Wicked Problem Project Finale!

The following two videos are part one and part two of an overview of the entire Wicked Problem Project. Please check it out and try it out!


Part 1:



Part 2:


Problem:  "Each day, about 5 million children walk into 274,000 classrooms nationwide and find a substitute. Students today will spend at least one full year with a substitute by the time they graduate from high school -- a figure that's higher in poor schools and destined to increase (http://www.post-gazette.com/headlines/20010107subs2.asp)."

Unfortunately, this is not something that can be changed as every teacher needs a substitute at some time or another. However, the true issue is the fact that you never know what type of substitute you are going to get. They most likely don’t know the students, the material, or anything about classroom management. A Post-Gazette study found the following when it came to substitutes in the classroom:

• "In all but one state, substitutes now need no teaching certification whatsoever to take over a classroom, according to the Post-Gazette's research
• In at least 28 states, principals are allowed to hire anyone with a high school diploma or a GED. Often, the minimum age requirement is 18
  
• A Post-Gazette study of national test scores shows that states with lower academic achievement are twice as likely to allow less-qualified substitutes in the classroom (post-gazette.com)."

These findings are horrifying, but also no surprise to most teachers who have seen the results of a poor substitute before. Therefore there are two choices a teacher can make when leaving sub plans for an unknown sub; one is to chance it and give the substitute new material, hoping they will come through for you, and the second is to leave a ton of work for the students to do so the substitute only has to monitor all of the students while they work on content they already know.

On more than one accounts I have heard the second option described as “losing a day” as the teachers feel like they lost a day of instructional time, while the first option, being a gamble could result in success or the possibility of “losing 2 days” as the teacher has to take the next day to fix all of the misconceptions that the substitute taught the day before. I have witnessed all scenarios first hand and I’m sure that all of you experienced with the daily life of a teacher can recall the very same things.

Solution: If the actual teacher can’t be in the classroom, the next best thing is to have a recording or video of the actual teacher with vidcasts and slidecasts. This keeps the students engaged and the actual teacher would still be able to teach the students and walk them through the process step by step.

A vidcast could be simply a video of the teacher teaching the lesson in the normal way with possibly a whiteboard or a smartboard, while a slidecast could be a voiceover of the teacher explaining the concepts with a powerpoint presentation. In both cases the teacher would have to do little extra work because they were already prepared to teach that very same lesson. In the case of the vidcast they just have to take the original lesson and video tape it or if they already had a powerpoint slide ready they could complete a slidecast. It would only take the normal time to present the lesson as you tape it.

There are many ways in which this could be accomplished including Jing, Audacity, Screencast-o-matic, and Slideshare. For these free online programs the only additional technology needed outside an internet connection is a microphone to record your voice. There is also Movie Maker that comes on a PC and iMovie that comes on a Mac. With these two programs you would also need a video camera if creating a movie of the teacher. All that a substitute would need to show the students was a single computer in the room and a projector, which is almost standard in most classrooms these days.

This works perfectly in the case of absences that you know about in advance, but what about the case when it is a last minute absence? In this case you could use vidcasts from a previous year if you have it, or borrow a vidcast from another teacher. Not only would this be beneficial with a substitute but teachers could also learn new ideas for teaching material through viewing other teachers’ videos. What an amazing bonus! To see another teacher talk about her ideas and how she incorporates videos in her classroom when a substitute is present check out this site.

TPACK:

1. What is the TP knowledge for the solution?

I teach Spanish using the TPRS method, which is Teaching Proficiency through Reading and Storytelling. The students learn an action for each word and they make the action as they say the word. As the teacher, I ask a lot of either/or and yes/no questions in order to get the students practicing the words out loud and to increase the number of times that the students hear the words. The more times they hear the words the more likely they are to remember it. After practicing the words I read a story with the words in it and have some of the students act it out. The last step is for the students to read a story on their own and translate it to English. With the videos, I focused on the gestures and the repetition of the Spanish words.

This is a very hands on method of teaching that is hard to teach if you have never experienced it nor learned how to do it. Therefore, even if a substitute is able to speak Spanish they are unable to teach the class using the TPRS method. Taking a video of myself teaching while using this method really supports and continues the TPRS method even while I am out of the classroom. In the videos, I focused on the gestures and the repetition of the Spanish words, so I encourage the students to do the actions with me and to answer the questions. They are getting the full experience of my teaching method, minus me being able to tell if all of the students understand what I’m saying. But that is where the substitute comes in. The substitute should be monitoring the class, pausing the video when additional explanation is needed or more wait-time is needed or replaying part of the video if the students need additional practice.

2. What is the TC knowledge for the solution?

Most often substitutes don’t speak Spanish and therefore don’t know how to pronounce any of the words. By using this technology I am ensuring that the students hear the correct pronunciation for all of the words and that there is no confusion about what the word means. I am giving the students another way to access the vocabulary that they wouldn’t usually be able to have when a substitute is present.

It also demonstrates to the substitute how I teach and what all of the information means. This would help if the substitute did speak Spanish and wanted to continue my method of teaching after the video was over. This would also help any non-Spanish-speaking substitutes so that they know what is going on and what the students should know or have learned based off of the video.

3. What is the PC knowledge for the solution?

By using the TPRS method, I am able to reach all of my students through different learning strategies. The students have the Kinesthetic method of doing a gesture that directly relates to the word and many times doing the gesture helps the student to remember the Spanish word.

Then I have the auditory method where the students are hearing the word but they are hearing the word in context to ensure the most understanding. They hear the word repeated multiple times to give every student the opportunity to really learn the word.

Finally, the students will also get to visually see the words when they read a story. Students have every way to access the content, though most significantly is usually the motivation. The students love making the gestures and acting out the stories. They know that they need to know the words in order to be able to know what to do when they act out the story, so they pay more attention.

Group Leadership Project

To create the 10 min. tutorial on how to use a wiki collaboratively in the classroom, we used many different tools. First we used google presentation to collaboratively create the slides, which was mainly Stacy and my job with input from the other two. Then Debbie used slidecast to add her voice to the slides. Debbie chose Screencast-o-matic to give her voiceover to the slides because she hadn’t had a lot of experience with it and wanted to explore something new. It also meant that she could simply upload the slides and adjust her voice to each slide as she went along. She did do a version on Audacity as well, in the event that Lisa wanted the voice and slides separate. Finally Lisa used iMovie to put the final touches on the presentation with other slides and transitions. Lisa chose iMovie because she had access to it and had the most experience with it. I definitely feel that both made a great choice after seeing the fabulous final product. To share the movie, Lisa uploaded it to YouTube, which took six hours! I had no idea it would take that long!

I think for the development of the final product I mostly learned about compromise and letting little things go. I had a vision of what I wanted the final product to look like, as I’m sure the other group members did as well, and sometimes it was hard for me to be open to some of their ideas when they didn’t match mine. But all my closed-mindedness created was a block in the production. To move things along and come up with a quality finish, I had to trust my group members to come through for me both in their ideas and in the work that they produced. I think the final product shows that we all gave and took for the betterment of the project and came up with a really great finish.

Although I really liked our final product, I would have liked to incorporate a little bit more animation or interaction with the slides if we had had more time. For example, if we had actually done a screen capture of us showing how to leave a comment on a wiki, rather than taking a screencast and circling what we wanted them to notice. I think the slides all looked very professional and were well done, but in the future I would be interested in seeing how I could take the slides to the next level with the animation. It’s actually something I really look forward to getting my hands into this summer.

Check out our amazing presentation below and please feel free to leave any thoughts, ideas or suggestions!

Personal Learning Plan

Throughout the three educational technology classes that I have taken, CEP 810, 811, and 812, I have set many goals for myself, both personally and professionally. It's time now to review those goals and see what I have accomplished and what I still plan to work on. So check out my video at the following link:

Personal Learning Plan

Mobile Learning

I myself have never been that obbsessed with mobile devices in my personal life. Therefore, I knew the ipod's and mp3 players played music, but not really anything else. I obiously have a computer and a cell phone. I know a lot of what I can do with my laptop, but much of that is specific to a mac. I never really used my cell phone for anything else besides calling and texting.

After my limited experience it surprises and amazes me that there are so many educational ways that I could actually use a mobile device in my classroom. A lot of the devices seem like they pretty much all have the same function such as the ipods, mp3 players, and PDA's. I was actually surprised to see a flashdrive on the list and was really interested in what new things I could do with one that I didn't know about before. But really it just transfers data from one place to another and while this is very useful, it wasn't new information to me.

I think the mobile device that I would like you use the most is the smart phone, especially after learning about the different successful trials already. My school is a smaller rural school without a lot of money or internet access. The idea that my students could all be handed a compact computer that they can use anywhere there is cellphone service just astounds and excites me. This would completely level the playing field and bring everyone into the 21st century.

I especially liked trying out Poll Everywhere. Making a poll was quick and easy, though I have to say that seeing my own results pop up on the screen seconds after I had texted them was really exciting. And I know that if I think they are exciting then so would my students. I already have several students in my middle school classes that bring their cellphones to the class even though they aren't supposed to. Poll everywhere would be a fun way to start off the class occasionally. The only problem I forsee with that is getting permission from the administration and then making sure the students don't play with the phones when we're done with the poll. The best way to solve that would be to use the smartphones that don't have the texting or calling capability, though I know our school doesn't have the money for that at the moment.

PART D - Findings and Implications

The problem that I was addressing is that when I am not in the classroom no new learning takes place. I wanted to resolve that issue with videos of myself teaching the new words in Spanish.

The project was implemented as planned. The videos were left for the substitute teacher who was able to access all of them and play them for the students. There were no problems with the videos or the other aspects of the technology needed such as the projector and computer.

The following day when I returned, I checked with my sixth grade class to see how many of the words they remembered. About half of the students remembered the correct action when I said the words in Spanish after having watched the six minute video. Most remembered se rie, which means he or she laughs, because the substitute worked on that word after the video was over. Unfortunately, very few of the 2^nd graders remembered the words, but it was a week later before I saw them again. They remembered learning the words from the week before, so although they didn’t remember the words, they learned them quicker so it was still a good way to introduce the words.

Besides how much the students learned, the videos also were successful in helping the substitute maintain control in the classroom. Although that wasn’t my main task it was a very positive side effect that got glowing reviews from the substitute. She had substituted for me earlier the week before and was much happier after leaving the second time and very appreciative of the videos. She thought they were a great idea. So overall it was very successful.

If I were to try to do a similar project again I would give myself more time to figure out all of the details as I was slightly rushed due to the imminent end of the school year. I would also try to think of all teacher’s situations, and not just my own, so that my project could be more easily transferable to other teachers.

Some of the things I learned from this project include that you don’t have to make perfect videos, just like in real life you are allowed to mess up. Also setting up a script might be helpful so that the video flows more smoothly. I did that for some of the videos and it worked really well. The students really liked when I used props and when I called out specific people. The calling out specific people works really well, but it also means that you would have to make new videos each time and couldn’t reuse old ones. The videos shouldn’t be too long as the students will lose interest. Finally make sure to leave enough wait time if you are asking a question and be very specific to the substitute on what is the best way to utilize the videos in order to create a successful learning experience.

I plan to create many more videos this summer that I can use in the classroom. I will make sure to include more wait time, possibly even using a timer to help. I will also make very specific, yet generic substitute notes on how to use the videos so that anyone can use it and I will be able to use it over and over. Lastly I would make sure to not make some of the videos quite so long. Besides that I think the videos were a hit and very successful and I wouldn’t change them, even if they were somewhat embarrassing to watch!

PART B - Storyboard and Script

Below is the storyboard and script that my group created to teach other teachers about how to use a wiki collaboratively. I helped the other group members come up with the ideas on what we were going to create and I made the second half of the slides for the presentation including the slides for Student feedback, Students Teaching other Students, and Communicating with another class.

Stacy and I worked the majority on the slides for our part of the final presentation and to finish the project Debbie will add her voice to the slides and Lisa will edit the final project and add in transitions and other sounds. The project will be completed before the due date in order to leave all group members to give final feedback.

Check out the following storyboard and script and give your own feedback!

Storyboard and Script

PART C - Implementation

I implemented the "sub" videos, as I like to call them, during one afternoon I had to be out of the classroom. Please check out the following podcast to find out how it turned out, what worked well, and what needs improvement for next time.

For an unknown reason when you click on the link below only a portion of the podcast plays, however if you copy and past the link into a new window it works properly. If you can't get the link to work by clicking on it please copy and past into a new window. Sorry for the inconvenience.
www.msu.edu/~bushally/Implementation.mp3

Below are a few examples of the videos that I used in the classroom that day:

The above video is a quick video of the expectations I left for my students of how they should act while we have a guest teacher. This is a great way to remind students that a substitute teacher doesn't mean they can forget how to act in the classroom.

Above is a video where I teach the words salta, nada and se ríe to my sixth grade class. See if you can figure out what the three words mean!

This video is of me singing the days of the week in Spanish. I use the song mostly with the 1st through 3rd graders. You can see one of my word blunders here. What's your opinion? Would you have left the blunder or spent the time to rerecord and fix it?