noredink.com

Today I watched a webinar about a new free resource for teachers called No Red Ink. It was so interesting! Normally I think anything having to do with grammar is extremely boring, but I can really see this working in classrooms.

To start off, the moderator talked about all the obstacles that teachers encounter when trying to grade papers--teachers see so many grammar mistakes that they feel they must correct that they are not able to address higher order thinking in their students' papers. I really hadn't thought about this before...but it is true. He also mentioned how time consuming it is to correct student grammar, and the fact that it proves to be rather ineffective (because kids see their paper marked up but do not have a chance to practice their grammar skills). Even though I have not graded very many papers in my lifetime (being relatively young and a preservice teacher) I can imagine that it gets very frustrating seeing students making the same mistakes over and over again. This website, No Red Ink, is a space where teachers can send students to practice grammar. Students can go online to practice their grammar and their results will be visible to both them and their teacher. When students make mistakes they have chances to fix those mistakes and/or watch a tutorial that will explain the error they made. Teachers can also use the site to create grammar quizzes. Interestingly enough the site gives student the opportunity to choose interests and the sentences that students see with be about those interests. This is a cool way to keep students engaged.

While the idea is very interesting, I could still see many students abusing it. I could see them clicking through the questions knowingly getting answers wrong so that they could sit through the tutorial and not have to think about the work. I could see students getting off task because the sentences (about their Facebook friends or interests) are silly. I could see students trying so hard to "win" or get through the questions quickly that they do not learn the underlying grammar principles. Of course, these kinds of issues are present in all forms of instruction.

Before, I would have said that this is more relevant to ELA teachers, but I definitely see myself using something like this in my history classes. As we have been told over and over again throughout the summer, teaching literacy is the responsibility of all teachers in all content areas. In my history classes I do want to be able to focus more on cultivating student intellect and helping my students perfect their critical thinking skills rather than correct grammatical errors or spelling mistakes. I am really excited about the opportunity to use new, free, innovative resources like No Red Ink!

Guest Speakers

Having Mac alum talk to us today about their schools and their experiences with technology was an interesting experience. It's so different hearing about people's actual experiences with technology in context as opposed to listening to professors lecture about it. When we sit in class and hear lectures it's so easy to brush them off. Hearing people talk about it is so...real. I feel like I learned so much about teaching with technology in the hour and a half with guest speakers--I didn't think I would be this interested.

One of the speakers was a history teacher, so it was interesting to hear her perspectives on technology. She said that in contrast to many of her colleagues, she lets students use their cell phones during class to look things up. Interestingly enough, she said that doing so takes some pressure off of her--she doesn't need to know everything because students aren't relying on getting all the information/questions answered by her. I really liked this reference because this is something I'm nervous about. With technology I will feel more comfortable admitting that I don't know something. Plus, my students will gain a sense of agency when they can look up facts and teach things to ME.

This speaker also mentioned that she likes to incorporate technology into her lessons in the form of research. She mentioned how she demonstrated the shortcomings of wikipedia by editing a page (with something she made up) and using it in class. I love this idea! After doing this she said she showed students how easy it was to edit pages in wikipedia. I think this would really drive the point home. I have always thought of teaching students to distinguish between reliable and non-reliable sources as a straightforward, boring (albeit necessary) requirement as a history teacher, but today's discussion displayed to me that I can make these traditionally boring things innovative and engaging.

I also really liked how she discussed the way that history education needs to change. I agree with her that the standard lecture, exam, paper format is not conducive to higher order thinking or high leverage practice. On a similar note, I enjoyed hearing this speaker discuss the value she places (or doesn't place) on the learning of dates. During our discussion she said that she wanted to help her students learn the chronology involved in history, rather than forcing rote memorization of dates. I couldn't agree with this more. Someone in our class questioned this, but I definitely side with the guest speaker. History is not about memorizing a list of dates. History is about learning about cause and effect, consequences of actions, and making connections between history and current events. I think in terms of history, students should learn about developing critical thinking skills, rather than rote memorization. What good is remembering a date if you don't know the implications of that date or what it means in context?

Basically....I really liked this teacher's philosophy on teaching history and on incorporating technology into her curriculum. Today was empowering :)

Edubloggers: Yes. Please.

Today I had the pleasure of reading Speaking of History, a middle school history teacher's blog about history, education, and technology. It was really insightful. The post I read was actually a podcast (there was a short introduction and then a link to a podcast) about the possibility of "watching" the State of the Union address via Twitter. What an interesting idea!

The teacher talked about how he did not have time to watch the SOTU, so he looked at tweets about it. He discussed how he could see people's reactions, both good and bad, to the President's speech. He raised the question of whether using Twitter as a lens through which to view the SOTU was either anti-social, more social, or just a different form of social... If I was going to answer, I'd say that it's somewhere between more social and a different form. Social networking sites like Twitter offer us a chance to speak with people we would not normally speak to, to see several different perspectives, and take in information in a relatively short amount of time. Can you imagine reading 30 articles or opinion pieces on the SOTU? No, you can't...because that would take a lot of time (which we don't have in grad school). This is what is so amazing about Twitter! People can only type 140 characters or less.

Listening to Mr. Langhorst discuss his personal use of Twitter for the SOTU made me think--can we use this in our classrooms? I know that a lot of schools block sites like Twitter and Facebook, but there are definitely ways around this. For example, I would probably type "State of the Union" in my search box and see what came up. If they were applicable, I could take a screen shot. This screen shot could be displayed during class and I could ask students to engage in a discussion. There are several different ways to take an activity like this, which I think is the beauty of it, really.

The other thing Mr. Langhorst brought up with the value of Twitter as a means of collaboration. Specifically, he talked about how the day that Osama Bin Laden was killed. He went on Twitter and saw teachers talking about how they were going to present this/discuss it with their students. Whether he used ideas from other teachers or not, I do not know. However, this says a lot about the uses of social networking sites. They are fun, but they can be for more than that.

Maybe it was because this blog related to my content area so much, or maybe because I liked his writing style and use of pictures and technology within his blog...but I really liked reading. I definitely see the benefits in reading Edubloggers.


*A note to any other history or social studies majors--Speaking of History has some really awesome pictures of Monticello with Jefferson quotes on it that are really cool. I think he has put them up for people to use/share. He also has made some pretty amazing inventions to spice up a classroom. Pretty cool!

"Organizing" My Online Life...

So today we learned about all these different online tools we could use either in our classrooms or in our personal lives in general.

So far I've been really impressed with the tools we've learned about...but this week I don't really feel that way. I'd say the tool I had to research, Diigo, was the most useful thing I heard about. With Diigo I can share resources (or borrow ideas) from other educators. I can share things with my students that are relevant to what we're doing (if they're over 13 years old, that is) and I can get them to share things with me. I can highlight and make notes on things I read online and can open bookmarks (and things I've highlighted or sticky-noted online) from other computers. Pretty cool! I'm already part of a "History Teachers" group and it has so many ideas. I'm so excited to have my own classroom--I'm going to read all these things people are sharing!

Dropbox is cool, but I'd rather e-mail stuff to myself/share things with my friends through e-mail and google docs than have to create a new account. I have way too many usernames and passwords to keep everything straight...and I'm not really sure how Dropbox will be useful in a classroom. My group tried to think about this but we really didn't come up with anything of substance. Evernote was cute--I like the icon and color scheme--but it was much too complicated for me. I could just use Diigo to share things with my colleagues and students (or friends and family in my personal life). Maybe I'm old fashioned, but I'd rather write down notes on paper...or in Microsoft word. Skype is useful for my persona life, but I don't think there are many uses in school. Someone in my group mentioned that we could use it for guest speakers. I thought this was interesting. She said that she had a teacher who would invite authors to speak to her class after they finished books (through Skype or something like it). That would be awesome! If I had connections with prominent historians or people who were alive during big historical events I could have them talk to my class without them having to be there. Interesting. But other than that, Skype doesn't seem very useful. The other problem is that we can't assume our students have access to computers or the internet (so they might not be able to use this stuff outside of school). If anyone has any ideas about how we can use these resources in our classrooms I would love to hear them. I need some examples!

I don't want to use all these different resources all at once...I think I have a good handle on technology, but I can't keep track of everything. All the stuff we did today in our groups was just overwhelming. Too much information in too little time for me to really commit to memory. I don't remember my password to Aviary, and that was only 2 weeks ago. I don't even remember the username I created for Evernote, and that was a couple hours ago. I feel like I took a step backward...I guess I think it's just easier to do what I'm doing right now. It seems to be working pretty well. Now I know about all these online tools that people may be using in my school, and that's enough for me.

Basically, Diigo is cool...everyting else? Meh.

Epiphany

Creating a professional portfolio is work. A lot of work. However, doing it online makes it fun! Today I started my own professional portfolio on Weebly. (Check it out by clicking on the link!) While I do think that online portfolios are useful for adults, today's class made me realize that online portfolios can be used in the classroom as well. Many classes require students to create portfolios of their work and this process is extremely time consuming and difficult to organize for students. I remember doing a portfolio my senior year of high school. I had so many pieces of paper to include in my portfolio (the actual work and then descriptions of the work, plus a table of contents and several sheets dividing categories) and it was a pain in the butt getting them in the right order. I'm sure that I'm not the only student who felt this way. In the interest of saving some trees and some time, I motion that we move to online portfolios. Instead of printing out copies of their writing or photocopying samples of work students can display electronic copies of work. Online sites like Weebly also offer more room to be creative. Rather than simply displaying their work in a book format where the reader flips through pages, students can use different themes and can edit the layout of their work. I know that if I had the chance to make my portfolio like this I would have been much more engaged, and I'm positive that my portfolio would have been better, both in quality and appearance. Giving students creative license can definitely increase motivation.

In a history class I might consider using an online tool like Weebly for a big project. For example, if students were doing a unit on World War II I would ask them to put different aspects of their project online. I might have students create page/tab for historical writing pieces (some short and some long) and one for reactions to/reflections on class readings. Even though I would be nervous that some students might feel uncomfortable with the idea of putting their work online I think using sites like this would be different because students wouldn't be forced to share their work/thinking with their peers. Instead, I'd like it to be online so their parents could see it. We've been talking a lot about the positive effects of parental involvement on student achievement. Unfortunately, we know that it decreases as students get older. Maybe using something like this in my classroom would promote parental involvement and increase communication between myself and my students' parents. When I was in school I didn't really want to go out of my way to talk to my parents about school, but if they knew what I was doing in a class and showed a genuine interest I probably would've been more inclined to involve them. Online portfolios and displays of student work could be effective tools in starting conversation between students and parents and increase motivation. How awesome is that? 

There are so many things that we could do with sites like this. Even though I was a bit skeptical before, I'm really starting to think that there are ways to bring technology into the classroom that will be meaningful in my discipline. Now I'm feeling excited about the technology's potential. I think I've really started to see the benefits of using technology in my classroom. I've had an epiphany: when it comes to technology, the possibilities are, in fact, endless!

Will Gamers Save the World?

Today I read a piece by James Gee on the parallels between gaming and learning, and how we can use gaming to motivate students and increase learning. It was interesting to see all the aspects of gaming parsed out and looked at in tandem with common school practices. Gee comes up with a lot of innovative ways to change classroom instruction to mirror game-play. I thought it was interesting to see the zone of proximal development come into play. Gee comments that people like video games because they are challenging, but not to the point of frustration. He says that kids are motivated to play games because of those challenges (among other reasons). We have been talking a lot about the zone of proximal development in classes so I definitely see the parallels, but I think Gee really oversimplifies it. I think a lot of teachers aim for instruction to be within students' ZPDs, but with all of their students at different levels of mental development and with different experiences/prior knowledge it isn't that simple.

After reading Gee's piece I watched a speech by Jane McGonigal about how gaming can solve the problems of the world. I have so many mixed feelings about this. I think it is an interesting concept, but I'm not sure how an idea like this would play out in real life. After watching the video I had so many questions--I wish she was here so I could ask her more about her theory and how she would implement that.

Do gamers actually think those games that appear more like real-life world problems are fun?

Would you support games moving into the educational setting? Can we implement games like this in our classroom? How? Are there games available for teachers to use (because I obviously couldn't make one myself).

What kind of reaction/response would we get from administrators and parents?

Would kids take the right things away from lessons involving games, or would they focus on the cool special effects and graphics? How would we formulate assessments to make sure that kids are getting things out of it?

After watching the McGonigal clip I went back to the Gee reading. At the very end I found a quote where he says "So the suggestion I leave you with is not 'use games in school'--though that's a good idea..." (pg. 11). This really got me thinking. Is it a good idea? Video games may hold the attention of their players and may promote intrinsic motivation to learn and continue on, but they are also associated with depression and lack of social skills, aren't they? I'm not saying that video games should never be played, nor am I saying that people who play video games are anti-social, depressed people (I do play video games too!), but excessive gaming is not necessarily a good thing. And if we tell kids that they can solve world problems by playing video games, isn't it possible that they interpret it to mean they have permission to game whenever they want? How can we bring the positives from video games into the educational setting and leave the negatives behind? Is that even possible?

In short, I'm not sold on the idea that gamers will save the world's problems...yet.

I've Got Love for Librarians

This week we had librarians come to class to work with us and I can honestly say I never realized how awesome librarians are! When I heard we were going to split into groups with one librarian in each group I thought it would be a waste of time. I imagined a stereotypical librarian--a soft-spoken lady with big glasses and an attachment to printed text (note: I just want to be clear that I do not have a problem with librarians, this is just the common stereotype of a librarian). I was so wrong, though.

The librarian that worked with my group was amazing. She gave my group really great ideas and steered our conversation in a helpful direction. She had so many resources to share with us, like wallwisher and my fake wall (which is no longer functional, but we found something else called fakebook that looks very similar). Wallwisher is basically a website where you can brainstorm as a group by putting stick notes on a virtual wall. My fake wall/fakebook is a place where teachers and students can create fake facebook profiles for historical figures and events. Sites like these are pretty much a history teacher's dream! The librarian also came up with really innovative ways that we could use technology for our lesson, like using twitter to show students what different perspectives were on issues (for example, the NYC sugary drink ban) by searching the issue and looking at what came up. Her ideas were not limited to making the lesson more engaging, though. She also suggested ways to use technology for formative assessments. We planned on having students use google docs while working in groups so that we (as the teacher) could see what the groups were doing and how their thinking progressed. I liked the way she thought outside of the box and encouraged us to do so as well. I'd say it was a pretty genius idea.

Aside from telling us about really useful websites, the librarian talked to us about things librarians can do for teachers. She said that librarians at our schools can create pathfinders for our students. Basically, if we were going to have students do a project the librarian could set up a website for the class to reference that would have links to databases and various other places students could look for sources. She said that librarians love to do this for kids. I guess I always thought of librarians as the people who checked out and checked in my books in grade school, so I didn't realize they did all of these other things too. Additionally, the librarian we worked with said that many librarians would be happy to co-teach a class related to finding resources, whether students were looking for hard copies or were searching online. I don't know very much about databases and searching for sources--or at least I don't know enough that I'd feel comfortable teaching students about it--so it would be great to take some of the pressure off of myself and get someone who is more informed to help.

I think it's safe to say that I have completely altered my view of librarians. They have wonderful ideas about teaching and lesson planning. They have a plethora of resources to share with us if we ask them for help. They are more than willing to share their expertise. Yes, librarians are fantastic. Aren't they?

I've got love for librarians. I hope you do too.

NYC Sugary Drink Ban & Lesson Plans?

While reading about how New York City is planning on banning the sale of sugary drinks (non-diet soda, energy drinks, and sugar tea for example) I kept thinking about how a ban like this relates to Prohibition. There are several similarities: the government telling people they cannot do something they once did, those enacting the law claim it is for the good of the people, and many people are upset about it. Though they are on different scales (and there are differences) the current event might be an interesting tool to help students think about Prohibition from another perspective.

If I were to use the NYC sugary drink ban in a lesson plan I would first have students read the article. After, I would ask them if they had ever heard of Prohibition. I would open up by telling students that Prohibition was similar to the sugary drink ban--that it was a time when the production and sale of alcohol was banned in an effort to get Americans to stop drinking, similarly to the way that NYC is banning the sale of large sugary drinks in an effort to get Americans to stop drinking things that contribute to obesity.

After giving an introduction I would delve into material, repeatedly going back to the analogy between Prohibition and the soda ban.

Once students had knowledge about the causes and effects of Prohibition I would work with them to compare and contrast it with the soda ban. I would write on the board and ask that they copy it down into their notebooks. This part of the lesson would look like a whole-class discussion where I scaffolded them by giving them hints about various similarities and differences and probed them for more detail and explanation of their answers.

After looking at the facts of Prohibition and the sugary drink ban I would shift to a discussion of the social aspect. I would ask students to think about how constituents who did enjoy Saloons and drinking in public probably felt, but considering how they would feel if they were told they could no longer have soda (I don't really want to use alcohol in the scenario because they will be under 21...I suppose soda does seem like the next "specialty" drink?). The discussion would turn to focus on civil liberties briefly.

For a homework assignment I would ask them to imagine they were living in the 1920s. I would ask them to write a journal entry that discussed Prohibition. What was it? How did they feel about it? How did they feel about the government telling them what they could drink? What did they do or not do because of it?

Obviously, this idea would have to be spread out over the course of several lessons (because there is a lot of material to cover), but you get the general idea...hopefully! I think one of the reasons I really enjoy history is because I like to try and put myself into other peoples' shoes. I hope that relating Prohibition to the NYC sugary drink ban will allow students to see Prohibition from the perspective of the people, rather than as a section in a textbook or set of facts they have to learn.

=]

Cost and Benefit

The idea of teaching with technology is so exciting! I love the idea of using technology to draw students in and get them engaging with content. I think technology is a great way to bridge the apparent gap between learning in a school environment and learning "for fun" that adolescents engage in daily. I think back to when I was in school--whenever we were given the chance to do a project involving technology, be it computers, digital cameras, or video cameras, I was always thrilled. My peers and I tried harder, and always performed better on assessments. That being said, incorporating technology into the classroom can be problematic.

The first issue I see with technology is how we use it. I think sometimes teachers are so excited about the prospect of incorporating some form of technology into their lesson that they don't think about whether or not the technology offers additional learning opportunities or if it is really applicable to their objectives. I have had classes where teachers try to use a video clip or song in class because they are excited about it, but the multimedia really has nothing to do with what we are doing in class or discussing. I don't want to be this teacher! I want to use technology, but be confident that the technology being used is adding to my students' learning experiences. It can be hard to use technology in a meaningful way though. I guess that's just something I'm waiting to learn.

Another issue that arises with the use of technology is the issue of exposure. In our class discussion someone said that they never wanted their peers to be able to read their work. Sometimes I can be like that too. Take this blog, for instance. I'm actually pretty nervous about other people reading it--Will you think what I'm saying makes sense? Am I smart enough to be blogging for other people to see? What if they don't like the way my blog looks? I'm sure I'm not the only one who is a little apprehensive about their writing being on display. I can see how for extroverts the use of blogs and wikis that classmates have access to can be a strong motivator, but I can also see how it could cause introverts to shut down. Some students who are scared of their peers seeing their work probably put a great deal of time and effort into their work, but that isn't the only possible outcome. Do other students get so consumed with discomfort that they stop trying? If they don't do the assignments or make it obvious that they didn't try, they won't ever feel like someone is judging their hard work. I suppose my point here is that we need to consider this when we are contemplating putting student work out for others to see.

Lastly, and probably most obviously, is the issue of cyber bullying. We touched on this briefly in class, but I think it is a pretty big deal. I'm sure that we will delve into this more deeply in the weeks to come. I definitely need to learn more about preventing any sort of discomfort or bullying that technology may cause for students. Honestly, I'm scared to use technology in my class because I don't want to be responsible for any cyber bullying that might go on as a result of online chats, blogs, or forums.

But life is all about accepting challenges and overcoming fears. Right?