Hand in hand?: The relationship between feedback and score. I have found that the most effective feedback does not always include a score with explanation of student progress.
Here is a story from an undergraduate Philosophy course I took. Writing in Philosophy, as a freshman in college, was a daunting task. Not only wrapping our heads around the ideas themselves, our class struggled with how to frame them in the format of the discipline. Our teacher, Professor Woody, was in his last of many many years of teaching and had teaching philosophical writing down to a psychological science. How v. Why: A Question of Audience. In my classroom, the most motivating factor for students to gain information has been, hands down, audience.
If students are working towards a project that will be presented for an audience they care about, it gives them a purpose beyond performing a task for my eyes alone. In addition, the traditional audience of one does not reflect our digital 21st century. Our students can and should publish to a wider audience. This can be done through individual and class blogs, collaborations via google docs, you tube videos, skype calls with other classrooms, voicethread essays, podcasts, letters to the editor, comments on news articles, book review sites, publishing a class book, online contests - the list is endless.
Time Well Spent to Change the World. Beyond 'Flipping the Classroom': Asking Students to Design their Own Learning. Too much of the teacher narrative out there is still devoted to what we do to our students.
In my opinion, we need teach our students how to teach themselves. Google Docs: 3 Ways to Use Commenting as Formative Assessment. When starting the writing process, students create a blank document in Google Drive and share it with me.
EdCafe and Primary Sources: Why does Balance Matter in John Adams’ General Principles? After a recent talk I had with my uncle on the future of education, he sent me this PatriotPost Founder’s Quote Daily: When I did a Google search for the quotation, I was immediately struck by the patriotic pattern of sources and their political similarity to each other. However, no Adams papers or .gov sites popped up. Curious, I started to dig deeper into the context of the quotation. John Adams initially delivered the passage in his address to the Young Men of Philadelphia on May 7, 1798. Guiding Students. Interdisc: North v. South & Ralph v. Jack.
In History, we are on the 'Road to the Civil War' and have been considering the foundational divide of the Union and the Confederacy.
As we explore the underlying issues, concerns, priorities, and ideologies of the populations on each side of the Mason-Dixon line, I wanted our students to dig deeper into what, exactly, begins to split Ralph and Jack by the end of Chapter 3. It's easy to stop at a simplistic dichotomy for both feuds: slaves v. free blacks, bully Jack v. humanitarian Ralph. Thursday Choices : What's Your Path? Vampires, Zombies, and Aliens: Understanding Humanity through its Monsters - aka English 10. Sci Fi & Dystopian Lit : Proposals & Calendars. Poetry Portfolio! Non-Fiction Unit. Non-Fiction Unit - Formal Submission Letter. Senior Final Exam. Final Project : Digital Submission. Congratulations Seniors!
Today you will submit your final project, demonstrating your excellence in either Dystopian Literature or Science Fiction Literature. If you were handing in a tangible item, I would have a folder and put your work into it. Since your submission is digital, I will be 'collecting' your work in a digital space - a Posterous blog. Carefully read the directions below and follow them exactly so that your work is accepted and can be published. What you need: 1) your final product in publishable form 2) a 'cover picture' for your product (email this to katrina.kennett@gmail.com) 3) patience Dystopian Literature - anything you send to me today MUST NOT have your last name attached.
Science Fiction Literature - click on this link - complete the requirements that are listed - write me a 1pg metacognitive letter about this project and the course as a whole - staple letter to your process and hand in by the end of class. Seven Steps to a Thesis. Paired with the Path to Purpose, Seven Steps to a Thesis is a concrete way to develop a robust and argumentative thesis statement.
The key to this graphic organizer is the easy first step - the threshold is so low that it removes the intimidation of producing an instantly brilliant thesis statement. Seventeen Continents of Experience and Feeling: LotF Outlines. Path to Purpose. For the early stages of the writing process in my English classes, students use two tools to quickly gather their thoughts and effectively craft an argumentative thesis: the Path to Purpose and the 7 Steps to a Thesis.
How to embed a Google Doc on your blog. Mrs. Fry's Spotlight: 1st Annual Poetry Cafe. Short Story Anthology. Using Google Spreadsheets & Wix to Publish a Class Portfolio. My two Senior Electives - Dystopian Literature and Science Fiction Literature - are drawing to a close, and students are completing the course by creating their own text.
In the mix: short stories, vignettes, choose your own adventures, a musical album, and a board game. Final projects can be found here: Dystopian and Sci Fi My objectives for the final project: demonstrate understanding of the genrego through process of disciplined inquiry and independent development to craft final productpublish to broad online audience incorporate student texts into the course final Students worked for the month of January to construct their final story / text / world / narrative. As we went through the subsequent weeks, we spent Tuesdays and Thursdays in the Information Media Center (If the day begins with T / We're in the IMC!) Using Pearltrees to Collect Online Resources / Create an Annotated Bibliography.
Pearltrees, an online curation platform, allows users to visually organize any resource that has a URL.
This could be website, blogs, wikis, videos, images, etc., making it a powerful collection space for students as they research. I have had students use this as a place to collect short stories for our short story unit. I also have it as an option for annotated bibliographies for my seniors. The intellectual work is the same - students find resources, summarize them, and evaluate their use - but the visual collection space is more engaging and visually organized around topic (instead of forcing resources into alphabetical order). Below, you have the collected pearls of my Fall 2012 Senior Dystopian Literature class. Teaching with Technology.