The Motor Car - Commerce Year 10

THE MOTOR CAR - YEAR 10 COMMERCE

Vince D'Elia

Laverton Secondary College

PROBLEM

We were looking at the issue of road safety and I wanted to devise a method to encourage students to take more active control of their own learning of this topic. To me, PEEL is a way of learning that puts the student in the "driver's seat", so to speak. When someone is in the driver's seat, they are usually more aware of their destination. Similarly, this was my aim in devising the following role play.

LEARNING STRATEGY

A role play was discussed by students working in groups to advertise a new initiative to reduce the road toll. Students were required to:

Discuss in groups new methods to reduce the road toll.
Take one initiative and produce an advertising campaign. Most groups produced a script and role play of a television commercial.
Groups were then expected to present their ideas to the class.

SUCCESS/FAILURE

Students were very excited about working in groups to complete this project. I had requests for video cameras, props and my car to mention a few items. The fact that students had to present their work in this format had the effect of increasing their awareness of road safety much more than I had thought would happen. The activities also put students in a position where they had to make a choice about how they would react given a dangerous situation - for example, would they risk getting into a car with a drunken driver? Perhaps by doing this activity they will be able to make a better decision when confronted with a similar real situation.