Skills Project-21st Century

After listening to the amazing podcast of Kevin Honeycutt and his innovative ideas, it was hard to imagine what kind of project I could come up with that would incorporate both teaching the cirriculum and using "Virtual Immagination" as a learning tool. The only thing that kept going through my mind was the beginning of a Star Wars movie where the words "Long, long ago and far away in a distant galaxy....." were displayed and scrolled on the screen...WOW. As a Teaching Assistant for Special Education, I have encountered many special students who, on occasions, create their own virtual reality with ease because they seem to think in three dimensional action. The projects that they come up with on their own for thier own pleasure are amazing to see and sometimes mindboggling to adults. I believe that it would be exciting to create a project not only for these special students but all students in a couple of different ways. One of the units in Living Environment is on Genetics and wouldn't it be amazing to see how the students could set up a virtual reality DNA Helix Ladder as one of their Lab projects instead of just sitting at thier desks using colored pencils to fill in a one dimensional chart that has been given to them by the teacher. The students could interact with one another and share all of their ideas to not only their classmates but to anyone who would like to link into their project. My second thought would involve the Art Department...the projects could be almost limitless and the students immagination could soar.