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This project was created by a group of five seventh graders, three boys (John, Adam, and David) and two girls (Sarah and Beth). As they mentioned at the beginning of their documents, "we hope that you enjoy our multimedia project as much as we have enjoyed making it." They enjoyed creating this project, and they expended intense effort in order to complete a 26 page document that included many photographs and sound files.

The most significant component in the Beatles project was the well-organized structure. They started with an explanation of why they chose the topic, who they were, the basic information about each member of the Beatles, how the Beatles were formed, the great success of the Beatles' appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show, an introduction to the Beatles' most famous albums and hits, the reason for their break up, and how the three living Beatles members are doing now. Lastly, they interviewed their classmates in order to gain a better understanding of what seventh-graders thought about the Beatles. Readers can get a very clear picture of the Beatles after reading this project. Of special interest was the fact that they properly inserted various sound files to make the project more attractive. This project has successfully established an exemplar model for a biographical report in the multimedia format.

With a group of five, the management skills became the most important issue. They assigned roles to group members after conferring during their initial planning meeting. Since the boys dominated the discussion during this meeting and seemed to know more, the boys assigned themselves the most vital roles, such as: manager, designer, camcorder operator, and typist. The two girls were assigned the roles of writer and evaluator. John, the manager, wrote the letter to get the copyright permission from the publisher and was the person who took charge of all the audio recording. The other two boys, Adam and David, operated the camcorder to shoot the video, connected the camcorder to the computer, and used the "VidCap" program to put these photos in the computer. After David finished writing one paragraph, he asked who was the typist. (Adam was the typist.) When the researcher suggested letting the girls do the typing task, (thereby, giving the girls time on the computer), all the boys responded, "They type very slow." However, the boys finally realized that they did not split the tasks evenly enough, so they started to give the girls tasks, such as typing and writing.

The students took pride in what they were doing. For example, the researcher told them that they needed to write a letter to the publisher to obtain permission to use their materials in the project. The very next morning, John stood up immediately and showed me the letter he had written at home, printed on a laser printer. It appeared very neat and professional. However, David had accidentally signed his name in the wrong place on the letter. This made the rest of the team members angry, especially John, because he wanted this letter to be perfect. In addition, when they tried to record some audio for the project and their classmates were talking, they yelled at them, "Be quiet! We have work to do here."

As the project proceeded, the group became "stuck" and seemed unable to determine the next step. They looked forward, rather than back, to see how the plan was proceeding. After the researcher suggested that they read what they had planned and written, the group created a list of outlines that they wanted to add to the project. During group discussions, they demonstrated again that they did not understand the planning process, as they seemed to become enmeshed in details and continually lost sight of the big picture. Therefore, proper advice from the teacher would be to remind them from time to time to keep to their plan.
 
 

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