Summarizing My Cohort Action Plan

Posted on April 25, 2014 by Coyne chris

I encourage you to check out my Google presentation on my Cohort experience and how my action plan took shape.

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1LNgcvNca_6qytMgz7I3h3QKUAu_z-WwbwwtwSAuR5YE/edit?usp=sharing

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Building a 10,000 piece puzzle

Posted on April 24, 2014 by Coyne chris

What a truly inspiring time I have had and will continue to have with the cohort community. I’m entering the final day with so much inspiration, motivation and eagerness to continue to accomplish new achievements and explore new realms of education.

I started off this year with a fairly good understanding of technology but was looking for a few ideas on what else there might be as well as building a community network with fellow teachers working in the independent system. I can confidently say that I accomplished both and so much more. I find myself actively sharing what I have learned with teachers around the school, bringing ideas to students on how to collaborate their work and a deeper appreciation of the creative ideas everyone has brought forward thus far during our own learning paths.

There is so much to write about which scares me as I don’t know what is to much, or to little or just right. Through Cohort and the community; I have implemented a flipped lesson strategy into my classes and will continue this trend. The students gained an appreciation for devising their own labs, sharing their results with family/guardians and brought this excitement and enrichment into other classes. It also sparked an interest in more labs to be completed in different environments (something I will be looking into further). I also ran a PD session for staff members at my school with our Technology Integration Specialist on my experiences with flipped lessons and where to start when first approaching the idea. WOW! Having the opportunity to do this blew me away. It was great sharing my successes as well as the numerous struggles I faced. I was fascinated in finding out how many teachers thought a flipped lesson was simply a video as homework (I was one of them as well before this). The biggest takeaway from these meetings is the connections and confidence I have built. I would say that I am rather a shy fella when it comes to PDs and the style and way with which Cohort was run aloud me to flourish in my own way and build on skills which I had.

The original action plan has since been flipped – quite literally. As I gained more of an appreciation of what a flipped lesson could entail, I realized that I could grab any video online and integrate it as homework which is one of my techniques I utilize. So instead, I decided to go all out and create a lab scenario which the students completed over several days at home. The feedback was overwhelmingly positive for this approach. Students (and parents) commented that they would be eager to wake up to check on the experiment, would discuss the progress of the experiment during dinner and wouldn’t go to bed until after checking on the results. As an added bonus, I noticed an increase in discussions in the classroom as well as the level of detail being put fourth within the lab.

Looking back, I am surprised at how far I have come. Although I haven’t made a major internet appearance (Main goal for summer and the upcoming school years), I have learned so many interesting tools and have integrated these tools into my teaching style. I have further developed my lesson plans based on ideas which have been shared and the new tools which I have gained. My goal is to have one flipped lab for each grade I teach for the new school year and I will be building on this to create flipped lessons as well to compliment the various learning styles. One of the main challenges I faced was getting online to share my experiences with the community. It’s partly because I am shy and want everything to sound perfect but also because of how busy the school year can get. After reading a few blogs, I know I am not alone in this but I know how beneficial it is (atleast for me) to read others as I gain new perspectives on material and exposed to different ideas/research currently going on. I look forward to increasing my online presence and keeping everyone up to date.

Stay tuned for the PPT to follow!!! 🙂

Remember – tweet me @ccoyne_sciences or checkout my google+ account Chris Coyne

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Turning the Class upside down

Posted on January 21, 2014 by Coyne chris

It’s been a bit since I have last posted with regards to my action plan but have been actively thinking about my next steps and planning my game plan. My thoughts so far:

  • I will be flipping a lesson in my Grade 12 Chemistry class in the Energy change & Rates of Reaction Unit. This unit is heavy in calculations so what better way to enrich the learning then providing them class time to work through problems and inquire about the process with the help of classmates and teacher.
  • I am still figuring out exactly what the flipped lesson will be but here are a few ideas which are running around my head:
      • Taking a PPT and recording it while discussing the concepts
      • Using a webcam, record a video of myself teaching the lesson and have students watch along with the PPT
      • I do want to provide a few examples of solving problems while getting the students to inquire about their surroundings
      • Once I have become comfortable with flipping, I would like to try to flip a lab and see how this may enrich learning by demonstrating chemistry is all around us. (This may be something I look into for the new school year – Thinking about a lab where students research the effects of salt and sugar on baking and conduct an inquiry based on their research)
  • Through my thought process, I have made a few changes to the layout of my class website. I have enhanced the discussion section in respect to this unit. I will be posing one or two thought provoking questions which get the students chatting and thinking about the impact of chemistry around them. I have also posted a “Homework Struggles” section and am encouraging students to post any struggles they have encountered and/or recommendations to various resources which have been helpful.
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Recap of Second F2F

Posted on November 25, 2013 by Coyne chris

Thanks to BSS for hosting the second F2F! What a great campus!! The second session was yet again an awesome experience which gave me so many ideas and a chance to reconnect with others from last time and find out what they have been up to.

We started off with writing down what we make time for during the week on a sheet and crinkling it into a ball to toss across the room. We then attempted to catch someone else’s snowball and read how they relax. It was a great exercise to use in the classroom to get the students active. Maybe doing a review with this or a recap of terms? I’m ‘tossing’ a few ideas around. 🙂

We then went into launching our action plan! We learned a little more about wordpress and the various templates as well as the awesome google+ and the hangout tool. The one nice thing about this Pro-D is that it demonstrates what it teaches within the session. So we looked at the collection of data and why we collect data, we tried a google hangout and trouble shot a few hiccups and dove into our kits which enabled us to ask more  enriched questions which arose as we chipped away.

It was great seeing other action plans and hearing how these were ‘stepping stones’ for the individuals rather than a final step. As a teacher, I am always looking to further myself and deepen my understanding and this is exactly what the action plan will do.  One concept which stood out in my head was that we should look at the larger picture and then focus on one aspect which falls under it… very similar to the understanding by design model. I am looking at Pedagogy and narrowing specifically into flipping the classroom. I encourage you to checkout the Action Plan category  of my blog “Organizing the Awesome Ideas”

Image - The Book of Awesome

Image – The Book of Awesome

to read about the questions which I am currently working through during the preliminary phase (Fingers crossed that the link works…). As silly as it sounds, I think the hardest part will be deciding which method to use to present my action plan.

We didn’t get a chance to look at Google Moderator as Garth and Justin adjusted the afternoon to better suit our needs based on the socrative and poll everywhere responses. Much appreciated! I enjoyed being able to chat longer with others who are looking at pedagogy and how to integrate various concepts into the classroom. Specifically, hearing what others have done to flip a classroom or bring in various tools was great! Gave me a starting point to look further into for my action plan.

During this session, I was able to connect with others and share a few ideas while being inspired by their stories and what they are doing. My goal prior to the next session is to post 4 more blogs geared towards science and my action plan, tweet a little more and integrate Diigo into the classroom. I’d love to hear how you’ve been using Diigo in the classroom. Share your thoughts/suggestions as a comment!

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Action Plan – Organizing The Awesome Ideas

Posted on November 25, 2013 by Coyne chris

Once again, I walked away from this amazing Pro-D inspired, engaged and filled with ideas. There wasn’t a dull moment during the day! We started with a review of our toolkit  and continued right through to generating discussion and ideas on our action plans. It was great seeing familiar faces and catching up on what we were doing as well as meeting Louis and welcoming him into Cohort.

I’ve been toying with the idea of flipping a Grade 12 Chemistry class and how this will look. I was enlightened with the discussion our table had on Flipping a classroom and what it really is. Does it need to include a video? Are flipped classrooms only designed to give more time in the classroom? Is it a new way of thinking? How much time does an educator need to put in to design a flipped classroom? How much of the course should be flipped? Can you flip a lab? I’ve got quite a list of things to look more into but needless to say, I am extremely excited to get started and dive into this action plan.

I’m confident that this’ll be an awesome experience for myself and the students. One which is enriched with inquiry, projects and in-depth labs. I look forward to bringing these ideas back to Pickering College and sharing with others.

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First F2F – Reflecting Back

Posted on October 27, 2013 by Coyne chris

What an adventure we were on during our first F2F session! I came in a little nervous as I wasn’t sure what exactly to expect but was blown away by the energy that this group had! Very engaging PowerPoint which incorporated a variety of tools which I could take away and use immediately. The first F2F opened the doors to network with others as well as learn how to use our toolkit.

Twitter – As others mentioned, there is a whole other side to twitter which I didn’t know existed and how it can be incorporated into the classroom. We learned about call outs (@) and keywords (#). Truth be told, I didn’t know there was a difference.  We also got a chance to try an activity out with twitter where we created a “backdoor” conversation during a video and got insight into the strengths and struggles that come with this concept. I’d be interested to see a video on this being done in the classroom.

Google Apps – A powerhouse tool which has blown me away with all the features it has. Coming into this, I knew of Google Docs and how students can communicate in real-time despite physical locations but I am inspired to look more into this platform and find out more about the many plug-ins I can enable and maybe why I would want a plug-in J

Diigo – An awesome bookmarking site! Although I had never heard of Diigo, after the group discussion, I learned about a few applications for this tool and how others are using it as a place for students to post websites for projects – very clever idea with so much potential. This enables students to work collaboratively together and share resources while allowing feedback on the types of resources they  find. The other idea I liked was using this tool as a potential search engine. It not only eliminates advertisements and top hits but gives you sites which have been bookmarked (liked) and the number of times.

Finally, we learned about two tools – poll everywhere and socrative and how we could potentially use these in the classroom. Cohort 21 is a wonderful idea to bring schools together, learn new tools all awhile enabling everyone to experiment with the tools and work collaboratively together.

I am flooded with ideas on how to integrate these tools into the classroom and rather eager/giddy to try them out but find myself wondering how far to dive into each tool with the students.

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Hello world!

Posted on October 10, 2013 by Coyne chris

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”.

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