 100 years for the students in grades six through eight. As a group we will decide on three focus topics from the following list:

agriculture, architecture, communication, economy, education, exploration, clothing fashions, fine arts, government, human rights, inventions, literature, mathematics, military, performing arts, philosophy, religion, science, sports, and transportation

After finishing the three focus topics, the students will be required to research at least two more topics. I have copied a page of questions for each topic to guide the students in their research. The students will be encouraged to use the Internet as well as books and encyclopedias. Since the gifted program only meets once a week and students are not suppose to get additional homework, I will allow approximately three to four weeks for the initial research stage.

Once the students have compiled enough information, I will introduce students to basic web authoring. This will include analyzing web sites and deciding what they like and do not like. Then, I will set up a basic web site and allow them to manipulate the graphics, the font, and the backgrounds using Netscape Composer.

By the fifth or sixth week, I expect students to begin developing a millennium web site where they will post the information they researched. As a group they will develop a Millennium Museum Home Page that includes links to all their time periods.

Goals of the project:

students will become experts on their time period
students will develop a basic web site which explains their information
students will realize how much the world has changed in the last thousand years by comparing each other's work
other students, teachers, and parents will be able to view our work on the web (in the past people outside the gifted program only had limited knowledge to what was done in the program)

In order to complete this project, I will need to prepare the following items:

set up a mini lab in an open classroom, which is Internet ready
make sure all necessary software is working correctly (including Netscape and Fetch)
contact our school's server to see if I can post our information on it
find web sites for the students to analyze
create a basic web site that students can manipulate

During the entire project, I will be monitoring the student's progress. When needed, I will also assist the students in their research and web development.