Substitute Teacher Guide • Grade 11 • Unit A: Foundations — The Design Process & Purpose
Understanding Your Audience: Research Methods & Personas — Day 2 of 2
Today's focus: Building a Persona
✅ Before Students Arrive
- Materials needed today:
- Sample survey results or a short case-study handout (teacher-provided)
- Persona template (paper or Google Doc)
- Most students keep their class notebook at its usual spot in the room and use it every day (see routine below) -- but it's each student's own notebook, so a few may bring theirs from home instead. Either way, everyone should have one out.
- Write today's Do Now on the board before the bell rings (see below).
📓 Daily Notebook Routine (students already know this)
Keep this going every day, in your class notebook: date today's entry, jot your Do Now response, add any new vocabulary word(s) from today's Key Vocabulary section (word + a quick picture + a simple definition in your own words), and take 60 seconds to sketch something connected to today's topic. This notebook is yours to study from, reference on projects, and pull evidence from later for your portfolio.
🗣️ Opening: Do Now
Write or project this, and have students start immediately:
“What's the difference between primary and secondary research?”
📋 Class Plan (step by step)
-
Step 1 — 22 min
🗣️ Say: "Now it's your turn -- work on your own (or with your table) on the following."
📋 Independent build (22 min): build a persona from the sample data.
-
Step 2 — 10 min
🗣️ Say: "Turn to a partner and do this together."
📋 Present to a partner (10 min): explain what it would mean for a design aimed at that persona.
🔑 Vocabulary Introduced Today
- Persona
- A fictional profile representing a real segment of an audience, used to guide design decisions.'
- Target Audience
- The specific group a design is created to reach and persuade.
✅ Wrap-Up: Exit Ticket
A few minutes before the bell, say: "Time to finish your exit ticket."
“Name one design decision that would change depending on which persona you were designing for.”
Collect exit tickets (or have students leave them in the usual spot) for the regular teacher to review.
⏳ If You're Short on Time
Protect the Do Now and the Exit Ticket above all else -- those are how the regular teacher tracks daily progress. If a step above is optional/homework, or is a "share out"/discussion step, shorten or skip it first.
⏳ If Students Finish Early
Have them keep working in their notebook: add extra detail to today's vocabulary sketch, review previous vocabulary, or -- if this is a portfolio update week for this class -- work on their portfolio. Early finishers should never be idle or distracting to classmates still working.
📝 For the Regular Teacher (fill in ahead of time)
- Regular teacher's name / how to reach them: ______________________________
- Where finished work / exit tickets go: ______________________________
- Front office extension / emergency contact: ______________________________
- Anything else this class needs to know today: ______________________________