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I had posted my reply earlier but it seems to have disappeared so apologies for the abridged version here.
The skill I selected was Collaboration, because I feel like it is an area that has been lacking in classes that I have taught recently. I have found that when given collaborative work there tends to be a leader that takes over and delegates all the tasks to the others, which can be a source of conflict. I have also found that groups break off and do their own work without linking together for the final project and some things get duplicated. There is also a tendency for the more introverted students to be given a back seat role which can lead to them working alone or not engaging at all as they can be reluctant to speak up for themselves when it comes time for deciding roles.
My Sway project centres around a Day in the Life on the Titanic, where I would like the children to explore what it was like to have been on the ship, while taking into account the different experiences of passengers in the different classes and also crew members.
There is a certain amount of creative freedom for the children to explore different mediums in how to present their work as a group but the children are all assigned a person from the Titanic Passenger list, and all passengers must be represented to ensure that the children’s work is interdependent.
The final projects (4 groups representing 1st Class, 2nd Class, 3rd Class and Crew) could be delivered with a variety of methods including letters from the ship, diary entries, video interviews (with the children in role) and using Sway or Powerpoint on tablets.
The children would be expected to engage in research and record interviews in groups but there would also be room for independent work in terms of writing letters and deciding themselves how best to represent the passenger that they have been assigned.
I found myself constantly referring back to the rubric, to ensure that the children would get the most out of the collaborative project. This has helped me understand where some of my previous collaborative lessons could have been improved, especially regarding the interdependent aspect of the project.
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The 21st Century Skill that I decided to focus on is Collaboration. It’s an area that I have found that my students have struggled with in the past. When assigned group work, a number of things tend to happen.
– A leader takes over. This tends to be the loudest or most confident in the group. The assign roles to others, keeping the “best” role for themselves. The other children in the group who wanted this role get disgruntled and arguments ensue.
– The group breaks up into smaller groups. 2 or more”leaders” get their closest friends in the group and break up into smaller groups. Instead of 1 complete project you end up with 2 or more smaller less complete projects.
– Students who don’t enjoy group work get isolated and either work alone or don’t engage with the activity.
I found the rubric very helpful in terms of rethinking my own practices in assigning Collaborative Work. On reflection the projects that I was assigning did not require the students work to be interdependent, which meant that the students didn’t feel the need to work as one big group.
When I was planning my Collaborative Lesson and using Sway, I found myself referring back to the Rubric constantly to ensure that the students would get the most out of the Collaborative side of the lesson.
There is freedom for Independent work in terms of research or letter writing. Paired and Group work with Interviews using the class camera or deciding the layout and design of a Sway Project,
There is creative freedom for the project as they are free to present their facts in any medium they want. The children must decide as a group what way their information is going to be represented, what roles each child will play in the presentation (researchers, camera people, artists).
Ultimately the work is interdependent because each child is representing a passenger and their story must be told in the final project, whether it is in a letter written by the child, an interview in role or a slide in a sway project.
http://Collaboration Project – A Day on the Titanic. Go to this Sway
I had posted my reply earlier but it seems to have disappeared so apologies for the abridged version here.
The skill I selected was Collaboration, because I feel like it is an area that has been lacking in classes that I have taught recently. I have found that when given collaborative work there tends to be a leader that takes over and delegates all the tasks to the others, which can be a source of conflict. I have also found that groups break off and do their own work without linking together for the final project and some things get duplicated. There is also a tendency for the more introverted students to be given a back seat role which can lead to them working alone or not engaging at all as they can be reluctant to speak up for themselves when it comes time for deciding roles.
My Sway project centres around a Day in the Life on the Titanic, where I would like the children to explore what it was like to have been on the ship, while taking into account the different experiences of passengers in the different classes and also crew members.
There is a certain amount of creative freedom for the children to explore different mediums in how to present their work as a group but the children are all assigned a person from the Titanic Passenger list, and all passengers must be represented to ensure that the children’s work is interdependent.
The final projects (4 groups representing 1st Class, 2nd Class, 3rd Class and Crew) could be delivered with a variety of methods including letters from the ship, diary entries, video interviews (with the children in role) and using Sway or Powerpoint on tablets.
The children would be expected to engage in research and record interviews in groups but there would also be room for independent work in terms of writing letters and deciding themselves how best to represent the passenger that they have been assigned.
I found myself constantly referring back to the rubric, to ensure that the children would get the most out of the collaborative project. This has helped me understand where some of my previous collaborative lessons could have been improved, especially regarding the interdependent aspect of the project.
I have to say I enjoy exploring and experimenting with Digital Technology when teaching. It is helpful in keeping children engaged in lessons, with videos, pictures and audio clips. Even using E-Books on an interactive whiteboard can be very helpful to highlight certain questions the children might have when they are using text books. Maths games help to build speed of processing especially when it comes to tables.
However I have found it difficult to get the children to use technology themselves in my own school. We simply don’t have any hardware available for the children to use (laptops, tablets etc.). Now these children are nearly all digitally savy by First Class, with their own devices at home, but they are almost exclusively used for Youtube, Minecraft (which isn’t all that bad) and Fortnite.
This lack of technology isn’t unique to my school i’d imagine but the children are missing out on opportunities to explore coding with Scratch, Typing Skills, Research Skills for projects and much more.
So when it comes to SSE and evaluating the school’s practice and making reference to the Digital Framework, there is a massive gap in our practice in terms of Student lead digital learning.
This module really caught me by surprise. I had heard of OneNote but had never really looked into its uses before.
It really is a Jack of all trades piece of Software, that can be used all throughout the school. We have had difficulty in the past few years keeping a digital log of our School Policies as we have been updating school computers. School management have been going around with a USB key and a list of the policies that should be on each desktop, when a OneNote document with all the policies included could save so much time. That file could be easily shared through Teams at the beginning of the year and everyone would be up to date.
The immersive reader is something that will help me from day one, when I return to the classroom. It will be a vital differentiation tool, as well as bring an incredible teaching aid when it comes to grammar lessons. The fact that it can scan text from different sources means that a quick screenshot of ebooks can be made and added to OneNote in minutes, saving time on having to type text out.
We do a lot of collaborative planning in our school so I feel like teams would be very beneficial in terms of sharing resources, organising planning meetings and collaborating with Additional Needs teachers.
Being able to share resources so easily means that teachers are not creating the same resources and that the time spent on creating resources can be shared among teachers at the same class level.
This could also be really helpful in where a substitute teacher has to step in on short notice. Using Teams the school could make a plan and resources made available almost instantly and help with a seamless transition for the teacher and students.
As teachers we are always engaged in a battle to keep students engaged with topics and are looking for ways to make lessons and assessments more interesting for the students. These tools are a great way to supplement the lessons we do every day and encourage greater engagement in the classroom.
I had never used Sway before starting this course and found it very user-friendly and an excellent way of creating visually impressive presentations that could be used to draw students into topics. The bright themes and easily accessible copyright-free images available at the click of a button helped to save a lot of time when creating the project.
Likewise creating the quiz on Forms was really straightforward and is a great tool for assessment. Children these days seem to be very competitive and multiple choice quizzes are a great way to assess what the children have learned while also being a bit more accessible for those children who find it difficult to express their knowledge through written assessments.
