Elaborating a rubric for assesement

Hi everybody again!

Until this moment I have been describing first, the whole analyzing process of my open EducationalDigital Project: then, how I turned it into collaborative one; after, how I turned the flat activities into super learning missions; finally, it is time to asses de whole process. I am going to show you a rubric I created, so as to gauge students in my Open Educational Project: “Matter in our world!”.

What am I assessing?

First and foremost, let me tell you that I decided to create a rubric concerning the final outcome of my project, which is “Fifth graders mentor their youngschoolmates”, which you can take a look at, here. This final outcome (final project) is connected to the two super learning missions I have designed in my lasts post. First, the content information and creating the song; second, recording the video clip and posting it on the blog in order to their schoolmates can see it.

I decided to focus on the assessment of the final outcome, since it is going to reflect all the contents and skills students are bound to acquire throughout the whole Open Educational Project.

How did I come up with a rubric?

Once I had a clear idea about the focus of the assessment, I decided to create a Poster, so as to organize the elements to be taken into consideration when deciding the criteria, and have a crystal clear idea of the rubric, as a whole.

As a result, I elaborated the following poster, by using an online tool called Canva, which is aimed at designing Posters, flyers, cardboards, etc.

The aspects that are going to be evaluated have direct connection with the goal established on the final outcome, that are the followings:

1.          Plan the steps you are going to follow.
2.       Look for information using the Internet.
3.       Create a catchy song using a digital tool.
4.         Use the vocabulary and expressions to sing the song.
5.         Record a video clip of the song and post it on the school’s blog.

Here you have a presentation made with Canva where you can see the criteria that I’m going to follow in my rubric.

Stockholm de Andrea Judit Pérez

And finally, I have done my rubric using the digital tool Quick Rubric. I registered myself and I started elaborating it, by adding columms and rows, and editing the criteria, the ratings and the descriptors. Then, I uploaded it at Issuu. QuickRubric let me do an easy rubric in few minutes. It was a fantastic tool, very useful and very easy to use.

Here you have my rubric:

Self-reflection

All in all, I am of the opinion that planning a rubric needs time, and we have to pay attention to the assessment. It is something that cannot be done in the blink of an eye. It needs practise, so from my point of view, you actually need to put the rubric intro practise and monitor it, so as to see if it is really manageable and accurate, in oder to enhance it.

I will definitely take into account the essential elements of a rubric, since a great deal of times, we tend to add lots of items, and we do not focus on the main criteria. So, if we add fewer elements and explain them clearly, we will not have any problem when assessing our students.

Thank you for walking with me through my new post again!

Turn flat activities into super learning missions nº2

Welcome to my second learning mission!

If you have read my last post you are now familiar with the concept of a learning mission and what teachers have to do in order to design them. However, it is time to go ahead with the development of the second super learning mission.

As in the previous mission I am going to repeat the whole process, from the election of the flat activity until the design of the super learning mission. The choice takes into account the course (5th grade) in which the content is created; and, this time, another fact will be taken into account: the super learning mission is going to be connected with the previous one. It is going to be the continuation.

What was the original flat activity?

“Outline the three states of matter and explain the particle behavior in each them. Finally, write an example”.

What is the learning mission?

This learning mission is called: “The matter Virtual Show”. Once the students have the Poster with the lyrics of the song “Solid, Liquid and Gas Song” (created with Picktochart) they will have to record a video clip singing the states of matter song (created with Wevideo) and, finally, they will post the video on the school’s blog as part of the final project of my open educational digital project in order to mentor third and fourth graders.

The steps/instructions that students have to follow to carry out this mission are:

As you can see on my presentation created with Emaze, the mission two is the continuation of the mission one. The activity is very simple; the students only have to follow 3 steps. Firstly, they have to learn the “Solid, Liquid, Gas song”; Secondly, they have to record a video clip singing the song with Wevideo; and finally, they will upload the video on the school’s blogs labeled in Natural Science.

Goals:

- To know the three states of matter and its simple properties.

- To use ICT to learn new content.

- To create a digital artifact using an adequate web tool or app for the requested artifact.

- To encourage motivation and creativity through visual resources (poster, video clip, audio/song).

- To teamwork with a certain autonomy.

- To improve the four language skills.

- To do cross-curricular work with music (rhyme, rhythm and, melody).

Target audience:

This super learning mission is for Fifth graders. However, the final outcome will be part of the final collaborative task of my open educational project “Fifth gradersmentor their young schoolmates”. The digital artefact will be upload on the school’s blog for being consumed by third and fourth graders.

Timing:

This activity will be carried out in one lesson of 45 minutes.

Tools:

To record the video: Wevideo, iMovie, Koma Koma, etc.

To record just Audio (Podcast): Soundcloud, AudioBoom, etc.

How does this activity align with the collaborative project I am contributing to?

The activity can be aligned with the collaborative project The ESL Times because this super learning mission has similar goals as the education digital project:

- The four language skills

- Using ICT when teaching/learning

- Promoting collaborative work, team work and autonomous work.

- Valuing the socio cultural side of the English language.

Competences involved:

1.      CC - Communication skills

2.      DC - Digital skills

3.      LL - Learning to learn

4.      SCC - Social and civic skills

5.      SIE - Sense of initiative and entrepreneurship.

6.      CAE - Cultural awareness and expression.

Once I have explained the super learning mission it is time to see an example of the digital artifact that I want students to do. Don’t forget that the final digital artefact will be a video clip done with all students and created with Wevideo; but, as I am alone, I will do a simulation audio with Soundcloud.

Soundcloud is a music and podcast streaming platform that lets you listen to millions of songs from around the world, or upload your own. I have used the same online tool in my first challenge so I felt familiar with it.

Self-reflection

Upgrade the Internet access in every public school classroom allows teachers to start giving students the opportunity to take advantage of the promise of digital learning. I believe that digital learning has the potential to provide all students with equal access to educational opportunity.

As a teacher, I can't help but express how proud of myself I feel with the project I designed with  the assistance of the different challenges I faced. By creating these latest posts I acquired so many skills and I learned about so many online tools in education, which at the present moment I cannot live without. I never thought I would enjoy so much creating this project and trying to collaborate with wonderful people that share the same enthusiasm as I do.

Turn flat activities into super learning missions nº1

Nice to see yo again in my blog!

I’m so happy to hear from you again! Today I bring you another challenge. This time I would like to show you how important is to adapt or transform flat activities (boring, passive and plain activities) into super learning missions (meaningful and unforgettable activities to develop in class).

In this case the challenge will be divided into two post; in each one of them I will share with you one flat activity turned into a super learning mission.

I came back to the prototype I created in March “Matter in our world”, and I chose 2 of the activities I developed then. Now, it is time to turn them into 2 different super learning missions specifying the original activity, the learning mission’s instructions, the goals to be achieved by accomplishing each of them, the digital artifact or artefacts to evidence the accomplishment, the online tools to use and the competencies involved, and finally how I am going to align the missions to ESL Times.

The distinction between activity, learning mission, artifact and tool allows us to place the relationship between the pedagogical side and the technological one within a project. So, let’s start describing the original flat task.

What was the original flat activity?

“Outline the three states of matter and explain the particle behavior in each them. Finally, write an example”

What is the learning mission?

My learning mission is called: “Solid, Liquid, Gas song”. What I want my students to do is to create a song related to the states of matter by searching on the internet the simple properties of each state. They can use the book and the explanation done in class in order to look for more information. Once they have got the song, they will have to create a poster with Picktochart with the lyrics.

The steps/instructions that students have to follow to carry out this activity are:

As you can see on my slide created with Emaze (which I recommend you to use) the activity is very simple, the students only have to follow 3 steps. Firstly, they have to look for information in order to classify the three stages of matter and their properties clearly; Secondly they have to write a song bearing in mind rhyme, rhythm and, melody; and finally, when they have the song they have to create a poster with Piktochart.

  

Goals:

-          To know the three states of matter and its simple properties.

-          To use ICT to learn new content.

-          To improve the four language skills

-          To do cross-curricular work with music (rhyme, rhythm and, melody)

-          To work cooperatively and improve social skills.

Target audience:

This super learning mission is for Fifth graders.

Timing:

This activity will be carried out in two lessons of 45 minutes.

Tools:

- To look for information: Google, books.

- To make the poster: Piktochart, Canva, Genial.ly.

How does this activity align with the collaborative project I am contributing to?

The activity can be aligned with the collaborative project The ESL Times because this super learning mission has similar goals as the education digital project:

- The four language skills

- Using ICT when teaching/learning

- Promoting collaborative work, team work and autonomous work.

- Valuing the socio cultural side of the English language

Competences involved:

1.      CC - Communication skills 

2.      DC - Digital skills 

3.      LL - Learning to learn 

4.      SCC - Social and civic skills 

5.      SIE - Sense of initiative and entrepreneurship.

6.      CAE - Cultural awareness and expression.

Below, you can see an example of the digital artifact that I want students to do. In order to do it, I have used Piktochart to create the poster with the lyrics of the song. This is an online tool quite simple to use for children at this age, with a great variety of resources to be able to create posters at your whim.

Self-reflection

We can agree about the importance of creating new and challenging missions for children, activities taht will requiere children to construct, step by step, their own knowledge working cooperatively toward the same goals. The teaching-learning process must be inspiring and motivating in order to get the best of our students. That the main and difficult task of a teacher, so now, fortunately we have got ICT to improve our teaching and their motivation.

Finally, I would like to say that I have really enjoyed doing this activity because it is a way of seeing how your work has results. I said this because I noticed myself more secure with the computer, with new apps and so on. It is true that you spend a lot of time producing something that probably will be used in just a couple of minutes, but the final digital artefact really worth it.

Don't forget to check out mu second super learning mission which is going to be related with this one!

Looking for partners

Welcome back to my blog!

My last post was about turning an open digital educational project into a collaborative one, now is time to look for partners to share my project and find collaborative running projects to fit in.

First of all, as you can check in my visual metaphor, I proposed a collaborative work for my open digital educational project. It was a collaboration work out of the classroom connecting fifth graders as mentors of third graders. The collaborative task would be named “Fifth-graders mentor their younger schoolmates”.

In the collaboration work “Fifth-graders mentor their younger schoolmates” that I suggested, the fifth graders students will explore the states of matter which is the main topic of my Open Digital Educational Project. Students will record an interactive video with a clear and dynamic explanation of the topic (The matter and its states) and the instructions for a macroscopic activity about the states of matter which are going to do with third graders in order to put into practice learned things. After the lesson and the activity all of them will have to write in their journals about the experience of sharing knowledge. The video will be made with the program called Wevideo.

For that challenge I have to browse some collaborative projects and decide on one to collaborate with. I will provide you the list and the link if you want to participate in some of them:

- The Other Kids EDU.

- The ESL Times.

- The 30 Goals Challenge.

- The Twima Project.

- Tertulias con sabor a chocolate.

- So on ..

I have been taken a look for a while to all of them, and I have chosen the one that was closest to what I am looking for! This is The ESL Times, a collaborative project where the reporters want to learn and enjoy together.

The reason of my choice is because The ESL Time has as an objectives use ICT when teaching/learning ESL and promote collaborative work valuing the four language skills: Reading, Listening, Speaking and Writing. Furthermore, I think I really believe my eProject fits into this collaborative projects as it encourages children to learn in different ways and it empowers and challenges teachers to use different teaching strategies and resources in order to teach.

After finding a collaborative running project to fit in, I had to record an elevator pitch to talk that running collaborative project into accepting me as a new partner. An elevator pitch is an enterprise technique to find financial support for a project in 20 seconds. We all know that nowadays, it is very important to be quick and practical when advertising something, we are always out of time. This is why we have to value the importance of going right to the point, and for this, I have prepared my Elevator Pitch! In which I explain the main reasons why they should accept me as a collaborator.

First let’s see what are the steps recommended to follow:

Stockholm de Andrea Judit Pérez

Here it is, my elevator pitch, I hope it convinces you to support me.

I would like to left you the draft of my Elevator Pitch as well, divided into four parts as I specified befour. The draft has been posted thanks to the Issuu program.

The steps I followed in order to accomplish this challenge a were:

1. Research about the different collaborative projects 
2. Describe which is the collaborative projects that really fits mine. 
3. Research about what is an Elevator Pitch. 
4. Use canva to design a poster with the steps from the elevator Pitch. 
5. Record a short video where I explain why they have to accept me as a collaborative partner. You only have to answer 3 questions: what, why and how. That is what I want to do, Why I want to do, and How I want to do it. 
6. Edit my video with WEVIDEO. It´s easy to use. 
7. Share my elevator pitch by embed directly from the tool to the blog. 

Every time that I start a new challenge I meet a new useful tool for my future job! Do not hesitate to have a look this and my previous posts to find out lots of new tools to work with!

Self-reflexion

Before finishing I would like to make a quick reflection of this challenge. This activity has allowed me to read the work of others, how they use their blog, how they manage them, every few they upload a post and so on. 

I was fascinated by the educational power of blogs, online classrooms, social networks, and so on; but definitely I am ready to jump into new collaborative projects to try and link teaching and learning ESL with the real word.

Visual Metaphor

Welcome back to the blog!!

Today I would like to share with you a new challenge related to my latest post. As all of you know in my latest post I made a Prototype of an Open Educational Digital Project and now I present to you a poster that shows how my project it is going to turn into a collaborative digital project linking fifth graders and third graders students in a very interesting journey of matter!

But first let's clarify what is a collaborative work?

Collaborative learning is a method of teaching and learning in which students team together to explore a significant question or create a meaningful project. A group of students discussing a lecture or students from different schools working together over the Internet on a shared assignment are both examples of collaborative learning. 

In this case, as part of my Educational project I will carry out a final session related to matter and the states of matter: solid, liquid and gas. It will be included in the last session of the project called: “How much do I know?”. 

The final session will consist of a collaboration task out of the classroom connecting fifth graders as mentors of third graders. The collaborative task will be named “Fifth-graders mentor their younger schoolmates”. Taking advantage of the Natural science lesson that third graders are taking about matter and their states, fifth graders will have a chance to help them by using ICT. 

In the collaboration work ““Fifth-graders mentor their younger schoolmates” that I suggested, the fifth graders students will explore the states of matter which is the main topic of my Open Digital Educational Project. Students will record an interactive video with a clear and dynamic explanation of the topic (The matter and its states) and the instructions for a macroscopic activity about the states of matter which are going to do with third graders in order to put into practice learned things. After the lesson and the activity all of them will have to write in their journals about the experience of sharing knowledge. The video will be made with the program called Wevideo. The video will be made with the program called Wevideo. This tool is very useful for making online videos and editing fun & easy. The activity will be part of the fifth grader’s teacher assessment. 

Here I leave you the visual metaphor (Poster) that I created. In order to create this I used the digital tool called Canva which is a tool utilized to create presentations, graphic content, posters, etc. This tool it is very interesting and I believe that it can have a lot of educational possibilities because of all the templates that offers.

Copia de MENTOR PROGRAM de Andrea Judit Pérez 

 By creating this visual metaphor, I wanted to show students the mentoring program. As you can see, the showed visual metaphor implies collaboration out of the classroom linking fifth graders students with third graders.

Thanks to this challenge I have had the opportunity to enrich my project. New useful tool learned! I really hope my work be useful for you too!

Thank you!!