Digital Writing in Multiple GenresDr. Young's Teaching Composition class is what got me excited about multigenre and multimodal writing. A large portion of the class was focused on different ways to use digital writing in the middle school ELA classroom. The multigenre project was difficult for me at first because we had so much freedom when it came to choices of topic, technology, and genre. Reading Tom Romano's book Blending Genre, Altering Style was extremely helpful, as he included examples and discussed how multigenre writing can help us fuse fact with imagination, compelling our readers to “experience the writing” (Romano, 2000, p. 24) After many drafts, peer feedback, and a few meetings with Dr. Young, I realized how much more critical thinking and creativity this project required than a traditional research paper and I felt COMPELLED to do this with my students. Navigate to the iTeach page to see some of their final products. Click the button on the right to check out my research paper on multigenre multimodal writing.
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New Literacies and MediaIn the fall of 2017, I took New Literacies and Media. This class helped me tackle the "purposeful" part of my compelling question. I think a lot of teachers use technology in the classroom, but forget how important it is to incorporate it as a tool for modification and redefinition of the curriculum. We should be using technology to do things that would not be possible without it: creating collaborative and interactive mind maps, using Doctopus to give audio feedback on student assignments, or connecting with other countries through Google Hangouts or Kidblog. For our final project in this class, my partner and I explored SAMR, a research-based model for purposeful technology integration in the classroom. We used this model to allow our students choice with new literacies on different tech-based projects in our classrooms. Check out our final video on the iLearn page. Click on the button to the left to see what students think about using purposeful tech in the classroom.
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Emerging TechnologiesA concept that was new to me after taking Emerging Technologies was the idea of makerspaces-- informal learning environments where knowledge is constructed through the hands-on experience of making something by playing or tinkering. A few emerging technologies found in makerspaces include 3D printers, control boards that send interactive signals, robots, and programs for coding. Makerspaces allow students to employ the 4 C's-- collaboration, communication, creativity, and critical thinking-- and are great ways to give students ownership over their own learning. They can develop their own questions, define problems, and test solutions-- all skills they will need in the real world! Check out www.renovatedlearning.com for some great ideas and makerspace resources. Click the button to the right to explore my research on the impact of makerspaces in schools.
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Going GlobalTheory and Research in Global Learning was one of the first classes I took and it really impacted the way I thought about students as global citizens. I completed a PBI on the role of technology in helping students connect globally, which can be found on the iLearn page. As part of this project, I created a visual essay on technology's role in global connections, which can be viewed by clicking on the button to the left. As part of the research, I read an article titled "Designing Learning to Engage Students in the Global Classroom" by Jennifer Lock, and found that one-time connections between classrooms in different countries (such as Skype or Facetime) don't impact students as much as having them collaborate over time on a project where they experience "knowledge building" together in trying to solve a problem. We did something like this in my own classroom! It can be found on the iTeach page.
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Blended Learning At the beginning of the 2017-20178 school year, a colleague and I decided to teach a workshop on using purposeful technology in the classroom. Our school had just received 3:1 laptop carts and we wanted to make sure all teachers were armed with ideas to use them with their students. One of the concepts we touched on was Blended Learning, something I found so fascinating that I ended up exploring Blended Learning further for my Teachers as Leaders course this past spring semester. Blended Learning is a student-centered approach to teaching that uses a mixture of learning through digital media, face-to-face teacher instruction, and small group learning with other students. Click on the button to the right to explore the professional development I created and read the research behind Blended Learning. I love that the technology piece allows students control over pacing and the learning path they feel comfortable taking. It also gives instant feedback to student and teacher!
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Click the photo above to explore more research and resources at www.blendedlearning.org.
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