It's Yearbook Distribution Day!

Written by Linda Ashida

Finally the day has come!  After a full year of hard work--decision-making (on design, theme, layout), collaboration, interviewing, taking photos, managing deadlines, writing copy, designing, problem-solving--it is Yearbook Distribution Day! It is a day that Lisa Martineau and her Flashmob, along with all of the EG staff and students, have been eagerly awaiting! 

In anticipation of this exciting day, I had the chance to visit Lisa Martineau's Yearbook class and talk her students to learn more about what really goes into creating the final product.  There is so much more that goes into creating a yearbook than meets the eye.


I enjoyed learning how students take such care to plan a book that will really capture the essence of our school.  So much goes into creating and publishing a yearbook that several students told me that the class has been one of their best and most challenging.

Michella told me that Yearbook is one of her most challenging classes.  She said that is such an awesome class because:  "It has a little bit of everything. You learn social skills, interviewing, writing, computer skills, photography and technical skills. It's like a bunch of components of all the classes in school combined into one class. You learn stress management, time management, people skills."  Mariana concurred with her thoughts, as did all of the students with whom I spoke.





I enjoyed chatting with Denise and Pedro to learn how they decide the theme, layout, colors, and all the elements that will unify the entire theme of the book

Amairani and Ayleen shared how they use Photoshop to work on the graphic design.

Each member takes ownership of certain pages, but all must collaborate as a team to make the final product come together and capture the year at Elk Grove High School.


Students are excited to get their first look at the 2015-2016 EGHS Yearbook!

   

Classkick

By Mark Heintz

Game changer! I have heard this term used in education twice. The first time was from Persida Bujdei.  She came into a peer observation group and was ecstatic about the power of AirPlay.  She was right on the implications and power of AirPlay. AirPlay continues to be a game changer!

The second was from Rachel Barry.   She came in after using Classkick for the first time.  Game changer was all she said. After using it, I cannot say enough on how much of gamer changer Classkick is.    Click here for the website. The website automatically plays an overview video that provides functionality of Classkick.

 It is an amazing tool! The user can upload any pdf or image into Classkick.  Classkick also connects with Google Drive. Any images or pdf already in Drive can be selected.  Once uploaded, the user easily can select any part of a pdf.

From Rachel's remark, I quickly created a lesson using Classkick. The lesson focused on the analysis of evidence and student writing.  The power of Classkick lies in the instant feedback it grants to the students and teacher.  The teacher can select any student and view their work in real time.   The teacher can comment on the information and the student receives the feedback in real time.   IN REAL TIME!

Since it is in real time, the feedback is immediate.  In the above image, the student wrote, "In both places."  I circled which places, and then they inserted Europe and Africa. The whole process took less than thirty seconds.  Since it was so fast,  the student's learning progressed quicker than ever before, because they received almost instant feedback while in the writing process.

The above image is the teacher's view.  The teacher can easily see the progress of all students. The teacher can click any square for a zoomed in view and the ability to provide feedback.  A great part of this view is just watching students think and express themselves in real time.  You don't have to be right next to the student, which allows students a degree of normalcy when writing.  Furthermore, the teacher can display any work via AirPlay.  Therefore, if a student writes something that is worthy of showing to the whole class, the teacher can easily display the work. The great thing, the teacher can display multiple student examples very quickly because of the central location of the work.

 

The student's work above shows their writing in purple and the teacher's feedback in red. The black is another student's feedback.  That's right, the teacher can enable student to student feedback.  And the student to student interaction occurs in real time!  The student can click on the hand icon in the upper left hand of the screen.  Once raised, teachers and students can help the person with the raised hand. Students can only help another student if the hand is raised.  They can then comment. The primary user can always delete any comments written by the teacher or another student.  

Students can work ahead if needed.  Also, students can work on the task after the class ended. The last bonus I will raise, is the work is saved for later use.  

Worth the Time

By Mark Heintz

The more I teach, the longer it takes me to get through the material.  In my first few years of teaching, I focused on completing activities. Let me emphasize the past sentence, I focused on completing activities.  I would lead the classroom and just get through the material.  If I was writing things on the board and students were packing up with a minute to go, I would still teach. Furthermore, I would continue to write down things for the students to complete a worksheet if the bell was about to ring.  I taught bell to bell.  I was a good teacher.  

An activity that used to take ten minutes, might take an entire period now. This is mainly because I actually teach the concept and/or skill.  I spend more time building or activating background knowledge, movement activities, writing, reading, allowing all students a voice, and ensuring all students have an understanding.  It takes more time because I am not as concerned about the teaching as I am the student learning that takes place. 

For example, look at the image below. For the activity below, I would model the first one with whole class instruction. Then I would have the class try the second one.  Finally, I would walk around the room and help students with the rest. If they didn't finish them, I would just tell them the answer at the end.  To get through ten statements, it would take about ten minutes.  

Now it takes me the whole period. I mostly do the same process.  But instead of me leading the completed task, I have students AirPlay their attempts and defend it. I still walk around and help students as they attempt it. But I am also looking for students responses that will help guide the class. As I talk to students and help them, I look for misconceptions and understanding that will benefit the whole class.  As they AirPlay, I make them defend their answer to the whole class. This a time-consuming process, but it allows the students to really show the understanding.  Although we might not get through as much in a day, what we do get through is incredibly powerful.

                       

Using Error Analysis to Think Critically

By: Rachel Barry

I believe that the most important skill to be taught in any mathematics curricula is critical thinking.  A student should leave my class knowing how to work through difficult problems, using a variety of strategies to develop solutions to these given problems.  If a student has left my class, without learning various methods to process through challenging situations, then I feel that I have failed them.  Critical thinking is crucial for students going out into the real world.

There are many approaches to develop critical thinking skills.  This comes more naturally to some students than others, and for some students the context is important to dig into those critical thinking skills.  In most cases, seeing a problem from a different perspective helps students realize a bigger picture that there may be more than one way to solve a problem.   This is a hard concept for some students to grasp because in math there is one correct answer, however, there may be more than one way to get to that answer.

In this blog post, I am going to share with you a couple ways that I use error analysis to build critical thinking skills.

Example 1: Where is the Error?

About once a week, I use error analysis in warm-ups for students to decipher what another student did incorrectly.  They have to look through a student's work, circle or explain the error that the student made, and then correct the work from where the error was made.  This process helps students in two ways.  First, I am able to address common mistakes that students make before they make the errors themselves.  Secondly, this builds students confidence because they are made aware that other students make mistakes as well. 

For the attached warm-up, I shared this with students as a note (instead of the .pdf that you see) in Notability.  This allows students to manipulate the work, instead of write over it.  You can learn more about this Notability feature in this earlier blog post. 

Example 2: Who is correct?

In this example, the work of two students is displayed.  One is correct and the other is wrong.  My students need to figure out who solved the problem correctly and what the other student did wrong.  Again, this process allows students to see common mistakes that students make and forces them to explain why something is wrong, which builds critical thinking skills.

Examples 3 & 4: Why is this wrong?

Another great method to get students to think outside of the norm is to ask students why an answer is incorrect.  In a standardized test warm-up activity, I ask why an answer choice is incorrect.  Students then have to work backwards from the answer to figure out what error the student made.  Then, they provide the correct answer.  The extra step on the front end ideally prevents students from making that same mistake when they are taking a standardized test. 

Analyzing distracters in standardized test questions also can address the common student errors of misreading the question or circling the wrong answer choice.  For example, let's take a look at the problem below.

Many times students solve for “x” correctly in a problem.  The question, however, does not ask for the value of x, but instead it asks them to find the value of "2x".  Distracter analysis can be used to address students reading the problem incorrectly.

If you have any additional ways to use error analysis to build students' critical thinking skills, please share in the comments section!

Curriculum Changes-Mastery of Learning

By Mark Heintz


The Elk Grove freshmen human geography team added a document based question curriculum to achieve higher level thinking skills.  Over the last month of school, the team has been testing new ideas through student-centered document based instruction in hopes to get a great understanding of how to move forward next year.  The concepts and skills are driving a focus for next year in human geography centered around four main categories.

Content	Writing	Interpreting Texts	Interpreting Charts, Maps, Graphs
·        See each unit plan.	·        Write main ideas to examine and convey complex ideas. ·        Through writing, provide examples to support main ideas. ·        Through writing, analyze details.	·   State the main idea from texts. ·   Draw evidence from texts to support main ideas.	·   State the main idea of charts, maps, and graphs. ·   Provide evidence from charts, maps or graphs to support the main idea.
One summative multiple choice test per unit.	One summative writing per unit.  Each unit the skills will build upon each other.  The grade will reflect the students overall writing ability at the end of the semester.	One summative interpreting portion per unit as measured by providing the main idea and supporting details for the number of documents listed.  The overall category grade will be reflective of the student’s ability at the end of the semester.	One summative interpreting portion per unit as measured by a multiple-choice test.  The test will cover charts, maps and graphs.  The overall category grade will be reflective of the student’s ability at the end of the semester.
30% of the overall grade	30% of the overall grade	20% of the overall grade	20% of the overall grade

The team came to agreements that the semester grade would reflect student's current ability levels.  From the "testing" period, came a greater understanding of what students were capable of and what we as teachers could do to improve the student's mastery.  Over the semester, the skills would advance, requiring higher level thought processes.  Additionally as the year progresses, increasingly complex passages will be used as their abilities hopefully improve.

The work that we are doing is has been so rejuvenating for me as a teacher as we move towards a place where students are rewarded for mastering content and skills over time.  The students' learning is centered around interpreting texts, charts, maps, and graphs to learn content.  And then writing to express their understanding of content.  It is very powerful and the impact in the classroom leaves students tired from thinking so much.  

Another change is the instruction.  Since the team's focus is centered around a blend of skills and content, the instruction must mirror that.  That subject is for another post.

  

Guest Post: Adding Value to People

By Joe Bush

In February of 2015, I was fortunate enough to attend the John Maxwell Team Leadership Certification Program.  It was the best professional development I ever experienced, and the knowledge I learned from that conference fundamentally altered they way in which I teach.  The most important pieces of information that I took away from the three-day conference are as follows: 1. The best leaders are those who have the greatest influence, 2. Leaders need to serve, 3. Leaders need to add value to people and 4. Expectations drive beliefs and beliefs drive behavior.

As a teacher, I have always considered myself a leader. However, for much of my career, I was a positional leader.  A positional leader is someone who leads because someone else gave them a position.  An example might be an NFL head coach who was handpicked by the owner, but is unable to influence the players.  That type of teacher rarely has success in the classroom because they use their position to hold it over students.  After hearing John Maxwell (The Number One Leadership Guru in the World) speak, I began to think differently about teaching.  If I were going to truly change the minds and hearts of students and educate them they way that I saw fit, I was going to need to serve them.  The second part was adding value to the lives of the students. 

I would like to explain more on the notion of serving others and adding value through an example.  This year I was blessed with the opportunity to teach a leadership through service course.  What I quickly realized was that my students had great ideas, were already influential in their own circles and they all loved to serve.  After hearing Maxwell speak I realized that instead of pushing my own leadership agenda at the beginning of the year I should have focused on helping each student become more influential using their own strengths.  For some it may have been through public speaking, others it was through organization and still others just needed encouragement.  After coming back from the conference, I quickly changed my agenda in time to help the students succeed in our St. Baldrick’s charity drive.  As I incorporated Maxwell’s ideas, I could quickly see how the students grew in an explosive fashion.  I helped my students enhance what they already did well. 

The final piece to the puzzle was the idea that expectations drive belief and belief drives behavior. Motivational speaker and entrepreneur Paul Martinelli talked about how he overcame stuttering and the fact that he was a high school dropout to build several million-dollar businesses.  Paul said that belief drives behavior.  Therefore, if we think we are stupid, our behaviors are stupid.  However, because expectations drive beliefs, as a teacher it is our job to set expectations for our students to live up to.   When we set those expectations, hold students accountable and provide supports to assist them, students achieve more.

What I found to be the best part of the Maxwell training was the fact that serving and adding value to others is something that can be done regardless of your position. Maxwell says, “Everything rises and falls on leadership.”  This is true because leadership is influence.  So, regardless of your position, you can always strive to be more influential, thus becoming a better leader.   Going forward, I will strive to add value to my students right from the start.  Each year will be different based on the different needs of students, but the lessons learned from that conference will forever change the way I think, lead and teach. 

Exit Slips and Higher Level Thinking

By Mark Heintz

Higher level thinking in May? You bet! At the end of my lesson on Monday, students wrote four impacts of the Neolithic Revolution.  We did one as a class, then they attempted three in their groups. As an exit slip, students submitted what they thought was their best to an open ended essay question in Schoology.

As I read through them, I found that some students grasped the goal of the lesson and used the document as evidence, while others...needed more time. There was such a wide range of sentences submitted and some students did not submit.  As I was reading, I realized I wanted all students to see the range of writing.   Furthermore, I wanted students to evaluate the writing and rank it as either high, middle, and low quality.

I took student exemplars and I typed them in a note in Notability, then attached the note it to Schoology.  This enabled the students to simply drag or edit the statements.  

The students ranked the statements from high to low and it was great! The students saw student examples from the day before.  They ranked the statements simply by clicking on the statements and moving them to the top if they were the best and the bottom if they were the worst.  As a class we discussed the why they ranked them they way they did.  The students were providing great reasons and rationales for their rankings.  The students who did not submit their statement the previous day were exposed to different quality of statements.  The students received timely feedback that improved their writing.  At the end of the day, the students were asked to complete a similar task with the Second Agricultural Revolution and the statements were significantly stronger.  

Book Recommendation: Mindset by Carol Dweck

By Kim Miklusak

I've just finished reading Mindset: the New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck.  The book is an informative and eye-opening read for everyone, but it's especially insightful for teachers, parents, and students.

The short and overly simplified version is that there are two mindsets: "fixed" and "growth."  The fixed mindset believes people are good/bad at something, that people like/dislike them, that there is success/failure and no possibility to change.  Conversely, growth mindset people learn from each experience.  They see paths and take steps to improve and grow.  In the book Dweck covers several chapters on how these mindsets are demonstrated in business, sports, school, and so on.  She explores situations where a person could think and act differently and provides suggestions for change.

Graphic from the book

This idea of mindset has enormous consequences for our students but also for ourselves as teachers.  We know the student who says "I'm bad at math," "I'm good at writing," and so on.  As I noted in my other blog (shameless plug!), it is imperative that we show students how a growth mindset leads to greater success.  It's equally imperative that we set up our curricula in such a way that students have tangible steps toward this success: feedback via formative assessment.

Additionally, it's important for us to look at our own mindset as teachers: do we feel we are done growing?  Do we look at each opportunity as a way to learn and explore?  Do we assume that we "deserve" success/failure based on our actions?  Do we look at our students that way?  And if not, can we take steps to change?

Skilled Workers

By Mark Heintz

On Monday, April 6, 2015, our district had an in-service day.  In the new contract signed last year, our Education Association and District Administration agreed to add an in-service day to the school calendar.  The day's intent was to allow teachers time to digitally convert their curriculum.   The day was great!  In the early stages of planning, I might have been a nay-sayer, but thanks to @Ashida_Linda and @MrsMiklusak, their wisdom prevailed.   In the morning,  spark sessions were given from a variety of staff members on topics from flipped classroom to the use of stop motion videos. The spark sessions flowed to two hours of EdCamp. You can read more about it here.  

Not to change subjects, but recently my history classes finished learning about the industrial revolution.  I can't help but make the connection between the in-service day and industrialization.  No, I am not talking about horrible working conditions or child labor.  I am writing on the needs for educated workers and the development of skilled laborers to work in factories.  People needed to be educated to work the complicated machines and perform a specialized job.

The in-service day showed how teaching has become increasingly skilled.  With the proliferation of technology and the ease of accessing information, teachers are shifting their role. New brain research drives educators to understand what methods work better to maximize learning.  Brain research coupled with new technology, it is hard to stay current with both the brain research and the technology.   The pedagogical techniques to meld these two together are difficult skills to master. The in-service day was great way to allow teachers to see a variety of new techniques and hear the latest brain research on effective teaching.  It was even better because the day allowed for time to development, collaborate, explore and create materials for their classroom from the new understandings they received at the beginning portion of the day.

A final thought: the day reminded my of a scene from Scrubs where two doctors are talking about how hard it is to stay up on the current research and how times have changed.  I have only been teaching for nine years, and the changes are drastic from when I first began.  I am fortunate to be in a school and district that has so many support systems in place to provide the tools and knowledge to become even more specialized and skilled in the art of teaching.  The teachers I work with constantly push me to new understandings of students and different ways to approach the subject matter.  I work in a school where teachers share ideas constantly.  It makes it easier to grow and stay current in a world that is ever changing.

How to Stay Energized

By Mark Heintz

How do you stay energized as a teacher?  Stressors emotionally drain us as teachers throughout the day.  In the midwest, it is furthered by February.  Stupid February.

The answer to staying energized is to collaborate with colleagues.  I always feel renewed when I talk about student learning in a positive way with other staff members.  When I get a new idea from them, I want to try it out. I have passion, a renewed purpose, and with the idea it engages the classroom in a new way.  I reflect on it's use, and I report back to the peer to let him or her know how I used it and what I would do differently the next time.  This is why collaborating is so powerful.  Collaborating improves instruction through bettering your craft to improve student learning in an organic and meaningful way.

Furthermore, the EGLLT (Elk Grove Lead Leaders Team), which you can read about by clicking here, met to collaborate on the topic of literacy.  Through the efforts of that meeting, teachers were exposed to a TED talk by John Hattie on Maximizing Impact on Learning. One of the great things is that when teachers work together to enhance student learning, it is one of the most powerful things teachers can do.  So, while you renew yourself, you will be impacting student learning at the same time!  Here are excerpts from John Hattie's work and the video.

If you want to watch the video or read the entire study you can use the links below to access it.  

Visible Learning for Teachers: Maximizing Impact on Learning By John Hattie (Routledge, 2012)

How to Create a Schoology Checklist

By: Rachel Barry

A Schoology Checklist is a great tool to hold students accountable for completing assignments in a designated order.  You can use this as an instructional tool for students to complete a warm-up at the beginning of class or to read an article before answering a discussion question.  At Elk Grove High School, some of us math teachers have used this tool to foster individualized learning in our classes.  Here is a set of step-by-step instructions of how to create a Schoology Checklist.  Before you begin, you should convert your documents to .pdfs and have the web addresses ready for any links that you will be posting.

1. Create a Folder

It is not necessary to create a separate folder for the Checklist, as it will still work

with other documents in the folder.  I have found, however, that it is easier for

students to understand what it is they need to complete when the Checklist is

separate from the rest of the materials of the topic.

    2.  Upload all Materials

Make sure that any materials (documents, links, discussion questions, quizzes, 

etc.) are uploaded in the correct order that you want the students to complete.

    3.  Create the Checklist!

Click on “Options” and then “Student Completion”.  Follow along with the video for

step-by-step directions!

     4.  Check Students' Progress

           Click on "Student Progress" and see each student's percentage of completion.

          Click on a student's name and see the individual progress of each student.

Things to Note:

• You cannot copy a Checklist to another course.

It appears that you are able to copy a checklist, however, when the students access the 

Checklist, the "Requirements must be completed in order" does not transfer. Students have 

access to all items. In order to set up the Checklist again, you must delete all items from the 

Checklist and Save. Then, you can recreate the Checklist.

• You see a completion percentage for each student, but they do not see their own.

I have posted on the Schoology Web Platform for this feature to be added to the student app, 

as a gameification feature that moves from red to yellow to green based on the percentage of 

completion. It has not happened yet, but I am hoping that it is coming in the future!

Enhancing Learning with Social Media

Posted by Linda Ashida (@Ashida_Linda)

I have become increasingly interested in the impact that Social Media tools can have on teaching and learning.  Many students still see Facebook, Twitter or Instagram simply as a means of social communication, without realizing that it can be a powerful learning tool. I am reminded of this when I visit colleagues' classes, in my role as Innovative Technology Facilitator, to teach lessons on Digital Leadership or Digital Presence. Students are often amazed and excited to learn about the opportunities social media can give them to share their work, receive feedback from authentic audiences, network, and extend their learning beyond the classroom. For example, after doing these lessons for students in our Leadership Through Service course, they began to regularly post on Twitter using their class hashtag #EGLTS. They were encouraged by the responses, feedback, retweets, or even by having their blog posts republished. These students quickly began to see the impact of social media on their learning and leadership.

In my work with teachers and students, I am also reminded about the challenge we all face with organizing all of the digital content that we come across every day.  Haven't you ever thought to yourself, "I know I read that online somewhere, and I saved it somewhere . . . " but you just cannot remember where?  Curation of digital content is an important 21st century skill for us and for our students, and it is greatly facilitated by social media tools such as Diigo, Pinterest, and Scoop.It.  Just do a Google search on a topic related to your teaching and include the word "Pinterest" in the search: You will find a wealth of great curated resources by other educators. If you are like me, from the examples of others, you will find yourself intrigued by the possibilities of using Pinterest to curate resources and have your students do the same.

For my own curation of content, I regularly use both Scoop.It and Diigo. Just today on Scoop.It, I came across this interesting article "Tools for Teaching and Learning."by Leila Meyer, via @ICTPHMS. Check it out! It gives examples of how to use six social media tools, including the aforementioned Diigo, Pinterest, and Scoop.It. It also shares ideas for using Voice Thread, Instagram and Feedly. Though they are examples are from college courses, they still apply to other levels of education.  

Do you have examples of how Social Media has impacted teaching and learning for you and your students?  Please share! Comment below!