Reflections

Blogger seems like a great tool, lots to explore! This might be one answer to tracking classroom proficiencies and help gather data for graduation portfolios. Many concerns as well: lack of consistent fast technology in the classroom; one MORE website meant to gather data (we have student portfolios on google sites & powerschool & naviance for the school plus my own classroom current events blog!....  I was hoping there would be a way to link a classroom discussion blog onto this site but I am not sure I can see that happening... etc etc etc).

Reflection Through Evidence

I believe that reflection is extremely important to my student's learning. Today I learned an organized, effective new process for students to reflect on their learning. I think it is super important for students to think about evidence of their learning as well. Finding that evidence is within itself reflection and a deeper form of metacognition. My big take away is getting students to constantly identify evidence as they start a new project or unit, and to use it as a tool for reflecting and growing.

Nearpod: Visual for All

NearPod:Visual for All

With thia app, students and teachers can interact with one another durine lectures and/or presentations. This is a great way to engage students in their learning and to help them feel more involved in what the teacher is doing. You are able to include podcasts, comments, images, etc to back up your writing which is really helpful since it offers a wide variety of ways to reflect and show your proficiency.

-Bri

How to Create A Better Portfolio

During today's session in using blogger in the classroom at he VTSBL Symposium, I learned about how I can better use my academic blog to show my learning. In a course I am currently enrolled in at Saint Michael's College, we are using blogger to show our learning. When I write my blog posts, I am sometimes overwhelmed and am not entirely sure what I am supposed to be posting about. During the session, we looked at an article titled "11 Essentials for Excellent ePortfolios" by Vicki Davis. The article can be found at this link:

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/11-essentials-for-excellent-eportfolios-vicki-davis

The advice the article gives can certainly apply to my students, but I feel that using these guidelines can help me to better my blog posts. The 11 tips elaborate on how to achieve portfolio excellence and give me a better direction to move towards.

-Mollie

Kenny's VTSBL blog post

Though I've spent some time this semester exploring blogging as an educational tool, I didn't understand just how powerful it can be. This session has helped me to see Blogger as a tool for personal learning and development with a collaborative twist. I was particularly inspired by one of the students that posted a link to a podcast to talk about their learning--and then reflected in writing on both the learning and the podcast. Below is a screenshot of a couple of these blogs.

Student Portfolios are the new Common App

Colleges and universities are moving away from using the common application and toward student portfolios. They believe that this can be used to demonstrate their growth of learning over their four years. Students can post assignments, projects, and other supporting documents to their portfolios. Blogger can be option for students to track this leavening and display it to the schools at which they are applying.

Sent from my iPad

What is metacognition?

It is thinking about thinking