ALTERNATIVE ASSIGNMENTS

With the information explosion, students will need ways to learn to find, evaluate, and use information. Besides the standard term papers, there are many possible assignments to help a student acquire these information skills. These are only a few of the ideas that have been used successfully.

• Annotated Bibliography Students select and define a topic (course or interest related,) find information sources related to it, and in an evaluative annotation, list the sources and why they used them.
• Author Analysis Students choose an author and research one aspect during that author's productive writing period and how it affected his writing.
• Background Paper Students use the library resources to provide factual background information on an issue.
• Create a Commercial Students do research and sell their idea (issue, product) to the other students. (Can be videotaped)
• Critical Book Review Students read a book and with certain criteria, critically evaluate that book. They can compare their evaluation with published book reviews.
• Community Analysis Students contact local, state, and private agencies relating to a special problem and ask what services they provide for their clients.
• Current Crisis Student choose "hot topic" on a current issue and follow it in the periodicals during the semester.
• Documented Essay Students write short papers which must be supported with expert opinion, but they need not do extensive research.
• Fact Finding Students find information to support a class concept, lab work, or class project.
• Issue Outlines Students present all of the view points they find on a given issue, both pro and con, but do not have to take a position.
• Interview Students interview people in their field and report findings.
• Journal Analysis Students summarize selected articles from research journals in their field on a certain topic.
• Lesson Preparation Students prepare material to teach other students about an aspect of the course.
• Media Diaries Students track a current issue on television, radio, and print sources and analyze the coverage in each type of media.
• Newspaper story Students write a newspaper article describing an event (political social, cultural,) based on their research.
• Practicums Students do some type of project that they might do on their job.
• Scrapbook Students compile a scrapbook of newspaper editorials, articles, pictures, and magazine articles to illustrate a certain topic (example: animal testing,)and provide a written justification for the items selected.
• Time Topic Students choose an interesting "happening" (scientific, technological, political, social, cultural, etc.) during the year they were born and find more information relating to it. (OPTIONAL: Trace its outcome to the present and how it effected them and the world they live in.)

Adapted from Bonnie Preston's Alternative Assignment