World Wide Language

I'm not sure how I missed this story last May, but it was the end of another school year and my head was likely in the thick fog of report cards and summer planning. The language teacher in me was warmed to discover that the first non-latin domain name was finally launched six months ago. It's about time. Latin based languages only represent a small population of the world. This means that only a small percentage of people in the world can access the internet in a meaningful way. I read an article on Mashable and learned that 42% of all internet users are from Asia. In the last 10 years Arabic online has increased over 2500%. Language is an incredible tool for communication that allows us to exchange information, thoughts, and ideas with others. Non-Latin language speakers have the same inclination to engage in this exchange. Now, they have equal access to the internet. This is truly monumental.

It will be interesting to see how the internet changes as it begins to reflect the diversity of people, cultures, and languages in our world. It's true that the advent of the web has made our world smaller and more connected, but it wasn't until 6 months ago that it became truly international.

Clicker Training

When I first got my dog, Lucy, she was naughty. She would bark incessantly every time I left her side, when left alone in the house she would chew and destroy everything in sight; the couch, area rugs, shoes, pillows, blankets, even the potted plants were in danger of her wrath. Her worst habit of all was jumping on people that we would pass during trail runs. She was happy to see people and eagerly wanted to greet them, but she definitely lacked social grace. People really don't like muddy paw prints on their Nike shirts. So, I realized it was time to take action. I bought a clicker. Positive reinforcement training with a clicker was a godsend. Eventually, Lucy learned to be a good dog. No more jumping, minimal chewing, and no barking when I left her side. I can say now that she is almost a perfect dog.... she is still obsessed with chasing cats (I don't think anything can cure the lure of the feline).

So, why am I thinking about my dog and clickers? I read an article about clickers in the NY Times today. But the dogs being 'trained', weren't dogs.. they were students. And I guess they weren't really being trained (although that is one way to look at it). They were being engaged. Recently, university professors at Harvard and Northwestern, among others, are using "clickers" or wireless devices. Students use the devices to check into class, answer multiple quiz questions, and indicate if they are confused without raising their hands. The biggest benefit that professors are seeing with these new devices is that they are increasing student attention. Students aren't able to doze off, text friends, space out, and daydream during a lecture because they are using these devices to 'engage' in the content. As I was reading this article, I started thinking about my own class. When I use hand held white boards with students, it increases their attention because they know that they will write something and hold it up for me to see. They are more engaged with the hand held white board than if they didn't have it. And I'm pretty sure they would be even more engaged if those white boards were digital. Our world and the people in it are becoming increasingly more and more digital and, thus, more digitally engaged. It only makes sense that our classrooms reflect our world. I like the idea of these devices and I wish that I had had access to this technology while I was in college. The article stated that some students resent the big brother potential of the clicker. I can see that point of view. But, I think the potential benefits outweigh the negatives. If the clicker is increasing student involvement and thinking, what more could a teacher or student ask for? Okay.. okay... a liver treat would be a great addition.

Now, if Lucy just had opposable thumbs, she could get a university degree.

Changing Education Paradigms

I really like this video from Sir Ken Robinson. I first heard Sir Ken Robinson when I saw his TED talk called Do Schools Kill Creativity?. This video is 11 minutes long and worth it to watch. His themes resonate with me and many others. I can see how modern education has boxed students into "academic" or "non academic" and how this limits human potential and creativity. He makes the point that our current system came of age during the age of industrialism and serves the interests of industrialism. His point is that education is modeled in the image of industrialism (schools are run on bells, subjects are separate, facilities are separate, kids are separated by age groups) and the production line mentality of education which includes more and more standardized testing is what is killing divergent thinking (the ability to see lots of possible answers or ways to interpret a question). Of 1500 kindergartners tested for divergent thinking the percentage of them who were scored at genius level were 98%. These same kindergartners were re-tested 5 years later and scored 50%. Are our educational institutions killing divergent thinking which is a vital part of creativity? As a teacher in the 21st century, how can I create a classroom that fosters and encourages divergent thinking? How can I foster my own divergent thinking and become a better model for my students?

Here are some ideas on how we can do this (I'm practicing my divergent thinking right now!)

• engage in new activities regularly
• if something seems difficult, it's probably worth doing
• do it and learn new ways of solving problems
• free write in a journal daily
• look at an object and think of as many different uses for it as possible
• participate in improvisational skits/drama
• play word association games
• write choose your own adventure stories (I used to love those books!)
• describe how ideas look, taste, feel, sound, and smell
• solving riddles, puzzles, and brain teasers
• brainstorm, brainstorm, brainstorm!

Nursery Rhymes for 21st Century Digital Kids

Reflections on COETAIL Course 3

Course 3 resonated with me because it confirmed all of my beliefs about the power visuals have of extending and deepening learning in the classroom. I found course 3 to be the most useful to me in terms of applying what I have learned here in COETAIL in my classroom with my students. It was valuable to have time to explore ways of presenting information visually during class and then actually creating presentations that I can use with students. I also appreciated learning about the Flip Cam and what we can do with the software from Mark. Even though I've always known that the flip cams were available for us to use, it wasn't until I actually had time to play around with them during class that I understood how easy it would be to integrate them into class activities and projects. Having time to tinker with technology helped me to get my creative juices flowing and my lightbulb of ideas to shine.

One of the results of this course is that I find myself not only thinking of ways I can make language learning more visual, but which visuals will have the deepest and most long lasting impact on student learning. It's also helped me to have conversations with my students about why and how images help them in their own learning and how they can use this awareness to use visual depictions to communicate effectively to an audience. For example, one of my students who was writing a story about a maid who was trying to figure out who ate all of the pizza in the kitchen drew this:

We later discussed how this picture would help the audience understand the story. What if it were a different picture, perhaps just a picture of a pizza box or just the maid? The main point that the maid was trying to figure out the mystery of who actually ate the pizza could have been lost. But, because she drew the maid scratching her head with a perplexed expression and an empty pizza box the reader has a better idea of what the message is communicating even without the use of language to reinforce it. In the future I'll continue to have conversations with students about how they can effectively use images to convey meaning. Fortunately, this course has given me a better sense of what visual literacy is and how to start talking about visual literacy with kids.

I was happy that digital storytelling was one of the focal points of this course. I am very interested in incorporating digital storytelling into my classroom on a more regular basis. This course gave me the opportunity to reflect more about how to use images effectively to tell a story. My final project is centered around digital storytelling and specifically encourages students to use images to help "tell" their story and make it appealing to a wider audience.

I'll post student examples of digital stories soon!

My Students are FLIPPING Out!

I am in love with the flip cam! I think the thing I like the best about using the Flip cameras in class is that they are so simple to use and the software to create magic movies is equally as simple. I spent no more than one minute explaining to students how the camera operated and I don't even think they needed it! They picked up on how to use them right away! Students created short videos narrating their stories in Spanish last week. Having the flip cams in class added a new level of fun and excitement to story retelling. It was easy to use, fun, and it got kids speaking in Spanish! ¡¡Me encanta la Flip!!

I Dig Digital Storytelling!

Saturday's class was fantastic because I got to do something I love best, create stories! I am really excited by the use of storytelling in world languages and I discovered a really great tool to create stories digitally for my Spanish class. Prezi is not only fun, but a really powerful tool for creating stories with zooming images and text. I can't wait for kids to try it out. In the past, we have always used Notebook and Voicethread to create stories since they are simple and inserting images is easy. I will still use both of those tools. Voicethread is so valuable to world language learners since it has the ability to record oral language. But, I'm now really excited by the possibilities of using Prezi with kids to write and tell stories in new and creative ways.

I created this presentation that I will use for my 3rd grade Spanish class (another reason I loved Saturday's class is that I got a lesson done!)

Mini-Cuento on Prezi

The process of creating this story was both exciting and frustrating. It was exciting because it's been awhile since I've seen technology that is so flexible and creative. It was frustrating because It took me awhile to get the hang of how to edit and add pictures and manipulate the "zebra" wheel. It was almost like learning a new sport and my fingers had to develop muscle memory to be able to control the zoom feature, etc. It helped sitting next to Laura who had just learned about Prezi at a conference in Shanghai. She was able to answer most of the questions that I had.

One of my goals as a teacher this year is to use storytelling to provide comprehensible input for my kids so this COETAIL class was really helpful to me. It allowed me the opportunity to not only learn about new ways of tellling stories, but to actually implement what I learned.