As detailed in my blog posts, creation is the big push this year in my English department, and as we get ready for the next year, the question still remains, how can we prepare students for the careers of tomorrow while still meeting the rigorous state standards outlined in the Common Core Curriculum? Our answer was, and still is, have the students “create” using new technology while still demonstrating mastery over the English skills and standards needed for graduation. Creation is one of the highest orders of thinking, as creation shows mastery over the given subject matter. Part of the reason we focus on the creation aspect of assessments, is that is makes the assessments authentic. When students become deeply involved in their work, they get a better understanding of the material. Synthesizing and presenting learned ideas with new skills are essential for the 21st century workforce. To do this we looked at our units, and at grade level decided what we wanted our assessments to look like, what skills we wanted our students to demonstrate, and how we could incorporate a 21st century twist to those assessments. For example, in 9th grade our students read Grapes of Wrath and Of Mice and Men; two novels dealing with the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl era. In years past students were given a character and job, such as a farm owner, migrant farm worker, farm hand, etc., and tasked to write journal entries detailing their life and struggles, and how they would go about solving their given issue such as drought, infertile land, debt collection, or unemployment; all problems that plagued the Midwest during this era. To bring this task into the 21st century, students are now assigned the same assessment, but they must create and post their journal entries as blog posts to a blog. In order to create a “classroom community” students must also post comments on their classmates’ blogs giving them tips or solutions to help them stay in business, keep production up, or to gather their families and head west to California. Their blogs must also contain pictures, family profiles, and historical records. To make their blogs authentic students had to read, research, plan, design, and construct their blog, and then interact with their classmates. Our students use the free website blogger.com of which they can access at their home computers or with their school given iPad, and can sign in with the Gmail address given to them by the school district. This simple assessment took the students from just writing journal entries to creating their own persona and immersing themselves in the world of John Steinbeck and his characters. They were still meeting the Common Core standards for writing, but doing it in a much more creative way that helped to foster style and voice while creating better connections to a time period almost a century ago.
By clicking the button above, you will be taken to a guide evaluating the use of an application for creation. As mentioned in the previous post, my department’s focus has been on this topic, so I chose to use this guide. Not only did I find it helpful to check off what the application can do, but it also had a place to leave notes and summarize the app. I think this form would be very useful when doing summer collaboration with my colleagues as we could each explore new web tools and applications, fill out the evaluation form, and upload them to our shared folder on the school interface program. That way when different teachers look to implement new technology into their classroom, they will have an easy guide to see if the application is the right fit for their assessment. The form highlights what the application allows the students to do, but it leaves out how user friendly the application is. Frustration with technology can be a big issue with student interest level and assessment completion. If a student feels frustrated with the technology piece, they are more apt to come up with excuses to why they couldn’t complete the assignment. Testing out the application and writing comments about how it went, what problems were encountered, and how they were addressed and fix would all be useful information for the comment section of this guide.
App Evaluation: Animoto (Storytelling)
Animoto is a video slide share application that allows the user to upload photos and video clips into a slide show. Each slide show can hold 20 pictures or videos that are uploaded into one of the “styles” of slide show complete with colors, common theme, transition, and music. If the student does not like any of the themes, they can create a “blank” presentation without the background pictures that come with the pre-created themes. Students can add captions to the photos and videos after the have uploaded them, as well as arrange them in any order. Before their presentation is finished, students can also use music from the Animoto app, or upload their own. Due to copyright, students must agree to the apps terms of use before uploading their own music. For class use I think this application would be great for quick presentations. For formative assessments, students in reading groups have to make a two to three slide share presentation on a given concept and present it to the class. Animoto could be used as a substitution for a more creative approach as students can create a sort of video presentation. This would be great for showing plot structure, conflicts, or themes as presented in their story. Based on the evaluation guide, this application allows for importing pictures and videos, inserting sound and songs, exporting and saving the work, provides instruction, uses the touch screen effectively, and has a web based application that can be used on computers and provide additional support. This application is free and very user friendly. As mentioned above this would be a great application for quick presentations/ formative assessments such as chapter summaries, presentations on the elements of fiction, symbols in a story, etc., in the English classroom.
Special Education App/ Tool: "My Smart Hands"
Personally, I don’t really know too much about applications designed specifically for students with special needs. And while researching what I found was that most of the applications seemed to be aimed at young students. Therefore, when working with high school students with special needs, it is imperative that you know the application, and can modify the assignment and its usage to meet the IEP requirements of your students. For this assignment I chose to research applications for students with hearing impairments. I also chose this particular group because I have a friend and lifting partner that is a speech pathologist, so I could run the applications by him, see what he uses when working with children in his profession, and get his take. He was also my go-to for researching. One of the applications he recommended for young children with hearing impairments is “My Smart Hands”. This is a free iOS download for all iOS devices. This application has instructional videos, pictures, and reference guides for parents to teach their children sign language. Not only does it teach ASL to you, but also comes with quizzes and allows the user to search for specific signs they’d like to know or teach. This application is mostly for parents of small children that either have hearing impairments, or just want to teach their children sign language to communicate and bond before their children are able to speak. Though this is geared toward very young kids, this could also be a great resource for a teacher that may have a hearing impaired student. Having the ability to communicate through the ASL, could help a hearing impaired student feel more comfortable and accepted in your class. I personally have found this application to be very interesting and easy to use, and thus have started learning ASL myself.