Cooperative Learning and Reiforcing Effort

What kinds of technologies can I use to help students participate in cooperative learning?

My students range in age from 7-11. I try to find ways to help students collaborate on projects. Some of the technologies I can use that we currently have at school are:

* Movie Maker- various projects at each grade level
* MediaBlender/PowerPoint - create presentations as a group
I currently do this in a 4th grade project where students work in groups to create a band and tour around Wisconsin. I also utilize word processing software for students to collaboratively write about their band and the tour.
* Online webquests at various levels and about various topics
* Microsoft Word to create a website about a topic
When I taught middle school, I used iWeb with my eighth graders to do this
* PBWiki to create a website about a topic
I am going to be using this for them 4th grade band tour project for next year


What kinds of technologies can I use to reinforce effort?

I have never used technology to reinforce effort. Some ways I could do this are:

* Posting finished projects on a Wiki page
I used to do this with my middle-schoolers, I would post their web pages
* I use Engrade to track my students grades and timings in Keyboarding and technology. I could give them a code so that they could view their grades/info at home or school anytime.

Online Mapping Tools Comparison

I compared and contrasted the following three tools, bubble.us, mindmeister, and Webspiration.

I found bubbl.us very easy to use. It was easy to navigate the tools and easy to share my finished product. It is free, which is a fabulous price. The downside, it is not very "fancy" and does not have images. Out of the three it is the least impressive, yet simplest to use.


Mindmeister was also easy to use. It is free, but you only get three free mind
maps. You can delete the maps after you make them, so it is not entirely limiting. It is much prettier thanbubbl.us, but still does not have images. It shares the same enter and tab functionality (adding subtopics) as bubbl.us.


Webspiration looks and feels a lot like Kidspiration and Inspiration. This program was by far the most "advanced." It offers diagrams and outlines. The outlines are a nice added feature. It is a little more complicated to use mainly because of the added functionality. It has graphics and the ability to upload your own graphics.
view my map at: http://www.mywebspiration.com/view/378548a7215

I would use Webspiration in my classroom. I think that my kids would benefit from the graphical aspect of Webspiration. I could use it with my non-readers by having them mind-map using images rather than text. I love this use of nonliguistic representation!

Setting Objectives, Providing Feedback and Providing Recognition

What kinds of technologies can I use to help students set objectives?

I teach 2nd-5th grade, so I hesitate to let my younger students set their own objectives. However, I do think that I could use a survey tool, such as Survey Monkey or Poll Anywhere, to have my older students let me know what they are interested in learning about. I could also have them set goals and decide how to reach those goals using a similar tool.

I can think of a time that I asked students to provide feedback on another students work and I was not pleased with the results. Why did it not go well?

This year is the first year I have taught fifth grade technology. One of the projects that all of the Tech teachers do is mini book that the kids write about any topic they want. It is a six page book, with a minimum of three sentences per page. After students were done writing their books, I asked students to switch computers with someone else who was finished and read their work, checking for complete thoughts, as well as spelling and grammatical errors. When I went to do the double check before printing EVERY SINGLE book had at least five errors or had parts that did not make sense.

Now that I've sat and thought about it, I can tell you why it didn't go well, I never modeled for them what it looks like to edit someone's work for completion and we never discussed spelling and grammatical errors. Next year, I WILL model good writing and editing for my students before asking them to complete this task!


I can think of a time that I asked students to use a rubric I had created to self-assess their project before I graded it and I was not pleased with the results. Why did it not go well?

I'm pretty sure I know why this did not go well either. First of all, no other teacher in this building uses rubrics (which completely blew my mind!). I had not taken the time to read through the entire rubric and explain the scoring in detail. A great way I could have improved this would have been to use an example and grade it together as a class using the rubric. This may have clarified why I was expecting and how to use the rubric at the same time.

Feedback That Fits

I found this article to be extremely eye-opening. I think that many times, in my classroom, I forget what good feedback looks like and how to use feedback to move students forward, rather than judge their work. Being a computer teacher, I find myself having to correct students use of the functionality of software often. I am just finishing up a project where my students created point of view poems and then used the poems to create a MediaBlender presentation. I know throughout this process I have given praise on their creativity and use of the tool, but how do I go about giving them feedback on their grammar/spelling, etc. in a way that will allow them to grow as writers? I think sitting one-on-one may work best, but I have 108 students and this will be extremely time consuming, but beneficial for the students.

Principles of Learning & Principles of Teaching

I enjoyed reading this article. It made me think about what really goes into the planning and execution of teaching.

I liked how the learning principles matched up with the teaching principles well. Students learn based on their background knowledge, which can help or hinder learning, and teachers need to teach based on student's' background knowledge. Students need to make connections between new information and old information and teachers need to teach them how to make these connections. Learning goals need to be explained to the students so that they know what goal they are moving towards and teachers need to use these goals to create activities that move them towards these goals.

I found it interesting that I never thought about teaching the individual steps of a process and how we, as adults or experts, skip steps disregarding that fact that students need this information to connect or move from one idea to the next. I also found it interesting how the article talked about teachers roles. I think all to many times teachers forget to choose the appropriate role to get the desired outcome from students.

In my teaching, I know that I do not do a great job of explicitly explaining the outcomes of the lesson, unit, course, etc. I have been working to change that and it's a daily struggle to make sure I am letting the students know what I expect because they can't read my mind! I think it helps put a lot of pressure off of students when they know what is expected of them.