Post 3 - Assignment 1, Reflective 2, Week 3

Welcome back, good to see you again!

What have you discovered this week?

Well, funny you asked that, did you see the news?

Wow, that's great, what else did you do?

This week, I explored the world of wiki's (vokis, web spaces, wordles and more blogging) and even attempted to make my own wiki for my teaching areas (mathematics and science). It really started with a good 'play' with the available feature of wikispace, and surprisingly within a few hours I had created an interactive wiki p that would align with an idea I had for a lesson plan.

How did you find the design of wikispace?

Well...Not bad, considering that after just a quick look at some YouTube tutorial videos on using wikispace (yes I am a visual learner, I see..I do), and I was off linking pages, inserting images and creating discussions. I took it one step further and created my own animation which is possibly a whole other conversation.

I still felt that I was only at the tip of the iceberg on what I could do with such an application, and to be honest, until I actually use this format in a group session I am still a bit unsure how you track and manage the process, for example, how do I only allow access to my classes, how do I track a individuals contribution to a group collaboration. I am confident that with experience these concerns would be managed and the ability to move through the SAMRs model and redesign your teaching pedagogy will become easier.

Whats the SAMR's model...I remember you mentioning it before.

Yes I did, but I will explain... The SAMR Model is represented below

http://www.unity.net.au/allansportfolio/edublog/?p=836

The focus of the SAMR model is to move our use of technology from a substitution level, were we are basically just changing the tools we use for the same output, to the highest level of redefining what we thought was possible.

The process of moving through the SAMR model is aligned with moving towards high level thinking and as mentioned with Bloom taxonomy, the more the technology is used to analyse, critique and create new ideas. The high level thinking is involved.

In relation to wiki's, I found that the result depended on whether my idea was good or wherther it was just replacing my lesson plan from paper onto a computer screen (Refer to as above as Substitution and Augmentation level!). 

To reach the highest level of redefining tasks and activity, the idea needed to be good and consider many aspects. 

So with the development of wiki's I believe the key is a great idea and than a lot of planning.  I have mentioned it before called the STOLEN model, but it is probably more applicable now. 

STOLEN developed by Foord and is a great acronym to consider as a teacher when using with wiki activities in the classroom.

                                   

S	Specific Overall Objective (Clear objective for the wiki, Understood by all, Not a “general” area)
T	Timley  (Definitive times for different “stages” of use, Definite end point ‐ even if left open after)
O	Ownership  (People need to feel that they “collaboratively own” the wiki)
L	Localized  (Some structure of what is expected, Starting points for editing)
E	Engagement (Who can edit, Which parts they can edit, Acceptable and unacceptable use)
N	Navigation  (Clear navigation structure, Simple)

http://www.a6training.co.uk/resources_Social_Software.php

To redefine how I was going to teach the information and make it easier to achieve learning outcomes and obtain high level thinking processes,  it was clear that I would need to consider;

What declarative knowledge did I need to provide to start an activity 

What concepts or terminology needed to be explained (constructivism) 

What connections (cognitive) of information needed to be made or revised (editing, writing etc 

What cognitive ability did the students have (i.e can they use Google effectively) 

What learning outcomes and timeline did I want the students to achieve 

How would I assess these outcomes

What process or activities was going to engage the student 

What additional links did I need to provide to guild their research or activity 

What key questions did I need the students to ask themselves so that they could apply and analysis the new knowledge 

What processes and questions would I need to use to encourage the students to critique and evaluate the new information 

What questions would create the students to make new ideas or views (constructivism) 

What additional discussions or activities could be used for those students that required an extra challenge (connectivism) 

What roles and responsibilities would the student have with this activity

So really....

Wiki activities “provided a vehicle for exercising most, if not all, of Bloom’s and SAMRs ‘higher order thinking’ activities”.http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/wikis/  

The wiki platform is more than suitable to meet the transformation stage of the SAMR model, the only limitations where, what YOU as the teacher could come up with, it all starts with a good idea. Wiki, if used safely and well, has unlimited opportunities it just came down to how creative you could be and how much you could implement new was of learning and actually redefine the process of learning.

I found this was true when trying to redesign both a math and science lesson plan.

Basically my wiki based on my math lesson plan was stuck between the SAMR levels of Substitution and Augmentation, while my wiki based on science lesson plan certainly was Redefined by wikispace to a task that, without this technology was initially inconceivable.

Plus Engages students increasing class participation Encourages students to collaborate Wikis and new and fun NO LIMIT to their ability to redefine learning Great tracking ability to assessment and learning outcomes           Can be monitored

Minus Editing issues especially with number of students at one time          Cyber safety, cyber bulling and particular school protocols was be a block to it’s use           Teachers need to be clear on the expectations of the activity and the actual purpose of the wiki            Teachers need to be creative  Internet access can be problematic spam, viruses and general IT issues could interrupt class,  may need a back up plan

Interesting            Can be linked to parents and can show learning outcomes to them in real time     Could be collated to become a website scrapbook for each students. Great for parent teacher interviews and home monitoring  Anything can be snipped added and embedded  ICT’s are out there, you just have to find them

They sound great, can I see your wikis?

I would love you too!

I have set up a wiki guest member username for you or my students. 
The username clatcham101 and password cquin101 and 
just follow the links  http://learningteachingicts.wikispaces.com/

I created two lesson plans which I aligned with learning outcomes from the year 7 curriculum;

Science Biological Sciences Yr 7 (follow link to page titled Who Am I?)

Curriculum: Interactions between organisms can be described in terms of food chains and food webs; human activity an affect these interactions (ACSSU112)

Learning outcomes: I wanted the students to be able to understand a food chain and the impacts humans can have on a food chain. I wanted the students not just to memorize one food change, but understand how they are created and the impacts humans can have on the environment and of the food chain above and below a selected animal.

Lesson Plan Outline: Who Am I?

The students would ideally work in groups of 4-5 (to reduce editing issues), and are allocated an animal picture on a separate wiki space page.

Each group would have a different types of ecosystem (aquatic, terrestrial, rain-forest etc). 

The questions are designed to increase cognitive thinking and constructivism increasing higher order thinking. They have to answer the set questions and are scaffolded to use their research, editing skills and the links to the supportive pages that I created. 

The aim is for them to answer question about an animal, its environment and the connected food chain. The students will upload their finished wiki page link to a weebly website which would be the basis for a presentation to the class in a follow up lesson. The learning outcome that I wanted the students to achieve include understanding and creating their own food chains and than follow up with discussions that would get them to create new idea and views such as; 

What do you think would happen if the food source of this animal became extinct?

What do you think would happen if the animals that eat the one you have identified where extinct?

As a teacher I would have the students report back to the class in a simple presentation using the central weebly site I created and  wiki space they have completed.

Sorry, a what? A weet-bix?

 Ha, yes I thought the same...No a Weebly, I will explain.

A Weebly is a web-hosting service that is easy and free and allows the user to "drag-and-drop" while using their website builder. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weebly

I created a weebly to facilitate the follow up lesson. My use the weebly space is based on social connectivisim and aims to increase the students exposure to a variety of food chains in a variety of environment. All the finished wiki pages would be embedded into this space to form the basis of student centered presentation.

To view the weebly site I have embedded a picture below or alternatively you can follow the link http://learningteachingicts.weebly.com

Below is a example or the wiki page I created to implement the above lesson plan.

I developed a link to a summary page describing and providing examples of various food chains to help scaffold the task and would aim to have an example of a completed wiki page using the same template but a different animal to clearly show what was expected.

The following pages are extracts from my central weebly site, I can see how this could evolve to be an amazing record of assessments and learning outcomes, especially for parents at home. "What did you learn today?" could be answer with a simple mouse click!



Here is the page on food chains that would form a group discussion in a follow up lesson.

The second wiki space activity I created was:

Mathematics  Geometry Yr 7(follow links page titled Assessment 1)

Curriculum: Demonstrate that the angle sum of a triangle is 180 degrees. ACMMG166)

Learning outcomes: I wanted the students to understand basic geometry and be able to find the missing angle in a triangle. I wanted to add some novelty and fun to a simple lesson on internal angles of a triangle. This lesson plan would be followed with a harder more complex set of steps to facilitate constructivism, by adding an advance version of this wiki model using quadrilaterals and demonstrating the sum of internal angles. Due to time constraints I haven't constructed the associated wiki page but can see how I could build on my current pages.

Lesson Plan Outline: Mission 1 - Triangles

I use a secret mission theme to develop my own animation that the students watch on the wiki space. The animation covered the basic theory and maths need to complete the mission.
The students are directed to the wikispace and follow the directions to complete the following equations. This is followed with individual/group collaboration to answer a series of addition math equations and then given a simple puzzle. The answers of the maths equation will give the colour code to the puzzle. 
I found this really doesn't redefine learning as it is already possible but I would love to learn about new software that could show internal angles as it is manipulated by the student. I think the more I learn, the more I will be able to redefine learning.

The sound interesting, I see what you mean about endless possibilities.  What do you think you will you do in the future?

Based on my experience, I think as a teacher I will need to be clear on how the technology will be implemented. I will need to make sure that I'm not just replacing a learning tool (swapping pencils for keyboard) but redefining the learning process, I need to be engaging and encouraging student to research, evaluating and analyses new information, creating new ideas, and analytical views. This means the students will be more likely be able to link these constructivism thinking skills and create new ideas to new concepts. They are therefore better learners and higher order thinkers. I think Wikis can do all this and more, I look forward to getting a creative and discovering new ways to make learning fun and engaging.

The main this is have fun,

be clever and

think like a kid, 
they have the craziest ideas...

that just might work!

Till next week, 
Cheers Cassie

References

Dhanapal, S., Tabitha, K., & Ling, W. (2013) A Study to Investigate How Six Thinking Hats Enhance the Learning of Environmental Studies. IOSR Journal of Research & Method in Education (IOSR-JRME). 1(6), 20-29

http://www.a6training.co.uk/resources_Social_Software.php

http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/wikis/ 

http://www.unity.net.au/allansportfolio/edublog/?p=836

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weebly

Post 2 - Assignment 1, Refection 1, Week 2

Welcome to the new world of wikis in the classroom!

Hello again!

What’s a wiki? 

I'm glad you asked! Well…

A wiki is a type of internet software that allows for online participation, basically any visitor to the wiki can become a participant. A wiki is “a collaborative tool that allows students to contribute and modify one or more pages of course related materials.” http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/wikis/

One famous example is Wiki-pedia, an online encyclopedia with no “authors” but millions of contributors and editors. http://www.teachersfirst.com/content/wiki/

There are many benefits of a wiki activity as shown through my mind map below.

After undertaking the wiki activity (6 Thinking Hats) looking at Mobile phones in the classroom, I felt the general design of this particular wiki was one dimensional, you could add text…and that was about it. Although the participants had the options of slight editing changes, such as coloured text, there was very little you could add without being a computer wizard. And if you weren't a wiz, there was also a high risk (and well repeated warning) that editing issues could lead to erasing and losing other participants work.

I think that the design of the wiki platform makes it ideal for group projects that emphasize group collaboration and individual editing. Such as mini research projects, collaborations on course work and creating and maintaining an online communication between students and teachers. 

Although I do agree with the statement “Wikis work best when individual authorship is less important than the outcome that is created. Also, wikis are most appropriate for content that doesn't need to be protected from accidental editing” http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/wikis/

What’s de Bono’s six thinking hats?

Again, I’m so glad you asked!

A bit of back ground…In 1985, Dr. Edward de Bono’s introduced the Six Thinking Hats which is a very versatile thinking skills tool. It allows participants to “simplify thinking by dealing with points consecutively and carry out a switch in thinking‟ (De Bono, 1999). 

Below is an outline of the different ‘hat’ or thinking styles, 

http://johnkapeleris.com/blog/?p=418

The six hats of thinking is a great scaffolded approach to increasing cognitive thinking skills. It forces the individual/group to for a perspective or opinion but from a different variety of mind set. It reduces conflict and increases collaboration in a very clear analytical results. I also believe it helps to open individual’s views to consider a topic from a different schema or mind set whilst reducing conflict. I find de Bono’s view on reducing attack and increasing the ability to think parallel amazing, and to have great benefits in not only the classroom but in business decisions for all industries.

Using the 6 Thinking Hats, the higher level thinker creates new ideas, the picture below is a pretty good example of the green hat!

http://woculus.com/make-better-business-decisions-edward-de-bonos-six-thinking-hats/



Attached is a link to Edward de Bono - discusses the Six Thinking Hats®, a fantastic interview with a great emphasis on reducing conflict and increasing learning in group settings.

There are many benefits to using the 6 thinking hats as I have tried to outline;

But how does the wiki’s design link to learning theories?

Wow, you ask such interesting questions!

Let me see…

The requisite of teaching thinking skills is perceived by the growing awareness of the change in society and skills that may no longer be appropriate to prepare students for the world beyond school (Fisher, 1999). Thus as teachers as Schafersman, (1991) states “today’s curriculum thrives towards teaching students how to think.”

This links very closely to the learning theories such as Cognitivism and Constructivism, whilst also aligning with the development of higher order and critical thinking skills as identified in Blooms Taxonomy, TPACK and the SAMR model.  

Blooms Taxonomy was created in 1956 after what must have been a very unproductive debate determining taxonomy for scientific organisms, the aim of Blooms Taxonomy as defined in Wikipedia.org was to ‘distinguish the fundamental questions in education’. 

This links to the purpose of the de Bono’s 6 thinking hats, another step by step (behaviourism) scaffolded guide with the aim of creating a productive and creative approach to group discussions and research. The fundamental questions have been distinguished for us and create a great template for achieving higher level critical and creative thinking, thus moving the participant from knowing information to creating new ideas.

Dhanapal (2013, pg4)

The Substitution Augmentation Modification Redefinition (SAMR) Model, offers a method of seeing and reflecting on how technology might impact on teaching and learning in today's classrooms.  Like the 6 Thinking Hats and Blooms Taxonomy, it also shows a progression that teachers utilising technology often follow as they progress through using ICT's in the classroom as a tool to redefining teaching and learning with technology. 

All three models aim to produce a higher order thinking and encourage student centered teaching and student engagement.  

I can see how using such a software such as Wikis, would give students the opportunity to shift from ‘consumer of knowledge’ to ‘creators of knowledge,’ which is a great way as a teacher;

• to encourage and scaffold (behaviourisim) your students to develop critical and cognitive thinking skills (de Bono’s 6 Thinking Hats and Blooms Taxonomy)

• to learn from one another through group participation linking with social connectivisim, and,

• to improve their ability to work in groups (reduction of attacks and arguments thus aligning with Dr. Judy Willis learning and the brain theories).

    All in all, this format would be beneficial as a group activity, as the end results are easy to collate and compare as a class.  The results could be followed up in class, maybe identifying the top five points for each area and collaborate the results (i.e. PMI, Pros and cons or 6 think hats).

How did you find participating in the wiki activity?

Wow, you really are an interesting conversationalist! 

After my own participation in a group wiki (in this particular wiki utilising de Bono 6 hats - mobile phones in the classroom), I found that the three most beneficial parts of the participation in technology applications such as wikis is that,

1. Wiki activities “provided a vehicle for exercising most, if not all, of Bloom’s ‘higher order thinking’ activities”. http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/wikis/  

2. The critical design elements of the wiki activity encourages a range of benefits and above all, processes such as the utilising  of models like the Six Thinking Hats encourages higher-order thinking skills, while being student focused, leading to better learning outcomes and academic performances.

3. The Six Hats also aligns with what we know about the brain and learning, that the more comfortable the learner (minimize conflict and arguments) and the more engaging the teaching (student centered) than the more efficient gain in the knowledge that gets 'into' the brain.

I found the activity very engaging and scaffolded to produce a clear outcome. The structure of the activity made it easy to become an analytical and critical thinker.  It encouraged me as a participant to be creative in the way I thought, and made me be less negative (black hat) and emotional (red hat). Overall it made it easy to align my thinking into a clear and easy group format (aiding productive team work).

The end result of this particular wiki activity is a development of higher order critical thinking skills including creative, problem based and analytical thinking. The activity is student centered and encourages the learner to process data and facts, and to move to a higher level of thinking and form an opinion, new views and ideas. The result of the design allows for easy and efficient analysis and data collection as opposed to an essay, while the use of de Bono hats reduces the potential for attacks and arguments between participants.

I can see how this activity could be extremely beneficial in the classroom, as it balances assessment and evaluation of a topic, while maximizing group collaboration and higher level critical thinking. It even sets a fair playing field that allows each individual to make their view or point, without the threat of people attacking or commenting on their views. The focus is on collating each individuals view in parallel. 

Although as a teacher I would personally be creating clear rules and ethical guidelines, outlining the students rights and responsibilities. These need to be clearly outline with agreed consequences with the aim of setting a safe working environment. I would aim to develop this in class with the students, giving them ownership over their behaviour and the consequences.

The last point I felt was paramount to my own experiences with this wiki's and my own Post Graduate assignments, has been discussed by many academics and education consultants including Dave Foord. 

Foord states that with all types of assignments and standard of assessments, the more clear you (as the teacher) are with your expectations and expected learning outcomes, the more likely students will be able to meet them.

A great acronym to consider as a teacher when using with wiki activities in the classroom is STOLEN developed by Foord.

S	Specific Overall Objective (Clear objective for the wiki, Understood by all, Not a “general” area)
T	Timley  (Definitive times for different “stages” of use, Definite end point ‐ even if left open after)
O	Ownership  (People need to feel that they “collaboratively own” the wiki)
L	Localized  (Some structure of what is expected, Starting points for editing)
E	Engagement (Who can edit, Which parts they can edit, Acceptable and unacceptable use)
N	Navigation  (Clear navigation structure, Simple)

http://www.a6training.co.uk/resources_Social_Software.php

And lastly, just to remind ourselves why these individual difference that we are trying to manage are actually important, take a look at the great minds below and consider that although 

no two minds think alike, they can think parallel!

Reference list

De Bono, E. (1999) Six Thinking Hats (New York: Little Brown Company

Dhanapal, S., Tabitha, K., & Ling, W. (2013) A Study to Investigate How Six Thinking Hats Enhance the Learning of Environmental Studies. IOSR Journal of Research & Method in Education (IOSR-JRME). 1(6), 20-29

Fisher, R. (1999) Thinking Skills to Thinking Schools: Ways to Develop Children’s Thinking and Learning. Early Child Development and Care, 153 (1), 51-63.

 Schafersman, S. D. (1991) An Introduction to Critical Thinking.

http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/wikis/

http://www.a6training.co.uk/resources_Social_Software.php

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20130622131044-19886490--you-can-t-connect-the-dots-looking-forward

http://woculus.com/make-better-business-decisions-edward-de-bonos-six-thinking-hats/

http://www.debonogroup.com/six_thinking_hats.php

http://www.teachersfirst.com/content/wiki/