This post is going up very late. I haven't had a lot of time to get to it.
Monday was the first day of presenting projects for the Creek Project. The Biology Teacher and I weren't 100% sure what to expect. The projects today were all from her honors students.
There were some very well done ones. One student recreated a salamander habitat (using craft store eyes as eggs). It was not the most engaging presentation, because the information was put on posters around the scene, but it was visually appealing. And, based on the info, it was clear that the students had learned something about the salamanders.
Students did infuse technology into their projects. One group wrote an original song. The execution was not great--the audio was poor quality (fortunately they provided a lyrics sheet for listeners to read along), and their refrain was a bit long. But, they lyrics showed a good understanding of their question, and the animations that went with it were an engaging mix of scientific and funny. One group did their project in the form of an episode of "House." In it, a fix owner brings in a fish that was harmed by pollutants in the creek, and Dr. House has to diagnose what the pollutants were, based on the fish's symptoms, in order to create a treatment to save the fish. The teacher eventually had to ask for their script because some parts the audio was good, and others it was bad. Another group did a series of sketches with a "water safetey lass" (basically a friendly eco cop) explaining to different people in different scenarios how what they were doing was having a negative effect on creek water.
One of the big concerns was the Photo Story projects. A lot of these students had done Photo Stories for the Helen Keller 3 Days of Sight project. So, feeling comfortable with that program, used it again. However, with laptops were reimaged, and Photo Story was removed. Fortunately, the students were easily able to access non-reimaged laptops to use. However, some of them did not remember the step to convert from a Photo Story to a WMV file. It was easy enough to deal with because the teacher still had Photo Story and I was able to help students convert during the period. I am more concerned because I would like to see student retaining more of the tech skills I am trying to impart. That being said, I did see improved file management.
Another concern was that some of the projects got more caught up in trying to be impressive or interactive, and strayed from the overall idea of teaching something and answering a question. Several of the games did a good job of testing knowledge but a poor job of presenting that knowledge ahead of time. Other projects simply presented research, with no context of an overall question.
We had discussed the idea previously, and came back to it again. The Biology teacher and I both felt that, if the students had been given more structure--been responsible for first coming up with a question, and then doing research, and then being introduced to the idea of being able to display their research/learning in a way of their choosing--more of the projects would have retained focus.
It was encouraging, though, to see students being creative. A lot of them used programs that they were not formally introduced to in school. Others used programs that we had taught them, but were able to discover and use some of the more advanced functions. And, so students who did not use a lot of technology did some very creative low tech things. Next year, going about this project in a more structured way, and still allowing for that creativity, will create even better results.
Showing posts with label directions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label directions. Show all posts
Friday, March 27, 2009
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Presidential My Space--Assessments
I offered to help the Social Studies teacher grade the wiki project when we were finished. I fear I wasn't that helpful. I only managed to help with a small handful. He was pretty well finished by the third day of grading, and I just wasn't moving as fast. I did get a chance to look at most of them, and even leave a few comments for him/the students.
Some of the projects turned out really well. Students were creative, and found resources online to make things more interesting.
A few students disappointed by plagiarizing. Only one went so far as to copy another student's project. No one, at least, sabotaged anyone else or defaced a page that did not belong to them.
For the most part, though, it wasn't plagiarizing as much as a lack of summarizing skills that plagued the students. As a result, the teacher even went so far as to give the plagiarizing/badly summarizing students the chance to redo the project instead of loosing credit.
So, the Social Studies teacher and I talked about the lack of summarizing skills. A lot of students think that copying and pasting an article, and removing or replacing a certain number of words, is the same as rephrasing. They also think that picking out key phrases or sentences, and copying them word for word, is summarizing. The English teacher from that team happened to stop in during this conversation and said that, although she does teach summarizing, she hasn't gotten to that part of her curriculum yet.
First of all, this made me wonder if it would be a good idea to have the teams sit down, looked at shared skills, who is teaching them, and when they are being taught. After all, it would be really good practice and reinforcement for students to learn summarizing in English, and then have a summarizing project/assignment in Social Studies the following week. And, it would save the Social Studies teacher a good deal of aggravation if he held the summarizing project until after the topic was covered in Social Studies.
Summarizing happened to come up as a topic on twitter just a few hours later, and I was able to pass this resource along. There were some interesting ideas. I also made the suggestion of giving the students an article, and having them write a "text message" to a friend explaining it. I do think most of these kids can summarize--they just don't have the skills to make a connection between how they "give the short version" to friend and what teachers want out of them in a writing assignment.
By permission of the teacher, I've copied a few of these wikis over, and removed student names from them, so I can show some samples. I picked a few at random from each class, and then copied the ones I liked best as examples. Check them out here.
Some of the projects turned out really well. Students were creative, and found resources online to make things more interesting.
A few students disappointed by plagiarizing. Only one went so far as to copy another student's project. No one, at least, sabotaged anyone else or defaced a page that did not belong to them.
For the most part, though, it wasn't plagiarizing as much as a lack of summarizing skills that plagued the students. As a result, the teacher even went so far as to give the plagiarizing/badly summarizing students the chance to redo the project instead of loosing credit.
So, the Social Studies teacher and I talked about the lack of summarizing skills. A lot of students think that copying and pasting an article, and removing or replacing a certain number of words, is the same as rephrasing. They also think that picking out key phrases or sentences, and copying them word for word, is summarizing. The English teacher from that team happened to stop in during this conversation and said that, although she does teach summarizing, she hasn't gotten to that part of her curriculum yet.
First of all, this made me wonder if it would be a good idea to have the teams sit down, looked at shared skills, who is teaching them, and when they are being taught. After all, it would be really good practice and reinforcement for students to learn summarizing in English, and then have a summarizing project/assignment in Social Studies the following week. And, it would save the Social Studies teacher a good deal of aggravation if he held the summarizing project until after the topic was covered in Social Studies.
Summarizing happened to come up as a topic on twitter just a few hours later, and I was able to pass this resource along. There were some interesting ideas. I also made the suggestion of giving the students an article, and having them write a "text message" to a friend explaining it. I do think most of these kids can summarize--they just don't have the skills to make a connection between how they "give the short version" to friend and what teachers want out of them in a writing assignment.
By permission of the teacher, I've copied a few of these wikis over, and removed student names from them, so I can show some samples. I picked a few at random from each class, and then copied the ones I liked best as examples. Check them out here.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Creek Project--Update One
I'm not going to track the Creek Project on a daily basis. Some days very little if anything happens with it. And some days, something happens, but not enough to prompt a blog entry.
We are closing in on the midway checkpoint. On March 9, 7 days from now, the students will have to turn "evidence" into the Biology teacher. All of them have so far turned in their project sheets--detailing their questions, and their projects.
I have only worked with a few students. I showed one group how to create a voki, or use gizmoz (which tends to work a little better on student computers). I was a little disappointed because the student computers do not all have flash up to date, so neither of these programs were running properly.
I worked with another group to show them how to remove lyrics from an MP3 using Audacity. That way, they will be able to record themselves singing their new lyrics over the music. They plan on working on this from home, though, where they have garage band. Being a PC user at home and school, I'm not as familiar with garage band, and don't know if they will be able to do the same thing. However, I am optimistic. I didn't just show them how to do it. I knew there was a tutorial on youtube, so I did a search, explaining to them what I was searching for and how. After finding the tutorial, I made the students follow it. They had to watch what was happening and read the captions. After a successful run, I made the students repeat the process without the aid of the tutorial. I feel confident that they will remember how to do it in Audacity, and will be able to figure out how to do it in another program.
Today, I touched bases with the Biology teacher again. She is in the process of introducing the project to her non-honors class this week. Yesterday she had them pick a question, and yesterday and today they worked on researching their topic. This way, they are more focused on what the purpose of the project is than on the technology or "product" part of it. Then, once they have gathered their research, she is going to introduce the project. She is still deliberating on how much in class time to give students to work on it. These students do not have a study hall like the honors students, and many of them will not have the ability to work on their projects at home. She has also decided to limit their project choices. They will be able to do a Photo Story, game, poster, or design another project (and get approval). This leaves the students free to be creative with their project design, but it also focuses students who might be overwhelmed with too many choices.
She regrets the order she did things in with the honors classes. Because she introduced the project all at once, a lot of students focused on what they were doing instead of why. Students had decided to do a Photo Story or a web site before deciding what question they were answering. Because of this, the projects might end up not fitting the objectives of the students. One example is a group of students that decided to do a website on fish--but they had no clear idea of what the purpose or function of the website was, or what information would be on it, or how to make it an interesting, engaging site that people would want to visit. I think we both agree, in the future, it would be a good idea to assign students to pick a question before introducing the project. For honors, at least, I still feel that it might be reasonable to have them responsible for doing research while putting together their projects. It would force the students to make intelligent use of their time, and redirect both the project and research based on one another.
We are closing in on the midway checkpoint. On March 9, 7 days from now, the students will have to turn "evidence" into the Biology teacher. All of them have so far turned in their project sheets--detailing their questions, and their projects.
I have only worked with a few students. I showed one group how to create a voki, or use gizmoz (which tends to work a little better on student computers). I was a little disappointed because the student computers do not all have flash up to date, so neither of these programs were running properly.
I worked with another group to show them how to remove lyrics from an MP3 using Audacity. That way, they will be able to record themselves singing their new lyrics over the music. They plan on working on this from home, though, where they have garage band. Being a PC user at home and school, I'm not as familiar with garage band, and don't know if they will be able to do the same thing. However, I am optimistic. I didn't just show them how to do it. I knew there was a tutorial on youtube, so I did a search, explaining to them what I was searching for and how. After finding the tutorial, I made the students follow it. They had to watch what was happening and read the captions. After a successful run, I made the students repeat the process without the aid of the tutorial. I feel confident that they will remember how to do it in Audacity, and will be able to figure out how to do it in another program.
Today, I touched bases with the Biology teacher again. She is in the process of introducing the project to her non-honors class this week. Yesterday she had them pick a question, and yesterday and today they worked on researching their topic. This way, they are more focused on what the purpose of the project is than on the technology or "product" part of it. Then, once they have gathered their research, she is going to introduce the project. She is still deliberating on how much in class time to give students to work on it. These students do not have a study hall like the honors students, and many of them will not have the ability to work on their projects at home. She has also decided to limit their project choices. They will be able to do a Photo Story, game, poster, or design another project (and get approval). This leaves the students free to be creative with their project design, but it also focuses students who might be overwhelmed with too many choices.
She regrets the order she did things in with the honors classes. Because she introduced the project all at once, a lot of students focused on what they were doing instead of why. Students had decided to do a Photo Story or a web site before deciding what question they were answering. Because of this, the projects might end up not fitting the objectives of the students. One example is a group of students that decided to do a website on fish--but they had no clear idea of what the purpose or function of the website was, or what information would be on it, or how to make it an interesting, engaging site that people would want to visit. I think we both agree, in the future, it would be a good idea to assign students to pick a question before introducing the project. For honors, at least, I still feel that it might be reasonable to have them responsible for doing research while putting together their projects. It would force the students to make intelligent use of their time, and redirect both the project and research based on one another.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Sight Project--Day Three
I think yesterday might have been one of the most hectic in classroom days I've had in a while. It just felt like everything that could go wrong did. But really, it was only one class out of three.
The first and third classes went fine. There were a few issues here and there, but nothing major. The middle class was a nightmare.
In all of the classes, the students were left to their own devices to continue working on the project. The teacher went back on her plan and told them at the beginning of class they would have one more day to finish. This hurt the hoped for sense of urgency. But, students still did work continuously for the most part. Some wasted valuable class time trying to edit music to add to the stories. Some who did not construct a good plan were still hunting up images. But most kids were working on editing and arranging images. A few tried out recording themselves, but very few had anything keepable by the end of class.
The middle class had its fair share of problems throughout. An inexplicably high number of students had to keep restarting because they could not connect to their student drives. This took up a lot of valuable work time. Then, several students were having trouble saving their work. It didn't take me long to realize it was students who had imported images straight from memory sticks or jump drives. The easy fix was to make sure the sources was in the computer before saving, so the file could be accessed. However, this was a problem for students who used multiple memory sticks--since only one could be in the computer at a time. I had to have kids drag and drop the images to a folder in their personal drive, delete the images, and then reimport them. This was horrible, because I had to walk each kid through it one by one. It was one of those days when it seems that the students just didn't have the ability to follow directions without me over their shoulders. And I was sympathetic. I think for most people this would be considered a complicated problem.
To make matters even worse, at the end of class, some students suddenly lost their network connections and couldn't save to their student drives. Once again I attempted to give general directions for this: save to your desktop, restart, move to your personal drive. But, I kept getting students raising their hands with the same question. I was becoming frustrated with the technology, my inability to effectively address all of the students at once (students who didn't yet realize they had this problem were still working and not paying any attention despite my telling everyone that I had something very important to say), and the impatience of students who seemed to think they took precidence over someone I was already helping because they were suddenly having problems, too. Massive problems in the last five minutes of class are exponentially more frustrating than massive problems at any other time.
Needless to say, I started the last class of the day explaining, once again, to save frequently. Saving frequently will not only prevent the loss of ALL work in the case of some failure, but it will also alert students to network issues earlier. I explained that, in the last five minutes of class I would not be able to help everyone, so if everyone had an issue at then end of class, most of them would lose work. It was not the best or most helpful tone to take, and it was largely colored by my multiple frustrations from earlier.
Many students do not have basic trouble shooting, or problem solving skills when it comes to technology. They encounter a problem, and thier first and only reaction is to shout to anyone who knows how to use computers. (I eventually told students that those politely raising their hands would probably get my attention sooner than those shouting my name). They do not have the ability to assess the causes or work through possible solutions to a problem. Quite a few needed help saving to their own jump drives. I'm not entirely sure that they weren't capable of doing it. After all, they had saved images to the drive to bring them to school. But, at school, they only saved to their personal drives. I fear that yesterday, in my frustration, I fell back into the trap of enabling learned helplessness.
I was very focused on technical issues yesterday. My reflection doesn't seem to have anything but them. That's a shame.
The first and third classes went fine. There were a few issues here and there, but nothing major. The middle class was a nightmare.
In all of the classes, the students were left to their own devices to continue working on the project. The teacher went back on her plan and told them at the beginning of class they would have one more day to finish. This hurt the hoped for sense of urgency. But, students still did work continuously for the most part. Some wasted valuable class time trying to edit music to add to the stories. Some who did not construct a good plan were still hunting up images. But most kids were working on editing and arranging images. A few tried out recording themselves, but very few had anything keepable by the end of class.
The middle class had its fair share of problems throughout. An inexplicably high number of students had to keep restarting because they could not connect to their student drives. This took up a lot of valuable work time. Then, several students were having trouble saving their work. It didn't take me long to realize it was students who had imported images straight from memory sticks or jump drives. The easy fix was to make sure the sources was in the computer before saving, so the file could be accessed. However, this was a problem for students who used multiple memory sticks--since only one could be in the computer at a time. I had to have kids drag and drop the images to a folder in their personal drive, delete the images, and then reimport them. This was horrible, because I had to walk each kid through it one by one. It was one of those days when it seems that the students just didn't have the ability to follow directions without me over their shoulders. And I was sympathetic. I think for most people this would be considered a complicated problem.
To make matters even worse, at the end of class, some students suddenly lost their network connections and couldn't save to their student drives. Once again I attempted to give general directions for this: save to your desktop, restart, move to your personal drive. But, I kept getting students raising their hands with the same question. I was becoming frustrated with the technology, my inability to effectively address all of the students at once (students who didn't yet realize they had this problem were still working and not paying any attention despite my telling everyone that I had something very important to say), and the impatience of students who seemed to think they took precidence over someone I was already helping because they were suddenly having problems, too. Massive problems in the last five minutes of class are exponentially more frustrating than massive problems at any other time.
Needless to say, I started the last class of the day explaining, once again, to save frequently. Saving frequently will not only prevent the loss of ALL work in the case of some failure, but it will also alert students to network issues earlier. I explained that, in the last five minutes of class I would not be able to help everyone, so if everyone had an issue at then end of class, most of them would lose work. It was not the best or most helpful tone to take, and it was largely colored by my multiple frustrations from earlier.
Many students do not have basic trouble shooting, or problem solving skills when it comes to technology. They encounter a problem, and thier first and only reaction is to shout to anyone who knows how to use computers. (I eventually told students that those politely raising their hands would probably get my attention sooner than those shouting my name). They do not have the ability to assess the causes or work through possible solutions to a problem. Quite a few needed help saving to their own jump drives. I'm not entirely sure that they weren't capable of doing it. After all, they had saved images to the drive to bring them to school. But, at school, they only saved to their personal drives. I fear that yesterday, in my frustration, I fell back into the trap of enabling learned helplessness.
I was very focused on technical issues yesterday. My reflection doesn't seem to have anything but them. That's a shame.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Presidential My Space--Day Three
Last day of the project.
Projects are not due til the following day, so students can work on them from home, or stay after school.
One of the benefits of this project was that students could easily access their work from anywhere. There was no saving of files involved. At the same time, it was not a public web space, so student privacy was maintained. This is probably the #1 reason I'm such a big fan of wikis.
I was in and out of the class today, because I was starting a project with another teacher. For the most part, students made good use of their time, and worked throughout.
One thing I saw was that honors students, who had to follow the general rubric, as well as extra directions that were posted on their class page, were forgetting the extra directions. In the past, when a teacher has divided a wiki into classes, I have them post all of the directions on each classes' page. Its redundant, but I think it helps the students stay organized. I think in this case especially, it would have been a very good idea.
As the project went on, and, as is common, a lot of student were more concerned with how things looked than the content, the teacher and I came up with the idea of using the directions/rubric as a check sheet. We suggested to students to print it out, and check off requirements as they were met. Quite a few students took the suggestion. I think I'll remember that for similar projects in the future, and encourage teachers to either do directions in more of list form, or to have a list version of the directions. Its easier to check off items on a list than in a paragraph.
Towards the end of one of the classes, I asked the teacher about grading the project. He seemed pleased to have someone to help him grade, and suggested that I go through the projects, make grade suggestions, and he'd either take the suggestions or not. Part of me regrets the offer, because its more work. Most of me knows that I haven't assessed anything in a long time. It will be good to get back into it. Also, being useful to teachers helps build those relationships. If another teacher asks me to help put together a project for the simple reason that he/she thinks I'll do all the grading, than that is a great opportunity to introduce yet another teacher to using tech in the classroom.
The projects look very good. It seems that most of the students included most of the required content. I don't know how many students went outside of their comfort zone and had fun being creative, though. I probably won't get to assessing anything today. I'll have to update on how the finished projects are, once I've been through some of them--I even got permission to post some examples once I remove student names.
Projects are not due til the following day, so students can work on them from home, or stay after school.
One of the benefits of this project was that students could easily access their work from anywhere. There was no saving of files involved. At the same time, it was not a public web space, so student privacy was maintained. This is probably the #1 reason I'm such a big fan of wikis.
I was in and out of the class today, because I was starting a project with another teacher. For the most part, students made good use of their time, and worked throughout.
One thing I saw was that honors students, who had to follow the general rubric, as well as extra directions that were posted on their class page, were forgetting the extra directions. In the past, when a teacher has divided a wiki into classes, I have them post all of the directions on each classes' page. Its redundant, but I think it helps the students stay organized. I think in this case especially, it would have been a very good idea.
As the project went on, and, as is common, a lot of student were more concerned with how things looked than the content, the teacher and I came up with the idea of using the directions/rubric as a check sheet. We suggested to students to print it out, and check off requirements as they were met. Quite a few students took the suggestion. I think I'll remember that for similar projects in the future, and encourage teachers to either do directions in more of list form, or to have a list version of the directions. Its easier to check off items on a list than in a paragraph.
Towards the end of one of the classes, I asked the teacher about grading the project. He seemed pleased to have someone to help him grade, and suggested that I go through the projects, make grade suggestions, and he'd either take the suggestions or not. Part of me regrets the offer, because its more work. Most of me knows that I haven't assessed anything in a long time. It will be good to get back into it. Also, being useful to teachers helps build those relationships. If another teacher asks me to help put together a project for the simple reason that he/she thinks I'll do all the grading, than that is a great opportunity to introduce yet another teacher to using tech in the classroom.
The projects look very good. It seems that most of the students included most of the required content. I don't know how many students went outside of their comfort zone and had fun being creative, though. I probably won't get to assessing anything today. I'll have to update on how the finished projects are, once I've been through some of them--I even got permission to post some examples once I remove student names.
Sight Project--Day One
The sight project got off to a slightly rocky start. The teacher and I weren't on exactly the same page about the path the project was going to take.
Students have to decide what things that want to see with their last three days of sight. I was under the impression that students had already been told to start gathering pictures (bringing them from home) and thinking about what they wanted. The teacher was under the impression that students would start planning out their projects on the first day in class.
Basically, the first class was instructed on how to use Photo Story, and then told to start planning things out before going on a hodge podge truck through google images, searching for anything that popped into their minds. So, they rather predictably put aside paper and pencil that were meant for planning, and started going searching and saving, and importing photos. During class, I wrote an "order of operations" for the project on the board:
I can't say that I'm 100% satisfied with that order of operations. Again, though, it comes down to not necessarily knowing the class as well as I would like. For some students, especially less organized students, this is probably great structure. For others, its going to be restrictive. I don't think kids need to find ALL pictures before importing, but it might help them stay organized. I don't think that all students need to import ALL pictures before creating--creating covering all aspects of using the program, including scripting, ordering, etc. I think for some kids, it would be good if they felt that they could do a little--write a note or a caption, befor they forget some good idea they had.
I do think, however, that some students will do things in their own order despite what was on the board. So, again, I think that the organization will help some students, and I hope that it won't hinder others. I do agree with the teacher that having kids plan out WHAT they want before beginning an image search will prevent them from being wasteful with their time. However, I hope that students who have an idea or two know that they can still go back and add it, even if the've moved on to import or create.
For the rest of the classes, I went through the "order of operations," as I for some reason insisted on calling it, before showing them how to use Photo Story.
I was rather pleased with how my intro went. I think Photo Story is very easy to use, and most students could have picked up on it without much help. However, I took the opurtunity to go over some other computer basics. I stressed the importance of checking for network drives before beginning any work. I don't know if it is a laptop issue or a wireless issue, but frequently, students cannot connect to their network drives. They work half the class, and then can't save. Sometimes they end up saving to the desktop without telling anyone, and lose their work. So I stressed that, if they do work, they deserve to have something to show for it.
Then, when going over saving photos, I went over file organization. I talked about putting things in folders, putting things where you will remember them, and naming things with some amount of logic. I'm sure a few kids already knew what I was talking about, but my experience tells me that most of them didn't. I think we live in a world where kids have always had the latest technology, and we assume they can use it. Largely that is true. But that doesn't mean that we don't have to take a minute to teach them old time skills like organization. Most teachers know student folders end up a mess, with papers sticking out, for a majority of students. I don't think its safe to assume their computer folders look any different. I probably didn't win any converts to the cause of hyper organization, but I think I opened a few eyes to the idea that they don't have to have one giant folder full of files they can't recognize.
I also focused on the idea of this being a story telling project. I talked about how, if they scripted themselves, they would sound better. I talked about giving the narration some interest. I tend to get a little sarcastic in front of classes. So to demonstrate what I wanted, I demonstrated what I didn't want. I started with "this is a...um...a picture of my friend Janet. I would want to see her...uh...be-uh-cause...she's my friend...and, uh, yeh...that would be good to see." Then, in a monotone: "This is the ocean. It's pretty. This is a flower. It's pretty. This is my mom. She's pretty." The kids laughed--which was the point--but I think they got it. Modeling is important. A lot of times things seem obvious to teachers, and we are frustrated by students who "don't have any motivation." But, I've found that modeling will improve student outcomes significantly. Just because its obvious to a teacher, doesn't mean its as obvious to a 14 year old who is going to be a bit less self aware. And, humor sticks with people better. I think just showing them a well put together example would have been good, if I'd had one (this is the first time doing this project, so I don't), but showing them what not to do--and making it funny--is also helpful in terms of modeling.
After going through the intro, I let students get started on the project. A few kids have photobucket accounts and were looking through them for photos. Others pulled out cameras. Many went straight to google images.
I did see a few lists started. The teacher instructed students to break their project into 3 days, since it is the last three days of sight. They have to specify what they will see on day one, day two, and day three. For the most part, I saw lists for day one. This is not exactly the amount of planning the teacher wanted--she wanted full lists that could be divided by days later--but at least it is something.
One thing I noticed during class was that a few students had lists that made it look like they were going to die, not go blind. I told the teacher, who laughed, and said she'd make a small announcement tomorrow.
Since the students didn't have a full day to work, most of them focused on pictures that came easily to mind--friends and family. I'm curious what they will think of after they get past the familiar.
Students have to decide what things that want to see with their last three days of sight. I was under the impression that students had already been told to start gathering pictures (bringing them from home) and thinking about what they wanted. The teacher was under the impression that students would start planning out their projects on the first day in class.
Basically, the first class was instructed on how to use Photo Story, and then told to start planning things out before going on a hodge podge truck through google images, searching for anything that popped into their minds. So, they rather predictably put aside paper and pencil that were meant for planning, and started going searching and saving, and importing photos. During class, I wrote an "order of operations" for the project on the board:
1. Plan
2. Find
3. Import
4. Create
I can't say that I'm 100% satisfied with that order of operations. Again, though, it comes down to not necessarily knowing the class as well as I would like. For some students, especially less organized students, this is probably great structure. For others, its going to be restrictive. I don't think kids need to find ALL pictures before importing, but it might help them stay organized. I don't think that all students need to import ALL pictures before creating--creating covering all aspects of using the program, including scripting, ordering, etc. I think for some kids, it would be good if they felt that they could do a little--write a note or a caption, befor they forget some good idea they had.
I do think, however, that some students will do things in their own order despite what was on the board. So, again, I think that the organization will help some students, and I hope that it won't hinder others. I do agree with the teacher that having kids plan out WHAT they want before beginning an image search will prevent them from being wasteful with their time. However, I hope that students who have an idea or two know that they can still go back and add it, even if the've moved on to import or create.
For the rest of the classes, I went through the "order of operations," as I for some reason insisted on calling it, before showing them how to use Photo Story.
I was rather pleased with how my intro went. I think Photo Story is very easy to use, and most students could have picked up on it without much help. However, I took the opurtunity to go over some other computer basics. I stressed the importance of checking for network drives before beginning any work. I don't know if it is a laptop issue or a wireless issue, but frequently, students cannot connect to their network drives. They work half the class, and then can't save. Sometimes they end up saving to the desktop without telling anyone, and lose their work. So I stressed that, if they do work, they deserve to have something to show for it.
Then, when going over saving photos, I went over file organization. I talked about putting things in folders, putting things where you will remember them, and naming things with some amount of logic. I'm sure a few kids already knew what I was talking about, but my experience tells me that most of them didn't. I think we live in a world where kids have always had the latest technology, and we assume they can use it. Largely that is true. But that doesn't mean that we don't have to take a minute to teach them old time skills like organization. Most teachers know student folders end up a mess, with papers sticking out, for a majority of students. I don't think its safe to assume their computer folders look any different. I probably didn't win any converts to the cause of hyper organization, but I think I opened a few eyes to the idea that they don't have to have one giant folder full of files they can't recognize.
I also focused on the idea of this being a story telling project. I talked about how, if they scripted themselves, they would sound better. I talked about giving the narration some interest. I tend to get a little sarcastic in front of classes. So to demonstrate what I wanted, I demonstrated what I didn't want. I started with "this is a...um...a picture of my friend Janet. I would want to see her...uh...be-uh-cause...she's my friend...and, uh, yeh...that would be good to see." Then, in a monotone: "This is the ocean. It's pretty. This is a flower. It's pretty. This is my mom. She's pretty." The kids laughed--which was the point--but I think they got it. Modeling is important. A lot of times things seem obvious to teachers, and we are frustrated by students who "don't have any motivation." But, I've found that modeling will improve student outcomes significantly. Just because its obvious to a teacher, doesn't mean its as obvious to a 14 year old who is going to be a bit less self aware. And, humor sticks with people better. I think just showing them a well put together example would have been good, if I'd had one (this is the first time doing this project, so I don't), but showing them what not to do--and making it funny--is also helpful in terms of modeling.
After going through the intro, I let students get started on the project. A few kids have photobucket accounts and were looking through them for photos. Others pulled out cameras. Many went straight to google images.
I did see a few lists started. The teacher instructed students to break their project into 3 days, since it is the last three days of sight. They have to specify what they will see on day one, day two, and day three. For the most part, I saw lists for day one. This is not exactly the amount of planning the teacher wanted--she wanted full lists that could be divided by days later--but at least it is something.
One thing I noticed during class was that a few students had lists that made it look like they were going to die, not go blind. I told the teacher, who laughed, and said she'd make a small announcement tomorrow.
Since the students didn't have a full day to work, most of them focused on pictures that came easily to mind--friends and family. I'm curious what they will think of after they get past the familiar.
Friday, February 20, 2009
Presidential My Space--Day One
Yesterday we started the Presidential My Space Pages.
One of the common complaints, of course, is that we aren't using real My Space pages. I should probably rethink/rename this project so that kids are not left thinking that they would rather do real My Space pages.
For the most part, the teacher went through directions with students. As a time saver, he went through how to navigate through the page to the student pages while kids were still booting up their laptops. Since the student laptops do take so long, I agreed with this decsion. However, a lot of students didn't pay attention. It led to problems later. I had to help about half the students 1-on-1 to find their pages. I had to explain to many students that there was already a page, and not to create one. And, one students edited the front page, and another deleted and edited over the rubric.
The rubric is fairly simple:
One of the common complaints, of course, is that we aren't using real My Space pages. I should probably rethink/rename this project so that kids are not left thinking that they would rather do real My Space pages.
For the most part, the teacher went through directions with students. As a time saver, he went through how to navigate through the page to the student pages while kids were still booting up their laptops. Since the student laptops do take so long, I agreed with this decsion. However, a lot of students didn't pay attention. It led to problems later. I had to help about half the students 1-on-1 to find their pages. I had to explain to many students that there was already a page, and not to create one. And, one students edited the front page, and another deleted and edited over the rubric.
The rubric is fairly simple:
For this project, you will create a mock 'My Space' page for one of the former Presidents. You may choose any former President you wish. Barack Obama is not a former President. You will create this page as if you are that President, living today. That means you should write in the first person, using 'I' instead of 'George Washington said...'. The page should contain mainly biographical information about that President. You should include at least the following sections:
Title: 'George Washington's page' The title should include the name of the President. (3 pts.)
Pictures: Include at least two pictures of the President on the main page. (2 pts.)
Background: Include Dates of birth and death, and dates the President served. Include place of birth. (5 pts.)
Biography: This should be 2-3 paragraphs about the President's life, from birth until they became President. You can include information from 'Background' instead of making a separate section for it. Be throrough. Include educational background, military experience, and any previous political experience. Talk about why these experiences prepared the man for the Presidency. (15 pts.)
Presidency: Include 2-3 paragraphs about what happened while this person was President. Include any important events, wars, scandals, etc. You can talk about what life in America was like during this Presidency. Remember, write as if you are this person. If something negative happened, try to explain why. Include at least 2 events and how the President handled that problem. (15 pts.)
Retirement: Include a brief description of the President's life after the Presidency. (5 pts.)
Creativity: A more creative page will receive additional points. (5 pts.)
Total points: 50
When picking your President, be careful to look at when they served. Picking a President who died after 2 days in office is a bad idea. You don't have to pick a famous President, like Washington or Lincoln, but skim through the bios to find someone who did something interesting, or served during an interesting period of history. Remember to make this a first person account, and use your own words. DO NOT COPY AND PASTE. That is plagarism, and will result in a zero for the entire project. This project is due Tuesday, February 24.
Most students didn't have much trouble navigating to their pages. A few got confused because, although I had provided links, they still had to click on a "create page" button after clicking the link. Many students immediately went to the "create a page" button from the home page, and started creating and editing pages there were not linked from anywhere. It was pretty easy to find and correct those students (they would loose their pages, since they weren't linked from the home page) and have them copy and paste their work onto the appropriate page. In later classes, I made every watch as showed the difference between the "create page" and "create a page" buttons. I think this should have been a more predictable problem.
The teacher has even provided three approved web sources for researching info (although a small handful of students went directly to google anyways.)
Students only worked on the project for about half of class for the first day. Everyone had picked a president, and most had a picture and a little bit of info by the end of class. Some only had a picture.
There is definately a large varience of comfort and ability when doing web based projects. Some students understood right away when I suggested they open the rubric in a seperate tab or window, so they didn't have to keep using the back arrow. Others were very confused and needed to be shown multiple times. Others needed to be shown only once before catching on.
And some students have trouble just navigating a single web page.
I was able to teach students the short cut key for pasting (ctrl + v) because the right click they are used to doesn't work in a pb wiki. One thing almost all students seemed very good at was finding a google image.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Reading Project--End
I haven't had a chance to update on this project.
With snow days, conferences, and trainings, I was out of the building for the very end of the project. The Reading teacher told me that she had very little trouble finishing up the recordings. She had a few absent kids that she had to record after the official end of the project. She had one student who refused to read in front of the class, but agreed to be recorded after school.
We had some time to discuss the assessment for the project. Most of that was decided early on, because she had to give the students a rubric. The whole project was 75 points, with 5 points each given for meeting deadlines along the way. Twenty points were given for creativity in selecting the article and modifying it for speaking. And, 15 points each were given for accuracy, pace, and emotion. So, the bulk of what was assessed was the three main goals that she had for the read aloud. We were a little worried about having so many points for the creativity with the assignment, but it did end up being a large part of the WORK involved. The teacher took notes while the students read live, and then used the recordings to be able to revisit and look at specifics. So even grading this assignment turned into a large time commitment for her.
Throughout this assignment, we've talked about changes that we would like to make for next year. After having started the recordings, I was made aware that several teachers have actual video cameras, so I would like to use those next year. Also, we talked about using monologues that would be performance ready, to cut down on the prep time and frustration for students, and allow the project to be more clearly focused on reading out loud. I think this year, the students could very easily come away from this project feeling like it was an internet search and writing project. We are still not in agreement about having the same reading being used for the initial recording/reflection and the second recording, or having part of the grade based on the improvements listed in the reflection. i think it is important for me to try to be practical. These are not my classes, and I am not ultimately responsible for grading their assignments. Partly, I think this might be a matter of not having high expectations--the Reading teacher does not feel that the students are able to write good reflections and therefore to get much out of them. My main goal for next year will be to get the teacher to model writing a good reflection. If the reflections improve, perhaps she will see value in adding that as an assessment component in the future.
All in all I think this project was successful. The students all had to read aloud in front of the class, focusing on accuracy, pace, and emotion. There are aspect of the assignment that can, and hopefully will, be improved upon to allow the students to learn more from it in the future.
With snow days, conferences, and trainings, I was out of the building for the very end of the project. The Reading teacher told me that she had very little trouble finishing up the recordings. She had a few absent kids that she had to record after the official end of the project. She had one student who refused to read in front of the class, but agreed to be recorded after school.
We had some time to discuss the assessment for the project. Most of that was decided early on, because she had to give the students a rubric. The whole project was 75 points, with 5 points each given for meeting deadlines along the way. Twenty points were given for creativity in selecting the article and modifying it for speaking. And, 15 points each were given for accuracy, pace, and emotion. So, the bulk of what was assessed was the three main goals that she had for the read aloud. We were a little worried about having so many points for the creativity with the assignment, but it did end up being a large part of the WORK involved. The teacher took notes while the students read live, and then used the recordings to be able to revisit and look at specifics. So even grading this assignment turned into a large time commitment for her.
Throughout this assignment, we've talked about changes that we would like to make for next year. After having started the recordings, I was made aware that several teachers have actual video cameras, so I would like to use those next year. Also, we talked about using monologues that would be performance ready, to cut down on the prep time and frustration for students, and allow the project to be more clearly focused on reading out loud. I think this year, the students could very easily come away from this project feeling like it was an internet search and writing project. We are still not in agreement about having the same reading being used for the initial recording/reflection and the second recording, or having part of the grade based on the improvements listed in the reflection. i think it is important for me to try to be practical. These are not my classes, and I am not ultimately responsible for grading their assignments. Partly, I think this might be a matter of not having high expectations--the Reading teacher does not feel that the students are able to write good reflections and therefore to get much out of them. My main goal for next year will be to get the teacher to model writing a good reflection. If the reflections improve, perhaps she will see value in adding that as an assessment component in the future.
All in all I think this project was successful. The students all had to read aloud in front of the class, focusing on accuracy, pace, and emotion. There are aspect of the assignment that can, and hopefully will, be improved upon to allow the students to learn more from it in the future.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Speak Blog Update
The snow day has altered everyone's schedule.
I checked in with the English teacher, assuming that the dates we had down would have changed. Fortunately, they have. If not, I would have been double booked between that blog project, and the Reading project I am finishing.
The English teacher finished putting directions up on the site. I'm going to copy and paste them here.
Welcome to 9th grade's on-line discussion board for the Third and Fourth Marking Period of Speak. As it has become evident, this novel is one that teenagers can relate to, even if they have not been in the exact situation that Melinda was in. Speak is a very common novel that discussions center around because many, varying opinions can be brought forth.
As we always say in English class, you are entitled to your opinion, but for it to be valued, it must be supported with examples, experiences, and facts.
1. Click on your period's page.
2. Click on the "Discussion" tab and then on "Question" 1 and post your response. Each response must be at least five complete, detailed sentences written in standard, school-appropriate English. (Do not let the online version fool you! You are not texting, instant messaging, or leaving a message on a My-Space wall. This is an English class assignment.) Your response MUST have examples directly from the novel, i.e. "On page 102, Melinda says....".
3. Proceed through the rest of the questions following the above directions.
4. For questions 1-3, you will respond to your assigned partner. A response can follow different paths, for example:
5. For questions 4-6, you can choose any post to respond to; however you may not respond to an original post that already has two responses.
NOTICE: As everyone begins posting, it will be very obvious to me whether you have written an original post or you have picked out ideas to use from other posts.
There are some really good points here.
She begins by explaining the purpose of the project "As it has become evident, this novel is one that teenagers can relate to, even if they have not been in the exact situation that Melinda was in. Speak is a very common novel that discussions center around because many, varying opinions can be brought forth."
The directions are very clear. She is starting by having them respond to an assigned partner. That will get them into the habit of the project. After the first three questions, they will be free to respond to comments that they want to respond to, within limits.
She makes it very clear that students don't have to agree with one another to comment. Also, she clearly puts forth the expectation that students are to be original, but that they have to have information from the book to back them up.
I'm going to be working with the class next week on Friday to help everyone sign up for a username and password, and to get oriented to the site.
I checked in with the English teacher, assuming that the dates we had down would have changed. Fortunately, they have. If not, I would have been double booked between that blog project, and the Reading project I am finishing.
The English teacher finished putting directions up on the site. I'm going to copy and paste them here.
Welcome to 9th grade's on-line discussion board for the Third and Fourth Marking Period of Speak. As it has become evident, this novel is one that teenagers can relate to, even if they have not been in the exact situation that Melinda was in. Speak is a very common novel that discussions center around because many, varying opinions can be brought forth.
As we always say in English class, you are entitled to your opinion, but for it to be valued, it must be supported with examples, experiences, and facts.
1. Click on your period's page.
2. Click on the "Discussion" tab and then on "Question" 1 and post your response. Each response must be at least five complete, detailed sentences written in standard, school-appropriate English. (Do not let the online version fool you! You are not texting, instant messaging, or leaving a message on a My-Space wall. This is an English class assignment.) Your response MUST have examples directly from the novel, i.e. "On page 102, Melinda says....".
3. Proceed through the rest of the questions following the above directions.
4. For questions 1-3, you will respond to your assigned partner. A response can follow different paths, for example:
- I agree/disagree with you because...
- You bring up a good point I never thought about which is.....This makes me think about....
- TO RESPOND, IN THE SUBJECT LINE, AFTER RE: DELTE "QUESTION 1" AND WRITE THE PERSON'S SCREEN-NAME.
5. For questions 4-6, you can choose any post to respond to; however you may not respond to an original post that already has two responses.
NOTICE: As everyone begins posting, it will be very obvious to me whether you have written an original post or you have picked out ideas to use from other posts.
There are some really good points here.
She begins by explaining the purpose of the project "As it has become evident, this novel is one that teenagers can relate to, even if they have not been in the exact situation that Melinda was in. Speak is a very common novel that discussions center around because many, varying opinions can be brought forth."
The directions are very clear. She is starting by having them respond to an assigned partner. That will get them into the habit of the project. After the first three questions, they will be free to respond to comments that they want to respond to, within limits.
She makes it very clear that students don't have to agree with one another to comment. Also, she clearly puts forth the expectation that students are to be original, but that they have to have information from the book to back them up.
I'm going to be working with the class next week on Friday to help everyone sign up for a username and password, and to get oriented to the site.
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