Could the Apple Watch be headed to your classroom?

“My Country” Assignment—21st Century Fluency Project

via Look Who’s Chalking

The Year Five students spent eight weeks focusing on their ‘My Country’ assignment. This assignment was designed to encourage students to explore their own knowledge and answer a question that could not be answered by simply looking it up on Google. They needed to create an online resource as their final product.

Students worked through the Six Ds of Solution Fluency. These are; Define, Discover, Dream, Design, Deliver and Debrief. This is a model I was introduced to earlier in the year at a development day with Lee Crockett. The below link explores the Six D’s in more detail.

This essential 21st Century Fluency is actually the foundation upon which the other Fluencies are built. Recently, two longitudinal studies found that teaching a structured problem-solving process to a student will instantly increase their IQ by 10% and that this increase is sustained throughout their lives. Let’s make sure our students benefit from this. Everyone identifies problem solving as essential, but without a process like Solution Fluency, it’s just an ideal that never gets implemented.

—Lee Crockett

http://fluency21.com/blog/2013/01/08/solution-fluency-video/

I introduced the assignment with this statement:

Everyone loves to travel, especially when they get to travel overseas. They can explore different types of foods, visit famous landmarks and immerse themselves in the culture of the country. 

http://mycountryassignment.weebly.com

I created a website (using weebly.com) that students could refer to throughout the assignment stages. This meant that they did not need a paper copy of their rubrics. It was fantastic to have this website for them but if I were to complete the assignment again, I would add more to the website. I will go into more detail regarding this later on.

The students needed to answer these questions:

• Where does my family come from?
• Why is this country a fantastic place?

We started with the Define Stage. In this stage, students need to state or define what is being asked of them and fully understand this. Students videoed themselves and uploaded these onto www.kidblog.org. They were then able to comment on each other’s videos regarding what they had defined as the problem. Students also had a teacher – student conference with me. In this conference we discussed what mark they were aiming for. I had set up the tasks so that there was multiple levels of success, rather than multiple levels of failure. Students told me whether they were aiming for a 1 (not completed), a 2 (minimal completed), a 3 (expected stage) or a 4 (extended).

Next, students worked through the Discover Stage. In this stage students research how the problem occurred, they gain context to the problem and they shift their thinking towards analysis. Students began to research their country, specifically focusing on the geographical and cultural information. They also needed to interview a family member about this country.

Majority of the students were able to complete their interview in person but some completed an international Skype call and filmed the conversation using Screenr.com. One student did this and then set up a new Screenr to film the conversation whilst pausing to translate it into english. It was fantastic and really blew me away!

We then moved on to my favourite stage, the Dream Stage (creative/crafty side of me!). Students needed to look into the future and see the problem solved. They had to think of ‘what is’ and imagine the possibilities of ‘what could be’. The Dream Stage is one which cultivates creativity, innovation and imagination, and these skills are extremely important for people to have in today’s world.

Students put together a poster to outline what they imagined their finished product to be. They used key words, sentences and pictures to show this. They then presented these in small groups, explaining what they had found out so far and what they still needed to do.

Then came the Design Stage. This is when students work backwards from the future, from their Dream. They identify the critical milestones that happened and decide how to implement the solution. This is the Action Plan, the Design of the Dream.

In this stage students needed to create a 10-day holiday to their country. They needed to include flight details and costs, other travel costs (cars, taxis, etc), accommodation, sight seeing and attractions, food expenses and spending money. The created a budget for their holiday as well as an itinerary. Students used Pages to complete this and majority of them set up a form of table within their document.

Students also used an online timeline to create a schedule for themselves. On this they included the dates (across the week), what they planned to complete each day and how they were going to do this. Students printed this and ticked off what they had completed each day. This was a great way for students to reflect on their learning over the week.

Students then came to the Deliver Stage. There are two sections in the Delivery Stage:

Produce and Implement.

In this stage students put their plan into action and complete the process of solving the problem which they originally defined.

Students were given the option of using EdCanvas or Weebly for their online resource. These were selected as they were both relatively new to students and therefore created an ‘even playing field’. Unfortunately, students had difficulty creating their websites at school (due to proxy settings) and therefore had to use EdCanvas.

EdCanvas was great to use as students could upload videos, photos and text. As a teacher I was able to set up a class group and give them the code. Also, students did not need to have an email account to access it. When students had completed their EdCanvas, they printed them off so that I had a hard copy to mark.

The final part of the Deliver Stage (Implement) was to persuade their audience (Year Four students, Year Six students and parents) to go on their holiday. They needed to create a range of resources to assist them with this. They also had to focus on the language they were using and how this could persuade someone to agree with them.

We set the classroom up as a travel agency with students positioned around the outside of the room. This was great as visitors moved around the room in a circular motion. Majority of the parents came to the travel agency as we had it over two days and from 2.30 – 4pm. This was perfect as student pick-up is at 3pm, so most parents where already here.

The final section was the Debrief Stage. This is the most important part of the Six Ds as student look over the process they have taken and reflect on it. They ask themselves about how this product or process could be made better this time or next time.

Students completed a written self reflection task based on their assignment. Once completing this I had another student – teacher conference with each student to explore how they had gone with each stage and if they had reached their original goal which they created in the Define Stage. It was very interesting to hear student insights on the different stages and majority of them said they would aim higher next time.

There are so many great students achievements that come out of setting an assignment like this. Not only are the subjects being integrated together (English, S&E and Mathematics), but they also have the opportunity to be responsible for their own learning. The rubric they are assessed on has multiple levels of success and students can therefore set a reachable goal. Students were taught about SMART Goals (Specific, Measureable, Attainable, Realistic, Timely). They referred back to this throughout the assignment to make sure they were pushing themselves to do their best work and, also, not setting unachievable goals.

I found that majority of my students challenged themselves and achieved what they had set out to do. I was extremely proud of all the work they completed and the constant reflection they did throughout this task.

The Year Five classroom was open to visitors on Wednesday 3rd July and Thursday 4th July.  Many parents, friends and students from other year levels came to observe the travel agency.

I am very much looking forward to running the next 21st Century Fluency task in our classroom. Stay tuned for more.

Gabrielle Trinca. @GabrielleTrinca

22 Ways To Use Twitter For Learning Based On Bloom’s Taxonomy

Last year we created a “twitter spectrum,” an image that clarified different ways that twitter could be used in the classroom in (hopefully) authentic ways.

TeachBytes has followed that up with an excellent graphic of their own that uses a pure Bloom’s Taxonomyapproach. The specific ideas range from “remix trending tweets with video and music” to creating concept maps showing the relationship between tweets.

We must admit to going back and forth over the exact fit of a social media platform like twitter in a formal (or informal) learning environment. Clearly it’s a great way to skim and monitor information streams, but just like we wouldn’t use sing Shakespearean sonnets to toddlers at birthday parties, using twitter as an in-depth critical thinking tool requires a bit of squinting, even as an Avante-garde 21st century learning tool.

Unless you’re using it as a cultural survey of sorts. Or study media design. Or following experts. Then it works swimmingly.

As with all things, sweet spot matters. To help you find it, this graphic should help.

Social Media Meets Bloom’s Taxonomy: 22 More Ideas To Use Twitter For Learning

Bryan Setser’s: Ten Tips for Teacherpreneurs

Film Group Backs Antipiracy Curriculum

This could turn out to be an essential part of curriculums developed in the future that focus on digital citizenship skills and awareness. This article featured in Stuff talks about the Center for Copyright Information’s push to have schools teach kids about anti-piracy and the importance of respecting copyrights.”

via Stuff.co.nz

When it comes to learning about the evils of internet piracy, Hollywood studios and the major music labels want kids to start young.

A nonprofit group called the Center for Copyright Information has commissioned a school curriculum to teach primary-age children about the value of copyrights.

The curriculum, still in draft stage, includes lesson plans, videos and activities for teachers and parents to help educate students about the “importance of being creative and protecting creativity,” with topics such as “Respect the Person: Give Credit,” “It’s Great to Create,” and “Copyright Matters”.

The nonprofit is backed by the Motion Picture Association of America, the Recording Industry Association of America and others, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Some critics say the curriculum, called “Be a Creator,” would promote a biased agenda. Others contend it would use up valuable classroom time when public schools already are struggling to teach the basics.

“While it’s certainly a worthy topic of discussion with students, I’m sure some teachers would have a concern that adding anything of any real length to an already packed school day would take away from the basic curriculum that they’re trying to get through now,” Frank Wells, spokesman for the California Teachers Association, told the newspaper.

The MPAA blames the illegal distribution of movies and TV shows for causing billions of dollars annually in lost revenue. The trade group has tried various tactics over the years to fight the problem, from filing lawsuits against college students who illegally downloaded movies to backing ill-fated federal laws that would shut down rogue websites.

The program is being prepared by the California School Library Association and the Internet Keep Safe Coalition, known as iKeepSafe, a nonprofit focused on helping children thrive in the digital environment. The group partners with educators, law enforcement agencies and major corporations, including Google.

The MPAA declined to comment and referred calls to the Center for Copyright Information, which is also working with iKeepSafe on the curriculum.

Jill Lesser, the centre’s executive director, said the curriculum has not been approved.

“It’s unfortunate this got out because we were nowhere near done,” she told the newspaper.

Lesser told a House subcommittee in September that she hoped the curriculum would be tested as a pilot program in California in the current academic year, and eventually be adopted at schools nationwide, the Times reported.

5 Powerful Questions Teachers Can Ask Students

via Edutopia

The Problematic Connotation Of Video Games

via TeachThought

Perhaps more than any other media form, video games suffer from connotation.

While sourced directly from a stunning convergence of art and technology, the public perception of video games drips with the juvenile, evoking images of–depending on your age–Pac-Man, Mario, or the Grand Theft Auto series. Their time in the public spotlight is usually brief, and tangled with inevitably tilted discussions on children, violence, impression, and even Constitutional rights.

This misses what makes gaming such an engaging rhetorical form–and the explosive evolution of video games as an interactive narrative medium.

Rainbow 6 is an upcoming game from developer Ubisoft Montreal that not only allows interaction (a player manipulating a digital avatar to in pursuit of some goal), but also seeks to tell a story in a way that books, poems, or music cannot.

The lead-in from the full text (seen here at Game Informer, by Matt Bertz and Jeff Cork):

“Americans are angry. And why shouldn’t they be? With an exponentially expanding national debt, crippling foreclosures, corporate bailouts, degrading infrastructure, dwindling job market, and widening income gap between the haves and the have-nots, it’s getting harder to believe politicians when they speak of American exceptionalism as if it were a fundamental truth.

“In response to gradual erosion of our beloved nation, resentful citizens of all kinds of political backgrounds are rising up in the form of new political movements like the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street. But unlike the 1960s, when protests and activism resulted in the discontinuation of the military draft, the Civil Rights Act, and the sexual revolution, the contemporary bickering government parties have proven largely ineffective at slowing or reversing the downward trajectory.

“The media isn’t helping matters. Rather than promote discussions about viable solutions moving forward, ad-driven 24-hour media outlets and radio programs are content to stoke the fires and sensationalize political differences. America’s volatile political climate serves as the jumping-off point for Rainbow 6 Patriots.”

Not your typical shoot-the-aliens—or even nameless “terrorist” context.

“In previous games, allowing a civilian to die was game over. Now you’re not exempt from tough situational decisions. Do you kill one civilian now and potential spare hundreds of lives, or is the lone human life too critical to lose even if it means thousands others may meet their untimely deaths down the road? In Patriots, you make the call.”

The story finishes with a play-through of an early draft of the game, in video game language called a “build”:

“Our live game demo (of the game) doesn’t start with Team Rainbow sated in the back of the chopper outside a facility surrounded by police. Instead, our first glimpse comes from the perspective of a well-to-do real estate investor sitting in his idyllic American home. Judging by the polished wooden floors, larhe HDTV, and the iPad-like tablet sitting to his right, this guy is living the good life.”

Continuing, the main character is presented a cupcake for his birthday.

“Happy Birthday. Go on, blow it out,” she says. Like a scene out of Heavy Rain (another immersive, heavily narrative video game), the player is given the option to blow out the candle or stroke his wife’s cheek.

“These types of ‘bad or worse’ situations define the story campaign in Rainbow 6 Patriots. Given the sensitive subject matter of Americans turning on each other, we asked the team if they were prepared to face a media controversy propagated by news networks that move so quickly and ignorantly to condemn video games as youth-corrupting trash. We can see the sensational headline now: ‘Liberal Game Publisher Paints Tea Party as Terrorists.”

“Why can’t a game be smarter? Why can’t a game embrace issues? We’re not coming down with any kind of ruling or judgment about any of this. We’re letting people talk amongst themselves. We’re making a game that we want to provoke discussion and deeper thought. We certainly welcome the opportunity to talk intelligently and thoughtfully about the mature subject matter. As the game industry evolves, we’re going to face these issues more and more often.”

As technology progresses, media forms will likely evolve but the rhetoric behind them will not. Video games are simply a media that are both interactive and digital. By some odd consequence of consumerism, sound, and color they were “given” to children first, and invariably (and unfortunately) any evaluation of games as a media form turns to the needs of children.

The more important–and more fruitful–discussions will continue to focus on a media form that is increasingly interactive, inter-textual, and full of self-directed scaling up and down Bloom’s taxonomy in digital acts of application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation.

Facebook Steps Up Efforts to Curb Bullying

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via Digital Trends

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