Monday, June 8, 2015

Day 6 Backward design, planning performance assessments, lino, wordle, zip grade app

Day 6

Dr. Kun Huang (Quinn) will be with us for a few days. She is teaching us how to incorporate technology into our lessons. We used 'polleverywhere.com' to note the top three things we learned last week. Then, we turned them into a word cloud at 'Wordle.' The most frequent responses come us as larger words in the word cloud.

Next we discussed 'Backward by Design' lesson planning, in which the final performance objective is decided before the instruction is designed. After some review and disussion of writing good performance-based objectives Dr. Huang also showed us how to collaborate a definition in Google.docs. Then we wrote performance-based goals for a planned lesson in our content area using terms which could be observed and assessed (measured). We posted our goals on a bulletin board in 'lino.' Each content area had a different color post-it note.

Before lunch on of our classmates demonstrated how to use 'ZipGrade.com' to quickly grade tests. For a small yearly fee, the teacher buys the app for their smart phone or tablet. On the site, the teacher prints out an answer sheet (bubble sheet, like a Scantron) which the students will use to select answers to a multiple choice quiz. The teacher opens the app, scans the quiz and receives a score immediately. The results go in the cloud, from which the teacher and students can see feedback about the frequently missed questions, etc. I expect to purchase this app when the school year begins. The price was $6.99 in the Play Store.

After lunch - Nancy and I paired up to examine a document called 'Games and Icebreakers for ESL Classes.' As we examined the document, I shared 'Kahoot' with her and we played a game together to make sure it worked in this lab. We also made comments about the games listed and the success we had with some variations of the games. Nancy shared how she uses Quizlet. I didn't realize it was that easy to create vocabulary practice and quizzes. The images and sounds are already installed so there is little work to do for the teacher. Her students practice meanings and pronunciation in and out of school, on their phones while on athletic trips, etc. They can take computer quizzes in class and the results are immediate. I will definitely use this FREE app this year!

As for the super-fabulous lesson plan I have to create - I'm leaning in the direction of exploring holidays and festivals in the Spanish-speaking world. This should lend itself  to reading (maybe listening) to authentic sources; answering and writing questions and presenting an interview as a skit. The question-answer part is a troublesome part of instruction for me. I have a to-do list including creating a list of choices for the students and locating authentic resources for them. I would like to create a sample lesson so I can make the directions clear for my students.

The last thing we did on day 6 was to create a Weebly account at Weebly.com.  It will be paired with our gmail+ services. We started the web page design and we'll keep working on it tomorrow. Mine is frieseng8ti2015.  Come visit.


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