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Instructional Technology - International Education - Wellness

Category: Shifting to Learning 2.0 (page 1 of 9)

Virtual School Pedagogy – Oldies but Goodies

February 12, 2021 / / 0 Comments

Note: My international school is just starting virtual school for the current school year, so we are now just experiencing what many schools have been doing for most of the year. I posted the following to our Wellness blog.

I hung up my instructional technology hat a ways back, so I can’t offer the latest tools, tips, or techniques that many of our staff use in their virtual learning delivery. I can offer pedagogical strategies that have worked in the past and can definitely be supported through technology to enhance learning in virtual schools.

Concept/Mind Maps

Concept/Mind maps help students make their thinking visible, primarily when representing connections between ideas, events, topics, etc. Concept maps also can be used as collaboration tools.

An excellent way to use concept maps for virtual learning is to use an online provider like Mindmeister. Students can share their Mindmeister concept maps with you to access their thinking, especially for formative assessment of their understanding as the unit of study progresses. Virtual collaboration is supported if you partner with students or place them in groups to work together to use mind maps for multiple purposes. Here is a mind map template for essential questions one teacher provided his students. Look at a blog post describing how students used concept maps to answer the essential questions for their units of study at a couple schools.

Learning Activity Types via TPACK

Several American professors came together in 2010-11 to organize learning activity types (LAT) into nine subject areas supported by technology. They published articles about their efforts. Here is one. They provide research-supported pedagogies in their Learning Activity Types website hosted at the College of William & Mary School of Education. They apply the TPACK construct for planning purposes. Look to their website by going to the left side menu to select from the nine learning activity-type disciplines. The supporting technologies are from 2011, so adapt ones that still exist today and/or find the latest iteration or replacement tool that best supports each pedagogy. Image Source

Multimedia Essays (Media Mashups)

Writing essays is one of the most precious skills that we teach our students. But sometimes, our students can benefit from an alternative learning experience and assessment that engages the full range of their ICL skills. We can differentiate and add complexity to the standard writing process by having students create multimedia essays where they “mash up” various sources of media to communicate their thinking. At the time, a William and Mary doctoral student describes her work with multimedia essays in this podcast. Image Source

Personalized Learning System (PLS)

Students (and teachers) use technology to access information, to make meaning, to create and communicate their learning via a personalized set of resources for learning… a “go-to” 24/7 technology and information access toolkit – a Personal Learning System (PLS).

We guide our students to work as architects designing and maximizing their “learning flow” (think of the term workflow) while also engaging in time management techniques to increase efficiency and purposeful productivity. Self-directed and growth-minded students use devices, apps, Web tools, and information sources, putting themselves in charge of their learning. Here is a web resource describing what a Personal Learning System can look like and a planning document for students to work with. Image Source

Sketchnoting (Visual Note-Taking)

Our students live in a media-rich world. They think in images, video, and sound while constantly making neural connections. The creation apps on phones, tablets, and computers offer students pathways to draw, audio record, insert images/video, and embed hyperlinks to information sources, all personalized. This is where visual note-taking comes in. We can expand note-taking choices beyond text recording into multiple modalities by guiding students to use mind maps, colors, shapes, images, and digital grouping by dragging and dropping objects and connecting lines to record their thinking. Image Source

The Six Thinking Hats

Edward de Bono created this approach to decision-making and problem-solving that guides users to think in terms of types of thinking and perspective. We can apply them for individuals and groups of students to use as they process information. Here is a helpful overview and a teacher’s application in her classroom. Image Source

Thinking Routines

In the book Making Thinking Visible, Ron Ritchhart, Mark Church, and Karin Morisson help readers understand the power of thinking routines to help students process big ideas and make their thinking visible. Teachers routinely use the thinking routines in their regular face-to-face classes. One can also choose from a variety of technologies to also use in virtual school. Here is a dated web resource on the supportive tools one can use. However, the application of the routines is sound. If you are new to the routines, you can review an article by Ron Ritchhart and David Perkins entitled Making Thinking Visible. Also, look to go through the Harvard Project Zero Thinking Routine Toolbox. Image Source

WebQuests

WebQuests are a natural pedagogy for virtual schools because they’re already web-based. They connect inquiry and research skills to students working in teams using their communication skills to present their findings. WebQuests are online research expeditions built by teachers that put the students into roles to find information from selected sites and other resources as they attempt to solve a real problem and/or answer a question. The students in teams analyze, curate, and then use the information to create a learning product to demonstrate their understanding. WebQuests are NOT internet scavenger hunts with students just going through a list of links. True WebQuests have the students performing in the authentic roles of historians, economists, mathematicians, etc. The culminating project is usually a performance task in which the students present their findings while playing their roles or applying the learning to produce a product. Image Source

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A significant wellness connection for these pedagogies is that they engage students in PERMAH while exercising their Character Strengths. Collaboration amplifies Relationships with students using their strengths of kindness, leadership, and teamwork, to name just a few character strength applications. The process of creating definitely has students applying their strength of creativity within the pillars of Engagement and Accomplishment.

So how do we take these oldies but goody strategies and other current innovative and effective practices to spread them throughout our virtual school? One approach would be to form a virtual school design team in each division who become busy bees finding out what’s happening in virtual classrooms elaborating on ideas, and making connections to new approaches. They then cross-pollinate throughout the division and potentially between divisions. 😁

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Home Learning Support Plan and More

February 12, 2021 / / 0 Comments

One thing is to meet with parents to provide a list of home support strategies. It is another to provide a method to help them apply the strategies. The image to the left is a screenshot of one parent’s effort to work with her child to complete a home support plan template I provided her.

The support strategies list provides strategies for building routines and health (i.e., diet and sleep), the physical learning environment (essential for virtual learning), organization skills, and self-control while supporting independence. One can, of course, come up with other categories.

I work with the students to design their personal wellness plans they then take home to share with their parents. The wellness plan is student-centered and managed with some parental coaching. The home learning plan is parent managed with input from the child. The older the child, the more he/she takes ownership of applying the strategies.

And then there is, of course, the Personal Learning System (PLS) and plan that I work with students to complete and implement to have agency over their learning. 🙂

The Game of School – Steve Hargadon

October 16, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Steve Hargadon recently posted The Game of School to his blog. I suspect that it caught the attention of many educators as Steve is a true thought leader in the field of education. If his name is new to you, do look to subscribe to his blog and read up on the many ways he influences teaching and learning around the world. Steve is definitely one to take action on his ideas. Look to read through his follow-up post about his online classes for students, teachers, and parents.

My main takeaway from Steve’s posts, from my perspective as an elementary school counselor and instructional technologist, is for me to continue to build on the ideas and strategies that I have written about the last couple of years around re-imagining the role of school counselor while connecting to (digital) citizenship, wellness and personalized learning for all stakeholders. Working backward from Steve’s high school-focused outcomes, what can be done in the elementary to either lay the foundation for or possibly alleviate the need for some of Steve’s high school-oriented points?

In other words, wouldn’t it be better to help parents and students construct their parenting and learning toolkits by the start of Middle School? Of course, this is the case and I am sure Steve has coursework for parents of elementary students.  And of course, wouldn’t it be something for more schools to stop playing the game of school!

 

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Videography in Student Hands (Lessons Learned)

January 31, 2017 / / 0 Comments

Video creation in the hands of students empowers (yes, the overused term but so true in this case) them to attain many skills, dispositions, and habits of mind while providing a voice to create and share their thinking. You might respond to this statement by saying, “of course,” but why even say, “in the hands of students”?

My lesson learned and ongoing belief going back to my first days starting in the field of instructional technology has been to do everything possible to give students total but scaffolded control of the video creation process. My recent year in a public school system demonstrated that even in 2016, this is sometimes not the case.

During my year in the school system, it was heartwarming to see and hear about elementary schools where students were involved in producing news programming shows. I saw and learned about educators guiding their students to gather, write and report the news and, in some cases, shoot video and still shots. I did not see or hear about students fully working and learning in the very authentic roles of directors, project managers, and editors guiding the production process from start to finish. As there are 100+ elementary schools in the system, I am sure there are exceptions to my observations.

This gets to a second lesson learned. As in many learning experiences, it is about the process and not the final product. Pretty obvious, but with video, it can be the case that adults sometimes step in to polish the video while depriving students of the final editing steps. Letting students have complete ownership over the process, especially the editing, is vital.

A third lesson learned is that content is king, with production values coming in a close second, especially steady video and good audio. 🙂 Video production sometimes doesn’t always support real learning, as kids will be kids if given free rein. Losing valuable learning time to shoot goofy videos and what I call fluff in support of upcoming parent presentations doesn’t provide the model we want students to emulate. 

I can come across as not being fun, but using technology to check the box of tech use and not taking advantage of the project-based nature of videography definitely is high on my list of misuses of tech. In 2008, we dedicated an entire episode of the Shifting Our Schools (SOS) podcast to this topic. The audio for the show is unavailable, but Jeff, myself, and Dave Navis posted a few lessons learned on this topic that I am now seeing pop up from time to time in the blogosphere.

We have come a long way from the early 2000s, with many educators providing guidance on using video in the classroom and many resources supporting the video production process. If my lessons learned make sense to you, look to work as a designer to develop storyboard templates, production guidelines, role descriptions, exemplars, etc., as you facilitate your student videographers to have a great deal of control over their creating and learning. Start with small projects where their peers can give feedback on content and video production values. You will quickly see a ramping up of quality as students work to shine for their classmates.

Here are a few previous posts that might be helpful.

Tips for Supporting Student Videographers in Creating Documentaries > Terrific insights from a video producer and links to the work of two leaders in student-created documentaries. There is a reference to a book to be published. Here is the link to the book that has since been published on how to support student-created documentary creation.

Teaching videography> This post includes a book on the how-tos of video production.

Connecting Your Mission Statement to the Community > There are so many topics your students could do news reports on or complete documentaries. A big one is the culture and mission of the school. This post provides an example of one Grade Three classroom’s effort.

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Authentic Task: Design a New Learning Commons/Hub (Library)

January 28, 2016 / / 0 Comments

learningcommonsMarshall High School Library
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We speak to the importance of designing authentic learning opportunities for students. Educators get to experience them as well. 🙂 My wife Margaret is working on a proposal to help guide her school leaders to look to the future and not the past when planning for a new library as they build a new high school to replace their current one.

Margaret and I are fortunate to have worked in some international schools where the leadership either adapted structures or designed new ones that put the libraries at the center of the learning experience for the students. Margaret provided the leadership and know-how to make each school library the virtual learning center for the community.

Moving back to the US continued our experience with innovative libraries. Our sons were fortunate to attend Marshall High School, which built a whole new library as part of the school’s five-year remodeling effort. Here is a blog post and Ed Tech Co-Op podcast, which provide more information about the very future-focused library.

As a sometimes helpful husband, I reached out to my PLN to see if I could find some resources to assist Margaret in her effort. Thanks to Lauren Olson for sharing helpful sites on how we design and interact in the learning spaces we call libraries.

Videography and 4MAT: Quadrant IV- Creation

July 4, 2015 / / 0 Comments

4MATI am completing my series of posts connected to how videography can be integrated into one’s teaching by using the 4MAT approach to curriculum design. The following originates from the Teacher Toolkit that I created in graduate school.

Quadrant IV: Doing To Experiencing- Creation: What if I take this in a different direction? What if?

Refine- This process goes on during actual video shooting but takes place during the editing process. A great deal of creativity takes place as the video editors put the music, transitions, voiceovers, and titles to the video clips tying them together.

Perform- The 4MAT learning cycle comes full circle as the student team completes the production and editing process with a finished product. They look to see how the ideas, concepts, and messages from earlier in the cycle compared to the finished product.

Learning Climate- The students are working in the present, reflecting upon the past, and looking to the future as they put the video together. The editing environment is often tense but filled with excitement and feelings of accomplishment. They ask themselves if they visually represent what they set out to do. Do they find themselves going in a different direction or reaching different conclusions as they bring it all together?

Method- It all comes together here in self-discovery, according to Dr. McCarthy. The teacher is in the background “on call” for the editors if they request input. The editors work on the computer with the video footage to make each scene “just right,” cropping scenes and making them fit together. The remainder of the student production team views a first draft of the edited video, which leads to further creation and idea sharing of how to finalize the video’s message. The teacher can step forward and interact again using guiding questions to have the students think individually and as a team.

The camera is not used in this quadrant, but the video editing software of the production process is used to finalize the product. 

Outstanding creativity occurs as students use editing tools, music, and voiceovers to finalize their learning products.

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E-learning Discussion at the Ed Tech Co-Op Podcast

July 1, 2015 / / 0 Comments

Ed Tech Co-OpMark, Jeff and I completed our third season of the podcast by discussing online learning in a variety of settings. Here is the link to show 77 on e-learning. It is definitely a show that connects with our earlier chat with Jeff Nugent and his work at Colgate University.

Videography and 4MAT: Quadrant III- Skills

June 30, 2015 / / 0 Comments

4MATI am continuing with posts connected to how videography can be integrated into one’s teaching by using the 4MAT approach to curriculum design. The following originates from the Teacher Toolkit that I created in graduate school.

Quadrant III: Conceptualizing To Doing- Applications: How will I use this information? How?

Practice- The team moves into production mode, setting up the scenes and videotaping them. They use the production skills taught to them by their teacher. As mentioned, this is where authentic experiential learning takes place. McCarthy writes about students practicing and “experimenting, mastering, predicting, recording, seeing how things work, …” (p. 221). It is fun for the teacher to watch the students doing all these actions as they set up scenes and check for lighting, sound, background, etc.

Extend- The students are in fast learning mode, critiquing and improving their video skills. The students also see the concepts of their storyboard in real life, which leads to ongoing changes and new ways to make the scenes work as they had conceptualized them in their minds. At the same time, storyboards are sometimes rewritten as the production crew sees different directions to take the production. One could not ask for a more constructivist and authentic learning situation.

Learning Climate- Motion and doing, looking at possibilities, seeing what happens, and trying it again- a little differently. As you can see, many different learning intelligences come into play with digital video cameras. Every teacher has students who need movement in their learning.

Method- Dr. McCarthy points to the teacher as a coach in this quadrant. The teacher works as facilitator guiding students and setting up a structure to keep them in opportunistic learning situations. Another description might be behind-the-scenes “facilitator” as the teacher steps in with open-ended and guiding questions at opportune times. One helpful question is, “What do you think will happen if you do it that way?” One reality is that time constraints weigh in on student enthusiasm and the final product. In other words, the teacher sometimes needs to help students “see” weaknesses in their video shots in two takes instead of ten. A guiding question can bring that “aha” moment a little quicker.

The video camera is actively used in this “doing” quadrant.

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Designing a 21st Century School Library

May 25, 2015 / / 0 Comments

I was fortunate to recently spend some time with Alanna Graboyes at the George C. Marshall High School library that opened this year as part of the overall school renovation. Alanna is the head librarian who teamed with administration and architects to design the new library. We recorded an episode for the Ed Tech Co-Op podcast and Alanna gave me a tour. As you can see below, I took many photographs. It might be helpful to review the photographs as you listen to the interview.

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The PYP in Practice

April 13, 2015 / / 0 Comments

PYP

The folks at the IB recently posted an excellent video sharing teacher voices explaining what makes the Primary Years Programme (PYP) so valuable. The teachers echo much of what we read about from progressive educators via the blogosphere and Twitter. It is worth viewing. Scroll down to the following link to see the video.

PYP in Practice

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