A Real-World Connection: One Example
At Gunn High School in Palo Alto, California, Spanish is the language spoken by many of the immigrant students. For students who were learning Spanish, their Spanish language skills gave them a special ability to communicate with these immigrants. They wrote and produced a video for new Spanish-speaking students to orient them to the school. The students could see that the school really needed this video and that they were the ones to produce it. In making the video, they had a reason to strive for perfect grammar and pronunciation. They suddenly needed lots of vocabulary words, some not found in their textbooks.
This project connects to the real world in many ways. It connects to a real audience—the Spanish-speaking students. It fulfills a real need—the school's need to welcome these immigrant students. It connects to student interests—students could choose an area of the school to describe in the video. It applies students' special talents and skills—particularly the ability to speak and write Spanish—to a real-world purpose.