As you know from my “Witness to History” post, history comes in all forms. From the first man on the moon, all the way to the pandemic we are facing today, what makes something historically significant varies. Most history is documented in some way, whether it be a photograph or through art, or even stories that are passed on from generation to generation. Back in the fourteen and fifteen hundreds, most history was recorded using journals or scrolls. That’s when our project, “Argh Matey”, takes place.
This project incorporated two classes, Humanities and Scimatics, which resulted in the same final product. The science aspect of “Argh Matey” was led by the driving question, How do cells and diseases interact? While the social studies aspect was led with the driving question, What is the historical significance of your explorer?
Competency Being Assessed:
- Questioning and Predicting: Demonstrate a sustained intellectual curiosity about a scientific topic or problem of personal interest
The first competency for the Scimatics portion of the project was questioning and predicting. The first activity we had to do was a project start mindmap. The mindmap included what we already knew about the driving question as well as questions we may have about the project or what we were going to learn. Since I had very little knowledge on cells and diseases, I had many questions about what we were going to learn in the weeks to come.
Scientific Communication:
Communicate ideas, findings, and solutions to problems, using scientific language, representations, and digital technologies.
After choosing my disease and researching the effects it has on the body, it was time to start planning out the comic book. We used this competency for Milestone 4 which was the storyboard. With the help of my story spine, I started off on the story board. Since this project is half humanities and half science, the storyboard had to incorporate both. This aspect was difficult, but after finding a way to blend the two while keeping a strong plot, constructing the rest of the story was much easier. Keeping the competency in mind, I showed how the cells and the Leprosy bacteria interact using scientific language.
Evaluating:
Demonstrate an understanding and appreciation of evidence:
This competency was when everything came together. All of the previous weeks of hard work researching and making drafts were finally going to be put to the test in our final comic book. With the story board beside me and the app, Comic Life open, it was time to start creating. To complete the science part of the comic book, I started with the text. In the storyboard, my drawings were very rough, but the speech bubbles and narrative pieces were mostly final. That made creating the comic book much easier to complete. Due to the fact that the Leprosy disease takes over ten years to develop, my story took place ten yers after my explorer contracted the disease. During the creation of the comic book, I found the drawing aspect to be most time consuming for both sides of the story. I tried to make the drawings as detailed as possible which made it much more difficult to complete the number of panels that I had planned.
The name of the project being “Argh Matey” has to do with the time period it takes place. The 1400s up to the 1600s were considered the Golden Age, or The Age of Exploration. Some of the world’s most significant events happened in that time period, including: the discovery of the Americas, the discovery of Africa and Asia, and the first circumnavigation of the the world. Some horrible historic events also happened during this timeline, like slavery or how poorly the natives of the land were treated by the colonists. In the humanities aspect of this project, we dove into the world of Europe during The Age of Exploration. We learned about some of the main explores who lived during that time period and what they did to become historically significant to this day.
Many attributes make something significant. It could be significant to you personally, or it could something that is historically significant. When determining historical significance, its important to think like historians. It is helpful to question if the person, event, or object you are studying achieved the following things:
• led to long-lasting change
• impacted many people
• had a profound or deep impact on people’s lives
• was revealing or symbolic of greater historical trends
My comic book told the story of Sir Walter Raleigh and his two failed expeditions to the New World. I showed how he and his expedition showed historic significance and how the Leprosy disease followed him to his early death. I thought that it was interesting that even though he led two unsuccessful voyages, he impacted and influenced many explores after his death. As I mentioned in the Scimatics section, I found the drawings aspect to be the most time consuming and difficult. Although, by the end, I found that I could copy some drawings to speed up the process.
• led to long-lasting change
• impacted many people
• had a profound or deep impact on people’s lives
• was revealing or symbolic of greater historical trends
My comic book told the story of Sir Walter Raleigh and his two failed expeditions to the New World. I showed how he and his expedition showed historic significance and how the Leprosy disease followed him to his early death. I thought that it was interesting that even though he led two unsuccessful voyages, he impacted and influenced many explores after his death. As I mentioned in the Scimatics section, I found the drawings aspect to be the most time consuming and difficult. Although, by the end, I found that I could copy some drawings to speed up the process.
Although, It was very challenging to finish the comic book, I am very satisfied with my final result. With all the time and effort put into it, I feel that I have successfully created a story that answers the driving questions. Reflecting on the entire project and the fact that I did it all from home, makes me feel very proud. With as much as I learned about both topics, I would say that the struggle to finish the final comic book was worth it. I hope you enjoyed The Search For El’Dorado and learned a few things along the way. Make sure to comment any thought or questions about this post.