Christi Coomes Self Agency Blog #3
Students, in general, have a difficult time with self agency because they have never had the opportunity to be agents for their own learning. However, students who are academically gifted are better at being an agent for their own learning because they have been doing it their whole life. When they were small, their parents would have had to answer the "why" and "how" questions or watch their children build elaborate creations from their own imagination. Gifted students wonder all the time about the "what ifs" , trying to puzzle out the world around them. Naturally, this wonder carries on to the academic world. I began to see this self agency when I implemented the compacting unit. I did not have to encourage them to do their work. They felt liberated to work as they needed. Also, the Genius Hour incentative encouraged them to complete the necessary tasks to work on topics of their interest.
So what about the general population of students in regard to self agency? All children start out interested in the world around them. So somewhere along the path from infancy to middle school, these students took a different path. One of the ways I try to promote self agency is to answer a student's question with another question instead of just giving an answer or process. I may ask the student what have you tried already. What do you already know about the task? What is confusing you about the task or skill? I really like the circular questioning technique because it makes students reflect on their own knowledge. Also, I liked the protocol of having students draw a circle and place what they know for certain in the center of the circle, what they don't know outside the circle, and what is somewhat clear near the edge of the circle. It requires students to reflect on the learning process. Hence, they begin to realize that they can figure out how to ask questions that will help them learn; instead of just quitting and saying "I don't get it".
Tuesday, November 28, 2017
Christi Coomes Genius Hour
Blog #4 Compacting with an AG class.
I have spent the last week working on compacting the chapter on inequalities with my Algebra I class. Students had the choice to compact or remain with traditional classroom instruction. Those who compacted worked independently on their assignments. I gave the compacters their assignments for the chapter. They had to turn in each assignment as they progressed. Afterwards, the students then work on a genius hour project related to math, any topic of their interest, and have to present a two minute presentation about their project. Students are now working on their genius hour projects or finishing up their chapter test.
This has benefitted everyone in the classroom. The students who have remained with the traditional instruction had small group instruction; therefore, the students felt more comfortable to interact and ask questions.
The compacting students have been enjoying the independent work for various reasons. One student said that she enjoyed working faster on some topics and being able to go slower for more difficult concepts.
So far the students who have compacted their instruction are academically doing well on the chapter assignments, making all A's on the quizzes and tests. Also, the students have enjoyed learning about how real world data can be used in the business world to extrapolate data to make business decisions for the company's future monotary goals. For example, one student looked at the sales of iphones compared to Samsung. She found out that Apple sales spike with the introduction of a number phone. Whereas, Samsung sales are more consistant. She is making a "proposal" to Apple to introduce new items into the market more often based on her findings. Another student is in the process of generating an idea to research, as seen in the first image. She is wondering how population rates effects global warming. The student will collect data on effects of population on global warming by looking at places where the population is dense and sparatic and determine if temperatures have been changing over time.
Students who are compacting are in the process of completing a goformative questionaire to determine how I should address another compacting unit. Some responses are shown in three of the pictures below.
Blog #4 Compacting with an AG class.
I have spent the last week working on compacting the chapter on inequalities with my Algebra I class. Students had the choice to compact or remain with traditional classroom instruction. Those who compacted worked independently on their assignments. I gave the compacters their assignments for the chapter. They had to turn in each assignment as they progressed. Afterwards, the students then work on a genius hour project related to math, any topic of their interest, and have to present a two minute presentation about their project. Students are now working on their genius hour projects or finishing up their chapter test.
This has benefitted everyone in the classroom. The students who have remained with the traditional instruction had small group instruction; therefore, the students felt more comfortable to interact and ask questions.
The compacting students have been enjoying the independent work for various reasons. One student said that she enjoyed working faster on some topics and being able to go slower for more difficult concepts.
So far the students who have compacted their instruction are academically doing well on the chapter assignments, making all A's on the quizzes and tests. Also, the students have enjoyed learning about how real world data can be used in the business world to extrapolate data to make business decisions for the company's future monotary goals. For example, one student looked at the sales of iphones compared to Samsung. She found out that Apple sales spike with the introduction of a number phone. Whereas, Samsung sales are more consistant. She is making a "proposal" to Apple to introduce new items into the market more often based on her findings. Another student is in the process of generating an idea to research, as seen in the first image. She is wondering how population rates effects global warming. The student will collect data on effects of population on global warming by looking at places where the population is dense and sparatic and determine if temperatures have been changing over time.
Students who are compacting are in the process of completing a goformative questionaire to determine how I should address another compacting unit. Some responses are shown in three of the pictures below.
Genius Hour - Kristi Winslow
My first experience with genius hour was semi-successful. I gave my students the question; “If you could learn ANYTHING, what would you want to learn about?” I told them the topic should focus on ways they could become a better person, help someone else, and benefit the earth in some way. They created presentations of their choice to display what they learned. I was providing them choice in their topic and choice in how they were going to present. It took them a minute to get started, because of the fact of me not telling them exactly what they had to do, they were a little hesitant on the idea that they could do whatever they wanted, of course as long as it was appropriate.
Most students were very excited about the opportunity to research something that interests them, and show others what they learned and in return teach us something we may not have known about that topic. In doing, the project I found out more about my students and their interests, and types of occupations they are looking forward to in the future. This opportunity was a great way to open their minds to something new.
I would definitely like to use genius hour again with my classes. In saying that, I would improve the way I introduce and procedures of the project. I would provide them with maybe a more specific topic and give a little more examples to help with the “getting started” portion. I would provide them with an entry event that would be more appealing and exciting. I would also be more direct with the description of the overall product they are to produce. I would also like to research more about genius hour to better educate myself in how I could incorporate it more often in my classroom and different ways that I could that.
Most students were very excited about the opportunity to research something that interests them, and show others what they learned and in return teach us something we may not have known about that topic. In doing, the project I found out more about my students and their interests, and types of occupations they are looking forward to in the future. This opportunity was a great way to open their minds to something new.
I would definitely like to use genius hour again with my classes. In saying that, I would improve the way I introduce and procedures of the project. I would provide them with maybe a more specific topic and give a little more examples to help with the “getting started” portion. I would provide them with an entry event that would be more appealing and exciting. I would also be more direct with the description of the overall product they are to produce. I would also like to research more about genius hour to better educate myself in how I could incorporate it more often in my classroom and different ways that I could that.
Monday, November 27, 2017
Clark H. Maxwell course 2 blog post #4
My Genius Hour
For my Genius Hour project, I had my students create a small PowerPoint about what they do at home for physical activity. I know that does sound like more of a survey, but they also had to find out what kinds of diseases could be prevented or lessened by being fit. My students also had to research how often a person needs to exercise to benefit their health. They class that did this were my 4th period 8th graders. This class is pretty small with only 15 students. My thinking was to do this on a small scale so they could present. And also, the 8th grade at FMS being their computers with them to every class, so I did not have to check out a class set of computers.
The kids did a good job and focused throughout the time allotted. Many of them found out similar things in relation to preventable diseases, but there were a few who dug a little deeper. The majority of my students, through, their own research, came up with heart disease, obesity, and high blood pressure. They also helped each other with where to look for things. The few who did a bit more researching came up with juvenile diabetes, high cholesterol. One student mentioned stress as a contributing factor in many of the above, and also how it can be lessened by exercise. As a side note, it was good to find out that just about all of my students like to do something to be active outside of school.
For me, the best part of this Genius Hour was the small discussion it generated about how stress can influence blood pressure and cholesterol. We had about a five minute discussion about how exercise can reduce stress to counteract those. One of the main things they wanted to know is what plaque as it relates to cholesterol, and how was stress was unhealthy. I really liked this part, because I do not think I would have had this conversation had we not done this. They seemed interested and attentive.
I think, if I did it correctly, that Genius Hour would work well for PE. As I have said before, my job is to keep them active for as much time as possible. I like the Genius Hour idea. It's short, simple, serves a purpose, and does not take more than one class to finish. Also, I can loosely control what we are trying to become experts on as it relates to physical education.
For my Genius Hour project, I had my students create a small PowerPoint about what they do at home for physical activity. I know that does sound like more of a survey, but they also had to find out what kinds of diseases could be prevented or lessened by being fit. My students also had to research how often a person needs to exercise to benefit their health. They class that did this were my 4th period 8th graders. This class is pretty small with only 15 students. My thinking was to do this on a small scale so they could present. And also, the 8th grade at FMS being their computers with them to every class, so I did not have to check out a class set of computers.
The kids did a good job and focused throughout the time allotted. Many of them found out similar things in relation to preventable diseases, but there were a few who dug a little deeper. The majority of my students, through, their own research, came up with heart disease, obesity, and high blood pressure. They also helped each other with where to look for things. The few who did a bit more researching came up with juvenile diabetes, high cholesterol. One student mentioned stress as a contributing factor in many of the above, and also how it can be lessened by exercise. As a side note, it was good to find out that just about all of my students like to do something to be active outside of school.
For me, the best part of this Genius Hour was the small discussion it generated about how stress can influence blood pressure and cholesterol. We had about a five minute discussion about how exercise can reduce stress to counteract those. One of the main things they wanted to know is what plaque as it relates to cholesterol, and how was stress was unhealthy. I really liked this part, because I do not think I would have had this conversation had we not done this. They seemed interested and attentive.
I think, if I did it correctly, that Genius Hour would work well for PE. As I have said before, my job is to keep them active for as much time as possible. I like the Genius Hour idea. It's short, simple, serves a purpose, and does not take more than one class to finish. Also, I can loosely control what we are trying to become experts on as it relates to physical education.
Savannah Griffith Blog Post 4
Genius Hour Project
For Genius Hour I used time the past 4 Friday's and allowed students to create an art project of their choice based on something they were interested in. I created a students packet that students kept in their folder that way on Friday's or during free time in class they could work on this. The packet explained genius hour, had a place for notes, project ideas, project planner and a project proposal. I also included a presentation checklist and rubric. Students were given this at the beginning of the project so that they would know exactly what expected of them. I used one day to explain the packet. It was a lot of information but I believe it helped the project work really well. I did use a few extra days in class if we missed a Friday or such to make up for lost time. This was the students favorite thing to do! They absolutely loved getting to use WHATEVER materials they wanted. They loved having the ability to work on their computer one class and then paint the next. It was exciting to see students take control of their project and get to work on something they enjoyed. Now not all students jumped on board so quickly. It took some weeks to finally get the concept. Overall I felt that the students were extremely successful. They are already asking me when we can do something else like this.
This is the steps we followed to achieve Genius Hour.
- Students will watch Genius Hour Video from YouTube.
- Students will receive Genius Hour Packet that they will keep in their sketchbook. Students will work through this as they progress in the project.
- Students will create a work of art based on a theme of their choice. They must research the theme and have reasoning for the topic. Once they have decided on a theme and received feedback, (page in packet) they will begin their work of art.
- Students can use ANY materials they would like but must stick to deadlines. All work will be completed on Friday’s or during free time in class.
- Students will end the project by completing a rubric for their work. They will also give a presentation to their classmates.
I am planning next time to use recycled materials and have them create something they can use to help others, working in groups that they choose. I think this will be a hit because I have so many students that want to help others.
Blog Post #2: Video Selfie/Observation Self-Assessment Reflection- Mandy Irick
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_XG5jjPdUN5N0NqSmZqRWw3QjQ/view
For my video selfie reflection, I worked with Mary Kennedy on her PBL project that focused on creating an engineering project that would be instrumental for a company. The students began by researching the specific career in the engineering field. From there, they chose their groups and what type of engineering project that were going to create. The design build had to be based on the physic properties they have focused on in class. The other component to this was they had to be able to create a sales pitch to promote the product to a specific audience. The sales pitch was where I was able to go around to each of the small groups to help them analyze the product and design to make it marketable. My goal was to help them understand how to construct a sales pitch making it desirable along with the group being articulate.
Identifying What’s Important: My part in Mary Kennedy’s PBL was to make sure that the students’ had a firm grasp on what a sale pitch was and how to construct one based on their product. I also wanted to make sure that this was based on individual needs of the groups so I went from group to group working with them for at least 10 minutes. By doing this, I provided them with guided instruction based on what their group needs were. I just chose one group to video tape but you can see how much guidance they needed during the lesson. The approach I established with them was for the first day I listened to their product and methods behind its construction. The next day, (which is what you see in the video), I revisited quickly their product design. I begin to ask them a series of open-ended questions in my attempt to draw them to think about how to approach a sales pitch. The series of questions that I approach them with are all geared to how can you make your item appealing to buyer. These questions were a way to help pinpoint their selling features and to justify why they were important. I noticed I would restate what their replies were in an attempt to help reinforce how important those statements were. The other thing I noticed I did a lot of was varying from group member to group member to get more responses from them. Two of the students seemed to have it down pat when it came to using their features to promote the bridge they were building. Unfortunately, two others were disconnected by lack of knowledge or interest. I wanted to pull them into the group as much as possible so reinforcing what answers were generated and calling them out by name to give insight was my way of getting interaction with them. The overall goal was to keep them thinking about how to make their product desirable to a buyer. I felt like I was proficient in making them understand the important concepts to focus on when dealing with a sales pitch.
Making Connections: One of the great things about doing the selfie video was being able to look at the small group interaction that I had with the students to compare with their final presentation of their sales pitch. This helped me to see whether they were taking the guided instruction that I was providing them along with the group collaboration and effectively using it to create part of their final presentation, which was the sales pitch. Many of the groups utilized those small group conversations to help influence their sales pitch. With the group that I videotaped, the key important featured that were discussed were used in their final sales pitch with some varying forms of elaboration. It was pleasing to see that they had taken essentials like building materials, key features like lights and a drawbridge to construct a pitch that made their product desirable to the city of Charleston. This was a major take away for me was seeing the connection or lack of one from the small group guided instruction to the final product. It really allowed me to see who learned from the experience and who did not. The other part of making connections were realizing that students were quick to decide on the creation like a bridge but did not do enough research to help them realize the complexity of their designs. As seen in the video, the group of girls had a design somewhat mapped put but missed some of the fundamentals. Through my open-ended questioning, I had hope to pull from them an understanding that they needed to do more research and comparison on bridges to help structure theirs. They lacked a knowledge of the costs of building a bridge of that magnitude. By questioning them, I hoped they took notice and investigated those components.
Incorporating Contextual Knowledge: During the second half of the video, you will noticed that some of my line of questioning then begins to focus on incorporating their contextual knowledge of physics to the real world application of their bridge. In one section of the video, the student was asked about what type of material they are going to build their bridge out of. We discuss the difference between the model they are constructing and the real bridge. I noticed quickly during the session that one of the more disconnected students of the group answered with wood and bricks. This quickly led me to pose the question “How does this connect to a draw bridge?” It was during this questioning session that I learned some of the group members were not very connected with the others about the materials that were going to be used. After the video, I had the girls discussed their design plan again to make sure everyone was on board and had a clear understanding of what was going on. The other thing the girls did was to do more research on building a drawbridge. I wanted their knowledge of the discussed elements of physics to be applicable to the construction of their bridge. They needed to understand the physics of a drawbridge in order to know how to construct and build a budget for it. The small groups helped me to see gaps in contextual knowledge so that I could help redirect those gaps or let the classroom teacher know. This would help her to scaffold some more types of small groups or labs to help the students understand the physic concepts required of them.
For my video selfie reflection, I worked with Mary Kennedy on her PBL project that focused on creating an engineering project that would be instrumental for a company. The students began by researching the specific career in the engineering field. From there, they chose their groups and what type of engineering project that were going to create. The design build had to be based on the physic properties they have focused on in class. The other component to this was they had to be able to create a sales pitch to promote the product to a specific audience. The sales pitch was where I was able to go around to each of the small groups to help them analyze the product and design to make it marketable. My goal was to help them understand how to construct a sales pitch making it desirable along with the group being articulate.
Identifying What’s Important: My part in Mary Kennedy’s PBL was to make sure that the students’ had a firm grasp on what a sale pitch was and how to construct one based on their product. I also wanted to make sure that this was based on individual needs of the groups so I went from group to group working with them for at least 10 minutes. By doing this, I provided them with guided instruction based on what their group needs were. I just chose one group to video tape but you can see how much guidance they needed during the lesson. The approach I established with them was for the first day I listened to their product and methods behind its construction. The next day, (which is what you see in the video), I revisited quickly their product design. I begin to ask them a series of open-ended questions in my attempt to draw them to think about how to approach a sales pitch. The series of questions that I approach them with are all geared to how can you make your item appealing to buyer. These questions were a way to help pinpoint their selling features and to justify why they were important. I noticed I would restate what their replies were in an attempt to help reinforce how important those statements were. The other thing I noticed I did a lot of was varying from group member to group member to get more responses from them. Two of the students seemed to have it down pat when it came to using their features to promote the bridge they were building. Unfortunately, two others were disconnected by lack of knowledge or interest. I wanted to pull them into the group as much as possible so reinforcing what answers were generated and calling them out by name to give insight was my way of getting interaction with them. The overall goal was to keep them thinking about how to make their product desirable to a buyer. I felt like I was proficient in making them understand the important concepts to focus on when dealing with a sales pitch.
Making Connections: One of the great things about doing the selfie video was being able to look at the small group interaction that I had with the students to compare with their final presentation of their sales pitch. This helped me to see whether they were taking the guided instruction that I was providing them along with the group collaboration and effectively using it to create part of their final presentation, which was the sales pitch. Many of the groups utilized those small group conversations to help influence their sales pitch. With the group that I videotaped, the key important featured that were discussed were used in their final sales pitch with some varying forms of elaboration. It was pleasing to see that they had taken essentials like building materials, key features like lights and a drawbridge to construct a pitch that made their product desirable to the city of Charleston. This was a major take away for me was seeing the connection or lack of one from the small group guided instruction to the final product. It really allowed me to see who learned from the experience and who did not. The other part of making connections were realizing that students were quick to decide on the creation like a bridge but did not do enough research to help them realize the complexity of their designs. As seen in the video, the group of girls had a design somewhat mapped put but missed some of the fundamentals. Through my open-ended questioning, I had hope to pull from them an understanding that they needed to do more research and comparison on bridges to help structure theirs. They lacked a knowledge of the costs of building a bridge of that magnitude. By questioning them, I hoped they took notice and investigated those components.
Incorporating Contextual Knowledge: During the second half of the video, you will noticed that some of my line of questioning then begins to focus on incorporating their contextual knowledge of physics to the real world application of their bridge. In one section of the video, the student was asked about what type of material they are going to build their bridge out of. We discuss the difference between the model they are constructing and the real bridge. I noticed quickly during the session that one of the more disconnected students of the group answered with wood and bricks. This quickly led me to pose the question “How does this connect to a draw bridge?” It was during this questioning session that I learned some of the group members were not very connected with the others about the materials that were going to be used. After the video, I had the girls discussed their design plan again to make sure everyone was on board and had a clear understanding of what was going on. The other thing the girls did was to do more research on building a drawbridge. I wanted their knowledge of the discussed elements of physics to be applicable to the construction of their bridge. They needed to understand the physics of a drawbridge in order to know how to construct and build a budget for it. The small groups helped me to see gaps in contextual knowledge so that I could help redirect those gaps or let the classroom teacher know. This would help her to scaffold some more types of small groups or labs to help the students understand the physic concepts required of them.
Drafting Next Steps:
From this small group guided discussion, my intent was for students to utilize our discussion as a means to creating an effective sales pitch. One of the strategies that I hope to implement for a future PBL such as this will be doing more mini-lessons with sales pitch. I have thought about even doing a mock one to help illustrate this a little more effectively. The classroom teacher did the whole group instruction for this. The other tactic I would like to use next time is to have a note taker taking the group notes so they have this as a reference instead of going just off memory and me revisiting the group. I provided them with the notes and it would be better coming from them. I noticed some disconnection within the groups, which I shared with the classroom teacher. In the future, I want to make sure group roles are clearly defined with everyone having equal parts. The other part to this is having each student in the group at the end of the session write their own reflection of what their group discussed for the day along with the essence of their project. This way I do not have to wait for a small group session to reinforce collaboration and providing more student accountability.
Blog 4 Makisha Fowler-Miller Genius Hour
Genius Hour
Genius hour was everything to my class! I have never had a class that was so excited about researching and telling each other about what they were interested in. I thought that I was going to have to go into detail about what genius hour was and spoon feed the students all the information that they needed and it was the exact opposite. I started my genius hour lesson by showing my students a short video about how genius hour got started. My students picked up from the video and soared. I had students that researched jobs that involved math. Jobs like computer programming, how to create a website, and cures for cancer. I have never seen my students so passionate about their work. The room was in total silent for two days. As I walked around the room, I was in awe! I didn't know my students had so much passion. I learned so much from my students. I honestly would not change a thing about genius hour and plan on using it more often in class. The students and their presentations were nothing short of amazing. Everyday, my students are asking me, Mrs. Miller is it Genius Hour Day!
I started my genius hour explaining how it came about. I launched my genius hour by having the students watch a short video that explained the purpose of genius hour. My driving questions were "What are you passionate about? What is one thing that you want to know about more than anything else?" The students were in awe and could not believe that I was going to let them decide what they wanted to learn! They were so excited and ready to start their project. My students were so passionate! I had several presentations that touched my heart. Students were able to tell me what they wanted to do when they grow up and give excellent reasons why. I will incorporate genius hour into more of my lessons. I think it is a great way for students to show me what they know and what they would like to know more about. If I had to improve anything about my genius hour, I would try to find a genius hour that went along with the math standard that I am teaching.
I started my genius hour explaining how it came about. I launched my genius hour by having the students watch a short video that explained the purpose of genius hour. My driving questions were "What are you passionate about? What is one thing that you want to know about more than anything else?" The students were in awe and could not believe that I was going to let them decide what they wanted to learn! They were so excited and ready to start their project. My students were so passionate! I had several presentations that touched my heart. Students were able to tell me what they wanted to do when they grow up and give excellent reasons why. I will incorporate genius hour into more of my lessons. I think it is a great way for students to show me what they know and what they would like to know more about. If I had to improve anything about my genius hour, I would try to find a genius hour that went along with the math standard that I am teaching.
Sarah Golightly--Genius Hour--Blog 4
Genius Hour—Blog
4
The students chose a topic in
which they felt they had both experience and expertise. Students then researched facts about their
chosen topic. Since this was their first
public speaking assignment of the year, I did not make the length of time long
because I thought this might be too intimidating. I told them they only had to speak for one
minute, but many, if not all spoke longer than that.
Once again, the students were the driving
force. I was completely impressed by how
outgoing the students were. They sang,
spoke, and played their instruments before their peers seemingly with no stress
or anxiety. In many way, my genius hour
became a talent show. Students were
excited to showcase their musical and artistic abilities.
Students ran into problems saving their information
from day to day on our laptops. They
saved them on the H drive and then the next day would be unable to find
them. It would be far better if every
student had their own flash drive.
I learned that we truly should not
underestimate our students. They have
talents that just need to be polished. I
am sure that many of the students in my fifth period class have a new
appreciation of their classmates now.
The students truly enjoyed this assignment.
Savannah Griffith Blog Post 2
Identifying What's Important
In this lesson I felt that it was most important for students to see how art can be creative and fun but also can develop into a real world career. I made sure that students understood that designing a book cover is not just a middle school art project but something that could inspire them to find their calling in life. This opened up the opportunity for me to speak with students about several careers that use art daily. From architects to astronauts.
Making Connections
After showing students real book covers they were able to understand how they could create layers in the project, use outside resources, etc. This day stood out to me the most as far as making connections because I saw the ideas spark in the students eyes. They were excited! I felt this entry event was super successful in making connections for students.
Incorporating Contextual Knowledge
I incorporated contextual knowledge by making sure that all students understood the concept of the project before I let them begin working on their own. This allowed me to assess students on the same level. I also felt this helped students achieve student agency because they we not constantly questioning themselves on the actual concept of the project.
Drafting Next Steps
If I were to do this project again I would encourage students not to think of their book cover as a typical rectangle. I would suggest to cut the corners off, use a different shape, etc. I believe this would push students even farther.
Savannah Griffith - Blog Post 3
Student Agency-
I believe that student agency is so crucial in our classrooms today. Students agency can be shown in several forms but comes down to students, "taking ownership and responsibility for their learning." I teach students daily that refuse to do more than expected. I wanted to change this in my classroom. I introduced a mixed media project that focused around student choice and direction. I gave the students a list of possible themes to get them thinking in hopes that they would create their own theme. Many of the students realized quickly that they would have to use their class time wisely. Some student caught onto this better than others. I never interfered with students projects. I pushed them to achieve their best and to make sure they had depth to their project. They are finishing these projects up this week. It has been so rewarding for the students to see their progress from the first week to now. Several made the comment that they loved how different everyone's project turned out. I explained to them that they have created student agency and how that they have achieved this by taking ownership over their project. I cannot wait for the final gallery walk, I know that students are going to shine!
Comments on the TED Talk-
"The Power of Yet." I love this title! It stood out to me because I use the wording, "not yet," in several rubrics that I use with students. I adopted this idea from Dawn. I think this helps students understand that they haven't failed but that they aren't quite there, "yet." I want my students to have the, "growth mindset," that Dwek spoke about rather than having a, "fixed mindset." I fear that too many of my students have a fixed mindset due to never being pushed to think beyond the text book or the worksheet that they have placed in front of them. As Dwek stated, "we can grow our minds capacity to learn and to solve problems." I challenge my students daily with thought provoking drawing topics. They may be challenging because of the concept, such as, "draw what you would change in the world." They may also be artistically challenging, such as draw yourself in your favorite setting. So many times I hear, "but I can't draw myself." I want my young artist to adopt a growth mindset where they will be fearless to just try. I explain to them even if they fail miserably they have tried and that they are going to get better every day with practice.
Blog post 3; Sarah Garner
Being in my first year of teaching I have learned so much about student abilities, motivation, and agency. I struggled to get my students to study, do their work, and pay attention during notes. Dr. Bismarck at USC Upstate challenged us new teachers to build more inquiry based lessons into our classroom. I was very skeptical at first, but I learned to love these types of assignments. These lessons allow the students to seek challenge and persevere through them. The students are confident in their knowledge because they discovered the content ON THEIR OWN. Through these assignments I have found that my students have more agency than if I were to just teach them the information. These assignments truly incorporate all aspects of the NTN Agency Rubric. Carol Dweck's idea of Yet is the perfect idea when it comes to inquiry based assignments. The students might not understand the concept yet, but with perseverance and hard work they will learn to understand. As I watched the video I was thinking to my self, "How can I incorporate yet into my classroom." It is easy as a teacher to always tell the a student, "We have been working on this for days, there is no reason for you not to understand it." because of standardized tests. However, we always have to have the "yet" mindset. Keep motivating our students to learn and grow.
Emily Waddill Blog Post 3
While reading the article on collaboration something that struck me about collaboration is that we need to design group work so that the each member participating and working together is essential for them to succeed. I think a lot of times group work is not viewed that way, especially from the eyes of the students. This type of group work isn't as easy to plan, but it is an important shift that we should all make when planning learning experiences for our students. The final product in this project was not as important as the collaboration and all of the students working together to achieve a goal. The expectations were clearly set from the beginning and I also believe that high quality work comes from students contributing as a team.
My
top three choices relating to collaboration that I feel are most important for
my students include using effort to practice and grow, tackle and monitor
learning, and actively participate. Too often students don’t want to put in the
effort that it takes to solve a challenging problem and math is all about
practicing the skills and taking the time to get quicker with multiplication or
division facts for example. It is so very hard for students to understand that
their actions now have consequences in the future and that we are laying the
foundations for a successful future. Being able to organize what needs to be accomplished to complete a task is a hard thing to do especially for 6th
graders. The students don’t naturally think to themselves about what they need
to know in order to solve something, so this is something that we need to try
to get students in the habit of doing. Lastly, staying actively engaged in what
they are working on is a challenge. A lot of students have a hard time staying
focused for more than 5 minutes at a time and hardly any try strategies to
focus themselves. Learning how to monitor their behavior and participate at the
right times is one of the most important skills to learn.
Emily Waddill Blog Post 4
For my genius hour project students task was to create a menu for their own hypothetical restaurant. The introduction of the project was for students to brainstorm ideas for food items and prices to include for their restaurant. The next day I handed out several different menus from restaurants in the area and the students filled out a noticings chart based on the different menus. Then they had a chance to explore the program they would use to design the menu. The website we used was called imenupro.com. Students could choose between many different layouts, and colors. All of the text was editable so they could change the food items and the pricing.
During this experience I realized that students needed more guidance when we were looking at the menus. I originally just had a blank chart when I did the project but after that day I went back and edited the word document to include some hints at the bottom for what kinds of things the students should be writing down. The website was free to use, so there were some restrictions. The menu was only able to be a page long and some students had more food items that could fit on the menu. I loved all of the different layouts and the kids had a great time choosing what they wanted their menu to look like. We did have some problems with saving the menus and uploading them to a shared folder, but I would use the site again. For lack of time, we didn't go into detail about profit or running a business. I briefly touched on how smaller sizes of plates would be less expensive than a bigger plate and how food with seafood is generally more expensive. However, I would have liked to discuss this further and have students create more realistic menus. Overall, the students enjoyed what they did and I was happy with the results.
During this experience I realized that students needed more guidance when we were looking at the menus. I originally just had a blank chart when I did the project but after that day I went back and edited the word document to include some hints at the bottom for what kinds of things the students should be writing down. The website was free to use, so there were some restrictions. The menu was only able to be a page long and some students had more food items that could fit on the menu. I loved all of the different layouts and the kids had a great time choosing what they wanted their menu to look like. We did have some problems with saving the menus and uploading them to a shared folder, but I would use the site again. For lack of time, we didn't go into detail about profit or running a business. I briefly touched on how smaller sizes of plates would be less expensive than a bigger plate and how food with seafood is generally more expensive. However, I would have liked to discuss this further and have students create more realistic menus. Overall, the students enjoyed what they did and I was happy with the results.
Julianna Lux Blog Post #3 Student Agency
Are you not smart enough to solve it...or have you just not solved it YET? Carol Dwek’s Ted Talk “The Power of Yet” focuses on encouraging students to believe they can achieve, even if they haven’t yet. Dwek presents the concept of focusing on challenging the students to grow instead of maintaining the same level of intelligence and talent. I have to question myself: Am I encouraging growth or stagnancy in my classroom? Do I challenge my students to become better, smarter, more talented individuals who can face a challenge? Or do I encourage them to maintain their current abilities?
I teach two very different levels of English--English II Honors (9th grade students who were typically identified as Gifted and Talented at an early age and took English I as 8th grade students) and English I CP. My English II students evidently experienced an encouraged growth mindset from an early age as they have been motivated to strive for the best academically; granted some students in this class do not continue to have this growth mindset and choose to do the minimum to get by. On the other hand, many of my English I students have been discouraged on numerous occasions during their educational journey to me; they accept Cs and Ds because it means they are getting by and not being left behind, with a few motivated to pursue the challenge of earning an A. Of course, as I typed that last sentence, am I encouraging them to remain stagnant by thinking of how they perform on given tasks using the letters I assign to their final product?
Dwek stated we should praise the process over the product. Encourage students because of their effort, their strategies, their focus, their perseverance. How often do I praise my gifted and talented honors students? Quite likely far more than I praise my CP students. We praise them by placing them in these categories. They grow up knowing they are “gifted” and “talented” and smart; however, some have developed the mindset that they don’t have to keep growing because they already have achieved these labels. By encouraging the process, I would be switching the mindset from producing something they already know how to do to what they can learn how to do during the process of creating something new.
During our Roaring ‘20s PBL, I refused to give my students a list of ideas for their creative product. Instead, they were tasked with completing a product proposal and meeting with me to gain approval for the assignment. I asked them questions about the final product and what it would like and how it would present the ideas; however, I now realize I should have been asking them about the process of creating the product and what they would need to learn how to do in order to accomplish it. Granted, they did produce some amazing products (a 3D model of a 1920s-style radio, a miniature replica of a baseball stadium, an animated video about Hubble, a Weebly and a Google website), but I’m unsure of how they grew as they created those products. I felt rushed, which is often the case as the end of the semester approaches. I do believe my students grew intellectually (many were able to talk for at least a minute on their researched topic without the use of notes); however, I want my students to grow more than intellectually and continue to challenge themselves.
How often do I praise my English I students? I try to praise them on a daily basis, but so many of these students have given up already. They realize they aren’t reading and writing at the same level as many of their classmates and, as Dweck mentioned, believe they’ve found themselves at a dead end. If I encourage them during the process of a challenging task, for the strategies they choose to accomplish the task, as they are maintaining focus on the task, and for persevering to the end of the task even if unsuccessful on the task, perhaps the next time they face it, they will be more successful. My English I students have six school days until they take the writing portion of the English I EOC. I plan to focus on the process of this challenge the next few days and stress the strategies they can use to be successful instead of focusing on the end game and if they are successful.
Changing the students’ mindsets to one of growth may not be easy, but it may place all of my students on an even playing field. They can become agents for their own learning and pursue their own interests and grow their own talents if we focus less on the final product and more on how to get there.
Sunday, November 26, 2017
Blog 4 Genius Hour Kimberly Trott
Blog 4 Genius Hour Journey
I decided to do the Genius Hour concept by having students
in my Civics class use one Friday each week for the last 8 weeks of school to create current event articles. The ideas
was to let them choose a topic of their own liking but it had to be
current. The goal was to have them
become experts in the class on the topic they were interested in.
So essentially, I told the class they had 30 minutes to
research the topic using SC Discus.org.
In that given time, they had to write a long one-paragraph summary of
the most important aspects of their article and then present it to the class as
an expert.
The first day I presented this to my Civics class many of
the students had a problem just picking a topic, secondly narrowing down the
topic when they found the amount of hits overwhelming, and thirdly not even
understanding the various sources from which they were recording their
information.
The students in this class struggle with reading and staying
on task so I was a bit overwhelmed at first.
Many refused to present and lost points also. So, I recognized I had to take the time to
put the website on the overheard and go through the types of information on
Discus. They were unfamiliar with the
differences between a journal, periodical, reference source, academic journal,
and newspaper source. In addition, the Discus website already has the article
cited in MLA format and many just could not understand how to do this. All they had to do was click the cite icon
and there it was to record.
By the third presentation they about had it down pat. Several students still struggled with finding
articles that they could actually read.
I tried to help them come up with maybe another topic choice they found
interesting but this was still difficult.
These particular students had no idea of what they were even interested
in.
This past Friday I found a web site by Time called the 100 most
influential people in the world and this was a good day.
I told them they could choose one person to go off topic on today or
stick to their original topic. Many
students choose a popular Christian rapper to present. They found writing about a pop icon interesting.
I really liked the idea of the Genius Hour current
event. I use to have my class write
current events but forced them to do certain topics. I may not feel like all of their topics are
worthy of researching now but it did get them involved and in the process of
writing. I need to also work on soft
skills in this class. The primary one
being, being ok with reading and presenting in front of an audience.
Maybe the final indicator of enjoyment would be the students
reminding me it was Friday and Genius Hour day.
We still have four left to write!
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