Taking the Lead

Program Standard 6

This quarter has been all about how to step up as a teacher leader through communication and collaboration. As I work with my colleagues, I am realizing that I have a lot of ideas but I'm still working on how I can implement them in a way that makes sense for my school. In my initial reflection, I wrote about how I had a lot of hope for the direction my school was moving as we shift our leadership structure and develop a new curriculum. Over the past few months, I have seen a lot of growth, both in the school and in myself. I am searching for ways to be more involved.

I am currently planning a book study to engage my colleagues as we plan our new curriculum. I chose a book study because I thought that it would be a good way to gather people who needed to learn about a new teaching method but who had limited time to meet. Zepeda (2012) writes "Effective book studies have the overall goal of supporting the reading of professional materials that will support the development of thinking or refined instructional practice" (p. 190). To that end, this project has helped me think about collaboration goals. Baum and Krulwich write "true collaboration... happens only when professional collaborate daily on the defining work of their profession." As collaboration is a word that gets tossed around a lot without really meaning anything, I have also thought a lot about how adults learn and how to apply these principles to make my book study an effective means of collaboration. Further readings from Zepeda (2012), particularly information about logistical planning and the provided case studies, were helpful in completing this project.

With my new learning, I have also sometimes been frustrated as I try to do more but do not have the tools or information. Smylie, Conley, and Marks (2011) emphasize the need for proper structures to build teacher leadership programs. It is important to note that it is not enough to give teacher leaders the training. The school culture or leadership needs to change to empower those teacher leaders. I have learned to be more frank about my needs so that I can be a better leader. I think that in the future I will be able to aid my colleagues through sharing information, such as articles from Edutopia or other education sites, or being a model in my own classroom, two strategies that have not been readily utilized at my school.

One tool that I found very useful was the "Teacher Leader Self-Evaluation" from the Center for Strengthening the Teaching Profession (CSTP). From this survey, I learned that systems thinking is my biggest challenge. Because I am not an administrator, I don't always have access to all the information (nor should I, in some cases). When I do have access to information, I don't always understand what to do with it, or understand all the steps that have gone into making a decision. I find it challenging to think on that level, as it is still new to me. Marsick and Watkins (2001) write that "The organizational context produces different work assignments, which, in turn, lead to different opportunities and priorities for learning" (p. 28). For me, as I have become grade level coordinator, this has led to a whole new context, and I am still learning how to effectively perform in that role. Marsick and Watkins (2001) also note that for adult learners, "learning begins with some kind of trigger" (p. 29) and my new role has triggered this desire to learn for me. It has made my grad school work more meaningful because I can apply it directly to my professional work.

Moving forward, I hope to embrace my work as a teacher leader help bring more voice to the faculty in leadership positions. I can remain flexible, and work with administration to negotiate what this will look like. I can also help my colleagues to see how giving a greater role to teacher leaders is beneficial, since empowering teacher leaders "can often maintain momentum in a school's improvement efforts" and "can build community and collaboratively find ways to make a difference for students" (Katzenmeyer & Moller, 2011, p. 8). Making a difference for students should be at the heart of what all teachers are doing. I look forward to helping my colleagues find new and exiting ways to do that.

References
Baum, K., & Krulwich, D. (2017). A New Approach to PD--and Growing Leaders. Educational Leadership, 74(8), 62-66.
Katzenmeyer, M., & Moller, G. (2011). Understanding teacher leadership. In E.B. Hilty (Ed.), Teacher leadership: The "new" foundations of teacher education: A reader (3-21). New York: Peter Lang Publishing.

Marsick, V.J., & Watkins, K.E. (2001, Spring). Informal and incidental learning. New directions for adult and continuing education, 89, 25-34.

Smylie, M.A., Conley, S., & Marks, H.M. (2011). Exploring new approaches to teacher leadership for school improvement. In E.B. Hilty (Ed.), Teacher leadership: The "new" foundations of teacher education: A reader (265-282). New York: Peter Lang Publishing.

Zepeda, S.J. (2012). Professional development: What works. New York: Routledge.

Critical Friend Groups

Program Standard 4
In my original reflection for this class, I wrote that I hoped to use what I have learned to be a better leader in my role as Grade Level Coordinator. I think that critical friends groups are one way that we can build on the existing department collaboration structure in a meaningful way to be better connected across grade levels. As my school continues to define the role of Grade Level Coordinator, I believe I will be able to make use of these techniques to guide my practice.

Critical friends groups "help people involved with schools to work collaboratively in democratic, reflective communities" (Bambino, 2002, p. 25). They "have unique structures that support the particular problem or dilemma that is presented" (Zepeda, 2012, p. 212). The meetings can take a variety of forms, from looking at student work to planning daily lesson plans. In my opinion, one of the strengths of the critical friends group is that groups can decide what they need to work on and how to structure the meeting. Overall, the goal is to collaborative critique and reflect to improve teaching practice.

Currently, collaboration at the high school level happens mostly within departments, though we have set a school goal of greater collaboration between the middle and high schools. While some critical friends groups form out of multi-disciplinary teams, such as the example in Bambino (2002) that describes a science teacher seeking feedback from a language arts teacher to improve a project, others form from single disciplines. Baum and Krulwich (2017) describe a school in New York that has moved it professional development exclusively to a critical friends model in which all teachers of the same discipline, seventh grade math, for example, collaboratively plan lessons and then reflect using student work and notes on teaching practices. Baum and Krulwich believe that "this work of daily collaborative lesson planning merges all the aspects of professional development into one comprehensive system" (2017, p. 66). While I don't think my school is ready to go that far (and we're far too small anyway!), we have a lot of room to grow as far as collaboration is concerned. One step that we have made in this direction is to shift the high school to a 5-day rotating schedule, which will help us better align with the middle school in terms of meeting times and opportunities for community events.

The heavy lift in implementing critical friends groups at my school would be data. We don't do a lot with data, so it would be a new way to talk about our students and our work. I think it would give use more purpose in our department meetings and more reason to observe each other. Right now, we often say we would like to observe each other more, but we never make the time to do it because there is no need or incentive. Each of us teaches our own grade level, so we have no framework for a conversation around that observation. Implementing a critical friends protocol, where we could share lesson plans and student work, could give us that sense of purpose. I plan to bring up these topics when the teacher evaluation committee that I am on begins to meet in the spring.

As we plan our new curriculum, collaboration will be crucial, especially for the teachers hoping to teach cross-curricular classes, either as co-teachers or with adjoined themes and essential questions. For my final project in this class, I planned a book study to aid in creating courses of this nature. A critical friends group could also help in this instance, because all the teachers planning this sort of class could meet, discuss strategies, observe each other, and reflect throughout the year so that we can ensure the students are getting the "right" things out of our new curriculum.

My school has a long way to go to improve collaboration. However, there are several changes in the works that, if we take advantage of them, can turn into wonderful collaborative opportunities.


References

Bambino, D. (2002). Critical Friends. Educational Leadership, 59(6), 25-27.

Baum, K., & Krulwich, D. (2017). A New Approach to PD--and Growing Leaders. Educational Leadership, 74(8), 62-66.


Drake, S.M., & Burns, R.C. (2004). Meeting standards through integrated curriculum. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Fahey, K., & Ippolito, J. (2015). Variations on a theme: As needs change, new models of critical friends groups emerge. Journal of Staff Development, 36(4), 48-52.

Zepeda, S.J. (2012). Professional development: What works. Routledge: New York.

The Realities of Adult Learning

We have all heard the adage "You can't teach an old dog new tricks." This comes from an outdated mode of thinking in which adults were thought to be "less-capable learners" (Merriam, 2001, p. 4). In reality, adults simply learn differently from children and teenagers. Professional development (PD) for teachers needs to take this into account.

Some aspects of learning stay the same- there is a constant struggle between what we know works and what we think we want. I have some students that adore lecture because they feel really good writing down a lot of information, even if studies have shown that this is not the most effective way to process this information. I know that I sometimes feel frustrated by PDs that involve activities and moving around, because I want to just get the information and go. However, research shows that effective PD cannot be a presentation that is given once and then never discussed again.

Zepeda (2012) defines effective professional development as "practices that are research-based, tied to standards, and present a coherent structure for teachers who work in an environment in which the work of teaching is rooted in learning" (p. 8). There needs to be a stated purpose that the whole community sees as important. Zepeda also writes that PD should be tied to feedback, just like teachers give their students. This means that PD needs to be an ongoing process, with opportunities for formative and summative evaluations that will ensure the overall goal is met.

At my school, there is a balance between ongoing training and one-shot workshops. For global needs like diversity training and curriculum development, we have been fortunate to be given the opportunity to attend a series of workshops that allow us to reflect on where we have been, where we are going, and how we doing on the path to achieving that goal. This has often meant hiring an outside consultant, such as a teacher from Rainier Scholars or a district-level curricular coach, to come and work with us. This training over time is more effective than a half hour presentation on student engagement or tech use.

One area in which I think my school is growing when it comes to PD is community involvement. According to the Institute for Educational Leadership, Inc., "an effective school depends on leadership from all members of the school community" (2011, p. 119). By actively engaging teachers to share their expertise, there is greater buy-in. "Learning from more experienced members of a community and participation in cultures of practice [has] led to... learning situations that incorporate situated views of learning" (Hansman, 2001, p. 46). "Situated views of learning" means that adults learn through interaction with community members in self-driven, interest-based environments. By drawing on the strengths of the community, schools save money and create a culture in which community members rely on each other for help and ideas.

As my school rethinks leadership, I hope that more attention is given to data, because while I am sure that our administrative team has data, the average teacher is not given access to data at my school like I think it is at other schools (based on conversations or examples given by my classmates). I hope that there is continued teacher input into the types of PD that we need so that the teachers see the PD as necessary and useful rather than a waste of time. Finally, I would like to see more time for reflection. I was intrigued by an example given by the Institute for Educational Leadership, Inc., where teachers got to take a planning day, essentially a sub-covered day, to reflect on a recently completed goal and evaluate successes, failures, and next steps. I could see this being incredibly useful for teachers at my school as we attempt to create a more cross-departmental curriculum. These days would be great for teachers in different departments to come together and reflect. As stated by many authors, the best PD has improvements for students at the heart, not just teacher needs.


References:
Hansman, C.A. (2001, Spring). Context-based adult learning. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 89, 43-51.

Institute for Educational Leadership, Inc. (2011). Teacher leadership in high schools. In E.B. Hilty (Ed.), Teacher leadership: The "new" foundations of teacher education: A reader (113-128). New York: Peter Lang Publishing.

Merriam, S.B. (2001, Spring). Andragogy and self-directed learning: Pillars of adult learning theory. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 89, 3-13.

Zepeda, S.J. (2012). Professional development: What works. New York: Routledge.

Teacher leadership- what is it?

As I begin a new quarter, here is my reflection on leadership at my school and my role as a teacher leader.

My school has been undergoing a re-organization lately. The head of the high school left for another job at the end of the 2015-2016 school year. We intentionally hired an interim head of high school so that she could help us decide what we needed in from the person in this position and allow us to conduct a full search. She decided to stay another year as we underwent radical changes in our curriculum and organization over the 2016-2017 school year. For the 2017-2018 school year, she has shifted and stepped somewhat aside for a high school "team leader"- one of our own teachers who is liked and respected- who is building a new leadership team. We now refer to our leaders as the "High School Leadership Team" more often than "Administration." It was an exhaustive process to define the tasks of each of our leaders, and I recognized the description of distributive leadership in Hilty. With a lot of turnover in administration, some things had fallen through the cracks and having clearly defined tasks will help with maintaining our daily operations. We also have a commitment to getting each of our HS leaders in the classroom- most of them are teaching at least one class, from math to science to English. This allows us to view our leaders as professional colleagues, as described on page 271. Plus, they continue to remain in touch with classroom issues and sympathize with the teacher role, the lack of which had become a problem with our former administration.

In this new organization, I have stepped into the role of a "grade level coordinator," keeping my finger on the pulse of the 9th grade. I hope to use what I learn in this class to become a better leader for my 9th grade team, with more opportunities for collaboration. We are also in the process of writing a new curriculum, and collaboration is very important as we hope to make our curriculum more integrated than in the past. Understanding what works, and how to be responsive to the needs of our students if what we're doing isn't working, can only happen if we work together. 

Finally, our newly-appointed curriculum coordinator recently sent an email asking for information about the professional development that we have received in the past- either school-sponsored or individually-selected. With the redefinition of leadership, I think my school will become more intentional about how teachers get professional training, and I look forward to seeing how I can help this process.

Podcasting as a Test Review Tool

Program Standard 12

Throughout the quarter in EDTC 6431, Learning with Technology, I have been reflecting on the ISTE student standards. As a final project, I have designed a lesson plan that not only meets content standards, but also meets several ISTE standards. This year I am teaching senior students who will need to review for their history IB exam in the spring. I decided to use this project to plan a part of their review. While IB has a skills focus, students still need to be able to remember a lot of information. My seniors should have ownership of their review, but I have found that students tend to gravitate toward a text-packed PowerPoint presentation when they are asked to provide information to their peers. I wanted to come up with another way to help them move beyond that strategy. I am going to help my students design podcasts as a review tool. This will give them ownership of the test review and help them teach their peers, and also be more worthwhile than a presentation that no one pays attention to. To view the full lesson plan, click here. If you want to learn more about podcasting in education, check out The Nuts and Bolts of Podcasting from ReadWriteThink.

I look forward to teaching this unit in the spring, but I know that I have a lot of work between now and then. I need to become comfortable using Audacity, the audio editing software I will ask my students to use. I need to create a rubric that will guide my students to success but still allow them to create personalized podcasts. I also need to ensure that as I teach throughout the year I am encouraging study and note-taking habits that my students will find useful when they get to this culminating project. I hope that by engaging with students to help them use technology to study in a new way I can make the review process relatively painless and, above all, useful. If this goes well, I would like to make podcasting a regular feature of assessment in my history classes.

Update after teaching this lesson
I ended up using the podcasting lessons throughout the year, creating a string of episodes for the students to listen to as they review, rather than as a review tool itself. Click here to listen to their work! This was particularly useful because the dozen students I anticipated when planning my year were broken into two classes- a section of 4 and a section of 8. This allowed me to create three teams of four students each, and it was so fun to watch as they became more comfortable with the podcasting process. I worked with the students to create a podcasting rubric and a planning worksheet. My favorite part was when they would have organic conversations about creating a thesis for their episode, or discuss how they were answering the question, even though we never talked about needing anything as formal as a thesis. In this way, I could see that they were beginning to understand the material in a new, deeper way. Though I still struggle to see how I might use this in a larger class setting, I definitely saw benefits to using a podcast structure as a unit assessment for my students.

References

Bhaskar, Santosh (2013, August 23). List of great free tools to create podcasts. EdTechReview. Retrieved from http://edtechreview.in/news/533-free-tools-to-create-podcasts

Readwritethink (2018). Podcasts: The nuts and bolts of creating podcasts. NCTE. Retrieved from http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/printouts/podcasts-nuts-bolts-creating-30311.html

Robin, B.R. (2008). Digital storytelling: A powerful technology tool for the 21st century classroom. Theory and Practice, 47, 220-228. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00405840802153916.

Soh, K. (2016). Fostering student creativity through teacher behaviors. Thinking Skills and Creativity, 23, 58-66. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tsc.2016.11.002.

Yang, Y.C., & Chang, C. (2013). Empowering students through digital game authorship: Enhancing concentration, critical thinking, and academic achievement. Computers & Education, 68, 334-344.

Organizing and Reviewing Information- ISTE Standard 4

This week's standard, ISTE Student Standard 4, looks at student use of technology to think critically and problem solve. I interpreted this standard in light of a review project for senior students who are preparing for an IB test. They have two years of information that they need to review, and if they want to pass the test I think this qualifies as "authentic problems and significant questions for investigation"! What I want to avoid at all costs is students standing in front of a text-packed PowerPoint with no one paying attention because they know they can just look at the slides later. This is not appropriate use of digital tools, and it is not an effective study method either.

My first idea for this review was a podcast. You can read more about free tools for educators at this link from EdTechReview. I am considering using a recording/editing software such as Audacity to create our podcasts and then sharing through Google Drive or OneNote. There are also a couple of online hosting sites, such as PodBean or Podomatic, but I need more research before I feel comfortable asking my students to create accounts. Since this is effectively changing the way my students will review and study, I will need to change up the way I teach and lead this review session. ReadWriteThink has good examples of teaching strategies to guide my students as they figure out what to include and how to make a podcast.

One way that I can support my students leading up to this review activity is with other tech tools to organize information. In history, timelines are particularly useful. For another avenue of research this week, I took a look at some electronic timeline creators. The beginning of my search led me to an article by Christoforos Pappas, originally published in 2013 but updated in 2013, called "Top 10 Free Timeline Creation Tools for Teachers". What is really great about this article is that it tells you right away what the features of the timeline creator are, and whether or not you need a paid subscription to use the site. I have been exploring these resources, and here are a few of my favorites.

I started by downloading the OfficeTimeline tool, a plug-in for Microsoft Powerpoint. It looks like a really cool resource, but I found that it had a few too many moving parts for anything I would require of my students. There also wasn't a good way to add more information, like an explanation of why an event was significant. I would recommend this tool for people scheduling an event.

I have had students use Sutori in the past for a timeline-esque project (they could convey the information however they wanted, and these students chose a timeline). It is great because it allows a lot of detail, and it says that students can collaborate on projects, working together at the same time. I also like that it allows the use of pictures.

MyHistro looks really interesting because it is tied to a map. I could see this resource used for a war or migration. However, it would have a limited use for a more abstract timeline of documents, for example.

Finally, TimeToast describes their product as "easy as toast" and it really does look like a no-frills way to create a good-looking timeline. Like the other tools, you can add pictures and descriptions, as well as collaborate.



My hope is that use of these online tools would allow students to better order and explain historical events. Students learn by doing- and "doing" needs to involve more than sitting and watching a PowerPoint, whether that presentation is delivered by a student or a teacher. Social constructivist theory "suggests that students actively construct knowledge through their experiences" (Yang & Chang, 2013). Projects like interactive timelines or review podcasts engages students in a new way, allowing them to process information, decide what is important, and decide how to share their understanding.

References

Yang, Y.C., & Chang, C. (2013). Empowering students through digital game authorship: Enhancing concentration, critical thinking, and academic achievement. Computers & Education, 68, 334-344.

Assessment- both formative and summative

Program Standard 11
We began this quarter in EDU 6613, Standards-Based Assessment, by examining our personal thoughts around formative assessment and how we use it in our classrooms. I reflected that formative assessment is essentially a check-in and that it can be tied to content, objective, or even work time. I have tried multiple formative assessment strategies in my classroom, and I enjoyed the resources to learn about ways to use it more effectively in my classroom.

The text for this course, Embedded Formative Assessment (Wiliam, 2011) encourages teachers to think through assessment at all stages of lesson. Possibly the most interesting fact I pulled from this book was Wiliam’s warning that feedback plus a score makes the feedback worthless (2011, p. 109). Students only look at the score and worry about how it will affect their grade, or compare it with their neighbors. This set the stage for research over the quarter into different ways to give students feedback and then how to use that feedback to inform my teaching. Carol Dweck’s article “The Perils and Promises of Praise” (2007) serves as a reminder that giving the right type of feedback is also very important. Dweck, a leader in the growth-mindset movement, emphasizes process praise that “keeps students focused… on processes they can all engage in to learn” is much more beneficial to motivating students than effort praise.

For students to really benefit from process praise, though, they need to know where they are in the process. Teachers need to have an objective in mind, and they need to share that objective with their students in student-friendly language. Stanier, in his 2013 article “Much to learn you still have,” advocates for inquiry models that help students reflect. Stanier writes that if teachers make explicit “what master of that piece of knowledge looks like, pupils can assess themselves and decide when they are ready to progress on to the next piece of knowledge” (2013, p. 15). In this way, teachers and students can work together to meet the learning goal. If students cannot evaluate their own work, they will rely solely on the teacher to be told when they have met the learning target. This is not only inefficient, but it also removes the partnership from education, taking us back to the days when a teacher held all the knowledge.

Example of slide with learning objective- I project this slide
to help students identify and meet the learning target

Mid-way through the quarter, I chose to focus on self-assessment to learn more about effective strategies. You can read my findings here, but my overall takeaway is that self-assessment is an integral part of standards-based assessment. I have reaffirmed throughout this course that it is important to start with the end in mind. Begin with a target, and then think of how you will get your students to that target. Plan ahead to meet student confusion or misconceptions, but also plan plenty of check-ins that will allow you, and your students, to ensure that you are all on the same road heading for the same target.

As I begin the new school year, I will use the work that I have done in this course and in Curriculum Design, EDU 6639, to re-work my freshman curriculum. This course addresses SPU Teacher Leadership standard 11, “utilize formative and summative assessment in a standards-based environment.” My future lessons will be aimed at greater understandings that ensure my students meet the social sciences standards at my school, taking away some activities that, while fun, did not advance student learning in any particular area. I look forward to working more closely with my students as I identify learning targets and together we work to meet them.

References

Dweck, C.S. (2007, October). “The perils and promises of praise.” Educational Leadership, 65(2), 34-39. Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/oct07/vol65/num02/The-Perils-and-Promises-of-Praise.aspx.

Moss, C.M., Brookhart, S.M., & Long, B.A. (2011, March). "Knowing your learning target." Educational Leadership, 68(6), 66-69. Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/mar11/vol68/num06/Knowing-Your-Learning-Target.aspx.

Stanier, J. (2013). 'Much to learn you still have!': An attempt to make year 9 masters of learning. Teaching History, (150), 14-19. Retrieved from http://ezproxy.spu.edu/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/1325039101?accountid=2202

Stockman, A (2015, April 25). "10 creative pre-assessment ideas you may not know." Brilliant or insane: Education on the edge. Retrieved from http://www.brilliant-insane.com/2015/04/10-creative-pre-assessment-ideas-you-may-not-know.html

Wiliam, D. (2011). Embedded Formative Assessment. Bloomington, IN: Solution Tree Press.

Curriculum by Design

Program Standard 9

          This course in curriculum design has shown me that using the Understanding by Design model is both the easiest, most natural thing in the world, and it is also the hardest. On the one hand, it makes so much sense. On the other, it takes a lot of time and energy to produce a quality curriculum. While I have always tried to use this method, this is the first time that I have been able to have the time to fully devote myself to a rigorous application of UbD to a curriculum for students that I know and love. In the past, I have been limited by abstract guidelines for a future, fictitious class. Throughout this class, I have evaluated a known curriculum and adapted my lesson plans to make learning a more meaningful experience for all my students.

Research

            Reading The Understanding by Design Guide to Creating High-Quality Units (Wiggins & McTighe, 2011) put the UbD process into perspective. I liked how this book broke the process down, provided examples, and even recommended an order in which to use the modules. This book was a springboard for other helpful resources. To discover more about learning targets, I found the article “Knowing your Learning Target” (Moss, Brookhart, & Long, 2011) very interesting. While I have posted learning targets for my students for years, this helped me to better understand the necessity of ensuring your students truly grasp what it is they are supposed to accomplish during the class period, just as you would do for a big project. When it comes to instruction, I enjoyed hearing Doug Fisher discuss his gradual release method in a Youtube video titled “Gradual Release of Responsibility” (2013). What I thought was most interesting is that he emphasized that while his initial figure of gradual release was a top-down triangle, and the phrase “I do, we do, you do” gets ingrained in new teachers, Fisher explained that you don’t actually have to go in that order, as long as all the parts happen every lesson. This allowed me to see gradual release in a new light and to think more critically about the responsibility I give my students in each lesson. One of my favorite quotes about teaching is from Cris Tovani in her book Do I Really Have to Teach Reading?, in which she says, “School should not be a place young people go to watch old people work” (2004, p. 20). By making my intentions clear, and holding all my students to the expectation that they can meet the learning standard, I can engage my students, challenge them, and make them see that what we do in my classroom is worthwhile.

Coursework

            The unit that I designed for this class has helped me to rethink the start to my year with my 9^th grade students. For the past three and a half years, I have taught a Western Civilization course guided by nothing more than being handed a textbook when I took over mid-year and being told “it would be great if you got to the French Revolution.” I felt bound to my textbook and the outline from the teachers who had come before me. Now, however, my school is shifting curriculum and I feel like I have the opportunity to re-think the 9^th grade experience. Over the next year, I will begin shifting the course from Western Civilization to World History. This is a daunting task, because World History is so huge! There are so many textbooks, most of them the size of a couple of bricks, and so many recommendations for what “needs” to be taught. By allowing UbD to guide the creation of my first unit for this new direction, I have been able to focus on outlines that will make World History manageable. I hope to teach my course as a series of case studies focusing on deeper understandings. This is supported by UbD.

Through my work on this foundational unit, I have a better grasp of how to start the year off right for my students. I began designing my unit by thinking about what I hope my students get out of it. I want them to understand where our concept of “history” comes from, and how it has shifted over time. I want them to understand the inter-connected nature of our study, and how what we study in one area of the world can be different from another, but that there is also a driving force for stability that encourages people to gather and be social. After thinking about these understandings, I had a better idea about what I should actually teach. I will be reformatting the first weeks of school around this unit.

I also have a better idea about how to ensure my students grasp these understandings. I enjoyed the reminders about constant formative assessment, both from this class and EDU 6613, Standards-Based Assessment. I incorporated many ideas from Wiliam’s Embedded Formative Assessment (2011) into my lesson plans. This includes opportunities for students to reflect on their learning and a variety of ways for them to communicate their learning to me. However, it all comes back to having a quality learning target. If you don’t know where you’re going, you can’t tell your students where they’re going. And if the students don’t know where they’re going, it is highly unlikely you will all end up in the same place. Hattie (2012) writes that for an accomplished teacher, “the primary concern is to add value to all students, wherever they start from, and to get all students to attain the targeted outcomes” (Chapter 4, Prior Achievement section). This is impossible without a partnership between teacher and students predicated on trust and clear expectations.

Standard Alignment

This course is aligned with SPU Teacher Leadership program standard 9, “evaluate and use effective curriculum design.” I feel that I have met this standard throughout the quarter. I began by evaluating the textbook that I currently use in my classroom. I found that while there were many activities and opportunities for students to engage with the material, the lessons provided amounted mostly to reading the textbook and answering some questions. Despite the inclusion of “critical thinking” questions, there were no places in the curriculum for teaching strategies to answer these questions, and if you followed the prescribed lesson pacing, there was no room to fill them in. From here, I began to design my unit, starting with essential questions and understandings, then learning targets, and finally activities to help my students meet these targets. Throughout it all, I collaborated with peers, giving and receiving feedback, and revising my unit accordingly. By designing my unit in this way, I created an effective unit that will engage my students and encourage them to think deeply about historical topics.

References

Fisher, D. [FisherandFrey]. (2013, May 11). Gradual Release of Responsibility [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjURdvzty4c.

Hattie, J. (2012). Visible learning for teachers: Maximizing impact on learning [Kindle version]. New York, NY: Routledge.  

Moss, C.M., Brookhart, S.M., & Long, B.A. (2011, March). Knowing your learning target. Educational Leadership, 68(6), 66-69. Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/mar11/vol68/num06/Knowing-Your-Learning-Target.aspx.

Tovani, Cris. (2004). Do I really have to teach reading?. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers.

Wiggins, G., & McTighe, J. (2011). The Understanding by Design Guide to Creating High-Quality Units. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Wiliam, D. (2011). Embedded Formative Assessment. Bloomington, IN: Solution Tree Press.

Media Literacy Against Fake News- ISTE Student Standard 3

This week we take a look at ISTE Student Standard 3

Students today have more information coming at them than ever before. Due to various social media platforms, traditional news programs, news sites, and newspapers both physical and online, everyone needs to be increasingly discerning about where they get their information and what they believe. There is also a disturbing trend of "fake news." While some people use the term to describe stories they disagree with, there are others who deliberately distort the truth to spread false information. With all of this in mind, I decided to focus my research for this week on media literacy. I have done some research in the past, but I wanted to compile a list of curriculum available to teach my students how to be critical consumers of the information around them.

I began by watching a video from Education Week that outlines steps being taken right here in Washington state to teach media literacy. The video brings up a great point that "just because kids are comfortable with social media doesn't mean they're savvy about what they're using." It also gives some recommendations about teaching resources. Below I will expand on some of those resources and add some others.

In the video, they reference an excellent and interesting study by the Stanford History Education Group, which provides awesome teaching resources for history lessons, particularly document-based ones. You can read the study here, or listen to a story from NPR at the bottom of the page. To summarize, students today are not great at discerning fake news, and educators should do something about it. I greatly recommend the resources from SHEG if you are a history teacher looking for quality lessons using primary sources. You can also see examples of the activities they used to conduct the study in the summary. I used some of them with my junior students last year, and it was indeed depressing to see where the gaps in their knowledge were. In particular, they are unfamiliar with the idea of checking to see who is providing the information. So, I hope by using some other resources I can help them become more discerning.

The video from Education Week also references the group Common Sense Media. According to their website,

Common Sense is the leading independent nonprofit organization dedicated to helping kids thrive in a world of media and technology. We empower parents, teachers, and policymakers by providing unbiased information, trusted advice, and innovative tools to help them harness the power of media and technology as a positive force in all kids’ lives.

They have various series on different digital skills, but I am most interested in their unit on Digital Citizenship. There are leveled games and activities, as well as guides for teachers to facilitate the lessons. They also offer professional development opportunities for educators and the opportunity to connect with other teachers through social media platforms.

The last resource I would like to share is called Checkology and it is created by the News Literacy Project. Similar to the other sources, it acknowledges that students today have a lot more information coming at them, and it provides a platform for the students to learn how to evaluate that information. It has an interactive classroom discussion wall, incentives in the form of badges, and it includes a variety of activities, not just videos and questions. For the 2017-2018 school year, the premium version, where you can create classrooms and monitor student progress, is free! I like that it is directed at teens, and from the videos and activities I have done it is engaging and in teen-friendly language. I look forward to testing this resource and others in my classroom this year.


 (Links to an external site.)Links to an exterand it is created by the News Literacy Project (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site. It acknowledges that students today have a lot more information coming at them, and it provides a platform for the students to learn how to evaluate that information. I haven't gotten very far into the modules, but it has an interactive classroom discussion wall, incentives in the form of badges, and includes a variety of activities, not just videos and questions.

Communication and Collaboration- the individual in the group (ISTE standard 2)

This week I spent time looking more in depth at ISTE standard 2: Communication and Collaboration. According to this standard, students should "use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively, including at a distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others." At my school, my students are very familiar using shared documents like Google Docs, Office 365, and especially OneNote to collaborate on projects and share information. For this reason, I chose to focus on the individual part of the collaboration standard. 

My question is: How can I hold students individually responsible for their work in a group project? I was particularly interested in finding technological tools with which to do this.

This is an example of
OneNote's user tags

In OneNote, I can see a tag on any typed work that tells me who typed it, and when they last worked on that section. What happens frequently in group projects is that either 

a) one student does the typing for the group so I only see her user tag, 

b) one student goes back and does a final edit, thus making it look like she has done all the typing, or 

c) one student copies and pastes information that was sent via email into OneNote, making it look like it was all her work. 

There is a "recent edits" selection, but it only focuses on pages as a whole. Also, if the work is hand-written on the screen, there is no time stamp. This makes OneNote great for sharing, but not for holding students individually accountable.

While OneNote is convenient, I think I might have to begin using Google Docs more extensively for group projects. As a study by Sharples, Arnedillo-Sánchez, Milrad, and Vavoula (2009) notes, "Traditional assessment methods are not appropriate for accrediting learning not directly related to the curriculum or done through informal collaboration" (pp. 8). Before tech made it possible to drag and drop, it was easier to tell who did what on a project. Google has a host of features and plug-ins that allow teachers to track the use of its technology. The "revision history" tool shows when edits where made and by whom, and it blocks off what was changed. There is also a plug-in called Draftback that creates a sort-of video of how a document was created. On the analysis page, it shows who did the edits. Reviews from teachers state that they find it particularly useful to tell when students are copy-and-pasting information, especially in language classes where Google translate can be a bane. If I can set up my assignments properly to include the use of Google docs, these tools will be really helpful.

However, just tracking changes does not make a group project worthwhile or ensure that everyone pulls their own weight. Accusations of inequality, or just plain lack of motivation, are common problems associated with collaborative learning tasks (Kao, 2013). To address these problems, it is important to build positive interdependence within your classroom. When working together, "team members need to think that success of the team depends on the contributions of each member" (The Foundation Coalition). When you have done this, using technology to track changes becomes secondary.

Here are a few extra resources on building positive interdependence and developing quality collaboration:

http://www.ascd.org/publications/books/109018/chapters/Using-Positive-Interdependence.aspx

https://sites.google.com/site/cooperativelearningresources/edss-555/assigningacademicsocialskillroles

References:

The Foundation Coalition. Positive interdependence, individual accountability, promotive interaction: Three pillars of cooperative learning. Retrieved from https://www.uwstout.edu/soe/profdev/resources/upload/acl_piiapi.pdf. 

Kao, G.Y. (2013). Enhancing the quality of peer review by reducing student "free riding": Peer assessment with positive interdependence. British Journal of Educational Technology, 44, 1, 112-124. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8535.2011.01278.x

Sharple, M., Arnedillo-Sánchez, I., Milrad, M., & Vavoula, G.N. (2009, January). Mobile learning. ResearchGate. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-9827-7_14

Creativity and Innovation in the Classroom (ISTE Standard 1)

ISTE Standard 1 states that "students demonstrate creative thinking, construct knowledge, and develop innovative product and processes using technology." As with all good classroom tech use, the goal is to elevate and move beyond what is possible with a basic pen-and-paper classroom. For this particular standard, students are encouraged to express themselves and share information in a creative way.

In most classrooms, "by tradition, teaching aims at convergence more than divergence" (Soh, 2016, p. 59). This means that students are rewarded for being compliant, for checking boxes, and, in general, for following instructions to the letter. In the past, this has been difficult to conquer as there are only so many ways to make a poster or give a speech. Most students only had access to a textbook or the teacher for information. Through technology, however, students have access to a whole new world of information at their fingertips. It is important that students be allowed to play in this world and to be taught how to do so. Used correctly, the "technology can be used to bring out the very best in how teachers teach and how students learn" (Robin, 2008, p. 221).

For this standard, I elaborated on the assigned question about creative and innovative student use of technology by thinking about a particular project that I do. As part of a unit on Greece and Rome, students summarize their learning by writing journal entries from the point-of-view of a time traveler. They record their observations, including sights, sounds, and smells, and they draw a picture of what they see. I wanted to see if there was a way I could elevate this project to allow students to go deeper with their work and demonstrate greater knowledge, as many of the journal entries I get begin to move beyond a repetition of the textbook info, but don't go very far. Digital stories are often easier to make more engaging than written stories because of its "quick visual displays of information coupled with its engaging images of people, place, and planet" (Dillon, 2014, p. 1).

One source I found to be very interesting was a book by Carolyn Handler Miller called Digital Storytelling: A Creator's Guide to Interactive Entertainment. The first chapter is devoted to a comparison of the myths and stories of ancient civilizations to the type of digital storytelling we do today. This would be a great way to hook my students and teach them a little more about the culture of Ancient Greece! The students like to see the people in history as relatable, and the learning sticks better when they can see themselves in the historical situations. This comparison would be good starting material for explaining the project to my students.

For the nuts and bolts of the project, I would probably use some of the resources from ReadWriteThink's lesson plan on creating digital stories about Greek myths. This lesson plan contains reproducible handouts for the planning, research, and writing stages, as well as a rubric for the digital storytelling project. There is also helpful integration of conversations about plagiarism and proper citation, which is very important when students are set free on the internet. I could see myself using parts of this lesson plan when I teach this lesson next September.

Before I do, though, I will need to think carefully about the atmosphere in my classroom. Thinking creatively is a risky activity, since most classrooms are set up for conformity. My students need to feel safe to take risks in my classroom. Soh (2016) writes that to foster creativity in students you need "to immerse them in a social environment which promotes creativity" (p. 60). Teachers who display creativity, and take risks themselves, can create this type of environment. This means that I need to welcome diverse project ideas, and I need to familiarize myself with various digital tools. ReadWriteThink endorses PowToon, a free-for-education site that allows students and teachers to create animations, for their digital storytelling project. I also want to learn more about creating podcasts, and EdTech has a list of different education-friendly sites. By developing competency in these areas, I can help my students grow and encourage them to think outside the box.

References:

Dillon, B. (2014, Dec. 15). The power of digital story. Edutopia. Retrieved from

https://www.edutopia.org/blog/the-power-of-digital-story-bob-dillon.

Miller, C.H. (2004). Interactive storytelling: A brief history. Digital storytelling: A creator's guide to interactive entertainment. [Google books version]. Retrieved from https://books.google.com/books?id=4FQRw8a9qSMC.

Robin, B.R. (2008). Digital storytelling: A powerful technology tool for the 21st century classroom. Theory and Practice, 47, 220-228. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00405840802153916.

Soh, K. (2016). Fostering student creativity through teacher behaviors. Thinking Skills and Creativity, 23, 58-66. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tsc.2016.11.002.

Wickline, K. Digitally telling the story of Greek figures. ReadWriteThink. Retrieved from http://www.readwritethink.org/resources/resource-print.html?id=30805.

Survey of Instructional Strategies Reflection

Program Standard 10

This quarter I had the opportunity to develop my skills as a teacher leader by reviewing effective teaching strategies and giving feedback to my peers. Two texts were used: Visible Learning by Hattie and Classroom Instruction that Works by Hubbell, Pitler, Dean, and Stone. Each of these texts walked through a lesson from start to finish.

First, we reviewed objectives. This emphasized the importance of using standards to create clear learning objectives for students, as well as the importance of communicating those objectives to students. This was a good reminder for me as my school redesigns our curriculum. I worked with my department to develop standards and articulate what we hope our students accomplish, and I was able to use these guidelines.

Next, we looked at the flow of the lesson and the tools that are available. From collaborative learning, to the use of advance organizers, these chapters were a great reminder of the importance of scaffolding and organization. I noticed that I used a lot more of these techniques than I thought, I saw places in my lessons where my students could benefit from additional instruction or graphic organizers.

My favorite part of this quarter, however, was the information on feedback. Both texts emphasized the importance of formative feedback, and this topic resonated with me. I have always given a ton of feedback to my students on large assignments like essays and tests, but these chapters reinforced the need for more smaller opportunities for feedback. Written feedback is greater than number scores in improving student learning. This information inspired my final project, a professional development presentation on electronic applications for feedback to my social sciences department colleagues. I have enjoyed experimenting with these apps in my classroom, and it was nice to be able to share my learning with my department.

In addition to improving my individual practice, each unit I gave feedback to my peers by commenting on videoed lessons. This gave me the opportunity to see different teaching styles and subjects and to practice giving targeted, action-able feedback. The feedback I received has allowed me to be more critical of my teaching in the moment. For example, I now hear myself as I say, "right" or "okay" to check in with students, and I intentionally pause an extra second.

Overall, I have been inspired this quarter to be more reflective as I plan and execute my lessons. I have used exit tickets more than ever with my freshmen classes, and I have given my juniors more opportunities for work with feedback and no grade. This has allowed me to be more responsive to my students' needs and for my students to extend and deepen their learning.

References

Dean, C.B., Hubbell, E.R., Pitler, H., & Stone, B.J. (2012). Classroom instruction that works. Denver, CO: McRel.

Hattie, J. (2012). Visible learning for teachers. New York, NY: Routledge.

Meredith, T. (2015, May 15). Starting student feedback loops. Retrieved from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/starting-student-feedback-loops-taylor-meredith.

Rauhala, J. (2015, April 30). Personalizing engagement: Checking in before they check out. Retrieved from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/personalizing-engagement-with-check-ins-johanna-rauhala. 

Schaaf, R. (2015, March 23). Snapshots of understanding? 10 smart tools for digital exit slips. Retrieved from http://www.teachthought.com/the-future-of-learning/technology/smart-tools-for-digital-exit-slips/.