How We Love to Learn

One thing that I've observed that makes a huge difference in student motivation is HOW the students learn the content. I've written other blog posts on this subject (see An Afternoon in Pleasantville and A Tale of Two Tools and Learning Inside the Box) but this past week, we've put a little different twist on it. We are working on the 10th Edition of the Coast to Coast Chronicles. The students wanted to learn more about the scientific method for this edition.

One of the collaborative projects we are doing is a Voice Thread of poetry on different science topics.This is a way for the students to connect, broaden their horizons in the field of science, and sharpen their poetry writing skills. We are working directly with a 3rd grade class in our building along with the students across the country. For this activity my students and the 3rd graders were put into heterogeneous groups across the grade levels. The first day, they brainstormed different topics that interested them in science. Because my students had just had Innovation Day, they were really thinking outside of the box. My learners did an amazing job of guiding the 3rd graders into topics in which they were unfamiliar.  The conversations were amazing. When the groups had a time to add their ideas to a words splash, because of the way that my students had encouraged and nurtured their ideas, all of the students participated in sharing their thoughts and why that topic was of interest to them as a group.

The second time we met, the learners began building context and meaning with different types of poetry. Because SimplyBox has closed their site, we moved to LiveBinders. Some of my previous students (who are now in 6th grade) and I created a Poetry LiveBinder of examples of different types of poetry. As with all genres of writing, I want my students to read real examples (mentor texts) to building their understanding of the characteristics of that type of writing. As one student said, "If I want to write great poetry, I need to read great poetry."  With the LiveBinders, you can create a collection of URLs, files, images, video or text on a particular topic. It is a great collaborative tool because you can invite collaborators to add to the binder.  It also allows the user to embed it into another site, which made it easy for my students to access.

As the writers were reading and discussing the different genres of poetry, the 3rd grade teacher and I were moving around the room, joining groups, listening to their conversations and asking guiding questions. They were already selecting a genre that they wanted to compose. What was validating to hear was that they weren't just choosing a particular genre randomly, they were thinking about how that genre would support their science topic.  All 50+ of these students were engaged in deep and meaningful conversations. With their previous experience, my students already knew where this was headed and guided their younger partners who stepped up to the challenge and joined right in the conversations.

Before they began composing, the learners set the criteria for their writing. This is where the real evidence of the learning manifested itself; not just my students but also the 3rd graders had a clear understanding of not only their genre of poetry, but also what things needed to be included with their topic, the audience and the purpose. As they began creating their poetry, they divided up the work. In most groups, you had a researcher to check facts, a recorder to write the ideas, and editor/time keeper, and an illustrator. With this lesson, everyone, no matter their exceptionalities, were able to successfully participate.

Of course the enthusiasm was intoxicating...all of the learners enjoyed themselves and they gained a much deeper understanding of poetry and their science topic. When kids complain about having to pack up to go home because they want to keep reading and writing, you know you've found a winning idea.

My Kids Think Skype is the Cat's Meow

Today was one of those days where something amazing happens. My students had the opportunity to Skype with anatomy students. Skype is not something new for my learners. We use it regularly when working with our peers from across the country on The Coast to Coast Chronicles.  My students have served as learners and teachers with much older students as well (you can read about that here) and they have always loved the experience. They always thoroughly enjoy their time working with peers via Skype, but today's results seemed a bit different.

Today, my students got to Skype with Amber Lewis' junior and senior anatomy students at Spain Park High School. Her students have been studying the different body systems and had dissected cats. My learners were really excited about the opportunity to see and learn with these cats. Since we had dissected squids earlier in the year, they had been begging to do another dissection; so, this was their opportunity to get to experience it with some real experts.

Amber's students were very well prepared for interacting with my 5th graders. Each group discussed a different body system. Not only did they have their diagrams and cats, they had questions and had prepared activities to engage my students...even from a distance. For example, when they were talking about the circulatory system and showing the different parts of the heart, they had my students feel their pulse while they showed how the valves opened and closed. They asked questions that connected what they were showing to my students lives...like polling them for who knew someone who had diabetes before showing and teaching about the pancreas.

The looks on my students' faces were priceless, especially when the mama cat was shown with her 3 kittens. I wish I could have gotten better pictures of their expressions and how they were testing their new found knowledge...picture 10 year old holding up their fists and placing it where their kidneys are or rubbing their necks to feel their trachea all with the shock and amazement that only kids can have.

My students were totally engrossed in the activity.  A couple of hours after our Skype call, as my learners were still connecting and discussing what they had just experienced, they came to a heated debate about the kittens and how they would look...like the mother or not. One student looked at me and insisted that I email Mrs. Lewis' class to get an answer. Google was not good enough....it had to come form THEIR experts.

Since, I didn't know exactly what to expect from the Skype call, I told me students that they were each responsible for reflecting on their experiences and explaining what they learned and why it was important to them. My students do this all of the time; we are always writing and reflecting on their learning and growth regularly. However, my students (even the ones that I have to pull quality writing out of) wrote pages about how important it was to learn about the different organs and body systems and understand how they all worked together.  One student wrote, "Today, I feel like I just graduated from a college class. I learned so much more than I ever thought was possible about the human body...from people I never met before. I hope that someday, I can teach them something too. Today was the best day ever!"

Their conversations went on for days. I think everyone in the school....maybe the community...heard about this Skype lesson. It was an amazing thing to witness. And like my kids, I can't wait until the next time we Skype in an expert. Anybody interested?

Students as Teachers

Last year, I was given a challenge of becoming a self-contained classroom teacher, teaching all academic subjects to the same group of learners each day. Every year previous to that year, I had taught Reading Language Arts or a combination of Reading Language Arts and Social Studies. It seemed a daunting task to have to effectively add math and science to my repertoire. What I quickly discovered as I started digging into those subjects was that so much focus was put onto reading and math that science and social studies took a back seat. I didn't want that for my students. I wanted for them to gain a sense of wonder for the world around them and realize how much it impacts their every day lives.

Although I felt that I had a limited knowledge of the content for the science course of study, I began searching out experts who could (through the use of technology) join our class, bringing a different aspect to our class projects, labs, and experiences. I've had the good fortune to meet Pamela Harman, a Geoscience teacher at Spain Park High School, through the Alabama Network of NBCTs. I asked her if she thought her students would be interested in working with my students in places where our content overlapped. Her enthusiasm in tackling this new collaborative partnership was infective and we set off together on our new venture.

For our first collaborative experience, her students did presentations about significant astronomers for my students via Skype. As I mentioned in a previous post, my students are currently creating interviews/conversations/dialogues between two different explorers or innovators. Her seniors taught my 5th graders about people that they had never heard of and set off a chain reaction of researching for more information to include in their own projects. When reading my students' reflections after this experience they said things like "You did a great job. You didn't need to be nervous," "this experience was life changing," and "I look forward to teaching you more about technology."  Of course their reflection revealed changes they would like to see in the future.There was an overall consensus that they felt the need to give back, to teach the older students.

That opportunity came this week. Pamela's students were preparing to study Astronomy instruments. She asked if my students would be willing to teach her students a lesson on concave and convex lenses via Skype. My students were thrilled with this opportunity, Although their nerves manifested themselves throughout the process, they remained confident that they could teach these older students something of value.

As a whole group, we discussed what they felt made a good lesson...the ways they liked to learn. Then my 5th graders brainstormed ideas and built an interactive lesson in which all of the students involved could participate. They decided to start the lesson with a poll so that they could connect the lesson to something personal. Their poll was created on Poll Everywhere and included finding out how many people were farsighted, nearsighted, both or neither. Students could take the poll online or via their cellphones. They created a Wallwisher to house all of our links for the lesson and to lead into their next activity, having the Astronomy students create "stickies" to tell what they already knew about convex and concave lenses.

Most aspects of the implementing of the lesson were tackled by pairs of students. After the introduction activities, two of my students taught about concave lenses and two taught about convex lenses. Each pair created multiple diagrams to hold up in front of the camera for the other students to see. Then I had a student who volunteered to teach about Benjamin Franklin inventing bifocals (which ties into what we're studying in Social Studies). He explained how they worked and even had a pair of bifocals to hold up to the camera and demonstrate how it worked. Throughout these minilessons, my students took time to ask for some audience participation.

To wrap up and do an overview of the lesson, one of my students created and performed a rap about convex and concave lenses.  To insure that all of the students could understand and catch all of his meaningful phrases and words, he created a podcast and posted it with the words onto our class' science wiki. We put a link to that page on the Wallwisher so that the SPHS students could view it again later. Then two more students created a quiz on ProProfs Quiz Maker to assess how much was learned from their lesson and as one student put it, "to see if you were listening to us."

Yes, this lesson was designed, created and implemented by 10 and 11 year old students. Did these students know how to teach? Did they think about different kinds of learners? Did they make the learning active? Did everyone learn something and have fun? YES!!! When I read my learners' reflections that they wrote at the end of this 25 minute lesson, their observations further solidified my belief that you learn much more teaching something than just sitting and passively getting information. They understood that. They understood how to connect a lesson to real life, how to keep it interesting by varying the activities and keeping them interactive, and how to assess the learning of the other students. And, they understood what so many teachers are missing...technology supports good learning; it's not a separate entity.

On their way out the door with huge, confident smiles on their faces, they turned in their reflections. They asked, "When are we doing this again?" Soon, very soon.