The Power of Social Networking

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I think that Classroom 2.0 is an awesome social networking site for educators. There are so many ways I can see this being useful; just from going to the main page I was intrigued by three different posts! This site is super practical in that it has educators sharing their experience of what works to encourage, motivate, and show other educators the great things that can be done in the classroom with the help of technology. I even found a group within the site for Spanish teachers. Not only can I find great ideas for my own teaching but I can learn about the trends and new styles of teaching that I had not heard of before. This is a great, very useful tool.

We are the Pieces to this Puzzle

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A learner is like a puzzle piece. Just like a puzzle piece needs the other pieces to form a complete picture, so learners need other learners (people) to connect to in order to make meaning out of their lives and contribute to something bigger than themselves. In his article, “Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age,” George Siemens states, “meaning-making and forming connections between specialized communities are important activities.” As a piece to this puzzle, learners need to know how to form connections so they can make meaning and extend their pieces for others to connect into. When we don’t become connected, we miss out on the plethora of knowledge and wisdom we can gain from others.

Siemens addresses the importance of connection in his video “The Network is the Learning” with the comment that “adding a node to a network increases the entire network exponentially.” Each person can contribute to these networks of knowledge with their own personal expertise and experience and thus move universal knowledge forward for the benefit of all. Therefore, we need each other to create the bigger picture, one that can only be truly seen when all the puzzle pieces are connected into the right pieces. 

Meaningful Washback

I am currently taking a class on assessment. After my long-term subbing position I had quite a few questions on meaningful, valid assessments and was determined to learn how to better evaluate and provide feedback to my students. While we've discussed washback briefly, we haven't discussed the best methods yet. Well today I came across a post on the Blog of Proximal Development on my Google Reader that dealt with this issue succinctly and positively.

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The Power of Feedback  outlines a great way to provide positive, learning-centered feedback on student work. We've all experienced the returned essays with overwhelming red marks: we searched for the grade, threw the paper in our folders, and completely ignored the teacher's comments. Or perhaps we've been on the other side, spending hours upon hours correcting student work. Don't we love to see our hours thrown into the back of the folder-or worse, the garbage can-as students rush out of class? Well this post offers an answer to our dilemma.

Konrad Glogowski points out that feedback should respond to what the student did correctly, not incorrectly. When we point out all their mistakes they aren't as motivated to change things. Sometimes they don't know how! Instead, Glogowski offers this advice:

"As teachers, we must help our students answer three questions:

1. Where am I going?
2. How am I doing?
3. What actions do I need to take next?"

Feedback is about the process, helping out students get to a great end result on their own, and encouraging them on the way. He offers a great example in his post of what this can look like. These three questions should be found in the feedback; however, "it’s important to keep in mind that our role here is to guide, not to answer these questions for our students." 

I really appreciate seeing this in action. It just makes sense. I can totally understand why a student would be more apt to respond to feedback that guided and encouraged them versus circling all their mistakes. I think this would still take some time to do, but perhaps it won't take as much time as the previous attempt and the results will be worth it. I am willing to try it. Effective feedback can be empowering and truly transformative in the way our students learn. 


Reference:

Glogowski, K. The Power of Feedback. Retrieved February 12, 2012, from http://www.teachandlearn.ca/blog/2012/02/09/power-of-feedback/

Social Media in the Classroom?

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It is amazing to think of how far technology has come within the past 5-10 years. In watching Social Media Revolution 2011 by Erik Qualman I was able to realize just what kind of impact social media alone has on the world today. Can you believe that Justin Beiber has more followers on Twitter than there are citizens of Australia? I find that astonishing. In this day and age when social media is being used by children through adults and 93% of markers for business, it is important to consider how this can be relevant and useful in the classroom too.

Two interesting points for me are that peer recommendations are so highly valued and the vastness of Wikipedia. I think an authentic activity/assessment in my Spanish classroom could be to have students write reviews/recommendations in Spanish about different restaurants in our area. This could be a whole section on a class blog and could include hotels, museums, etc., for when students take vacations or class trips. This would be a way to incorporate a real world task as well as teach students how to read and write reviews to make more educated choices. If peer recommendations are so valued in our world today, students should learn how to write and review them with discretion and honesty.

When I was in undergrad I did a neat activity in my Educational Psychology class pertaining to Wikipedia. We had a selection of topics based on current class content that were under cited on Wikipedia. Our task was to add to Wikipedia with research and citations of scholarly articles to support our evidence. This was a beneficial task because it taught me 1. how to edit Wikipedia 2. that Wikipedia can be edited by anyone 3. the importance of citations and evidence in making research claims. I would love to incorporate this project into my own classroom, teaching my students to research, write scholarly, edit Wikipedia, and again, use discretion when using online sources. There is something really fantastic about students having done work that is instantly published and available for everyone in the world to use. I think this realization for students is the goal of social media and the read/write web, as discussed in Will Richardson's book Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms.


As far as Facebook, is it appropriate to make a class page? I have never investigated this but it could be interesting. If any of you reading this have insights, please share. Seeing how powerful these tools are, I am really going to be thinking about how I can best incorporate them in my classroom to make my lessons as meaningful and engaging as I can. 

Internet Safety

¡Hola, Estudiantes!

Welcome to a new school year! This year in Spanish we are going to be using the Internet in many interesting and exciting ways. I’m confident our explorations will improve your understanding and appreciation for the Spanish language and cultures. In order to use the internet to the best of its potential, however, we need to establish some basic online manners and safety.

1. Always keep in mind that the class work we do in and out of school needs to be school-appropriate, so keep it clean and civil. If you’re ever unsure, ask me and I can help you figure it out.

2. Never post details about you: your last name, your address, your age, your phone number, etc. People may seem friendly and interested online but it’s not safe to disclose this information about yourself. This website offers good advice on "smart surfing." Keep the conversations on topic and always be cautious. For more information on social web tips, check out this website.

3. Do not share your passwords and login names with anyone other than the teacher and your parents. You should be the only one posting information under your name and you should not be “helping” anyone by posting under their name.

4. If you ever come across something inappropriate in your searching, close out of it immediately. Let me know if inappropriate windows continually pop-up or if you mistakenly get stuck in a wrong browser.

5. If you ever feel uncomfortable or bullied by comments or discussions online, talk to me right away. This is serious. You should never feel this way when using classroom web tools and I need to know immediately so we can fix the situation and change the tool if necessary. These two websites offers great tips on recognizing cylberbullying and responding to cyberbullying.

I always aim to create a safe and enjoyable learning environment for all my students. I know that if we follow these guidelines carefully, internet use will only improve your learning experience. 

Also, remember that you need to bring the printed copy of these guidelines, along with guardian permission, signed by both of you to class by Friday. 

I look forward to a great year of learning and discovery! ¡Vamos!

Sincerely, 

Miss Parsons

Blogging in the Spanish classroom: 3 ideas

1. Students can use their blogs as journals to practice reading and writing in Spanish. First students search for and read an article online about a Spanish topic, in Spanish (depending on the class level) about Hispanic culture, history, etc.  Then they write a blog post about it, adding their own summary, thoughts, perspectives, and interpretations. This could be a weekly or biweekly assignment and would include commenting as part of the evaluation. Comments will be in Spanish and on at least two other classmates’ blogs. This would allow students to research something of interest in the target culture, read in the target language, or at least write in the target language, thereby processing and responding to the information in the articles. This would address all of the ACTFLstandards. If I thought the responses were not targeting all areas of these standards I could assign topics or themes for the articles.

2. Students could use blogs as a form of group pen pals with a foreign classroom: I’m not entirely sure how I could start this, but hopefully I could find a classroom in another country and work with the teacher in blogging pen pals. An idea for this would be choosing a topic every two weeks or so (i.e. fast food, popular television, school system, popular books) and have students from each classroom share from their cultural perspective about this topic. We could alternate between writing in our native languages and writing in the foreign language. This could create an ongoing conversation and authentic cultural look at the other country. This could include pictures, videos, etc. to pull in speaking the other language as well. It would be awesome if this led to a study abroad experience, both going to the other classroom’s country and bringing some of those students to ours. This too would address all the ACTFL standards, especially if it led to a study abroad experience.

3. A blog could be used as an organizational and presentational tool for a final research-based project or a semester-long portfolio of their work. Students would follow a rubric including a specified number of blog posts based on research and ideas discovered along the way. Students would have daily/weekly assignments (depending on the length of the project/portfolio) that would reveal their productivity, findings, and thought process as they find and synthesize the information. This could be a neat way to do a variation on a group project. Each group would have an overall theme:  literature, food, or important people. Then students would individually do research on this theme in a separate country. The end result would be a group comparison of this theme in their Hispanic countries to that in the United States. Again, commenting would be involved so as to keep students on top of their group’s most recent findings. The amount of Spanish required would depend on the level of the class. This project would address most of the ACTFL standards; it might be difficult to include the Communities section. The rubric would be geared toward incorporating the different aspects of the standards.