field notes.edu

image:http://www.teen-reading-club.wikispaces.com

This year, as part of our Library and Media Centre program, we’re personalizing reading.

Our goal is to engage our students, boys in particular, in enjoying reading.

What have we done? We’ve taken a survey of all of our students in grades 7 through 9 to find out:

• the extent to which they enjoy reading (or not)
• the genre which they prefer, and any authors/titles they’ve liked
• the last good book they’ve read
• formats they prefer (print, audio, graphic novel, etc.)
• recommendations

I shared the results with our Library Assistant, and she immediately put together a reading list tailored to student interests. She even went so far as to contact a book company to see if they had a specific lexile and thematic level for one student who struggled with reading. I am so proud to have her as part of our team!

The result to date after one month: we have engaged 15% of our junior boys in enjoying reading more. How do we know? We’ve connected with our reluctant readers, and have made personal connections to their reading interests, recommending novels through visits in class and through the Library-direct connections.

Wow! We even got a reader who hated reading to “I LOVE reading!” Now he’s determined to read all of the books in a particular series. This student has now moved on to full-text reading series at an increasingly challenging lexile level.  We love it when that happens!

It just goes to show that literacy matters and that we can make a difference if we target our Library programs to our students’ interests, and include all Library staff in a team approach in developing (and modelling!) a lifelong love of reading.

Next steps? Inviting students to participate in a Library Leadership Group, an occasional group of diverse students who will help make recommendations on reading selections, digital, print, and audio, as well as developing our Learning Commons into an engaging personal and virtual space!

I’m always looking for an effective and convenient mobile means of assessing learning.

 In my last post, I spoke of how some of my colleagues and I collected videos and images that can be used to assess students’ learning, or be forwarded via email for students to put as evidence in their eportfolios.

Just the other day, I came across a Twitter post by @mrrobbo (Jarrod Robinson) announcing his new mobile portfolio app, Easy Portfolio, now available on iTunes. I decided to try it out, and so far, I am quite impressed. The app allows me to do the following:

• Create several eportfolios
• Add images, videos, audio, documents, and urls with a few simple clicks
• Export these items via email or Dropbox

I like how the app helps categorize the collection of evidence, and allows me to export via email or Dropbox so I can later add the artefacts to my actual website. I am thinking of using it as an organizing repository, though it can be used as is. It’s also available for iPad.

I can see the app being used by my students to collect their own learning evidence. It’s $2.99, within reason for an app that I think can add real value to student-centered learning.

For elementary school teachers, I think it can be a nice alternative to Evernote, particularly since it integrates with Easy Assessment, an app that lets teachers create groups and rubrics for tasks, allowing on-the-spot assessment (including adding notes, photos, and video). For example, a teacher can create “portfolios” for each of her/his students, collect formative evidence within Easy Portfolio, but also add summative pieces from Easy Assessment.

It’s looking like a handy app to have right now, and worth a try!

I recently viewed a Slideshare presentation by Brian Kuhn from SD43 about documenting learning in the early years with technology. I was prompted to reflect about our own learning journey in this area…

This year at our school, we are continuing to embed eportfolios as learning, reflection, and self-awareness tools. Part of that process is to collect evidence of learning: assignments, projects, videos, reflections, scans, notes, and more. We’ve encouraged our students to use their handheld digital devices to capture the moment (or capture the moment for a friend who may not have one yet), but sometimes they forget…

In my InfoTech 9 class, students are doing great things. They are engaged in working on individual and team choice projects in the domains of: photography, videography, and game design. We are working on competencies such as: creativity, independent learning, and problem solving. Much of my time is spent coaching using the following questions to move learning forward:

“How did you learn that?”
“What do you want to explore about that?”
“How would you do that differently next time?”
“Can you share your learning with a classmate?”

I take the time to document their learning with my iphone when I ask these questions. I first ask if they don’t mind if I take a photo or video, then I “shoot and share” with them via email. If it’s a video, and they have a youtube account, I remind them about privacy settings. Then, they are welcome to add the evidence to their eportfolios or learning blogs. It works well.

The other day, I had a conversation with a colleague who used handheld devices in another way—he used student devices to record foreign/second language readings right into their devices so they could use them during class to practice their pronunciation. Students without devices used the class ipod. It worked. “Having the device right there, in the moment, is critical,” he says.

Another colleague uses her iPad to video students as they are doing their Science experiments or Biology labs so she can replay decisions the team made, and to ask them to reflect on their thinking during the process. It works well. “It’s so easy to just take a snapshot or a quick video,” she says. And the evidence of learning is there, at the fingertips.