In my first post regarding Edtech Challenges, I highlight an issue of students developing a portfolio of evidence that can follow them throughout their lives. After completing a module on Project Based Learning and completing research on the use of blogs and eportfolios, I now fully subscribe to this belief.
I believe the process of developing the Edtech Challenges object has allowed me to reflect on how both the institute in which I work and my own views on different students' motivations are guided outside of school. Giving students choice is important, but I have also feel that the ability of the teacher to assess the work done by students is manageable. Understanding the diversity in our learners is an important part of our role, however I also see the need to balance the work load for teachers. I build and use rubrics for assignments that give students the choice of how they "respond" to the challenge of the task. By providing a grading rubric, students know what is expected of them and the teacher can assess submissions based on these standards.
Tuesday 5 August 2014
Monday 4 August 2014
Scaffolding
According to Jaime McKenzie scaffolding:
1. Provides clear direction and reduces students’ confusion – Educators anticipate problems that students might encounter and then develop step by step instructions, which explain what a student must do to meet expectations.
2. Clarifies purpose – Scaffolding helps students understand why they are doing the work and why it is important.
3. Keeps students on task – By providing structure, the scaffolded lesson or research project, provides pathways for the learners. The student can make decisions about which path to choose or what things to explore along the path but they cannot wander off of the path, which is the designated task.
4. Clarifies expectations and incorporates assessment and feedback – Expectations are clear from the beginning of the activity since examples of exemplary work, rubrics, and standards of excellence are shown to the students.
5. Points students to worthy sources – Educators provide sources to reduce confusion, frustration, and time. The students may then decide which of these sources to use.
6. Reduces uncertainty, surprise, and disappointment – Educators test their lessons to determine possible problem areas and then refine the lesson to eliminate difficulties so that learning is maximized
7. Delivers efficiency – Since the work is structured, focused, and glitches have been reduced or eliminated prior to initiation, time on task is increased and efficiency in completing the activity is increased.
8. Creates momentum – Through the structure provided by scaffolding, students spend less time searching and more time on learning and discovering, resulting in quicker learning
From: Scaffolding as a Teaching Strategy
I intend to provide my students with a project website where they can access the full content, schedule, resources, assessments - formative and summative - rubrics, basically everything they will need to complete the project in the absence of a teacher. Communication will also be built into the site; it will be in Google Sites and part of our GAFE domain. All of McKenzie's points will be addressed by the project site and will offer the teacher access to statistics of access in order to preempt Issues of students not getting involved.
1. Provides clear direction and reduces students’ confusion – Educators anticipate problems that students might encounter and then develop step by step instructions, which explain what a student must do to meet expectations.
2. Clarifies purpose – Scaffolding helps students understand why they are doing the work and why it is important.
3. Keeps students on task – By providing structure, the scaffolded lesson or research project, provides pathways for the learners. The student can make decisions about which path to choose or what things to explore along the path but they cannot wander off of the path, which is the designated task.
4. Clarifies expectations and incorporates assessment and feedback – Expectations are clear from the beginning of the activity since examples of exemplary work, rubrics, and standards of excellence are shown to the students.
5. Points students to worthy sources – Educators provide sources to reduce confusion, frustration, and time. The students may then decide which of these sources to use.
6. Reduces uncertainty, surprise, and disappointment – Educators test their lessons to determine possible problem areas and then refine the lesson to eliminate difficulties so that learning is maximized
7. Delivers efficiency – Since the work is structured, focused, and glitches have been reduced or eliminated prior to initiation, time on task is increased and efficiency in completing the activity is increased.
8. Creates momentum – Through the structure provided by scaffolding, students spend less time searching and more time on learning and discovering, resulting in quicker learning
From: Scaffolding as a Teaching Strategy
I intend to provide my students with a project website where they can access the full content, schedule, resources, assessments - formative and summative - rubrics, basically everything they will need to complete the project in the absence of a teacher. Communication will also be built into the site; it will be in Google Sites and part of our GAFE domain. All of McKenzie's points will be addressed by the project site and will offer the teacher access to statistics of access in order to preempt Issues of students not getting involved.
I want students to be able to submit work and receive feedback on their performance immediately. Since some students will work at a different speed to others, having students self assess their work in the first instance seems logical. To achieve this, I will use a GForm that submits the students' answer to a GSheet that is attached to a GDoc template, via Autocrat, with the correct answers written in. the students will be able to self assess and then receive comments and feedback from their teacher at a later date.
Scaffolding of skill acquisition in research and practical write-ups may be accomplished in a similar way using a GForm that marks and gives feedback based on a set of correct answers. Calibrating the students' research and write-up reviewing skills may be done by giving the students an exemplar piece of work that has been produced by the exam board. The students can complete the form for each part of the research exemplar and receive feedback as to their accuracy. If the rubric they use is easy to understand, hopefully the students will come into line with the examiners as quickly as they do the the research I have read!
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