Point A to Point B

Category: Content Area Focus

  • Content Tech: 5th Grade ELA

    The 2007 5th Grade listening section had a very cute story about a photographer who encountered a rare lioness:

    Lion Story

    After 2 readings, the following questions were asked:

    Lion Questions

    Two of the questions have reasonably tricky distractors, and the question asking for supporting details from the story could be a stumper if not paid attention to while listening. Students are directed NOT to take notes the first time they listen – I understand why but to have them cram notes the second time only – yikes.

    Anyway – what to do, and how to support it…

    No Tech (which is how students take the test)
    Teacher reads a variety of stories of a similar nature, directing students to listen and take notes as they would on the exam.

    Some Tech
    Teacher records story using recording software (Audacity), and also has one or two other adults record the story, so students can get used to a variety of oral deliveries. Students listen and take notes as they would on the exam.

    Total Tech
    Teacher records story using recording software (Audacity) and posts it to the WITS class notes page. Using the discussion forum, students listen to story and take notes in forum as they listen. Students then review notes taken by other students to compare and gain ideas for listening cues. Teacher posts readings done by other adults as well, to provide a range of oral deliveries.

    Document and Image citation:
    Elementary/Intermediate State Assessment. New York State Education Department. 16 September 2008. <http://www.emsc.nysed.gov/osa/elintela.html>.

  • Content Tech: 8th Grade Social Studies

    In what I plan to be a new regular feature, Content Tech, we’ll look at examples in various content areas of what students are to know, and how tech may (or may not) help. For the first stop in this endeavor, we take a look at Social Studies.

    Here is a set of questions from the 2006 8th grade Social Studies exam (click the image to enlarge):

    Clearly, sorting, organizing and some level of independent thinking is required to correctly answer these questions. During the course of the year, what tools would help students think in these ways?

    No Tech

    • Students have cutouts of colonies, supplies, climate, crops, politics, religion, etc., and regularly use maps to organize them

    Some Tech

    • Using Interactive Whiteboard, students do the same as above

    Total Tech

    • Using graphic organizing software, students continually manipulate and organize geographic information about colonies as they learn about it.

    Would the use of technology drastically improve the ability of students to do well in this example?

  • Data

    Data can be awesome – as long as it is meaningful. The Dilbert comic below came out recently, and it hit home with me only because we are right now trying to determine if the data we collect for Fitnessgram is telling us what we want it to.

    Dilbert.com

  • Video Poems

    We just finished a video poem project with Mrs. Calandra’s classes. The idea came from a Creative Educator article I have on my digital storytelling page. The twist we added was to have the students put imagery to their own original poetry. I have to say I was very excited by the level of work everyone did. I hope to be able to post some of the student work here in the near future (working on the logistics/legal stuff regarding that now…)

    In the mean time, the students motivated me to create my own piece. I chose to write a reflective poem about one of my favorite books that I just re-read, Jonathan Livingston Seagull. I also wrote a little refelction on my Shelfari page about the book.

    Thanks to the students in Mrs. Calandra’s class for motivating me on this – I hope you like it. (click below to play)

    Get the Flash Player to see this content.

    Jonathan

    Dodging, swooping, yelling, screaming;
    Why don’t you stay away?
    Useless, crass, dirty, rude;
    Please GO AWAY.

    I did not see you since you were off on your
    own.
    When you soared by I thought you were
    one of the bunch.

    How is it possible we want the same things?
    What makes us so much the same although we are
    vastly different?

    PLEASE let me
    fly with you.

  • Oh, and the Other Thing Today…

    So today was one of those “sneaker days” as I call them. Running from project to project and room to room. These days are awesome…

    digitaltypewriter.jpgMrs. Leone’s 8th grade spanish class finished the first digital storytelling project for the year today. Students had to be filmed in an interview situation with a partner. The content focus is to review the important basic communication elements they have learned for the past 3 years. The medium allowed them to create their own scenario for the interview. There were some clever ideas, and the time allottment was not big at all – just 3 days of classtime for editing (including exporting/burning). More importantly are 2 things: students were on task and self-directed (motivatied and captivated) since they were working on video of their own creation; and the product is tangible and lasting – the video will exist for as long as we want it to.

    We have spawned a series of storytelling projects already this year, and I think we are going to be very happy with the results!

    Image citation:
    “Typewriter with the Word Digital.” Online image. PowerMediaPlus.com. 5 October 2007. <http://www.powermediaplus.com>

  • While We’re on the Topic of Science

    Following up immediately on the previous post, and speaking of great science teachers…

    Another lesson today was with Mr. Trombley and Mrs. Krieger (current gifted programming teacher and littlegirlreadingbook.jpg former science teacher). The three of us and another teacher are working together on our Professional Study Plans. We are in year 3 , which means we do some sort of study on improving learning. We have chosen to focus on the work of Robert Marzano and his Building Academic Vocabulary meta-research. This is a district initiative and we are using science (and math) classes to do our study.

    Today was the first time to introduce the study to the students. We administered a pretest using the CPS “clickers,” followed by a lesson on learning vocabulary with the Marzano method, taught by Mrs. Krieger. Today’s group is the “focus” group and next Tuesday is the “control” group. We will evaluate the results of the unit test to see if there is any difference in scores based on how the vocabulary is taught. Throughout this year we will be rotating the focus and control groups so all the students in the class have the same opportunities.

    Its really exciting to be able to work on projects such as this. It makes learning for everyone exciting!

    Image citation:
    “Little Girl Reading Book as Words Come off the Page.” Online image. PowerMediaPlus.com. 5 October 2007. <http://www.powermediaplus.com>

  • An Answer to the “Copy and Paste” World

    Just finished a lesson today with our excellent science teacher, Mrs. Merlino. She is starting a unit on photosynthesis, and we introduced the students to the notecard tool within NoodleBib. The notecard tool allows the students to copy and paste direct quotations from a source, and then provides scaffolding for them to put what they paste into their own words, and then create their own ideas from there. It is a straight forward process that has existed long before technology, but the simple-to-use interface and anywhere-access makes this a powerful and easy resource. Within 10 or 15 minutes of overview, we were having great conversations about the right thing – how to paraphrase, and form ideas and questions. The ease and power of this tool is great.powerful.jpg

    Man, I wish I had NoodleBib while I was in school!

    Image citation:
    “Dictionary Definition: Powerful.” Online image. PowerMediaPlus.com. 5 October 2007. <http://www.powermediaplus.com>

     

  • The Second Full Week – Just as Full

    So here it is a week since the last post, and the second full week is done. Were we ever on summer break? I can’t remember it at all now…

    Open house was Wednesday night, and I’m very pleased with how our feature video went. We have changed the format of open house a little to where we have a “spotlight” section of about 20 minutes in the middle of the night to feature something about the school. Last year we focused on our Internet Safety efforts with Netsmartz (from the National Center for Missing and Exploted Children), and our in-house website, WITS. This year we used the theme Healty Bodies = Healthy Minds to produce a video about the many ways we promote health and wellness in our building. The shooting and editing of the video was quite hectic due to the deadline, but the results were worth it.

    The second activity that started up this week is our 5th graders registering for EM Games. These online math games are part of the Everyday Math program in 5th grade. They are good reinforcement and practice for the skills they need in math. With just a few minutes of login instruction, you quickly hear students gleefully trying to win Factor Captor, Baseball Multiplication and more.

    Next week brings the start of 2 digital storytelling projects – one new one and one started last year. The following week I’m doing an inservice on digital storytelling which I think is going to spawn many more projects. Should be quite fun.

    Note – this is my first post using ScribeFire, and it appears to work great – thanks to Chris at On the Trails for the idea!

    Powered by ScribeFire.

  • Visual Thesaurus

    I just completed the final set of extra work hours for my school – they are still a ridiculous paperwork nightmare for everyone, but they continue to provide focused time for study and reflection.

    I spent today with the work of Robert Marzano, specifically on his research into building adacademic backround knowlege and academic vocabulary. I’m working on how technology tools can support this approach.

    ani-book.gifThere are many ideas that are going on in my head, but the one that stands out that I want to investigate is the Visual Thesaurus. This tool, best described by just going to the site and trying it, puts words and their definitions in a whole new visual context. It’s is a pay-for site, so it will necessary to work with it and see if it is worth it. I remember first being introduced to this site a couple of years ago at NECC, and I think its time to revisit and really get a handle on its use.

    This puts a whole new spin (pun intended – you’ll know what I mean if you try the site) on learning words and relationships of words. Go there, and enjoy!!!

    Clip art licensed from the Clip Art Gallery on DiscoverySchool.com.

  • Learning Toolbox

    Everyone has a toolbox in the garage/basement/kitchen/wherever. It contains key tools to perform necessary tasks around the house. The digital learning toolbox is the equivalent in the realm of schools. What tools do we have access to right now that will perform the necessary tasks to “build” learning?

    1. WITS (classroom communication)
    2. NoodleTools (citation creation/management and notetaking)
    3. EdVideo Online (graphics/movies)

    These are broad tools that apply to anyone. There are many more digital tools out there to support the various subjects. What digital tool(s) do you have or want in your toolbox?

    WITS Logo

    NoodleTools Logo

    EdVideo Logo