Incorporating journalism, art, and researching skills, on-level World Geography students spent  last week creating a news based project with the last of the classes turning it on Friday.

“Basically we just wanted students to learn more about Southwest Asia or the Middle East,” World Geography teacher Jennifer Nelken said. “So we thought they could turn it into a newspaper, which allows for research with sort of journalistic qualities. Some of my kids are like, what’s a newspaper? So it is a good way for them to see new mediums and things like that.”

Rather than a lecture based unit, the newspaper project is designed so students learn the material in a hands-on way.

“The project details Southwest Asia, which is the current unit of study, and North Africa,” World Geography teacher Kenneth Schiumo said. “It’s just regarding different things that occur in that region such as gender inequality which they struggled with, the rubric includes the Palestinian-Israeli conflict over the Holy Land, and also economic aspects of those countries, like oil and petroleum. It’s just a good way to get the kids familiar with the content in a fun and engaging way.”

Being able to have some freedom in how they create their project is appealing to freshman Cade McGarrh.

“I like this project a lot because it uses your creativity,” he said. “But it also helps you learn about the unit by incorporating different tasks into one project that actually explains a lot of the current and important events that are going on in Southwest Asia.”

Besides creativity, the project required other skills for freshman Maliyah Ross.

“During this project I use my research skills because we have to do a lot of researching about the subject,” Ross said. “Yet I also use my art skills because you have to be creative to make it look nice, and there is a drawing component with the map.”

Students are able to apply what they learn in class about the Middle East with a combination of research and use of online resources to produce an imitation of print media.  

“This is a good project to implement because it shows you the kids skills in a variety of ways,” Schiumo said. “They can be creative and get in touch with the project in the sense of being online and utilizing different resources like videos, documentaries, things like that. There’s several different ways in which students can gather information and utilize technology which is obviously never growing need in education.”