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.