Upon the conclusion of this week’s learning resources I sat back and really tried to respond to William Richardson’s statement that basically said that teachers must use technology to push student learning and development (Richardson, 2010). Admittedly, I struggled to come up with an idea on how a 10th grade Global Studies teacher would be able to use a blog.
Upon further reading Richardson states that blogs serve to connect people around the world (Richardson, 2010). That is when the light bulb went off. I have a friend who teaches 10th grade Global Studies roughly three hours away. If we were able to keep our curriculums closely aligned, we could have all each of our students create blogs in which they are given partners, similar to Internet pen pals. We could create assignments where for one chapter his class creates individual reviews and my class is then responsible for signing on and completing the reviews to prepare for tests, each student will benefit and we can change roles from chapter to chapter. Then the students would be using the information from class and communicating it to a new individual who benefits from the practice and the creator of the review gets to review further by grading the review. These reviews could be short answer or a posted Microsoft Word document.
This type of an activity gets the kids communicating with those people who exist outside their comfort zone, which helps to build character, they get to work with technology, and they are most importantly still working heavily with classroom content. I fell as though this would have to be highly structured and clearly modeled, but how cool would it be for our kids to be responsible from someone else’s education.
Cole-
ReplyDeleteI also thought about how W. Richardson pushed the point that blogs need to be educational, not a journal and how the need to encourage thinking and learning. I tried to make my lessons meet those criteria.
You could also have each student post a question and the pen pal would have to answer the question. This would add to the "thinking deeper" and making students contribute to the lesson of the day/week.
Cole,
ReplyDeleteI think using blogs to work cooperatively with another class is wonderful! There's one concern I have about your idea. What if one partner is doing substandard work or otherwise affecting the learning of the other? I know as an adult I've collaborated with colleagues who didn't pull their weight and it affected what we were working on, and I've seen students grapple with the same frustraton while working in groups in class. I would suggest possibly switching partners after a set amount of time so that students can both gain more experience working with others and avoid a pitfall such as that. Good luck!
You make a very important point. I feel one way to combat substandard work is to choice a collaborating teacher wisely. Also, If we are explicit in our expectations, there will be no reason to not meet those standards. I certainly understand where you are coming from and I can only imagine how frustrating a situation like you have brought up could be. Thanks for the input!
DeleteI think your idea for students to connect with another class to create lesson reviews using the same text would be a great tool. When your students create the reviews it will be reinforce content and help them to review as well. I don't know how much content you have to cover, but I think Global Studies provides a wonderful opportunity for students to learn about other cultures or the beliefs and values held by their peers. Perhaps you could look at the topics that you will be learning about in your respective classes and then use the blogs as a forum for discussion. The blog could be a place where your students could share their beliefs and values about related topics or where they could respond to a thought provoking question.
ReplyDeleteYou might also be able to collaborate with secondary teachers in other countries and use the blogs to have your students learn about their peers across the world. They could share the respective customs, beliefs, and foods of their countries. They might discuss favorite movies, musicians, and how they get their news. I have a colleague who does this with his students in a similar class.
Cole,
ReplyDeleteI see that you are also a NYS teacher and feel the pressure of the Regents Exam. Tenth-grade global is probably one of the toughest years to teach because of the two years of information covered between grades 9 and 10 tested at the end of the year. Your collaboration with another teacher three hours away seems like a good idea; have you thought about collaborating with the ninth grade global teacher(s) at your school in a similar assignment as a way for 10th graders to review for the Regents?
Cole,
ReplyDeleteYour idea might also be better served using a Wiki. Your students would collaborate with the other class to co-construct the study guides and add other content such as videos, images, and articles that they have found to support class content (Richardson, 2009, p. 61-62).
My knowledge of Wiki is nonexistant. When I learn more about them and see what it can do in my class, I would love to try that out!
DeleteYour idea is interesting. I believe that you are correct that this activity would have to be structured and clearly modelled. This type of communication is so different from the way in which most teens communicate with each other (social networking, texting, etc.) that you probably would need to establish clear expectations regarding langugage, mechanics, content, and so forth to ensure that this activity would be a valuable learning experience for all.
ReplyDelete