I took a fun walk down memory lane with the games that I used to play when I was a kid. I played a lot of Treasure Mountain, Math Blasters, Munchers and Math workshop. I had forgotten all these games and how much time I used to spend playing them. In the 90s games were much different than they are today. We have come such a long way in the way of design and animation! I think that there are two main takeaways from this experience...games give kids a safe environment to make/ learn from their mistakes and games offer the much needed opportunity to PLAYYYYYYY!!!! the amount of time tinkering, experimenting, and just PLAYING AROUND has diminished a lot and with bringing more games into the classroom students and teachers alike can make the learning experience more engaging and student centered.
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Reflect on how you might use Google Forms 1)in your practice and 2) for your Touro action research/capstone project. What might be the best uses for your particular situation? If you already have been using Google Forms in your practice, explain how you currently use them and what you might do to extend your knowledge to new applications/situations. I do not have any experience with using google forms or google sheets. I have a few ideas for how I could incorporate them into my capstone and teaching practice. The first idea I had was for homework. Ever since being hired I have been trying to figure out an effective and efficient way for students to complete homework assignments. There is always an excuse for why they don't have it and it seems like such a huge waste of paper. The second way I can see myself using Google sheets/forms applies to my capstone project. I think that making a student survey to gather information on peer feedback and how students feel about giving and receiving feedback would be influential in the development of my capstone. Creating a rubric on Google forms/sheets could be helpful in keeping students informed of the expectations for their peer feedback. This could allow me to easily and effectively share their progress. The last way I can think of to make good use of Google forms/sheets for my capstone is by creating a way in which my fellow colleagues can communicate with me about what they would like to learn in a tech 10 meeting. I want to be able to share these tools with them and I don't want to waste their time. I would like to hear about which tools they would find most helpful for them in their teaching practice. I would also like to hear about how it is going after I have told them about the tech tools and offer them the oportunity to ask questions for assistance if need be.
If I were to come across an inappropriate post made by a student outside of class I would have not problem approaching them about it. I would address them privately and in a non threatening way with an administrator present at the time of the conversation. I would remind them of the importance of remaining respectful and responsible on social media and although it is their first amendment right to express themselves in whatever way they choose they are also developing a reputation online. Everyone and anyone can access things online, even future employers. What they post online can have extending circumstances and unforeseen effects on their lives. I would use this instance as a teachable moment to encourage students to be their best selves on and off the internet. I look at this as a challenge. All the time I am trying to get more bang for my buck when it comes to fitting as many standards into a lesson as possible. There are many teachable moments that cannot be wasted. As I have heard from other teachers who are trying out a new form of technology in their classroom both student and teacher have to get their feet wet and come upon issues of digital literacy as they arise. Teachers sometimes are fearful of this because as a species teachers are kind of control freaks and like to see road block and avoid them, but I think it is healthy to teach students important lessons about proper program usage by making mistakes as they go along but subsequently learning from those mistakes.
Regardless of how full our schedules are digital literacy is a topic that must not be overlooked. It is our responsibility as educators to teach children how to conduct themselves on the internet in a safe and respectful way. Common sense media has many great lessons that can be melded with other lessons. We also don't have to spend a large amount of time teaching these lessons. I think that short little tidbits of pertinent information can be shared with students so that they have opportunities to learn and apply new knowledge about digital citizenship in a seamless way. Since the first semester of this program when we were asked to start finding tech tools that would help us to achieve a goal in our classroom. I bumped into a video about Seesaw and instantly was drawn to what it could do for my students. Seesaw is a tool that is user friendly and easy for students to learn use. As the teacher, I am allowed to have multiple classes that are easily accessed by snapping a picture of a QR code. When students are in their class they have the ability to do many things. They can add a video, a picture of work they did, add a drawing, a link, a note or a picture from the camera roll. This product is added to a digital portfolio. This digital portfolio is a running total of all of the work that is submitted during the year. I can post assignments that are either created by me or have already been created by another teacher and posted to Seesaw. These assignments can be organized into folders. One of the things that has proven to be somewhat of a challenge for me so far is managing student work. Many times students will not complete work from the week prior so I will leave it up so that they can complete it without a harsh deadline. When I post an assignment i can assign it to a folder but for some reason those folders are not visible to the student...or at least I have not figured a way to make them visible. This means that if I post an assignment to the math folder. I want them to be able to navigate to the math folder with all of the math assignments easily accessible. Instead, all of the work is listed in the assignments tab with no delineation of subject. I am wondering if this is something that I am doing wrong or if that is simply the design of the app. I have put it on my personal timeline to find out. There are capabilities that I have not yet explored on Seesaw because it would require me to purchase the PLUS version. I do appreciate the ability to allow parents to see what their child is doing at school and enable them to interact and leave comments on their child's work. This is a wonderful incentive tool for the students. I also have cut down on a lot of the paper that is wasted each week by doing exercises digitally. I have found Seesaw to be extremely helpful in developing the 21st century skills of my students. I look forward to increasing my knowledge of this resource.
Seesaw Tutorial In last week's class when we discussed digital citizenship I started thinking about which key aspects of internet usage were vital to making sure that first grade students understood. It came down to two many aspects : safety and respect. In order for these young people to have a firm foundation for continuing to use thes internet in a safe and respectful manner they needed to be given to tools to understand what to watch out for when using the internet and how to keep themselves and other safe when using it.
The lesson that was designed for these first graders did exactly that. It covered what kinds of things to tell an adult about and what to do if a stranger interacts with you in an inappropriate way. How sharing your personal information with people online is not safe. Teaching kids the right way to communicate so that they are not partaking in bullying behavior as well as noticing if they themselves are being bullied is very important. I look forward to teaching this lesson to my students and helping them to become responsible and respectful internet users. Safe internet usage/ Cyberbullying Lesson At the school I currently teach personalized learning has been part of our pedagogy since the day I got hired. This personalized learning took the form of S.M.A.R.T goals. S.M.A.R.T basically means Specific, Measurable, Agreed upon, Realistic and Time based. We give a pre test that is based around a specific standard/expectation. Then we level the students based off of that pre-test. Each teacher on the team gives intervention for their specific area of need for a set amount of time. We may do progress monitoring check-ins to see if the interventions are working and plan accordingly. Last, we do a post test to see if we made improvement. Most often these SMART goals are focused on priority standards that carry a large amount of weight.
The obstacle I have found with following through on these SMART goals is meeting with intervention groups and managing to follow through on teaching the rest of the new curriculum that needs to be taught. First grade students also lack the independence needed to allow me to get through the intervention lessons with a small group. Another way we have used personalized learning is by using anchor papers. Students will read or critique their work by looking at samples of students work. They will decided on what level they are currently at by comparing their work to the work samples provided. Then we will set learning goals for how to move to the next level by the next assessment window. We have allowed students to have a say over how they present their knowledge, but we had trouble aligning the final products with the success criteria and also helping so many different students at varying levels of ability complete their projects was a real challenge as well. We have this image of what personalized learning looks like in our classrooms, but achieving it is a different story all together. |
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April 2019
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