Getting Started…Making Choices
Academic Standards
Getting Started…Making Choices
Getting Started…Making Choices includes three activities:
Activity 1: What Do You Know? »
Activity 2: How to Speak 'Planning' »
Activity 3: Who is Responsible? »
During the following activities, participants will reflect on their local communities as places that have shaped their lives. This bond between people, environment and community constitutes a “sense of place.” By exploring the media, participants define local issues. Articles abound on topics such as new housing developments, traffic, highway construction, land conservation and community character. The activities in this lesson focus on comparing local news articles from various communities throughout Pennsylvania and aligning them to basic land use principles.
Being a community leader requires an understanding of the vocabulary. It is important to learn the language of “planning”. Participants match vocabulary words and definitions to begin to translate the language. Participants share information about themselves and positive aspects of their community. Participants share objects and artifacts that represent the character of their community as they begin to discuss and define the importance of citizen responsibility.
Standard Categories
- Environment and Ecology
- Civics and Government
- Geography
- Service Learning
Standard Statements
4.8 Humans and the Environment
5.1 Principles and Documents of Government
5.3 How Government Works
7.1 Basic Geographic Literacy
7.3 Human Characteristics of Places and Regions
Content Objectives
- Discuss and compare current articles about land use
- Correlate articles to land use principles
- Share information about communities
- Identify concepts and additional information
- Match vocabulary and definitions
- Discuss citizen responsibility
Instructional Strategies
- Analysis
- Compare and Contrast
- Discussion
- Listening
- Matching
Assessment Strategies
- Discussion and Review
Time Required
- 1.25 hours
