1) YOUR CONCEPTUAL
UNDERSTANDING:
At
the beginning of this process I felt very lost and discouraged about how to use
the technology we were required to use for this project. I actually had never
heard of something like a scrapblog but was intrigued to use it since I had
never before. I found myself looking at the other examples students had posted
about the same topic I was working on: environmental literacy. Viewing these
examples were really the “experience” that helped me understand the technology
I was using. I found that some readings were a little helpful but the main resource
that guided me through my understanding was the other examples! I really
enjoyed using scrapblog and in my lesson, which you will read about in part 3,
I even incorporated it in because I think it would be an awesome way to get
kids thinking about creating projects through this technology. My conceptual understanding of
environmental literacy actually changed drastically from where I began. There
were certain components like “ecological footprint and green tips” that I had
heard of before. However, through my exploration I found out about “ECO-IQ
test, 5 components of environmental literacy, etc”. All these topics seemed to
be very vital in the understanding of environmental literacy and I was shocked
I had never heard of them. Some new strategies I am now aware of are definitely
feeling more confident in the fact that I think it is extremely successful to
utilize technology resources like this to help understand a new literacy
because these resources prove to be way more interactive and engaging for students,
and even for myself!
2) EFFECTIVE LITERACY INSTRUCTION:
In
my opinion, “effective literacy instruction” means that, as the teacher, you
are providing your students with diverse resources. Diverse learners mean that
students all learn a little differently whether it be visual, verbal, on print
out activities, or technology geared activities. As a learner myself in this
project I realized there was a lot of information about environmental literacy
that I was unaware of, as well as types of technologies I had never used before
to create a project. This project showed me that, even as an adult, I may not
know all the resources out there or all the information I need to know. After
this project I realized the importance of exploring new literacy technologies,
students today have more resources for learning than we did when we were
children. We’re learning right along with students and I feel its essential to
learn about all these literacy options for our own benefit and learning as well
as for our students.
In
terms of how I would consider using these new literacy technologies in my
classroom of second graders, there are several questions and strategies I would
want to teach my children. I mentioned this in my lesson (part 3) but I want
students to consider these questions when exploring new technologies: “what is
this page/project telling me? What did I learn from this that I didn’t already
know? Where can I find more information on these topics the project was talking
about?” All these questions, I feel, will help students not only just LOOK at
the new technologies but also CRITICALLY THINK about what they are looking at.
If students aren’t taught to critically comprehend the information they are
reading about on the projects and technologies, then these new resources have
no more benefit than traditional literacies. Along with having students asking
themselves these questions I want students to develop note-taking strategies
that can help them reuse the information they learn in projects like a blog or
a scrapblog project they create themselves. I want students to use “digital
literacies” like the scrapblog I created as well as other examples you provided
to us on our wiki, blogs, interactive websites, etc. I also believe that
websites with interactive “tests” for students to take can get students engaged
in the literacy and critically think instead of just staring at the computer
screen. My project was just on environmental literacy and I already feel the
urge to look and explore about the other literacies like cultural and emotional
so I can better explain to my students how to explore and navigate the
Internet. One final important aspect to these new literacies is making sure
that students have a guided activity or worksheet or something so that they can
reflect on their learning and critically think rather than just staring at a
screen and not being able to make connections to what they are reading about!
3) LESSON PLAN:
·
Target
Area & Rationale:
This topic on environmental literacy through scrapbloging can be useful for
students needs to teach their peers because it shows the students a different
aspect of recording their discoveries. Students may feel more engaged in the
exploring if there is a new way to discover information about environmental
literacy. Environmental literacy is vital to understand because it establishes
an understanding for our world we live in and how/why we need to keep it clean!
Now, more than ever, our society and especially children at a young age would
benefit from learning more about the environment. Allowing students to have
materials and resources to utilize for teaching their peers can help themselves
learn and solidify their understanding as well as spreading the knowledge
around to other kids.
·
Objectives:
§
Students
will be able to utilize the resources I have provided (such as my environmental
literacy scrapblog and a bloging website for our class) to guide them through
their exploration of environmental literacy.
§
Students
will learn and explore the ideas of environmental literacy through the use of
the web and previously done scrap blogs (not only mine but other scrapblogs I
can find about environmental literacy like the examples you showed us in
class).
·
Materials
& Supplies Needed: smartboard
(for whole class discussion and displays), computers (for each student to
explore the scrapblog and also be a part of the blog for our class where
students journal their thoughts and findings), paper (in case students feel
more comfortable writing a draft on paper before writing on computers), writing
utensils
·
Outline
of Key Events:
§
Intro:
explain to students about how today we will be learning about environmental
literacy through the use of the web and scrapblog projects. Ask about students
opinion of what they think environmental literacy is? And then what they think
scrapbloging is? Ask students how might we use the web to help with our
exploring?
§
Discuss: together as a
class we will use the smartboard to explore an example of a scrapblog and work
through this project while asking questions about what they see. I want to tell
students to ask themselves: “what did I learn from this page? Did I know this
information before reading the page? What do I find interesting? Is there a
website on this page I can find more information?” By doing this students can
see how I want them to be critically thinking while exploring the projects and also remember to click on
all the links that the project has listed on it.
§
Explore: Students can
work in pairs or by themselves while they explore other projects and websites
listed on these projects as well as websites they find on their own. I want
students to be taking notes about everything they learn so that later they can
write a blog post on our class blog!
§
Post: Write your
findings on our class blog. I want to make it clear that students need to be
writing what new information they learned not what was their favorite part,
etc. After students are done posting I want to gather on the rug for our
closing summary about what we learned today and how we can use the internet and
technology to help us learn more. I want to get their opinion about how they
liked the use of technology while learning about environmental literacy!
·
Closing
Summary: By being able
to explore projects like mine and other scrapblogs examples students can not
only see how scrapblog is used but also be learning about environmental
literacy at the same time. In order to make sure my students are paying
attention and actually learning and retaining information, having them reflect
on a blog for our class will be a good way to have students describing their
findings while at the same time utilizing a new technology! All of these
resources and strategies can be utilized to help students teach their peers
about the never-ending possibilities with technology and learning about the
environment.
·
Ongoing
Assessment: Students
will have the ability to add more and more “findings” from their environmental
literacy exploration through the web! As a continuous assessment I want to have
students writing at least one or more comments a week about anything to do with
environmental literacy like: something new they learned, a new website they
found, a new project they could create online, etc.
I loved your Scrapblog ! Since your project was the one I got to evaluate for our virtual class, I really got the chance to focus on your work and it actually gave me ideas for my Mixbook project. Your development from starting out extremely discouraged about the technology to creating a great product shows that you really took the time to look at others’ work for examples. This is evidence of how amazing technology can be in terms of collaboration. Although we did not directly interact with our peers to gain ideas for our projects, we were able to see their ideas through technology to help guide our creations.
ReplyDeleteI loved your rationale about why you’re teaching your lesson because I think we forget how important it is to teach young students about how important it is to keep our world clean. In high school I took an environmental science class and I remember thinking how valuable all the information we learned during that class would have been at an earlier age; if students become exposed to ideas at a younger age, there is a chance that they may internalize this from a young age and develop their knowledge as they grow. Focusing on this important idea while integrating it with a cool technology activity is a great way to get students motivated about environmental literacy and may push them to want to develop their knowledge even further.
It’s a great idea to have students write comments about anything to do with environmental literacy throughout the year. This will help students be aware of how important the environment is in and out of the classroom, making them more accountable for their environmental behavior. The more students are aware of their behavior in the environment, the more prone they are to acting in a positive way towards the environment. Sharing this information with the class will also be a way to give studnets more resources to develop their knowledge about the environment.
I absolutely loved your New Literacy Project. When I saw it for the first time my initial thought was, “Wow! How can I make my project look this great!” I like that it was creative AND informative. It seems like the most difficult thing is trying to accomplish both of these things, and you were successfully able to do both. I learned a lot about what environmental literacy is, and what it involves. I am aware that there are very important things going on in our environment, but I have never been so interested in finding out more about them, until I looked at your project and took the Eco-IQ test. More specifically, I realized that there are several things I come in contact with everyday, and never realized were implemented to promote environmental literacy. Prior to looking at your project, I would have guessed that environmental literacy was a person’s understanding of the physical and natural world we live in. Although I would not have been too far off, I never thought about it being about how everything on earth connects. In addition, I would not have associated it with environmental problems or concerns. I knew that we all needed to Go Green and recycle, but I never realized that the effort put behind it was to promote environmental literacy.
ReplyDeleteI was very hesitant about choosing that topic to research, because it never really stood out as being as significant or important as the others. As funny as it sounds, the various colors and fonts kept me engaged in the information. I had never heard of Scrapblog before, so I found all of the new print and designs exciting. Since there were so many links and resources posted throughout your project, I think this was the perfect technology to use with it. It was a very good way of teaching information in an interactive way. I loved the questions that you listed that explained what you wanted your students to be thinking about while using this technology. I think they fit perfectly with what students need to understand. They help to add depth and purpose to an, already fundamental, topic.
I think you chose a very good lesson plan for your topic. I like that it exposes students to environmental issues, making them aware of their own impacts. I know your lesson was written for adults, but I think it can be modified to fit elementary grades, as well. There are tons of other student-based websites that you can use, to teach the lesson to a younger crowd. Overall, I feel like you did a great job of explaining the content and choosing the best technology.