Research Project - Influential Person with Optional Wax Museum

Your students will love researching an influential person and becoming that person through a Wax Museum! This resource can be printed or used digitally, giving you flexibility for use in your classroom. With clear directions on each page, your students will be able to work on this independently, making this a fun and creative project to use year after year!

Engage your curious learners in a fun and exciting research project all about influential people and their special accomplishments!

Students will research an influential person to learn all about their life and greatest accomplishments. They will practice strong informative writing skills as they incorporate their findings into a research report. At the end, students have the option* to dress as the influential person and write a speech from their person's perspective. They will insert or draw a photo of them dressed up as the influential person to bring their report to life! This was added as a way for us to participate in our ‘Wax Museum’ during school closures.

*[This is optional, if you do not want your students doing this, simply delete the slide or do not print that page.]

Getting Started with Research

Students will be asked to choose one influential person to research. In selecting a person, students should try to find someone of significance, someone who has been successful in their hopes and dreams, and/or someone who represents the best of people and the world.  It could be someone they consider a role model, someone they admire or strive to be, or someone they want to learn more about.

This project asks students to research information about:

• The person's early life
• The person's adult life
• What makes them an inspiration
• Their own opinion and final thoughts about the person
• Wax Museum Speech: Students draft a speech from their influential person's perspective using the information they found out about them
• The final "I Am…” slide is where students insert a photo [or draw an illustration] of themselves dressed as the person and write their final draft of a speech as that person. (optional for teachers to use or discard)

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Go Digital!

Assign this project through Google Classroom for students to complete using Google Slides. This project is scaffolded with student-friendly directions on every slide, making it perfect for distance learning. Each slide includes a checklist of ideas for students to consider as they conduct their research and work on their writing. And of course, predefined text boxes make it very easy for students to get right to work on their slides!

Not a Google Classroom user? No problem! This download includes a PowerPoint version as well for schools and students who have access to Microsoft products. Just add the file to whichever digital platform you use to assign work to your students. They will download the file and work on it on their device, remind them to save their work as they go. Just like the Google Slides version, the PowerPoint option has predefined text boxes to make it easy for students to work independently, even if they have minimal experience using PowerPoint!

SeeSaw is a wonderful tool for distance learning! Uploading this project to SeeSaw is extremely easy. You will just upload the PDF version included in the download (you get 2 PDF versions: one in COLOR and one in BLACK & WHITE). I recommend uploading the COLOR version to SeeSaw. Students will add text boxes and photos into the template and submit it to their journal when finished!

Print & Go!

You can always decide to use this resource as a print and go project with minimal prep work. Within the download you will receive two PDF files, one is in color and one is black and white. They are identical to the digital files. For a low ink requirement, print the black and white version for students. They will draw in the illustration boxes or they can print a picture and glue it in, like a scrapbook!

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What Comes in your Download

This resource is a ZIP file that contains:

• 1 Color PDF file [best for SeeSaw]
• 1 Black and White PDF file [best for printing]
• 1 PowerPoint file [for students with Microsoft products, or schools that do not use Google Classroom]
• 1 link to Google Slides version (you will make a copy and save it to your drive) [for use with Google Classroom]

For the Teacher

Each format of this project includes a spreadsheet for teachers to stay organized with the different influential people that students choose to research, as well as a rubric for easy grading.

I hope your students enjoy learning about influential people and their accomplishments! I also hope you, the teacher, enjoy the low prep and high engagement of this project. You’ll get a kick out of the Wax Museum element of it should you choose to have your students dress up! It's my favorite part!

For an extra fun idea, invite students to record themselves performing the speech they write and insert it as a multimedia recording into their slides or on SeeSaw! You can also use Flipgrid for students to record their speeches... this way their classmates can view the video! [Flipgrid is a free tool for educators that allows students to record short video clips]

You can also invite other classes from your school to tour your "Wax Museum" and listen to your students give their speeches!

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