Announcements
This week, I continued my walkabout in the ELA departments at El Monte and Orosi High School. I observed quite a few lessons on novels where kids were tasked with identifying textual evidence of theme, claims, etc. Some of my feedback included using Booksnaps to identify evidence and rationalize. Other feedback included using the Iron Chef Eduprotocol to foster opportunities to achieve this learning goal while sprinkling in opportunities for students to collaborate and communicate.
From an observation during my ELA walkabout last week, to co-taught a 3-day lesson with Ms. Orosco at El Monte. Ms. Orosco's 7th graders just finished a lesson on the 5 Pillars of Islam. Ms. Orosco, when I followed up on my observation feedback, planned with me a culminating project where students were given voice and choice to demonstrate learning by either creating a website on Google Sites, building and recording a lesson with Google Slides and Screencastify, or use their cellphones to record playtime videos with toys and Legos. Collaboration, communication, critical thinking and creativity were on full display.
After doing a demonstration/observation cycle of the Fast and Curious Eduprotocol with Ms. Fernandez last week, Ms. Fernandez' 8th graders showed great improvement with vocabulary terms. She reports higher student engagement and understanding of science vocabulary as students went through many reps with the vocabulary terms. I will be following up soon to plan a few more Eduprotocols.
This week, I continued my walkabout in the ELA departments at El Monte and Orosi High School. I observed quite a few lessons on novels where kids were tasked with identifying textual evidence of theme, claims, etc. Some of my feedback included using Booksnaps to identify evidence and rationalize. Other feedback included using the Iron Chef Eduprotocol to foster opportunities to achieve this learning goal while sprinkling in opportunities for students to collaborate and communicate.
From an observation during my ELA walkabout last week, to co-taught a 3-day lesson with Ms. Orosco at El Monte. Ms. Orosco's 7th graders just finished a lesson on the 5 Pillars of Islam. Ms. Orosco, when I followed up on my observation feedback, planned with me a culminating project where students were given voice and choice to demonstrate learning by either creating a website on Google Sites, building and recording a lesson with Google Slides and Screencastify, or use their cellphones to record playtime videos with toys and Legos. Collaboration, communication, critical thinking and creativity were on full display.
Since so many teachers are implementing sketchnotes, I've begun sending an email each Tuesday calling for teachers to send me sketchnotes exemplars to be scanned then curated on the Cardinal Innovation Center Sketchnotes Gallery. Over the years, when I update the Sketchnotes Gallery, I not only send the link to teachers, but also Tweet the link. As time has gone on, sketchnoting celebrity Sylvia Duckworth has taken notice of our students' sketchnotes. Sylvia has authored two books on sketchnoting and travels the world teaching educators how to sketchnote. She frequently uses exemplars from our students on the Cardinal Innovation Center Sketchnotes Gallery in her workshops. Our students' work is making a difference worldwide.
| I got to meet Sylvia Duckworth in Chicago at ISTE in 2018 |
Teacher Workflow Tips
If you're looking for a quick way to get started with the Fast & Curious. Thin Slides, Sketchnotes and or Booksnaps, take a look at the "cheat sheets" below. Please contact me with any questions concerning facilitation of these strategies.
Fast and Curious (50 min class period)
- Create set of 7-12 vocab terms in Quizlet and copy terms over to Quizizz too.
- Quizlet Solo: Give kids 7-10 minutes to individually explore the various practice games in Quizlet
- Quizlet Live: Play 3-4 rounds of Quizlet Live for kids to collaboratively practice the vocab terms
- Speed Sketchnotes: Using whiteboards, in groups of 2-3, have students sketch the definitions one term at a time. One student sketches and partners tell what/how to sketch. Each group must get teacher feedback/approval before moving on to a new term. Do this for 10 min
- Quizizz: Facilitate Quizizz game to gauge initial understanding. This can serve as an exit ticket. Repeat this Quizizz game throughout week to show growth and give students extra reps
Thin Slides (5-7 min)
- Create a slidedeck in Google Slides and assign one slide per students. Distribute via Google Classroom giving students edit permission. Remind kids to stay on their assigned slide.
- Give kids a prompt or big idea
- Give kids 3 minutes to build slide that has ONLY 1 word and 1 image
- Project slidedeck
- Have all kids stand and when their slide comes up each kid does a 5-7 micro presentation explaining their understanding and ideas. Kids sit when finished presenting.
- Possible Extension: Students post in Google Classroom stream what they said in presentation. Students look at each others' posts, choose one different from theirs and repost by paraphrasing.
Sketchnotes
- Provide blank paper, pencil, pens for tracing, colors for color coding
- Kids look at text, article or video and determine components
- Kids divide paper into sections based on number of components
- Pencil sketches: visual representations with labels/short descriptions (no long sentences or paragraphs)
- Trace sketches
- Color coding: Color code components by shading background of each section
Booksnaps
- Create slidedeck with images of text, prompt/theme/claim, textbox on each slide (5-7 middle school; 7-12 high school)
- Distribute via Google Classroom by making a copy for each student
- Kids use "scribble tool" to circle evidence
- Kids type rationale in textbox
- Kids insert an image or emoji (1-3) to support what they circled and typed
Fast and Curious (50 min class period)
- Create set of 7-12 vocab terms in Quizlet and copy terms over to Quizizz too.
- Quizlet Solo: Give kids 7-10 minutes to individually explore the various practice games in Quizlet
- Quizlet Live: Play 3-4 rounds of Quizlet Live for kids to collaboratively practice the vocab terms
- Speed Sketchnotes: Using whiteboards, in groups of 2-3, have students sketch the definitions one term at a time. One student sketches and partners tell what/how to sketch. Each group must get teacher feedback/approval before moving on to a new term. Do this for 10 min
- Quizizz: Facilitate Quizizz game to gauge initial understanding. This can serve as an exit ticket. Repeat this Quizizz game throughout week to show growth and give students extra reps
Thin Slides (5-7 min)
- Create a slidedeck in Google Slides and assign one slide per students. Distribute via Google Classroom giving students edit permission. Remind kids to stay on their assigned slide.
- Give kids a prompt or big idea
- Give kids 3 minutes to build slide that has ONLY 1 word and 1 image
- Project slidedeck
- Have all kids stand and when their slide comes up each kid does a 5-7 micro presentation explaining their understanding and ideas. Kids sit when finished presenting.
- Possible Extension: Students post in Google Classroom stream what they said in presentation. Students look at each others' posts, choose one different from theirs and repost by paraphrasing.
Sketchnotes
- Provide blank paper, pencil, pens for tracing, colors for color coding
- Kids look at text, article or video and determine components
- Kids divide paper into sections based on number of components
- Pencil sketches: visual representations with labels/short descriptions (no long sentences or paragraphs)
- Trace sketches
- Color coding: Color code components by shading background of each section
Booksnaps
- Create slidedeck with images of text, prompt/theme/claim, textbox on each slide (5-7 middle school; 7-12 high school)
- Distribute via Google Classroom by making a copy for each student
- Kids use "scribble tool" to circle evidence
- Kids type rationale in textbox
- Kids insert an image or emoji (1-3) to support what they circled and typed
Support English Learners with EdTech
In the past, Google Translate was not very accurate. These days, it is much improved and very accurate. It's a common practice to use Google Slides to project instructions for activities, learning goals, learning targets and more during class. Use Google Translate to put instructions, etc. in English and Spanish side by side to aid English learners.
The Google Translate mobile app recently upgraded its conversation function. If you don't have a student translator nearby, use the conversation function. Select conversation mode and set target language to Spanish. Click the microphone and it will immediately in text and out loud say your words in Spanish. When the student responds, you'll hear and read their response in English. Click here to a video for how this works. This video shows the function on a Google Nest Home Display, but it works the same on your phone app.
In the past, Google Translate was not very accurate. These days, it is much improved and very accurate. It's a common practice to use Google Slides to project instructions for activities, learning goals, learning targets and more during class. Use Google Translate to put instructions, etc. in English and Spanish side by side to aid English learners.
The Google Translate mobile app recently upgraded its conversation function. If you don't have a student translator nearby, use the conversation function. Select conversation mode and set target language to Spanish. Click the microphone and it will immediately in text and out loud say your words in Spanish. When the student responds, you'll hear and read their response in English. Click here to a video for how this works. This video shows the function on a Google Nest Home Display, but it works the same on your phone app.
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