Improving the learning with Web2.0 tools

By Robin Sutton, Senior Master @ Christ's College of Canterbury...
@suttonr2002 or rsutton@christscollege.com

The teaching profession is filled with good people, well intentioned people, people who want the best for the students that sit in front of them. These are people who would often almost literally give the shirts off their backs for their students.

Yet these are also all too often people who fill their daily working lives with practice based upon little more than mythology. Challenge it and the response is all too often that wonderful professional 'put down' - 'well of course it works, and you'd need to be pretty stupid to think otherwise.'

That observation leads to more than a touch of nervousness when I start to describe the impact of what we might call 'Web2.0' tools in the classroom. In between those bouts of Senior Management 'stuff' that fill my day, I teach two Level 2 Economics classes, and over the past 5 years I have progressively brought several new tools into the class repertoire. The focus of the work has been on developing students' ability to think critically, and to express that thinking in writing. It is no coincidence that the three external Level 2 Economics standards now count towards UE literacy (writing) in NCEA terms,  a commentary on the reasoning and writing expectations of these standards.

I now have a well established pattern of development through the year. Running in amongst the more traditional 'direct instruction' I begin by developing students' ability to reason and write with the use of online discussion forums. I moderate these carefully, giving every student detailed feedback on their posts (perhaps one of the more powerful differentiation tools?) before setting them to the process of constructing and deconstructing argument with each other.

As students develop confidence in their ability to argue, and to record those arguments in writing, I then transition them to more formal writing using GoogleDocs. I create a writing structure using the SOLO framework, ensuring that their written work closely matches the expectations of the NCEA standards and assessments. Each piece of work receives detailed feedback from me in writing.

While content tends to be developed through more than traditional direct instruction, I often use GoogleForms to elicit responses to content related questions. I gather this data under 'test' conditions. This provides a rich array of thinking, not all of which is correct. Students then take this response data (which I have shared back with them) and in groups co-construct the correct answers to a range of questions that help them to develop their understanding of subject content. Throughout all of this classes are engaged with the use of Twitter both inside and outside the class.

I am also teaching specific writing techniques (in particular the Statement, Explanation, eXample/evidence structure with which our English colleagues are enamoured).

Finally, because our external assessment system still requires students to sit examinations in which they write their answers using traditional pen and paper, I then start on the final transition to answering questions on paper.

What have I found? I can hear the voices (quite rightly) calling 'where's your data?' I have no reliable, authentic, replicable data on the outcomes.  I have some observations to make.

Consistent with international research (Goldberg et al), students in my classes write more and write better than they ever did before. Whereas 10 years ago on paper they might have written a paragraph of 5 lines, now they will write anything between 15 and 30 lines in explanation (mostly - there are ALWAYS exceptions). The reasoning is clearer (in general) and the examination results improved. The students are now more often writing responses  that I would classify as Relational and Extended Abstract as they respond to questions. A class taught without these approaches over the same period saw reasonably static results.

This year for the first time I ran an NCEA internal assessment using GoogleDocs. The results were dramatically different. The overall pass rate went from 55/75% to 94%. There is almost no evidence of collaboration (the task had to be completed independently). The answers were fuller in nature, the reasoning clearer and more accurate with most students. I have clear evidence of metacognitive thinking. As I supervised one of the 'in class' sessions of this assessment I watched over the shoulders of students as they used the comments function to pose questions of themselves on what they had written, ready for review later before they submit their work. Interestingly (perhaps??) this was not something I'd 'taught' them to do.

I see great engagement amongst students with both the class work, and the subject. The use of Twitter has been enlightening as students pose questions, offer answers to questions (both in and out of class), and tweet interesting resource material to me and the class. I run a unique class hashtag for each class.

Is any of this conclusive? NO!!! Is this any better than the mythologising of which I accused too many colleagues at the start of this post? Probably not.

It is quite possible that the results have nothing whatsoever to do with the technology. What is needed is some quality research. I'm a numbers man, I need quantitative data. I have little other than probably meaningless word and line counts (there are the NCEA achievement stats for both internals and externals), but I am not bold enough to try to suggest cause and effect yet. That's next year's Teaching as Inquiry project.

References

1. Goldberg A, Russell M, and Cook A "Meta Analysis: Writing with computers 1992-2002", Technology and Assessment Study Collaborative, Boston College.
2. Hattie J "Visible learning for teachers: Maximizing impact on learning", Routledge, 2012.

Why Tag Your Tweets??

by Matt Nicoll, St Andrew's College

If you follow me on Twitter, you will see that I am a serial user of hashtags. What are hashtags? Why should you use them?

WHAT ARE "HASHTAGS"?

You will see from my tweets that I tag just about everything I say with at least one hashtag; these are the things like #ChchED, #scichatNZ and #edchatNZ:

Tweets by @mattynicoll

So, a hashtag is a word or short phrase (without spaces between words) preceded by "#" that you add to your tweets. But why use them at all? I have a few reasons:

1. Twitter Chats
2. Specifying My Audience
3. Building a Community

TWEETDECK

Before going too much further, it is important to point out that the power of hashtags can really only be exploited if you have a way to filter them. I was pointed in the direction of TweetDeck and have never looked back. I can set up "Search Columns" for each hashtag, making them easy to follow.

Here is a video that I found that has a wonderful overview of TweetDeck Columns, including hashtags and how to set up a Search Column:

TWITTER CHATS

My first introduction to (useful) employment of hashtags was when I was asked to take part in the 3rd-ever #edchatNZ chat. I had my #edchatNZ column set up, and the rest, as they say, is history. #edchatNZ has been the most useful source of regular PD that I have had for the last two years...and it is free (apart from the time spent ignoring my tolerant partner!).

Go looking for Twitter Chats that resonate with you. There are a lot out there; here are just a few:

• #engchatNZ (English educators)
• #mathschatNZ (Maths educators)
• #scichatNZ (Science educators)
• #midedchatnz (Year 7-10 educators)
• #penzchat (PE/Health educators)
• #aussieED

You will get amazing ideas and connect with amazing educators by taking part in these chats. If that seems a bit daunting (don't be ashamed of feeling like that - we all did at some stage!), read this post by Steve Mouldey about Twitter Chats:

ADVICE FOR TWITTER CHATS

SPECIFY YOUR AUDIENCE

I asked Danielle Myburgh (founder of #edchatNZ) what she thought I needed to include in this post, and she said, "It's how [people] find your stuff and how you find [people's] stuff." She mentioned that a hashtag was analogous to a paperclip; this resonated with me.

If I tweet about Science education, I use #scichatNZ (and sometimes #edchatNZ too). If I tweet about something Christchurch-specific, I use #ChchED. You get the picture... People with these columns set up will notice these tweets; they do not get "lost" in the "noise" of the general Twitter feed (the "Home" column).

#ChchED Tweets

BUILD A COMMUNITY

This all leads me to why I want YOU to use hashtags, please. Christchurch Connected Educators are using #ChchED to help build this community. If you have a question to ask, please tweet it using #ChchED. If you have a resource to share, please tweet it out there using #ChchED. If you are blogging, tweet about it using #ChchED. Help us build this community, and make sure the community knows about the amazing things you do. Thanks.