Grade 8 English Final Project – context 

This is a year-long Grade 8 English class of 27 students of diverse backgrounds and abilities, including several Individual Education Plans which require adaptations to assignments and expectations.   

The focus of the course has been “What makes a hero” and has included looking at the Hero’s Journey and “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone”.  Prior to this assignment, an in-depth study of Norse and First Peoples’ myths and what they have in common. 

Students will create their own hero of whom to present a story using a video, infographic or other visual media tool found in the Canva application. Students will also create a figure of their hero in Hero Forge so their rendering is not limited by copyright.  However, visual demonstration of comprehension of the Hero’s Journey will be the crux of the assignment. 

Prior to receiving the assignment, students will receive a tutorial session on accessing and using Canva. Students will be encouraged to play around with the application before beginning so that the instructor will be able to answer specific questions that may arise. 

After being given the assignment, students will review the Hero’s Journey video that was presented and referenced throughout the course.

An instructor-created exemplar of the assignment will be shown and accessible through Canva.

Students will be aware of and be given a chance to provide feedback on the project rubric. 

Students will be provided with no less than 6 class periods (3 blocks a week) to complete the project.

Learning objectives:

Use writing and design processes to plan, develop, and create engaging and meaningful literary and informational texts

Student Assignment

Welcome to the final project of English 8!

This year we have looked at what makes a hero with a lot of different examples (Megamind, Harry Potter and myths).  It is now your job to create a hero!

  1. Go to Canva.com on your laptop.
  2. Sign up in Canva with your school e-mail address.
  3. Join Ms.  Mounce’s team on Canva through the invite link in your e-mail.
  4. Follow Ms.  Mounce’s instructions and then play around with Canva.
  5. Create a presentation in Canva.
  6. As a class, we will watch the Hero’s Journey video and brainstorm some ideas.  Then using the Hero’s Journey, plan out the path your hero is going to take.  You must show your plan to Ms.  Mounce before moving on to the next steps.
  7. Create a model of your hero on Hero Forge and take a screenshot of it for your presentation.
  8. Complete a presentation in Canva for your hero, detailing their hero’s journey.
  9. You will have 2 weeks (6 class periods) to complete this assignment.
  Emerging  Developing  Proficient  Extending 
Drafting  An unclear idea of the hero and the story was developed.  A somewhat clear idea of the hero and story were developed, but there were many questions that needed answering  A mostly clear idea of the hero and story were developed, but some questions needed to be answered  A clear idea of the hero and story were developed, and all questions were answered 
Hero’s Journey  5 to 6 of the parts of the hero’s journey are included  Two to 4 parts of the hero’s journey are missing  One of the parts of the hero’s journey is missing  All 12 parts of the hero’s journey are included 
Quality  Little explanation of the hero’s journey is given, a lot of information is missing  Some explanation of the hero’s journey is given, some information is missing  Most explanations of the hero’s journey is given, some information is missing  All explanations of the hero’s journey are complete, little to no information is missing 
Organization  Slides are unorganized or difficult to understand  Slides are crowded or have little information on them  Slides may be a little crowded or have too much extra space  Slides are well laid out without too much information on them 
Conventions  Mistakes distract from the presentation making it difficult to understand ideas  Mistakes distract from the presentation but it can still be understood  Errors begin to distract from the presentation  Few errors that do not distract from the presentation, need not be error free