Running head: WRITING SKILLS 1

Silver Creek High School Writing Skills: Design Project Report

Crystala Button, Eric Zachary, Gia Devlin, Kelly Bettencourt

California State University Monterey Bay

IST626 Advanced Instructional Design

Dr. Jeanne Farrington

July 24, 2018

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Silver Creek High School Writing Skills: Design Project Report

Our client, Shelley Wessels, requested training material on fundamental writing

skills for her high school students. Team 2, The Wolfpack, has been tasked with creating

asynchronous learning modules, which will be assigned through a Google Site and will

link to a variety of online instructional media and materials. Wessels is a high school

Social Science teacher working mostly with eleventh-grade and twelfth-grade students.

She has identified a gap in her students’ ability to use appropriate writing practices when

completing both formal and informal writing assignments. Ms. Wessels has indicated that

many teachers of core classes other than English Language Arts, math, science, etc., have

limited requirements or have completely stopped assigning substantial writing

assignments due to their students’ lack of basic writing skills and teachers’ lack of

instructional time to remedy stated skill deficits. Training is necessary to address the

identified gaps, and it is important that this training does not get in the way of the already

tight curriculum map.

The goal of this project is to create learning activities that can be assigned to

students for completion outside of the classroom, thus minimizing lost instructional time.

In addition, the asynchronous design of the training will limit the need for teacher

involvement in remedial writing instruction. The Common Core State Standards (CCSS)

mandate that formal writing be addressed in all content areas. To meet these mandated

standards, Wessels’s students must possess appropriate grade-level writing skills. The

desired outcome of this training is for the students in Wessels’s classes to successfully

use the writing skills presented in the instructional materials to write at or above their

grade-level. The training will employ formative assessments periodically; however, as

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these training modules will be assigned on an as needed basis, a summative assessment

will not be administered. Wessels will have the opportunity to evaluate the learning

through noted improvement in students’ writing assignments throughout the school-year.

Client and Organizational Goals

This training is necessary for students in our client’s classes to be able to master

the Social Science content. Her students are expected to have a solid understanding of

English-related skills when they come to her Social Science class. Since their mastery is

assumed, Wessels does not take the time out of her curriculum plan to include writing

skills review. The client goal of this training will be for students to learn and review

writing skills independently so that this remediation does not disrupt Wessels’s lesson

design. Based on a conversation with our client, students at Silver Creek High School are

mostly English-Language Learners, and they suffer from a lack of academic writing

skills. As these students are both in her regular Social Science and Advanced Placement

Social Science classes, it is important that they are writing at or above grade-level. Some

of those academic writing issues were defined as grammar, spelling, and formatting

errors. This training will work to address most of the issues outlined above.

In creating this training program, Team 2 will be considering the Santa Clara

County Office of Education’s 2017-2018 Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP).

Santa Clara County has lofty goals for its students and teachers. A simple summary of

their five LCAP goals reads as follows: all students will be engaged in rigorous learning

in a safe/responsive environment where the needs of the whole child are in the forefront

so that Santa Clara County students are prepared for a future of their choice (Santa Clara

County Board of Education, 2017). A training that focuses on writing skills and is
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delivered through a technology-based learning environment will allow students to

“participate in rigorous, relevant and engaging instruction aligned to 21st century skills to

eliminate barriers and promote achievement” and will assist in preparing students for a

“successful transition to college and/or career as a result of quality programs, services

and curriculum” (Santa Clara County Board of Education, 2017).

Learner Analysis

The learners completing this training are mostly eleventh-grade and twelfth-grade

students at Silver Creek High School. Many of these students are English-Language

Learners. These students are enrolled in at least one of the following Social Science

classes with Wessels: Law and Society, Sociology, Social Problems, Economics,

Advanced Placement U.S. Government, and/or Politics. According to the Silver Creek

High School’s most recent Academic Performance Index (API), this school was at one

point in project improvement, which means the subgroups, determined by race,

socioeconomic status, and other special needs, were not meeting targets set forth by the

state of California (California Department of Education, 2013). In knowing that, our

training can better focus on assisting these students in meeting and exceeding the

proficiency level for Language Arts, which will, in turn, boost their proficiency in Social

Science and promote college and career readiness (Wessels, 2018).

Project Description

There are two main topics to the writing skills training portion of this project,

which will be located on the Google Site. The site will house the online modules

associated with each main topic, Writing Skills and Editing Skills. Team 2 is exclusively

creating materials for the Writing Skills portion of the site. Team 5 is responsible for the
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Editing Skills portion of the site, but we will combine both projects on the same site for

ease of usage. Once the students open the site, they will be greeted with a how-to video

that describes what the purpose of the modules are and how to use them properly. Once a

student chooses “Writing Skills”, they will be met with the “Quick-Start Writing Guide”.

From there, the learners will choose either the writing format Hyperdoc module or the

grammar and spelling Hyperdoc modules. The modules will focus on increasing students’

understanding and use of writing skills, as well as grammar and spelling skills by

utilizing outside sources and sources created by members of Team 2. A breakdown of the

Hyperdocs’ module contents are as follows:

Formal Writing Skills:

● MLA Format: It is what it is!: an introduction to MLA format and what it looks

like in a formal essay.

● Citing my sources: an introduction to plagiarism and how to prevent accidental

plagiarism.

● What should my essay look like?: a description of essay format.

● Care for a sample?: a complete essay example and guide.

● What’s in a thesis?: an introduction to writing a solid thesis.

● Test your skills: formative assessment.

● Did I miss anything?: a review of skills and more advanced tips.

Grammar and Spelling Skills:

● Apostrophes: When to use apostrophes.

● Capitalization: Appropriate capitalization rules.

● Homophones: Check common homonym mistakes.

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● Spell/Grammar Check: Use the spell/grammar checker within Google Docs and

Grammarly.

● Are you using complete sentences?: Use complete sentences, not sentence

fragments

● Subject verb agreement: A check to ensure that subjects and verbs are aligned.

● Prepositions: Proper use of prepositions and prepositional phrases.

These modules are specifically designed for differentiation. They can be done in order if

needed, or if a student only needs help in one of the areas, they can access the specific

one that they need. The modules are not meant to be completed in succession.

Design Decisions

The main deliverable for this project is comprised of two Hyperdocs, often

referred to as modules throughout this document. Hyperdocs are digital-documents that

contain “hot links”, otherwise known as live links. The design of these deliverables called

for housing the Hyperdocs on a site that can be maintained and accessed by students with

ease; therefore, a Google Site is the final deliverable for the project. The Google Site also

houses the deliverables from Team 5. It is believed that since Silver Creek students are

familiar with Google products, a Google Site will be user friendly and this might create a

more readily used program. It was decided that the client would create a Google Site and

then give editing privileges to Team 2 and Team 5 in order to actually build the site. This

solution allows the client to be the “owner” of the site with the ability to make changes to

the product over time as needed. The Google Site now houses the Hyperdocs with

links/embedded assignments for students to work through.

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Evaluation

Developmental testing was completed informally throughout the later stages of

the project development. Prior to completion of the project, Wessels’s co-worker, an

English teacher at Silver Creek High School and a high school-aged student completed a

beta-test of the Google Site for feedback regarding content and usability. More

specifically, the testers also worked through the Writing Skills portion of the site. In order

to gauge participant response, and to determine whether it is meeting the needs of the

students for developing writing skills, an embedded Google Form can be found on the

main page of the Google Site. The Google Form includes questions on what resources the

students are using and what further resources might be needed so that they may be added

to the training program in the future. Learner performance will be analyzed through the

use of formative assessments within each main writing topic. Final performance

evaluation will be achieved by evaluating usage of the online portal to student’s writing

scores in the targeted content classes.

Teamwork

From the outset of this project, Team 2 placed emphasis on assigning roles that

matched the individual strengths of each team member. Crystala Button has a background

in teaching high school English Language Arts as well as implementing educational

technology. Due to her extensive background in the training module subject area,

Crystala took on the role of both project manager and subject matter expert. Gia Devlin

and Eric Zachary took on the role of website and multimedia design. This included

creating the website, which served as the portal to the training modules for both Team 5

and Team 2, and creating the introduction videos for the site. Kelly Bettencourt had
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experience working with a Flipped Classroom format, she was able to provide valuable

insight into finding and creating many of the resources used for the training Hyperdocs

used in our modules.

Crystala served as the primary contact with the client. In addition, as a team we

had multiple virtual meetings with Wessels using Zoom. Having Crystala as the primary

contact with Wessels worked well as any issues or concerns were directed to one person

and then Crystala could then delegate the task to the appropriate team member for

amending. Crystala assigned the other team members roles for each portion of the

project. Each team member contributed to each part of the instructional design process.

Some team members contributed more than others on particular assignments; however,

Crystala worked to ensure that the overall workload was distributed evenly.

There were many things that we did as a group that allowed the project to come

together. First and foremost, our team communicated well. We were typically in daily

contact via text message, and when a text wasn’t enough, we called each other or met

virtually via Zoom. Additionally, staying ahead on assignments was vital to our success.

As teachers with the summer off, all of our team members traveled at some point during

the development of this product. As a team we always made sure to complete our parts of

assignments if we knew we wouldn’t have access once leaving home. Finally, having a

responsible and organized project manager was essential. Team 2’s project manager

handled this project with a great deal of dedication. The team never had any question as

to what we were individually responsible for and, as a group, what we needed to achieve.

These three things allowed for a relatively smooth developmental process and a quality

product as an end result.

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Challenges

One of the major challenges was being able to meet at the same times. Since our

client and our team are all teachers, it was hard working around everyone’s vacation

schedules. In order to overcome those challenges, Team 2 did the best that they could do

in the individual situations they were in. All team members that were on a trip had to

make sure to have work done by a specific date so that it would be done on time. Since

all team members took a vacation, everyone was very understanding of one another.

Another challenge was working with Team 5 to produce content for the same

client. However, working together was simple since we all began communicating early

on in the project. Each team was in charge of a different aspect of the project and met

with the client respectively. It was the teams’ responsibilities to then come together to

make sure we were all meeting our client’s needs.

A different challenge for our team was designing specifically what the client

wanted. Our client also had deliverables produced for her last year and seemed unhappy

with the results. Knowing that allowed us to gear our meetings with the client in a way

that would ensure that she was satisfied. To overcome this, we took into account what

was unsuccessful for her last year and addressed those issues within our own work along

the way.

Advice for Future Students

1) Set a timeline with dates and stick to it. By having a timeline with everything pre-

set, it helps you keep track of what needs to be done. It is also helpful to have a

visual representation of said timeline shared between the group. That way, group
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members can keep up with what needs to be done and what has already been

done. A shared Google Calendar or Google Doc can help with this process.

2) Keep your client involved during the entire process. By having the client involved

throughout each stage, it helps make less work for you by going back and fixing

things that they may have not worked if you did it, then asked if they liked it. If

you are all on the same page throughout the entire assignment, it helps the work

flow easier. Keeping the client aware of all of the changes or just simply updating

them weekly can help quell any issues before they arise. Ultimately, it is

important to treat your client as if they really are a client that has hired you to

complete a project.

3) Plan your time wisely and make sure that you are available for your team. Never

being able to meet with your team in person is challenging in itself, make sure

that you don’t compound that challenge by further limiting the lines of

communication you do have with your team. Be available through email, text, or

another quick medium that your group has decided on and be sure to respond in a

timely manner.

4) Listen to your client. Understand what they really want from the beginning so you

can craft a product that will be useful. Listen to them along the process and make

changes based on their suggestions. It is much better to build a product the client

will love by using their input and suggestions along the way than to spend time a

product that won’t be used because it wasn’t what the client had in mind.
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References

California Department of Education. Analysis, Measurement, & Accountability

Reporting Division (Ed.). (2013, July 30). 2012 -13 Accountability

Progress Reporting (APR). Retrieved June 2, 2018, from CA Department of

Education Data Quest website: https://api.cde.ca.gov/

Acnt2013/2013SchSummary.aspx?allcds=43694274337903

Common Core State Standards Initiative. English Language Arts Standards

History/Social Studies Grades 11-12 (2018). Retrieved June 3, 2018, from

Common Core State Standards Initiative website:

http://www.corestandards.org/ELA-Literacy/RH/11-12/

Santa Clara County Board of Education (Ed.). (2017, June 21). Local Control

Accountability Plan and Annual Update. Retrieved June 5, 2018, from

SCCOE website: https://

www.sccoe.org/depts/students/Documents/LCAP.pdf#search=goal

Wessels, S. (2018, May 29). [Video conference interview by MIST Team 2: The

Wolfpack].