Experiment with confidence

From reading blogs and instructional technology magazines, I come across quite a few different tools that I can supposedly implement into the classroom to improve instruction. With enough time and resources, I could probably make my classroom into one of the most interactive and rich learning environments around, but time is tough to come by. During the school year, it only takes a few months (if you are lucky ;) ) to fall a little behind schedule, and once behind schedule, you must utilize every extra moment to get students back on track. In the summer, however, teachers generally have a lot more time on their hands. Now, before I hear the cry of tired teachers, “We need a break from school, too,” trust me, I understand. Occasionally, though, over the next two-and-a-half months, experiment a little with various Web 2.0 tools. If you practice during the summer months, you may prevent many mistakes in the fall.

Last Thursday, for example, I used Audacity for the first time. First, the students wrote a 1 – 1 1/2 page response to one of two prompts. Second, they recorded their written responses using Audacity. After exporting the sound files as .WAV files, I easily inserted them into our Wikispaces classroom website. Once the two students were finished, each student listened to the other student’s recording and responded to the recording with a one-paragraph response. The exchanges were incredible! With a primary focus on a couple of character relationships from the short story we read in class, students generated original analysis of characterization by creating hypothetical verbal exchanges between characters. Overall, students found the experience enjoyable, and I look forward to experimenting with other tools over the course of the next few weeks.

On a slightly different note, I want to share an observation. The other day, I had fourth grade students perform some research on the Danish Resistance and the role between Denmark and Sweden in 1943 in preparation of our reading Lois Lowry’s Number the Stars. I gave one group the former topic and other group the latter. After about 20 seconds, the second group began complaining that they could not find anything about their topic. When I asked them to show me how they researched, they demonstrated how they attempted to use Wikipedia and Google, but nothing was coming up. After encouraging them to use different resources and to search various key terms, they eventually found appropriate information. I was a little surprised how quickly students felt defeated when an online encyclopedia and a search engine did not find the right facts for them after a couple attempts. What’s the best way to teach students how to perform research?

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Image Citation:

The non-scientific partent's guide to science fair projects. Retrieved on June 22, 2008, from http://www.onlinescienceprojects.com/guide/scientist.jpg