The Space Mag

     For the past few years I have had my Earth Science students make an informational magazine covering the planets, moon and various objects in our solar system.  They digitally design these magazines on their laptops.  I love doing this assignment with them for many reasons.  The number one reason is the experience and the journey they go through to achieve the final product.

     For the last part of our Astronomy unit I wanted my students to be able to experience the wonders of our own solar system. I needed a lesson to do this while still making it meaningful and relevant to my students after they leave my class.  This is why I chose a magazine.  By making this magazine my students practice their research skills, graphic designing, problem solving, APA citations and experience perseverance; all while learning detailed information about our solar system.

**A disclaimer is that my students all have Mac computers, a lot of the programs that I mention are built in, but if you have Photo Shop or Picasa this is possible on a PC.**

   The first thing I would do is make a rubric for a large project like this. It is important you know what you want the students to have.  Before giving them the rubric, give them an organizer. Here is my organizer I give my students to help them get started. Again, for my class this is a HUGE project so there are a lot of different areas of research on my organizer.  The great thing about this, is that it can be shortened and it is extremely easy to differentiate for high ability or low ability students if needed.

The introduction paper is here to give you an idea of all that I require them to do.

  In the introduction it explains that each student must pick a theme and, that the theme must be present throughout the entire magazine.  This really helps bring the magazine together and make it unique.  Here are some examples of different themes and magazines that a few of my students have turned in.

Pixar Theme 
The Big Bang Theory 
The Hunger Games 
Video Games 
Thor


Areas that I emphasize on (and have learned to emphasize on) are the following:

1. APA citation- It is critical that they make the citation as they go and not wait until the end. If they do wait they will have a days worth of citation generating and they will most likely forget which citation goes where. 
2. Color Scheme- They are not allowed to have more then 5 different colors per page.  Anymore looks like the rainbow threw up on the magazine. 
3. Images- Must have at least 3 images per page.  One must be of the actual object, the other two can be relevant to the object. An example of this might be having a picture of the Mars rover, Curiosity on their page.
4. Theme Overload- The personal theme is one of the best things about the magazine, but if you are not careful the students can get so wrapped up in it they lose sight of what they are doing.
5. Table of Contents- I have learned to have them do this FIRST.  It gives them guidance on where to start.  It may seem trivial, but it really does help them get the ball rolling on the project. 
6. Peer Editing- Occasionally I will have someone else just look at their pages and see how the flow is going.  Most of the students end up using a lot of the same sources from NASA.gov, so I have them just look at the overall appearance of the pages. This helps give guidance in the aesthetic area of the magazine. 

This project is long, but there is a huge sense of accomplishment when they are done with it.  They are also very proud of the magazine that they create and it becomes something they like to keep. I usually get the top magazine printed and bound with nice glossy paper.  If I could afford it, or if your school has the money I would definitely print them out for every student! 

If you have any questions please let me know!