Teach2Connect

ethics crisis!

Posted on November 14, 2008 by Teach2Connect

Teaching character is always a tightrope. In our school, we are lucky to have the basis of Christian faith as a jumping off point for our conversations, lessons, moments along the way. This month we have a focus of the trait of Courage. For grades 2 and 3 students are looking at courage through the lens of composers. Second grade is studying Beethoven and Third is studying Handel.

The students in Third grade watched a realistic fiction piece, “Handel’s Last Chance” and are now taking an in-class field trip to the Handel Learning Center. One of their tasks is filming their response to the question “How did Handel or Jamie (a character in the film) show courage?” There is a scene in the film about stealing a chicken and some of the children have identified this as a courageous moment in Jamie’s life. Oh dear me! After a discussion about the meaning of courage (again) and whether or not stealing is ever allowed I find that our conversation needs a bit more de-briefing. Some of the kids made a really good point about how the character was poor and hungry so he stole to feed his family. This leads us to that ever present question of is stealing ever ok? Who knew such ethical crises could occur in the mind of an 8 year old.

I’m fascinated by their deep compassion for the character but at the same amazed at their inner struggles to justify stealing. I look forward to watching their videos and once they are complete, I will certainly post it here for you.

is this wiki working?

Posted on November 12, 2008 by Teach2Connect

As I work with my 6th grade class to develop a wiki to catalogue our learning this year, I find myself wondering if this is the best device for this kind of “data” collection. I use the term data loosely as I don’t want to equate our work in any way with standardization or number crunching.

My students from the first trimester rotation gave great feedback on this new course. They mentioned that they were frustrated by the wiki’s functionality, particularly the “stealing of the lock” message when multiple users are editing simultaneously. I’m not sure the way around this anymore then they are, but we will continue to learn together.

I love the idea that we are using a wiki and this is our portal for demonstrating our learning, but I wonder if a forum function would be better or if using google docs or another type of sharing tool would be more useful. I’m really thinking overall that a NING would serve us best. But a wiki we’ve begun so a wiki we’ll complete.

google docs

Posted on November 6, 2008 by Teach2Connect

This was a great post today from the digital learning environments site. I am a late bloomer to Google Docs, but am trying to make it work and exploring how it might work for my sixth graders. They DO have email, but it isn’t always the most productive way to do an “attachment”.

Square Peg/Round Hole.

Posted on November 6, 2008 by Teach2Connect

On Tuesday, our faculty had the privilege of learning from Dr. Judi Harris, of the College of William and Mary. Dr. Harris is a leader in the field of educational technology and there was much to be learned from her. Perhaps the most engaging and “touchstone” element of her presentation was the three-part test for the value of using technology to enhance or further a curriculum goal.

While I do not want to infringe on her copyright of the test, its basic gist is: Is it feasible? Is it Appropriate? Does it provide a Relative Advantage? Needless to say it provoked in me the idea that just because I understand how to use and am excited about a particular online tool it does not mean I must immediately use it. I’ll call it the square peg/round hole concept. If I am going to use a piece of educational technology, say a wiki or a voicethread, will is enhance or further the curriculum goal or is it just a “cool new thing”. Likewise, is the use of such a tool going to increase student achievement.

The ubitquitous concept of increasing student achievement is such a fine line in a school discipline where my students are not actually assessed on their academic achievement. My middle school students are assessed academically, but not my primary and intermediate students. Regardless, how does one measure the advancement of student achievement as it results from the use of educational technology. The verdict is still out.

Nevertheless, I will put my practice to the test to really look at matching the use of online tools appropriately for the ehancement of the curricular goals rather than just being the “cool teacher using tech stuff”. It is my hope that a more judicious point of view will lead to greater student achievement and understanding.

Hello Big World!

Posted on November 5, 2008 by Teach2Connect

After three years of blogging for my personal use, I decided it was time to put all of my ideas, resources, and streams of consciousness about teaching out into cyberspace. This will blog will serve as a window into my professional life as I work to help children how music, performing, and character all relate to every other arenas of their lives. Whew. Big Task. Welcome to the Journey.