Monday, August 25, 2014
Sunday, June 8, 2014
Technology, Methods, and ME!!!
So, my website is located at: http://www.mrsbsworld.com/triangulartools.html
I had originally coded the site in ETEC 500 and have been adding to it off and on throughout the course of the school year. I added the section that the link above takes you to as part of my project for ETEC 644, but the component that I completed for my final project for this class was the closed captioning/subtitles/why do I talk so fast to my how to solve videos. The videos to which I added captioning are all 3 sine videos, tangent video 2, and the 30-60-90 special right triangle video.
Things I learned from this process:
1) I talk TOO fast. I was trying to speak slowly in the videos. Yeah, go ahead and:
2) Technology saves SO MUCH time... when you know how to actually use it.
The videos that I captioned show a progression. If you watch the tangent video, the 30-60-90 and the second sine video, you'll see one type of captioning. I did all of this screen by screen checking the timing and putting in my own annotation text boxes. I shall confine myself to say that this took an excessive amount of time. Then, I somehow magically got the add captions selection to work in camtasia. (I had previously tried and it was shaded out so that I didn't have access.) I captioned that video MUCH more quickly and went to add captions to the last sine video and couldn't match what I had done at first. I'm pretty sure that it has something to do with selecting the recording in some particular way. I'll play with it more later but for now, stop changing the Google on me!
3) This is not the sort of process that you can complete on your own in an hour or two to make really nice, high quality videos. There are issues with phrasing in my videos. There are issues with background noises (a special "shout out" to my darling children, darling husband and Hiccup, the dog...). There are locations in my video where a letter just magically disappears, where did it go? I think it's with all the socks...
These are the real things that take time, know how, and a crazy amount of effort to erase either through re-recording or more technology know how than I have currently. Don't get me wrong, my videos aren't bad; I just can't help but watch them and find detail after detail that makes me want to cover my eyes.
4) This process of video creation is something that I want to bring into my own classroom practice. Ha ha students! Look at what I had to go through and now you do, too! No, that's not why. I just have seen the ways I could have perfected the language, planned more, been more specific, built more structure, I could go on but I think that I have made my point. In having my students create videos, I will be affording them the time to really focus their attention and refine something. I am looking forward to exploring some of the free extensions on my google chrome books with my students (we video and pic monkey to name a few) to bring their learning to the next level.
Thanks for everything this quarter Dr. Newberry!
Michelle
Sunday, June 1, 2014
Session 9 - I have confirmation that Dr. Newberry is a mind reader!
In applying the skills we have been learning to my own class, I have been considering many of the very things that Dr. Newberry has asked for us to type about this week. Therefore, I must conclude that he is not using the weak spell Legilimens to read my thoughts, we must have entered into a full on Vulcan, wait for it, MindMeld!!!
All kidding aside, thank you for asking questions which give me additional time to really consider the application in my own classroom.
To begin with, I am borrowing Dr. Newberry’s rubric
for grading the blog posts (THANKS Dr. Newberry!) and I intend to revise as
necessary to inspire the best work from my students. I also intend to have an
in class unit in which we discuss netiquette for both their published work and
also for their interaction with other students. (From my trial run of blogging
with my current set of AP Stats students, I have found that many lack an
academic register when typing for the Internet because they had never
considered aught else. They need to learn to distinguish from their typical social media posting style.
All kidding aside, thank you for asking questions which give me additional time to really consider the application in my own classroom.
1. Identify
three different technologies that support discussions in online classes.
Describe each technology in terms of its ability to support worthwhile and
rewarding discussions.
Technology #1: Schoology Discussion Forum
The Schoology Discussion Forum as seen below allows
for students to have student-to-student interaction. While students could
conceivably be online at the same time and posting back and forth in real time,
this ideally situated as an asynchronous discussion technology that allows each
individual student to engage with the question and with each other in a
blackboard style setting. The ability to work at any time and from any location
(Schoology even has smartphone apps from which students may engage), edit their
work and consider the posts of others work together to promote quality
discussion from all students.
Technology #2: Blog Responses to Questions
Like the Schoology discussion forums, blogs (google
or otherwise) allow for student to engage student-to-student and
student-to-content asynchronously so that students can work in their own time
and place of most comfort. Unlike the Schoology discussion forum, the blog of
each individual is housed wherever they keep their blog. But, if like Dr.
Newberry, an instructor keeps a list of links with the blog of each student
attached available, students can readily navigate from blog to blog to interact
with their fellow students. The benefits of the blog over the discussion is
that the individual contributions of each student are kept more visibly
distinct so that each person is able to maintain their own, more distinct,
discussion on their page.
Technology #3: Google Docs – Comments and/or Chat
Finally, a third and final technology for discussions
would be Google Docs. Google Docs have both an option for commenting and/or
chat amongst members with whom the document is shared. The greatest benefit to
this particular technology is that while it works very nicely as an
asynchronous discussion area (anyone with document access is able to show a
revisions history to see what has been done and when) with particular areas
highlighted with comments (or not) by contributors, it has the added advantage
of working nicely as a synchronous technology via chat should group members so
desire.
2. Describe
an eLearning context (type of class, students, and specific content) where you
would advocate the use of an online discussion. Identify the technology you
would use to facilitate the discussion.
I have already been working to pull together the
online aspect of my AP Statistics course for the upcoming 2014-2015 school
year. As stated, the course is AP Statistics, which means that it is a college
level class in Statistics (not calculus based). The 89 students enrolled in the
course are predominantly self-motivated seniors, but there exists a handful of
juniors and even a sophomore or two. The online aspect of this course (from
what I have discerned through informal interviews) will be relatively new to
these students, though many have worked with blogs in English or history or
both over the course of the past school year.
I discovered last year that my AP Stats students were
NOT well-equipped to read the college level text and discern that which was
important from that which was less critical, nor were they proficient or
persistent in seeking sources to illuminate the topics they did not understand.
It is for the purpose of helping them to read, understand, and interact with
the text, their classmates, and myself that I am choosing to use discussion
with these students.
As shown above in either the blog picture or google
docs picture, my students (very like what we do for this class) have a series
of question with which they need to engage for each chapter through a blog post.
They will answer these questions with the help of the text and outside sources
from their own vantage point and then visit at least 3 other blogs and either
leave feedback or ask questions which demonstrate the extension of their
learning.
3. Describe
how you would plan for the discussion described in question 2. For example, how
would you prepare students for the discussion, structure associated
presentations, plan other activities that students be doing along with the
discussion, and how you would ensure that the student workload was balanced and
appropriate.
To prepare for the aforementioned blog discussion,
students will read the weekly assigned readings. As I am just beginning to
start with this application in my coursework, students will primarily engage
with the text. In the long run, I’d like to add videos, powerpoints/prezis,
articles, etc. to add dimension to the material and support any weak points or
add extensions to the chapters to guarantee quality student preparation.
The blog questions for each chapter will be posted
(along with the due date and rubric) on the schoology website. Students have
already come to an informational lunch time meeting with me where they were 1)
walked through the Schoology website, 2) shown how to use the calendar to keep
track of due dates, 3) shown how to access the questions for each blog and 4)
shown the organization of the folders so that they know where their assignment
papers, etc. are housed.
Last year, I assigned more practice problems from the
book to give the students assigned, structured time to engage with the
material. I have reduced the number of assigned problems as the blog questions
allow the students the structured time to engage with the application of the
vocabulary in a much more fluid and dynamic manner, those questions have been
stricken from the assignment to allow the students time to actually read and
complete their blog.
4. Develop
a set of guidelines or policies that you would give to students to help them
engage successfully in the discussion.
 |
| The merged social media of the future where no one has to split their time... |
As with my rubric, my netiquette guidelines will be
something I start with and expect to modify to suit the needs of my students
and myself over time. I rather liked these heavily stolen from Boise State:
Be respectful!
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Be polite!
|
Be open-minded!
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Don’t argue!
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No complaining!
|
Write properly!
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Spell Correctly!
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Avoid slang!
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No lol’s!
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No cursing!
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Show pride!
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No advertising!
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Don’t gossip!
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Don’t spam!
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Be fair!
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1) Exercise Proper
Manners
We
all know the golden rule for how to treat others and that is how you want to be
treated. It is normal to disagree, as we all perceive things based on our
experiences, influences and reasoning skills. You may be wrong about your ideas
sometimes and right about them at other times. In fact, there may be no right
or wrong answer in some contexts. Also, choose your words carefully as online
communications are easily misinterpreted. Please be objective and understanding
of other's input at all times. If you don't have anything nice to communicate
then don't communicate at all.
2) Control Your
Emotions
We
all have bad days - it's a part of life. Everyone is dealing with unique circumstances
in their life, both good and bad. Sometimes it is difficult to control your
emotions. However, online communications is not the appropriate arena to
display negative feelings and ideas. Often, the emotions that consume us are
temporary - our good will and better judgment prevails and our feelings change
once again. Don't make the mistake of communicating your feelings online, only
to later regret it. Once you communicate something in writing it becomes
permanent and easily distributed to many. Control your emotions in online
communications and avoid the embarrassing consequences.
3) Be Professional
Remember that first and foremost, every single thing you
write or produce in this class is tended towards producing success on the AP
Stats test and in college in years to come. When communicating online, it is important to write in a way
that can be easily understood. Be careful not to write in the manner in which
you speak. Verbal communication offers simultaneous, two-way interaction that
enables misunderstandings to be resolved in real-time. Online communications
does not afford us the opportunity to clarify our thoughts instantly. A lot of
productivity can be lost in online communications as we wait on responses for
clarity. For this reason, it is important to form sentences properly and avoid
misspelled words. Also, avoid the use of slang and short-cut acronyms, as
others may not be familiar with such words or phrases. Cursing is absolutely
prohibited. Take pride in your writing and how you represent yourself. Choosing
not to be professional may create a negative reflection of your work and
character.
4) Do Not Spam
Online
communications offer the ability to broadcast a message instantly to many
people, thus it is a popular way of communicating upcoming events, news and
promotions. Although it may be convenient for some people, spamming in general
is considered a bad practice. Spamming is unsolicited communication and is
neither appropriate nor fair to those who did not express an interest in
receiving such messages. It is opportunistic behavior that offers nothing to
the academic foundation in which these online communications services are
intended for. Please do not waste your time and other's time communicating
anything that is not relevant to the content in which you are required to learn
5) Don’t Over Do It
Online
communication is not intended to replace traditional forms of communication.
There will always be situations that warrant verbal dialogue. If there is
something you don't understand that is complex in nature, it may be appropriate
to go to your teacher or seek the support of other students. Do not spend a lot
of time typing a message that is long and detailed - it wastes your time and
the recipient's time. Also, it is not appropriate to copy and paste large
amounts of text inside the body of a message. Please place large text,
including graphics, in another document and attach it to your message.
Following this simple rule allows messages, particularly messages with many
replies, to be navigated and read more easily.
5.
Describe and/or develop a system for assessing
student participation and learning in the discussion.
As previously stated, I intend to start the year
using Dr. Newberry’s own rubric for grading our discussion posts as seen below:
Each blog post is worth up to 10 points according to the
following:
10 points: Post is
made before required deadline, is well written, and appropriately addresses
any topics raised by the instructor or discovered through your own
investigation of course-related topics, response may include the use of
graphics, images and/or links to information related to the topics of the
course that bring quality content into the course environment.
8 - 9 points: Post is
made before required deadline, is well written and adequately addresses any
topics raised by the instructor or your own investigation into course-related
topics.
0 - 7 points: Post is
made late and/or the post is poorly written or inadequately addresses course
related topics.
|
As this is a new teaching methodology for me, I would
like to work into is slowly. Over the course of the summer, the students will
learn to work the blog and how to interact with the text and material in such a
way as to learn the material from the readings and additional resources.
Once we return to school in August, I have slated
time to work with the students (via the Chromebook cart that is being added to
my classroom) to develop an understanding of how to leave meaningful feedback
for their classmates. (I really do NOT want to read, variations of good job or
nice work over and over again as it, I am sure, becomes frustrating and often
is not true.) I would like to work with the students to develop a framework for
what constitutes good questions, feedback comments and responses so that they
have a) considered it thoroughly, b) understand why the framework is what is
and c) take ownership.
6. How
would you prepare the instructor for participating in the discussion?
As the instructor, I will work to model quality feedback,
questions, etc. to the students through the first two blogs, which the students
will be completing over the summer. Additionally, I need to make sure that I am
prepared to find or create additional materials to answer questions that I have
not anticipated in both the content and creation of their work. Finally, as the
instructor, I need to be prepared to help students grow to meet the guidelines
of posting over time as they are all relatively new to the online classroom
environment.
Final Project
I am still working to record, caption and, sadly, reshoot the "how-to" videos of my triangular tools website. This worked out nicely as my students said they'd like the videos captioned in my formative evaluation with them.
I have been struggling with whether or not I should just use a weekly type site to set up my site or continue to code it myself. On the one hand my current site is obviously home created and lacks professional polish, but on the other, I like having complete control and access to my site. More to come in the future!
Michelle
Final Project
I am still working to record, caption and, sadly, reshoot the "how-to" videos of my triangular tools website. This worked out nicely as my students said they'd like the videos captioned in my formative evaluation with them.
I have been struggling with whether or not I should just use a weekly type site to set up my site or continue to code it myself. On the one hand my current site is obviously home created and lacks professional polish, but on the other, I like having complete control and access to my site. More to come in the future!
Michelle
Sunday, May 25, 2014
Annotated Bibliography and Final Project Ideas - (Reverse)^2
Final Project Ideas
First and foremost, I'd like to say that the quarters I've completed thus far in the program have furnished me with a WEALTH of ideas from which to choose as I begin to mentally prepare major adjustments for my instruction with my students in the upcoming 2014-2015 school year and while I do have these ideas, I find myself most strongly pulled to my AP Stats class (in comparison to my geometry classes) as I feel that this is an audience a) more ready to take on the challenges inherent in embracing online learning for the first time (more motivated group, they're older and have had more time to learn to juggle school and other considerations and also have had more technology in education experience) and b) it is the smaller of the 2 groups (2 sections of 85ish students total versus 3 sections of 115ish students total) so it makes it easier on the instructor (I really like this chick; she's a hard worker, but deserves the time to make mistakes and learn from them with a more forgiving group...).
While I wish I had time for both of the first two options and the third and will, likely, end up completing all 3, I know myself too well. The second option, develop a course outline, is the one that I really NEED to do, but I won't be able to complete it well enough for myself to be satisfied with what I'd have to turn in at the end. The full year course of AP stats and the interactions I'd like to work into the course are percolating in my mind and already (some of them, summer homework here we come!) coming to fruition. What I need most is to complete it over the course of a year so I can adjust as I see and learn from the mistakes that I've made with my students. (I've already started formatting my class with the Schoology LMS for next year from previous investigation we did.)
Therefore, ultimately, I think I'll be combining my project from ETEC 644 with the work for this class final. For my ETEC 644 project I am working to build (SLOWLY and over MUCH TIME) a website that my students can visit and interact with to better understand how to choose from and apply the various triangular tools they learn over the course of the year in high school Geometry. (triangle angle sum theorem, pythagorean theorem, sine, cosine, tangent, sine inverse, cosine inverse, tangent inverse, 30-60-90 special right, 45-45-90 special right, law of sines and law of cosines)
My project will be the work of making each of these presentations high quality and ADA compatible (something which I had previously planned to "wimp out" on...) So, at the end of my final project for both I'll have diagrams for students to choose from and practice, and how to solve videos that are both captioned in and of themselves, but that also have text documents of the transcript from each video.
I would love to hear from you all with any feedback you have to make this project better because I want it to be AMAZING for my students.
Have a great one!
Michelle
Annotated Bibliography
First and foremost, I'd like to say that the quarters I've completed thus far in the program have furnished me with a WEALTH of ideas from which to choose as I begin to mentally prepare major adjustments for my instruction with my students in the upcoming 2014-2015 school year and while I do have these ideas, I find myself most strongly pulled to my AP Stats class (in comparison to my geometry classes) as I feel that this is an audience a) more ready to take on the challenges inherent in embracing online learning for the first time (more motivated group, they're older and have had more time to learn to juggle school and other considerations and also have had more technology in education experience) and b) it is the smaller of the 2 groups (2 sections of 85ish students total versus 3 sections of 115ish students total) so it makes it easier on the instructor (I really like this chick; she's a hard worker, but deserves the time to make mistakes and learn from them with a more forgiving group...).
While I wish I had time for both of the first two options and the third and will, likely, end up completing all 3, I know myself too well. The second option, develop a course outline, is the one that I really NEED to do, but I won't be able to complete it well enough for myself to be satisfied with what I'd have to turn in at the end. The full year course of AP stats and the interactions I'd like to work into the course are percolating in my mind and already (some of them, summer homework here we come!) coming to fruition. What I need most is to complete it over the course of a year so I can adjust as I see and learn from the mistakes that I've made with my students. (I've already started formatting my class with the Schoology LMS for next year from previous investigation we did.)
Therefore, ultimately, I think I'll be combining my project from ETEC 644 with the work for this class final. For my ETEC 644 project I am working to build (SLOWLY and over MUCH TIME) a website that my students can visit and interact with to better understand how to choose from and apply the various triangular tools they learn over the course of the year in high school Geometry. (triangle angle sum theorem, pythagorean theorem, sine, cosine, tangent, sine inverse, cosine inverse, tangent inverse, 30-60-90 special right, 45-45-90 special right, law of sines and law of cosines)
My project will be the work of making each of these presentations high quality and ADA compatible (something which I had previously planned to "wimp out" on...) So, at the end of my final project for both I'll have diagrams for students to choose from and practice, and how to solve videos that are both captioned in and of themselves, but that also have text documents of the transcript from each video.
I would love to hear from you all with any feedback you have to make this project better because I want it to be AMAZING for my students.
Have a great one!
Michelle
Annotated Bibliography
Citation:
Eseryl, D., Law,
V. Ifenthaler, D., Xun, G., & Miller, R. (2014). An Investigation of the
Interrelationships
between Motivation, Engagement, and Complex Problem Solving in Game-based
Learning. Journal of Educational
Technology & Society, 17(1), 42-53.
Summary:
The purpose of this study was to
investigate how the connections between complex problem solving, motivation,
and engagement in the context of game-based learning could be used to guide
future studies and instructional design efforts surrounding game-based
learning. The previously completed research was summed up by the authors as,
“games are problems being solved by players [and games are engaging]; therefore
playing games will help [and motivate] people be better problem solvers (p.42).”
The researchers hypothesized that
the following factors would have a positive effect on students’ engagement: a)
degree of interest, b) student’s perceived competence, c) perceived autonomy,
d) relatedness, and e) self-efficacy for the tasks during game play.
Additionally, the researchers made a second hypothesis assuming that the
students’ engagement and prior ability to address a complex problem would have
a positive effect of his/her ability to address a complex problem.
Researchers concluded that degree of
interest and student’s perceived competence actually negatively predicted
engagement as students lost interest fairly quickly (when comparing the game to
commercial products), but continued with high engagement as it was the only
required course activity. They also concluded that perceived autonomy and
relatedness had no impact on student engagement for good or ill. Researchers
were, however, able to conclude that self-efficacy did have a positive impact
on engagement and that engagement and prior ability to address a complex
problem did have a positive effect on their future ability to address a complex
problem.
Review:
While the researchers were, unfortunately, unable to
use the results of the experiment to support many of their hypotheses in regards
to engagement, the paper is noteworthy in that the researchers were among the
first to move to address the lack of literature concerned with empirically
validating generally accepted, though untested suppositions in regards to
game-based learning. Instructional designers need to, whenever possible, base
their work in researched methods to help instructors (whether the designer is
the instructor or not) help their students engage with the material in methods
that will bring the greatest positive change in learning; this study allows for
designers to now conclude that, unsurprisingly, it is important to sustain
student motivation over time during gameplay in game-based learning.
Citation:
Downes,
J. M., & Bishop, P. (2012, May). Educators engage digital natives and learn
from their experiences with technology. Middle School Journal, 6-15.
Summary:
The purpose of this study was to
illustrate the engagement of middle grades students’ in a technology-rich AND
student-centered classroom environment. The main focus of the paper was to
highlight the attributes of the technology integration that, from the
perspective of the students, were most engaging. These elements were:
reliability for students, accessibility (in a range from students with skill to
students with learning gaps), organization that becomes possible with digital
access, and the ease of collaboration when Web 2.0 tools are used.
Additionally,
the authors reviewed the implementation of school-wide technology programs and
the components necessary for success when undertaking such a large venture.
Unsurprisingly, educators who were in an environment with a school culture of
trust and collaboration were more willing to take a leap into the gap of the
unknown when working to implement technology in the classroom because it
constitutes a risk for teachers when they strive to radically alter their
teaching to incorporate these tools on a regular basis in a successful way. Finally, in the implementation of
school wide technology programs, the authors found there to be two factors
which contributed most to building that school culture of trust and
collaboration for teachers. The first factor was that you had to have teachers
who were willing to take the risk and spend the time and effort to radically
alter their style. The second factor was having school-site and/or
district-level leaders who are committed to finding funds for the endeavor and
who are willing to make time for ongoing and embedded professional development.
Review:
As the implementation of the
common core state standards (CCSS) gets closer and closer to full
implementation (we go full bore with the 2014-2015 school year), the
discussions around implementation of technology in the classroom environment
have shifted from a focus of questions like: could you try? have you
considered? perhaps, someday, you might incorporate… to questions like: what
technology are you incorporating in your classroom? Or how have you prepared
students for the new testing environment?
This is especially true for the mathematics and English classrooms as it
is our two subjects that have full implementation of the common core next year.
With that
in mind, I found this article to be particularly helpful to me as the co-lead
of my department. This coming year, each teacher in my math department will be
given a cart of chrome books to use in their classroom environment on a daily
basis. This article serves as an important reminder to myself and the
leadership in any school environment that we need to make sure we are
structuring collaboration time and working to make teachers as comfortable and
prepared as possible or we’re going to be missing both components of the two
most important factors for transformational success.
Citation:
O'Sullivan,
M. K., & Dallas, K. B. (2010). A Collaborative approach to implementing
21st Century skills in a High school senior research class. Education
Libraries , 33 (1), 3-9.
Summary:
The idea for the study was founded when
a spate of other, recent studies claimed that high school students are
graduating without the necessary basic skills needed to be successful in
college or at work. While the authors found no consensus among postsecondary
institutes as to what skills are required to consider a student as “ready”, the
purpose of their study was to offer one example, a high school research paper
class, of how a class can be designed and structured to give high school
students a structured opportunity to experience what college level research and
writing entails.
The study
details the work done by one English teacher as she partnered with the library
media specialist. They worked to teach seniors about the available technology
to research from day one. Areas of focus included the ways in which a question
can be revised to mapping the connections of an idea to other subject areas to
finding support for the ideas that they have about a topic in general.
Review:
Once again,
this article is of interest to those at the high school level as they work to
transition to the common core state standards. The CCSS were put together to
help teachers answer the question of what it truly means to be college and
career ready and to also map out how teachers can build these skills from year
to year, expanding on that which the students mastered the previous year in a
clearly defined, almost yearly linear progression. This article is a resource
to those interested in seeing an example; it serves as a starting off point for
ideas. Additionally, I have personally found the article useful as I am working
to retool aspects of my AP Stats class to include more outside application and
research on the part of the students. I would like for them to be able to research
and find papers detailing studies and experiments and report back on what they
have found in regards to statistical quality.
Citation:
Watson, J. A., &
Pecchioni, L. L. (2011). Digital natives and digital media in the college
classroom: assignment design and impacts on student learning. Educational
Media International , 48 (4), 307-320.
Summary:
The purpose
of this article was to share the learning experience over time of a group of
instructors of health communication as they explored an assignment and how it
motivated students to interact with both each other and with the content in a
meaningful way. The instructors assigned students to groups (or in the third
year had them assign themselves to groups) and had them choose a topic of
interest on which to create a documentary. The instructors had a variety of
assignments over the course of the 16-week semester from watching and analyzing
a professional documentary as a group to teaching them how to shoot different
camera angles to requiring them to pull together a 2-minute edited clip to form
a basis of understanding on the amount of time editing a video for quality
really takes. The remainder of the paper details the flow of the project
development over the course of the semester and through that detailed flow the
growth of the project over the course of the three years.
Review:
“Often new media and digital
technologies are either demonized or viewed as the panacea for curriculum ills
(p.307).” (Watson & Pecchioni, 2011) This was one of my favorite quotes
from the article because I have feared too much administrators favoring one or
the other end of this spectrum. If I have learned anything over the course of
the ETEC program, it has been that technology is not the cure all or the evil;
it is merely a tool as so many other things and needs to be considered in the
light of the instructional needs of the students. As stated by the authors,
they took the student-centered approach in designing their documentary
assignment and kept their focus on what would most engage students with each
other and the material; a technology-centered approach is bound to fail because
it doesn’t view the needs of the students as paramount.
Citation:
Gunn, T. M., & Hollingsworth, M. (2013).
The Implementation and Assessment of a Shared 21st Century Learning Vision: A
District-Based Approach. Journal of Research
on Technology in Education, 45 (3), 201-228.
Summary:
The purpose of this study was to detail the process one district took
as they strived to increase the implementation of technology throughout the
district. Working with a university, they founded their strategy of technology
implementation and “up-ramping” in the existing research on successful change
within a system. The ultimate district change design called for substantial
professional development (100+hours over the course of a single year) and used
a system of surveys and response to measure the change in everything from attitudes
to integration of software on a 1 to 5 Likert scale.
The
strongest trends found in the district were 1) older groups of teachers (the
groups as young as the 41+ group on up) were least confident in their abilities
regardless of their extensive training and 2) the more professional development
hours dedicated to information technologies, the better acceptance and efficacy
felt/observed by teachers.
Review:
This
article makes an interesting and applicable read for any individual, at any
level, involved in a district or university-wide push for technology change.
Once more, with the common core standards being fully implemented in my subject
in the following year, one of my jobs as lead will be to make sure that my
teachers have the time, development and support of the admin and district level
team to work to learn, apply, and adapt to all aspects of including technology
in the classroom. Being aware of these needs is the first step to actually
fulfilling them and I take this role seriously.
Saturday, May 17, 2014
Week 7 - Alternate Assignment
Still, I found the process to be INCREDIBLY rewarding and I look forward to the creation of more videos (over a LENGTHY timeframe) for use in my classroom both by myself and my students. The piece that has bothered me the most since the creation of my first set of how to videos at the start of first semester (for my students) this year was the lack of subtitles. As a visual person, reading the words while hearing them has ALWAYS helped me to increase what I take away and I imagine the same is true for many others.
I had originally tried to take my old video and import it to imovie so that I could add subtitles, but that was a hot mess. I then found camtasia(the pay to play service like my good old friend jing) which was an upgrade because it allowed me to a) add subtitles on top of my screen recorded loveliness and b) allowed me to save it in formats other than swf (the only one allowed by jing). To make it even better they gave me a free 30-day trial! Yay for free!!!
I then thought to just play my old video and record it using camtasia, wham, bam, thank you ma'am done video (once subtitles were added). I even went so far as to try to use my Mac's speech to text function. This is what it gave me:
Scissors
You basically all gratin café or Wednesday which is
Dilmus.com/Clear now is the sandwich in the three functions that you want okay
so I’m actually look first
Function
This is what I actually said:
Ok, so the first thing you want to do is to go the online
graphing calculator website which is demsos.com/calculator. OK. Now what you want to do
is decide which of the 3 functions that you are going to look at.
Then I started to really watch and listen to my old video and I HATED it. All these this's and it's... Where was the specificity? Ugh.
So then I rewrote the script, made it more general. It's really hard to be informal when you're typing everything out, but it makes it better for the viewer, so... enjoy!
I'd appreciate any feedback. I may actually buy Camtasia to use in the future and would like to actually use this video for this project again next year. If you're interested in reading about the project, then please click here. I apologize in advance that some of the equation pieces (like parentheses) are missing.
Cheers,
Michelle
Monday, May 5, 2014
Week 6 - How you doin'?
Blog 6 Assessment vs. Evaluation – How are they different?
1.
What is the difference between assessment and evaluation?
According to
the readings set us this week by Dr. Newberry, the main difference between
assessment and evaluation is that evaluation carries a judgment of quality,
establishment of value or worth along with communication about the significance
of the student performance.
In searching
for additional documentation, I found this explanation from Duke
University that generally meshes with what Dr. Newberry said. The one big
difference here was that to them, assessment was not graded.
In my own
practice, I have found assessment to jive strongly with Dr. Newberry’s
definitions with the following additions/modifications:
1)
I am ALWAYS in assessment mode; the same cannot be said of evaluation.
(I am very careful to develop this understanding amongst my students because
most feel judged the moment they enter math class.)
2)
I may or may not grade assessment pieces; it will depend entirely on the
task at hand. This will even vary to the extent that what is graded in one
class may not be graded in another with the same class title.
2.
What are the challenges to assessment and evaluation in eLearning?
The greatest challenges to
assessment and evaluation in eLearning, to me personally, are 1) being able to
guarantee that the work done was actually a product created by the student
being evaluated and 2) being able to guarantee that the student is able to
successfully complete the necessary work without external aid (notes, books,
Internet queries, etc.) as math is (unfortunately) incredibly performance
based. While there is certainly an argument to be made that we live in an age
of easy reference, they still need to internalize certain skills.
3.
Explain the possible use of an online portfolio in eLearning.
An online portfolio might be best used in an
eLearning situation when students are required to complete a number of
individual and team projects. Through the progression of the course, students
have an opportunity to build and include a) examples of their work, b)
self-evaluations, c) peer evaluations, and d) evaluations completed by the
instructor to build a case and show what they have learned and whether they
have met the course objectives.
Three benefits of an
online portfolio in eLearning are:
1)
A nicely built portfolio allows students to showcase work from various
career stages in addition to obtaining reference information,
2)
Portfolio assessment more closely mirrors the type of evaluation
students will see in the workplace and prepares them for this eventuality, and
3)
Portfolio assessment lends itself more readily to the type of work that
students must produce themselves, not copy from the Internet or peers.
I think the
most important phrase used by the author of our text was when she characterized
the use of portfolios being best in a student-centered learning environment.
This portfolio idea would not work well with much of what you see in a
traditional math classroom. Trying to have each student complete the same worksheet
with the same tired, old problems would not make for high quality portfolios.
4.
Identify at least two ways to measure student participation in an online
class and explain how you think these methods can factor into the students'
grade in the course.
Method 1: If using a portfolio in the class, one
way to measure student participation would be to have a rubric for grading the
quality of the portfolio. A grade is assigned for the quality of each portfolio
item, the organization of the portfolio, and for the overall quality of the
entire portfolio according to a Numeric Grading Scale like the one below:
10 Excellent
Quality Work
·
Far exceeds course requirements
·
Demonstrates superior effort
·
Course content mastery
|
8—9 Good
Quality Work
·
Exceeds course requirements
·
Demonstrates commendable effort
·
Good course content knowledge
|
6—7
Acceptable Quality Work
·
Meets course requirements
·
Demonstrates acceptable effort
·
Acceptable course content knowledge
|
0—5
Unacceptable Quality Work
·
Fails to meet course requirements
·
Incomplete or unacceptable effort
·
Poor course content knowledge
|
Since my first class, I have really appreciated Dr.
Newberry’s rubric scale of grading our weekly participation within the
framework of our engagement with the material and each other. While I am not
sure it would motivate every one of my students, the differentiation between
the 10 (perfect score) and the 8-9 good quality work pushes me to delve deeper
into the material and engagement than I might otherwise because I want the top
score. As the expectations are clear to students they can work to achieve at
their desired level and impact their grade in that way.
Method 2: Self-evaluation of their performance in
the course – team project. Having students answer a question like, “What is the
most important thing you contributed throughout the course of this project?”
allows students to synthesize the work that they have completed; what they
share as their most important take away allows you to see what they truly
learned over the course of the project and evaluate their contributions to the
team as a whole.
When combined with peer-evaluations and the
components of the work that the team pulled together over the course of the
project, this component of the grade makes for an additional fair way to assess
participation.
5.
Define peer evaluation and describe its advantages and disadvantages.
Peer
evaluation: a structured process by which students participating in the same
course evaluate alone, in pairs, or in teams the work of another student or set
of students.
One of the
advantages of peer evaluation is that peer evaluators often have more time to
give quality feedback. (This is especially helpful when the class size is
large. Yay for me as I have 85 students in my AP stats class next year… 3
cheers for peer evaluation!)
Hip, hip, hooray! Hip, hip, hooray! Hip, hip, hooray!
Peer reviews, especially when structured in the online environment, allow students to take their time and put together thoughtful, well-articulated feedback.
Disadvantages of peer evaluation arise when it is structured into
teamwork as many times, students object strongly to any part of their grade
being determined by the work of another.
6.
Describe a possible group assignment for an online class and explain how
to evaluate student performance in the group assignment.
Assignment for
AP Statistics:
Consider what
we have studied in regards to evaluating data sets both in isolation and in
comparison to one another. You are going to write the lead story in a newspaper
on a topic of your choice. With your teammates, you will collect a minimum of
two real sets of data that you will present in both diagram form and interpret
for the reader. It’s your job to convince the reader that a) the topic matters
to them, b) the topic is newsworthy and c) that it is presented in a way that
they understand the applications of the data to themselves and/or their family
members. Be sure to cite the sources of your real data in your write up. All
diagrams should be professional quality, remember they are the main source of
the data trends of which you are trying to convince your readers.
You will be
evaluated on the final product, the quality of the writing, relevance of the
data chosen, and the creativity of presentation.
Additionally,
each team member will fill out a self-evaluation and a peer evaluation.
Your
self-evaluation will answer the question: what did you contribute to the
success of the group? Rate your work according to the rubric below:
10 Excellent
Quality Work
·
Far exceeds course requirements
·
Demonstrates superior effort
·
Course content mastery
|
8—9 Good
Quality Work
·
Exceeds course requirements
·
Demonstrates commendable effort
·
Good course content knowledge
|
6—7
Acceptable Quality Work
·
Meets course requirements
·
Demonstrates acceptable effort
·
Acceptable course content knowledge
|
0—5
Unacceptable Quality Work
·
Fails to meet course requirements
·
Incomplete or unacceptable effort
·
Poor course content knowledge
|
Your
peer-evaluation will answer the question: what did each of your group members
contribute to the success of the group? Rate the work of each teammate
according to the rubric below:
10 Excellent
Quality Work
·
Far exceeds course requirements
·
Demonstrates superior effort
·
Course content mastery
|
8—9 Good
Quality Work
·
Exceeds course requirements
·
Demonstrates commendable effort
·
Good course content knowledge
|
6—7
Acceptable Quality Work
·
Meets course requirements
·
Demonstrates acceptable effort
·
Acceptable course content knowledge
|
0—5
Unacceptable Quality Work
·
Fails to meet course requirements
·
Incomplete or unacceptable effort
·
Poor course content knowledge
|
7.
Create an online test.
Go to http://quizstar.4teachers.org , create a student account and
search for the class name “AP Stats – Period 3”. I am listed under Michelle
Romanek-Beyronneau and it’s a sample quiz for title. For your convenience I
have screen captured the quiz image below:
8.
Create a rubric or other grading aide for an online assignment.
One of the most challenging aspects of the AP exam is the
face that each of the distractors from the correct answer is SO well thought
out. One of the key skills that I need to develop in my students is the ability
to evaluate each of the available answers and understand where they may be
coming from. This short answer quiz will be graded according to the following
rubric:
1 – correct identification of an incorrect answer; poor or
incorrect reasoning/argument/explanation for choice
2 – correct identification of an incorrect answer; weak reasoning/argument/explanation
for choice
3 – correct identification of an incorrect answer;
moderately well reasoned argument/explanation for choice
4 – correct identification of an incorrect answer; exemplary
argument/explanation for choice
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