Completing our second major unit on Evolution, students' work was well thought-out and the quality has definitely improved. A number of students chose to use Google Drive, working from Windows desktops, laptops, and tablets. Sharing their work made instant feedback a reality, and I've used comments in ways to suggest improvements & strategies to communicate their arguments more effectively, and also to focus on grammatical areas. I proposed several ideas for the evolution unit, including a project called Monkey Business, based on the Scopes Trial. Using iRubric, I created a scoring guide to use with the project and also shared with other teachers online. Teaching in a flipped classroom, I've discovered that there is time not only to interact with students, ensuring they're working on research and their projects, but also time to provide detailed feedback on their work and discuss their progress in class. A second idea pitched to the class was a critical analysis pitting Darwin and Lamarck in a hypothetical debate. In "Battle of Ideas" they go head to head. Finally, I borrowed an idea from an iRubric project a colleague created entitled Simpsons Evolution and adapted it a bit. The response by students has been great so far. They're a bit overwhelmed by the freedom and complexity that creative projects provide. Simultaneously, they're excited by the reports and projects they can create. I've included a few screenshots below. The podcast you see in the image gallery is a full narrative created by one group enacting the Scopes' Trial. I asked the students if they were interested in sharing their work. With a slight audio change, they said yes. I've included it below :)` All in all, student work, feedback, and interest remain high.
0 Comments
Anyone who says a flipped classroom requires less effort from teachers and students is pretty far off the mark. It's actually quite the opposite. Having finally graded the first round of work by students, it's been an "eye opening experience." The process is incredibly intensive, but well worth the effort. Allow me to provide some of my observations and inferences at this point. To begin with, students were invited to try different formats including a Linnaeus Facebook page, a podcast where Linnaeus saves a Metropolitan museum from closing with his brilliant organizational system, and more. The guiding principle was to provide a few ideas for students and allow them to creatively expand and express their ideas. It was exciting to see some students embrace role play, having Linnaeus explain his system in character. One group of students went so far as to create a puppet show video with a full set with bears, squirrels, snakes, and starfish explaining why each belonged in their respective taxa. I asked to post their video, but the students being as modest and shy as they are asked that I provide screenshots instead. Overall, I had a tremendous time evaluating student projects and enjoyed the diversity and originality of their presentations. I learned that some students work especially well in groups. Others are hyper-taskers and work best alone under a well-defined deadline. What follows is a gallery of (anonymized) student work with my not-so-anonmymous comments and response to their work. In our first class, I like to recount the history of biological sketching and have students try their hand at cross-hatching and stippling techniques. From Leonardo da Vinci's biological sketches to modern stippled drawings, students were challenged to apply the two traditional drawing techniques. They drew specima from our collection and today, we added a benefit. Students used smartphones, tablets, etc. to provide additional and often better images than the preserved critters in the lab. This gave them an additional opportunity to practice biological sketching, from home if they so chose. Below are images of their works in progress - a synthesis of traditional approaches and modern technology. Students were quite happy to use their phones for learning. It was a great experience that we'll complete tomorrow. Next stop - Linnaean classification -- organizing living organisms in a logical hierarchy. Not to worry, it's not hard to find our campus. Follow the eCampusLive link on our school website and snoop for the eCampusLive Biology 11 listing. BTW, we're working on eCampusLive Biology 12, but that's another story =:) All resources, links, videos, and related materials for eCampusLive are hosted on our Moodle course server. We've made our resources as web friendly as possible, testing them on all sorts of devices. Access requires a course password. See Mr. Bleecker for details about that in September. With a few days to go, I had a student contact me to inquire about bringing her own device to class. She asked what I thought was best. It was a very interesting conversation and I thought I'd share the highlights. Q1 - "Should I bring a laptop? What do you think is best?"
Q4 "Will you show us how to use our devices?"
eCampusLive is a work years in the making. And, it's finally here. It was exciting to add the final digital lessons this past July and provide a full library of course material for students to watch whenever and wherever they choose. Alongside web links, animations, YouTube videos, and podcasts, the digital campus became ready to open. Building access was a pivotal challenge. Providing wifi paved the way for students to use their devices -- something that was steadily building for years. Not quite ready for a paperless classroom, creating printing access in the classroom was also important. And finally, increasing access to school technology, was accomplished just before summer. Now a go for launch, it's thrilling to anticipate how a flipped classroom will shape learning. For myself, it will be quite different to perform less "on stage" and work alongside students as a guide. Focussing on projects and inquiry based learning is hands-on for a reason - it's engaging and fun. As well, students will have greater control to express their learning style. Ironically, project-based learning, a regular theme in my computer arts and I.T. courses for years only now makes it's debut in a science classroom. |
Archives
November 2016
AuthorWelcome to the eCampusLive blog. I'm Jerry Bleecker. I teach Biology, Science, Information Technology, Computer Arts, and more. It's an exciting year to share our experiences with our flipped classroom endeavour. Categories |