"When You Wish Upon A Wall..."

No offense to Jiminy Cricket, but this time, we'll leave the stars shining in the night sky and make our wishes on www.wallwisher.com. This brilliant site will make every teacher's dreams come true! 

Wallwisher.com is a virtual bulletin board of sorts to post and share what you want--text, images, videos, and links. It's a great tech tool for informal or formal assessments at all levels of Bloom's taxonomy.

It's a free site with a no registration option, and it's easy to build a wall in minutes.  Teachers can build a wall by registering. However, if you do not register, you will not have editing abilities. Teachers will want to register to be able to receive emails for screening student posts and offer feedback for post revisions. Once registered, you are prompted to create a unique URL for your wall so you can share it, and determine who can view and post on your wall. Wallwisher.com allows you to personalize the wall by picking a color theme and image or uploading your own. Most importantly, you can add a title and subtitles at the top of your wall so contributors to the wall know what they should or shouldn't post. Titles and subtitles serve to state the wall's purpose, and can be in the form of questions, descriptions, thought-provoking quotes, or whatever purpose you want the wall to serve. 

Here's how I have used wallwisher.com:

1.) I have used wallwisher.com to practice vocabulary. I have asked students to post original sentences for their assigned set of vocabulary words, and include an image, video, or link to illustrate the word's definition and connotation. Since students see each others' contributions, it's great practice for students to click on each others' posts to read other original sentences and see the attachments illustrating each of the definitions. 

2.) I have used wallwisher.com to assess reading comprehension for pre-reading, during reading and after reading practice. At different stages of reading instruction, I have asked students to stop reading, reflect and post predictions, connections, inferences, personal interpretations, comparisons, cause and effect examples,  and more. Students have posted what they believe to be the themes of a piece; they have identified the tone and mood of a reading piece and then included a post with an image, video or link expressing that particular tone or mood.

3.) My students have used wallwisher.com to have virtual sticky note conversations by responding to each others' posts. Students have practiced how to elaborate, agree or disagree with each other and how to provide textual support for their arguments in the form of images, links, videos they attach to their virtual posts. 

A classroom wall can be theme based or can be used for brainstorming. Teachers can post content for students to edit on the wall, and students can always include additional links, videos, or images to elaborate, extend and support whatever they post. All posts are limited to 160 characters which also teaches students to be succinct. 

As a virtual bulletin board with unlimited postings, there are as many possibilities for wallwisher.com's uses as there are stars in the sky to wish upon.  Not only can wallwisher increase student engagement, but it is a great tool to encourage a sense of collaboration and community in the classroom.  

"When you wish upon a Wall, 

Makes no difference who you are 

Anything your heart desires will come to you..."  

As Jiminy always says, "Let your conscience be your guide" when you design ways to use www.wallwisher.com in your classroom. Feel free to share how you have used this stellar tech tool! 

Check out a video from eduTeacher on how to use wallwisher.com, and my Fearlesstech4teachers Wallwisher to post how you will use this tool in your class!

Think Collaboratively: Mix and Match Your Ink!

MixedInk.com leads the way in supporting collaborative writing and critical thinking. Students not only write original content, they also practice how to edit, comment and rate their peers' writing. Students evaluate each classmates' content and synthesize the best ideas, mixing and matching different versions to ultimately create one best piece representing the collective voice of the class. Every student's voice is heard because MixedInk.com identifies key words and phrases giving each original author credit for his/her contributions. As students mix and match their words with those of their peers, they receive real time examples of other classmates who have used the same language. These real time suggestions encourage students to elaborate, and expand on the ideas of their peers. Every student is accountable to write and contribute his/her thoughts. Throughout this collaborative writing process, students rate each text anonymously practicing the art of constructive criticism and evaluation. Students' ratings determine the best contributions. Teachers can easily assess writing strengths and weaknesses as students engage in the collaborative writing process.

   

Student Writing Soars With Storybird!

Soar to new heights with Storybird.com, a site that allows students to create, collaborate, read, and share their own stories. Storybird.com has thousands of art pieces arranged by themes. Students select a theme or piece of art to inspire them to write a story.

Students can invite collaborators to share the writing of a story. 

Storybird.com also has a public library for visitors to read stories others have created. 

Students can create reading lists of their favorite Storybird stories. 

Best of all Storybird serves as a publisher! Students can publish their stories privately or publicly online or in hard copy. The site is entirely free, but for a reasonable price, parents can order soft or hard cover of books their children create, or you can order a PDF version of a story to read on an e-reader or iPad.

Storybird encourages collaborative writing and supports all aspects of the writing process. Its features are easy, intuitive and safe. There are endless possibilities for using Storybird to support reading instruction as well. Regardless of age or grade level, storybird.com's art work inspires anyone to be a connected reader and writer!  

Storybird Quick Tour from Storybird on Vimeo. Here is a story I wrote about technology using storybird.com! Hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed creating it! The Purple People and the Elephant by firstclasstutoring on Storybird

We're Lucky To Have Tech, But Are We Any Wiser?

In the age before tech tools, a.k.a. the analog world, teachers had to find creative ways to engage students with difficult texts or concepts, and help them transition to more challenging reads and ideas, but it wasn’t always easy or even achievable in 180 days! And, naturally some teachers were better at it than others. Now that we’re lucky enough to have tech in schools, are we any wiser? What’s changed in terms of how we use our resources? How are we using tech tools effectively to motivate reluctant learners and help them make the necessary transitions to become literate, educated adults? 

If students reach the fourth grade without strong math or reading skills, how many of these students overcome their deficiencies in middle school, high school or even adulthood? How are we truly using tech tools as interventions to stop the cycle of illiteracy and aliteracy?  

Today’s tech tools proclaim to boost critical thinking and combat all types of illiteracy, and I believe they can...someday in the near future, not just yet! I visited a Title I school recently where thousands of dollars had been spent on lap top carts, yet no one had bought the software for the lap tops. How effective was that decision to buy the hardware without the software? How long will the lap top carts sit in a closet before students and teachers can take advantage of them? Like this school, not all of our nation’s schools have caught up and established the infrastructure needed to support complete tech integration, and in those schools that have, we need to ask if the tech is being used wisely to teach critical thinking. 

With good reason, there’s been a lot of buzz about the September 3rd, 2011 New York Times article revealing the stagnant test scores of the Kyrene School district of Arizona. Many pro tech educators, including me, claim these statistics don’t tell the full story. However, what is the real story? I am a firm believer that learning how to critically think, without ever teaching to a test, increases a student’s chances of scoring high on standardized tests. Of course, for some students, it’s just not that simple; there will be other factors that affect their test performance. But, on the whole, if there is an entire school who has been using tech wisely and meaningfully for several years, statistically wouldn’t the scores tend to be higher? So, the questions remain: With tech tools as support, what critical thinking skills do students need to learn from year to year, and how are all subject area teachers across grade levels working in vertical teams to achieve “digital” continuity from kindergarten to high school? How are teachers building on the tech and critical thinking skills students mastered in previous years? We need to reflect on our curriculum goals that integrate tech and identify exactly how these goals help students develop critical thinking, study habits, and mastery of concepts to progress to more rigorous thinking levels. 

  

However, if schools have struggled to achieve this continuity and consistency to build vertical teams and meet benchmarks when we first began to use pen, paper and books, what are we going to do differently now that we have tech?  Have we grown wiser? These are questions  I think we must continually ask:

• How are we using specific tech tools to effectively address illiteracy and aliteracy?
• How does my school or my district’s vertical team create continuity, consistency and increase rigor year to year? What conditions create successful tech integration?
• How are we using specific tech tools to effectively teach critical thinking year to year?
• How are we using tech tools to engage and build autonomy?
• How are we using tech tools to help reluctant learners transition from less challenging work to more rigorous academic levels?
• How has tech integration lead to increased academic achievement? 
• What specific tasks and roles are we assigning reluctant readers and writers when we use tech tools in the classroom? How we are we using tech tools to help build these students’ skills so that they can have an active role in our classrooms, and become independent learners?  

Tech in education remains undiscovered country for many schools, and our students exist as digital natives held back by an analog world. Many of our nation’s teachers remain afraid to abandon the analog world. The sooner we begin to coordinate our efforts, the wiser and luckier we will be.   

Please check my webdoc and share your thoughts! Thanks for reading!

Say Aloha to Wikis: Using Wikis to Teach the Writing Process!

What did one control freak say to another control freak? "Get your hands off my wiki!" 

If you've heard the word wiki, but are not quite sure what it means or how to use it, then you've come to the right blog! Wikis are webpages created for ongoing editing and revision by one author or multiple authors. 

Control freaks and wikis do not mix well because a wiki is meant to be in a constant state of revision and editing by multiple authors. (The control freak will want to keep that wiki all to himself!) 

Wikis can be messy and should be! A wiki promotes collaboration and critical thinking. All students can throw in their two cents, and see every contributor's thought process, but they serve an even better purpose!  They teach students about the writing process. In many classrooms, writing is not taught as a recursive process. Students are given writing prompts, but rarely receive feedback to understand how they can improve their writing skills.  If they are lucky enough to receive feedback, students may not know what to do with that feedback, nor do they have the opportunity to revisit a writing piece to polish it. (And by the way, kids do read feedback if they're taught how to read it, apply it and and give it...another post for another day.) Here's where wikis are a breath of fresh of air and give new life to teaching the writing process!  

Teachers can create wikis for pairs of students who have different writing strengths, small groups of students or an entire class. These wikis can be safely shared online locally, nationally or globally by joining wiki sites like Wikispaces so students can receive writing feedback and participate in collaborative writing projects with their peers.  

If you're worried that wikis may be too messy for your taste because content may get deleted,  Hakuna Matata, no worries! (Oops, not a Hawaiian expression, but let's pretend!) When you create a wiki, there is a "revision history" so the wiki creator knows who edits, what is edited and even at what time the editing took place. Issues that may arise with wikis include:

• allowing students practice time to learn how to use a wiki 
• building a community of trust so contributors feel confident their contributions will be valued 
• ensuring the quality of the content students add to the wiki
• assigning authentic writing topics so students will be excited to write and collaborate
• assigning subtopics to each student and/or roles so students have a distinct contribution
• determining how you will assess the content added to the wiki
• safeguarding your wiki so it is not vandalized or deleted                                                   

Luckily, wiki sites offer monitoring controls to wiki creators. You decide to make your wiki public or private, and who contributes and edits. Students can also add videos, images, audio or links of websites that support their content.  So, fear not and hang ten! 

A wiki can change students' attitudes about writing because they will participate in different aspects of the writing process.  Students will learn from their mistakes, recognize their peers's mistakes so they can help them, but most importantly they will collaborate with peers, and internalize the process of revising, editing, polishing and presenting their writing. 

Students at any grade level can create wikis on any subject, and even share their wikis with classrooms around the world to receive input from other student or teacher authors.

Check out these educational wikis looking for student and teacher collaboration! 

http://www.wikispaces.com/

http://educationalwikis.wikispaces.com/Examples+of+educational+wikis

http://pbwiki.com

http://wikisineducation.wetpaint.com

By the way, the word wiki-wiki is Hawaiian for fast or quickly! 

So start your class wiki, wiki-wiki today!