Bloom's Digital Taxonomy

My favorite thing about "Bloom's Digital Taxonomy" is that Churches provides rubrics for assessing things that I find difficult to grade. For example, I would have never thought to use a rubric to assess a student's ability to search for information on Google. These types of rubrics are ideal for formative assessment. I do encourage my students to use higher order thinking skills. Although Churches mentions that students may begin their learning anywhere in Bloom's Taxonomy, I typically have my students begin with knowledge and comprehension and work towards evaluating and creating. By providing students with clear learning targets at the beginning of a unit, I allow the students to see that they will eventually use their understanding to evaluate and create. Typically this higher order thinking activity will be the summative assessment. I think it is valuable and motivating for the students to recognize why they need to understand information in order to create a final product. This reading gave me an idea for modifying my poetry project. In the past I have asked students to create their own poetry, but I would like this project to fit into the Bloom's Digital Taxonomy this year. I love the Mixbook idea, and I know my students would enjoy this opportunity for publishing their work as well. I think I may use this for my final project for the class. Using Mixbook would provide more higher order thinking because students would not only create poetry, but also design and and publish this work.

LA Assignment

I continue to be impressed by how capable my students are when it comes to technology. I asked the students to write a social protest poem after reading A Christmas Carol. However, this year I offered an alternative to this assignment. I saw a video called "The Girl Effect" on Oprah, and I thought this would be a perfect fit for social protest. The problem was that I had no idea how the students would create a video like "The Girl Effect." I explained the poetry assignment and showed the video in class. I told the students that I didn’t know how they would create something like this video, but that they could if they knew what they were doing. Of course, most of them had ideas for how to create a video like this. The students are motivated by this format for the assignment. It is due after the break, but I am amazed by what they’ve already accomplished. This experience made me realize that the students are probably my best resource when it comes to technology. I can simply show them an example of what I would like them to do and ask them the best way to go about it. They did not all use the same types of technology, but the end results are the same. I love that! I’m looking forward to seeing their final projects.

K-12 Online Conference

I watched the archived presentation "Whither ePortfolios" by Drew Buddie. I selected this presentation because I thought it would be about digital writing portfolios, something I would eventually like my students to create. However, Drew Buddie has a different focus. He discusses the benefits of ePortfolios, the technology students can use for this, and the challenges teachers may face accepting this type of publishing. He argues that students have the choice to publish the work they want others to see, something that does not necessarily happen with a classroom bulletin board. He shows various sources for creating these portfolios, such as Glogster (I was happy to see this because I have used Glogster with my students this year). He argues that publishing work in this way allows students to receive feedback that they would not receive without ePortfolios. While I haven't read "Bloom's Digital Taxonomy," Buddie mentions it in his presentation, which sparked my interest in the upcoming reading assignment. He demonstrates how Moodle can be combined with something called "Mahara" as a place where students can create ePortfolios. There are obvious benefits to watching this presentation online. First of all, I watched in my pajamas in the comfort of my own home. However, what I really enjoyed was that I started watching a couple of the other videos and stopped them because they didn't seem very interesting or relevant. Walking out of a presentation is rude, and it just doesn't seem like an option. I truly like this option with online conferences. However, I believe that I am more engaged when watching a presentation in person.

Webcast Reflection

Creating a SMART recording about parts of speech was not difficult. The most challenging aspect is accepting the fact that I will never sound exactly like I would like to when I am creating the screencast. I, of course, will inevitably insert an "um" here and there. I posted this webcast on my website because some students are struggling with parts of speech. I thought this would be a good resource for them. I showed the students how to access this during class. I envision myself using this technology as a review of concepts for students. I like the fact that I didn't create a separate webcast for each part of speech. Instead, I created an overview of all eight. This makes creating webcasts manageable, which means that I will use it in my classroom.

Webcast

Here is my SMART recording on parts of speech.

Parts of Speech

Ideas for Screencast

So, I still haven't created a screencast for this assignment; however, I did create a SMART recording and post it on my website earlier in the year. Shannon and I wanted our seventh graders to refer back to our recorded directions for a project. We thought that this would ensure that every seventh grade student would have the same directions and information. Also, we wanted parents to have access to the directions for the project. It was not difficult, but I haven't seen much of a need to use this type of technology. Well, I suppose I do see the need, but it hasn't been very practical. In a perfect world, I would record every lesson, so students who are absent have the opportunity to watch the lessons. This would also be great as a review for students who were present for the lesson. I'm struggling to find the time to do this, so for now I want to treat these recordings as something I will do when I know multiple students will need them as a resource. Recently many of my students have been struggling with parts of speech. I have met with several of them during class and after school to review various concepts, but I would like to do more than this. I am thinking of creating a screencast that reviews each part of speech and putting it on my website. I will probably create a Word document with the definitions of each part of speech and examples, and I will use SMART recorder to explain these grammar concepts. I plan to work on this screencast this week, so I will post my parts of speech recording soon.

Scriblink and Etherpad

I've played with Scriblink and Etherpad and liked both of them. Etherpad reminds me a lot of Google Docs, but there are several features that I like better. First of all, Etherpad automatically assigns a color to each author, which would eliminate a step required to do this in Google Docs. Also, I LOVE the option to watch the changes in real time. This would be such a great tool to determine exactly how much each student contributes to a group assignment. It seems more user-friendly than Google Docs as well. The options to save directly to a Word a document are very easy to find, for example. I'm not sure if Google Docs has an unlimited undo button, but I really like this option in Etherpad. I feel this is necessary when junior high students collaborate. I may use this next year for the Our Town project (rather than using Google Docs). Scriblink is a lot of fun, and I imagine math teachers love this tool. I like Etherpad better for language arts, but I still see opportunities to use this for reading and writing. For example, it would be a fun way for students to create a web as a pre-writing activity or a Venn-diagram to compare concepts. Again, I like how easy it is to use. I think students would like the fast email option and toolbar. I truly don't see many limitations with either Etherpad or Scriblink; however, I have found that it is often difficult to assign group projects/assignments. Making sure that one student does not dominate the group or not work at all is always a challenge. Even with this great technology, making sure that each student contributes equally is not easy. One idea that I definitely love, though, is using it to sign up for projects, presentations, etc. I will probably use this next year as a tool for students to sign up for a book talk date.

Technology Issues

Well, I am starting to feel some frustration with technology. I found the time to sit down and work on my assignments today, but I can't get into Moodle. It won't load from the Mariemont page. This experience taught me a lesson, though. As I continue to assign more activities online, my students have more and more issues accessing websites, remembering passwords, etc. I feel their pain today. I am proud of myself, though, because I realized that I could still access the list of blogs by logging into Google Docs. So, here I am. I won't be able to check out the Scriblink and Etherpad assignment (which is what I planned to do), but I will be able to spend some time checking out other blogs. Anyhow, this experience raises some questions. How can we hold students responsible for completing online assignments when problems may be beyond their control? Is this fair to students without Internet access? What is the best way for students to keep track of all of their passwords? This last point has been particularly frustrating for me lately. I asked my students to create a Voki (speaking avatar) and post it to my wiki space. This required two separate passwords, which I do not have access to, for each student. I spent three bells troubleshooting on Wednesday, which doesn't seem like an effective use of classroom time. I want to use technology, but half of the students couldn't complete this assignment. I am off to see if I can access Moodle.

Playing with Google Docs...

http://docs.google.com/present/edit?id=0AdN3OFjXzn0bZGY4c3ZrcWhfMGdxYzgyaGZ3&hl=en

Google Docs

Well, I am using Google Docs for the seventh grade Our Town project. You know something works when students who are absent collaborate with students in class. I couldn't believe it! Not one, but two students decided to work on the assignment from home, so they didn't miss anything their groups added to the project. The students are working in groups to create a one act play, and Google Docs is perfect for this assignment. Last year they shared the Word document through email, and it was messy. Google Docs allows me to keep track of their progress. Because each student writes in a different font, I can also track how much each student contributes. I often ask students to create Power Point presentations in groups to demonstrate their understanding. I will definitely ask them to use Google Docs for this in the future. I thought Google Docs was just Word, so I'm excited to learn that there is more to it. I do have one complaint, though. I don't like the formatting in Google Docs. It is much more difficult to deal with spacing and indenting than it is in Word. For example, students struggled to format their works consulted correctly because of this. I'm playing around with the Power Point ideas in Google Docs, so I will post it when I'm finished. It's nothing that I will use for class. I just want to see how it works.

Idea for Project

I always want my students to have a real audience for their writing. I have considered ways to do this online in the past. For example, I thought students could post writing on my website; however, this made me nervous. Who could see the writing? How could I make it the students' responsibility to publish (rather than my own)? Plus, I want the students to have the opportunity to receive feedback from their peers about this writing. Still, I wonder how I will monitor this feedback. I would love to create a poetry blog for my students. It would be awesome if they could record themselves reading the poems as well. I'd like the blog to be an online text for students to not only publish poetry, but also learn elements of poetry. For example, as we discuss figurative language, I could ask students to find metaphors within students' writing. They could demonstrate this understanding by posting comments on the blog. This may be my final project for this course.

First Class

I am learning how to create a blog.