Summer 2012 - Year 2 Cohort Coursework
Just Shoot Me
Our Opening Day Activity was to find something on campus that represented us and our teaching. I found this picture of Abraham Lincoln, which spoke to my love of U.S. Presidents. I also teach 8th grade U.S. history, so this was a great fit.
JJAMS Voice Thread
Jacy, Jason, Allison, Melissa, and Sarah...JJAMS was born! This group was the group we did all of our group projects with. This quick VoiceThread gives an introduction to the 5 of us.
Physics Experiment
In this video, the JJAMS group spent time exploring with various-sized balls - ping pong, basketball, and golf balls. Our task was to video tape and figure out what happens to a ball when dropped from various points. We also had to try to prove what happened when balls were dropped from different levels at the same time - one being dropped straight down, and another ball being dropped off a ledge. Clicking on the image will take you to the YouTube video.
Behaviorism Prezi
To help refresh our memories, the first few days of class were centered around different learning theories. Our group focused on Behaviorism. Our challenge in this assignment was to utilize the tools the Internet offers to find a game that discussed the basics of classical versus operant conditioning. Because the "point" of a game is to challenge you to do something to earn a reward, we found it nearly impossible to find a game that demonstrated the characteristics of classical conditioning, where two unrelated things cause a reaction. So, we found a nifty game that allows the user to simulate the experiment Pavlov did with his dog. The other idea, operant conditioning, lent itself really well to a memory game. In this game, the user hears an annoying sound when he or she gets the answer incorrect; a correct match earns a pleasant, dinging sound.
Cognitive Concept Map
One of the main texts for this course was Daniel Willingham's book: Why Don't Students Like School? Our group focused on two chapters related to drilling students, the effectiveness of that teaching strategy, and the idea of trying to get students to think like experts. One of the easiest way to help map out ideas and to see the connections between and among them is through a concept map. Our group used the tool, bubbl.us, which is a very easy, user-friendly and intuitive online concept mapping software. The picture is our group's concept map about the two Willingham chapters we read.
Why Don't Students Like School?
This was another group project the JJAMS group created. Born out of our discussions of Willingham's key points about drilling and having students like like experts, this Google Presentation goes beyond what he discusses to integrate scholarly research as well as resources for teachers to use in their classroom. Because we are focused on TPACK and not just the content or pedagogy, we had to supplement Willingham's book with our own technology resources.
Exploring Key Topics in Education: Universal Design for Learning
Our group, JJAMS, created this wiki to be a resource for teachers who are interested in integrating UDL principles in their teaching. The wiki offers information about the key components of UDL, some scholarly works surrounding the research of UDL, and resources for lesson planning, unit planning, and student engagement.
De-Motivate Me!
We've all seen the cheesy motivational posters that line conference room walls: lofty pictures, big words, and sentences designed to encourage and uplift.
We decided to make our own posters, but called them De-motivational and sort of poked fun at the concept of motivational posters. Ours centered around how to reach students.
We decided to make our own posters, but called them De-motivational and sort of poked fun at the concept of motivational posters. Ours centered around how to reach students.
Creativity Poem
It's no secret that the older we get, the less creative we become. Sir Ken Robinson argued in a popular TED Talk that schools are educating the creativity out of our youth. So, in an effort to combat that trend, we spent just a few minutes writing a poem about creativity. This challenge centered around the idea of being creative when it comes to repurposing technological tools so they better fit our educational and pedagogical goals.
iImages
Pictures often capture so much more than words can. One of the ways we started thinking about what we wanted to teach for our DreamIT project was to focus on some big idea related to our content area. To help frame our thinking, once we had decided on an idea, we then had to find pictures that represented that big idea. This was another way to start thinking about how to make the concept more concrete for students and how to make it more relevant for students by using images that might resonate with them. Below are the three iImages I created for the concept for my DreamIt project on liberty.
Dream IT - Backward Design Template
Lesson planning with the end in mind first. What skills do you want your students to have, what knowledge do you want them to know, by the end of the unit? These key questions are central to Backward Design, a concept piloted by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe. As part of the Dream IT project, we spent some time thinking about what we wanted our students to know at the end of the Dream IT project unit. Since I am focusing on liberty and freedom, my big idea was for students to have a deeper, more concrete understanding of those concepts: what it means to fight for something, what the motivations surrounding that desire are, what the outcomes or repercussions of those desires were, and how these concepts are still relevant to them and to society today.
Tensions
For this activity, we brainstormed a list of tensions that exist in education. My picture shows the tensions between doing things the traditional way and being overwhelmed with all the different technology choices.
Alphabits
This really fun assignment challenged each individual group to go out and find a letter shape somewhere in nature. It had be a naturally occurring one, not one that was printed on a sign. When each group put their letters together, we spelled out beauty. The purpose of this activity was to spark creativity and help us to recognize that we can often miss something because we're not looking for it.
Web 2.0 Wiki
There are literally hundreds of "Web 2.0" tools out there. These tools are designed to help both teachers and students integrate technology into their teaching and learning. Because it is impossible to do an in-depth analysis of all of the different tools out there, we did a technology jigsaw where each group chose an overarching category. Then, within that big category, we each chose something that we thought would fit well with our particular age group and content area. Our group chose Writing Tools. The image is linked to our Wiki, which gives an overview of the tool, its advantages and disadvantages, and classroom implementations.
Understanding Understanding
This group project was born out of a discussion about common misconceptions people have about things. For example, we watched a video about what causes seasons on the Earth. They interviewed Harvard graduates and high school students and the video showed their findings. It is interesting to hear what people know about something that we all learned about at one time. Our group decided to think about the three branches of government and the system of checks and balances that the framers designed. The image takes you to the website we created. This website has our video, the interview questions, and summaries of our findings.