Suppl_eMINTS

Five Things: Working with Authentic Data

Tonight we focus on working with authentic data. The software we’ll focus on is Microsoft Excel. This might be one of the scariest pieces of software to use. However, I’m confident you will find excellent applications for this great tool.

Anyway, here are my five things concerning authentic data and spreadsheets:

1. Authenticity is the key. – Like much of what we do in our trainings, the authenticity of our content and teaching methods is maybe the most important factor in getting through to our students. They want to know how they can use this in the real world or why it’s important to know at all. By using authentic data, students are better able to connect data collection and analysis to their lives outside of school.
2. Excel (and other spreadsheet software) is your friend. – Spreadsheets are there to help you make sense of data. They help organize data so that it’s easier to analyze. Luckily, software like Excel does most of the organization for us. Remember when no one knew how to use Word or PowerPoint? Give it time. Excel will make your life easier.
3. Use online templates. – Sometimes software like Excel can frustrate us by not doing exactly what we want it to do. Don’t worry. Find a template that already contains the formatting for which you’re looking. Microsoft even provides a few templates here or you can always do a Google search for “Excel templates“.
4. Use the Help. – When in doubt, always use the help menu for Excel. Also, I have had a lot of luck searching for tricks and tips on using Exel by simply doing Internet searches.
5. There are alternatives to Excel. – We are using a Google spreadsheet in order to keep records on classroom visits and training sessions. A Google spreadsheet makes collaboration possible and I can embed the sheet directly into the Moodle. Another collaborative spreadsheet can be found at Zoho. The best part of these spreadsheets is that you can work on them collaboratively and transfer the data directly onto an Excel spreadsheet either through download or by simply copying and pasting. Here’s a list of almost all the spreadsheet programs out there.

Hopefully, after we spend an evening with Excel, you will find applications for you and your students.

Image Source: http://xkcd.com/373/

Five Things: Classroom Management/Website Enhancement

My original goal was to post in time for training sessions. However, with my crazy summer workload, this did not happen. So, I’ll promise to post something here right before or right after we meet.

Classroom Management
We cover this topic at the beginning of the year because it’s the most important thing to establish at the beginning of a school year. I know it’s cliched, but it’s true. Whatever sort of expectations, norms, or procedures you set in August and September will either carry you through the year or make you want to quit. So consider your management strategies carefully.

Five Things:

1. The difference between norms and rules – Norms are long-term behaviors that you want from your students. These are the practices that will make learning possible throughout the year and possibly beyond. Norms are what students should do. Rules, on the other hand, are typically restrictions handed down from a higher authority; in this case, it’s you. Norms help students know what they should do while rules restrict students with few options.
2. Students help set norms. – You can set the norms in your classroom by giving one or two that are very important to you. Then, let the students determine the rest of the norms. They might just surprise you and they’ll feel more ownership.
3. Spend a lot of time on procedures. – Spending a considerable amount of class time in the beginning on procedure will make it possible to spend more time on learning as the year moves along. Plan simple lessons or even games where students perform class procedures for no other reason than to make them more efficient, leaving more time for learning later on.
4. Read Alfie Kohn. – Be sure to read the Alfie Kohn articles if you did not get a chance yesterday. They are extremely valuable in providing a theoretical framework to classroom discipline. The three articles can be found here, here, and here.
5. Don’t forget community-building. – Team and community building often get confused. Team building is the work you do to get teamwork out of small groups. Building community involves getting the whole class to work together with learning as the goal. There are several great resources for these kinds of activities in the online resources or there are a few on my Delicious account.

Website Enhancement
You all spent a lot of time working on your websites last year, but now that a new school year is upon us, there’s more work to be done.

Five Things:

1. Content, content, content – More important than anything is your website’s content. The most basic looking websites can still be the most useful if they have good content.
2. Update and maintain – It’s super important that your website is updated. Students and teachers won’t pay it much attention if the “last updated” message is from last school year.
3. Consistent Design – Just because we spent time enhancing websites does not mean you should adds lots of bells and whistles or mix in multiple fonts. Keep the colors and design elements consistent throughout your website in order to show cohesion of ideas.
4. Contrast – If you have a dark background, use a light color for your text. If the background is white, use black text.
5. Utilize Web 2.0 Tools – It’s really hard to make a website interactive or easy to update. Consider using a blog for your newsletter or announcements. Google Calendar can easily replace bulky, made-from-scratch calendars on Dreamweaver.

Again, don’t forget the resources in the Moodle and keep working at updating that website. See if you can find ways to best utilize your website to enhance classroom management.

See you all at the next session when we cover Excel and how to use authentic data in the classroom.

Image Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ijames/ / CC BY 2.0

From the Edu-Blogosphere

I realize many of you do not want to think about next year at this very moment. I also realize that many of you can’t help but to think about next year. So, with these things in-mind, I thought I’d share some things that have crossed my Google Reader and Twitter feed.

David Warlick asked his readers, “When you return to your classroom (or other edu-workplace), what do you wish will be there that wasn’t there this school year?” Folks then posted their wishes on Twitter with the hashtag #classwish. I wished for online presentation software could be collaborative and had non-linear possibilities. Today, Warlick compiled his results.

How would you answer David Warlick’s question? What do you wish for next year that wasn’t there this year? Really think outside the school box on this one. Who knows, we might be able to make it happen. I found the presentation software I was looking for in Zoho.

Over at Weblogg-ed, Will Richardson writes about a Time article in which the future of work is pondered. The article states, among other things, “We will see a more flexible, more freelance, more collaborative and far less secure work world. It will be run by a generation with new values–and women will increasingly be at the controls.” Richardson then wonders…

Which would seem to me to suggest that we need to create a more flexible, more freelance, more collaborative learning experience for my kids, right? If as the article states fully 40% of the US workforce is predicted to be independent contractors by 2019, shouldn’t we be rethinking what it means to prepare them for that?

How do these ideas change what you do in your classroom? My hope is that what we do in eMINTS supports this shift in education and the workplace. What do you think?

In conjuntion with the news that California (read “Cal-ee-fornia”) is dumping the textbook in favor of internet sources, I stumbled upon the blog TeachPaperless. While it claims to mainly provide educators with ideas for going paperless, the blog also gives its readers president for going tree-friendly in their classrooms. Even if you don’t care for the political slant, it’s an interesting read.

In my personal network, a friend who teaches high school English in Lincoln, NE mentions on his blog that his team of teachers is meeting to deal with plagiarism. It seems that several students have figured out how to copy and paste content from online sources onto their own papers, trying to pass the work off as their own. Have you considered this possibility in your own class? Do you have a plagiarism policy? Are you aware of ways to teach about and discover plagiarized work?

My partner sees this a lot as an English professor at the university. It’s easiest to deal with plagiarism when papers are turned in electronically. She copies the suspect content, pastes it into a Google search box, and up pops the original work. Sometimes it’s that easy; sometimes she has to search for a while.

As far as teaching about plagiarism, I have a few resources that may help:

• For you Wikipedia fans out there, there is a page with specific directions for citing the online encyclopedia of the people. Besides citation instructions, the page also offers advice such as “As with any source, especially one of unknown authorship, you should be wary and independently verify the accuracy of Wikipedia information if possible.”
• Plagiarism.com does the Google searching for you. Just enter the offending text in the box and hit “search”. You can even set up a Google alert as soon as the same text pops up anywhere on the Internet.
• The Citation Machine takes the guessing out as it will help your students generate citations for the work they ethically use within their writing.
• Excellent guides for teaching plagiarism can be found from Colorado State University, Web English Teacher, and Bedford/St. Martin’s.

Look for me to continue updating this blog about once a week this summer with more ideas to get your next year with eMINTS off to a great start!

Picture Source

The Fear of Blogging

This blog is turning into “What Will Richardson/David Warlick Said,” but when folks have good ideas, I have to recognize them and hopefully expand those ideas.

Anyway, Richardson had a great post today about the difficulty of blogging. He states:

While the successes are many and impressive, a good number of people still find the thought of publishing to an audience, even a relatively small, private audience of like-minded souls, to be too daunting. It’s just way outside their comfort zone, and they just believe that their contributions would either not be relevant, interesting or useful.

He goes on to get at the core of the argument:

…no matter how you slice it, blogging is a risk. And it’s a risk not just because you are putting yourself out there for the world, but because unlike many other types of writing that we do, it’s unfinished. At least that’s the way it feels for me. I don’t KNOW very much for certain. But blogging isn’t about what I know as much as it’s about what I think I know, and I find that to be a crucial distinction.

I think this has been an issue for me. I talk and talk in training sessions and classroom visits about the wonders for blogging. However, when it comes to my own professional blogging, it’s sporadic at best. On the other hand, when I blog about my non-professional interests, I find it to be easy. I’m afraid someone with way more expertise will come along and completely wipe out my ideas about education. It can be very intimidating.

Even if you’re not blogging professionally or with your students, the web can be a menacing audience. It’s what keeps us from blogging, starting wikis, writing WebQuests, or updating our websites. How do we get over that fear?

I know that reading other blogs has always helped spark ideas. Today (and yesterday) on this blog is no different. It’s helping me to blog by accessing my own personal learning network (PLN) through RSS feeds and Twitter. Now, if I could just come up with a few of my own ideas…

(Image “Blogging for Dummies” by Somewhat Frank.)

Classroom Management & Online Projects

Wow!  That was a long day we all spent together!  I hope everyone was able to glean something from all the content we covered and discussions had over the seven hours or so of training.  I also hope you are not already burnt out.

I wanted to revisit a few of the key points and some great resources to get you on your way…

Classroom Management: I know that many of you are masters at managing your classrooms and some of you are always looking for new ways to facilitate learning.  With the new year approaching, you have different considerations for classroom management than you did just a year ago.

Really think carefully about your classroom norms.  It’s alright to have a few in mind.  It’s even OK to include a couple that are extremely important to you, but make sure to include student input on those norms.  They will feel more ownership in how the classroom runs this year than if a list of rules are dicatated to them.  Also, be sure to word your norms as what students should do instead of what not to do.  For example, instead of the rule “no talking,” try the norm “listen to others when they speak.”  The goal is to get students to pay attention to each other or the teacher.  A norm should give the desired behavior.

To get your year off to a great start, you should focus your efforts on management and behavior almost exclusively.  The best way to ensure that these norms can be maintained throughout the year is by building a positive classroom community.  Check my links for community building activities here.  Don’t reinvent the wheel.  Use some of these resources to plan out your first days of school.  For secondary teachers, you could do the same activity with every class.  Elementary teachers may want to do one in the morning and one in the afternoon in order to break the monotony of the day.  Either way, have a little fun with it and get to know your students.  Building relationships with them now will pay off in the long run!

For the rest of my links related to classroom management, click here.

Online Projects: The key to a good online project is to think about the ways in which you can make it transform student learning through an authentic task.  Start out small, like an email project or a class blog, then think of ways you can transform some of your old lessons into a real world project that incorporates some form of online tools or networking.

If you wanted to access many of the resources from our training session, go here.

Some tools to consider for online projects are listed below:

EduBlogs – This is a safe, user-friendly tool for blogging.  You may remember that we had trouble with this tool last winter, but it seems to be working much better these days.  I still use it, in case you couldn’t tell.

Gaggle – Gaggle offers blogging and email options that can make online projects interactive and transcend borders.

E-Pals – Some people mentioned E-Pals as a great resource for pen pal projects.

Youth Twitter – This is the kid-safe version of the micro-blogging pioneer.

Top Ten Things to Consider When Writing a WebQuest

As you all begin the process of writing your WebQuests, I thought I would impart some knowledge and helpful tips to keep in mind.

10. Be creative. We really have to think outside of the box when writing WebQuests. David Warlick recently posted on his blog, 2¢ Worth, that the creativity we need to encourage in our students “will not come from lessons about creativity, but from a different kind of lesson that makes room for, invites, and values creativity.” Think outside the box and find ways to help your students do the same.

9. Think: What do adults do with this information? Think of your WebQuest as an opportunity for the students to practice applying what they learn in school to the real world. Thinking this way can also help you understand why the topics you teach are so important for preparing students for their adult lives.

8. Web 2.0 is your WebQuest’s friend. Not only can you provide resources from which your students can gather information, but you can also utilize all the great tools online for their WebQuest work. Wikis, like those at Edublogs or PBWiki, can be useful for group plans, note-taking, and even final products. Additionally, there are always things like blogs (Edublogs, Blogger, etc.), Moodle, various media hosting sites (TeacherTube, Switchpod), online productivity tools (Google Docs), and even social networks ( Youth Twitter, Edmodo).

7. WebQuests are best accomplished in groups. Here is your chance to put together a cooperative learning activity that is positively interdependent, able to hold each individual accountable, provides equal participation, and gets all the group members simultaneously active. However, WebQuests could also be valuable as tools for distance learning or independent studies.

6. Hook your students’ interest with great role-play. This doesn’t only mean you have to come up with great scenarios and characters for the students to carry out. You can also incorporate some “fake” email addresses for the students to contact clients, mysterious informants, or any character needed to make the project feel real.

5. Provide scaffolding for the learning whenever you see fit. It’s OK to link graphic organizers to the WebQuest that help students organize their learning. This could be a good opportunity to use software like SMART Ides or Inspiration. Just remember that this sort of work is to help the process, not to give you something to grade. You could also add a section for “learning advice” that could suggest techniques for organizing or how to aggregate the information.

4. Include brief descriptions of each of your resources with the links. This will allow students to know exactly what sites they should be researching. It’s sort of a preview of the site that prepares them for the other side of the hyperlink.

3. Be clear. Whether it’s the task, process, or expectations, you will want to be crystal clear for your students to be as successful as possible.

2. Consider including a teacher page in your WebQuest. A teacher page can provide others who want to use your WebQuest with contact information or tips for implementation. It may also be a good place for you to keep notes for the next time you use the WebQuest.

1. A WebQuest is a work-in-progress. Just because you assign a WebQuest to your class and they complete the task doesn’t mean that you are done with it. A WebQuest can be revised over and over in order to keep the links updated, the task fresh, and the strategies effective. If something doesn’t go smoothly, change it before you use it again. If you see a way that it could be altered to give students different perspectives, make the revisions. It’s your creation for you to mold into the perfect learning experience.

A WebQuest is a great way to provide real, student-led inquiry in your classroom. The best part is that it is also something that you can create to fit your students’ unique needs and gifts.

Why Visual Literacy?

To many of us, “literacy” has always meant reading and writing, but it means so much more.  Literacy is how we read or create almost any form of communication.  There is literacy in understanding a friend’s emotional state or interpreting a great piece of art.  Literacy is not confined to the written word, and neither is illiteracy.

My partner, who is a college professor at Mizzou in English and Gender & Women’s Studies, focuses much of her work on images.  She is a rhetorician, specifically, who looks at how images are used to make arguments.  Often times, she assigns students images to read or alter in order to make their own meaning.  Visual literacy is a definite reality at the college level, and if we are preparing our students for college, we must include visual literacy.

One of the most discussed examples of visual literacy has revolved around the photographs in National Geographic.  Often times, NG uses images to convey a sense of exoticism even though the accompanying articles have little to do with the photos.

One example of this use of an image to demonstrate the exotic is found in Steve McCurry’s picture of the Afghan girl (seen below).  The photo provides a sense of wonder as to the life of this wild-eyed girl in a strange, war-torn land.  The topic is both intriguing and problematic.  It is intriguing in that NG uses images like this over and over to give their readers a sense that the publication opens the reader to strange, new worlds of exotic beauty and wonder.  It is problematic in that the images are of real people with real histories and issues that stretch far beyond these depictions and should not be limited to the perceptions of the publisher and reader.  In other words, it’s very complicated.  We need to prepare our students for these complexities in society.  We need to make our students visually literate.