Alternative Resources for Flipping Your Lessons

Posted on June 25, 2012 by Scott

As I have learned more about the Flipped Classroom and as I have searched for smart, innovative ways to practice these methods, I’ve been a little disappointed.  I do like the idea that flipped lessons enable teachers to better differentiate their instruction and hone focus on mastering skills, but it seems those who are leading this movement are focusing mostly on science and math to the neglect of the humanities and language arts in particular.  Khan Academy and at The Flipped Class Network, for example, have countless math and science videos but very few that are useful to us in the humanities.  Given this lack of resources for language and lit, I came up with some alternative sources you might consider if you want to try flipping your middle or high school language arts lessons.  Some easily overlooked places you might find these useful videos (often referred to as “vodcasts” … Continue reading →

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Flipping your Classroom

Posted on June 3, 2012 by Scott

I have been hearing a lot lately about the “flipped” classroom.  If you haven’t heard about it yet, Holly Epstein Ojalvo and Shannon Doyne of the New York Times provide a succinct definition: “an ‘inverted’ teaching structure in which instructional content is delivered outside class, and engagement with the content – skill development and practice, projects and the like – is done in class, under teacher guidance and in collaboration with peers.” It all started when a couple of teachers started recording their lectures and posting them as Power Points on the net for students who were absent.   And that is the essence of it really.  You provide content for the students to access outside the classroom and structured exploratory activities and lessons based on that content in the classroom.  This “flips” the teacher’s role from class lecturer (information provider) to class guide through activities based on the pre-assigned content. … Continue reading →

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BBC’s ‘State of Debate’ Game Worth Playing in the Classroom

Posted on April 7, 2012 by Scott

For a while I have been hesitant to write about games in education.  I think it’s the old-school teacher in me.  Or, maybe it’s the stigma attached to electronic games in school based on the common assumption that they present distractions from and not opportunities for meaningful learning.  But recent research suggests otherwise.  In fact, a 2009 MIT study suggests well-designed educational games are valuable tools for developing skills in communication, collaboration, problem-solving, and even innovation.  Unfortunately, many educational games only present rote learning—repetition of addition and subtraction, for example.  But some games are designed to encourage and support critical thinking.  The BBC’s “State of Debate” is such a game.  It is very well-designed, it is interactive, and it encourages students to think critically about persuasive arguments.  Even hardened critics among us will see this one is a game worth playing in school. In the classroom In “State of Debate,” students are … Continue reading →

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Take “The Brainstormer” for a Spin

Posted on March 27, 2012 by Scott

A small group of aspiring authors from among my students just started an after-school creative writers’ club.  They meet bi-weekly to share ideas, to collaborate, and to encourage each other to write.  So the gathering of this new group got me wondering…what kind of cool resources are online for students interested in creative writing?  After a little digging around I found a fun application called “The Brainstormer” created by graphic artist and illustrator Andrew Bosley.  The Brainstormer, a simple but innovative tool, is comprised of a set of three wheels that you spin virtually by clicking the center for random ideas about things like conflict, setting, and character to spark the imagination.  You can also select ideas manually by moving each wheel to a desired topic.  This application is also available through the iTunes App Store for $1.99 so students can download it to their iPhones, iPods, and iPads.  This … Continue reading →

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Use Online Newspapers to Meet Common Core Standards

Posted on January 31, 2012 by Scott

Common Core Standards, Informational Texts, Key Ideas and Details: 2. Determine a central idea of a text and analyze its development over the course of the text, including how it emerges and is shaped and refined by specific details; provide an objective summary of the text Online editions of many local, national, and world newspapers are a great place to find resources for teaching students to analyze informational texts for central ideas and how they are shaped.  In fact, many newspapers now dedicate an entire section to providing teachers with ways to use the news in the classroom and some even offer alignment to standards.  A quick Google search will help you find your local newspaper’s NEI (newspapers in education) section.  If your local paper doesn’t have a specific focus for lesson planning, many of the most popular national newspapers do.  Among them, The New York Times has an impressive collection of … Continue reading →

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Teach Students to Use the Power of Images with Worlde, Creatly, and Statworld

Posted on January 22, 2012 by Scott

The other day a student stood in the middle of my classroom holding his cellphone at arm’s length, pointing it at the white board. I was about to tell him to put it away, but then I realized what he was doing and it gave me pause to think…he was “taking notes” by snapping a digital picture of what I had written on the board.  So I wondered, what if I asked him to use those images in his next essay?  Isn’t this a way to integrate technology into the language arts curriculum—taking digital pictures and using them with text? But really, when is the last time you asked your students to include images in their essays?  Probably never, right?  When students include pictures, it’s usually to adorn the cover of the essay beneath one of those annoying plastic report covers.  But consider how many images the average student encounters … Continue reading →

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Commit to Trying New Methods on Digital Learning Day

Posted on January 14, 2012 by Scott

If you have been teaching for a long time, making changes can be difficult and even intimidating. Sometimes it’s easier to close the door to the classroom and do what you have always done instead of worrying about whatever next “big thing” is coming along. Things, after all, are always changing and maybe it’s impossible to keep up with it all. But today technology is significantly impacting how our students engage and process information more than ever. Consider how in the last decade our chalkboards have been replaced with LCD projectors and smart boards. Grade books are accessible by students and parents online 24/7, graphing calculators are now available as downloadable apps on smart phones, and students communicate in a dozen different ways using as many different modes of technology from email and texting to Facebook, chat, and Skype. Textbooks, magazines, novels and newspapers are no longer limited to the … Continue reading →

Posted in Lesson Plans, Presenting, Technology Integration | 2 Comments

Diigo: A Powerful, Hands-On Research Tool for Students and Teachers

Posted on January 7, 2012 by Scott

Informational Texts Common Core Standard #1 – Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text. Remember back when we were in school and research meant pouring over books in the library with a stack of note cards?  When I was in college, I became very handy with Post-it® notes and multi-colored highlighters for finding “textual evidence.”  I miss those days hunched over a notebook amid piles of old books.  I loved rolling up my sleeves and immersing myself in the physical work of learning. Students seldom set foot in brick-and-mortar libraries for research anymore, and they rarely flip through actual paper books or periodicals either.  Most research is done with electronic resources now, and I don’t know any current students who know what a library card catalog looks like (you know, the ones with the long, narrow … Continue reading →

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Bring Shakespeare to Old Time Radio–Common Core Standard 9

Posted on December 24, 2011 by Scott

Most students are probably not aware that copyright protection laws are relatively new, so they might be surprised to learn just how many famous authors like Shakespeare borrowed and adapted others’ ideas. They should already know (I hope) that Stephanie Meyer’s books aren’t entirely original vampire stories, but they probably don’t know how many earlier “versions” of Romeo and Juliet you can find. Common Core Standard 9.  Analyze how an author draws on and transforms source material in a specific work (e.g., how Shakespeare treats a theme or topic from Ovid or the Bible or how a later author draws on a play by Shakespeare). Although there are many authors who treat themes and topics from earlier works in their own, Shakespeare is one of the easiest to approach with students simply because one can find more information online about him than nearly any other author.  If you are lucky … Continue reading →

Posted in Audio, Classical Literature, Common Core Standards, Drama, Lesson Plans, Shakespeare, Technology Integration, World Literature | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Blending Art, Literature, and Problem Solving at the J. Paul Getty Museum

Posted on November 11, 2011 by Scott

Common Core Standard 7 for Reading presents teachers with many possibilities for mixing all kinds of art forms with literature.  Music, photography, painting, sculpture, and many other media are easily brought into the classroom today because of the internet…the important thing is to use these resources heuristically. 7. Analyze the representation of a subject or a key scene in two different artistic mediums, including what is emphasized or absent in each treatment (e.g., Auden’s “Musée des Beaux Arts” and Breughel’s Landscape with the Fall of Icarus). Teaching students to analyze subjects or scenes in comparative forms gives us an opportunity to explore with them the traditions of storytelling—the many and various ways stories can be told and have been told throughout history.  Poetry, short stories, plays, and even novels and epic tales have important connections to art and present new, thoughtful ways to analyze and evaluate themes. To start, you … Continue reading →

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