Classroom Experimentation
Welcome to my lab! As a secondary humanities teacher I have been working for some time at attempting to integrate elements of 21st. century education into my classroom. As such all of my students are occasionally used as guinea pigs in my attempts at utilizing the latest trends and tools available in the pursuit of educating our youth.
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So what is the lab you ask? Well it is where I will be reflecting on elements of technology in the classroom. Perhaps it will generate some discussion on best practices in education - or perhaps it will eventually provide a source of information and inspiration to be examined in more detail. It is sort of a dumping ground for my thoughts and your feedback - lets see what happens.
ReplyDeleteThe creation of a virtual classroom.
ReplyDeleteI have achieved success in this regard. As our school looks for ways that they can increase our educating students using 21st century technology I have taken up the gauntlet and proceeded to attempt a couple of different things.
Several years ago, while attending our annual teacher's conference, I attended a session with Michael Furdyk who is the founder of a site called Taking IT Global. The IT stands for Information Technology for the less computer literate in the crowd - and yes I had to ask!
Any way to make a long story short, the site was designed by Furdyk to allow youth from around the world to connect with each other to talk about issues of mutual concern as well as allowing them to share resources or ideas for dealing with these issues. In short he was establishing a broad platform for youth empowerment.
The site itself is designed in two parts. The first; an open site with universal access to anyone that wants to sign up provides a set of network resources that includes discussion boards, galleries to post art work, resources that others have designed to create change in the world, a depository of resources or links to resources that deals with a multitude of social, political, environment and global issues that spans the spectrum of social activism.
The other half of the site is an area where teachers and other educators can pay to establish a virtual classroom or classrooms for a flat fee. This area allows you to create a secure area where assignments, resources, bookmarks, file sharing are available to all. Also, each class can create blogs, and showcase other forms of writing. There is also the option of networking through video chat. Here students and teachers as well as guests from other places can come together to network or conference in real time.
Some people may be tempted to dismiss this site as simply a fad or trend. Be that as it may, what I really like about the site is the fact that it allows me to provide students with all of the assignments, and print materials that are needed for the course. This means that when they are not at school or have forgotten something like their binder with the worksheet they can simply log in and print off the one for the posted assignment. While all of this is extra work for the teacher - once it is in place it requires the student to be more accountable for their work. Or at the very least allows them another way to be successful. One that many are taking more advantage of as I move into my second semester of using this system.
For those interested in finding out more about the TIG website there is a link to it in the sidebar of this blog.
An Interesting Proposal pt 1
ReplyDeleteI had an interesting challenge presented to me this week. It is interesting how one's vocation and avocation can be so closely entwined.
Myself and a fellow firefighter were at our local radio station doing a morning spot to advertise the upcoming Fire Department Annual Ball. During one of the breaks in the broadcast the morning show host, who is a huge supporter of the volunteer fire services in the area, asked about recruiting - a matter that we are always fighting with in the service. We commiserated on the lack of people that seem to be willing to give up the considerable time that this advocation requires. Talk turned to the need to advertise and out of the blue Doug stated, "I have a challenge for you!"
Intrigued, I waited as Doug pitched his idea. He proposed that I get some of my students to create a 10-30 second spot jingle or ad in support of recruitment for the area's volunteer fire departments. Once we had completed it he would be willing to record our "spot" and cycle it through his community announcements each week.
As I am always looking for authentic experiences for my students to express themselves and new ideas for my instruction I agreed that my students were up to the challenge and gratefully accepted the opportunity on behalf of my English 20.2 class.
It was not until I was on my way back to the house that it dawned on me that I had taken on another project that I had little idea about; this I had the feeling would be another huge time suck on my part to get up and running. While reflecting on my self-created predicament, it dawned on me that I have built the capacity within my teaching and my students to be successful in tackling this project.
I decided that even though it would take up several classes that I would use the inquiry based learning model to share the, inquiry and design work associated with creating an understanding of the assignment, the use of co-created criteria and development of a viable assessment rubric as well as clearly stated instructions for the assignment.
An Interesting Proposal pt 2
ReplyDeleteAs my class is finishing up its novel study of the novel, Of Mice And Men, I have a couple of days to do several things that I have discovered work well in this mode of instruction. I began by giving the students the heads up as to the challenge that I had accepted on their behalf. I did this during the last five minutes of the class a couple of days before the novel study was finished. I did not give a great deal of detail - I merely pulled back the curtain on the upcoming assignment.
I had the usual deluge of questions from those of my students, what exactly were we doing? What was it worth? When is it due? and the like. I sidestepped these questions by indicating that I would have more details for them over the next several days. As they exited the room I smiled to myself feeling that in some students at least I had raised some curiosity and that is of course half the battle.
The following class was much the same, with about 5 minutes left, I again reminded them of the impending challenge. This time I was met with more questions: do we have to do a recording? can it be written? I stated that I was not yet sure - at which juncture another student suggested, "maybe we could each choose what how we want to do it?" Here again I was saved by the bell and informed the class, "tomorrow we will begin the inquiry process to begin sorting this challenge out." Feeling that I had sufficiently set the hook I sent the students off to their next classes.
Yesterday was Friday and I knew that we would finish up the discussion of the novel with about forty minutes to spare. At this point I placed the challenge on the board and asked, "What questions do we need to answer to be able to accomplish this challenge?" With a bit of coaxing on my part the flood gates opened.
By the end of the period we had generated a series of questions that began to allow us to see the target that we were going to be aiming our efforts at. I was very pleased when, by the end of the period, we had three areas of inquiry clearly defined. These consisted of questions regarding the nature of the assignment or what to produce, how it would be evaluated or assessed and lastly what sorts of information from outside sources we would need to take into consideration - this last area consisting of questions for Doug, local fire chief's and possibly survey questions for local firefighters.
As the students posed questions about the nature of the assignment with respect to the idea of broadcasting it became clear that there was the development of a teachable moment happening.I broke out the laptop computers and created a discussion thread in our virtual classroom and ended the period by getting them to post questions, that if given the opportunity, they would ask of Mr. Spurgeon. I used this "digital" method as it allows all students to have a voice on a question where in an open classroom discussion they may not feel comfortable or get heard as other students vie to be heard.
Speaking of which - this reminds me that I need to survey those questions and put them into a document for Doug to examine as I ask him if he is willing to address the class.
~And the learning continues.... more on this project later.
An Interesting Proposal pt 3
ReplyDeleteToday we took the project to the next level. Mr. Spurgeon came in to talk with the students about where their inquiry based learning had taken them with respect to responding to his challenge.
The first ten minutes or so were spent bringing Mr. Spurgeon up to speed on where we had gotten to in our deliberations. Following this introduction to where we were at Mr. Spurgeon began by asking students a variety of questions about what it was that they were getting ready to do.
His talk focused on several key areas: a)Demographics, b) Catch phrases, c) length of commercial, d) resources that would be required, e)how to go about creating a theatre of the mind - which is how he described radio for the students.
During his talk I acted as scribe and used smart board technology to record all of the areas of consideration that Mr. Spurgeon took us through.
I found that his reinforcement of concepts associated with clarity of communication were completely aligned with that which I have been reinforcing all year.
The excitement of the unknown! Both the students as well as myself were completely engaged with Mr. Spurgeon as we were entering a completely new area of learning. The students thinking and speaking about their ideas for the catch phrases or the sound effects and me working both that aspect as well as wondering about what the documentation should look like for this entire challenge; as students will need clear ideas of things that will be assessed as well as organizers to create ads that will work within the parameters that Mr. Spurgeon has established with us.
The excitement of working on differentiated instruction and inquiry based learning without a front loaded pre-established set of parameters certainly increases the challenges that face the teacher, the positive aspect of this is it has allowed me to model, first hand, much of the meta-cognitive skills that are inculcated in the curriculum. The fact of the matter is that students enjoy watching a teacher occasionally have to stop and do the same head scratching that they do on a regular basis. It also opens awesome dialog as they offer me suggestions on how to next proceed.
The final aspect that this portion of the Interesting Proposal generates is the physical documentation that needs to be generated to assist with the actual writing and recording process. I will soon link the set of notes that Mr. Spurgeon's visit generated as well as the documentation that will be required by the students to actually generate their commercials.
For those that are wondering about ties to curriculum I can assure you that this sort of project will allow one to cover numerous objectives and make use of the best of differentiated instructional techniques; and when the detailed lesson plan for this activity is completed I will link it to this site as well.
~Time to go and be creative - resources to follow!