Reading Reflection 5

When starting up a project, there are some things that need to be considered such as the resources, the what and the who. There are several questions that you can ask yourself in order to pinpoint what you will need to begin. “What materials will you need? Will your project involve the use of technologies that are new to your students? Will you need to expand your students’ access to technology? Will you students need access to experts to answer questions that are apt to come up during your project?” Each of these questions that you can ask yourself will get you to think about what you will need for your project and tell you more about how to make the project successful.

            Projects will require management skills from both the teacher and the students. The book lists several for each of them.  The teachers project management skills need to include tools for communicating with students and others about the project. This is one of the most important for me because communication plays an extremely key role. There is nothing more frustrating than being assigned a project or assignment and not getting enough instruction from the teacher. This makes it hard to give your best work. When the students and the teacher can communicate properly, everyone is on the same page and better results will come from that. One of the most important project management tool for students is to help them manage their time and flow of work. Procrastination happens to the best of us, and it is important to help our students learn to split their time efficiently and get things done one step at a time, so they aren’t stuck at the end scrambling to do everything at once.

            There are many technology applications that could be considered for a project. “The simplest way to begin using the Web to support projects may be to build a project wiki.” This makes it easy to branch other things. Make announcements, add links, and even make more pages for communication. Personalized web pages are also a way for students to integrate technology into their projects.

            This directly relates to what we are doing in class, again because of what we are working on in our groups. When we are constructing lessons and projects for our “students” it is important to ask questions first, in order to make it as successful as possible. It also helps narrow down which skills are the most vital such as communication and time management.

Reading Reflection 4

            When integrating Project-Based Learning into teaching strategies, pitfalls are going to be natural. As the book points out, there are several in particular to look out for. The first being a long activity, and short learning outcomes, which in the end is not worth the student’s time and effort, or yours. The amount of effort put into a project should reap similar benefits. One way to look at this in the end is to say, “Where could my students and I go with this idea?” in order to take it to that level. The second pitfall to watch out for is technology layered over traditional practice. “Good projects focus on reaching significant learning outcomes, not merely making use of technology applications.” So when looking to reinvent a pitfall like this, it is important to ask questions like, did it connect students to rich data? Another pitfall potential is called trivial thematic units. Where themes can have no actual connection to learning, like the example of apples where the students paint pictures, use apples in math class, etc. The project theme can be run differently where the students use apples to learn about agriculture and commerce. It all depends on how the theme connects back to what you are trying to get the students to learn. The last potential pitfall discussed was overly scripted with many steps. If a project has very specific steps, there will be very specific results. It is important to have steps to follow loosely, but if there is no wiggle room, there isn’t room to grow.

            There are many features of a good project. Some of which are; designed with the possibility of different learning paths, cause students to construct meaning, center on a driving question structured with inquiry, capture student interest through complex and real-life experiences, realistic, tap rich data, structured so students learn from each other. This last one I think is a really important aspect of Project-Based Learning. Many of these are important features of projects that students could do on their own, but what I have found is that I learn the most under collaboration through others. In a class where we discuss something, there are many brains working together, and that opens me up to certain thinking and learning that I could not have done on my own.

            Good projects are everywhere. They can come from books, student ideas, and good projects can even come out of failed projects by learning what went wrong. Successful projects are a domino effect and often lead to even more good projects.

            In the first activity in the book, it helps lay out how to design your project. The first step recommended is to revisit the framework and make a list of learning objectives, decide what specific skills you want to address, and identify what learning depositions you want to foster. From there you can establish evidence of understanding by imagining what your students would know or be able to do with this information. Then decide what you want your students to create. The last step would be to plan how to get the students attention and build excitement for the project ahead. Once everything is planned out, you can get feedback and opinions from colleagues to make improvements.

            Again this chapter clearly relates back to what we are doing in class because of how we are using collaboration and working in groups to plan projects for our “students”. This chapter can help us see what not to do and how to come back from poorly planned projects while also teaching us good ways to start a project.

Virtual penpal Questions

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Reflection 4

Overcoming pitfalls is a part of project learning. We can avoid some of these pitfalls. A common pitfall is long on activity, short on learning outcomes. Many times teachers plan projects that are a very long process of busy work and don’t tie in enough learning outcomes. This can make this long lengthy project not worth doing. It is also important that we find different ways to tie technology into projects. Having students research a topic on the Internet and then present it in an electronic slideshow is not a quality project. Selecting the wrong theme can result in a pitfall. Many teachers choose themes that are not very effective. For example, apples are the chosen theme for the fall semester. The students paint apples, count and add apples, read stories about Johnny Appleseed, etc. Quality themes like survival, justice, and interdependence are more effective themes and prepare them better for real life. Sometimes teachers over script their projects. By over scripting your projects you are limiting your students’ creativity. Their project outcomes are very easy to predict.

Good projects focus on reaching significant learning outcomes, not merely making use of technology applications. If technology helps your students reach your learning outcome goals then it is essential for them to use. It is important that students can make connections to the project. If students can build off prior background knowledge they are more likely to get more out of the project. It’s important to let students’ interests and curiosity drive the learning experience. If students are interested in a project you are going to get better results from them. Some of the best projects are very loosely designed so that students can mold them to what interest them. Having students work together collaboratively is also a key to the best projects. Students should start working together collaboratively at a young age because when you get out in the real world working alone is more rare.

Project ideas can come from anywhere. Building off what interests your students is a good place to start. If they can make connections from life at school and at home they are likely to be more successful. Teachers should try to be creative and imaginative. As a teacher figure out what learning outcomes you want your students to reach and find a way for your students to achieve them. Good project ideas can come from anywhere.

There are many steps that go in to creating a project. Writing a project sketch can be very beneficial. A project sketch is not intended to list every detail of a project. It is intended to get your ideas flowing and onto paper. When you are designing you need to revisit the framework. Make a final list of learning objectives, deciding on specific 21^st century skills, and planning a theme are some of the essential steps.

This chapter helps prepare you for our final group project. I know now what obstacles to try and avoid and what I can do to plan an effective lesson plan. This chapter really informed me about good approaches to planning good projects. I know now that planning is an essential key in creating a lesson. 

Google Maps

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Chapter 3

When considering the “Big Idea” for a project, we should be looking at what “core concepts and processes, should students know” and “if your students understood…just two or three things, what would they be?” The last part was huge for me, what few main things are important that you want your students to take away from a project? That is what we need to think about when planning projects into our lessons. As teachers, there are many things we want our students to learn and sometimes it can be hard to focus on one specific thing. The “big idea” really helps teachers zero in on the heart of the material that will benefit students the most. Another thing to consider in finding the “Big Idea” is real-world contexts. I think this is extremely important not only because it will help students skills later on in life, but because when students can make real-world connections, they tend to remember it for longer.

            Three 21-st century skills were: Analyze, Evaluate, and Create. All of which are key in working with Project-Based Learning. This three things are exactly the focus of what students will be doing in a leaning environment focused around group work and projects.

            The book gave multiple definitions for literacy, but finally narrowed it down into down to one sentence that I think really works well, “learning to be independent, aware, and productive citizens”. I think this goes hand in hand with basic 21-st century skills, because if students can work on skills in literacy, they are also enhancing their ability to analyze, evaluate and create as well.

There are eight Essential Learning Fuctions, of which include: 1) Ubiquity: Learning Inside and Outside the Classroom, and All the Time, 2) Deep Learning, 3) Making Things Visible and Discussable, 4) Espressing Ourselves, Sharing Ideas, Building Community, 5) Collaboration-Teaching and Learning with Others, 6) Research, 7) Project Management: Planning and Organization, and 8) Reflection and Iteration. These are all clearly essential for students and preparing them for their life ahead. When students can learn inside and outside of the classroom as well, that is when they are learning at their fullest potential because there is no down time, they are taking in everything around them and learning from it. When students are deep learning, this is where technology can really come into play to help then with things like the web-based spreadsheets and online graphing. Another way technology really is a key tool is with making things visible. When students can create using digital tools, it can take their learning a step further. Building a community is something that I find is always really important, especially in young children, because they need to feel comfortable to be able to learn at their full potential, and having a sense of community in the classroom makes this possible. Community and collaboration really go hand-in-hand, working in groups and learning together helps make connections. A very real-word skill is planning and organization, and for students to learn this skill well is going to help them so much when they go to college, get a job and further on. Again technology is helping students when they go to reflect, if a student keeps a blog for an extended period of time, they can look back on how they have grown. This is key to assessing how a student has done and can also boost they students if they feel like they hadn’t learned anything, to see how far they have come.

          This chapter really easily works in with what we are doing this week because we are starting to think about our lesson plans and focus on those ideas. Its important for us to first look at the "Big Idea" while we are doing our planning and really focus our lessons on the key facts that we want our students learning from these projects. 

Reflection 3

When finding the “Big Idea” for a project, we, as teachers, need to relate whatever we are teaching to the real world. Connect it to their community somehow so that they see the purpose.

                While teaching we need to plan on how this will help them develop 21^st century skills. We want our students to master the subject but to also know how this applies to the real world. In order to do this we should make sure that we hit every level of Bloom’s taxonomy: Analyze, Evaluate, Create.

                We also need to keep in mind teaching 21^st century literacies. Students need to be able to understand fully so that when they are finished with school they have the literacy capabilities to go through life reading and writing.

                There are many learning functions that we need to cover as we teach. The first is Ubiquity, which means that we need to teach students that they can learn wherever they are and however they want and then we need to teach them how to do that. The second function is Deep Learning, which means that we need to teach students how to really dig deep in research to find more than just the obvious information. The third function is Making things visible and discussable, this means that we need to teach them how to turn subjects into a visual object such as a concept map, and that we need to teach them the first step into getting a conversation going. The fourth function is expressing ourselves, this means we need to show them how to express their ideas and the many ways to do so. The fifth function is collaboration, we need to teach students about how peers and tools can help you to learn more about a certain topic. The sixth function is research, sort of an obvious one, we need to teach students to research things they don’t know about. The seventh function is project management, this means that we need to teach students how to manage their time, work and sources. The eighth and final function is Reflection, we also need to teach students to look back at their work and to reflect and see what they could have done differently so they can fix it next time.

                Concepts in this chapter relate to our project because these are the exact things we need to incorporate into our lesson. Things like how to relate to the real world and how to work through an assignment correctly.

Reflection 2

Learning communities are a positive experience for all. Learning communities focus on teachers working together to teach. They plan together, and teach a large group of students together.

                This benefits all. It benefits teachers because they have someone there planning with them. Teachers can evaluate students better and be able to plan better because they have more than just one mind coming up with ideas.

                Learning communities affect teachers in a positive way because they always have a colleague there with them. They can always receive constructive feedback and ask for questions because they are not isolated. Other positives are the fact that there is increased commitment to the mission and responsibility is shared.

                Learning communities affect students because the learning becomes more powerful. Since there are more teachers planning the lessons, essentially the lessons are more powerful. The students will understand the material more because of this.

                There are many components for shared vision in learning communities. Everyone needs to have a clear sense of the mission. They also need to share the same vision and work together. The teachers need to make sure that they organize into groups and really focus on student learning. For this to work properly teachers need to be goal and results oriented. Lastly they need to be committed and see themselves as life-long learners.

                This concept relates to my project because in a way we are creating a Learning community. Three of us are all researching the same topic to teach and finding ways to do it and in the end it will be one final project. We are collaborating and will all be reaching for the same end goal.

Reflection 3

When you are teaching a subject to your students it’s not always easy to get them to understand the big picture. Students have a hard time connecting what they are learning in the classroom to real life scenarios. For example, a teacher taught the number line all the way to 1,000. The students had a hard time understanding how big of a number 1,000 really was. The teacher decided that by copying 1,000 names off Wikipedia would help students realize how many people a 1,000 people are. These created a text to world connection for the kids and know they understood the bigger picture. Math class is a prime example where teacher need to help connect the dots for students. “Where am I ever going to use this in real life?” This question is so common in a math classroom. If teachers make the concepts more relevant to students then they will be more engaged and eager to learn.

Teachers need to continue to improve their teaching as technology advances. Bloom’s taxonomy is a effective guide for adjusting to this transitional time. Bloom’s categories of objectives are; Apply, Analyze, Evaluate, and Create. Bloom’s taxonomy is moving towards education that includes more collaboration and imagination. We want to prepare our students to be life long learners. We need to select topics that they can relate and make connections to.

The focus is to prepare for students to be ready for the real world. The world is becoming more globalized every day and our students need to learn about it now. They need to become inventive thinkers, good communicators, and productive workers. Being able to develop these qualities in a student comes down to the teacher’s effectiveness.

There are 8 essential learning functions; Ubiquity, deep learning, making things visible & discussable, expressing ourselves/sharing ideas/ building communities, collaboration, research, project management, reflection. These are all learning functions that prepare you for real life situations/jobs. Ubiquity is about students using more tools like mobile phones, web based applications, and GPS are just a few examples. Deep learning function is about students explaining, reporting, and voicing their own opinions. This helps them create their own opinions and views.  Making things visible & discussable is about teaching with visuals. Instead of just telling students verbally all the time, show them. A concept map would be a good example. Expressing ourselves is about defining who you are. A modern day example would be Facebook. Collaboration is obviously just about working together so that you can bounce ideas off each other and come up with good conclusions. Research is about finding the information. Today research is not a problem because of the Internet. You can literally find everything that you need to know. Project management helps you relate to how everyday life is about working as a team. And reflecting on yourself will only make you better at what you do.

This chapter related to our class in many ways. Our class is set up so that we develop these skills. We work as a team, communicate with each other, and are working on real life situations that we can relate to. Our project in this class is helping us develop skills that will help us in the real world. 

"The essential conditions that make collaboration possible come down to one word: respect." In communities, both student and teacher based, this is key. Collaboration can only work if all parties can respect each other and acknowledge that even when things do not work, something is learned and that will help make a better outcome the next time. 

Whether on a small scale between a few teachers, or in a larger classroom scale, learning communities "learn new patterns of thinking, they learn how to capitalize on wisdom of the group, and, most importantly, they continually learn how to learn together." When integrating Project-Based Learning into teaching, it is nearly impossible to not also include learning communities. 

Communities benefit both the teachers and the students all at once. When teachers can group together and critic strategies and different approaches, this helps the teachers feel more comfortable and have a buffer when they are struggling. This also encourages teacher's growth, which in turn better helps their students by getting more out of a lesson. Teacher collaboration can also benefit both the teacher and the student by evaluating the student’s work. Getting a second (or third and fourth) opinion on critiquing student’s work can really benefit the student by getting multiple views and feedback. When the teachers can come together to create ideas, there is no comparison to the quality of teaching compared to a traditional classroom.

However, in order for learning communities to work well, there needs to be a shared vision. This is the way to get more success out of the communities where everyone is all on the same page. 

There is a clear relationship between learning communities and our project because not only are we working and collaborating together in groups, our project is based on our students working in groups. Everything through this class is based off learning communities and what it means to learn in a community.