Team
NickLower Macungie Middle School, PA, United States
FerminLower Macungie Middle School, PA, United States
MeiLower Macungie Middle School, PA, United States
HarukaLower Macungie Middle School, PA, United States
Age Range
15 & under
Coaches
Vicky RomagnoliLMMS, PA, United States
Joan KeiperLower Macungie Middle School, PA, United States
Category
History & Government
Audience
Ages 12 and up
Language
English
Team Collaboration
In 2008 or 2009 our group was presented a challenge to make a website for ThinkQuest. Our topic was on the dictator and Adolf Hitler’s best friend Benito Mussolini. This was because one of our group members was interested in this man. We worked together through all the steps of making the website, from finding out information to actually setting up the website.
We had some challenges deciding on topic after we found it was a bit difficult to research. Haruka and I wanted to do fast food, but we finally compromised and decided on doing our website on Mussolini.
All of the group members put their ideas together to design the website. Our website was aimed to teenagers and young adults, so we included pictures of Mussolini. We chose to break down Mussolini’s life into categories, such as his early life, his death, what his evil doings were, and his military background. This would make it easier for the readers to comprehend.
We worked all in sixth period in Commutation Applications since we are all in the same class. We had started in mid-November on this project and finished in mid-February. We divided the work by having every group member research a different topic on Mussolini’s life. We went to the library often to get more information about Mussolini.
Our team got to know each by researching together and using all of our ideas. We learned that Nick likes World War 2 and that Mussolini took part in that time period. The whole year we used our class time very, very wisely.
Some of the things we liked while doing this ThinkQuest challenge was that we learned and spent a lot of time together as a group. We learned so much about how hard it is to make a website. Also we had to met a deadline. We learned so much from experience.
Team Diversity
Our group was a very diverse group. Each member of our group had different opinions toward things. Therefore, it sometimes made working together harder but we all learned to handle our differences well.
One of our problems we had was choosing a topic. We all had interest in different things, and we could not decide on a topic until the very last minute. Nick was the one who brought up the idea of researching on Mussolini. Fermin agreed, but Mei and Haruka did not agree right away. After we talked about it, we decided to research on Mussolini even though not all of us were satisfied.
Right from the begging, we split up our work. Fermin decided to research about Mussolini’s childhood. Nick decided to research about the army Mussolini belonged to. Mei decided to research about his evilness and how cruel he was towards others. Haruka decided to research about his death and how he died. We were able to pick our own topics fairly easily, and we all knew the responsibilities of working for not only ourselves, but for others in the group.
