Part of my lesson plan today involved some basic note-taking. I had a nice template to use with Smart Notebook but my plans were just too teacher centered. I knew the students would be disinterested and might tune out the activity completely.

With a few computers available I was able to shift gears and offer the students some choices that transformed the lesson quickly. First, we played a vocabulary game from Quia.com.  The students enjoy playing games and they are more ready to learn after a little fun.  Next we did a few quiz-type questions on the SMART Notebook activity from the SMART Exchange to get them thinking about the topic.  But when it came to the new vocabulary, where I would normally give them the notes they need, I offered the students a choice.

They could make a poster to show the vocabulary words, create a section on their group wiki page, make a Microsoft Publisher poster, make a Microsoft Word document, or use the available media anyway they liked in order to display the new vocabulary in a memorable way.  Given only 20 minutes the students created many types of projects.  They went one step further and added their own drawings, home-made graphics, and pictures from the Internet.  They checked their understanding with students in other groups and they found additional information to supplement what their text books provided.  The students were active and that means they were ready to learn!