Project 12B

Blog Post 12

C4T#3

  My C4T#3 was on Angela Maiers blog.

  SUMMARY:Her first post that I am writing on is, "What Went Right Today? Let’s Write Our Own Narrative. #BreaktheCode". Maiers says the U.S. education system is very negative and tends to focus on everything that is going wrong, instead of anything that is going right. Society like news stories that get them mad and worked up over an issue. She says the main reason for the negative aim of many tales about U.S. education is the hesitation of teachers to boast about all the successes that are occurring in the classroom. If teachers won't boast about themselves, they should boast about their schools successes, their students, and their colleagues. At the end of every school day ask yourself, “What Went Right Today?”, and when you find that answer, share it with everyone.

  COMMENT: I love this post! Negativity weighs down students and teachers alike. Teachers should come to school excited to teach and learn, and expectant that their day in the classroom will have been fruitful for the students! I'm glad this post was recommended to me in my EDM 310 class at USA!

  SUMMARY: Another post of hers that I am writing on is, "Let’s Close the Passion Gap". Passion is not a word often brought up when it comes to education. One is more likely to hear words like standardized, common core, assessment, etc. Maiers says, "There is a passion gap in education, and students are disappearing into it, and drowning in ennui." 88% of Americans cannot contribute their full potential because they do not have a passion for their job. Passion is key in the real, working world. Passion is the genius of all geniuses. Passion driven workers are fiercely innovative, endlessly creative, and confidently unstoppable.

  COMMENT: Teachers should be passionate about their subject field and for their students to learn the material. If a teacher is not passionate about a subject being taught, the student will not be passionate about learning it. Passion is more than emotion, it's yearning for more information!

 

Add caption

Blog Post 11 What can we learn about teaching and learning from these teachers?

  In Brian Crosby's video,"Back to the Future", Crosby talks about the setbacks of a narrow curriculum. He says that it is hard to imagine what could be, if you don't know anything about what is. Because of this, students have nothing to build creativity off of, leading to no passion. He goes on to show many of the projects his students have done, and how it has positively affected them with motivational context. Students need opportunities to build schema for the real world.

  In the video,"Blended Learning Cycle", Paul Anderson discusses the use of the blended learning cycle in his science classroom. Blended learning is taking the compelling parts of online, mobile, and classroom learning, and blending them together, then taking the learning cycle (engage, explore, explain, expand, evaluate) and combining it with blended learning, producing the blended learning cycle. This cycle moves through the following steps: Question, Investigation/Inquiry, Video, Elaboration, Review, and Summary quiz(QIVERS). He says that the blended learning cycle makes him feel more involved in the classroom.

  In the video,"Making Thinking Visible", Dr. Ron Ritchhart talks about documenting students thinking to use as a model for other students and teachers to learn from. This helps in showing the progress of ideas and in evaluating students thinking process. Visible means written, recorded, documented, etc.

  In the video,"Sam Pane 4th Grade", Sam Pane teaches his students to become super digital citizens. A super digital citizen is a person who chooses to act safely, respectfully, and responsibly online. He lets his students build their own superhero digital citizens and puts them in real world situations online to inspire them to act responsibly while on the internet, he says this gives his a students a greater sense of ownership. One student said he felt inspired by his classmates superhero to react safely online. Pane says students will be exposed to choices online and he wants to prepare them to make smart choices.

  In the video,"Project Based Learning", three teachers talk about how they restructured their classroom to incorporate project based learning (PBL) to create a unique learning experience for students. The teachers realized that when the students were given more time for their projects, they were able to go back to improve and enhance. Students feel an ownership of the project and do better when they are able to go deeper and when they are given more time.

  In the video,"Roosevelt Elementary's PBL Program", PBL is broken down into its basic parts and definitions. PBL (project based learning) is in depth learning, integrated thematic instruction, based on a real world problem, research based, and deals with project and presentation. PBL incorporates real world problem solving skills in the classroom, students learn how to think for themselves.The application of the students knowledge is apparent when PBL is applied. PBL encourages public speaking at a young age, reducing fear in future classes. Through PBL, students have their own choices and options, which gives them a sense of ownership, pride, and power. Students also learn to work in groups, cooperate, and collaborate with fellow students. PBL combines so many educational and learning styles. Students become engaged and have background knowledge when working with PBL. Teachers and parents agree that PBL has done so much for the children and improved their learning/cooperating/applying skills tremendously

Interview Movie Project 10-A

Special Blog Assignment

  For our special blog assignment, we are to choose from Dr. Heidi Hayes Jacobs' 68 resources on Curriculum21, find 6 that are particularly interesting to us or that could benefit us as teachers, and write about them.

  Museum Box allows students to build up an argument or description of an event, person, or historical period by placing items in a virtual box. You can display anything from a text file to a movie. You can also view the museum boxes submitted by other people and comment on the contents. Museum Box provides tools for collecting and presenting digital versions of primary sources. Students can use Museum Box to collect sources about historical eras, events, biographies, inventions, regions, fashions—in short about anything that can be digitally documented. For students who need help with organizing their ideas, Museum Box imposes proper structure. I like this website because I will be a history teacher, and I think this is a great way for students and teachers to categorize history for projects without becoming overwhelmed.

  270 To Win is a history of the electoral college that will engage students in both individual states and national trends right now and in past elections. Statistics and probabilities can be tracked, and this website offers an interactive map of the electoral college. You can review interactive maps for recent presidential elections and find out how battles in the Senate and House played out. There's a blog, some quizzes, and an election simulator that's connected to the most recent presidential election. Kids who already have a pretty clear understanding of how this system works will benefit from the site, but there's not a ton of explanation or kid-oriented details about the election process. This is a great site for history, government, and math teachers. This website is important because students can understand politics and understand what is going on during elections.

  World Library (WDL) is a Global library of primary resources. The WDL makes it possible to discover, study, and enjoy cultural treasures and significant historical documents on one site, in a variety of ways. Content includes: books, manuscripts, maps, newspapers, journals, prints, photographs, sound recordings, and films. WDL items can be browsed by place, time, topic, type of item, language, and contributing institution. The search feature can be used to search all of the metadata and descriptions and the full text of printed books on the site. Other features include advanced image-viewing, timelines, interactive maps, and in-depth thematic sections on selected topics.

  Pinterest is a great tool for students and teachers to share, to organize, and to focus communication through photos and downloads. This website is a GREAT way to share ideas and to collaborate. Pinterest is a place to discover ideas for all your projects and interests, hand-picked by people like you. You can create several boards, pin anything you want on any board, organize those pins, share your pins and boards with fellow pinners, and discover EVEN MORE pins! I use Pinterest DAILY! Hands down one of my favorite websites EVER!

  TEDEd allows educators to create and share lessons built around YouTube videos. With fantastic animations, TED-Ed can take even sometimes-boring subjects and transform them into wildly engaging content. You can use TED-Ed's videos and lessons to supplement almost any subject. And while it may take a bit of searching, it'll be worth it. The content is remarkable, and comes from some of the world's best minds. It has an extensive library of lessons where carefully curated educational videos are available. The platform allows users to easily create customized lessons around educational videos. One of the most powerful features that TED-Ed offers is the ability to track and measure various forms of engagement within each TED-Ed lesson over time. Students are likely to engage with it right away. I would love to use this as a teacher to aid me in setting up lesson plans!

  Remind 101 is a free, safe, easy-to-use communication tool for teachers to text students and stay in touch with parents. Teachers can instantly message their entire class. Students receive it as a text message, email, or push notification on the app. Phone numbers are always kept private so information is safe and secure. Teachers never see students’ phone numbers, and students never see theirs. Teachers, students, and parents have easy access to their message history, and can also use our reporting tools to flag conversations. Teachers save time by sending or scheduling announcements directly to students’ and parents’ phones. Remind allows you to send a message or question, watch as students and parents respond with Stamps, and summarizes feedback in a snap! I would utilize this as a teacher to be able to reach my students quickly with important information!

Project 12-A Smart Board