In this project, students rediscovered NYC , especially their neighborhoods in any of the five boroughs, through doing primary research, reading literature about New York, observation, interviewing  people, taking photos to record and writing to explore.

This project helped students become more aware of their social commitment by motivating them to dive into the community they were living in. To present what they had found out about their neighborhoods, the students created a webfolio (digital portfolio) and uploaded them in the web. As a class project, the students collected their writing and made a book titled Writing about New York.

Objectives:
--To learn the skills of communication, observation ,and interview .
-To learn to process the information for a specific purpose through  doing primary research, reading and writing.
--To learn to prepare a  web portfolio.
--To help students become aware of their social commitment
--To exercise the student's skills of technology such as web design, and web navigation.

In this project, students studied the history of work ethic and contemplated on their own work ethic. As the continuation of the " Writing about New York" project, they focused more on discovering the work ethic of their neighborhood and their families through interviewing people from the local businesses and their family members. They were also invited to use any artistic method to express what they had discovered about their neighborhood, such as drawing, collage, songs, poetry, and personal narratives, etc. They further explored the theme by  reading the novel The Jungle by Upton Sinclair . To demonstrate their final product, they presented the online Power Point presentation.

Objectives:
-To help students establish the right attitudes towards work
-To acquire the necessary skills-writing, reading, research, critical thinking and technology, 
-To review the history of work, do field and online research on the topic and write about the subject creatively
- To create a timeline of the history of work ethic and report on the research
-To learn different genres of writing based on the tasks and create an art work
-To learn to use the Discussion Forum for the on-going discussion about the project.