Module 6- Co-Teaching!

Last week in my Education 203 class we were given the opportunity to create a lesson plan with another peer from our class. This was a co-teach lesson and it was my first time being able to create and present something like this. I was paired with one of my classmates and together we were able to choose the grade, subject, and lesson plan. The subject we decided to do was a Physical Education lesson. The lesson teaches the students in grades K-2 about their body parts and what they are used for. For our lesson, we decided to focus on the external body parts so that we would not overwhelm the class with an excessive number of vocabulary words they were not familiar. The body parts we decided would benefit our classmates were, nose, eyes, ears, arms, hands, fingers, legs, feet, and toes.

When we were trying to figure out what type of lesson we wanted to teach together we had a fun time looking up ideas on what would be best to teach together. We had to remember that what we were teaching to our students had to be something “they had no prior knowledge on”. This is because when we teach a class of our own one day, the students in the class will not know everything about what we are teaching. This topic we had to choose was going to have to be something we were pretending to teach them for the first time. This was tricky because we could not ask students questions they were supposed to know because they had to pretend they did not know anything. So, when we were sharing facts about the body parts, the students had to be taught everything starting with the basics.

Between my partner and I, we worked on creating a lesson plan that had the following, topic, subject, grade level, time, Illinois learning standard being addressed, academic language, objective, planned support, formative assessment, technology used, instructional plan (Engage, connect, launch), sequence of learning activities, and a closure. This definitely seemed like a lot of planning out, which it was, but we had a fun time trying to come up with stuff together that was going to be enjoyable for students, as well as informative and information filled. While trying to figure out what exactly we were going to do, we tried to make sure we could have an activity the students were going to be able to get up and move around, so they can better understand what is being taught. A very important thing I felt we did was give the students a lot of hands on and labeling of the body parts. It is important the students see their body parts on themselves as well as other people, not just on a picture. 

Once we completed the lesson plan it was time to create a PowerPoint that was going to be interactive and easy to follow along with for the students. We decided to add a couple of Peardeck slides that the students would be able to draw or type on. The reason for this being, we believe students learn best from having hands on experiences and the best way to do that in the classroom is to implement it as much as possible for the students. We also had an interactive activity where the students in our class had to pair up with a peer and label the outer body parts of their peer with sticky notes This was definitely a great way to see which of the students was understanding and applying their vocabulary to real life, and which ones were going to need more practice. I was able to take a lot of good feedback away from this experience and I am very fortunate I was given the opportunity to practice the skill of co-teaching so early on in my educational career. 

Twitter Post #2

Over the past semester in my technology in Education class, we have been active members on education twitters. I was able to make a twitter for educational purposes. Through my twitter posts and retweets, I have been able to share ideas and create new ideas for a future classroom and how I want to hopefully run it one day soon. I think by going onto twitter a few times a week, I have been able to hear from different teachers and administration about their favorite memories or goals for the future. I think hearing their stories from them has helped me create a type of mindset I want to have in the future

So far while searching twitter I find myself becoming really interested in technology tools used in the classroom. I am not a huge technology person, so hearing from other teachers about what they are using in the classroom is a great tool for me to have learned so early on in this process. I think companies like Flipgrid and Ozobot are so interactive in the class and I cannot wait to share these ideas with future students. Another page I actively have begun following is a teacher/blogger/speaker by the name of Jennifer Hogan. She posts some of the most uplifting quotes and phrases for students, leaders, faculty, educators, parents and so on. She does a wonderful job in sharing her stories as well as asking others to talk about what certain words or quotes mean to them. 

I think it would be such a fun opportunity to be an educator and a teaching blogger. I have seen so many new pages on twitter recently about blogs and Teachers Pay Teachers, and it really is eye opening to have discovered so many new materials and ideas though a form of social media! I want to be able to share my ideas and projects with teachers all around the world, and I think a blog or twitter type of platform would be a great spot to do so!

I have been able to retweet ideas and quotes I want to not only share with classmates I have right now, but hopefully I can share these ideas with future students of mine. I hope I can continue to use twitter as an active form of professional development platform. I find myself going on there more often than any other form of social media and I definitely think that is a great start to a wonderful future full of constant education and learning!

Module 5- Flip Project

Welcome back to another blog post! Over the past couple weeks, we have been creating a flip project on our own! A flip project is done by a teacher and shown to his or her students! We were able to learn a bit about flip projects and how they are so beneficial in the classroom. One quote that stuck out to me was on a website called the daily riff. The quote stated, “One of the greatest benefits of flipping is that overall interaction increases: Teacher to student and student to student.  Since the role of the teacher has changed from presenter of content to learning coach, we spend our time talking to kids.  We are answering questions, working with small groups, and guiding the learning of each student individually” (TheDailyRiff1). The flip project takes the teacher away from standing in front of students lecturing notes and information to them, and changes the whole dynamic of the classroom.

            I decided to do my flip project on first grade math. I thought something simpler like addition and subtraction of single digit number would be a good topic to start off with. My first task in the flip project was to create a lesson video showing the topic I was going to be making a quiz on. I wanted to make sure I was not talking for too long and gave the students time to write down the problems and follow along. My video showed students how to add objects together by counting them and then creating an addition sentence. Then I had the students add photos on the PowerPoint and demonstrated how to create another addition sentence. The subtraction demonstration was very similar to the addition one. I showed how to take away objects from one another, and then how to subtract numbers in a sentence. Creating this flip video was easy and a lot of fun to do! I was able to visually demonstrate addition and subtraction and show multiple ways to do it. This would provide students with ways they find easiest to use when solving these types of problems.

            The last step of my flip project was to create a 10-question multiple choice quiz for my students to complete after they watched my flip video. I really enjoyed making this quiz because I was able to be creative with how I wanted to ask questions that could assess whether my students were able to understand the information and then apply it to the problems! I look forward to doing this again with a class of my own one day and be able to work one on one with my students while they get to be independent and complete tasks!

SRS!

Welcome back future educators! I am excited to share my new SRS (Student Response System) tools! Over the past semester in my Technology in Education class, we have gotten with groups in our class and researched different SRS websites that may benefit a future classroom. I am going to share below three of my favorites I have learned about! The top SRS tools I am going to share are Peardeck, GoSoapBox, and Quizizz. Before joining my Tech in Ed class I had never heard of any of these websites. I was used to using links like Kahoot, and PowerPoint. Although great resources, these new three websites are above and beyond when it comes to an interactive unit in a classroom.

Peardeck has become my absolute favorite way to present in a class! It is like a high-tech PowerPoint! The first time I heard about Peardeck was in another one of my education classes. One of my classmates was doing a presentation on a chapter we had read for homework. We were asked to log onto joinpd.com and enter the log in code given by her. Then our screens became the same as the one on the board she was using to present with. Each slide was interactive. There are so many slide options to choose from, including, drawing, true/false, commenting, rating, and even mind maps! When you write on each slide as a student in the class, the teacher presenting can choose to make it appear on the main board of the class! It can then become a class discussion and everyone is able to see each other’s ideas and comments. I think Peardeck would be a huge hit in an elementary classroom! Having something students can be interactive with and comment on while having a class presentation is the best of both worlds as a teacher! I think Peardeck is the new way of having a PowerPoint presentation in classrooms. It provides students with interactive activities and allows them to be creative and continue learning through the lesson.

https://www.peardeck.com

The second website I enjoyed learning about during our SRS classroom presentations was GoSoapBox. Similar to a lot of information I have learned in my technology class, this website was brand new to me and I was eager to get to see what was in store. This website allows teachers to create quizzes, mini tests, run polls, and create presentations. Through GoSoapbox, a teacher can see what their students are succeeding in and what they may be struggling with. It is a great informal assessment tool. When I was shown this in my class, it was a little difficult to follow how to log in and find the work, but once I got there it was smooth sailing. I think it’s a great resource for students. They can also leave comments on whatever the teacher has given them. This is a great way for students to stay engaged in the class and the work being presented. One of the only times I could see myself benefiting from GoSoapBox is possibly when I want to create my own quiz to see where my students are at in the unit. I also think this website may be geared more towards upper grades rather than younger. Older students will probably have an easier time commenting and giving feedback to teachers as well.

https://www.gosoapbox.com

The final SRS tool I am going to blog about may be my new go to. Quizizz is a website that can be used for so many different purposes. When my classmates presented quizizz, they showed us a quiz they created on their own. The explained it and showed how easy it was to create your own as a teacher. Then, I began searching the website to see what else it had to offer. When you come to the first page, they have a list of popular quizzes. Quizzes about Pi, Parts of Speech, Mathematics, history, movies, and so much more. The list is endless when searching the website. When I saw this SRS tool, I immediately thought of how convenient it could be for a classroom of any age. When students are taking an assessment and finish early, this website would be something great for them to go to on their IPad and work on quietly. As a teacher, you can assign quizzes or give them free range to quiz on whatever they are feeling. I also think this website is a great brain break tool to use in the classroom. When students are working hard or just finishing a day of testing, I think this website could give them a break from testing or learning, and allow them to enjoy some thinking of other topics. You can also quiz students on books, or historical events that you may be learning in class. Whatever the quiz, I think this website could benefit any age and any classroom!

https://quizizz.com/admin

Overall, SRS was a wonderful way to learn about a handful of new resources. I now can go to any website I had never heard of before and create a presentation, give a quiz, create an assignment, and so much more. The list goes on and on with ways to implicate these websites in a classroom. The way we learned about them in class with students presenting a website they found useful and comfortable to use was beneficial to me as well. I was able to see first-hand how easy or difficult it was to create an account and how my students were maybe going to react to it. All of these new resources are going to benefit a future class of mine immensely! I cannot wait to get started!