Author Archive

Hacking Assessment: 10 Ways To Go Gradeless In a Traditional Grades School by Starr Sackstein

Wednesday, February 3rd, 2016

Goodbye, Grades; Hello, Growth

When she started her new system, Starr found that her lower-level students liked the idea of not being judged as they lacked success with the traditional system. Rather than assigning additional nightly homework, students just continue working on the projects they were working on in class. Top students had to realize that top grades had little to do with learning and were more about their need to feel smart. Portfolios of work are key here and you can make YouTube videos to display student work. When grades are required, you can let the students work with you to determine grades together. More important is ongoing feedback from the teacher and other students.

Hack 1: Shift the Grades Mindset

Changing how students think won’t be easy and will take time. Starr teaches seniors who have been living in a grading culture for a long time. In essence, you need to promote a growth mindset. For more on this topic see my summary of Carol Dweck’s Mindsets. Expect ongoing discussions and be ready to redirect the conversation to remind students that learning has no grades. Ask “what did you learn, what can you do now you couldn’t do before, and how do you know.” Be sure to make the standards clear, give examples of mastery, and use frequent feedback. Students should submit reflections and self-evaluations about what they learned compared to the standards. Eventually Starr’s students stopped worrying about grades and became more excited and eager to try things as they had been when they were younger.

Hack 2: Promote Buy-In

Throwing out grades is a big change. Many people won’t get it right away so get ready for a lot of push back. You need to reach out to administrators first to get their support. Next you need to set up sessions to roll the idea out to other teachers and perhaps look for a beta team to roll it out with you. If that works you can later look to expand the effort to the entire school. Parents are next at the same time you work on changing student thinking. You should be able to find parent leaders who can be a big help once you persuade them. In addition to your own written and spoken explanations, you can provide links to articles by others who have tried it. Starr includes some in this book. Don’t expect the push back to stop and there are sure to be stakeholders who you don’t win over.

Hack 3: Rebrand Assignments as Learning Experiences

You need to avoid assignments and tests that don’t allow for creativity and student growth. Chances are that some or most of your old lesson plans will have to be overhauled or discarded. Assignments need to allow students to show depth of learning. Allow for student autonomy and avoid single paths. Students should be able to modify the teacher’s assignments or create their own. All assignments should allow for revision (iteration). The lack of grades makes this possible. Expectations need to be tailored to each student so that all are capable of success. Try to find out what students are interested in or passionate about and try hard to fit that in. Try to connect everything to content and skills previously experienced. What’s the point of learning something if you don’t use it? When students have something ready to show, be sure that everyone can see it. This will help convince skeptics.

Hack 4: Facilitate Student Partnerships

When the teacher is the only one in the room giving feedback, students miss opportunities for growth. Also, teaching what you know demonstrates a high level of mastery. These are two very compelling reasons to promote student collaboration. You need a plan to teach students how to be peer reviewers. This should involve encouraging them to model your behavior when it comes to giving feedback. Give student groups the chance to become experts in an area that each can share with others. If students post work on a blog, make sure that others leave comments. Student feedback probably won’t be of high quality at first, but encourage them to work on getting better at it. At the end of the chapter Starr tells how this works in her journalism class.

Hack 5: Digitize Your Data

Starr believes that many teachers spend too much time collecting data which leaves too little time for using it in a meaningful way. She recommends that you create digital forms for students to fill out so that they essentially do the work of data collection. This sounds like an efficient way to find out where each student is in the learning process. With this data in hand you can adjust your instruction. Starr includes sample form. Secondary teachers can share student data with other teachers who have the same students. Students should periodically update their data. By the end of the year you can use this data for final evaluations.
Starr also uses her smart phone to capture pictures and short videos of students in action that can be shared with students. You should consider using a classroom Twitter hash tag which can help students and parents see what is happening. She recommends that you take a look at Google forms.

Hack 6: Maximize Time

Time is a problem for all teachers so if it is important to coffer with each student you need to extend yourself beyond class time. Starr has students complete conference forms before she meets with them and reviews student feedback as well. Students should also have questions for the teacher ready to go. You can use an app like Voxer, which allows conversations to extend over time. In-class conferences can take place while students are working on projects. Conferences should be tightly scheduled and last 3 to 5 minutes. You can follow up electronically as needed. You may need to see some students for additional time after class. With social media, students can often get questions answered by other students.

Hack 7 Track Progress Transparently

Starr uses a spreadsheet with column headings like assignment, feedback, standards addressed, and strategy. Students are responsible for maintaining the chart which shows transparently what they have accomplished. If you are still in the middle of a traditional grading process you can try a test run and refine as you go. Parents can view the forms the students fill out to track progress as well. The focus should be on students demonstrating how they have grown with a critical eye for where they need to go next. Starr uses the text messaging app Remind to send general announcements and after class public praise to highlight examples of student learning. Formative assessment tools like Socrative and Kahoot help to check for understanding, provide feedback, and course correct. Students also complete a weekly self-reflection Google Form so students can engage in meta-thinking.

Hack 8: Teach Reflection

Metacognition, or thinking about your own thinking, has been a hot topic in education literature, but not often stressed formally in the classroom. In a no-grades classroom, students replace grades with their own evaluation of their learning through reflection. Questions the teacher should consider are: 1) What did I do to succeed with this task? 2) How did I overcome the challenges I faced? 3) What evidence do I have that I have met some standards? 4) What do I still need to work on? 5) How might I do it differently? You can ask them at the end of each class to consider what they have learned, and be sure to model the process for them. Part of the process should focus on how what they are doing now connects with previous learning and the real world. Teachers need to provide feedback on students’ written reflections. Students may see this as extra work and push back, so be ready to convince them how this process makes their learning more effective. (Doug: Reflection requires recall, which is more effective in building long term memory than further study.)

Hack 9: Teach Students to Self-Grade

It is vital to include students in the evaluation process as it shows what they really know. Understanding the level of mastery achieved is the goal and each student must decide if they achieved mastery. Forms containing rubrics connected to the standards will help as will checklists. If final grades are still necessary, have each student provide and defend their grade with the teacher. (Doug: I did this when I taught leadership courses for teachers working on administrative certification.) Use the grade determined during this conversation so there are no surprises. If there is disagreement, continue the conversation. Starr is inclined to err on the side of the student’s opinion as she doesn’t think grades matter very much. Although you might think this process would lead to grade inflation, that’s not what Starr has experienced. For the most part, students work to defend their proposed grade and that only serves to increase what they learn.

Hack 10: Cloud-Based Archives

Report cards don’t tell you much about what a student knows and can do, but portfolios of their best work do. Contributions will be more frequent and contain much more detail. They are also a tool for growth and student reflection. If a teacher can see a student’s portfolio from the previous year, they are in a good position to know what to expect next. It is also important that students share their best work with a broader audience. Starr suggests that students do class presentations on completed projects and that parents be invited. Some class time should be devoted to project work due to its importance. The work also needs to be digitized in some fashion for storage, future reference, and possible sharing on the Internet. When it’s time for college applications, you will find that admissions offices are more use to viewing portfolios than ever. (Doug: My daughter was an art major so for her the portfolio was essential. Let’s hope it becomes essential for all majors.)

Starr Sackstein

Starr is a high school English and Journalism teacher at World Journalism Preparatory School in Flushing, NY. She is also the author of Teaching Mythology Exposed: Helping Teachers Create Visionary Classroom Perspective. She does a blog for Education Week called Work in Progress in addition to her personal blog at StarrStackstein.Com where she discusses all aspects of being a teacher. She moderates #jerdchat and #sunchat and contributes to #NYedChat. If you are looking for an energetic, high quality speaker on the subjects of blogging, journalism education, and bring your own device (BYOD), contact her at twitter (@mssackstein) or FaceBook.

Five Ways To Make Essay Writing Engaging For Students by Julie Petersen

Thursday, January 21st, 2016

Five Ways To Make Essay Writing Engaging For Students by Julie Petersen offers excellent advice for teachers, parents, and students about how to make writing more exciting and interesting. You should also check out the high-quality articles for educators and parents at Julie’s fine website AskPetersen.

Introduction

Sometimes, students are natural writers, and the challenging task is getting them to stop and move onto the next assignment. But more often than not, it takes some creativity to get students excited about writing academic essays and papers. Luckily, there are some effective ways to inspire them to want to write and to give them the guidance necessary to help them succeed. Here are some tips to get your student(s) genuinely interested in writing.

1. Read

It cannot be said enough that reading and writing are intrinsically linked, for better or for worse. By encouraging your students to read more, they will not only gain more of an appreciation for the written word, but they will have a bigger vocabularies, better grammar, and more ideas to inspire them when they write. To get students to read, you can read aloud in class or assign reading several times each week. Once the students have read a work, have a group discussion about the reading assignment and get them talking about the piece.

2. Make It Applicable to Real Life

Do you have a class full of students that can’t stand writing academic essays for the sake of writing and getting a grade? Try a new approach in which they have to write things like letters to a friend, thank you notes after a holiday, or even a description of a person they are close to. They might be more interested in writing when it’s something they see as useful. Once they see the value in writing, you can go back to writing essays, poetry, prose, or research.

3. Suggest Inspiring Tools

One of the best ways to get students interested in writing is to give them tools that allow them to believe they can do it. Here are some tools that can offer help when it’s needed.
Hemingway Editor: Sometimes students need some help making their message clear. Hemingway Editor highlights any sentences that are too long or difficult to read, so that the student can rewrite these sections.

Readable: Readable gives your writing a grade level at which most people could easily read your work. Make sure this grade level isn’t so high as to be considered difficult to read. But also make sure it’s not too low.

EssayMama essay writers: Essay Mama can help students come up with great writing ideas. They can also help with editing, proofreading, and formatting academic essays.

Thesis Builder: Need some help coming up with a thesis for your paper? Thesis builder can help with that by asking some questions about your topic and giving you some options for a thesis.

Help.PlagTracker: PlagTracker will find any instances of plagiarism in your student’s paper and eliminate them. The website can even rewrite these sections with original content.

4. Show Off The Writing

Reward and inspire your best writers by showing off their work. You can do this in a number of ways. You can (with their permission) read their work aloud to the class. Alternatively, you could create a book with the best stories. These books could be distributed to your students alone or multiple classes. If you want to be a bit more subtle about it, you can post students’ work to a bulletin board or hang them in the hallways at your school. Whatever you do, make sure to let the students know that their work was featured because you enjoy their writing and look forward to what they will write next. (Doug: You can also post their best work on a class blog.)

5. Allow Illustrations

This might not be as important for older students (in High School or college), but younger students might feel discouraged when writing their essays if they can’t find the right words to say what they want to say. By allowing illustrations as part of the assignment (without compromising on the written requirements), students may feel more at ease about saying exactly the right thing. It may also provide further inspiration to tell their story in writing.

Whatever method you choose to help inspire your students, remember that everyone is different, and what works well for one student might not work for another. Try these tips one at a time to see what works and what doesn’t. And no matter what, remember that the best thing you can give to a student who is struggling to write is encouragement. Let them know that writing takes time and practice. If they keep at it, they’ll be successful.

Julie Petersen

Julie is a private English language tutor and a content marketing specialist. She is the author of educational AskPetersen review blog, and a contributor to such websites as FreelanceWrite.About, Business.com, and Teach.com. Contact Julie on Linkedin.

Share this:

Posted in Guest Posts | Comments Off on Five Ways To Make Essay Writing Engaging For Students by Julie Petersen

When it comes to teenage safety, which is more important? Privacy or Safety? by Hillary Smith
Thursday, January 7th, 2016

When it comes to teenage safety, which is more important? Privacy or Safety? by Hillary Smith offers sound advice for parents who have children approaching the age where they will have their own smartphone. This article also contains several excellent links to sites that reinforce and add depth to this fine effort. Thanks Hillary.

Introduction

There’s a lot to love about teens, but there are also some problems that we face as parents, and a few of these problems are worse than those where two cherished values come into conflict. There are, however, conversations that we need to have with our teens in light of the impact of modern technology. In this post I’ll take a look at where the values of privacy and safety stand and what we should do to deal with problems and how you might avoid them.

Teens Want Privacy Too.

As children grow older, they naturally start trying to acquire more privacy in their lives. They stop telling us everything they’re doing, develop more of a sense of modesty, and sometimes even go behind our backs to make the nicest things. It’s not just children, though. One look at the outcry over government surveillance programs makes it clear that our whole society cares about privacy. You can’t blame teens for wanting something when we tell them it’s good to have it, right?

Safety and the Teenage Brain

That’s when the other shoe hits. We love teens, but biology has long since proven that teen brains are still under construction. This means that they literally do not have the mental capacity to truly understand their actions or the consequences that could arise from the things they do.

This is especially true for impulse-driven behaviors that offer immediate rewards, which is exactly what the Internet and Social Media cater to. Posting a picture from a party may be fun now, but what if a potential employer looks at that picture five years from now and denies them a job as a result?

Most teens aren’t thinking about that sort of thing, and it could cost them. The key issue with online safety is that many of the threats aren’t immediate. Damage can often take place months or years afterwards. As parents, we want to keep our kids as safe as possible, but we also want to give them privacy and independence. How are these values supposed to be reconciled?

Watching Teens Over Time

The best answer may be a little of both. It goes like this. When your child first gains access to technology or new technology, such as adding a their own smartphone to their technological tools, watch them closely and carefully. We’re not trying to invade their privacy here, we’re just trying to make sure they understand what they’re doing and that they can be trusted to use the device without supervision. Over the next few years after they get their first smartphone, they can slowly gain more privileges and privacy. Smartphones can be addictive, so it’s best to start small and limit them to only an hour or two of access each day, gradually increasing the limit as they demonstrate their responsibility and maturity.

“Wait a sec,” you might be saying, “Doesn’t not having the phone on them defeat the purpose of having it in the first place?” That’s a fair question, and the answer is no. First of all, teens no longer regard phones as phones. They’re personal entertainment devices with portable connections to the internet, and the ability to make phone calls is just a secondary function. Secondly, most teens have no need for access to the device all day, every day. You can give it to them when you’re heading out for the day, but they don’t need it at all times. If someone really needs to call them, they can use the house phone or your phone if you don’t have a land line.

On top of that, if they need the smartphone during or after school, make sure they’re not using it during class without the teacher’s permission as they’re a known distraction from learning. You may also want to use monitoring software to be sure they’re not sending messages when they should be listening to the teacher. They should know about the monitoring, too. Children who know they’re being watched are far less likely to misbehave.

In short, stick with the old adage of ‘Safety First’ and give your teens the right to privacy when you know they can stay safe on their own.

Hillary Smith

Hillary was born and raised in Austin, TX. She is a free-lance journalist whose love of gadgets, technology and business has no bounds. After becoming a parent she now enjoys writing about family and parenting related topics. You can reach her by email at hilary.loren.smith@gmail.com.

Share this:

Posted in Guest Posts | Comments Off on When it comes to teenage safety, which is more important? Privacy or Safety? by Hillary Smith

Dr. Doug’s Multimedia Talk: Resources for Schools
Wednesday, December 23rd, 2015

On December 23, 2015, I gave a presentation on social media for educators to the staff at the Unatego Central School District in Upstate New York. During the talk I referred to the references below that for the most part stand on their own. Enjoy and share with educators you know.

Put this in the wall: Don’t post ANYTHING, ANYWHERE that you wouldn’t want ANYONE to see EVER! That goes for email too. If an email or any post makes you angry, your best reply is “let’s talk — tomorrow.”

You did review digital citizenship and online behavior prior to sending the kids off on the winter break, didn’t you? Research shows an increase of incidents related to sexual content and a spike in the number of students observed for depressive, self-harm, and suicidal issues during this time. Do you know who has this responsibility in your school?

Social Media and Your Reputation

Social media gives EVERYONE (that includes educators) one more way to get in trouble. What kind of trouble? See
Dr. Doug’s slides from his social media talk – This is a pdf file.

Your Facebook Online Reputation Can Help or Hurt Your Future. This is a great video to show students. @JoshOchs @safesmartsocial

Six Ways to Stay on Top of What Kids Are Doing Online

Good Selfie?

Bad Selfie?

What is the Periscope app? Social Media Safety Guide – There is a lot of good social media advice here. @JoshOchs @safesmartsocial

But What About Sex?

Adult Content Has Driven New Media Since the Beginning of Time.
If you want to read some research on the topic, type “Students viewing Internet porn research” into your favorite search engine or click here.
2015 Stats on Internet Porn – There is data here from many surveys that shows how often students of various ages and adults from various demographics view Internet porn. The big question is what should parents and teachers do about it?

Revenge Porn – What happens to the racy pictures you sent to your boyfriend when he becomes your ex-boyfriend?

Confessions of an orgy addict If you think Tinder is bad, how about 3rinder? Other special sites includ Grindr, JDate, and Christian Mingle. @JaneRidleyNY @nypost

Social Media for Communicating with Parents and Building Your Brand

Check out now New Milford High School in New Jersey uses social media.
If your school isn’t using social media to promote itself and communicate, consider starting a student club to do it.
Twitter People With the Most Followers – See if you can guess before you look.
I don’t advise 1:1 electronic communication with students. Let students post questions to a blog where all students can see the question and your answer. If inappropriate questions or comments come in, take them down and talk to the student in private.
How many kids don’t have access at home? Do you know who they are? Who teaches copyright issues? Have your read your school policy lately?

Social Media for Professional Development and Student Learning

Shouldn’t every educator have their own professional development plan? Social media can facilitate this.
Step one: Join Twitter and attend some Twitter chats. Start with #Edchat at noon and 7pm EST every Tuesday.
There are hashtags for every specialty in education.
Top Teacher Resource Blogs
How to Use Social Media for Professional Development
If you want your own personalized daily paper go here. Here is the link to my 12/15/2015 paper.

Students should have a larger audience.

Teachers should too. Do your teachers and students have blogs? Do students get to see their best work posted on the Internet? Why not?
How One Teacher Uses Her Blog – Note that top student work is posted her also. Is there student work on your blog?
If you want students to search for something that interests them Digg Here.
Should you punish students for social media behavior outside of school? It isn’t unusual for schools to receive viral criticism for over punishing kids. Here is one school that did. Hip-Hop Stars Support Mississippi Rapper in First Amendment Case.

Share this:

Posted in Doug's Original Work | Comments Off on Dr. Doug’s Multimedia Talk: Resources for Schools

Seven Digital Tools to Make Your Students Better Writers by Antonio Tooley
Thursday, December 17th, 2015

Seven Digital Tools to Make Your Students Better Writers by Antonio Tooley gives you the skinny on writing tools your students can use immediately. Creative writing is a process that happens in the human brain, and no technology can replace a good writer. However, the right technology can help you become a better one. It is a shame not to take advantage.

Antonio Tooley

Antonio is a hopeless optimist who enjoys basking in the world’s brightest colors. He loves biking to distant places and occasionally he gets lost. When not doing that he’s blogging and teaching ESL. He will be happy to meet you on Facebook and Twitter.

Introduction

The personal computer has not been around that long, and neither has the Internet. Despite their relatively recent entry into society, these two have become so important in daily life that students cannot imagine a world without either. They use both tools to socialize, play games, keep up with the news, keep in touch with friends, and otherwise keep themselves entertained.
However, very few people actually appreciate the potential of computer technology to serve a more complex purpose than finding out what their favorite celebrity had for breakfast. Digital technology is useful in everything – from organizing tasks to controlling the International Space Station. Using it for solving problems with creative tasks like writing is right up that alley. Students are lucky that information and useful apps are so accessible. It was not always like that. The great thing about digital technology is that most tools that can be of help for the research process are free to use or require just a little cash outlay. These apps are just out there, waiting. Here are seven of these tools to help students become better writers.

1. Trello

Managing projects just became easier with this simple and intuitive online task manager app. You can use it for creating a to-do list for each of your writing assignments (in separate boards), set deadlines for each task, make an outline, and even organize your references by attaching files. Best of all, you can invite people to help you through each task. All these functions can be done from one free account that syncs on all your devices so you can work on the go. Trello has a pretty neat interface so that all the task “cards” are on the dashboard allowing you to easily move everything around. The free account is fully functional. However, if you want more features, you can choose the paid version for $5 a month.

2. Ideaflip

Group writing assignments can be hard if you all have busy schedules and nary a common time to come together to discuss your action plan. Ideaflip is a cloud-based tool you can use to collaborate with group members to generate and organize ideas wherever you are, in real time. It uses post-it type notes that you can create, edit, drag and drop anywhere on the idea space. You can upload PDF, image, and CSV files, and even screenshots of websites. You export your collaboration as a slide presentation. All you have to do is simply create an account, invite your group members, and use the free 14-day trial version. The monthly subscription is $19 a month or $199 a year.

3. Edugeeksclub

If you are on your own – without a clue as to what to do and your friends are of no help – there is no need to panic. You can collaborate with the professional writers and editors of Edugeeksclub at any stage of your writing process. They can give you a crash course on what a polished, well-researched paper or essay looks like. If you just need research or editing help, they can do that, too. Rates vary depending on the work, the level of expertise required, and the urgency. The price range is from $1.99 to $29.99 a page.

4. Ilys

Ilys may possibly stand for “I love your style” because that is the whole message of this app to all writers. It seems to say, “Just keep writing, and whatever it is it will be wonderful, typos and all.” Well, maybe not wonderful, but the tool does get you writing until you reach your word count goal just to see what it looks like. You will probably edit a lot at first, but once you get used to the weird one-letter-at-a-time interface, you will start making fewer mistakes and need fewer edits. It is a great tool if you are a perpetual “I’ll do it later” type of writer, or if you have writer’s block. The trial version lets you compose up to 3,000 words, after which you pay $10.08 a month to continue using it.

5. Blankpage

One of the nightmare visions of all writers is staring at a blank page. This tool prevents that horror from becoming a reality because it helps you become productive by letting you write without distractions, and do so whenever and wherever you feel like it. In fact, this web-based app lets you set daily writing goals and nags you until you reach them. The minimalist interface harks back to paper and pen days when all you had to do was put one word after another in succession. You can jot down topics and ideas that you can go back to when you are ready to write it. It will also tell you how long it takes to read out the text, which is a useful feature when you are writing your valedictory speech. The downside is that there is no free trial version of this app. You can try it for $5 a week (plus VAT). If you like it, you can upgrade to the $10 a month or the $100 a year plans (plus VAT).

6. Dailypage

Most people need a nudge to start writing, and this online app does just that by giving you daily prompts. You can chose to respond or not, but either way, it does give you writing ideas. You can choose to make your response private or public. You can also check out what other users are writing about the same topic. It can help you develop your writing skills day by day, and you can even take one of their paid online writing courses if you want. It is free to use after signing up on the site.

7. Onlinecorrection

This is a cool free online tool for finding spelling, grammar, and stylistic mistakes. You don’t even have to sign up to use it. Just copy and paste the passage you want to check, or type directly on the window. OnlineCorrection will then go through each gaffe and error with you and give suggestions for correction or improvement. It does not catch all mistakes, but it does catch a lot.

Share this:

Posted in Guest Posts | Comments Off on Seven Digital Tools to Make Your Students Better Writers by Antonio Tooley

« Older Entries

Newer Entries »

Author Archive

Hacking Assessment: 10 Ways To Go Gradeless In a Traditional Grades School by Starr Sackstein

Goodbye, Grades; Hello, Growth

Hack 1: Shift the Grades Mindset

Hack 2: Promote Buy-In

Hack 3: Rebrand Assignments as Learning Experiences

Hack 4: Facilitate Student Partnerships

Hack 5: Digitize Your Data

Hack 6: Maximize Time

Hack 7 Track Progress Transparently

Hack 8: Teach Reflection

Hack 9: Teach Students to Self-Grade

Hack 10: Cloud-Based Archives

Starr Sackstein

Five Ways To Make Essay Writing Engaging For Students by Julie Petersen

Introduction

1. Read

2. Make It Applicable to Real Life

3. Suggest Inspiring Tools

4. Show Off The Writing

5. Allow Illustrations

Julie Petersen

When it comes to teenage safety, which is more important? Privacy or Safety? by Hillary Smith

Introduction

Teens Want Privacy Too.

Safety and the Teenage Brain

Watching Teens Over Time

Hillary Smith

Dr. Doug’s Multimedia Talk: Resources for Schools

Social Media and Your Reputation

But What About Sex?

Social Media for Communicating with Parents and Building Your Brand

Social Media for Professional Development and Student Learning

Students should have a larger audience.

Seven Digital Tools to Make Your Students Better Writers by Antonio Tooley

Antonio Tooley

Introduction

1. Trello

2. Ideaflip

3. Edugeeksclub

4. Ilys

5. Blankpage

6. Dailypage

7. Onlinecorrection

Book Summaries