Transliteracy is the idea that one is able to create,communicate and take in content across a variety of settings including verbal, non-verbal, visual and technological. According to blogger Suzana Sukovic, “Transliteracy consists of skills, knowledge, thinking and acting, which enable a fluid ‘movement across’ in a way that is defined by situational, social, cultural and technological contexts.”
When thinking about transliteracy in the context of teaching math content I immediately think about the ways in which my students engage with mathematics. Students are accustomed to learning math in the most traditional sense of instruction. They actually like direct instruction because it is a familiar process and takes the focus off of them. My students like when I lecture because they can be passive in their learning; taking notes and writing down examples, without actually being invested in the development of problem solving. Employing the principles of transliteracy to my instructional practice will include diversifying the ways that I communicate content to my students and in turn will influence the ways that they are required to take in information. This semester, creating videos and posting lectures/tutorials online helped my students to see the benefit of online content. They were able to re-watch videos, engage with content they didn't understand the first time they saw it, and fast forward through parts of my lecture they felt comfortable with. This was particularly helpful for my students who require accommodations and those who are still learning English. Some students even branched out and explored other math content on YouTube. I think that most teachers are intimidated by transliteracy because they think that transliteracy equates to required use of technology. I think that, while technology use should be included in any curriculum that embraces transliteracy, it is not required. Teachers who explain to their students the differences between taking notes from a lecture and taking notes while reading a text book are engaging in transliteracy. There are elements of transliteracy that we engage with everyday without realizing it. As innovative teachers we need to encourage and foster its development among our peers.
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As my capstone project began I was concerned with the math anxiety that was so apparent among my math 1 students. The desire to cure my students of math anxiety and increase their performance on assessments drove my research. My intended audience throughout the first semester of this program was other math teachers also concerned about the math anxiety our students displayed.
As my research evolved during the second semester, I began to focus more on engagement techniques as a means of better preparing my students. My audience shifted to teachers who wanted to engage their students in content practice in and outside of class time. Now after marrying my two concerns and refining my current capstone project - using a flipped classroom model as a means of reducing the cognitive strain that students face, my audience now includes any teacher looking for techniques to combat the negative affects cognitive strain has on students, in particular math teachers who will see the correlation between cognitive strain and math anxiety. In terms of innovative teaching and use of technology, my capstone speaks to teachers interested in a flipped or blended classroom model. More specifically, those interested in the use of digital tools to create video tutorials for their students to use outside of class for frontloading of new information and remediation. My hopes for my capstone center on my desire to help students overcome the fear and anxiety they face when confronted with math. Unfortunately, fear of math evolves into dislike for math related content and that dislike is normalized by a mathphobic society. If students are given the space to process their math anxiety and taught practical habits for success in math I believe that all students are fully capable of performing math at high levels.
In terms of how my goals align with those of the program, I want to innovate my instructional practice by using technology in meaningful ways to increase the likelihood that my students are engaging with math content outside of the classroom so that they come to class more prepared to perform math. By helping my students to engage with math content at home (flipping my classroom) they will come to class with a reduced cognitive load, better able to focus on the transfer of content from working memory to long term memory, and less anxious about math. We are a pretty open and friendly cohort. We have many members who work at the same school sites which makes it easy for us to communicate our needs in person. For the last two semesters we have supported each other greatly through leaving encouraging and engaging comments on each others blogs. Their comments help me to think deeper while also giving me the confidence I need to make it through all the stress of teaching while working on a masters. I will continue to provide this support to my cohort as well as being responsive to any other needs. The only group norm that I can think of requesting is that we continue to have our work due on the Sunday nights of the week that assignments are due. We worked this out with the professors during our second semester as it gave us another day to complete work, with the understanding that we would all be timely in our responses to each other blogs. Im looking forward to working with this group of people for one more semester and then collaborating outside of the program after we graduate! Creation of my project blueprint When I started thinking about the blueprint for my DQ project I thought a flowchart of the major events that have taken place since the end of EDUC 790 and throughout EDUC 791, would be the most appropriate way to illustrate my thinking. I zoomed out from my involvement in the research process and thought of the events that have had to take place to ensure that I was addressing the needs of my DQ. Creating a blueprint helped me figure out the next steps of my research and create a timeline for when I will accomplish my last rounds of data collection before school ends. Looking at the completed blueprint, seeing all that I have done and all the things that remain for me to do, I realize how much work I have completed in this research project. Seeing the flow of ideas helps me to see the logical thinking that I have been using throughout this process despite my constant feelings of being lost. Creation of my flipped classroom model
As I was creating my project blueprint, I got to a point where I had to define a flipped classroom. I wanted to define what the expectations would be for the teacher and the students. Creating a separate model for the “flipped classroom cycle” was my attempt to summarize the necessary steps for running a successful flipped classroom. In my model for the flipped classroom cycle I defined two phases, the “At home phase” and the “In class phase”. Each phase consists of the required actions of both teacher and student. What each role must do to achieve success in this flipped format. After defining each phase and the requirements of the roles in each phase I was better able to show students what I was doing and what I expected them to do during this new cycle of learning. This model blueprint helped me to establish clear expectations for myself and for students. Gamification in education is the application of typical elements of game playing, point scoring, competition with others, a specific rules and rewards system, for example used to drive an educational experience. Game based learning is when specific content is taught or reinforced with the use of a game. While gamification uses the mechanics of gaming outside of the context of the game, game based learning uses an actual game as the vehicle for driving learning. My first experience with gamification was in high school. My calculus teacher allowed students to create games for our spring finals. Being a huge fan of The Price is Right I decided that I was going to create a Plinko board and have my peers compete to receive chances to drop a ball into the Plinko creation in order to score points OR to subtract points from other players. Math was the framework for the learning, as all of the questions were based on math content but the mechanics of how students engaged with the math were all game based. My first experience with game based learning came during computer lab time in elementary school. There was a math game that students loved, despite its content. It required one to move a shape onto an identical shape somewhere else on the screen by spinning, sliding and flipping the original shape. As a math teacher I now realize that the game was teaching the concepts of transformational geometry. As students were spinning, sliding and flipping, they were actually learning to rotate, translate and reflect images. I was lucky to find an updated version of this game hosted by Mathplayground and I am super excited to use it with my students as we progress through transformational geometry.
At the high school level students really appreciate any gamification that one adds to a course. Even if it’s simply putting students together in a team and having them race to complete assignments, or allowing students to gain class points toward a common goal by answering questions correctly, they enjoy the competitive and group elements it adds to the course. I get so much student by in when I use Kahoot or Quizizz by allowing the top scoring student to select a non academic kahoot or quizz to play next (Most common choices this year are: Disney movies, Minecraft and SexEd.) It is not a significant prize by any means but the students enjoy the choice and voice it provides them for demonstrating content knowledge. Next year I fully plan to incorporate more instances of Desmos based activities. Before I really looked into what was offered through their site I thought it was simply a free-use graphing calculator. Exploring all of the teacher created resources I found that there are a wide variety of games that help students learn complex topics such as functions and linear systems through exploration. I began this research project by looking into math phobia which tends to manifest in specialized math anxiety when one is placed in situations where math is required. I observed correlations that exist between a students feelings towards math and their performance in a math course and through data collection I was able to establish a negative correlation between a students level of math anxiety and their performance in a math course (The higher a students level of math anxiety, the lower their performance level).
As I looked closer into causes of math anxiety I explored the concept of cognitive load, a person’s ability to process information and the brain's ability to move information from working memory to long term memory. Math anxiety places a severe strain on cognitive load, comprising a person's access to working memory and thus their ability to learn. Through a survey on contributing factors to math anxiety, I found that a major reason my students felt math anxiety was their lack of preparation before coming to class. Outside of class my students were not committing any time to practicing what we discussed in class, including doing any of my assigned homework. My students were relying solely on the brief instructional periods we have to prepare them for the rigor of secondary math courses. It was at this point that I decided my assigned homework was ineffective at preparing students and so I needed to attempt a flipped or blended instructional model. My biggest struggle when first setting up a blended classroom was figuring out a way to effectively and efficiently create content that I could have students engage with at home, before coming to class. I first tried using content that was already created by searching for videos related to my content on different video hosting sites but all of the content that I found was too broad to be effective. I realized that I would have to create original content and it was through this need that I found “ShowMe” an iPad app that allows me to easily create videos, screencasts and interactive medias for my students. What makes this app so effective is its ease of use and how it allows users to easily integrate slideshows, voiceover and annotations in a powerful way that lets users easily guide students learning to desired objectives. When I first began this process I looked at technology as a replacement for things that I was already doing in my classroom. I used to think that instead of doing an example for students I could show a video of someone else doing an example. I was thinking very surface level, simply replacing with the tools I had available. In building my knowledge of the TPACK model I am seeing that by developing deep understandings of pedagogy, technology and content, teachers are able to integrate technology as a means of increasing the effectiveness of one’s instruction. Now instead of simply replacing with technology I am integrating with activities like: having students record themselves doing a problem, uploading the videos to flipgrid and then commenting on the work that their peers are doing. Using technology to develop my students ability to collaborate in more creative ways is how TPACK has helped improve my instructional practices. For this weeks exploration of flipped and blended classrooms I really wanted to take the opportunity to explore some of the whiteboard apps that are available to educators. Thinking about flipping my classroom, my number one concern is the ability to provide consistent instruction to students whether they be at home or in class. A solid whiteboard app would allow me to recreate the necessary elements of my in-class instruction while also allowing me to push students towards developing better understanding of math content in a variety of ways.
I chose to explore two different whiteboard apps based on feedback I have heard from other teachers and from various google searches. Kami - your paperless classroom hero Kami is an app that allows you to annotate and interact with any file you upload. Aside from seamless uploading of PDFs Kami does have the power to allow teachers to upload word documents and even powerpoints but at the cost of an upgrade to a paid version. I felt that Kami was extremely limited with its free version and required too much work-around in order to be useful without paying a fee. I also felt that Kami was not as responsive to inputs as other whiteboard choices. I used both my finger on the touchscreen and a stylus; neither impressed me. Kami does not have a built in screen capture feature so users would have to create annotated slides and then use something like screencast o'matic in order to create a presentation that could be posted for students. Show me Interactive Whiteboard - iPad ShowMe is an amazing app that turns your iPad into an interactive whiteboard and has a built in recording feature so that you can record videos right from your device. It was very simple to add in a picture, PDF or other file and start annotating directly over the file. You can prepare slides in advance and then go through your presentation, speaking over slides and describing all of the annotations in real time. It was really easy for me to use my iPad to take pictures of different examples that I had already created, adding them directly into the presentation I was cultivating for my flipped lesson plan. I can imagine finding amazing resources online and then using screenshots to easily develop fresh teaching materials right on the device. There is also a comprehensive “Explore” tab organized by both content and standards that makes available ShowMes created by teachers from all over the world. I was very impressed by the ease of using this app. Sadly there are limitations imposed to those who do not want to pay a fee. You are only allowed to upload 5 videos for free and then you have to pay a monthly subscription to continue posting content. Despite all of the great features that are made available by something like ShowMe, none of it matters if students are not able to access resources due to limited technology or internet options or if they simply refuse to make use of the learning material. As Jon Bergmann and Caitlin Tucker explain, we have to Flip & Engage so that students are interacting and not just passively watching. Having students interact with the screen cast increases the likelihood that they will learn something from the experience and walk away feeling as though the resources you are creating should be valued. EdPuzzle is a great option to bring in once you have created content like a screen cast because you can add further annotations and even quiz questions on top of your video to require students to view, explore and think while engaging. Integrating activities relating to the video such as having students complete google forms or engaging in online discussions through google docs might also be a way to monitor student engagement and ensure that they are utilizing the flipped aspect of instructional screen casts to their fullest potential! Baggio - The Visual Connection
My biggest take-away from the Baggio text is the idea presented in chapter 11 that your learner must always come first; even before your own desires, ideas and even content; the learner is the priority. As teachers we often think that the goal of our profession is to impart understanding of our particular content area. We worked for countless years to attain a level of mastery in our field so when we get into the classroom it is natural for us to believe we are the most important delivery system for information. Baggio argues, understanding the needs of the learner and putting those needs before our own is the only way for learning to take place. Knowing our audience and following the visual guidelines, like CRAP, that are outlined in The visual Connection helps to reduce the cognitive load that our students are suffering and facilitate the processing of information through working memory, into long term memory. It is paramount for instructors to build an idea of our students needs, truly viewing them as the end user for any instruction material that we create, so that we can effectively structure their learning experience to aid in long term memory transfer. Clark - How to teach processes The Clark chapter that is most relevant to my DQ and, in general, where I am in my instructional practice is chapter 6. This chapter explains that process is a more meaningful application of procedure and when learners understand procedure and the systems under which that procedure operates, they can access process. Clark also explains “remember” and “application” levels of learning in this chapter. My DQ is concerned with reducing a students cognitive load by increasing the preparation they receive before coming to class, using a blended learning model. I noticed that many of my students were not able to access process or application level learning because they were not able to move information past working memory. I believe this is because they were not practicing enough with the content and procedure I was teaching via homework. In class, their cognitive processing ability was too low because they were still struggling to understand procedure. By using a blended learning model I am hoping that I can engage students with tutorials and instruction that focuses on procedure, at home, so that they are more able to build process understanding in the classroom through direct instruction, focused note taking and repetition. The SITE model and how it applies to me and my students The SITE model is a framework for determining how appropriate something is for the audience that it is intended for. In every step of the design process of my DQ and instructional elements related to my DQ I must always consider the end user and their needs. My students must benefit from any instructional tool I create so I have to constantly weigh the effectiveness of my tools based on its ability to be used by my students with ease. As a masters candidate my research will add to the existing body of knowledge for cognitive processing, math anxiety and the use of a blended classroom model. Eventually my peers in academia may use my research to springboard from and the SITE model provides an organizational framework that ensures effective communication of information. For this week's assignment I wanted to create 3 new google forms to address needs in my instruction and coaching life. I am a complete beginner when it comes to google forms but in exploring the various blogs, add ons and youtube videos concerning google forms I have begun to see how powerful of a resource it can be as an educational tool.
Form 1 - Homework Survey This form is being used to collect data for my capstone project. I wanted to explore the number of students who are doing homework on a regular basis and get feedback from them on what useful, effective homework looks like. This was my first google form creation and it is a very basic collection of multiple choice questions, slider questions and short responses. Student responses from this survey will help to inform my research on flipped classroom models and the creation of more effective homework assignments that better prepare my students for learning. Form 2 - Sample branching homework assignment This form was inspired from the work of Alice Keeler and her branching quizzes in google forms. I wanted to create an assignment that focused on providing students with help if they were not able to correctly answer a homework question. I created a form with multiple sections and intentionally selected the section that students were brought to, based on their answers to the homework questions. Correct responses bring them to the next question and eventually to the form submission screen, while incorrect answers bring them to a tutorial page with an instructional video that will then loop them back to the question they missed. I also used the add on - EquatIO in order to incorporate mathtype into my form. This add on is an absolute must for math teachers as it allows so many ways for you to add equations into your forms including writing the equations out by hand and even speaking the equations into life through your mic. Eventually I will be able to create homework assignments like this for every section and use them in my exploration of a blended classroom model where students review material at home before we cover it in class. Form 3 - Cheer candidate evaluation This form was created as a means to reduce the amount of paper generated from traditional teacher evaluation forms during cheer tryouts. With 50+ candidates that require 6-7 teacher evaluation forms each, I become buried under a storm of papers that must be organized, reviewed and evaluated. This google form allows me to compile everything into a gorgeous google sheet that will then easily let me organize data by cheer candidate. Through conditional formatting I am also able to color code the responses from teachers based on value (1 = red, 2-3 = yellow, 4,5 = green) to easily allow me to determine the best candidates for our cheer squad. I have never played around with conditional formatting but Alice Keeler’s blog made it simple to figure out and experiment with. I attempted to use the add on AutoCrat in order to compile individual scores for each candidate into a visually uniform output/template but after watching a couple youtube videos, I decided that I need to continue experimenting with the possibilities of the add on as it too advanced for my current level of use. I am excited to reduce my paper consumption this year and get teacher evaluations through google form! When thinking of the challenges related to the creation of an instructional resource aimed at sharing my research with my colleagues I want to refer back to my major takeaways from the Clark readings this week.
Chapters 3-6 in the Clark reading highlight the different technical aspects of teaching procedure, concept, fact and process. My major takeaways from each of these sections follow: Procedure
Concept
Creating a resource for the concept of a blended classroom model will include the use of examples of what different classroom models are available to teachers. Most of my colleagues in the math department are only familiar with two different instructional models: the direct instruction model which is very teacher focused, and the PrBL model which, if done correctly, can be student focused. Building conceptual understanding of a blended model requires that they understand the purpose of the classroom and have clear intentions for the instructional model they choose. I hope that my resources will allow them to see that a blended model allows for each interested party, teacher and student, to have a hand in the learning of material. Fact
When I think about the presentation of fact I refer to the Clark readings explanation of fact being unique pieces of data. My resources will include hard data as to the effectiveness of the blended instructional model I am experimenting with as well as any relevant facts related to the use of a blended model. Such facts will include things like: - Homework will look different using a blended model - Students will be front loading information at home before they take notes in class - Front loading information before lecture provides students with prior knowledge Process
Resources related to process will include a flowchart that explains the learning cycle in a blended classroom. The resource will explain the process of students watching videos at home and trying one practice problem, coming to class and taking guided notes on the concepts related to the video they watched the night before, and then doing what is traditionally called “homework” in class with teacher aid. This process then repeats for a new concept. The deeper the understanding my colleagues have for the blended classroom model the more likely they will be to attempt it and employ it correctly. |
Brandon DeJesusMath Archives
July 2019
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