Invention Lesson Plans for Grades K-12
Teachers
Thank you for embarking on the InVenture Prize curriculum with your students. It will require them to think, conduct research, work collaboratively with a team and harness their creativity skills. We have developed lessons for Kindergarten, Grades 1-3, Grades 4-8, and Grades 9-12. The lessons walk students (and teachers) through the design engineering process, and culminate in a digital presentation that can be entered in the K12 Inventure State Competition at Georgia Tech.
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InVenture Prize Timeline
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August - December: Complete lessons and K-12 InVenture Unit curriculum
December - January: Students present projects/compete in local competitions
Early February: Deadline for submitting final team(s) to Georgia Tech State Finals
Mid February: State Finalists will be announced
March: Finalists will attend the State Finals at Georgia Tech
Updated Competition information and timelines can be found on the following website: https://k12inventure.gatech.edu/home
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K-12 InVenture Unit Lessons
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K12 InVenture Prize Website:
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All lessons and materials are presented online so that teachers may easily implement it into their classrooms.
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Pacing Guide:
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Explains each of the lessons and tasks that students will complete. Teachers should feel free to adjust lessons to fit their classes’ needs and time constraints.
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Includes all teacher directions, website links, and links for printable handouts.
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Extension Activities have been added for most lessons that address the needs of advanced students or students who desire to learn more.
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Most lessons feature independent video exploration that can be done at home or in the classroom.
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Roles in the Inventure Unit
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Teacher
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Share and model lessons so students understand the steps in the Design Thinking Process.
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Conference with teams as they work through the various parts of the Design Thinking Process. Thinking of original ideas takes persistence and can be difficult for both students and teachers. It is crucial to help teams when they are “stuck,”; however, teachers should not supply ideas or solutions to teams.
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Evaluate students based on contributions to group work, collaboration, communication, Log Book and culminating project.
Student
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Complete lessons to the best of their ability
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Keep a notebook/journal of ALL work completed throughout the process. This will be used in the
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Work collaboratively with team members
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Do their fair share of tasks to complete project
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Complete homework when assigned
Parent
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Provide prototyping material as needed
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Assist with carpentry tasks such as sawing, drilling, etc.
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Parents SHOULD NOT make prototype or give students solutions
Options for Local Competitions:
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Classroom/School Competition - Teams present one at a time to teachers/invited judges who score them on a rubric to determine which teams will be submitted to GA Tech to compete for a spot at the State Finals.
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Exhibition - Multiple classroom teams come to a common area (IE: Media Center) to display projects and parents are invited to view all projects. Judges can either circulate among projects or can be in a separate area where students bring projects to them. This is helpful if noise level is a concern.
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Showcase - Teams can share projects and no judging if the school opts not to send team(s) to Georgia Tech State Finals.
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Judges: It is helpful to have a variety of judges. For example, the National Invention Convention has one engineer, one educator and one business person in each judging team.
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