Engaging Parents with a Classroom Blog

Engaging Parents with a Classroom Blog

fashion style    8:27 PM   

Studies are finding a close correlation between parental involvement in their child's learning and their child's academic achievement. Some are here, here and here. Although an effective teacher is foremost, all veteran teachers notice that students who are high achievers have parents that push them and value a good education. How can we get more parents involved in this process?

I wrote a post back in August about how to foster better relationships with parents, but found that I've really gotten things going this year with use of a classroom blog. Some of the things that I've done are that have been extremely useful:

1. Having a page for parents on a classroom blog for tips to support their child's learning. Other topics might be on the curriculum or teaching pedagogy.
2. Creating an email list of all my parents. Although it wasn't easy with 200 email addresses, with this list, I've been able to write letters to parents informing them about major events in our classroom. After a major project or learning activity, I've written a little summary and then looped it back to the URL post.

 My parents have been ecstatic to see the things that their children are doing. It's helped deprivatize learning and provides families with topics of discussion at the dinner table. Some of parent comments:

This is Hayeon’s mom.
I think she had a useful experience and a choice. Obviously she seemed to enjoy the time. When she observed the cell through the microscope, she must have excited the wonder and mystery of the cells. Also, she must have learned how to use the microscope exactly.
Most of all, I felt impressed by science teacher’s kind and detailed explanation for the students. Thank you for letting my daughter have the wonderful, useful and memorable time.

Your post was neat and thank you for your kind description, and because of the translation, it helped me more to understand. Once again thank you and I think this lesson will be useful in the future one day for Jackie.
From Jackie’s Father

Hello. This is Lily’s mom, and I have read the microscope post with her. She explained some facts, I thought she did a great job, I can tell she listens in class and that’s alway is good. I think that this is useful for the students, and this is a good equipment for science. It’s neat.

This is Liam’s mum, Michelle. I found reading this entry very exciting, it is great to see the students at the forefront of the various methods to gain information, and your approach to balancing those, to make the most of each, will certainly inspire – as it has done for Liam already. I’m looking forward to seeing more… iPad apps next???


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Authentic Assessment: Graphing Functions

Authentic Assessment: Graphing Functions

fashion style    5:49 PM   

As "21st Century Skills" has entered the education sphere, we have been exploring ways to make students content creators. Such opportunities give students the chance to teach their peers and a digital record gives them content which to use in their portfolios.

The following is a project based authentic assessment which takes place of a traditional assessment but does measure and include all learning benchmarks:

1. Which best represents the graph of y = 2x − 5? Standard 3.3
2. Students solve simple linear equations and inequalities over the rational numbers Standard 4.2
3. Graph linear functions, noting that the vertical change (change in y-value) per unit of horizontal change (change in x-value) is always the same and know that the ratio (“rise over run”) is called the slope of a graph. Standard 3.3
4. Plot the values of quantities whose ratios are always the same (e.g., cost to the number of an item, feet to inches, circumference to diameter of a circle). Fit a line to the plot and understand that the slope of the line equals the ratio of the quantities. Standard 3.4 
5. Solve two-step linear equations and inequalities in one variable over the rational numbers, interpret the solution or solutions in the context from which they arose, and verify the reasonableness of the results. Standard 4.1
6. Graph functions of the form y = nx 2 and y = nx 3 and use in solving problems. Standard 3.1 
7. Graph linear functions, noting that the vertical change (change in y-value) per unit of horizontal change (change in x-value) is always the same and know that the ratio (“rise over run”) is called the slope of a graph. Standard 3.3

 What I did was turn the solving of a function into the final assessment as I felt that the project targeted them well, and I could debrief some of the minor points of slope afterwards. (Some project only hit a minor swath of standards so this is why I still favor traditional tests in some regards)

In this case though, students recorded themselves using the document camera while solving a function. The project rubric was at their side for reference which included some target vocabulary and some of the things I wanted them to do while working with functions. The document was in a quiet section of the room where students could "rotate through" over a period of two weeks. Here is an example of a student recording:



After the recording, I met with the student to discuss how well they met the objectives, and if they wanted to, could resubmit their work. The video was great content for their digital portfolios which they worked on at the end of the year.

Graphing Linear Functions Rubric





I'm tinkering with the rubric a bit before we start this year's projects, but the students said that they quite liked the experience. I don't always use projects as summative assessment, but through good design principles, an authentic summative assessment can bring applications to life.