Collaborative Unit Reading Enrichment Unit: Grade 9

Survey of Skills:

I collaborated with the student’s regular 9th-grade literature teacher and asked her what prior knowledge
and ability levels the students had. This is a college preparatory class. The class is a college preparatory
class. The students in this class generally perform on a higher level academically than students in the
regular literature classes. For this lesson the teacher will have already gone over the research
assignment, but the class will not have begun researching their topics. The teacher says that students
have difficulty evaluating their resources.

Stage 1 – Desired Results

Established Goals: G

GPS:
ELA9W1 The student produces writing that establishes an appropriate organizational structure,
sets a context and engages the reader, maintains a coherent focus throughout, and signals closure.
The student
a. Establishes a clear, distinctive, and coherent thesis or perspective and maintains a consistent tone and
focus throughout.
e. Writes texts of a length appropriate to address the topic or tell the story.
g. Supports statements and claims with anecdotes, descriptions, facts and statistics, and specific
examples.

ALA/AECT Information Literacy Standard

Standard 2: The student who is information literate evaluates information critically and competently

Understandings:
Students will understand that… U Students will be able to…
• The quality of the source affects the
quality of the writing.
• There are ways to evaluate sources to
make sure the best are used.
Students will know….
• Not all sources are reliable
S
• Accurately identify reliable and unreliable
sources.
• Use at least three reliable sources in their
research project.
• Explain why a resource is reliable or
unreliable.
K Essential Questions: Q
• What do reliable and unreliable mean?
• How do I determine if a source is reliable?
• Why can’t I just use any source?

Stage 2 – Assessment Evidence

Performance Task: T

• Students will find three appropriate sources for their research project. The appropriateness of
their sources will be evaluated through the standards of relevancy to their topic and reliability of
their source. These sources will ultimately be used to help create their research project.

Other Evidence: OE

• Discussion with students during the unit.

• Daily informal observations of the students during the lesson activities.
• Students will have discussions with their peers about the topic. Self assessment can take place.

Stage 3 – Learning Plan

Learning Activities:

Students will:
• The students will view a website on an LCD projector. They will be asked to write a short
response to the website. They will be asked to mention if they trust this information and why or
why not. H
• Media Specialist explains that the website they just viewed was not an acceptable source and
gives a few reasons the students should have been suspicious (amateur design, no sources are
cited for the information, many of the claims aren’t supported by the facts that the students
already know). Explains the plan for the day’s lesson. W
• Media specialist goes over the CARS checklist for source evaluation found on
http://www.virtualsalt.com/evalu8it.htm. Demonstrates how the site used earlier would have
fared with this checklist. E
• Students in the computer lab begin searching for sources for their research topics. The students
are required to complete the CARS checklist for two different sources. They will need to turn in
one they don’t think passes the checklist and one that does. Teacher and media specialist
circulate through the room answering questions and providing tips and redirection. R, E2
• As a ticket out the door, students list one thing they learned from the lesson and at least one thing
that they want to know more about or don’t understand about the topic. E, E2

Media Specialist will:

• Post essential questions for the unit.
• Go over the characteristics of reliable resources.
• Demonstrate what a reliable and unreliable sources look and sound like.
• Lead discussions
• Ask students what the learned and what they don’t understand. Their answers will be used in
combination with the success of the sorting activity to assess the quality of the unit.
• Observe and give feedback on the sources chosen by the students.