Tracking Understanding

Since this was the second time I was teaching these units as a Grade 1-2 teacher [on a two year cycle], I wanted to change the order in which I taught them. Two school years ago, I taught our current unit, Sharing the planet: An inquiry into rights and responsibilities in the struggle to share finite resources with other people and with other living things, at the end of the year. This time, it is in the beginning.

In my classroom I have a large basket filled with scraps of paper to be used in future projects. This was a great chance to ask my students why I would have a box of paper scraps in my room. After our discussion, I put them to work making their own self portraits using the scraps of paper.

After we were done I had all these self portraits that I was planning on simply displaying. But when I put them up in a row, I noticed I could have them talk to each other. 

This evolved into a way to track student understanding through our unit. I created speech bubbles that are big enough for post-its, and periodically, I ask the question, "What do you know about our unit?"

Each time we talk about it, I put their answers into a unit page in their portfolios so we can see how they grow in their understanding and knowledge.

This might be a good opportunity next unit to develop a rubric about conceptual understanding.

Dealing With Challenging Students

I came across this article on Teach Thought entitled, "Growing Closer To Your Most Challenging Students" and it inspired me. Of course, that was last week.

When I encounter a challenging student, I try to win them over. I do this by trying to get to know them better and building a bond with him or her.

By creating this relationship, more times than not the student will settle down. I usually learn something about him or her. By understanding where the behavior issues are coming from, I have more empathy and am able to handle issues that arise with more compassion.

This is not to say that issues disappear when a relationship is built, but rather that issues are able to be met with more understanding.

Time for recess duty.

Photography in the Classroom

I first bought a digital camera when I came to Japan in 2003. Since that time I have gotten more serious and have spent a fair amount of money on it.

I have also changed the way I use the pictures I take in the classroom.

I started out taking pictures of the students in action and putting them up around the room or outside of the classroom. I still do that, but I have extended it to taking pictures for other teachers in the school as well as in my own classroom.

I also decided that the one page my students get in the yearbook did not come close to accurately

Continental Draft

A while back at one of our school's PD days I was introduced to a video call Austin's Butterfly Drafts.

This video shows the power feedback and how students can improve through the feedback cycle.

We are in how we organize ourselves unit we are studying communities and I found an opportunity for the students to use each others critiques to make their original map better.

The students are reading a book called Me on the Map. We are making a flip book based on Me on the Map that starts as continent and moves to country, city, street, house and down through the layers to the students own bedroom.

Yesterday I had students draw a picture of Asia. I did project an image of it and passed out some iPads so that they could have the image to look at while they drew.

Some students surprisingly could do a really good job, and others were rather lazy with their drawings and could clearly improve.

Today I showed the kids the video about Austin and we talked about how they could improve their own work. Students were very interested to try it out.

Since it was their first time doing this activity, and we did this as a whole class instead of breaking into smaller groups it took a long time. They were all very interested in helping others, however they were not so interested in hearing critiques from other students. I had to keep reminding them that this was for their own benefit.

However when it came time for the students to do their second draft of Asia, they were much, much better.

This lesson took more than an hour, however it was well worth the time. I'm hoping that this lesson will help them think about how they draw their subsequent drafts, and maybe it will seep into how they think about all their work. We will have to do this more often though so it becomes engrained into their thinking.

There was one boy who I actually think did not do as well the second time. That might be because his first draft was so good.

Understanding by Design - Chapter 3

Standards and Big Ideas
Standards provide teachers with a "focus" for which they teach.

Big Ideas from Lynn Erickson (2001)

• Broad and abstract
• Represented by one or two words
• Universal in application
• Timeless--carry through the ages
• Represented by different examples that share common attributes (Erickson 2001 p. 35)

Wiggins and McTigue go on talking about how Ercikson's list of big ideas can be generalized (p. 69)

• Providing a focusing conceptual lens for any study
• Providing breadth of meaning by connecting and organizing many facts, skills, and experiences; serving as the linchpin of understanding
• Pointing to ideas at the heart of expert understanding of a subject
• Requiring "uncoverage" because its meaning or value is rarely obvious to the learner, is counterintuitive or prone to misunderstanding
• Having great transfer value; applying to many other inquiries and issues over time--"horizontally" (across subjects) and "vertically" (through the years in later courses) in the curriculum and out of school