Using Technology to Enhance the Writing Process

The ISTE Standard 2 explains that students will use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others. Ultimately, a teacher's role is to engage a student in individual learning as well as full class learning, and technology can be one tool to help students achieve that learning. In the article we read from edutopia by Michelle Lampinen, she explains how blogging encouraged students to write more, allowed them to use their own voice, and also motivated them to have less writing errors. This idea helped me to think through my own questions about using technology to support students in the writing process.

Oftentimes, in both my ELA class and my ELL class, it is a struggle to have students reflect and revise works of writing. In ELA, oftentimes students feel this is an unnecessary step. In my ELL class, it can create anxiety when grammar and spelling are extreme, and trigger students with fixed mindsets to give up. What I love about both the article by Lampinen and an article I found from edutopia is it expressed the amount of student buy-in when students were able to share their work with a broad audience. I felt that Rusul Alrubail, the author of the article Blogging for English Language Learners, made it clear that implementing a blog in either my ELL class or even my ELA class is a viable option to improving students ability to revise their work (Alrubail, 2015).

This blogging would have great impacts on my students individual learning and group learning. First, students who are struggling with form and grammar can see exemplary students and grow from the More Knowledgeable Other (MKO). Students who are more advanced can assist their classmates and demonstrate their ability to think beyond spelling and grammar to meaning. Plus, it raises their affective filter as they support their peers. Overall, it requires all students to edit work every time they write, a skill many of my students to not use when writing informally. Moreover, blogging can create a strong way for students to build up each other's work and support one another through revision, which is the base of ISTE standard 2.

Lampinen, M. (2013). Blogging in the 21st Century Classroom. Edutopia.org. Retrieved from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/blogging-in-21st-century-classroom-michelle-lampinen

Alrubail, R. (2015). Blogging for English Language Learners. Edutopia.org. Retrieved from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/blogging-for-english-language-learners-rusul-alrubail

Fostering a Creative Classroom

ISTE Standard I: Creativity and innovation

Students demonstrate creative thinking, construct knowledge, and develop innovative products and processes using technology.

a. Apply existing knowledge to generate new ideas, products, or processes

b. Create original works as a means of personal or group expression

c. Use models and simulations to explore complex systems and issues

d. Identify trends and forecast possibilities

My triggering event question: What types of technology exist that students can use in schools where technology is outdated and slow?

The ISTE Standard 1 requires that teachers use technology to transform the classroom culture so that students can use their creativity to enhance classroom activities. This standard asks teachers to move beyond the process of enhancement to transforming the classroom for students to utilize the creative process.

My own use of technology is so limited, and my school’s use of technology is right there with me. My question came from a place of wanting to explore how to use technology in the classroom, but a fear that I probably wouldn’t be able to transform the culture with the little amount of technology that we have. I was fascinated from the study in Hong Kong, by Syh-Jong Jang, where the study demonstrates that students’ creativity is enhanced through online interaction and peer competition; however, the author pointed out that some challenges were student’s (lack of) access to internet as well as their abilities using word processing (Jang 2009).

After reading this, my question changed just a little bit. I didn’t just want to find out what types of technology were available for students who had little access, but I also wanted to find apps that did not require students to rely on typing quickly.

EmergingEdTech.com had 8 really strong ideas. What I liked was that most were simple technology that even I could utilize for students. Plus, one of the websites-mind meister- allows students to interact from one class to another. I was imagining how this tool could have enhanced my recent lesson on theme. Students from my first class had really strong ideas, and if my next two periods had seen them, I bet their ideas would have been even stronger; instead, the second two groups came up with themes that we didn’t end up using. I believe if I had been able to use an app like this for students to bounce ideas off of each other from class to class, students would have been able to use their creativity and have stronger themes.

Again, I still feel like even this activity would only be an enhancement to the lesson; however, this website gave me a few ideas for ways to experiment with technology in the classroom. Unfortunately, I do not know if it is possible to transform a classroom culture with the lack of access we have at my school to technology. That would be a great question to save for a future week. But even with the materials I have found so far, I feel like they would begin to spark my students creativity, particularly because these resources are visually engaging and new.

Jang, S.J. (2009). Exploration of Secondary Students’ Creativity by Integrating Web-Based Technology Into an Innovative Science Curriculum. Computers & Education, 52, 247-255. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5W5P9bQJ6q0N0xSTnc0bEpZUGM/view

Walsh, K. (2014). 8 Engaging Ways To Use Technology in the Classroom to Create Lessons that Aren’t Boring. Emergingedtech.com. http://www.emergingedtech.com/2014/10/technology-create-lessons-that-arent-boring/

Standard 6: Assessment

Through my time learning in the Alternative Routes to Certification program, I am beginning to feel more confident in my disposition as a teacher. I am building my teacher persona and becoming more comfortable in the classroom. As I grow more confident in my teaching persona, I am still developing strategies and learning a few of the 8 program standards, including assessment. While I can create assessments and even use informal assessment to adjust my own instruction, I am still working on giving students usable feedback in an organized way. 

SPU’s program standard 8 explains that a teacher can use both informal and formal assessment to inform his or her instruction, as well as evaluate student learning. It includes creating assessment around common core standards, assessing students daily using formative assessment to adjust teaching instruction. It also includes providing feedback to students about their progress as they learn, taking into consideration student voice. While I feel comfortable with planning assessment around standards, and even using informal assessment to inform my own lesson planning, I want to continue learning about giving students feedback through their work.

Recently, students read the book Night in class. During this week, students worked towards formulating themes by looking for the author’s message. For our exit slip, my mentor teacher and I asked students to respond to one instance where the character interacts with his father, God, or himself. We also asked students what the author’s message for readers was. In this informal assessment, many students could recall an occurrence where the main character interacts with himself or others; however, about half of the class did not put any answer for the author’s message. As a response to students who did not have a message, I simply wrote, “author’s message?” For students who did write a message, I gave them a mark (V+). At the beginning of the year, my mentor teacher and I explained to students what each informal assessment mark means (V, +, or -).

From these exit slips, I knew my mentor teacher and I should make sure that all students could identify a message from character interactions. Many students identified a message, but none of them were strong. Because of this, my mentor teacher and I created a follow up lesson to have students create messages in groups, rather than independently. By working in groups, almost all groups brainstormed one of the messages of the author. Some groups needed teacher support and guidance. From there, students worked in the same groups to change that message into a theme. But by the end of the lesson, all students had accomplished the objective in their exit task.

Through reflecting on this experience, I realized that I feel more comfortable in creating assessments around standards. With the help of my mentor teacher, I created a lesson that evaluated student’s ability to develop theme (R.L. 2). From student’s exit slips, I modified a lesson to meet students where they struggled. Through this lesson, students who were still confused about the authors message worked collectively to create a message and turn it into a theme. Students who had already created strong messages in their exit slips were able to modify them into strong themes with a group. By the end of the second day, all students had created a theme, which my mentor teacher and I used to create five themes summarizing the book. Although some themes were stronger than others, every student demonstrated their knowledge of identifying a message of the author and demonstrated their ability to create a theme from that message.

Although I felt satisfied with student learning, through the process of reflection I have some practical steps I can take to increase student feedback and even my ability to create meaningful exit slips. First, when I read student’s exit slips, I did not give any direct feedback to half the class. In the future, when assigning exit slips, I would like to give students a remind of what each of the scores mean. For example, with this exit slip, I could have shown students that receiving a – mark meant that the exit slip was incomplete, and that the student did not demonstrate the learning target. I could explain that receiving a V meant that student did not give an author’s message, and that receiving a + means that student demonstrated all components of the exit slip, and that the student fully understands the objective. This is something I could modify each time to remind students before the complete the exit slip what they are hoping to achieve (objective related tasks) and bring this information back when students exit slips are returned. I believe this method helps me to communicate clearly to students while not taking forever to grade, and it helps students identify if they reached the objective for the day.

Overall, implementing this strategy would increase the effectiveness of my exit task routine. It gives students a reminder of what they want to reach for. It will help me as I grade, and it will help students to receive clear feedback about what they still do not understand. Finally, it will help me to create differentiation in my future lessons, as I use student data to modify and create lessons.