STUDENT CHOICE AND CREATIVITY IN THE RESEARCH PROCESS
Project Abstract
Does student choice increase engagement and motivation? That was the primary question I explored in this project. I conducted action-research in my own classroom by selecting the most time-consuming and important project of the year, student research papers, and allowing students to submit a creative project in place of the paper. I had hoped that students who were not normally engaged in the curriculum, would choose the project and feel further connected to the material because they did so. In the end, I learned more about why students were not interested in the creative project, as only two students elected to do the creative project. The students who did select the creative project, however, submitted high-quality work that was both historically accurate, analytically strong, and creative, proving to me that it is possible to add creativity and student choice without sacrificing the overall quality. But because so few students opted for this option, I was unable to assess whether an open-ended creative project would actually increase student motivation.
Does student choice increase engagement and motivation? That was the primary question I explored in this project. I conducted action-research in my own classroom by selecting the most time-consuming and important project of the year, student research papers, and allowing students to submit a creative project in place of the paper. I had hoped that students who were not normally engaged in the curriculum, would choose the project and feel further connected to the material because they did so. In the end, I learned more about why students were not interested in the creative project, as only two students elected to do the creative project. The students who did select the creative project, however, submitted high-quality work that was both historically accurate, analytically strong, and creative, proving to me that it is possible to add creativity and student choice without sacrificing the overall quality. But because so few students opted for this option, I was unable to assess whether an open-ended creative project would actually increase student motivation.
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