Is it just me, or are there other teachers out there who feel like the walking dead by Friday?
Here's hoping you have a great and energizing week!
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I had my pajamas on and was in my bed by 7:30 p.m. last Friday night. (It was a loooooooong week.) My kids peeked their heads into the door, and my oldest asked, "Mom? You know it's still light outside, right?" Is it just me, or are there other teachers out there who feel like the walking dead by Friday? Here's hoping you have a great and energizing week! Image by inconsequential via Tumblr
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To my chagrin, I'm one of the worst stereotypes out there: a girl who doesn't "get" math. To my younger son's chagrin, the girl-turned-mom who doesn't "get" math can't help him with his homework. Most times, I drag my older son, the math genius, from wherever in the house he's hiding so that he can offer his assistance, because even if I could help, I know I wouldn't want to explain a math concept the wrong way and undermine the amazing work his ever-patient and brilliant math teacher has done to get him this far the last three years. It's the same reason we don't even use sites like KhanAcademy or MathTrain for video tutorials because we've tried that, but the kid laments that "they" don't do it the "right way," i.e., the way his teacher taught him. He's very insistent and sometimes frustratingly indignant that Mrs. S. does things the "best way." Which is why I often find myself wishing that Mrs. S. could give me a brief tutorial on the math concept du jour. And now I think she might be able to with the help of these DIY whiteboard apps I recently discovered. 1. ShowMe Billing itself as the "easiest way to create and share lessons on the iPad," ShowMe allows you to create a video tutorial using your iPad screen as a whiteboard while you provide your own voiceover. I tested it out myself and found it to be as easy to use as a classroom whiteboard. There are thousands of tutorials across all subject areas already uploaded to the website for use by teachers and students. I discovered one teacher on the site who uses the app to flip her classroom: the students watch the lesson/lecture at home and come prepared the next day to work on what they just viewed. Take a look at the site to get some ideas of your own. 2. Educreations Again, this is another user-friendly whiteboard app. What I like about Educreations is that you can type text on the whiteboard AND you can upload an image from the iPad camera, the iPad photo stream, Dropbox, or the web. Like ShowMe, there are plenty of previously-created videos already on the site. They're arranged by subject area and by featured videos. I tried making my own video with text and images, and boy, did it look professional! Even better, once I registered, I received an immediate email from the support team checking to see if I needed any help getting started. Now THAT's user-friendly! And if you don't have an iPad, you can still create lessons using Educreations' online whiteboard. 3. Knowmia If you're a little more advanced with your tech skills, I'd recommend Knowmia. Knowmia allows you to create "sophisticated animation sequences" with slides, images, graphics, video clips, and a video recording of your own face with voiceover. Don't let these state-of-the-art features intimidate you, though. The site provides excellent support resources for newbies. In addition, you can visit the Video Revolution Project to learn how teachers across the country are using Knowmia, and you can browse Knowmia's collection of "over 25,000 video lessons from great teachers." Applications for Education: Teachers could create a short video tutorial about that day's lesson to which students could refer at home while doing their homework. Alternatively, teachers could create lessons for the flipped classroom. Create your own video tutorial or lesson, and add an image from anywhere to enhance student understanding. Whether you create a video for remediation or for flipping, your choices are pretty limitless. If you're not the creative type, you could certainly recommend video tutorials from other teachers to suit your needs. So, Mrs. S., I hope you're reading this. I'd like to learn to do math the "right way." And my son would like me to learn, too! Image by Educreations ---------- UPDATE (3/30/14) Just to prove to you how easy these apps are to use, I had my older son create a sample video tutorial today in ShowMe. And it got me thinking...why not assign some of your more tech-savvy students to create these short videos for you? That's some serious ownership of learning AND collaboration! Like most parents of my generation, I feel guilty. Maybe it's because almost every other day, a Facebook friend/Twitter follower/LinkedIn peer posts yet another article about how we're failing our children: we're too overprotective, we're too permissive, we over-schedule, we aren't strict enough, we hover too much; we're "helicopter parents" and "tiger moms" and "snowplow parents;" our children are overly attached and unable to function without our constant intercession; we're raising a generation of self-centered whiners who will never be able to independently function. Like I don't beat myself up enough. Now I've got every writer, blogger, and Tweeter doing it for me. So when this article by Hanna Rosin was brought to my attention the other day, my self-esteem took a nose dive simply by reading the title: "The Overprotected Kid." But it's precisely because I'm an overprotective parent that I knew I had to continue reading. Ironically, I'd be doing my overprotected kids a disservice if I didn't discover how I was providing them such a disservice, right? Indeed, parents today are exceedingly overprotective, as the article goes on to explore in great detail. As Rosin keenly notes, "even though women work vastly more hours now than they did in the 1970s, mothers—and fathers—of all income levels spend much more time with their children than they used to." We arrange playdates, spend our weekends chauffeuring our kids to basketball and art class and ballet, volunteer as den mothers, and chaperone the class field trips. Our parents were never that involved in our lives. Why are we? Rosin attempts to explain the root of our child-centric obsession and posits that the motivation behind this behavior is fear-based: we've either come to believe or have been shaped to believe that if we don't overprotect, something bad will happen. She offers this gentle and (thankfully) non-condemning explanation for our behavior: "For a variety of reasons—divorce, more single-parent families, more mothers working—both families and neighborhoods have lost some of their cohesion. It is perhaps natural that trust in general has eroded, and that parents have sought to control more closely what they can—most of all, their children." I recognize myself in that remark. I'm a divorced, working, single mom who most definitely has pursued a focused and single-minded path of controlling what I can, especially when it comes to my two sons. And yes, I certainly recognize my own "helicopter," "tiger," and "snowplow" behaviors. (But let's not get into those just now.) There's a thin line between being overly protective and being overly controlling, and I seem to walk that unctuous tightrope more often than I'd care to admit. I will admit this, however: as a teacher, I abhor helicopter parents. Yes, you read that correctly. I'm a hypocrite. Or maybe I'm in a unique position to judge. By coming into contact with overprotective parents, it's forced me to confront my own parental overprotective behaviors. As a teacher, I've been begged to change grades after report cards have been issued. I've been bullied to extend offers of extra credit a week before the quarter ends. I've been grilled about assignments and projects. I've been accused of being wrong, boring, mean, unprofessional, and unfair. And all of these behaviors come from parents. A generation ago, this type of behavior was unheard of. I was raised, as were the majority of my friends, by parents who lived according to the following credo: your teacher is right, and you're wrong. Or if you're not wrong, you're probably at fault somehow. My mother would never dream of signing a detention slip with the following postscript: "This is completely unreasonable. My daughter is a good kid and I protest this discipline notice." (A parent actually wrote that to me. And to further drive home her point, she even refused to sign the detention slip.) So how did a generation of children raised to be independent and accountable for their own behaviors in turn become ferociously overprotective to the point of attacking and accusing the people our parents once demanded we respect? Being horrified and made weary by this behavior has benefitted me, though. It's forced me to back off my own kids--at least a little bit. And even though it sometimes makes me queasy when they fail to hand in a homework assignment or don't study enough for a test and subsequently receive a less-than-desired score, I have to let them fail. As much as I want to swoop in and save them and email their teachers and ask for a reprieve, I have to keep the tiger mom in her cage. Because the last thing I want to become is the parent about whom I complain. Near the conclusion of Hanna Rosin's article, she gently suggests to parents that "the real cultural shift has to come from parents. There is a big difference between avoiding major hazards and making every decision with the primary goal of optimizing child safety (or enrichment, or happiness). We can no more create the perfect environment for our children than we can create perfect children. To believe otherwise is a delusion, and a harmful one; remind yourself of that every time the panic rises." So when the panic rises, as it frequently does for this overprotective mom, I'll try to swallow it and allow my sons to experience less than perfect situations. . After all, experience is the best teacher. For my children, for my students, and for myself. Image by Peace In Your Home The final quarter begins today, and for the next nine weeks I'll be teaching Internet research skills to my students in grades 4-8. So I almost snorted out my morning smoothie when I saw Dan Piraro's Bizzaro comic in this morning's paper. How many of us use books anymore to conduct research? (For that matter, how many of us still read paper versions of newspapers?) Have a great week! Image by Dan Piraro via Arcamax Yesterday, I wrote a piece about three quick and easy formative assessment tools you could start using in your classroom right away. Incidentally, I now truly believe there are no coincidences, because look at what popped up in my Twitter feed today: 33 Digital Tools for Advancing Formative Assessment in the Classroom. At first glance, the list appears overwhelming; however, each tool discussed provides a quick overview of how you could replace your current non-tech formative assessments with a tech-based option. Personally, I'm going to check out all thirty-three, but if you're new to the idea of using technology for formative assessment, pick three and try them out. Baby steps! I am a HUGE fan of QR codes in the classroom, not only because the possibilities are endless in terms of applying these codes to every level of the Bloom's Taxonomy model, but because they make learning fun. Plus, they're one of the easiest ways to integrate technology into your lessons--especially if you're more of a digital immigrant than you'd like to admit! My go-to QR code generator has always been QRStuff, but I've discovered some new sites that have really piqued my interest: 1. QR Treasure Hunt Generator This site is the only site you'll need to create your own QR Code Treasure Hunt for any subject. Type your questions and answers, generate a QR code with the tool provided, and display the codes around your classroom and even your school. 2. Goo.gl This is Google's version of a URL shortening tool (like bitly and ow.ly). Use goo.gl to shorten a website link and a QR code automatically gets created for you! To find the QR code, click the "details" link after you make your abbreviated URL. You'll also learn how many times your link has been used. This would be useful to count the number of students who've followed the link or QR code. 3. QR Voice QR Voice lets you to create QR codes that play an audio message when scanned. Record a message or type it in 100 characters or less. I'd like to try this with student feedback! How are you using QR codes in the classroom? If you haven't yet explored the possibilities but want to try it out, I'd recommend beginners start here and those who are more experienced with QR codes check out this site. For fun, scan the QR code in the photo and see where it takes you! Formative and summative assessments have been one of the major tenets of the Common Core roll-out. Formative assessment is a process by which teachers evaluate students' needs while students are learning. This feedback allows teachers to adjust their teaching methods to meet student learning goals. Summative assessment evaluates student learning at the end of an instructional unit. This allows teachers to know if students have met the curricular standards or benchmarks. Listed below are some examples of formative and summative assessments.
These examples are pretty standard and are often used, as they should be. With regard to formative assessment, however, there are some useful tech tools out there that make learning more fun and engaging for students--and easier on teachers! After reading this recent blog post from one of my favorite sites, I decided to try them out, and here are my three free favorites:
1. Socrative Socrative describes itself as a "smart student response system that empowers teachers to engage their classrooms through a series of educational exercises and games via smartphones, laptops, and tablets." Teachers log in via their own device, select an activity, and direct the students to login and respond in real-time. Many of the activities and games are pre-designed, saving teachers much-needed time. Socrative activities include the following:
2. Kahoot Kahoot is a game-based classroom response system where teachers can create quizzes, discussions, and surveys and project these items on the classroom screen. Students join in through their personal or school devices and "play against each other aiming to top the on-screen leaderboard" while the teacher has the ability to "facilitate and discuss the content." Kahoot's drag and drop feature makes content creation easy. In addition, students can create their own quizzes and then "think up and answer their own questions through thorough research and the collation and/or self creation of imagery and video." 3. Collaborize Classroom Collaborize Classroom is an online collaborative education platform that allows students and teachers to "transcend the boundaries of their physical classroom to engage in an online collaborative learning environment." With this tool, students can
If you want to get started, but feel overwhelmed by the technology, I'd suggest you start with Socrative and allow yourself and your students time to get comfortable with the platform. I'm definitely looking forward to getting started myself! Good luck, and let me know how it goes with your class! There are two comics that still consistently make me laugh out loud: "The Far Side" and "Calvin & Hobbes." The former for its dry wit, the latter for its simple exuberance of character. This particular comic above, which appeared in 1992, is still pretty applicable today. As much as we as teachers bear the demands of our government and our administrators to become better teachers for the 21st century, we also need to remember that it's not only up to us. Hopefully this takes the pressure off a wee bit. And speaking of wee things--like leprechauns--and in honor of St. Patrick's Day, I looked for an Irish blessing specific for teachers, but alas, could find none. So, instead, I wish you a good week with this alternative: "If God sends you down a stony path, may he give you strong shoes." image by GoComics Q: Stephanie, I love the work you're doing! How do you build your lesson plans/curriculum units? (@marnimand) This recent inquiry by a new Twitter contact got me thinking about why and how I do what I do. Which is funny, because I never really gave it much thought before. In the fast-paced world of EdTech, as soon as you've mastered the latest tool, something better comes along to top it. For example, I thought my students were on the cutting edge when we created our own wikis a few years back. Now, we create our own websites. Units I've created in 2008 are outdated now. That's why--like software--I'm always "upgrading." I suppose I'm what you'd call a backwards planner, although the technical term is backwards designer. Backward Design is a method of curriculum design in which you choose the end before you know where and how to start. In other words, you put the cart before the horse. Or, to put in cartographic terms, you're first choosing your destination and then mapping out your route. Personally, I'm a huge fan of project-based learning and performance tasks, so I almost always choose the end task first. Actually, I choose the EdTech tool first. Because I subscribe to a bunch of EdTech blogs, my inbox is daily inundated with the latest in technology tools. I can't try them all out at once, of course, so I put them in my digital sandbox for future reference. Hmmm...I realize I still haven't provided an answer to Marni's question, so here goes: A: Hi, Marni! Thanks for your kind words, and thanks for stopping by. To answer your question, here's how I build my units:
Also, I send out requests to other teachers in the building to see if anyone's amenable to developing a cross-curricular unit. For example, I wanted to try out easel.ly, so I approached the junior high math and language arts teachers and we devised a unit on creating infographics. As you can see, I try to keep it simple. Hope this helps! ---------- Marni's question got me thinking about how often I tend to encourage (well...more like nudge, prod, and annoy) my teacher friends to try out my new discoveries in their classrooms. Usually, I get a polite smile and nod, because, really...who has time to revamp the curriculum? I get it. I sincerely do. But here's my question to all of you teachers out there, and it echoes the title of this post: Is there an end product you've already designed that you could replace with a tech tool? Or at least integrate with a tech tool? It really is easy. I promise! ---------- Image by ConnectedPrincipals ThingLink does exactly what it sounds like it does: it links your stuff to, well...things on the web. Think of it as an interactive poster: you choose an image and create "hot spots" on the image that launch you to related information (e.g., websites, video, audio) about that topic. And did I mention it's free and user-friendly? Last year, I collaborated with the art teacher, who was (a) teaching a unit on Impressionism to the 5th graders, and (b) looking to incorporate technology as an extension of their learning. I was (a) looking to create a cross-curricular unit, and (b) eager to have a class play around with this new application I had discovered. And thus, our Impressionist ThingLink unit was born. We started simply. The kids each chose one of three artists whom they were studying in art class: Renoir, Cassatt, and Monet. After a brief introduction to age-appropriate keyword searching, students were directed to find websites with the following requirements: (1) biographical information about the artist; (2) 2-3 examples of the artist's work from a museum; (3) a video or audio spot that provided additional information about the artist; (4) any other cool stuff that an eleven year-old kid would enjoy. Here's an example I provided for the students to use as a model. Of course, the kids loved it--and asked if they could create their own on a topic of their choosing. I was already devising ways to utilize it with other subject areas. Before you get started, take a quick and closer look at ThingLink's features and to get some ideas. If your students don't have their own email accounts, teachers can set up classroom accounts here, and you can view these examples of ThingLinks that have already been created by students and teachers. Here are some quick and easy ways for you to get started in your own classroom: 1. Interactive Book Report Students download a Creative Commons image that represents the author/theme/protagonist of the book. They then add information specific to the usual book report. 2. Interactive Map Using a map as a base image, students add links to the history of the location, attractions, important historical events. 3. Multimedia Definitions Find an image with a vocabulary word specific to the subject area. Students add links to websites, photos, videos, and audio that demonstrate the meaning of the word. 4. Periodic Table For each element of the Periodic Table, students provide links to, again, websites, photos, and videos that further explain the element. 5. Study Guide Students download an image related to an upcoming quiz/test and provide links to sites related to vocabulary, concepts, historical dates, etc., to help them prepare. They're simultaneously learning while they create. ThingLink works on iPads and iPhones, too, if your school has a BYOD policy. What things can your students link? Please share your ideas! Image from ThingLink |
Stephanie DeMicheleEducational Consultant - Presenter - Instructional Coach Educational consultant + coach in Cleveland, Ohio sharing innovative technology ideas for educators.
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