Activity Template: The 8-Event Collaborative Timeline Challenge

Google Drawings is one of the G Suite Apps that does not get as much love as some of the other ones. Docs is used pretty frequently for writing and taking notes. Teachers use Slides for lessons and students use it for assessment and creativity. Sheets gets all your data and your list-making (we love a good list, don't we?) But Drawings is an underutilized program that needs its day in the sun! There are so many uses for it in the classroom as you can create images that can be quite interactive.

One of those uses is to create interactive timelines. Wait! Before you leave thinking this is just a post for Social Studies teachers, it is most certainly not. Any subject can incorporate the use of timelines into their curriculum. Whether it is researching an author and how it has shaped their writing in an ELA course, identifying the key events and movements in the development of nuclear technology in a Physics class, or studying the cultural history of a nation in a World Languages class, timelines are extremely useful for a student's understanding of curriculum. Let's dispel the myth that timelines are only for the History class.

As a Social Studies teacher, timelines were essential but I hated just making kids slap a bunch of events together on a line of time and calling it good. I think it is all well and good for them to understand sequence but what was lacking was their understanding of cause and effect or key importance of one event or events over others. We need to push our students to go deeper and think critically on what makes evebts so important within a given subject. We need to force them to evaluate information, make choices, and justify those choices using evidence. This is where this activity comes into play.

The 8-Event Collaborative Timeline Challenge

This is a template and an activity idea for those interested. Of course you can alter it as you see fit (don't like the number 8? Go with whatever number moves you). The idea for this activity is straight forward: get students to make informed choices and justify those choices. In the process they are hitting on the 4 Cs of 21st century learning - Collaboration, Creativity, Critical-Thinking, & Communication.

The detailed rationale and instructions for this activity are embedded on the file (click the pic below to access it and save a copy for yourself) so here is a brief snapshot of how it works: After brainstorming and discussing key events as a class, students will collaborate in small groups or partnerships to develop their top events. They'll work together on the timeline creation and their justification for selecting the events they did. When turning the activity in, you want students to have access to each other's products so the audience is not just you. They can access their peers' work and generate some interesting discussions. From there you can take it as far as you'd like (I include some ideas on the file below). You can use the finished product as an assessment or you could create a formative assessment using your favorite product.

Click the pic to access the file and see instructions for the activity - instructions are outside of the canvas so you'll have to use the slider to see them all

Timeline activities shouldn't be static. The students need to interact with events in order to fully grasp them. Instead of plotting 20 events on a timeline, let them evaluate all 20 and choose the <enter number here> most influential events. They'll be able to dive deep into their learning....and they'll thank you for not making them do all 20! 😝

Writing Practice: Revision Gameboard

We all know writing in the classroom is essential to building communication skills in students. But teaching students to revise their work is critical to that development and effectively understanding content.

We may be strong at teaching the thesis, or the introductory paragraph, or how to use and explain evidence in the body of an essay. Where most of us need work is with helping our students revise their work in an effort to make it (almost) perfect. The problem with revision and revising tactics (aside from the time it takes) is that students need guidance and structure in order to effectively address the issues within their essay. You can't tell a developing student to merely "look it over and make some edits."

Lisa Guardino, EdTech TOSA in El Dorado County created the below file to make it easier for students to cover the vast ground of effectively revising an essay.

We are revising arguments gameboard style! https://t.co/gk2TxLdXBh pic.twitter.com/GbBHmyzjth

— Lisa Guardino (@LisaGuardino) April 20, 2017

She's created a Google Doc "gameboard" in which students one by one complete "squares" on their board as they complete the tasks embedded within. Each square focuses on a different aspect (grammar, strong thesis statement, focusing on the audience, etc.) suggesting various tools for students to use in revising their work. You can alter the tools they use as you see fit. As each student completes the various tasks they fill the cell of the table in with a color. If done correctly, the student has fully revised their paper in a meaningful way focusing on different aspects of the writing and editing process. The more we can embed these skills in our students' practice, the stronger writers they will become.

Guardino's work is embedded below for you to view, and I've provided a link to your own copy. With your own copy you can make as many alterations as you see fit! When ready to roll these out to your students, have them make a copy of the document themselves so it becomes theirs.

With this tool, the revising part of the writing process will seem less daunting, the students get to visually identify areas of their essay they need to revise, and they can work at their own pace and pick areas to revise before others. In short, they will be given a path to success and be responsible for how effectively they use their voice.

Link to the file below

Argumentation Template: March Madness!!

 We love a good competition. The largest one that takes place around this time of year as the flowers begin to bloom is the NCAA Basketball Tournament. If you don't know what this is, ask a student of yours. Now, not all are fans, this I know, but a number of our students are. I like to incorporate as many student interests in my curriculum as much as I can, regardless of my feelings of them. Side Note: Never try to have your students recreate the story of American Imperialism using the "Twilight" series as inspiration <enter shivering emoji that doesn't exist>

Standards dictate student-writing across the curriculum. And it's not just writing for writing's sake. Different forms of writing need to be taught, practiced, critiqued, honed, and improved upon. Argumentation is one of those forms. Now our students love to argue. But can they argue effectively? Can they communicate their voice effectively in writing?

This activity forces them to take a stance on competing ideas, concepts, individuals, events, or anything else you can think of. The idea is to create a tournament in which students determine the winner by practicing their argumentation and writing skills. I've used this activity in class as a review activity for the Rise of Totalitarianism in the 20s & 30s. The students had to take a stance on certain events and argue which one had greater influence on the rise of dictators and the shift towards isolationism around the globe during the time period. It was well received as students were able to analyze events and movements we'd covered in an in-depth manner. I made it a partnered activity and it was interesting watching pairs argue with each other to place one event over the other.

This is a snapshot of the template I created that you can use and alter as you see fit

If you're interested in creating your own bracket, I've created a document you can make a copy of and alter as you see fit to suit your needs. It's pretty basic so get creative with it. I've included different ideas in the margins of the file for your benefit on how to use the file. If you'd like help with setting up an activity like this, please do not hesitate to ask me. I'd be happy to help.

Download Argumentation Template - March Madness!!

Apps I'm Into: Blended Learning, Guided Reading, & Student Organization

Just a quick rundown of some apps I've been looking at in the past few weeks. I get very Google-centric here because of their vast array of resources and the availability of them, but it's important to remember there are amazing #EdTech resources outside of the Google realm. All three of these resources are designed to be for any curriculum. They are tools every class can use as apart of their repertoire.

TES Teach with Blend Space

This is a favorite of a lot of people in the EdTech world. For Blended Learning purposes (think flipped but not completely), this resource is a big one. You can house a series of steps for your students all in one easy to navigate, and use, hub for a self-contained lesson. Add content (documents, video, images, etc.) from your computer or the web, and provide guidance for students. The resource is shareable and embed-able (as you can see below) and makes complex tasks with numerous steps easy for students to grasp.



A link to the above file if you'd like to see it in a new tab:
https://www.tes.com/lessons/C9C0J3u6cp4OPQ/rise-of-fascism-dbq-prep 

Actively Learn

I'm a huge fan of EdPuzzle for videos (forces students to answer questions about the video before proceeding) and Actively Learn works very similarly but with articles and primary source documents. Have students answer questions as they read as part of their check for understanding. Want them to discuss items while they are reading (What? Thinking...while they are reading?), create the space for them. Want them to take a poll within the document at any place to gauge their opinions or understanding? Well....lets' do that!! It's one of those products that asks you to create a classroom and have students sign into it. But it is well worth it. Ken Buck at NU has been giving it a go as of late and he reports its an excellent resource for Primary Source documents and his students' understanding of them. There are a ton of features and options and Actively Learn walks you through the process in an easy to understand way.

With Actively Learn, you set the pace with students, get them to answer all the questions in a rich manner, and allow for a deeper understanding of course material. After clicking, "Read More" check out the pic and gifs on how this looks for the student.

Presentation Activity: Ignite Talks with Students

Ever see an Ignite Talk or Pecha Kucha? Ever heard of one? The concept is straight forward. 20 slides playing on the screen switching every 20 seconds. In the end, you have a presentation on any topic done in just under 7 minutes. The slides are minimal - images, gifs, light text if any, no videos - and accompany the story the speaker is telling. There is a ton of practice needed obviously but what emerges is a crisp, concise presentation on the topic of choice.

This would be excellent practice for our students at any level in any subject. For years, teachers have had a difficult time incorporating speeches (whether formal or informal) into their curriculum for obvious reasons: they take a lot of time, require a lot of guidance and monitoring, student fears of getting in front of their peers detracts from effort, teachers, although public speakers on a daily basis, aren't trained to coach the skills, and with content standards to meet they are difficult to justify. Well...standards have changed to include Speaking and Listening skills to get them College & Career ready. And it shouldn't be just ELAs job to meet the standards.

This activity could be used as an assessment, a mid-unit check in, or as an introductory activity related to a theme of the unit. I loved doing formal and informal presentations in class as it gave students an opportunity to learn from each other and work out those fears of speaking in front of others. I'd give students time in class to build their speeches and practice with one another and myself. I'd have them film themselves so they can see what others see in order to analyze their practice performances. In the end, students realized the speech was an important venture because they know they need practice in the skill. They wanted to do their best...right down to the shyest person in the room.

Now, I wish I could tell you each speech incurred a standing ovation. But what I can tell you is that students learned what made a winning speech, what constituted as good techniques for them to borrow from others, and most reported after initial jitters their nerves faded as they had to focus on the speech itself. The process is lengthy but worthy if we're committed to preparing our students for a world that values presentation skills.

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To run this process in your class, follow these steps:

1. Introduce the topic (can be anything related to your curriculum or on a topic of their choice) and the assignment - 20 Slides/20 seconds (of course you can adjust the slides and time based on your needs)
2. Give students time to brainstorm and build the framework of their speech - lots of hands-on help here
3. Introduce the Rubric (see below)
4. Show them videos of other Ignite Talks to give them an idea of what they look like - YouTube is full of them
5. Get your students to write their speeches in class so you can ensure they are writing something of substance
6. Introduce the Visual Component - Let them know that they need to create "X" amount of slides for their speech
7. Have students practice their speeches with peers complete with video so they can see and analyze their performance 
8. Commence with the speeches

The Rubric
I've found Google Forms works best for this as I can sit in the back and assess the student as they're giving their speech without missing much if at all. I fill out the Form and after submitting I click the link that allows me to submit another entry on the Form. I then create a spreadsheet with all the data and share that with the class for immediate feedback. Below is a generic Form I created for this purpose. You can get a copy below it.


If you want this Speech Rubric, click that link and make your own Copy as anyone with this file can edit it. Once yours, you can alter the Form ti suit your needs. If you need help with this, let me know.

Peer to Peer Feedback
I've also found for any speech, it's important to include the audience in a certain task. This keeps students focused on a part of the speech. The discussion that takes place after is actually more helpful for the audience than the speaker themselves. The most effective way that works for me is to break the class into 4 groups (number them off 1-4). The picture below are the four tasks the class completes collectively for every speech.

So the same group doesn't continue doing the same thing, after each speech, I rotate the roles to the next group. So if Group 1 was "A" for the first speech, they will be group "B" for the next.

After each speech I select a student or two, in each group, to report out what they observed (the speaker standing in the front of the room simultaneously relieved and feeling awkward standing in front listening to their peers talk about them). I then give some brief verbal feedback of my own and ask the class to give the speaker an enthusiastic round of applause - despite how they did up there.

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We need to make time for learning experiences like these in the classroom. Not just because there are standards now. They need the chance to practice these essential skills, get feedback from peers and professionals, in a safe environment. Public speaking is a necessary skill in many aspects of life. Our kids deserve these opportunities.

Research Resources: Utilizing EdTech to Work Smarter

Research projects are a cornerstone in any secondary curricula. New standards on Research skills are not merely for ELA or Mathmatics classes. Whatever your subject, we need to teach, model, and allow students to demonstrate mastery of research skills. Educational Technology can assist in this process in numerous ways. Below is a list of various apps, extensions, web services, and resources that you can incorporate into whatever research project you assign next.

Brainstorming & Organization Resources - That all important first phase that puts and keeps students on track

• Make Checklists in Google Docs
• Create a concept Map in Google Drawing
• Google Keep (They already have this) - Create checklists on tasks needed to complete when planning a project, collaborate with other students, and get reminders sent across their devices
• Mindmup - Mindmaps on your Chromebooks
• Popplet - Web and iPad app that allows you to create multi-media mindmaps
• Wunderlist - App & Extension - Create dynamic to-do lists for students to stay on task when planning a project

Note taking Resources - Use to type up ideas and arguments or counter-arguments for tpics raised in the project

• Google Keep - add notes quickly 
• Sticky notes - see my previous post on sticky notes
• Super Simple Highlighter - kinda self explanatory, but students can highlight info on web pages and they stay on the page when they return to them later after closing their tab
• VideoNot.es - synchronize their note taking with any video they are tasked with watching. Notes are saved in Google Drive
• Evernote - Evernote is an excellent educational research for keeping organized on projects. It operates like a Digital Notebook where students have the ability to take notes and clip sites and documents on the web related to their research topic. Web-version, Chromebook App, Extension, and mobile apps for all your devices

Information Collection Resources - Locate and save sources for the project

• Feedly - Curate content from around the web around a single topic or tag. The mobile app allows for syncing with the web account. Students can have the information come to them
• Google Keep - again...this thing is awesome
• Padlet - When students would work on research projects, I'd often have them save evidence from a website that was useful for them. Padlet works well for this as an online, collaborative corkboard of sorts. So if there is a group research project, students can be working on the same Padlet together
• Evernote - Again...powerful tool

Citation Resources - Gotta make sure credit goes to where it belongs

• Chrome Extensions - Cite This For Me and EasyBib will give the proper citation of websites instantly in different styles 
• Citation Machine - Books, Magazines, Websites, Journal, Film? No problem...this free web service can do that for your students in thousands of styles (Turabian? Hmmmmm)
• BibMe - Works like Citation Machine

Presentation Tools - Speaking & Presenting standards need to be met as well

• We Video App - Students create Digital Stories ...think iMovie or Movie Maker only the Chromebook version
• Bunkr - Web presentation software where students can embed a ton of content from code, to interactive graphs, social media posts and more! It looks and presents everything nice and clean 
• Weebly - Students can create their own websites and portfolios in a drag and drop fashion!
• Infographics - these are great products to create depending on the research project ad purpose of the presentation. This would be an excellent presentation option for Technical Writing research projects. The best web resources for this is Easel.ly, Canva, and Piktochart

Assessments: Performance Assessment Resource Bank

New State Standards have changed the game in recent years. Teachers and schools are struggling to transition from one paradigm to another. Students are noticing the shift and have been exhibiting a wide range of emotions. Teachers are still unpacking all the standards they must meet. Not to mention some subjects do not have updated standards ready to implement.

One of the biggest concerns for teachers is the assessment their Juniors must take in the Spring and how best to prepare them for the tasks. Coming from an environment in which the test was "THE TEST," this is understandable. For those that have administered the CAASPP tests in Math or ELA, you know its a beast! For years we modeled our assessments around the standardized tests of yesterday. We need a new model for assessment. Now that things have changed, how will we assess our students in a manner that assesses their knowledge, understanding, and application of skills taught in the classroom in an authentic way that also prepares them for CAASPP?


Enter the Performance Assessment Resource Bank out of Stanford University! And its all free!

23 performance task modules when searching "Mathematics" and "11th Grade"

This is an exciting collaborative project between Stanford Center for Assessment, Learning and Equity (SCALE), Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education (SCOPE), and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) and was just released to the public. You can browse resources by subject, course of study, type of assessment task, or grade level. The resources provided are stand alone units or can be incorporated into already existing units. Each unit focuses on developing the skills laid out by Common Core and assessed on CAASPP.

Other resources include explanations on how other school districts have implemented the resources to have students create portfolios, resources to help you build your own Performance Tasks, and something called "Learning Progressions and Frameworks" - advice from leading education policy organizations on how to create frameworks for implementation.

Take some time with this site...there's a lot to unpack and explore.  But I think it goes without saying that with CAASPP creeping up as the days get shorter, this is serendipitous timing!!