Digital citizenship and responsibility: Real life application in the newsroom

Advising students that are working with an online publication opens up all of the issues discussed in week 4.  I struggle to make sure my students do not use any images especially that are not public domain.

One of the resources I have used with my class is below:
http://www.edutopia.org/blog/film-festival-digital-citizenship

I have attended many conventions and I marvel at the way that some school newspaper are using social media and teaching their students to be responsible with those tools.  These papers are teaching not only their staff members but all students how to be responsible citizens and to access information.  One school I have watched is below.  They have established an RSS feed and promote their paper on facebook

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/film-festival-digital-citizenship

There are many others that do a great job as well.

http://mvhsoracle.com/

Using formative assessment on the go

All English teachers struggle to teach grammar to students who are tuned out. One of the more difficult examples of this is verbals in the ninth grade curriculum.  As I struggle to get students to simply identify the verb of the sentence it is hard to move on to the next level where students are applying their understanding and using verbs in new ways.

I approached this concept differently this year and used formative assessments as I went.  The results made me very happy.  By the time we took a test on the concept most students got 100% or only missed one question.

Our Literacy Coaches provided us with a list similar to this but this list includes many of the activities I used as we spent three days on verbals and one day reviewing verbs.

I also used a pre-test to allow those students that could identify verbs to move on and complete a pre-unit activity that would lay the foundation for the concept of verbals.

http://www.isbe.net/common_core/pdf/da-form-asmt-chart.pdf

This week's topics of project based learning and inquiry learning led to a great deal of reflection. I agree that the real world component of education is critical in getting students to "buy in" to their own educational process.

My journalism class is project based learning at its best.  I start out the year front loading the students with the information they will need to be successful.  As we continue, students are separated into groups of their choosing.  Students become reporters, bloggers, or photographers.  The work load of creating an online publication is split among the group and students are constantly working with real time demands and deadlines. All of their final products are available to a world wide audience.

Each student group is led by an editor.  Students make their own decisions about what they will be working on, when deadlines will be set, what needs improved etc.  Students are also held accountable for their contributions to the team just like on a sports team.  If a team member is not contributing discussions will take place and eventually students can be removed from the staff.

I want to continue to move forward with these models of learning and adapt more content to be inquiry and project based.  The two novels I teach lend themselves to this.  I also do a great deal of inquiry based education in my diversity in literature class.  Students are constantly investigating what interests them about certain cultures like Native American tribes or marriage customs etc.

Using my wiki space as my delivery method and organizational method seems to be working for now.  I do think as I progress this method will need some enhancement.

Below are two resources I came across that I liked.  The first is a prezi that investigated the current trends in journalism as a career and the second is a graphic that represented project based learning.


http://prezi.com/kwwtjhqe_tyo/project-based-learning-launch-video/

welcome to my blog

I have created this blog for an online course I am taking about blended learning.  I will write each week to explore different concepts I have learned about and how they relate to what I do in my ninth grade English classroom.

I teach at Altoona Area Junior High School.  My current teaching assignment includes academic English 9, poetry, Diversity in Literature, and Journalism.  Teaching these different classes allows me to explore a variety of content and teaching methods.  I am most proud of my journalism program and it has grown over the years.  This is the first year that we are online using the internet.  The site has evolved this year, and I have lots of goals for next year.  Check it out at livewire.aasdcat.com

I also try to use technology effectively in my classroom and have developed wiki spaces for the students.  These are also evolving.  I am just finishing up To Kill a Mockingbird and have tried to successfully integrate technology with the study of this classic literature.  You can check out my English wiki space at PletcherEnglish9.wikispaces.com