The Image Factor

One of our 5^th grade must read aloud books is a story about the life of Jackie Robinson. Engaging students in nonfiction can be a challenging task, but our students really involved themselves in Jackie’s life and daily struggles. They asked great questions about the reality he lived in, trying to understand why he was treated so poorly. Students had rich discussions, showing empathy and compassion for Jackie.

I began to read a chapter that explained the country’s state at the time Jackie was an adult. Words like prejudice and discrimination were discussed, as many students were unsure of what the word prejudice meant. Using the Google Home the words were defined and discussed. However, as we got into the chapter the word lynching came off the pages. I suggested our Googler of the Day ask the Google Home what lynching meant.

The definition came out of the speaker. Gasps about how could this happen in real life were heard. This led to courageous conversations about how I felt reading the book and how students felt listening to the story. We interacted with the text as a community.

That night as I was prepping for our #FETC presentation on data privacy and personal assistants in education, I happened to reflect on our usage that day. It dawned on me that had I asked a student to Google the word lynching on one of the classroom computers the student would see the definition and have the option of seeing images or a video feed of lynching.

Not every parent is ready for their child to see these images, and I was glad the Google Home was a protection for our 5^th grade students. Using this tool allowed us to have dialogue around the word and how it made us feel versus seeing it in action. Sometimes we need to consider the image factor when allowing our younger students to use Google for searching. This is one of those times I was grateful the personal assistant was available to allow us to have a developmentally appropriate conversation.

Our Reactions Speak Volumes

Our Reactions Speak Volumes

Guest blog post on Craig Klement's blog.

Continuing the Conversation

Okay Google! I want to have a conversation. Imagine the possibilities of being able to have a conversation with a personal assistant device because this setting is now available. This morning my FETC co presenter on data privacy and using personal assistants in the school setting, Eileen Belatock, sent me an article with the question Have you seen this?

The title How to Enable Continued Conversations for Google Assistants struck a chord as I immediately began to wonder what having a conversation with the Google Home could mean. I read the article, which talks about this excellent feature and how easy it is to change the settings. I wondered if this was really an excellent feature for a classroom or to use with students.

My mind was racing as I began to ponder what this actually meant, so I decided to do some investigating. I followed the instructions of how to enable the conversation view to see what would happen, but as soon as I got to the toggle option to turn continued conversation on, I found my answer.

Wait a minute! Is it excellent that the mic will be turned back on after every response for the Google Home to listen? Do we want it to listen to us after we immediately ask it a question? Our class worked hard to develop a RUP and guidelines for the Google Home use in the classroom, and by turning this feature on we actually violate our own policy. We turn off the mic and unplug it after a question is answered. I asked Eileen what her tech director advice was, and she confirmed my own thinking. She said, “NO!” we should not be turning this option on.

I discussed this feature with students to gather their thoughts.

Owen shared we have no idea who can see our responses on Google’s end so we should not turn this feature on. Jacob did not think we should turn it on because it will hear other people talking around you and record that while it is waiting for a response. He felt it does not have the right to hear other conversations. Ava added that the Google Home should not be listening to us all the time. Chase also thought we should not turn it on because it could pick up questions students ask to the teacher. They are not asking the Google Home the follow up question, so it should not be recording. Jenny added one of our guidelines is to unplug it when we are done with it, so turning it on would not follow that rule. Emmeline asked why we even need it since we are asking one question. We do not ask multiple questions. The class voted and decided we do not need this feature. However, they felt some people might find it to be an excellent feature but here in school it is not one we want to use.

Therefore, our class will not be using this feature that I did not find excellent. Before you turn on a new feature, I always suggest doing some research, talking to people, and making sure it is a safe practice to use with students. I will leave you with a question. How much data do we need the Google Home to collect?

Making Feelings Visible

Before vacation I got a note in our classroom bothering box. It simply said There is girl drama. I took a deep breath because navigating the world of problem solving for young female students can be tricky. Over the course of the next few days I received emails from students about their feelings of what has been going on to them in our classroom. Students self-advocating and communicating to the teacher via classroom email was something I never got to do as a young girl. I wish I had that option. I am sure many of us do.

I respectfully asked the students involved to spend vacation week enjoying time with family and friends and to shut out the negativity until we got back to school. I reiterated that sharing thoughts online should be considered strongly before hitting the send button. Once you hit send there is no turning back. The girls promised me they would heed my suggestions.

I spent some time trying to decide the best course of action. I thought heavily on what the actual problem was and how best to address it. My solution was to make their thinking visible. We have been discovering the beauty of sketchnoting this year as a form of communication, and I wondered if this technique could apply to social emotional learning. Reflecting on today I am proud to say I have some students who saw conflict resolution, compassion, and empathy through images and words.  I also have students who are laughing and feeling the power of positivity versus the negativity they left school break feeling.

What I did today was unlike anything I have ever done before with students. I explained to the students that we were not there for them to tell me what the other did and then either deny or accept that claim. This would get us nowhere. Rather we were here to discuss our feelings. I had each girl draw on our board how the other person made her feel. Then they had to switch places and write why she thought her peer drew what she drew. We ended up with a lot of hurt feelings on both sides, which was not surprising. We discussed where some of these feelings stemmed from, and it had to do with words being shared, perception, and assumptions and their reactions from that. I then sketched my thinking about what happened around the girls’ work. This showed a clearer process for us all to discuss.

The image below is a recreation I designed of what happened today, color coded to represent the different people participating in this exercise similar to what happened on our classroom whiteboard. The images on the board helped shaped the conversation, listening, and responding that occurred during our talk. 

We shared how these words, assumptions, and perceptions led to hurt, anger, frustration, etc. This became a catalyst for negative talk whether face to face, online, or with peers. We talked about how good friends do not make each other feel this way. I then had them write about how they each made each other feel prior to this incident, and they shared some candid things that involved laughter, sharing, and being helpful. They offered to read these statements to each other and we discussed our hopes moving forward. 

I shared that I hope they can come to an agreement on how to move forward whether it was that the negative feelings outweigh the positive or vice versa. They agreed they missed each other. and suggested working on improving their relationship. This led to a brief conversation about how both of them is wise beyond her years but is only 10 or 11. Friendships are tricky to navigate especially with the variety of ways people communicate in today’s world. Regardless, with some dry erase markers, we can make feelings visible, and we all deserve that.

A Journey Into Podcasting

This year we were asked to use Wordly Wise to help teach vocabulary through direct instruction. For those of you who know me I am not what you would classify as a workbook person, but I was on board with the expectations from my administration. However I did ask if I could use the book in different ways with the goal of students learning the words and applying them in a variety of situations with understanding.

We spent the first several units (1-3) learning how to figure out what words mean and expectations of exercises in the book. I wanted to create an authentic experience for students to use the vocabulary words and decided we would create our first class podcast.

I spent some time researching various podcast programs and speaking to colleagues across the country who podcast with students, including our principal. I asked for permission to do this as well. The programs suggested were:

• Podbean
• Irig with anchor
• Vocaroo
• Audacity
• Sound trap
• twistedwave.com/online

I met with the people from Soundtrap. Though that is an amazing program to use, it is not sustainable given the cost I would have to pay out of pocket. I decided to start with Anchor.

Students and I met to discuss possible themes for a podcast. They had time to individually write a list of ideas. Then they met in a small group, figuring out two possible choices. Students showed me their two choices, and I asked them to come up with a list of items we could podcast about under one of them.

Students suggested The Day in the Life of a 5th grader, books, Discovery Quests, and Top 10 Lists. We had a long discussion about which one would produce the easiest way for us to discuss things and use our vocab words.

Students narrowed it down to Top 10 and Day in the Life of a 5^th grader. We then spent some time chatting about each one, expressing opinions and asking questions. I pulled two students together and modeled how it would look with each one. Students realized the Top 10 one would require research and be very limited in information, so we should use that as a backup. They had a lot to say about their days, and it didn’t have to be just in school. We used words we had already covered from topics 1-3 to create a short podcast. I needed to figure out with students how to use Anchor and get us started. We are all learning together.

The students worked in collaborative groups to create their first segment. We counted off by 3s, and each group took a chapter from Worldly Wise. I modeled what one could say in a podcast and went over a bunch of ideas they could talk about. We also listened to sample podcasts. Students did a great job creating their first segment. However when I did a mock recording, they expected it to be done in the first try. They learned things take time, patience, and practice. It was a dry run through. I figured out Anchor does not let you record and upload at the same time. I can do one long piece and break it up. Students needed to practice a bit more since they were off key when speaking in unison and crumbled paper or were not sure when to go. I also forgot to use the microphone I had gotten.

 

We did see Anchor had music for a theme song. I decided to do the small chunks with a live studio audience. I hooked up the mic. We organized the segments by type and had the students come up to read. Two groups had some trouble starting but we were able to delete their blooper and rerecord. When they were done I spent some time after school figuring out how to put the podcast episode together with transitions. Then I shared it with families and on social media.

What started as a voyage into vocabulary words turned into something much bigger! Check out our first class podcast!

I spent some time with the students listening to the podcast. They were asked to think about things we did well and things we need to work on. They could have either written bulleted notes or sketchnotes. Students thought some groups were animated. They gave props to our singers. They liked that we had a lot to talk about. One student was surprised at how people got along and did not argue when having to do the task. They felt we needed to work on intonation (voice excitement), more diverse topics, and background noises.

They really did a great job capturing some specific ideas of what we can do moving forward. I talked about using passions, ideas, and reflection to share their story. Students see the benefit of using Wordly Wise exercises to help us get to know the words. The background knowledge of the words was helpful. Our podcast has inspired others at the elementary level across the country!

Several students were empowered to blog about their podacasting experience!

Check out the work of Kayleigh and Parker!

Our journey is just beginning, and we are going down this podcasting path together.

Going Off Script

The math program goes from dividing by tens to dividing with a two digit divisor without any reteaching of division with a one digit divisor. Therefore I took a leap and went off script! I broke the lessons down to really make sure students had a solid understand of division.

The first day I put a problem on the board to get their minds going. Some students picked up their pencils, expecting to solve the problem. I surprised them and asked them to think about how to explain what this problem means using math vocabulary. Using BrainPOP’s Make a Map tool we developed a word web for division. The word quotient was in the middle. Students came up with dividend, divisor, remainder, equal group, and product. This led to a conversation on inverse operations. Then I asked students to write me a short piece, explaining what division is. Having students explain math concepts using vocabulary is a great way to express understanding and take a deeper dive.

Students shared their written pieces with classmates. Then we started learning how to divide in groups of tens, hundreds, and thousands. Many students used multiplication to help them. Laying the foundation helped us the second day when I posted a problem with a single digit divisor. Again, some students picked up pencils to solve the problem. Alas they sadly had to put them down because we showed this problem using a model (base 10 blocks). Students saw why we start dividing in different places when we had trade cubes to make more cubes. They began to understand why we have a remainder, and that if your remainder is larger than  your divisor it is incorrect.

Breaking up into small groups, students worked with teachers on understanding the process of division and thinking in terms of equal groups. We practiced several problems as a whole class, then small group, and finally independently. Students who needed a challenge got some bigger numbers to divide using a single digit divisor. Tomorrow we will use a deck of cards to create problems to solve. Then we will return to our math lessons from the program. Sometimes it is okay to go off script. Know your students. Understand their needs. That is what is most important. If I had jumped into two digit divisors I know the results would have been vastly different.

A parent sent me this image of her child's work that the student did when she got home from school. 

I have shared the image with her permission.