Professional Development Reflection Questions by Maia Blaise

Digital Tools Currently Using in Classroom

srhineer20 — 2024-07-30 22:28:12 UTC

I currently use an AI program (Amira) that is mandated by Baltimore County that acts as a benchmark and PM program for reading. I also use PebbleGo as an online text. I rarely have students use their own devices to access digital tools and instead use my device and project the tool and interact with it as a class. The reason why I do this instead of 1:1 devices is honestly for the sake of time.

How I engage with different types of text:

srhineer20 — 2024-07-30 22:35:49 UTC

I use interactive maps on the promethean board and when reading from a book students highlight, draw pictures and annotate.

Primary sources

srhineer20 — 2024-07-30 22:37:35 UTC

Honestly, I don't think that I use many primary resources.

Digital Tools

cdebord00 — 2024-07-30 22:37:40 UTC

My 4th graders have become extremely comfortable with our class online platform. This is where I post assignments, videos, resources, links, and more. They love using the discussion boards to interact with one another since they are not bound to just write a response, but can attach videos, voice memos, and photos to explain their thinking.

Different types of text

cdebord00 — 2024-07-30 22:44:58 UTC

Our SS curriculum locks teachers into using a textbook to present texts to students that correspond with the lesson. I have started to supplement this with videos, primary documents, artifacts, and more to give students a more comprehensive picture.

Primary Sources

cdebord00 — 2024-07-30 22:46:17 UTC

This is such a struggle for me when teaching SS. It is hard to find sources that are grade level appropriate for students to access that are free/easy to find.

Analyze

cdebord00 — 2024-07-30 22:47:35 UTC

My students are expected to gain knowledge from the textbooks readings. I use this understanding and ask my students to build off of it as I ask them to connect this to the primary documents that I present to them. I ask them to make inferences, draw conclusions, form arguments, and more.

Digital Inquiry Group

srhineer20 — 2024-07-30 23:00:39 UTC

After exploring Digital Inquiry Group website, the First Thanksgiving Lesson would be one that is very engaging for my students. It is an easy lesson to modify for younger learners. The original lesson has students identifying whether the artifact is an accurate depiction of the First Thanksgiving by using their sourcing skills. For younger students, we could compare and contrast two images to determine which is more accurate and to notice any similarities or differences. I also really love how the rubrics for the assessment of this lesson are in English and Spanish.

Analyze

srhineer20 — 2024-07-30 23:01:41 UTC

Our students are required to identify POV and Author's Purpose of the text. Students are required to explain the main idea and also state supporting details. Students are taught to ask questions while they read/observe and encouraged to find answers by collaborating with others or looking further into the text.

Digital Safety

srhineer20 — 2024-07-30 23:02:17 UTC

There was a student who was taking inappropriate pictures of himself and others on his school computer. He was not in my class but was in my grade. The teacher, principal and parent worked together to explain to the student the severity of the issue and the student's device was then under close supervision by parents and staff at all times.

Digital Safety

cdebord00 — 2024-07-30 23:03:49 UTC

This has been a severe issue in our elementary school. Sadly, our students are getting on technology at home, and bringing issues created at home with technology into the school environment. There have been issues of cyberbullying, as well as inappropriate messaging and soliciting of inappropriate photos. Due to the nature of the situations, administration, parents, and the police have been handling these cases.

Differentiation

srhineer20 — 2024-07-30 23:05:28 UTC

One way I could differentiate instruction/resources for my students would be to offer the same text in more than 1 way for students. For example, I could use an article from PebbleGo but have some students read it printed out, read it on the computer, or listen to it read aloud. All students are getting the same content but the process differs based on needs.

Tableau

srhineer20 — 2024-07-30 23:14:33 UTC

This strategy could be used in any discipline, but specific to social studies, it would be fun to have students use in our "Captain Kid" unit where we talk about finding treasure using cardinal directions and how the sun interacts with objects to make shadows. We use an example of a real pirate who attempted to find his treasure but did not know how to read a compass and never found his treasure. Students are expected to "help" him finally find his treasure. Students could "act out" the mistakes that Captain Kid made throughout his journey and other students could notice the mistakes and critique what went wrong.

Differentiate

cdebord00 — 2024-07-30 23:24:30 UTC

My students respond well to ways that they can demonstrate their learning using digital tools. Instead of just showing their knowledge on paper, they can type it, talk to a dictation tool that will type for them, create a digital collage, create a video, podcast, etc. All of these allow student choice and differentiate based on their learning needs.

Mission U.S.

cdebord00 — 2024-07-30 23:26:13 UTC

I am eager to try mission U.S with my students. This is something that I will have to scaffold for my fourth graders by presenting background knowledge, modeling, providing groupings, and printed/virtual supplemental materials. However, it has been my goal to make S.S more relevant to my students. I believe that his digital tool may help do that with them.

Digital Tools

2024-07-30 23:36:53 UTC

I am also using Amira and PebbleGo. With Kindergarten, there is a focus on how devices can take a lot of time to set up and get logged in, but I am excited to see more ways to utilize devices moving forward.

Engage with different types of text

2024-07-31 03:08:19 UTC

I use my document camera to show and zoom in on our texts. Sometimes we have interactive notebooks for different monthly events that the students have copies of so we can fill them out together.

Primary Sources

2024-07-31 03:10:13 UTC

I don't think I have primary sources that are strictly for Social Studies. We have some ELA books that have a focus on some Social Studies topics but it isn't specific for S.S. time.

Analyze

2024-07-31 03:12:44 UTC

My students do a lot of discussion based questioning to analyze text. Sometimes they respond to my questions or I will have one of them ask the question and then they respond. There's a lot of turn and talk time and looking at main idea and key details.

Digital Safety

2024-07-31 03:21:48 UTC

In Kindergarten, it hasn't been the biggest issue, but I do have some families that try to use their student's device to do personal tasks- like banking and online shopping. Most of the time it is blocked, but there is a safety concern there and it is clear that not all parents have the same understanding of online or digital safety.

Differentiate

2024-07-31 03:29:10 UTC

I really liked the online tools- like Epic- that I can use for some of my higher kids that need more independent work while I am working with some of my lower students. I feel like I struggle with wanting them to feel challenged still without need adult support so this seems like a really great option.

Living Picture

2024-07-31 03:31:57 UTC

I think it would be so fun to do a living picture activity in the classroom! I know we have a whole unit with community helpers so the students could act out and pretend to be someone in our community (firefighter, doctor, teacher, etc.). This could encourage the students to connect some of our text to these characters we are creating and also talk about how they can be involved in the community.