End of Year Reflections...

This month has been an exciting time for writing in my classroom.  Have some students struggled and been reluctant?  Of course!  Have I struggled and, at times, felt reluctance about some of the assessment pieces?  Of course!  The wonderful thing is that sometimes, out of struggle comes some of the greatest learning--for myself and for my students.

I have been absolutely amazed at some of the things that my students have been able to create and they have been amazed at some of things that they have been able to create.  They have learned so much about the topics that they have chosen and that has given them some really incredible buy-in.  They also have pretty amazing voices when they are writing about a topic that they are truly invested in.  They are also better at everything than they were at the beginning of the year.  :)

At the beginning of the year, I was really struggling with how many questions that I had about how to manage everything.  It seemed so overwhelming to think about how to teach students about digital citizenship, their digital footprint, and even getting them onto a level playing field with their ability to use technology in a purposeful and meaningful way.  I think that I have come to realize that it's just like anything else about our students in the respect that we take them from wherever they are at and we take them as far as we can.  We reflect on what worked well and what did not.  We reflect on how we can make things better and we make plans to do it better next time.

As always, I will challenge myself to find new and better ways to challenge my students.

February-What is Jing and is it Contagious?

        First, let me say that I feel so blessed to be surrounded by teammates that are continuously looking for ways to improve their instruction and stay on top of the newest tools.  At our February 1st Inspired Writing meeting, they not only told me about about this thing called Jing, but they were incredibly patient with me while I downloaded it on my computer and played around with it a bit.  They also shared some of the ways that they are using this tool in their classrooms.  As a person who sometimes needs a little push to add anything else to my plate, let me just say--Jing is worth it!
      With Jing, you can make a 5 minute video that does not need to be stored on your computer and give the link to anyone you choose.  My mind is still processing the possibilities of it!  With help, I made some video conferences for my students.  Essentially, I take a Google doc that one of my students has written and talk about their next steps as I highlight things on their actual document.  For example, one student got a video conference on using transitions in a more natural way, while another got one on using complex sentence structures to help fix those run-on sentences.  It generates so much enthusiasm for writing on the days that my students know that they are going to get a video conference from me. They truly appreciate the one-on-one instruction that they get.  It can be time consuming to make them, and I don't have it all figured out, but when I saw the impact, I knew that it would become an important instructional tool for me.

January-Who is the Expert?

     So as my fourth graders and I embarked on this journey of writing essays, I was again reminded that I do not have to be the only expert in the room.  I began January with a change in the homework. Instead of asking students to practice their spelling words, I asked them to practice writing at home for three weeks.  On week one, they had to make a plan for a persuasive essay.  After receiving feedback from me, week two's task was to create a first draft using that plan and incorporating that feedback. Again, they received feedback, and were asked to create a final draft on the third week. I was so impressed by the level of enthusiasm with which both students and parents approached this task!

     My new learning came on week one when a student approached me and asked if he could use the Tree Map on the Inspired Writing Website to plan his writing.  Even with all of the new learning that I have had this year, how could I have forgotten one of the most valuable tools for pre-writing?  While not all of my students have access to the Internet or a even a computer, many of them do and many of my most reluctant writers are so encouraged by the freedom to use technology.  Just simply taking the need for drawing that Tree Map off of the list of things to do for a reluctant writer, was like removing a huge obstacle.  Now my students use the Thinking Maps from the website all of the time to plan their writing!

November--Publishing Electronically

November-Publishing

     In November, my students were spending a great deal of time publishing on the EEEs.  One surprise for me was when I saw students doing some things in electronic publishing that I had not seen them do in their pencil and paper publishing.  For example, I had several students that were no longer capitalizing proper nouns (like "I"), most students were no longer indenting, capitalizing the first letter of each sentence, or using ending punctuation.  

     I ended up doing some minilessons to connect the things that they were already doing with respect to grammar and conventions in paper publishing, to how do those things properly in electronic publishing.  After our half day meeting for Inspired Writing, I got some more ideas about how to use the reasearch tool in Google and using the microphone on Google's search site.  Essentially, these became my minilessons.  For example, I showed students how to start at the beginning of every sentence, make sure that there was  beginning capital and then track to end of the sentence to find the punctuation.  Initially, I had them highlight these, but now most students are checking these things without the highlighting.  The minilessons were short enough that I used them as my midworkshop teaching point, so I didn't need to spend several entire sessions on convention and grammar targets.  I am now very pleased to see that they are demonstrated their understanding in their electronic publishing, as well as their paper publishing. 

October

     In October, we were studying Colorado's life zones.  At the end of the unit, I asked students to choose one of the life zones and create a Google presentation about that life zone using a template that my amazing teammate had made.  In hind sight, I can't believe that I didn't anticipate some of the problems that arose.  I found students spending far more time than I had anticipated on collecting research and pictures for their presentation and not enough time on meeting the learning outcomes for the assignment.  Collecting information from life zones that are not in Colorado, trying to synthesize too much information, and struggling to focus on gathering just the information that was in the presentation template were some of the major issues.  According to the TPACK model, my students were engaging in the use of technology, but the work had strayed away from the essential learnings.
     It still isn't perfect, but I found that when I "front load" by compiling a list of websites for them to access and ask them to stick to just those websites, it really helps.  Students no longer got caught in "the black hole" that the Internet can become, and their searching became far more focused.  They were only gathering information on Colorado's life zones (not life zones from other places in the world).  They still had to synthesize the information to meet the learning goals, but the amount that they needed to synthesize was much more manageable for them.  It was a great project for them to begin learning about using that Google research tool in an effective way.

Literacy and Essential Skills: Why Digital Literacy is Crucial
by Dr. Sarah Elaine Eaton
   
     Coming into a classroom with a dedicated laptop for each one of my students, I have really had to reflect on the ways that I use technology in the classroom and what it means to be digitally literate.  I agree with this author's assertion that simply being able to use a computer is not being digitally literate and is not enough, but I do believe that students who do not know how to use a touch screen or the internet will be able to acquire those skills fairly quickly.

My concern is that students who have not had exposure to technology in the elementary grades may very well fall behind, but because they haven't learned how to access, process and use this type of information.  So much about the way that we access information is changing, that students need instruction just on navigating and comprehending internet text.  Information on the internet is also dramatically different in the way that it requires the reader to evaluate its accuracy, its point of view and its biases.  When readers are connected to information on the web, there is no guarantee that the author has any expertise on the subject and much of the work is published with the expectation that others will alter it.  Today's students need to not only be capable of higher level thinking when engaging with digital media, but it probably needs to be second nature for them.

I think that it's always important to remember that we don't know what skills these students may need to possess in ten or twenty years.  What are the essential skills for today's students?  What is the most important work for us to be doing right now?