"AROUND THE WORLD IN EIGHTY DAYS"

Subject area(s): English, Math, Social Studies
Grade levels: 9th or 10th
Time required: 4 to 5 weeks (1 grading period)

Introduction:

Students will read the novel, Around the World in Eighty Days, by Jules Verne. They will keep a journal of the cities visited from the viewpoint of either Phileas Fogg or Jean Passepartout. The journal will be the basis for the cities to be used in the mathematics activity. The math activity will involve calculating air distances between pairs of cities and comparing them to the land-sea distances using percent of change. A multimedia presentation will culminate this activity.

By the end of this lesson, the students will:

• locate cities on an atlas and determine their latitude and longitude
• create and compute formulas on a computer generated spreadsheet
• find the percent of increase or decrease when comparing two numbers
• write creative journal entries
• present a unique and informative multimedia presentation

Phileas Fogg's great grandson is recreating his great grandfather's original trip around the world, only this time he will travel by air. He has challenged you to help him find out how the land-sea travel miles that his grandfather calculated differ from the air miles he will travel.

Time to pack your bags and start your adventure!

Knowledge:

• how to locate continents, countries, and cities on a world map
• how to name the longitude and latitude of a city
• high school reading level
• basic math skills including how to find percent of increase/decrease
• high school basic grammar /writing skills
• scientific or graphing calculator skills

Computer skills: basic knowledge in the following

• word processing
• spreadsheet
• Internet searching
• database
• PowerPoint/Hyper studio

Paper-based:

• Book, Around the World in Eighty Days, by Jules Verne
• Mathematics textbook
• World map/atlas

Computer-related:

• Great Circle Distance Calculator
• Distance Calculator
• Online-line Around the World in Eighty Days
• MapQuest
• Quick Maps
• Longitude & Latitude
• Map Coordinate System

1. Read the novel, Around the World in Eighty Days, during a three week period. (Short class and group discussions after each chapter reading-see posted schedule in English classroom.*)
2. Keep a handwritten journal written from the viewpoint of either Phileas Fogg or Jean Passepartout. An entry must be made before each assigned discussion.
3. Individually, complete the Literature Think Sheet.
4. Fill in the spreadsheet handout.
5. Create a computer spreadsheet. (See posted math lab schedule)
6. In your cooperative groups, discuss and write the answer to the Math Think Sheet (See math lab schedule)
7. In your assigned groups, choose a pair of cities from the spreadsheet and create a multimedia presentation.
8. Create a group portfolio.

• Journal criteria
• Spreadsheet directions
• Formula suggestions
• Literature think sheet
• Math think sheet
• Presentation guidelines
• Portfolio criteria

Grading Scale:

• Presentation: 50%
• Cooperative Work 20%
• Portfolio 30%

A Rubric is provided to give you the criteria for successfully completing your presentation. This will allow you to consider the quality of the product and to share this with your group and class.

Other grading handout rubrics and evaluation sheets will be handed out at various steps in the project.

Now that your journey has ended, you should have a better idea of how Literature, Math, and Social Studies work together. Your map skills are now excellent, love of reading great literature is an overwhelming joy now and your math percentage skills are superb.

 

*This project was adapted for a WebQuest from a UofMemphis graduate ID&T project co-authored by Ms. Linda Stubbs.