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Artifacts of learning

Part 1 of the Chemical Reaction Artifact series of posts.

I'm teaching at a new school this year. I've been unhappy with how little I've been able to integrate projects that involve students creating an "artifact of their learning." I've been doing too much sage-on-the-staging, which I greatly dislike for a great many reasons.

I'm teaching a freshman level class (Integrated Science) that by some coincidence happens to be very similar to some classes I taught a couple years ago at my previous school. This is a happy coincidence because I already have quite a few resources put together for a good chunk of the material. It's not so happy because much of the material I have made up is a few years old and doesn't reflect the best that I can do.

What is an artifact?

Essentially, it's something the student creates in which they demonstrate their understanding of the required content. Most often I give students some choice in the format they use for their artifact. Example formats students often choose are a textbook, magazine, comic book, video, newspaper, PowerPoint presentation, poem/rap/song, etc.  The artifacts can vary in scope from covering a specific topic and take only a day or two to create to being a final exam and requiring a week or more to put together.

Background

The last two years I began implementing projects in which students create artifacts to display and assess their level of understanding of the content. I began having students create artifacts hesitantly. I was worried they might be fun but not be great as an assessment of student knowledge.  I quickly lost those worries when the student work came pouring in.

Why I love this

Student Choice. Students can choose the format of their artifact. Students who are excellent artists can throw together some amazing comic books. Those who are good with computers could create a webpage. I strongly encourage students to play to their strengths when introducing new artifacts.

Depth of Understanding. This is great for students who usually whip through typical assignments and then sit around waiting for others to finish. Since there's always more information, images, examples, videos, and so forth that could be added to improve their artifact, it gives them a chance to make artifacts that just blow me out of the water. Students who struggle with the content just need to make sure they cover the required material. As an added bonus, I usually have more time to work with students who are struggling since those whiz kid students don't need my help very often.

Synthesis. I can't emphasize enough how heavily I emphasize that artifacts must be totally written in students' own words, that they explain images and diagrams, and that they don't ever put any information into their artifacts that they couldn't explain to their grandmother. If they want to put it into their artifact but don't understand it, they'd better look up information on it, ask for help, and know what they're talking about before adding it.

Ownership. Artifacts require students to own the information. Students put a lot of time and effort into making them and I've found 95% of the students are proud of what they've made. It's theirs. It's different from everyone else's.

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Part of the Chemical Reaction Artifact series of posts:

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Have a great Thanksgiving!

Although busy and slightly stressed, let me share a brief list of educationally-related things I'm thankful for:

  1. The readers of this blog. It's weird for me to think about how many people read my ideas here. Not that I have a huge readership, but I'm happy for every person who engages with my ideas in this forum.
  2. My previous experience. I spent six years at a small school in Whitmore Lake, MI busting my rear developing new classes, projects, and school-wide programs. I can't think of a better environment in which to start my teaching career. This experience has provided me with a skill-set that will follow me the rest of my teaching career. I was very sad to leave Whitmore Lake despite the new opportunities in Connecticut.
  3. Colleages old and new. One of the things that bothers me most about the teaching proffesion is how little time we have to work with our peers. I'm greatful for the moments (structured and unstructured) I get to spend with professionals working in similar environments.
  4. My blogroll. I've learned so much in the last year or so that I've been seriously reading education related blogs. You people are great.

Have a great Thanksgiving. I hope you find yourself in a relaxed state spending quality time with friends and family.

Turkey

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Image Credit: ~Sage~

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Making out

Here's a sign that's being posted in the stairwells of my school:

No Makeout Zone

This sign would be so much better without the threat. It could come across as a humorous reminder to not suck face in public spaces. Instead, this sign is just being asked to be torn off the wall. I'm tempted to do it every time I see it. I suppose I can be a little oppositional at times- but so can our students. Not to mention the threat of a blue slip (read: detention) smacks of an authoritarian environment instead of a caring one.

Here are my entrants into the "No Making-Out" poster category:

Paris

Image source

Gross

Image source

Kisses & Hugs

Image sources: Kisses, Hugs

LOLcat

I believe these still get the point across but in a light-hearted, humorous way. Whaddya think? Anyone else have any good hallway signs?

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C(R)APT testing

I truly believe that it is possible to have a standardized test that does at least a decent job of measuring student achievement. That being said, I have yet to see one that does.

Exhibit A

I snapped a quick pic of a CAPT (Connecticut's standardized test of choice) practice sheet that was left sitting by the copying machine on Friday.¹

Question 1

My favorite part of this? It includes the little bubble-it-in-grid. Not because this particular worksheet gets scanned, but it's just practice so students know how to fill in bubbles. As if there's nothing more important in our students lives than learning these valuable life skills (Objective A.12.34: Students will display proper usage of No. 2 pencils and bubbling technique).

These tests always seem to be trying to trick students. The questions asks for the answer given to the nearest gallon. Doing the math without rounding gives you an answer of 12,990.6542 gallons. The bubble grid includes space for decimals. How many students put in 12,990.65 and get it marked incorrect? What are they supposed to bubble in? 12,990? Would that get marked wrong because the last two decimals aren't filled in? 12,990.00? That's technically incorrect² but I can see how a 15 year old who is really trying to follow directions to a "T" would answer in that way.

Question 2

What knowledge is this question testing? At first it seems to be a question about proportions (40 gal. sap : 1 gal. syrup), but then it throws this whole gallons into quarts thing in at the end. Thus this question only tells us if students understand the conversion and the proportion concepts.The test can't determine if they understand one but not the other. Thus, the test doesn't determine what a student actually knows with any degree of accuracy.

Furthermore, how important is it for students to memorize conversion factors? Especially in Imperial Volume Units? I can barely keep those straight (and have little reason to). Anytime I really need to convert these units, I pull up Google and use their handy unit conversion tool.

What's the big deal?

This isn't a problem unique to Connecticut. It's a general problem that is pervasive throughout the high-stakes standardized testing world. How can these tests accurately determine what students know if they're poorly written? How can districts be told they're failing their students if the instrument used to determine that students aren't learning has serious validity problems? How can the entire education system in the United States buy into these tests as the best way to measure success?

Who are the people that write these tests? Do they read the questions they've written?

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¹ Sorry for the poor quality images of the tests. They were taken with my camera phone.

² The reason 12,990.00 is incorrect because it implies that the measurement is accurate to the nearest one hundredth of a gallon which is a higher degree of accuracy than can be ascertained from the given information. In fact, the correct answer should be 13,000 gallons, due to the total dollar value being given as the entirely vague "about $556,000." This implies that the final answer can only be accurate to the nearest thousand. Thus ends the quick & dirty lesson on significant figures.

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Playing it too safe

One of my big arguments against filtering teacher and student internet access at schools is because it blocks connections to amazing resources. Students should learn how to form personal learning networks, and teachers should be utilizing them in their practice as well. Case in point:

Out of the (relative) blue, @nporter threw a link at me as a result of my recent post on filter troubles. The link turned out to be a gem of an article on Edutopia written by Suzie Boss, "Stumbling Blocks: Playing it Too Safe Will Make You Sorry."

Great article. If you're at a school that filters out blogs, wikis, YouTube, etc. read it.

Now.

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A hole in the(ir) filter (logic)

I officially addressed the rest of the school improvement team with my concerns over the draconian level of filtration at my school. I essentially said something like, "We're charged with educating students for the 21st Century, yet we're telling them they can't use the tools of the 21st century. We're missing a major opportunity to educate these students on how to use these tools."

Initially there was no response. About 15 minutes later, after the discussion had moved on, a student piped in describing how YouTube could enhance his Physics class. Teachers brought up the fact that you could simply use VTunnel.com to get around the filters.¹ Further, they pointed out that all the students know about VTunnel, and if a teacher doesn't know how to use it, they could ask one of their students to help them with it.

Umm...err...so...

Why am I meeting resistance over this filtering issue? If there's a hole in the filter that everyone knows about and everyone is using, why don't we just adjust the filters appropriately?

Are my logic circuits out of whack? Is there a point to extremely tight filtration if most people know a somewhat reliable way to circumvent the filter?

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¹ VTunnel doesn't work from my school computer for whatever reason. It's blocked. Some teachers also mentioned that it tends to be unreliable. It'll work some days but not others, which keeps me from hopping on VTunnel with my students to utilize blocked sites. If it was totally reliable, I'd so already be there.

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Better teachers make better schools

Teachers are the key. To be more precise, highly effective teachers are the key. Putting high quality educators in every classroom would increase student performance more than any other reform movements. This isn't just my opinion, it's also the opinion of Professor Edward L. Glaeser according to his op-ed in the Boston Globe.

Dr. Glaeser proposes that step one to getting high quality teachers into the classroom is getting highly capable people into teaching. He suggests increasing teacher compensation as well as making the certification process less of a bureaucratic nightmare. I think both ideas are promising. I've certainly had to (and continue to) deal with the mess of getting certification and keeping it current.

Step two involves keeping these high quality teachers in the classroom. Teacher burn-out is a serious problem, especially among highly motivated, highly effective teachers who spend countless hours planning and prepping for those pivotal few minutes actually spent in contact with their students. People who are highly motivated and very capable also tend to have no problem adapting to careers outside of education.

Step two is where I'd really like to agree with Dr. Glaeser, but perhaps I'm just too cynical to really think things would work out as well as he hopes. Glaeser says, "Perhaps teachers unions could start endorsing the use of test scores to evaluate their members and determine tenure."  Look, I totally agree the current seniority based pay scale is not helping our education system. There's simply no incentive to work hard. I get a raise next year whether I bust my behind or just slide through the year. However, tieing test scores to salary gives me the willies.

Why basing teacher pay off student test scores scares me

  1. Test validity. Most state sanctioned standardized tests have a better correlation with socio-economic status than a students ability to think critically, scientifically, or those other skills that actually matter. If a standardized test could be shown to reliably measure the ability to think scientifically, mathematically, critically, etc. then I'd be much closer to liking this idea.
  2. The measurement of instruction affects instruction. Once you pick an instrument, that instrument determines what and how instruction will occur. If my salary is tied to successful test taking, I'm much more likely to focus on test taking skills or knowledge that students need for that one test. Gone is the focus on life-long learning.
  3. Local policies. What happens if my students don't do so hot on the test one year? Or a couple years? Who determines that policy, and how fluid is it? Perhaps it's just my cynicism, but I can envision too many ways this type of system could be used to keep the "good ol' boys" employed while pushing out innovation.

Things my salary should be based on

  • Classroom observation. Watch me at work. If you're paying me to interact directly with students, my salary better be based upon you watching me do that.
  • Student improvement in the areas of critical thinking, literacy, numeracy, and scientific thinking. I realize the standards say students need to know the difference between an element and a compound, but isn't it more important that my students know how interact with scientific information? We need to be teaching students more than facts.
  • My role as a professional educator. Am I a leader in the school? Can I be counted on to work for what's best for the school community?
  • Personal improvement. Am I reflective about my practice? Can I effectively target when things have gone poorly and change things to improve my weaknesses?

I'm unaware of any instrument that measures all the variables above. I'm not sure if that instrument existed if that would be the solution to our educational woes.

What things should your salary be based upon? Discuss.

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Tips and tricks: Workarounds

I realized earlier this week that I've figured out several workarounds for when I'm working on my school computer. With filtration that would have Mao crying foul mixed with a lack of administrative access to install programs or change settings, what works at home doesn't at school.

The setup

  • PC: running Windows XP.
  • Internets: Filtered.
  • Administrative rights: None.
  • Browser: Firefox 3 (for whatever reason, I've found that Firefox will often install even on machines where you don't have administrative access. However, the computer tech at school did put Firefox on my computer when I asked.)

How to get YouTube videos at school when they're blocked

There are many ways of doing this, but the following is simply the method that I have found the most effective.

At home: Find a video you like. Go to Zamzar.com. Click the "Download Videos" tab and paste the URL of the video into the appropriate box. Enter the file format you want the video to be downloaded in. For school I usually use the .mpg format, simply because it meshes well with all the Microsoft stuff. Put in your school email, hit convert. It can take a couple hours for your video to be converted, but it's usually ready within an hour.

At school: When the file has been converted Zamzar sends you an email with a link to a page where you can download your file. My school doesn't block Zamzar (so I doubt yours does), so I just go to the download page and save the video to my school computer to use as I see fit. I like this method because it automatically sends the email to my school address and I don't have to remember much.

TwitterAccessing Twitter from school

This is only a trick if Twitter is blocked by your school's internet filter. You need to be running Firefox for this one. Ask you tech people to install Firefox for you if you can't do it yourself. I'd bet they'd be okay with it.

Install either the TwitBin or TwitKit Firefox add-ons. For some reason they're able to retrieve and post tweets even when Twitter is blocked. I suggest both because at my last district TwitKit didn't work with the filter, but TwitBin did. Currently the opposite is true. I don't know enough about how these programs work to give you insight into why that might be, my best advice is simply to try one- if it doesn't work; try the other.

Print screenSaving and editing screenshots images on my school computer

My school computer's a PC, so the clearly superior Skitch program is right out. Other free screenshot tools that are PC compatible generally require administrator access to install, which in my situation is a deal breaker.

  1. Use your PrintScreen button to copy your screen as an image.
  2. Paste the screen image into PowerPoint.
  3. Crop the image, add text, arrows, emphasis, etc.
  4. Save your edits in one of two ways:
  • One: Use the "Save As..." function to save the entire slide as an image. This only works if the screenshot you want is as large as the entire slide, otherwise you get a lot of unnecessary white space.
  • Two: Select all the shapes and text you've added along with the image (do this by holding Ctrl while clicking on each element). Right click on the image. One of the options should be "Save as Image..." Pick that one and it will give you the options of saving your selection in a variety of formats. I generally use .jpg or .gif.

Hopefully you'll find these useful. What workarounds do you use to get around overly protected digital environments?

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Image sources:

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Censoring > Educating?

Too many times, our schools block websites, social networks, and brilliant content rather than emphasize education and appropriate use of these tools. Most of the time, the decision makers don't even know what it is they are banning. They act out of fear.

-Mike Sansone (Is Fear Disabling Our Students' Future?)

We're not focusing on educating students as much as we are on censoring them.

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Wikispaces + RSS = No Worries

As I've mentioned earlier, I'm using Wikispaces for my online classroom space this year. I've been slow about getting students involved in using the wiki, mainly because of my limited experience using Wikispaces but also because of the limited time I had before the school year to do any sort of planning.

Locked down

Initially, I locked all the wiki pages that I created- The class home pages, weekly schedules, assignments, etc.  Students did not have the rights to edit these pages. They could create new pages and edit them, but I was worried about the slim risk of a student vandalizing a main page, which might then be seen by a parent or administrator before I (or someone else) deleted the vandalism.

I know this reasoning was fear-based, and I didn't like it. I want students to be able to edit anything and everything. I want to give them the chance to improve and collaborate online. What I needed was a better way to monitor page edits.

RSSRSS saved my life

After minimal searching, I realized that in addition to providing RSS feeds for the edits made to individual pages, Wikispaces also provided a "master" RSS feed for every page edit made on my space.

I quickly subscribed the the "all page edits" RSS feed via Google Reader, and instantly every page edit made on my class space was pushed to my reader. Suddenly I was confident that if anyone chose to vandalize a page I would notice it right away. I check my Reader at home, at school, and often via my phone. Gone on vacation? I can still check page edits no problem.

Currently many of the day-to-day page edits are my own. During class wiki projects, there's a deluge of edits, but it doesn't take much time to flip through them since you really only need to pay attention to any changes that were made.

To date there's been no vandalism on the class wiki. I doubt vandalism will ever be a problem. But now I can unobtrusively monitor editing activity so I don't even have to worry about it.

What it looks like

Wikispaces RSS feed

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RSS Image by photopia / HiMY SYeD