Blog Post #6

What questions do we ask? How do we ask them? What do we need to know about asking questions to be an effective teacher?

We all know that teachers are infamous for asking questions. Who? What? Where? When? Why? How? Does everyone understand? Repeat. Why do we ask so many questions? Most teachers would say it's a mindless habit. Ben Johnson elaborates on what it is like from a students perspective. After a few weeks of class students are fully aware of which classmates enjoy blurting out the answer. I will be the first to admit that I hated being called on in class. All throughout high school I was that student who let out a huge sigh of relief when the teacher called on someone else to answer. How can educators use effective questioning to better engage their students?

The Teaching Center lists general strategies for asking questions:
- When planning questions, keep in mind your course goals. What do you want your students to learn?
- Avoid asking "leading questions." These are questions that give away their own answer.
- Follow a "yes-or-no" question with an additional question. Get students to explain their answer. This is a good method to use to verify your students have understood the lesson.
- Aim for direct, clear, specific questions. Use a series of depth to build depth and complexity.
- In classroom discussions, do not ask more than one question at once. This is an easy way to get yours students confused.
- When you plan each class session, include notes of when you will pause to ask and answer questions. This is helpful for the teacher in measuring a students understanding of the lesson. It is important to keep the students engaged rather than waiting until after class.
- Ask a mix of different types of questions. All students think differently. Using open ended questions and closed ended questions is a thoughtful way to turn on the lightbulbs of all your students.

What is a close-ended question? According to Dr. Chesley's youtube video Asking better questions in the classroom, a close-ended question structures the response for a student. It can be answered with a brief phrase or with one word, typically being "yes" or "no". What is a open-ended question? It is a question that leaves the answer up to the person who is responding. This method of questioning is for eliciting more thinking and yields more information. When you ask a student a close-ended question during your teaching and you receive a one word response you are getting exactly what you have asked for. The student tells you the answer you want to hear and they no longer have to think about the topic at hand. One way to avoid a close-ended question is by using the same content of the question and adding "what if" to the beginning or "what do you believe". This generates thinking and the student will immediately begin imagining the scenario in a variety of ways.

While doing a bit of research on questioning in the classroom I stumbled across a website titled Tips for Teachers. The site states that teachers of project-based learning have to encourage students asking questions and peer questioning to improve overall student engagement. We want to use questions that ask students to elaborate, justify, and extend their thoughts and ideas. I thought this was a good site to use for many reasons. Project-based learning is a focus of this site just as it is for Dr. Strange in EDM310. They have listed questioning strategies that provoke high level thinking. A good example of promoting higher thinking is asking a student to describe or observe an event or object. The site also goes on to discuss asking probing questions and divergent questions.
Overall asking questions in the classroom may not be as simple as it generally seems. There are many methods to use to keep students involved in the learning process. I think the most important task in being a teacher is finding ways to engage students in learning. A good place to start is by asking questions.

Project #8 Book Trailer

After being assigned this book trailer project I began wondering what book I would use. I went back and forth with many books. Is this one too long? Is this one too girly? Is this one too boring? After some debating I finally found the one. For this project I chose to use "The Museum" written by Susan Verde and illustrated by Peter H. Reynolds. This book is so fun to read with so many emotions on one little girls journey through The Museum. This is the first time I have ever made a book trailer and I had such a blast figuring out how! iMovie is wonderful and I highly recommend using it.
I have reached out to both Susan and Peter and I hope I get a response soon! You can watch my book trailer below:





UPDATE:
After I made this video I tweeted the link to Susan Verde and Peter H. Reynolds thinking they probably wouldn't notice. To my surprise the very next day they BOTH acknowledged by video! I was very excited to receive such wonderful feedback from a respected author and illustrator. It was only a few weeks ago that my EDU301 class celebrated International Dot Day based on the children's book "The Dot" written and illustrated by Reynolds. Thank you Dr. Strange for encouraging me to spread my work! And thank you Peter H. Reynolds for reading and commenting on my class blog!

Project #7 This is My Sentence...

Blog Post #5

C4T #1

Post #1
Daniel Edwards is the Director of Digital Strategy at the Stephen Perse Foundation schools in Cambridge, UK. In his recent blog post The Impact of New Technology In Schools - Results are In! he discusses the impact of the recent technological changes in his school. For two years an A level classroom of 15 students has been using iPads. These same students produced the best grades Edwards has seen in ten years of teaching at the school. Was this a direct cause of iPad use in the classroom? Well, we are still unsure but he does mention he believes they have enhanced learning. There could be many reasons for the increase he has seen in grades.
Beside the fact that this A level class recorded higher results, the entire school also received record breaking General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) results. This goes to show that technology has not had a negative impact on the students. What can Edwards draw from this information? Engagement with learning is crucial and I could not agree more. New technology has enabled his students to better engage with the materials and context. In a short video you can see how collaboration and communication skills are being practiced with technology in these classrooms. Although we are still unsure of the impact of technology on the rest of the world, we know Daniel Edwards feels like a better educator because of it.

After reading this post I could not help but wonder how the iPad's are being used in the classroom. My main concern was how are students being assessed? This is the comment I left for Mr. Edwards:
Greetings Daniel, I am a Junior studying Early Childhood Education at the University of South Alabama in Mobile, AL, USA. I am currently enrolled in EDM310 (Micro-computing Systems in Education) with Professor Dr. Strange who has kindly assigned me to discuss your blog this week. First, I want to say congratulations on the results you have received as that is quite an accomplishment for a teacher! You should be very proud. In our neighboring county, Baldwin County, this is the first school year where we have seen every student provided with a Macbook to further their studies. It is challenging to engage all students through lecture so perhaps in two years we will see better engagement from our students in the classroom as well as you have. I am curious though, when you are teaching students with iPads (especially PE), how do you assess them? Is this done via web or manually? Hope to hear from you soon! Please feel free to follow me on my Class Blog or Twitter. Thanks!


Post #2

Edwards' posts The iPad Toolkit for Learning diagram in his latest post. This is basically a guide for new and experienced educators who use technology in the classroom. He believes that 15 apps or less can act as a starting point for learning. The great thing about this diagram is that you can edit it to customize your teaching or learning needs. Some apps may be noticed more than once on the diagram to validate their importance in education. There are benefits to using all of the apps suggested. I would recommend reading Edwards' full blog post. (Link above)
This post got my brain wondering how I could incorporate these apps into my classroom. In fact, this is the comment I left for Daniel.
"Do you have any suggestions on how to incorporate these apps into a lesson plan?"

Project #3 Presentation

Blog Post #4

Langwitches - Flat Stanley Podcast

I have to admit this podcast is extremely entertaining for me! The level of creativity has blown me away. I can remember in elementary school when everyone in my class was assigned a state. Our project was to design a poster board with facts and information about that state, for example the state bird. I'm not saying that project wasn't educational, but this podcast is genius. I love the way that the teacher has instructed these first graders to incorporate all the senses and sounds to portray the mood. This work is incredible for first graders and has led me to believe that podcasts are highly beneficial to the classroom for many reasons. It is clear the students have researched their locations before creating the podcast. Researching encourages reading and writing and brainstorming (turning on the brain!). Researching also encourages communication skills especially for a first grader. The student also has to practice communicating with the teacher to make the actual podcast. It is amazing to me that this class will forever have a souvenir of their hard work. They should be very proud.
Listening to this podcast motivates me to use this method in my classroom. Creating something to share with the world is a great way to get the children motivated also. I typically make changes to someone else's ideas if I decide to use them but I can not think of any changes I would make to this podcast. I am so impressed!

Langwitches - Listening-Comprehension-Podcasting

Flashcards out, podcasts in. This is another great example of how to use podcasts to teach. I find it fascinating that this teacher has encouraged these first grade students to create something so detailed. Reciting this Hebrew script would be a difficult task for most people. These students have mastered it! They have been taught how to listen, comprehend, and speak fluently. On top of learning these important skills they have experience using Garageband. My favorite part about this podcast is that the teachers recorded the script out of order. The students are required to engage in the process to put the recordings in their correct order. When I become a teacher I hope to use podcasts the same way. If I find a story I want my students to tell, what better way to do so?

Langwitches - Podcasting with First Grade

Reading this blog post feels like I am putting my foot in the door for success. First grade is such an important age for learning speaking and communication skills. Podcasts encourage these skills as well as identifying sounds. Shy students are able to open up and become a part of something fun and interactive. I think it is wonderful that these students had no issues waiting for their turn to record. I can not help but wonder if these students enjoy editing podcasts in first grade, what could they be capable of doing 20 years from now? Podcasts are encouraging higher thinking skills. The entire time these students are learning how to use technology effectively they are also learning about a story book.
After reading these posts about podcasts I have no doubt I would like to make one (or more) in my classroom. I realize there are endless possibilities when it comes to making something creative. Podcasts are a great way to engage students from anywhere.

Blog Post #3

How Can You Provide Meaningful Feedback to Your Peers?

What Is Peer Editing is a helpful video in learning how to edit my classmates work. It simply states the guidelines which we should follow for peer review. I learned it is important to stay positive, be specific, and suggest corrections. When correcting someones work you have to remember how you would feel if someone corrected your work in a negative manor. Be sure to compliment the writer where you feel necessary to keep them interested in your ideas. Understand when you are making a suggestion the writer has the option to disregard your corrections.

Tutorial Peer Editing is a simple slideshow that describes what we should look for while editing. We need to focus on things like word choice, details, organization, sentences, and topic while making our suggestions. It is important to let our classmates know when spelling and grammar could use improvement. Top Ten Mistakes is composed of the most common issues we see while peer editing. As we see here, if we want to make progress we have to be interested in what our peers have to say. I have to say the production of this video is genius for a classroom. We should never say that someones writing is bad, but there is always room for improvement. I chose to do my peer editing in comments left on the blogs of my group members. This way, if someone wants to add to my corrections or even correct my suggestions they have the opportunity to do so.

Kayla Syzmanski:
Thanks for the feedback Kayla! You seem to be somewhat of a professional at critiquing. Sometimes I wonder if my sentences are too short or too long so I appreciate your help.
I noticed you made a simple error in your second paragraph: "I have learned to be more serious when writing when writing things that are posted on the internet."
Anyone could easily get distracted while writing which is why it is important we double check our work! Hope to hear more feedback soon. Thanks again!


Katy Mehrer:
Katy, I think you have done well in expressing your thoughts about computers in the classroom. I like how you pointed out that you used computers in the classroom in the 20th century but this is a broad statement. If a young reader did not know any better they could mistake this as you saying you used computers in the classroom in 1901. This is why details are important. In your second paragraph I noticed a few sentences that would be better understood if you could elaborate a bit more on the topic.
Example: What I don’t agree on is them having to use them in elementary school. Google has been a big part of looking things up for kids, but I believe that most kids that are using these tools are the children in upper schooling.
I like how you point out that Google is a popular search engine in the 21st century. Perhaps you could elaborate on why you do not believe students should use computers in elementary school. Do you think Google has the potential to be a helpful search engine to primary students as well as secondary? Also, you use "them" twice, referring to two different things in once sentence.
Another example: When I was in school, we still had computer labs, and different things to do with computers. I don’t believe it is a must do to teach with computers. I know quite a few things about computers.
I like how you compare your education to the future of education but after reading I am curious to know more. What different things did you do with computers in school? Were these activities beneficial to your learning? What did you learn about computers? If you do not believe it is significant to teach with computers I think it is important to try and convince your readers of the same.
One more thing I would like to touch on is your opening sentence. In my experience I have learned that the opening sentence of any kind of writing should be captivating to the reader. At first I was a little confused by the repetition of "Teaching in the 21st Century”. Perhaps you could replace this with a bold statement that will make your readers desperate to know more. I believe you have done well but I would suggest spending more time on perfecting your writing.


Alyssa Sherman:
Alyssa, you have done well providing feedback on your video. I like how you summarize the video and pose more questions and information about what you saw. It is clear to me that you thought long and hard about your response. There is one word that I think may be misspelled. Did you mean "lessons?"
"However, while the idea of teaching students their lesions the night before class seems like a great idea, there are some major flaws that cannot be overlooked."
I also noticed an abundance of the word "this" throughout your writing. Do not be afraid to mix it up a bit and use other words to phrase your writing. Overall you make some interesting points and I enjoyed reading.

Blog Post #2

Professor Dancealot
Professor Dancealot Video
Professor Dancealot has a very ineffective way of teaching. In fact, I hate to refer to him as a teacher after seeing this video and it brings back painful memories of a few teachers I have had in the past. His presentation is very out of date and uninteresting to the students. When they begin the class Professor Dancealot has their undivided attention and loses it simply because he does a poor job at keeping them involved and stimulating their brains. Professor Dancealot discourages any interaction such as when the students try to discuss the class, so how will they ever learn? When he demonstrates the dance moves the students cannot even see his feet. It is no wonder that the students fail miserably when given the final exam whether it is open book or not. In order for these students to effectively learn how to dance Professor Dancealot needs to step it up in terms of teaching. Using visuals such as videos or instructional techniques on the web could be helpful as well as seeking a professional dancer on a social website. Professor Dancealot needs to make many changes in his teaching before expecting his students to learn to dance.

Harness Your Students Digital Smarts (HM)
Video
Vicki Davis is an outstanding IT director and teacher in rural Georgia who has used digital citizenship to teach her students about technology. As stated in the video, Davis likes to call herself a “teacherprenuer” because she customizes her curriculum according to the students she has in the classroom, based on their strengths and interests. Davis is focused on teaching her students to learn how to learn, teaching them new software, how to blog and communicate effectively using online resources and how to generally be comfortable with technology as a whole. She mentions several times that she is teaching her students to learn how to learn. This is evident in the video where you see the students individually interacting with technology and she is watching and participating herself by asking questions to challenge their thinking and skills. Davis has her curriculum and introduces it to her students then it is expected of the students learn how to complete the request at hand. In this particular case these high school students are learning about terraforming, which is a new term to them, and she expects them to look it up and learn to learn. This reminds me of a popular motto by Dr. Strange, “Never tell, always ask”. This is an effective way of teaching because the student has to seek the answer rather than just being told. This allows the teacher to motivate the students to think, just as I did when I personally had to Google the term terraforming for this video. Not only does Mrs. Davis have these students searching for information but they also have the opportunity to teach one another and in this case they have taught the teacher. Davis justifies teachers do not always have to be educated on what they want their students to learn because it is a chance for the student to be a teacher, as this empowers them and they can share with each other. As you see in the video, the students have an opportunity to stand in front of the class and teach their peers which promotes networking skills. These students are blogging with people from around the world and really collaborating with them to learn about other cultures and ways of learning. She has proven herself to be effective by empowering them to embark outside of this rural Southern community by connecting them to the world.

Teaching in the 21st Century (KM)
Video
What does it mean to teach in the 21st century? Teaching in the 21st century, according to the video “Teaching in the 21st Century”, was talking about how computers have such an impact on children of today. I don’t believe that to be completely true; however, I do feel like it is important for children to learn about computers and how to use them. What I don’t agree on is them having to use them in elementary school. Google has been a big part of looking things up for kids, but I believe that most kids that are using these tools are the children in upper schooling. Most kids learn from themselves with using computers. Teaching in the 21st century is a lot like it was in the 20th century. When I was in school, we still had computer labs, and different things to do with computers. I don’t believe it is a must do to teach with computers. I know quite a few things about computers. That is why we have computer classes in college. If you would like to know more about computers, than take a class. That is my opinion on the 21st century teaching.

The Network Student (KS)
Video
What a simple, yet powerful video. Kevin Roberts did a great job at compiling the reasons why PLN's are such vital parts of our students educational growth. The question is asked after watching this video, why do students even need teachers anymore in the 21st century? Even though students can basically teach themselves using tools offered by PLN's today there are a few things that teachers can also offer that are beneficial as well. Teachers are the ones who help students build their PLN's and help the students take advantage of these great learning opportunities. Without the teacher showing their students these tools they would never know they existed. Also teachers can offer their guidance when the students get stuck on a particular problem. It is so much easier when you can just ask questions and get results back, this is the teachers job. The teachers also show the students how to communicate properly and ask respectfully for help from experts. If the students did not have teachers to show them what grammar mistakes they were making the world would be one huge error. Teachers are still needed in the 21st century even though there are plenty of teaching tools free on the web. This is why it is so crucial for teachers of the 21st century to be computer and technologically literate. And lastly the teacher shows the students how to sort out good information and propaganda while they learn on their personal network system. Also the teacher must show the student how to turn a web search into a fun excited way to learn. Students can be self taught all day long, but they need that encouragement to keep going. This is almost the same instance as the last blog post we did. The children were teaching themselves English and other things way above there time, but yet they still needed encouragement every now and then to keep going. It is a proven and tested fact, teachers will be around in the 21st century and even after that.

Flipping the Classroom—4th Grade STEM (AS)
Video
Ms. Manofo states in her video several reasons why flipping is being implemented in her school. At first glance her ideas sound fantastic; every child will get the most out of his or her education. However, while the idea of teaching students their lesions the night before class seems like a great idea, there are some major flaws that cannot be overlooked. First and most importantly how can students learn new information, especially in math, if they cannot ask questions while learning? In the video Ms. Manofo says that the idea behind flipping is so that students can come to class prepared having already done some problems. But what if a student does not understand? It is crucial, especially in math, for students to ask questions as soon as they do not understand something. How can a student do any practice problems if he or she does not understand how to solve the problem? While some students may feel more prepared for class after already hearing the lessons, this will not work for everyone. A second flaw of the flipping system, as mentioned in the video, is that not every student has a home computer. While students would be allowed to use a school computer in the morning, this plan is not very effective. Students in this situation would have a major disadvantage since they cannot do their homework the night before. Also, the main idea of flipping is to have students prepared for class lessons; this cannot be done when not every student can hear the lesson and prepare the night before. While the idea of flipping does have its bad sides, there are some benefits that were mentioned in the video. Students would have the opportunity to see and hear the lesson ahead of class. This would allow students to come to class ready to work, and, hopefully, with questions. This would allow for better use of class time. Another benefit of flipping is that students could watch the lesson as many times as necessary for them to understand. This would allow students to learn at their own pace. Ms. Manofo makes some very excellent points in her video about the benefits of flipping, but she does not mention some crucial aspect of this plan. For this system to work some changes need to be made in the plan. However, the idea of flipping could be very beneficial to students overall.