Cheers,
Lesley
As some of us at CAT prepare for a PD session on the flipped classroom, I'm reminded of the many things we already know how to do. Whether you use Moodle or another virtual classroom, those LMS's (Learning Management Systems) often contain the most powerful pieces for learning--discussion forms, quizzes where students can receive immediate feedback, and the ability to add links to videos (either made by you or by others) or other resources to enrich the class. A flipped classroom may sound daunting, but I bet you are already using some of the necessary elements, so the hope is that the jump to flipping won't be so scary. Plus, if you have participated in a MOOC or another distance learning course, you have experienced the flipped classroom. Anant Agarwal, the CEO of EdX, explained the basics of a MOOC in his TED talk from June of 2013, and his ideas are still very relevant, especially when we consider what changes we have made to today's classroom (i.e., not much). I hope this talk has inspired you and prepared you to think about ways you could flip your classroom. To be frank, I haven't flipped my classroom, but I have flipped parts. For example, most quizzes and tests for my class are done on Moodle so that my students receive immediate feedback. I also have instructional videos for various subjects (i.e., explaining how to create a Weebly blog and using the library's resources) and I have given students links to audiobooks of assigned reading, but that is basically the extent of the flipped part of my classroom. I have found discussion forums to work occasionally, but my students tire of them if I use them too often, so in-class discussions still reign. So you could say I'm not 100% of the way to a flipped class, but I'm far from 0% and that is an accomplishment. Each year I create new resources that give students the opportunity to review what we did in class and learn the material at their own pace and I think that is the crux of the flipped classroom. Perhaps if you take a "baby steps" approach like me, you will get farther in the flipped process than you had ever imagined you would.
Cheers, Lesley
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It’s that time of year again… I’ve assigned the semester project to my 9th graders (they’ve actually been working on it for a few weeks now). I’m using the same semester project I did last year, hoping it work better than last year. If you’re unfamiliar with my semester project, I asked my students to choose a book (a book that I have deemed appropriate for their ability level) and they are blogging about what they have read. Last year I made my students make a Weebly website but this year I let them choose. Most did choose Weebly, though, so we’re getting a good feel for the latest version of the Weebly app. As I’m sure you know, I’m a big fan of Weebly—it’s the site I use to maintain this website. I had tried to use the app in the past, but it wasn’t the most user-friendly so I stuck with the computer version. However, Weebly has made some drastic changes to their app and now I’ve been using it with my students on a weekly basis. The app makes editing one’s Weebly site significantly easier than editing via the website on an iPad, so if your only device is an iPad, you NEED the Weebly app. I, however, have had a different issue since I started all of my Weebly websites with the computer version. Since I did that, I am unable to edit all parts of those websites through the app. I’m not sure what the issue is, but I’ve had to stick with the computer version for the Weebly sites I have had for years now; therefore, I haven’t really been able to assess the efficacy of the app except through working with my students. So what is the final verdict? Well, the Weebly app is great if that is where you started your website. For those of us who have used the computer version for many years, well, we’ll have to wait until a few more bugs are fixed and stick with the computer version for now. Either way, Weebly is a wonderful resource for any classroom and my students have enjoyed creating something that the wider world can see and use. Cheers, Lesley Last week I had my students begin their semester project blogs. (I'm working on refining the same project I did last year with reading a book of their choice and blogging about it as they read.) I'm encouraging them to use Weebly since they will be using Weebly for their math class. Although I love Weebly and I think it's easy to use, last year was so hectic when students were creating their Weebly sites and their blog pages! I swear it was one of the longest teaching days of my life... I repeated myself over and over and kept having to go back to show students what they had to do. After such a terrible class, I ended up making a video over the weekend for students to use in their homes. That meant that this year instead of repeating myself and getting as exhausted as last year, this time I showed my students where the video was (I put the link on Moodle so it was very easy to find) and I asked them to watch it and follow along, pausing as they needed to.
To be frank, not everyone was a fan. I, however, found it much easier to walk around, monitor student progress, and assist as needed. It was such a pleasant class for me! I felt like I was able to meet with each student and truly gauge their comfort level with Weebly. Plus I enjoyed the fact that students who missed class had the opportunity to watch and video and feel like they hadn't missed a beat. I don't think I will be using YouTube every day or even every week, but there are times when it is helpful. Therefore, I will leave you with my anecdote and this infographic from e-Learning Industry. Maybe there's a place for YouTube in your classroom, too. Cheers, Lesley We're all trying to help our students expand their vocabularies, right? I've done the bookmarks, word walls, flashcards, quizzes, and blah, blah, blah. Some methods work better with some students than others, but I think I have found a tool that will work even better because it can be directly related to the SAT (something my students will take in the future and something the high achievers are already thinking about). ProfessorWord is a website that allows you to install the program on your toolbar (mind you, you will need to ensure your toolbar is visible) and it will highlight words that are used on the SAT and ACT exams. It will also allow you to highlight unfamiliar words and it will define them right there for you, so there's no need to open another app or tab to search for a dictionary. I've only begun using ProfessorWord, but I'm sold! I've begun encouraging my students to use it and I am looking forward to ProfessorWord's future plans to include personal vocabulary lists (which won't be as easy to lose as those bookmarks I've been assigning). Below is their YouTube video that will explain just how easy it is to use. If you teach high schoolers, this is something you and your should start using today. Cheers, Lesley I've been busy lately reminding myself of the power of a simple discussion forum. (But as the instructor, it takes time to respond to my 97 students!) At our school, most teachers have Moodle or Schoology, both of which offer discussion forums. In fact, I use discussion forums for my graduate classes and while they can seem tedious at times (let's face it, it's easier and faster to speak than it is write!), they are a great learning tool. In my first instructional design course I read a paraphrase of a retention chart: "People generally remember 10% of what they read, 20% of what they hear, 30% of what they see, 50% of what they hear and see, 70% of what they say or write, and 90% of what they say as they do a thing" (Morrison, Ross, Kalman, & Kemp, 2011, p. 186). Therefore, it seems that a discussion forum should get students to that 70%. Great, right?
However, I've found another great reason to use a discussion forum: differentiation. As a 9th grade teacher, I don't want to label any of my students for fear that they will define themselves with that label, so I struggle with the idea of ability grouping. After all, my students can figure out pretty easily where they fall, so I've taken to secret ability grouping via discussion forums. For our last novel, I used three leveled questions but never labeled them according to the level. I merely assigned the groups by the title of the question (i.e., conflict, character, point of view, theme, etc.) and the students responded according to those groups. I don't think they ever made the connection that it was ability grouping either, so it was a successful endeavor. I was even able to give students more individualized feedback and push them in the ways they needed to be pushed to grow and learn. It might take more time for me, but I think it is worth it to hear from each student, too. So often our quiet students don't speak up unless asked to, so it was a nice change of pace to hear from everyone and monitor their individual progress. After all, there's no hiding in a discussion forum. If you're struggling to get students to participate or to differentiate in a meaningful way, I would recommend using a discussion forum. It might take the students a couple of tries to get the hang of it, but like the blogging, mine have found it useful since it breaks our studies down into more manageable pieces. I've even seen some of their discussion post ideas coming up in their final essays, so that is more evidence that the discussion forums work. Cheers, Lesley Reference: Morrison, G. R., Ross, S. M., Kalman, H. K., & Kemp, J. E. (2011). Designing effective instruction (6th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. It's been a while, huh? But I did promise I would update you on the blog project... It's been quite the eye-opener! I knew blogging would be time-consuming, but it's a little more than I had anticipated! Part of the problem has been with the internet at school because many students want to do the blog posts at school; however, the internet will be down or their Weebly pages won't open properly because the internet is too slow (I haven't been able to use Weebly at school for about three weeks now!). These are things you just have to deal with, but I have a number of students who forget to do things after our class bell rings so they're behind. To help, I made a Google Document a la Khan Academy style that shows their progress. It's a chart with their names and the due dates of the blog posts and the boxes are either green to show that I have seen their post and it's good, yellow meaning that the post is late, or orange meaning that the post is missing. It's helped keep the students more accountable so that's been nice! No more post-it notes of their missing work!
Now as far as the actual content of the blog posts, it is lacking for some students. I gave them guiding questions, but I can tell some students aren't that inspired. And while I did reach out to former colleagues and to other schools in Mexico, I didn't get any takers who wanted to comment on their blogs and have a conversation about reading. Therefore, I think I need to do the following changes:
The blogging itself hasn't been as successful as I had thought, but there are some students who've really taken to it and have found their voice. The way they write has become clearer and more engaging, so that's been encouraging to see. Along with that, there are students who have created pages to share the music they like. They are now participating with a wider world and creating something to contribute to it as well. If nothing else, I know I have helped my students become digitally literate and given them another tool to use for the future. I know of a few students who have even used Weebly for class projects, so even if I feel like the project was a failure, I know it wasn't a complete failure. Everything hasn't gone exactly as I had imagined, but there has still been glimmers of greatness within this blogging experiment. Now I know a few ways to tweak it and we shall see if the project improves.... Cheers, Lesley Well, it was an intense class, but almost all of my students should have their Weebly blogs up and ready to go. (I chose Weebly because I like how easy it is to add pictures and videos and other media that would make their posts more interesting.) Tomorrow I will have to review some of the requirements (some of them forgot to use tags and some haven't given me their links yet!), but I am just about ready to start connecting with others. Do you want to see what it looks like? Here's the Weebly site I'm using to make it easier for me to keep track of and for others to use: Why did I feel the need to make a website that connects it all together? Because I plan to connect with other English classes (and this way I only have to send one site!). I hope to be able to touch base with Amber, last year's 8th grade English teacher, and have her students comment and interact with my students' blogs. I may even use my Facebook and Twitter connections to find others who are interested, so that my students have a bigger audience and their writing will become more meaningful to them. In the past, I have been the only one reading my students' writing and that is a tragedy. I've seen some great pieces in my years of teaching and now the hope is that some of that writing can reach others. We'll see if this works out the way I hope it will. For now, that's my plan and feel free to have your students check out what my students are reading. :-)
Cheers, Lesley I’m diving in head first, folks. I’m going to get my students blogging. Honestly, it’s something I tried last year but it didn't go so well. I didn't have a strong vision or idea what I wanted to do; I just knew that I enjoyed blogging and having people read my blog entries, so thought it would be motivating for some students to receive a wider audience. I think because I wasn't sure what I wanted to do exactly, that made it difficult for me and for students. I did give them direction and guiding questions along with my own example, but it seemed sporadic, unfocused.
Nevertheless, I have learned from my failure. I had a good idea, I think, and it fits into the SAMR model (though last year I think I was hovering around the Modification point), but this year I have done some more research and feel better prepared. I have even spoken with my colleague, Sergio, who uses Weebly and we have agreed that our students can create a separate page for my course on the Weebly site he had our students already create. That way our students have less to keep track of and will perhaps see a connection between their courses. (It’s always nice when you can do some collaboration, right? And who knows what possibilities this will create for us in our courses!) I'll keep you posted on the trials and tribulations of this new experiment. I fully anticipate that it won't be perfect, but I know I will learn from it as will my students. And who knows? Maybe they will get the bug to go above and beyond and make their own Weebly site dedicated to what they're interested in. I know my students already have a pretty good mentor for that kind of work. ;-) Cheers, Lesley If you haven't heard about the SAMR (pronounced "Sam-er") model, it's time to check it out. Basically, the SAMR model presents a framework for teachers to use as they think about incorporating technology into their classroom. As technology has been progressing at CAT, I know many of you have already from Substitution to Augmentation which is a great step towards enhancing learning; however, our goal should be to transform learning. That's when we want to get to Modification and Redefinition. Now I could write more about the SAMR model, but I really think this 120 second video would be more beneficial. After all, I'm sure you're all quite busy, right? Hooray for new beginnings and opportunities to use the SAMR model! Cheers, Lesley (p.s. Please don't miss the above link to the article: Educational Technology and Mobile Learning: SAMR Model. It gives classroom examples of the SAMR model, so I know you will come away with ideas of how to transform your classes!)
"Technology has to adapt to humans, rather than have humans adapt to technology." ~Dr. Richard Mayer Some people believe that technology will do all of the work for them. I want you all to know that is false. Dr. Richard Mayer, a Psychology professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), pointed out how in the 1930's people thought radio was going to change education. In the 1950's, they thought television would change education and then in the 60's and 70's, people thought programmed instruction via computers could take the place of teachers. As I'm sure you've figured out, none of those changes stuck. Technology should not drive instructional decisions and new technologies do not change the way people learn. As Dr. Mayer said, "What makes a computer or a book effective is the instructional method being used." Knowing that means our question becomes: How can we use the technologies available to us to enhance learning? Now I must admit that I may not have the answer for you, but one newer learning theory may help: connectivism. If you've never heard of it, here's a great video that demonstrates how connectivism can be used in the classroom: Personally, I've been trying to add elements of connectivism into my classroom by teaching students about social bookmarking (I usually promote Diigo, but Evernote is another popular option), Google Scholar, EBSCO (with Andrea's help, of course!), and we've been doing some blogging as well. I definitely don't have it down to a science (but does anybody ever really reach that kind of perfection when your students change from year to year?), but I'm excited about making some changes next year that I believe will help my students be successful in the future. But more on that later. :-) For now, just think about how connectivism could work in your classroom and with the tools you already have available to you.
Cheers, Lesley |
About the AuthorLesley is an English teacher who is passionate about using connectivism in the classroom and preparing students and teachers for using the tools that are available to them on a regular basis. This blog will focus on iPad apps and Web 2.0 tools that can enhance and diversify learning. Leave a comment and let me know what you think or what you'd like to learn about! Archives
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