Action Plan 2014 Final thoughts

As I finally sit down to start writing my wrap-up blog post about my Action Plan, I can’t believe it is nearing the end of the school year. This year has been so ridiculously busy, it has flown by. There have been times when I have felt overwhelmed with all the new and exciting technology and ideas – how do I fit it all in? How do I have time to read all the articles posted to Diigo and Twitter? I quickly realized that I don’t have time to do it all. It isn’t physically possible, and I don’t think that trying every new technology in a classroom is all that great either, as much as kids these days are digital sponges, they need time to absorb and learn to use the programs and apps they are exposed to, as much as we do. They can’t keep switching to the latest and greatest thing either. The trick as an educator – in life, and in the classroom – is finding a balance that works for you and your students. When I decided to redefine an assignment as my Action Plan, I knew I needed to allow the students to become comfortable with the technology before I had them complete their major research assignment. To do this, I added a video element to an existing assignment and asked the students to use Voicethread. It is through this experience, that I realized that you can’t assume the students know tech, we need to take the time to figure out the programs we are asking them to use, and to provide instruction. Due to a few different factors, I did not have the chance to show my class how to use Voicethread, I was optimistic they would just figure it out. Unfortunately, this didn’t pan out, but as resourceful as they are, most of my students just picked a video program they knew how to use for their unit assignment. Lesson learned. Knowing that time would constrain me to really learn Voicethread, I decided to ditch it, and allow the students to use any program they liked for their major research assignment. Once the students got to work, the research assignment went very much the same as the previous version of the assignment (where the students wrote a 6-page essay). I still needed to teach research skills, documentation skills and basic thesis and essay writing skills. My goal was to enrich the final product while still allowing the students to think critically about an event or person in Canadian history. Overall, I am very pleased with the results. The students seemed more apt to take the time to plan out their work than in past years, and many had very detailed storyboards. The final products were (for the most part) very well done. They included primary sources, music and the student’s voice over. When I asked my class, they overwhelmingly said they would much rather do the digital essay than a written essay. The main reason they stated was that they didn’t have to worry as much about the French grammar, which isn’t exactly what a French teacher wants to hear, but in the end, they all communicated their research and their thoughts clearly. I still have a few kinks to work out to improve this assignment for next year:

• Extending the video timeline – I had said 3-5 minutes, and the feedback from the students was that this was actually too short to get in all they wanted!
• Citations and bibliography – because they didn’t put the bibliography directly into the video, the structure of their citations was not very formal. I need to figure out a way to have students properly cite all their work, and the images they use in their video.
• Thesis – Although I conferenced with the students to check over their thesis statements and outlines, in the future, I think I will have them submit this as part of their final work, this way I won’t be struggling to listen for it, as some are not always clear!

Ever since I started teaching the Canadian History course in French, I have wanted to modify the research essay. Thanks to the opportunity I had to be a part of Cohort 21, the redefinition of the assignment was made possible. It gave me the ideas, motivation and inspiration to create a new task using technology. Now that the Action Plan is wrapping up, and our final Face 2 Face meeting is upon us, I look forward to maintaining the connections I’ve made with the Cohort 21 community as well as the educators I’ve connected with through Twitter. It has been amazing to have different tools and ideas pop up or be presented through Cohort 21 as well as through my school PD. I have had the opportunity to have conversations and share ideas with my school colleagues that I wouldn’t have had before. Cohort 21 helped me to begin building my PLN, I am looking forward to continuing to grow my it through the BLC2014 conference in Boston this July.

Check out my powtoon final presentation here.

Thank you again Garth and Justin for your guidance and leadership. Your feedback was always meaningful and helpful!

Voicethread

Before the March Break, I had my students complete their project on World War 2. In partners, students were assigned an important event from the war. They had to examine the event, answer critical thinking questions, and then present their findings. As an added element this year, I also assigned a short video, more as a quick dry run for their major assignment, and to test run Voicethread.

Unfortunately, Voicethread did not work as hoped. Partially my own fault – again I was absent (a reoccurring theme in my teaching life this winter!) so there was not a lot of instruction on how to use Voicethread. Consequently, most of the students chose to use software they already had on their computers. The few students who did use Voicethread, didn’t log in through the class account I had created, and both groups complained of many issues using the program. They found it slow and glitchy. When I was marking their work, I didn’t really like the quality of the Voicethread videos compared to what students created using Photostory. The Voicethreads didn’t seem to flow very well.

So, I’ve decided to ditch Voicethread and allow the students to use the program of their choice for their major assignment digital essay. Glad I decided to test out Voicethread before!

My students have just gotten started on their digital essays. Last week was research in the library, this week is working on the thesis…

Long over due…

This blog entry is a little late, but  the past couple of weeks have been a whirl wind. I think I have spent more time away from school on the ski hill than I have in the classroom!

A couple weekends ago I spent a long time re-working an assignment for my grade 10 Canadian History course. I wanted to add a small multi-media component to this unit task as a bit of a run-through for the major assignment.

In partners, students are to research a World War Two battle and analyse it’s importance. They will present this to the class using PowerPoint or Prezi. I added a short video so the students would have some experience going into their major assignment. After a bit of quick research, I decided to have my students use Voicethread for this element of their task.

I was really surprised at how long it took me to revise the assignment, I originally thought I would just be adding the video component. But, the week before reviewing the assignment, our History department had been visited by Garfield Gini-Newman from the Critical Thinking Consortium, so that was also running through my mind as I reworked the assignment, and planned the next few classes for my students (knowing that I would be away for about half of them!). Because my students would be doing a lot of independent research over the next few weeks, I decided to spend some time teaching them how to critically evaluate websites. I included the critical assessment of websites a part of their unit task. (I collect these tomorrow, so we will see how this went.) The classes spent on assessing websites proved to be a much more valuable exercise for my students than I had expected.  It was interesting to compare websites that at first glance seem legitimate, but after further investigation, students realized the sites were not reliable. They were picking up details and elements that I wouldn’t have expected.

The most time consuming part, which I guess isn’t really a surprise, was re-working the rubric. It must have been a while since I built one from scratch – man does it take a while!

Tomorrow, I will get to see how the boys are doing on this assignment…it has been a struggle to move forward with this class, when I have been missing it so often. Now that ski season is over, I won’t be away as often, so I’m looking forward to seeing what they have produced!

(I hope this entry makes sense…on top of everything else, I’ve spent the weekend writing report cards!)

Face 2 Face #3

Another overwhelming day with Cohort 21! So many cool new things to think about and to try.

In an attempt to be efficient with my time, (nap time is only so long) here we go!

Action plan: Redefine my Grade 10 (Extended French) Canadian History final research essay into a multimedia presentation. Students would create a digital story/essay with pictures, images, primary sources and a voice over instead of writing an essay.

What are my immediate next steps?

I had a great conversation with Mike and Tim yesterday and they had some fantastic suggestions for programs to use to modify my assignment and to even possibly change my original plan.  I need to decide which program I want the students to use to create their movie/digital essay. Tim and Mike had an idea to add a blogging element to help provide assessment for learning and to check off the written component that my department head has asked me to include.

I would like to continue reading about the SAMR model. My goal is to redefine the task, so and I want to ensure I have a complete understanding of what that means.

Also, I am going to begin scaffolding the major assignment by adding a multimedia element to my next unit assignment.

When will I publish next?

As per our school academic calendar, I need to present the assignment outline to my students before February 14th.  The bulk of the student work will be done in class, after March break.

I will blog again once I have had a chance to revamp the assignment, so probably around Feb 14.

How will I present my findings/exploration?

Because I am asking my student to create a movie, it is my goal to create a movie to present my findings.

Lots of work to do in the next few weeks and months, but I’m sure it will all pay off!

Out with the essay in with the digital storytelling!

After my post contemplating which area to focus on for my action plan, I realized I was leaning towards using the SAMR model to redefine the summative/major assignment in my grade 10 history class. My idea was rather than have my Extended French students struggle with writing a 6-page essay, they would create a digital essay. Before I could venture down this road, I needed to ensure that changing the major assignment for my French section was ok. While my academic director had some misgivings, my department head (who teaches the English sections of grade 10 history) was all for it, and I finally got the OK last week. The only condition is that there is some sort of written component that will be marked.

After looking at the current assignment outline, I don’t think that I need to change it too much. The students will still be investigating their choice of event/theme/person in Canadian history, it is just the final task/output that will change. My job now is to help prepare them for this new task…what do they need to know to be able to create a multi-media presentation? How will I teach thesis writing skills without the students actually writing an essay? I’m hoping to blend my current assignment with an assignment I was presented with in November at the Ontario History and Social Studies Teacher Association (OHASSTA) conference. I attended a workshop by two award-winning teachers from Bill Crothers Secondary School in Unionville, Daraius M. Bharucha and Stefano Fornazzari San Marin. The assignment was a year-long task where students researched their place in Canadian history. Using digital storytelling, each student would recount their family’s story; when they came to Canada, what was going on at the time, etc. While my students won’t be examining their own place in Canadian history, Darius and Stefano’s assignment has several elements that incorporate the multimedia aspect I am hoping to add.

So, that’s where I’m at right now. As a step to prepare my class for the multimedia aspect of the major assignment, I think I’m going to modify the project for their current WWII project…hopefully not a disaster!

Social Media Fitness

On Tuesday, my school had the pleasure of having guest speaker Chris Vollum speak to the students about social media awareness. His message was important for all of us as more and more (and more!) of our lives are shared online. As teachers we need to remind ourselves that in using technology in our classrooms, it is important to teach students how to create online profiles they are proud to show. Chris gave several examples of adults who had lost their jobs for their Twitter posts, and teens who had lost scholarship opportunities, or had been kicked out of school because of what they had posted online. He provided the students with tips and tools on how to remove the things they aren’t proud of online and to rebuild their profile with things they are proud of. He also shared ways to use social media to learn and to engage with those they admire.

I wouldn’t necessarily say I am proud of everything on my online profile, but there isn’t anything I am ashamed of. I have attempted to create two separate profiles, I use Facebook to connect with friends and family, and I use Twitter to connect with other educators and to build my PLN. The challenge is finding time to manage our various profiles and to engage in a way to really benefit from the wealth of information out there. Still a learning process for me, and one I want to share with my students and help guide them to be proud of their online profiles.

Two biggest takeaways from the session:

1) You are what you (and your friends!) post online.

2) You will be Googled – so make yourself AWESOME!

What to do?

Yesterday my fellow Cohor21-ers and I met again for our second Face 2 Face meeting. Motivated by this upcoming meeting, I spent a few evenings last week catching up a bit on what had been going on; reading blogs, checking Twitter more frequently and watching some of the Hangouts. After a few crazy weeks of colds, family events, school events, report cards and starting to coach again, thinking about my PLN and Cohort 21 was pushed to the back burner. The F2F came at the right time, before everything else took priority, and some of the Cohort tools ended up in that  eternal “I should try that one day” pile that sits on my desk and in lost PD file folders (I hope I’m not the only one!) Just when I needed it, the fire got restarted, and the enthusiasm rekindled. Justin and Garth, you are right on track with the article I happened upon this week: 10 Keys to Making Professional Learning Meaningful. You are hitting up most of the points, especially , #6: No One-Day Wonders and of course # 8: Maximize 21^st Century Tools. 

The whole nature of Cohort 21 is that we have no choice but to stay connected, and to DO things. To use not only what we learn about together, (Google Apps, Twitter, Diigo, WordPress blog, socrative, polleverywhere, etc) but what we learn from the larger PLN that we are now connected to, and which is constantly growing. Then of course comes the other key component, the Action Plan.

Three years ago, I participated in the IBSC’s Action reseach program and examined the question: How can boys’ engagement and achievement in the study of Foreign Languages be developed and enhanced? This program was an excellent introduction to the idea of action research to improve one’s practice. I learned a lot from my research, but I think the experience as a whole is what has lasting effects. I want to continue to challenge myself to become a better teacher, and to meet like-minded teachers. Which now leads me to my current question of a potential action plan…

I’ve been thinking about some ideas for a while now, but can’t seem to narrow it down and commit to one. Part of my problem is that I am having trouble deciding which course to focus on. Currently I am teaching two sections of grade 9 Core French, and one section each of Information and Communication Technology in Business (BTT1O), Canadian History (gr 10), and Presentation and Speaking Skills (gr 11)….all taught in French as part of my school’s Extended French curriculum.

My initial thought was to integrate an action plan in my core French classes, and focus on a Flipped classroom. I’ve never tried this before, but see it as an amazing tool that I want to know more about.Core French at the grade 9 level is always interesting as it is a required course, and students come from a variety of backgrounds, each with their own strengths and weaknesses with the language. A flipped classroom could help solve the feeling of sounding like a broken record sometimes, and allow students at different levels to review lessons as needed.

I was also considering doing a collaborative activity with Jen Bibby, using some of the Google Apps for connecting two of our classes. To help build oral communication skills in our students.

Then, yesterday we were presented with the idea of SAMR. This was the first time I’d ever really thought about the way we use technology, and then I started thinking of heading in this direction for my action plan.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=us0w823KY0g&noredirect=1[/youtube]

Still with no clear direction, I listened to some other people’s ideas for their action plans, and eventually started a conversation with Tim and Mike. Tim happened to show us this prezi by Jim Cash. It was like a lightening bolt struck me. I could do his redefinition example in my history class. This is only my second year teaching the French version of this course, and I have never been happy with the idea of having the students write a 6-page essay as their final summative task. Having the students create a mulit-media assignment makes so much more sense. They will still need to do the same amount of historical inquiry, but the output task is much less onerous for a second language student.

Needless to say, I’m still not 100% sure of my direction. This week I’m going to speak with my History department head and the Academic Director to make sure that my course can have a different summative evaluation than it’s English counterpart. Also, I plan to talk to another colleague who has started using more flipped lessons in his French classes.  Hopefully over the next couple weeks, I’ll have a better road map!

Twitter gives me a headache…

A week after diving into Cohort 21, the speed at which my head has been spinning is finally starting to slow down.

It has been a strange week. I spent Monday resting a back ache, then I caught a cold and spent  Tuesday and Wednesday home sick watching Barney and Dora with my sick 3 year-old. It might have been partially because I could barely breath out my nose, but I found myself awake in the middle of the night thinking of things I could be tweeting, of posts I should be reading and of things I could be doing in my classroom. One morning while trying to tune out Barney, I tried what Garth had suggested, and was checking Twitter on my phone. I felt completely overwhelmed with all the posts that were showing up in my feed, and was feeling guilty for not having the energy to read about “How game-based learning influences design thinking?” or “12 Conversation Starters on What Parents Want You (Teachers) to Know”. Throughout the day (and week), my phone was beeping and buzzing with updates not only from my fellow “Cohorters”, but from educational experts from around the world…it was all just giving me a headache! By Wednesday, I felt I needed to take a break. Was I already in too deep 5 days into this experience?

Luckily, by Wednesday evening, everyone was feeling much better, and Thursday was back to the normal daycare/work routine. My work day began with our monthly faculty meeting, and as luck (?) would have it, the main topic of discussion was technology. After some initial school business and announcements, we broke into 3 groups and rotated through 3 sessions. My first one….Twitter…I felt a bit of trepidation and anxiety. As my group sat around the large table in the Archives, I listened to how our residential housemasters are using Twitter as an extra tool to communicate with parents. They are tweeting house events and pictures, and are retweeting tweets from sports teams if  one of their members is mentioned. What a fantastic and quick way to disseminate information, and help parents not feel quite so far away from their sons in boarding, I thought. Next, another colleague, Melissa, started showing us how she was using Twitter to take in information, by building her PLN (my ears perked up). As she was logging into her account, the questions from the group started flying: “Isn’t Twitter blocked on the school firewall?”, “How many parents are following Sifton House?”, “How much time does this take you?”, ” Can someone PLEASE explain what a hash tag is?!”  Suddenly, amidst all these questions, I started to feel more comfortable. I knew the answer to at least some of these questions! I quickly opened up my Google Drive and found our trusty folder with the workshop materials and found the Language of Twitter page we had been given and shared it with a few of my colleagues. As the questions were answered, and the presentation continued, one thing Melissa said really struck a cord. She also said she checks her Twitter on her phone. For her, it is normally when she has a few minutes while she waits for her kids at the bus stop. Melissa acknowledged there was a lot of information to filter through. She suggested scrolling through a few tweets, and grabbing anything of interest that might be there. You will miss some tweets, but you just need to let it go.  Let it go – she was right. I couldn’t read it all, I needed to be ok with missing an amazing, useful, inspiring tweet.  If it is really something that worthwhile, someone will probably retweet it anyway, right?

With those few words, let it go, I left the session feeling a lot more at ease about the journey we have embarked on as part of Cohort 21. I actually felt like a semi-expert after being on Twitter for all of 6 days, and realizing that I wasn’t the only one who was initially overwhelmed by the information overload it provides.

With the initial anxiety and feeling of being overwhelmed subsiding, I’m looking forward to see where this week takes me!

Cohort 21 – Day 1

What an inspiring day! So excited to be part of this group. The teachers I have met today are keen, motivated and enthusiastic not only about student learning, but their own professional learning and becoming better educators in the 21st century.

I can’t wait to start using my social media, my Google Apps to connect with Cohort 21 and teachers around the world. The collaborative excitement is in the air!

Some things I would like to try in my classes are:

Diigo

• In my Canadian History class to build a research database

Socrative.com

• Exit Ticket to gage student understanding and to ask questions

Twitter in the classroom???

• Still feeling a bit overwhelmed by this one as to how to use it as an educational tool… we’ll have to see!

Some things I would like to try for myself as professional development are:

Diigo

• Building a PLN
• Doing professional reading

Twitter

• Joining/creating a PLN
• Connecting with other Cohort 21 members

Any tips or feedback?

Hello world!

Welcome to Cohort 21 Cohort 21. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!

Cohort 21 is a unique professional development opportunity open to teachers and school leaders who are seeking to build a learning network amongst CIS Ontario member schools. The Cohort 21 community will be built on a foundation of collaboration and innovation and together, will investigate and refine 21st century teaching and learning best practices through the rich experience of “learning by doing”.