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Welcome to Adventure #6!
In this adventure, you will learn:
-How a presentation should tell a story
-What a presentation about your invention should include
-How to put your presentation topics into the best order for communicating the story about your invention process to your audience
-What a "patent" is
You will also get a chance to review all of the steps in the invention process in a fun game challenge!
Mac whips open the door to the Clubhouse. He is breathless and has poster boards and a big bundle of art supplies under both arms. Mac has brought exciting news for the group.
Mac gathers the Curious Kids and reveals the news, “Everyone, gather around! The Mayor is hosting a special celebration for the community to share news about your awesome inventions. So, he would like you to present your inventions to the whole Curiosity Creek community. It’s going to be a party!” The Curious Kids jump up and down squealing with excitement.
Mac adds, “You’re going to be creating presentations about your inventions. A great presentation is like a great story. Think about your favorite stories. What do they often have in common?”
Mac replies, “Yes, excellent ideas! Great stories often have an exciting beginning, characters, a problem and a satisfying solution at the end. They also should hold your interest all the way through!
In the same way, a great presentation about your inventions will include:
- an introduction,
- the problem to solve,
- the people (inventors) solving the problem, and
- the solution and how you made sure it
would work.
Are you ready to create the stories of your inventions?”
After a few days, the Curious Kids are finished creating their invention presentations. They practice their presentations with each other and give each other thoughtful feedback about ways to improve them. They also ask Mimi and Mac to watch their presentation for some extra feedback. Mac suggests the teams let each member do part of their presentation as a way to extend their teamwork. Mimi corrects a couple of grammatical mistakes she hears.
They are now ready for the presentation to the Mayor, Figgy and the other fish, and the whole Curiosity Creek community.
Both the Trash Bin team and Timmy took 4 poster boards each: an introduction, the problem in the creek, the invention team, and their solution.
After making sure they looked their best, the kids headed to the creek area where the celebration will be held.
Timmy, with a tear on his cheek, says, “Oh no!” Some of our posters are missing.”
Tanisha adds, “Our presentations are ruined!” but Hector quickly says, “No, we’ll look for the missing posters. We can fix this, but we may need a little help.”
Challenge #1
Both Timmy and the Trash Bin team each lost 2 of their 4 poster boards in the marshlands. See if you can help them by clicking around to find all 4 missing poster boards. They could be hiding anywhere!
Challenge #2: Poster Board Order
Now that you have found all of the missing poster boards, all of the posters need to be put in the right order for their presentations. Remember, every great presentation has an introduction, a problem, people who will fix the problem, and a solution. In this presentation, the people who will fix the problem are the Inventors. Here's what you need to know to solve this challenge:
- Four of the poster boards are already in order.
- Click and drag over the 4 missing poster boards (2 for the signs, 2 for the trash bin) that you found to their correct invention presentation order.
- Click the START button to begin.
When the Curious Kids have finished their presentations, Figgy and their fish friends let out a gurgly “Yay," and the kids all have big smiles as the whole audience applauds.
As the Curious Kids leave the stage, a trumpet blares, announcing the Mayor of Curiosity Creek is coming to the stage. The crowd is hushed. But who is here to introduce him?
“Hello, members of our Curiosity Creek community!” Mayor Squiggly’s voice booms.
He continues, “The Curious Kids have created amazing inventions to help save the fish community that we know and love. The signs and trash bin were so successful at helping keep our park and creek clean and safe for all of us, that our town council has voted to change the town ordinance. Now, two more signs and an additional trash bin can be placed at the creek and surrounding park area for all visitors to use!”
A loud cheer goes up from the crowd.
Mayor Squiggly adds, “And, that’s not all! We have all seen how inventions can help make our community better, so, from now on, we will have a Curiosity Creek Invention Day celebration every year on this day!”
The crowd cheers and the Curious Kids high five and
hug one another with joy. Figgy and their fish friends blow bubbles into the air, Digger barks from excitement ("Woof!") and, while we don’t see him, we hear a tinkling of happy bells from Teenie Genie.
Hector says to the Curious Kids, “Looks like we have some work to do, making more signs and trash bins! Let’s meet later to discuss what we have to do and what we might need to do a little differently.”
Image supplied by Freepik, free license
Some of the kids even had their inventions patented. That means their inventions were licensed by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) in Washington, D.C. so that only those kids could make, use or sell them, if they wanted to do so.
It looks like Mayor Squiggly still has one more thing for you to do… complete one last challenge!
Challenge #3: The Invention Process
Credits
This two-year project was awarded to Dr. Marilyn Arnone and Dr. Ruth Small, co-directors at the
Center for Digital Literacy, School of Information Studies, Syracuse University and funded, in part, by a National Leadership Grant from the U.S. Institute of Museum & Library Services (IMLS).
We also wish to thank the following individuals for their critical contributions to the development of the project’s digital story-game:
Adventure Reviewers: The 15 school and public librarians from 9 states (Amanda, Anna, Beatriz, Julie, Katie, Kim, Loriana, Mandy, Nicole, Saptarshi, Shelley, Soline, Sonja, Suzanne, Tyler) serving on the project’s Librarian Design Team
Adventure and Journal Reviewers: The 10 children, grades 2-5, from 4 states (Cassie, Dean, Haley, Hudson, Ivana, Jaire, Kavya, Owen, Roxy, Sophia), serving on the Children’s Design Team
Animator: Dr. Marilyn P. Arnone, Professor Emerita
Story-Game Artist: Marguerite Chadwick-Juner
Graphic Design/Layout of Invention Journal, Glossary, and Best Practices Guide: Katie McGinnis
Disabilities and Inventing Advisor and Bibliography Creator: Suzanne Schriar, State Library Associate Director
Project Consultant: Dr. Christopher Harris, Library Administrator
Project Advisors: Amanda Baskett, Brian Mayer, Dr. Shandell Maxwell, Katherine McGinnis, Stephanie C. Prato, Dr. Mega Subramaniam, Dr. Carol L. Tilley
Software Developers/Programmers: Tom Hardy, CEO, Data Momentum, Marcin Cjaza
Journal Concept and Advisor: Brian Mayer, School Library System Coordinator
Journal Puzzle Challenge Developers: Soline Holmes, School Librarian; Brian Mayer, School System System Coordinator
Script Writers: Dr. Ruth V. Small, Professor Emerita; Jennifer Han, Project Graduate Assistant
Intellectual Property Rights and Permissions
Through a Creative Commons license, all digital and downloadable products created for this project including the story-game, Best Practices Guide, My Invention Investigation Journal, and Digger's Great Green Glossary are freely available to users with attribution/link (The Innovation Destination) and may be used or adapted for non-commercial personal use such as for teaching in the classroom, library or home, or presenting at educational conferences, as long as the modified materials are not distributed publicly. The Curiosity Creek concept and characters (an original concept, website and books created 2003) remain the intellectual property of Dr. Marilyn Arnone and may not be adapted for any kind of distribution either commercially or non-commercially. If you have any questions about permissions, you may contact project directors Dr. Marilyn Arnone (mparnone@syr.edu) or Dr. Ruth Small (drruth@syr.edu).
"The Mystery of The Burping Fish" by The Innovation Destination is licensed under CC BY -NC ND 4.0.
Digger’s Great Green Glossary