Weekly reflection-Module 6

I firmly believe that if we hand students iPads, we are also responsible for teaching digital citizenship with a 9-12 systematic approach. Currently our district doesn’t, and I believe that is irresponsible. In my own children’s district, there is a systematic approach in the elementary and middle school and as a parent, I feel as though I can trust that my son is using his electronic device appropriately and responsibly.

This past year, I took a course on digital citizenship which mostly used resources through Common Sense Media. I incorporated a lesson plan in my English class, but at that point it was difficult to know what they knew and didn’t know because we don’t have a district-wide approach. Most of the material through this course was on social networking, the dangers and how to form positive, healthy relationships safely while on-line. 

This past week, I learned some new things as well. I am familiar with the term digital footprint, but the videos on students promoting positive messages through social media enabled me to think differently. I started to consider how I could use social media in my classroom as a way to encourage students to think  outside of their world. Currently, most students use it to socialize with friends, but the potential for it academically is far-reaching.  I was able to express this idea through this week's lesson plan in a way that promotes positively to a student’s digital footprint, while reflecting on their current habits. The other two resources that hit me was the website on “Spread the R Word” because I can say until I am blue in the face that the word is offensive, but this website, with the social media implications, makes more of an impact. In addition, I have avoided using Twitter, even though I have an account, because I don’t quite understand how it works. But the website on “Complete Guide to Twitter Hashtags” gave me some insights on how I could use it in my work-life and in school. 

Despite everything I have learned, it doesn’t do much, if it isn’t applied. I can’t just piecemeal it into my classroom. Consequently, like many things I strongly believe in, it takes small steps towards a common goal. First this class, then collaborating with other like minded people, then hopefully incorporating it into the culture of our building. I believe we now have a principle where that kind of action is supported, so perhaps the goal can be realized, and it will become systematically part of our school culture. 

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Weekly reflection-Module 5

Alen November’s article was certainly a rationale for how to create a culture in our schools where students take more responsibility for their own learning, foster a global work ethic and understand how to organize teams of people from around the world to solve complex problems. Although he didn’t specifically mention E-Portfolios, it is certainly something that embodies the school culture he is describing. He had a few helpful suggestions and links for how to do create this culture in an actual classroom.  Dr. Barret’s information on using Google Sites and Google Drive to organize student portfolios enabled me to visualize using them in a classroom setting. Going through the exercise of providing our own artificats enabled me to visualize how I would organize in my classroom, possibly for a final exam experience. I wasn’t sold on Google Sites necessarily, but I did watch the short video on “Google Drive iPad Portfolio” and realized the many options for downloading work students have which they can showcase, including Notability, Explain Everything, Book Creator and iMovie.  By the end of the year, my students will have used each of these programs in English class, and could use them as artifiacts in a portfolio. 

On the Edutopia website, there was an article called “Digital Portfolios Pull Double Duty” and a teacher Martin, believes that preparing digital portfolios can also help students prepare for college, because they can be organized like a job portfolio. Today, when people apply for jobs and college, it is mostly on line and being able to represent knowledge, understanding and student work in a presention that is visually appealing is a useful skill in landing a job. The exercise we did this week where we viewed student E-Portfolios made me realize the challenges of doing this large scale, especially across content areas. While I believe is would be a valuable experience for our students at the high school, it takes so long for change to really happen, that it is doubtful it would happen large scale. Where is could happen is within departments, with the leadership of a department head, or within a program like Learning Alternatives. This week has motivated me to start small scale with E-Portfolios, and use it within my English and possibly Ecology class as a final exam.

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Weekly reflection-Module 4

Collaboration in the workplace and in the school environment is a necessary and important skill, and therefore we need to teach students how to effectively communicate both face to face and on-line. In the article “Preparing 21st Century Students”, there was a quote that stood out to me, “employers note that although oral and written communication are among the top four skills they seek in new hires, all graduates are lacking in these areas”.  Although written communication is stressed in English and other content area classes, oral communication is not.  Oral communication is something that our school should focus on, but we are not. 

One of the most successful ways I have implemented collaboration in my classroom is through project based learning; specifically with our school garden and recycling projects. In both instances, I have had outside community organizations come in and work alongside my students to create change. Although I give them the tools necessary to work towards a common goal, as a group they need to reach the destination. The journey or process is also looked at closely, in addition to the individual roles students play within the larger group. Challenges for PBL have included group dynamics, conflict resolution and lack of attendance. The benefits include students gaining ownership of the project, discovering skills not often developed in other classroom settings, and seeing students problem solve versus repeat back information they think I want to hear for the grade or to just get by. 

The one collaborative tool students have used in the past has been Twitter; however once that group left, it didn’t continue into the next year. Google forms may be one way to communicate with this current group. I found several good ideas looking at the link “79 Ways to use Google Forms”.  Here either myself or other students could create forms to collect data, communicate progress or report out. 

Currently we check in as a group at the start of class. I pose questions to the group about our status in the project and students give feedback. On one of the Edutopia videos this week, “Five Tips for Building Strong Collaborative Learning”,  I saw some collaborative tools an English teacher did with her class, which may work well for this group. Students sit around a big wooden table so that they are all able to see each other. She also has student roles for the discussion including scribe, mapper and moderator. I have never heard of having someone visually map the conversation, but I really want to try this with my group. 

The collaborative activity this week using Explain Anything, was fairly useful. It did force me to play with the tool and brainstorm ways I can use it in my own classroom. Tom and I work closely together physically, so it was easy to add slides and brainstorm lesson ideas.  Steve and I also worked together, but in different areas of the building, and we shared through Google Drive, which took a bit more time, but did work. I did run into some technical difficulty exporting the document. As a collaborative tool, I am not completely sold. I do see how students could express their own understandings and skills using a slideshow. Collaboration is something I enjoy doing in my own workplace and I see the value. I need to continue to develop curriculum where my students are able to collaborate within other content areas besides science. 

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Weekly reflection-Module 3

This weeks assignment, creating an iMovie was challenging. I didn’t explore many of the resources you provided because the past few technology classes I have taken, I have done a bunch of exploring and really wanted to use the majority of my time towards the actual project. Creating a movie is at times frustrating and time consuming. I found myself going through several steps in the process. The first is brainstorming. 

I knew I wanted to create a movie based on a project in my ecology class. We have been doing project based learning and I wanted to document our process and results to share with others. Most of my previous movies have been with still photographs, so for this project, I really wanted to use video, and in particular interview my students. I created a list of individual questions for each student and informed them last class that they were going to be interviewed. They were mostly good sports about it. I had one student film, while the student and I sat beside each other to do the interview. We had to do several takes with some students as they were a bit shy or goofy. I managed to interview all students in an entire class period which was surprising. After I had all of the video, I had to watch it several times to look for themes that were consistent throughout the interviews. I also didn’t know how to organize the video. (This is the step that I find my students really struggle with. I usually sit down with them at this point and walk through ideas with them because they are ready to give up at this point).  I watched the student interviews a few times before deciding on a format. Each student had some piece of the interview that really stood out. I took that piece and used it as a quote to introduce the student interview. I also cut out a great deal of the interview for each student. Next I had to decide on how to introduce and end the video. I went with text boxes versus narrating because I really wanted it to be about my students. I used some data and photographs we had compiled over the past month.

I was pleased with the final result and liked how the student interviews came together to connect the whole piece. I may add music to the end and beginning but haven’t quite decided yet. I am going to get feedback from my students next class. There were some challenges with iMovie on the iPad that I still need to explore. Transitions and using sound effects were frustrating. There was a sound effect for each transition slide that I couldn’t figure out how to erase and I found it distracting. In the end, this project is a good lead into the culture unit I am about to begin with my freshman. Now that the struggles and joys are fresh in my mind, I can share them with my students first hand. 

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Weekly reflection-Module 2

This past module has motivated me to do things differently in my classroom. I can visualize how to integrate flipped classroom with my own curriculum after watching several of the resources from this class. In particular, I have viewed Tom Driscoll, the Doctor and Katie Kimbar. Each one of these educators have similar reasons for using the flipped classroom; to engage students, encourage collaboration, provide resources that students can use at their own pace, and to provide transparency and accountability

The content I viewed from the doctor was reasons on why teachers should flip their classrooms. McCammon talks about the importance of teachers creating their own versions of the content and that “each teachers possess their own personal connection with the content that they teach that can inspire their students to care and to learn”. That is a significant selling point to me on using the flipped classroom. In addition, the playlists I create can come at my own pace, in my own time, without the added distractions I might encounter in a classroom. When I make the playlists, it is my version at my own pace which will come across clearer and more concise. He also discusses the simplicity of creating playlists for both the teacher and the student, again another good selling point. The only tools needed are a white board, tripod and cell phone. It looks and sounds easy to set up. 

Tom Driscoll’s wiki provides a view of what a flipped classroom might actually look like. I watched his two minutes compilation of different assignments that he had used in class. This has really got my head spinning along certain assignments or lessons I can do with my English class in particular. For example, in the next culture unit, I could have an playlist that would include an introduction, the essential learning targets, and the technological tools that will be used. I would probably use a keynote like Tom did to guide students, in addition to a white board. I also like how Tom provides a piece of himself and a sense of humor for his students, personalizing his flipped classroom. I then viewed Tom’s world history video on World Religions, an overview. It appears as though he is using a keynote where he has important point in text and then he elaborates on points verbally. I again like this type of style and visual myself using it for my next culture unit. 

Katie’s videos on flipped classroom was essentially answering questions and concerns from teachers. She was honest, straightforward and genuine in her responses. She addressed some concerns I had about what if students don’t watch the videos outside of class and points out that they can watch the videos at any time they want as either a first time view or a refresher. In addition, when students go to other places outside of her classroom, such as core lab, workshops or hassle for tassel, students are easily able to keep up with her content because of the playlists she creates.  

The assignment for this week on creating a screencast was very easy to use. I had played around with Quick Time this summer doing some screen recordings and so the Screencast-O-Matic was very user friendly. I can see some limitations to it, but again as an introduction for teachers and students to flipped classrooms, it does the job. My next challenge with be to play around with Explain Everything on the iPad’s.

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Weekly Reflection-Module 1

Using videos in the classrooms has changed a great deal from when I first started teaching. I used to have a few go to movies I would show in the classroom with questions and answers to guide students. Eventually I moved towards more of a reading/viewing log, but still stuck with the same videos. Now that we have one-to-one technology and YouTube, it really expands the way that videos are used in the classroom. I remember when we were banning students from using YouTube, now it has become an integral part of some teacher’s curriculum! In fact, many students come to us having used videos in ways that teachers have not. Students have created their own how to videos, or game reviews, or lego skits and are very comfortable in that arena. 

The thought of getting in front of a video and sharing it on YouTube is definitely uncomfortable for me. I have used iMovie as a teaching tool and quick time to teach a short lesson so far. In that boring Vialogue video we viewed with the annoying music, one of the main points is that many educators are still doing things similar to the 1950’s, and as Dewey points out not adjusting to their world. Today we have young kids who are YouTube sensations and many more that strive to be. We must dive into that world and get used to their landscape. 

Having a YouTube channel and creating playlists is a good way to get your feet wet and help you to organize. I do use YouTube but am chaotic and unorganized, so this assignment really got me thinking about how I can use my YouTube channel to really enhance my curriculum, connect to student interest and make the lesson more visually engaging. I also realize that creating your own content takes time. The librarian I found, who has created several YouTube videos on the research process, evidently has taking a great deal of time to create her playlists.  I have created a similar one for certification and it wasn’t easy. I must have recorded the same one ten times.

Finally, as Ken Kay points out in the original reading, we need to encourage students to collaborate and contribute. Having a channel that students create in the classroom is the next real step towards achieving 21 Century skills. On these classroom channels students can work together creating outcomes on standards with their very own YouTube videos that can then be shared with students in their own classrooms as well as students on other teams. 

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