Write to Express Yourself

RACES Writing Strategy

The purpose of this module is to teach you a writing strategy to answer constructed response prompts or questions. The best part is that it can be used in any of your classes, and it is just five steps.

LEARNING OUTCOME:

I can create a well-structured, on-topic paragraph with relevant evidence from the text to support my answer to writing prompts or questions.

OBJECTIVE: I can recall the steps of the RACES writing strategy for constructed responses.

DIRECTIONS: Listen to the audio lesson which can stand alone or be used with the RACES poster image.

RACES Poster Image

First: Learn

RACES Multitrack Final_mixdown

00:00 / 01:30

audio script

Second: Practice

DIRECTIONS: Drag and drop the pieces into the correct box to recall the RACES strategy. If you get stuck, scroll back up to the RACES Poster Image.

Third: Evaluate

OBJECTIVE: Given a text passage and a writing prompt, I can evaluate three choices for each sentence of the constructed response and choose the best options to form a complete paragraph which accurately answers the prompt.

Directions: Read the passage before completing the video quiz.

DIRECTIONS: Click on the button below to listen to the passage. Audio of the passage is available by clicking the button on the right. Once you have read or listened to the passage, complete the interactive video lesson, answering each quiz question as you go.

Passage: The Benefits and Dangers of Youth Ice Hockey

Audio: The Benefits and Dangers of Youth

video transcript

Write!

Time to express yourself.

Visit our Google Classroom. Choose one of the articles posted. Write a constructed response using the RACES strategy for the prompt on your article. Highlight each step of the strategy in your completed paragraph with the colors of the pennants. Restate (pink); Answer (yellow); Cite (blue); Explain (green); Sum it up (pink).

Digital Media Principles

RACES Digital Image

All components are original and were created using Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator using basic and advanced raster and vector techniques. The image follows the CRAP design principles with contrast using bright colors on gray, white, and black backgrounds. Fonts vary to show relationship and importance. Borders contrast to background. The strategy is given visual weight. Repetition is seen in colors and shapes to direct attention and flow. Alignment is seen in the offset header and linear strategy tiles in the body. The photos follow the curve of the road and the oval at the bottom centers back up. Proximity is shown in groupings: RACES strategy, example photos, and the GPS location pin and text.

RACES Multitrack Audio

Audio was recorded and edited in Adobe Audition. The audio is layered with multiple tracks to add depth to the listeners experience.The final audio includes a voice recording, background music, & car sound effects with music fades at the beginning and end to allow the content to be heard clearly in the body of the clip.

RACES on Ice Video

The video was edited in Adobe Premiere Pro. It includes a title and credit page which is common form for professional design. The text is manipulated to include multiple layers, alignment, and transformations. The video shots are original and follow the rule of thirds, avoiding vertical and horizontal centering, and they consider lead space. The shots include a long shot, close up at eye level, and over the shoulder. Multitrack audio was created including voice recording, music, and sound effects with beginning and end fades. Transitions were applied to join clips in a smooth and professional manner.

Learning

Outcomes

LEARNING OUTCOME:

I can create a well-structured, on-topic paragraph with relevant evidence from the text to support my answer to writing prompts or questions.

One of my primary considerations in meeting a writing lesson objective is engagement. Many of my middle school students say writing is boring. This guided my decisions to include bright colors in the anchor poster. The audio clip is bold with engines revving and rock music. In the poster and the video, I used my sons as the subjects because they are in the target audience range at 12 and 15 years old. This webpage is a different color scheme than my other portfolio pages. This page needed to be colorful and easy to navigate. I got bold and broke out of the Wix theme and into the editing mode which is far more flexible. This allowed me to play with colors, text size, and strip size to design the page to aid my learners in flowing through the activities.

I planned carefully to have the RACES Multitrack Audio support the digital image so students can listen to the audio and flow down the poster. This allows them to revisit the steps repeatedly as needed. I teach many students who need audio support to access the general education curriculum, so I added the audio for the article which needs to be read prior to watching the video. Additional accessibility tools are an alt text link on the poster, verified closed captions on the video, edited CC script posted under the video, and audio script under the player.

To aid engagement and gather formative assessment data, I created a sort and an interactive quizzes for the video. This will allow students to check their own understanding and correct thinking as they learn which allows for more accurate and effective knowledge and skill acquisition.

Overall, the projects were planned and designed to scaffold the students from lower to higher depths of knowledge. I believe this shows in the final project and does support the learning outcome.