Friday, September 19, 2014
Thursday, September 18, 2014
Are you floundering or flourishing?
I have had a goal for about 5 weeks and I had not
pulled the trigger…I was foundering! Let
me provide some background information. Liberty North, where I am the innovation
and learning coach, has an amazing faculty and offers clubs to increase student
engagement and attachment to our school.
I wanted to be a part of this tour de force and have been thinking about
it for weeks. However, there were roadblocks in my opinion…my calendar,
the commitment, and mostly the unknown.
Will students be interested? Will I prepare and no students will attend? Will
it all be a waste of time? Of course, there
is no way to determine the answer to any of my questions until I put it out
there and give it a whirl. Today I decided
to risk it and make it happen despite all those pesky unknowns!
There was a bit of research involved, but through the help of a few friends I whittled my idea into something I could articulate. I was interested in supporting students in publishing themselves using a variety of media and we will start in November with NaNoWriMo. Imagine my elation when I found out about there is an entire month, website, and Twitter community @NaNoWriMo devoted to helping students be crazy about writing and sharing their work.
Desire to do something is great, but the proof is in the pudding. It takes true intentional decisions to actualize your goals. I now have the dates in my calendar, I have notified the organizer, and there are advertisements flying around the school. This is flourishing!
Monday, September 15, 2014
Research by chance and the luck of the draw
Using a deck of cards and MacBook Airs one
health class achieved the following standards through student research.
FS1A: Investigate disorders, their treatments, and prevention techniques
to maintain a healthy sensory system (e.g., hearing loss, glaucoma, near and
far-sightedness, halitosis, numbness, and tingling).
Present information,
findings, and supporting evidence such that listeners can follow the line of
reasoning and the organization, development, and style are appropriate to task,
purpose, and audience.
Each student was handed a
card at random and set to the task of determining the description, treatment,
or prevention of a sensory disease. The
lucky student with the Ace of Spades was the recorder on a collaborative Google
doc. This was a great method that combated the common practice of copy and
paste and really caused students to put the medical information into their own
words. The added bonus was the class discussion about personal experiences with
each that really added to the relevance. After each disorder the cards were shuffled and handed out again.
Wednesday, September 10, 2014
Another #tyiw pledge…say thank you.
It’s simple. It’s effortless. It’s effective. I can truthfully say I love my job and it
gets even more rewarding when out of the blue I am thanked for doing my job. The frequency of this
phenomenon has inspired me to quickly post this and hopefully encourage others
to spread the joy. I must say the effect has spawned some unusual behavior on
my part. For example, this week I crawled on the floor behind a computer
station to look at wires I had about a 5% chance of understanding just in case
I could help. It is motivating to hear
affirmations and I am so appreciative for those kind words. This year I plan to diversify my thankful
messages to those who inspire me, work their tails off for kids, leap out of
their comfort zone and work on innovation in their classroom, and continuously
care. Thank you.
Friday, September 5, 2014
Relevance is the super power of any lesson
How do you take
a cold, cold standard and turn it into a warm and inviting lesson? Relevance.
Relate the standard to student’s hearts and minds by making it applicable to
their lives. Let’s try it with the
common core state standard below.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.9-10.6
Compare the point of view of two or more authors for how they treat the same or similar topics, including which details they include and emphasize in their respective accounts.
Compare the point of view of two or more authors for how they treat the same or similar topics, including which details they include and emphasize in their respective accounts.
For the bookworms
Start with Amazon.com and have students search for a book they loved. They can
read both a glowing and disappointing review and complete the standard reading
about something for which they have passion.
For the sporty students
These students would probably do well with reading up on both of
the arguments regarding if college athletes should be paid. Imagine how all the
information might help them when they sign up to play college ball!
For the history buffs
Explore a non-fiction and fiction piece on WWI or insert your favorite history topic. How does the
fiction author treat the time period differently than the non-fiction writer? This is really interesting stuff! Students would engage at another level with this approach!
For the future engineers
Read the launch information and a review of the latest and
greatest technology gadget. How do the company and a non-partial write up
compare?
Be a super hero and reach for Quad D today!
Check out these great resources!
@RigorRelevance
Thursday, September 4, 2014
Where do you stand on RIGOR?
Rigor…the 5-letter
word with so much baggage. Unpacking the
baggage was an important step in the International Center for Leadership in
Education training I attended yesterday. It was the best professional
development session I have been to in a long time and I feel inclined to share
some big ideas that will guide my thinking and implementation.
Rigor/Relevance Framework
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1. Harder, longer,
and/or more confusing does not make a lesson rigorous. Moving from the first half of Bloom’s to the
second half of Bloom’s taxonomy will accomplish rigor.
2. Asking students
to “figure it out” does not make a lesson more rigorous. Asking higher-level
questions to guide student thinking does! For example- I see you have chosen
said piece of evidence to defend your thinking. Can you prove your conclusion
without it?
3. Rigor does not
have to be saved for cumulating projects or only your advanced students. Out of Quad A, Every Day was the key phrase of
the training. Yes, sometimes we have to
build background knowledge and allow students to build momentum and capacity in
our contents. After a certain amount of that type of learning, the brain is
overloaded. Think about the answers to the questions below.
Are my students in memorization mode?
OR
Are my students thinking mode?
For example- Chunk your lesson delivery. Give students time to process, practice, and/or produce.
So WHERE do you
stand on RIGOR?
Is it...
- you don’t think about
- it creeps in occasionally
- it is a priority when planning
Check out these resources as you play with RIGOR!
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