Reflections of a Techie

Tools to amp up kids' thinking

I've been working all week on scientific argumentation...trying to distill the parts of what makes a scientific argument and then how to teach those parts to my 6th graders.  It is a daunting task.

One thing I know for sure is that I need constructs or models for how they should think when approaching a task.  I know that it will mean that they must also know when to apply the strategy, but I think it won't leave them so flat footed if they have a bag 'o tricks from which to pull.

My Google Reader brought me a very interesting post by Dave Gray on something he called Q-Tools.   Dave Gray » Q-tools: An approach for discovery and knowledge work.  He has a set of very insightful pictures that capture the thinking strategy that will be applied to a particular setting.

THIS is what I am hoping to create for scientific arugmentation.  I wonder if it's better to first think up the final product (something like making a claim) or if it's better to think up pictures to define the filters that you must apply to your thinking (evaluating the claim for evidence--stuff like data, facts, opinions or theories).  Probably doesn't matter.

I'm going to hang out a bit more with Mr Gray's piece and see what I can come up with about my own thinking structures/filters.  But thank you for the great seed of an idea!!!!

Web 2.0 cartooning

I'm just beginning to try out some of the 2.0 apps...in particular I think the comic strip ones might be particularly useful in science class.  We know that cartoons are some of the best ways to depict scientific phenomenon...and then if you have several varying explanations of what is happening....well, you can gain significant insights into what kids are thinking.

I think it would be fantastic way to do formative assessments.  Can't you imagine then taking the cartoon that you provided, reading through all their explanations and then leading a class discussion?  I'd love to try this out next year.

I'm slowly working on participating in the Web 2.0 Wednesdays challenge.  Imagine my delight when the first assignment was to use cartoon 2.0 apps to explain 2.0.  Not that I can explain much, but the author from Kevin's Meandering Mind sure did.  See what you think.

I think this is quite good and sure to communicate the 2.0 essentials.

Rapping to Convert Metric Measurements

Well I'm back at it....trying to find ways to make the startup of the science school year fun.  Fun and learning rules just never seem to go together.

I'm armed with an array of lab safety games, the Absent Minded Professor Skits and MatchUps. 

But when I started looking for fun ways to teach conversion of metric units of measure....well, you can probably see where things started to go awry.  Then I remembered Teacher Tube...a place where many colleagues are doing incredibles things with video.  I found Mrs. Burt who was rapping about converting from big to small and small to big units.  That may not sound so critical to a blog reader, but to an 11 or 12 year old kid, it's huge.  They never understand when to multiply and when to divide.  I think she does a crackerjack job. See what you think.

Kudos to Mrs. Burt for being brave to rap, for having such a great way to remember which operation to use and for sharing with those us who can't do what you're doing!!!!

Celebrations...a solution to the homework completion dilemma

One of the most successful strategies we've found for upping homework completion is to have end of  the quarter celebrations.  If you're wondering what this is...well, it's basically a drawing and recess.  Two simple components that all kids love...especially our middle schoolers.

In order to come to the celebration, you must have all your work turned in by a certain date.  Simple and easy to understand.  All of our grade level teachers publicize this date on their boards, we announce it on our class webpages and in a voicemail home.  We have fanatastic parents who support us...they collect a wide array of "giveaways" in August.  they get movie money, First in the LunchLine pass, bags of candy, 2 L bottles of pop, Lunch in classroom with 5 invited friends, coupons from local businesses.  Each student gets a set of passes to use if they need to go back to their lockers, to the bathroom or other things like this.  Whatever passes aren't used at the end of the quarter, go into a drawing.

You'd think we're giving away a car with all the whoop-la.  It's so much fun.

Once the drawing is over we go out and play.  Depending on the season, we play kickball, walk/talk, ultimate, dodgeball, karaoke, board games and so on.  We stay out for about an hour and the parents donate bottled water.

Why do we go through all this?

Homework completion had become a huge problem.  Threats just weren't enough.  Detentions and mandatory study sessions didn't work.  We decided that a carrot might be more effective.  That's the reason we developed the drawings and the celebration activities.  The response is amazing...once you put up the missing assignments at the beginning of the week.  Well, you might have 20 or 30.  They see their name and freak that they won't get to go, so the work just starts coming in.  Without any huge threat from me and by the deadline comes, I have 2.  This quarter over the 5 classes, I probably had 15 assignments for 30 kids each...450 in all.  Only 2 assignments weren't turned in.  So they will go to a help session while we are outside and get their assignments turned in.  Then when I go to calculate their grade, they will have a complete set of scores.

The first quarter every year we have about 10-12 kids who have to complete their homework during this work time.  By the fourth quarter, we're down to 2 or 3....out of more than 200 students.  All of us have stopped chasing the homework train and it is so much better.  We have the work turned in AND we have a time to relax with students, get to know them in a different setting than the classroom, and celebrate all the hard work that everyone has done.

Photos licensed by Creative Commons.  Homework photo is from http://www.flickr.com/photos/sharynmorrow/ .

Finding your voice in writing about math

Yesterday I spent most of the day working with colleagues on how we'd differentiate a new course offered next year.  A "Plus" math class to compliment the regular math class.  My opinions of this decision is a whole other post...and not relevant to thinking about how I'm going to deal with reality.

We went through each unit and pulled the most challenging problems...those that were extensions of the idea into new realms.  Or ones that had students access information from previous units...in the attempt to tie all things together.  I think that works out pretty well.

As we began to talk, a colleague really hammered home the need to "frontload" vocabulary.  If you are working with a math curriculum that is story problem based, it is essential for them to use words as precisely as possible.  That thought then got me considering other things...such as writing in their math journals.

I'm definitely going back to the word wall idea next year.  Don't care if my middle school colleagues laugh.  I think it helps to "read" the wall...use that flashlight to practice vocabulary.

Right now I'm pretty limited in knowing how to teach writing in math class.  I have a set of "signal words" from a LA teacher.  That has helped me require students to improve on their word choice depending on the types of text answer they are attempting.  It has worked pretty well, but it is still quite difficult.  At the beginning of the year when students would try and describe a process they'd used to solve the problem, you'd hear all sorts of artiifical langauage...they'd inject after, before, later, then, when, not long after, etc etc etc.  No matter how well it fit the situation, it was there...maybe all of them would be there!!!!!  Slowly they began to use the language better.

I still need to improve dramatically in how I teach them to write about what they know in math.  I want to incorporate more than word choice...I really want to expand into organization...and do you think there's voice in this type of writing.  I think so.  If I think about really great expository writing, there's voice in there.  Now I don't know if you consider math journals expository or technical writing.  Note to self:  Find that out.  It probably will help you determine if there's voice or not.

Here's what I really know.  There is a void of writing examples in math.  You try finding something that isn't an elementary school student.  I haven't been able to find a middle school example.  I am going to try and work with our school improvement specialist on this. 

Photos are licensed as Creative Commons images from www.origamitessellations.com/category/mentions/.

Frustrating and intriguing----great possibilities for simple machines

I read about this supposedly fantastic website to help students figure out simple machines while at the SmartBoard.  I was excited to get there and try it out.

Hours later and only having mastered several levels....I have to tell you that Magic Pen is frustrating as all heck for me. But ripe with wonderful possibilities for the kids.  It reminds me of an old piece of software from way back in the day...called Amazing Incredible Machines.  The kids would be given all sorts of different simple machines and they had to figure out how to put those together to solve the puzzle.

Magic Pen works on this principle.  Instead of having premade shapes, you have to draw them.  Eeeks.  Honestly if you can even come close to the shape, it recognizes it.

So I couldn't blame by utter lack of success on my drawing ability.  It must be my lack of inventiveness because for the life of me, I could get my drawing abilities coordinating with my problem solving abilities.  Trial after trial, I'd work on getting this little red ball from one side of the screen to the other...navigating past obstacles.

These are the kinds of puzzles that are perfect for my 6th graders.  Especially since there old teacher can't do them.  They'd take untold delight in showing me up and also I can see how it would absorb some of the potential engineers in the class.

Heed my warning, though.  It is addictive, frustrating and sucks your mind right into the fun of using these simple machines.

I Hate ROBOLAB

That's a pretty strong statement but it sums up my 7 years not so pleasant experience with the software. 

Picture this...we're working on our bots and my kids have been working hard to figure out gear ratios.  OK, they're 6th graders and ratios are still a bit foreign to them.  We've spent the whole week talking about ratios and what they mean.  And they've got their bot built and are ready to start the trials...we were to change into different gear configurations and see what the effect was on speed.

I only needed Robolab to allow the kids to create the simplest of programs...just a short 4 second turn on of both motors.  Not so much to ask.  But Robolab IR interface is a continuing problem in our school environment. 

First of all, we don't have the proper network permissions for the kids to be able to plug in the USB Infrared Tower...so I have to log onto the computers.  So much for network security.

Then it won't "see" the IR tower because we have too much light.  We try putting the tower in a box, under a desk in a box and so forth.  Still our program won't download into the RCX brick.  I find out that we haven't installed the patch.  Whatever the darn patch is..........

It's enough to discourage teachers and students.  It's why I hate technology.  When it's so complicated that you just want to throw in the towel ....well, all the cool learning is gone.  The kids were so disappointed that we could run their tests...

Not to worry.  I called a friend who has a stand alone computer not invovled in the network.  She brought it over to my room and we just wrote one program that everyone used.  The IR towers worked great and the bricks got the instruction set. 

Monday we'll run our trials.  I wish I could permanently borrow my friend's computer.  That's so not practical.  I simply lack the resources or know-how to get this to work on what I have in my room.  And by the way, let me tell you that our NXT software, LabView, works like a charm.  If I only had enough NXT bots, I'd be just fine.

Tapping into the best learning style

It's the end of the year and I'm knee deep in teaching Force & Motion.  I usually try and save this for the end of the year because it is highly engaging content even though kids think they'll die with all the math.  Lots of moaning and groaning when I tell them that physics uses the language of math to explain how things move!!!!

Unfortunatley we don't have enough time to really discuss cool, but only related material to F & M.  right now we're using Lego Robotics to study gears.  Specially how gears can make the TankBot go faster or slower depending on what gears you install.  I use these because the kids love robotics.

I thought one way I might continue this conversation is to use a wiki for expanding their ideas.  On the wiki I thought I'd put all the things you might expect to see in a F & M unit....Newton's laws, motion, speed, work, simple machines...but then I'd have a separate section of Robotics.  So I went in search of cool things on robots and Mars is the natural choice.

I called the page...Fact or Fiction??? and then hyperlinked to Mars rover animation.  With 4 hours, almost 300 comment flooded into the wiki.  Because I'm also trying to teach them how to actually have a conversation they did a pretty good job making reasonable comments.

Here's the thing..............they loved using this format for their learning.  They spent hours online last night and could hardly wait to see what new treasures I brought them to see tonight (can you tell me about the 7 minutes of terror???)  As we near bedtime on the second night of the conversation, they logged almost another 200 comments.  What teacher wouldn't be thrilled if even half of these comments were good one and that kids were busy talking to each other about space exploration????

As I reflect on my choice of using a wiki, maybe I made the wrong 2.0 choice.  I probably should have used a blog and then worked on creating threads.  I will consider this when I finish....and a good friend suggested that I accumulate some of the conversation and then have student summarize what was said.  I think that was a great suggestion.

Commenting challenge....

I know that I have lots to learn in this area and I am trying to capitalize on this 31 day Challenge to push myself beyond what I am comfortable doing.

I do understand that commenting causes the conversation to happen and just be a big reader doesn't contribute to the process.  But I have no idea if I'm going to be able to master all the pieces of this.  But I thought, "what the heck, I'll never get better if I don't try!" 

So here I go.

Reg Weaver's Lettter---By Any Other Name May Still have Thorns

Warning...I thought I had found an encouraging note, but was more of the same old, same old.  One of those eye catching side bars in the President's Viewpoint letter in the March, 2008 issue of NEA Today..."Too many teachers...have been denied professional pay for too long."

Hurray I thought.  He's finally going to take the jump and acknowledge the possibilities of pay for performance systems.

Wrong....after a flowery intro the article says..."Yet much of the conventional wisdom and public discussion about teacher pay is misleading"  (OK, I thought I agree with that) and then "The result is misguided policies that divert attention from addressing the root cause of teacher turnover and stagnant student achievement".  I know I'm a hopeless optimist because I know better than to read this letter because it usually just makes me mad.

What?   Later he says.."The question isn't how to differentiate pay between teachers.  The question is how to pay teachers a salary that encourages the creation of a great public school for every child".  And then he launches into a laundry list that sounds as apple pie as it can be but is really nothing more than dragging feet and throwing cold water on the idea of pay for performance.  At least in my opinion.

To me it IS about differentiating teacher pay.  It's about saying that we do not all do the same thing and that we cannot all be thrown together into one lump pile and paid as if we are interchangeable widgets. 

To me the question IS about differentiating pay so that every teacher can be compensated according to how well they do their job.  Because to assume that we are all the same just seems dumb to me.  We are not the same because our communities and students are not the same.  We sound foolish when we try to simplify this incredibly complex task down to getting more training and experience.  It's well beyond that.

That is the status quo.  It is where we pay teachers for staying in their position another year regardless of what they did with their students during that year.  It is the status quo where you get a pay raise because you completed graduate hours regardless of how useful or useless those hours are to your job. 

Wake up.  The status quo is not enough.  It's terrible.  It's why people are not coming into our profession, it's why they aren't staying and it's why I want to find other systems that will pay teachers according to how well they did their jobs.  Yes this system was a huge step forward for teachers but that was years and years ago.  It needs revamping and revitalizing.

Let's take a cue from the current political revolution that is going on right now. Regardless of which candidate you support, it's clear that democracy is alive and well if you can go around the entrenched machines and communicate with the grassroots.  I  think it's the dawn of a new era of politics and I hope teachers are at the front of the line ready to explain their position and explain their ideas.  Instead of having to talk through old world machines, it may be our opportunity to take the place at the policy making table and advocate for ourselves.