Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Social Learning in Practice

http://voicethread.com/share/2907626/


As Wong and Wong state, Cooperative learning is not so much learning to cooperate as it is cooperating to learn (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & Malenoski, 2007, p. 140).  This statement resonates with me so much due to an experience I had with my students today.  I implemented a new strategy to help my students become stronger readers.  During this strategy we high-light all the dialog and divide up groups that read their part as it arises.  All but one of my groups was willing to work together.  One group would not read in unison no matter what.  There was too much competition to be heard rather than focusing on developing their skills like the other groups were.   The groups that cooperated with each other were reading with expression better than ever before. 

Cooperating with others is definitely a skill that needs to be taught.  Many of us have experience taking personality tests, which turns out what type of learner or team player you are.  Well our students are in the same boat.  We need to get to know our students in order to strategically place them in cooperative groups.  We also need to prepare them to appropriately interact with one another.  One way I would to this is have my students develop a classroom web that defines what collaborating means to them.  I would then give them sentence starters and have them practice how to agree and disagree in a proper manner. 

Cooperative grouping allows social learning to take place.  We know as educators that once we teach something our understanding of the concept is that much stronger.  Well this is also true for our students.  Cooperative groups are common in my classroom, but this week I have been introduced to so many new ways to incorporate technology.  Social sites like Facebook are not an option for younger children, but we are able to use sites like Gaggle that allow us to regulate who our students interact with.  Due to the lack of computer access, I find it hard to utilize social sites as often as I would like to.  Although, the Voicethread.com is amazing!  My students absolutely loved participating in this week’s project.  Voice Thread was so user friendly, quick, and effective for my students to use.  Once my students saw how this site worked they started sharing ideas left and right about other ways we can use it.  We are going to start by choosing a student’s writing, uploading it, and allowing students to make comments about what they like or would like to see improved. 

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E. R., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works. Denver, Co.: Mid-continent Research for Education and Learning.

8 comments:

  1. Hi Kelly,

    I like your opening statement, “I would like to find out what pieces of technology you use in your classroom that are easy to maintain and user friendly for both students and teachers”. I would also consider the parents. There have been a lot of terrific resources exposed to us in our last two courses, however, I feel we need some time to learn them before we implement in classes or share with colleagues at school. I attended a meeting at school this past Thursday night with parents and we were discussing all the new technologies and how we communicate with parents. It was mentioned how feelings could not be expressed using newer technologies, such as emails and our online grade book, where comments are made. I think parents still like verbal communication when negative issues are at hand. On a side note, I have to thank Walden, I have my new class wiki link posted on my web page, a parent mentioned how they liked seeing what we do and use in classes.

    Joe

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    1. Joe,
      I have a document camera, projector, PA system, four student work stations, a wireless mouse and keyboard, and a Mimio Pad. I find myself at a complete loss when my document camera or projector malfuntions. Mimio is a very user friendly tool I like to use becuase I am able to write all over internet sites, papers I've uploaded, pictures, etc. Then with one click I can erase it all. On the other hand I can save the image and print it out. It's a wonderful way to share notes with an absent student. Everything I have mentioned is incredibly easy to use and maintain. My students are able to continue using it when I have a substitute in the room.
      Kelly

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  2. The first sentence of your second paragraph really hit home with me. "Cooperating with others is definitely a skill that needs to be taught." I firmly believe this concept is a life skill and needs to be learned, but what do you do when your students are in high school and they lack all interacting/social skills? The baggage brought with them to the classroom is so polluted and non-reversible. Where do I begin? How do I get to know them? How do I teach them simple eye contact or a friendly hello?
    I may try your suggestion of starting a classroom webpage, where as a whole we will define what collaborating means. Maybe we could go further and write goals for the class to involve cooperative learning by the end of a semester. A list of life skills to gain by the end of the school year is also something I would like the students to develop together.

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    1. Mandie,
      High school is a whole other story, but I came up with an idea while reading your post. Not sure if you have time, but maybe you could hold mock job interviews. Upon completion of the interviews you could discuss what qualities individuals had that made them stand out from others. Such as those interacting/social skills. This could be the basis for your lesson.
      Kelly

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  3. Kelly

    I like how you mentioned completing personality test in your classroom. I know that during the first week of getting to know you/me we take a few tests and match up the classroom according to the numbers and data. I like how you mentioned that idea of teaching your students how to agree and disagree properly. I know that this is a difficult topic for students to complete but if we teach them at the beginning of the semester how to back their ideas and reasoning it makes for much better learning in the future lessons. It almost seems silly or redundant to teach this but I have experienced the struggle it maybe if we don't establish this early on in the year. I know that my students will sometimes get frustrated when I keep questioning them but I just remind them that I want them to be able to win every debate they may have after my class and in order to do that they need THE FACTS to back it up! Great post!

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    1. You made a great point. Time spent well in the beginning allows for more time and deeper understanding in later lessons. Teaching elementary, we spend the majority of our time teaching routine. Anytime I am not consistant I find myself frustrated mid-year wondering why.
      Kelly

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  4. Kelly,

    I just watched your voicethread. I have never heard of a policy like this. I teach in a high school, and we have lock down drills quite a bit. However, we have no policy of whether or not our door should be locked any other time. I typically keep mine unlocked. I really like to keep my door open, but sometimes it is hard to do that because of the noise in the hallways. A similar concern I have at my school is that we aren't allowed to cover our "window" (The little tiny one in the door). I had mine covered for a while. I don't like for students to peek in my door and disrupt my class, and if we are on lockdown, I don't want an intruder looking through my window either! I'm curious why your administration wants all doors locked at all times--what prompted this? Nice voicethread, by the way. Very well done.

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    1. Whitney,
      Thank you so much. I was very nervous to do that voice thread. Basically, a local eager police officer has been spending a lot of his time in our building ever since we gained a new attractive vice. Anyhow, he suggested we increase our safety because of the surrounding neighborhood becoming more dangerous. We find it rather distracting and actually creating less of a safe invironment. Not to mention, we no longer interact with our colleagues because we don't want to interupt each other. I feel if they are that worried that we need to have our classroom doors locked, then we should probably have indoor recess and lock the main entry doors. It is just silly. Apparently, our district was unaware of the situation until last week when our union reps. mentioned the concern at a board meeting.
      Kelly

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