Failure Isn't Final

At the beginning of the school year, I identified four ways to increase personalized learning in my classroom. My overall goal this year is to empower students to take an active role in their learning.

I planned to increase personal learning through:

1. Geek out blogs
2. Personalized learning paths
3. Passion projects
4. Wonder day

The school year is halfway done, and I’m so excited to celebrate some success. At the same time, some of my plans haven’t worked out so well. I hesitate to call those moments failure because that seems so final, doesn’t it? And if I’ve learned anything in the last few years of my professional growth, it’s the value of continually learning from both positive risks and unfortunate mistakes. Failure doesn't have to be final.

Last Year’s Successes Are Not Guaranteed...

Perhaps my biggest failure so far this year has been expecting my students to excel in the same ways as my class did last year. As teachers, we comment all the time on the stark differences from one class of learners to another, but for some reason I naively expected my students to display the same maturity and skills as my students last year.

This year we have struggled with remaining on-task and displaying a willingness to try to solve one’s own problems. I’ve been disappointed, and sometimes discouraged. My students have also had the tendency to rush through work to be done rather than focusing on producing their best work. For this reason, I put our blogs on hold. I started using a few new accountability measures to encourage on-task behaviors and hard work for this next quarter, and I plan to use student blogs as a place to publish bigger projects so that students realize published work should be a reflection of our best efforts.

...This Year's Successes Are More Than I Anticipated

If I only measured success based on last year's experience, we would have missed out on some amazing learning. Success this year looks different, but it's still great! My students have amazed me with their deep empathy during our passion projects. They chose to research topics including homelessness, animal cruelty, modern slavery, girls' education, PTSD, and brain injuries. Later they created websites, video games, presentations, care packages, videos, websites, and original art to demonstrate their learning. Their work moves me! They see problems in the world and show genuine concern. I've taught them that their voice matters, and they have what it takes to change our world; they have taught me to stop underestimating their possibilities!

Looking Forward

I will begin implementing personalized learning paths for our gamified blended learning in the next few weeks. I’m fairly confident my students will do well with choosing which resources they will need because during the first half of the year, I provided many opportunities for my students to self-assess their learning progress and choose how much/what kind of support they needed to move forward. I’m anticipating that my students will need help tracking their paths, so I will create a paper path tracker so that my students can easily visualize their learning route.

I’ve planned our Wonder Day for the end of this quarter. I’m looking forward to this experience because my students have had such great success with passion projects! I’d like is to have my students help me plan this day. I think allowing student leadership and voice during the planning stage will increase buy-in and motivation.

Larger Lessons

As an educator, I’ve come to realize the value in all types of lessons. I don’t want to miss the opportunity to teach my students how to embrace failure as an opportunity to learn and grow. It’s what happens sometimes when we take risks. My own failures are great opportunities for me to learn; they are also a chance to model the mindset of perseverance. I took a few minutes at the start of the semester to talk with my students about my failures and what I was going to do about it. I guided them to reflect on their own progress so that they can make changes, set goals, and move forward. I want them to learn that failure isn’t final.

I gamified my classroom and students are soaring

An average child today will have played 10,000 hours of video games before the age of 21. If playing games is part of our culture, even part of our identities, then it stands to reason that students can be highly motivated by game-based learning opportunities. So what if we make classrooms the game?

Gamification means using game design principles such as cooperation, competition, character development, and point scoring in a non-gaming context. In the classroom, it can be as straightforward as transforming learning activities into games or a more subtle application of game design principles to learning tasks.

Gamifying your classroom can be as simple or as complex as you choose to make it. Some teachers choose to make their own game for their classroom in order to customize features including backstory, characters, rules, and objectives. At the same time, there are many user-friendly apps that teachers use to simplify those features.

As a classroom teacher, I gamified my classroom because I needed an engaging way to deliver the online lessons I created for students during reading and math workshop. I was able to turn my online lessons into an adventure with a storyline, obstacles, and learning challenges. I had read research about the benefits of gamification, but I was still surprised to see such a remarkable transformation in my classroom. In just a few months I saw amazing benefits!

Social-Emotional Growth

I’ve spent that last few years implementing different vocabulary and integrating specific read alouds to help my students develop a growth mindset. In particular, I wanted my students to develop grit and perseverance- a mindset that welcomes challenges and does not give up easily. When I gamified my classroom I realized that the nature of gameplay promotes positive challenge and helps my students practice and apply a growth mindset.

One of the most amazing shifts I noticed in my classroom was my students’ response to failure. Rather than feeling defeated when failing at a task in our game, my students have returned to the task with renewed determination, rising to the challenge with a positive attitude. In the past, a poor grade usually resulted in the negative feelings associated with failure. Within our game environment, however, mistakes are seen as an opportunity to try again and do better. Students are more willing to listen to and apply the feedback I give them because they are determined to master skills and level up.

Engagement and Motivation

Not of all students are motivated by the grades they earn, but most are willing to spend hours working to beat a challenging level in their favorite video game. Pairing student motivation related to game playing along with learning tasks has great potential to increase student engagement. My students are excited to work online every day, even asking me for extra work so that they can earn points to level up. With students asking for additional work and persevering through tough learning challenges, it’s no wonder that my learners have shown so much academic success.

One of my students last year struggled to complete school work and would avoid working at home also. After we gamified our learning tasks, he eagerly showed his parents his work, asked for help at home, and showed new focus at school. I was so encouraged to see this young man become excited to learn.

Positive Relationships and Community

Playing with my students broke down social barriers that usually take a significant amount of time to overcome. I have been able to build trust with my students quickly, and that has allowed me to challenge my students in new ways. Building a positive community within a competitive gaming situation is critical. Friendly competition is great, but what’s even better is a collective community that is genuinely interested in the learning of everyone involved. One way that we build our community is through collaborative battles within our game. When the class is counting on every student to work hard and be prepared, students are motivated to invest in their peers.

My Tool of Choice

I began gamifying my classroom by using Classcraft, a gamification platform in which students work both collaboratively and independently. Each player customizes their own avatar that they work to develop by earning points, and teams work together to support one another's learning and development. Students and teams can earn points a variety of ways that are fully customizable, allowing teachers to reinforce the learning and community behaviors their students need.

There are so many different apps available to help teachers with gamification. Some have specific focuses like behavior management or academic progress. What I like about Classcraft is that it reinforces so many aspects of my classroom: positive social interaction, collaborative learning, behavior management, personalized academic lessons, and of course fun. Classcraft’s quest feature allows me to turn my online lessons into an adventure with a storyline, obstacles, and learning challenges. My class works together during formative review challenges to defeat a fictional character. As students earn points and level up, they unlock rewards such as choosing a new seat in class, obtaining extra time on an assignment, or upgrading armor and pets for their avatar.

Other teachers in my school are beginning to use Classcraft as well, and the new Engagement Management System gives our teachers and administrators real-time feedback to track and improve academic success as well as social-emotional behavior. With this information, teachers like me are equipped to make informed decisions.

In all, I’m so pleased with the impact gamification has had on my students, from building a positive class community to strengthening social skills and increasing engagement. My students are shining, and of course, we are having so much fun along the way!

Note: This article was also published on eSchool News.

Student Skills for Successful Blended Learning

I’ve been using a blended learning model in my classroom for a while now. I’ve found that using this model is extremely effective in providing personalized learning for my students. Moreover, allowing students to learn online for part of our instructional day enables me to teach small groups of students, often forgoing whole-group instruction. I’ve essentially created my own digital co-teacher because my students who are working independently learn online with lessons that I’ve created for them. 

My experiences last year helped me to realize that students need to be taught how to learn online. When beginning this school year, I had an outline of skills that I wanted to teach my students before they began learning online independently.

Media Interaction

Watching a video to learn something at school is a whole lot different than watching Netflix at home. Watching at home is a passive activity with the purpose of entertainment. In fact, many people “watch” TV while also playing on a tablet or phone, dividing their attention. These are not behaviors that will aid learning. For this reason, I take time to model appropriate ways to interact with learning media. We practice these skills as a whole class anytime we use a video, infographic, or image for our whole group learning. 

I encourage my students to pause videos to think and replay parts when needed. I also teach my students to take notes, draw diagrams, write questions, and solve problems while learning online. 

Digital Citizenship

A few of the most important digital citizenship lessons that I teach focus on creating a positive online community. Taking time to reinforce these skills early in the year goes a long way!

When learning online, my students have the opportunity to publish their work online, provide comments for their peers, participate in discussion boards, post video reflections, and topic discussions, and work collaboratively through the G suite.

To make the most of these experiences, I explicitly teach my students how to create valuable comments and how to receive suggestions from their peers. I have found that using student blogs is a great way to teach and reinforce these skills throughout the year. My students use their blogs to publish class work, reflect on their learning, and communicate with their peers. Last year I used a series of hyperdocs to create a blogging network for my class, and this year we are trying Google Sites. So far, I’m happy with blogs being authentic websites because my students have the added opportunity this year to work on designing their website.

Self Monitoring

Learning online takes quite a bit of self-monitoring. It’s one thing to work through an online lesson and complete all the required tasks. What’s better though, is teaching students to reflect on their learning and make choices based on their needs. If students realize they need more help with a skill they have a few options: redo the online lesson, ask a neighbor for help, or request a meeting with me to practice the skill together.

As much as possible, I want my students making decisions based on their learning needs. Of course, I still make most of the intervention decisions for my fourth graders, but they are capable of taking part too.

Troubleshooting

It’s very important to me that my students troubleshoot technical issues with as little of my support as possible. I simply cannot teach a small group of students if I’m continually refreshing websites, helping students log in, and reminding them to read the directions.

At the beginning of the year, I take a considerable amount of time waiting for students to troubleshoot their issues rather than rushing in and “fixing it” for them. To encourage student confidence, I make time for students to explore new apps before I model using them. I also ask students to demonstrate using apps for the class so that their peers know who to ask for help with certain apps if they are stuck.

My students this year seem to be a bit impatient when they run into issues. I still have students approach me with their Chromebooks during my small group instruction. For this reason, I created this quick chart to remind students of different ways to problem solve. I usually just point to the chart when I see a student coming my way so that I can avoid disruptions. 

Finally, I also designate a few reliable students as “tech support.” These students are my last line of defense before my intervention is needed. If a student has tried multiple strategies to solve their problem and a tech support peer can’t help them, then they can ask for my help.


Eventually, some of my students slip back into bad habits. When that happens, I usually buddy them up with another student for a few online lessons to reinforce positive online learning behaviors. Pre-teaching these skills is great, but I still make time throughout the year to reteach and further develop these skills.

The Maker Movement: More than Cardboard and Duct Tape

I remember overhearing a teacher at a conference say, “What’s the deal with all the cardboard and duct tape? Are we really wanting to prepare students to make low-budget items? Where is the learning?” 

Sometimes, as teachers, it’s easy to hear “makerspace” and “STEM” and simply associate those terms with bins of materials. We see the projects students make and wonder how on earth a teacher has connected a cardboard prototype with the everyday math and reading standards outlined in our curriculum maps.

Consider this idea presented by Richard Riley, Former Secretary of Education, “The top 10 in-demand jobs in the future don’t exist today. We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist, using technologies that haven’t been invented, in order to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet.”

How can we possibly prepare students for a future like this? 

More than Making a Product

As educators, we must teach students more than content- we must teach them how to think and design. Between attending conferences and tackling my reading list, I’ve come to a better understanding of design thinking and the benefits it can afford our students.

From my learning, the maker movement isn’t so much about the end product that students create, although that’s what we typically think of. Instead, it is about the thinking process they are applying. Students are learning how to be critical thinkers and problem solvers. They have meaningful tasks to collaborate on, and they practice the skills to become effective communicators. They also realize they have what it takes to solve real-world problems.

Children are Makers

Cardboard creations and rainy-day forts are part of so many of our childhood memories, and children today have the same natural drive to create in this way. Expressing creativity through building and making is such a great way for our students to learn by doing.

Have you heard about Caine’s Arcade? Take a few minutes to watch his story and consider all the different thinking processes and content areas he used while making his creation. If you were his teacher, how could you have used his arcade with your content standards?

Where to Begin

I didn’t begin with a designated STEM curriculum, a fancy makerspace, pre-made lessons purchased online, or even a weekly time set aside for these activities. Instead, I began by looking for units in my district curriculum map that would lend themselves to this type of thinking.

For example, each year we investigate the forces related to flight by creating a glider. This year, we created and flew gliders from a provided template. Then used what we learned to design our own gliders. We began with researching other aircraft, followed by a few rounds of rapid prototyping. Finally, we created our own models, tested them, and made revisions. Rather than just using a pre-made design, we critiqued it and tried to improve upon it. My students became the creators, not just procedure-followers. Isn't that what we want our students to be able to do in the workforce?

This semester, my class is beginning to use the Launch Cycle to investigate issues they are passionate about. John Spencer and A.J. Juliani’s book, LAUNCH outlines a student-friendly approach to design thinking. In this process, students learn about a topic or process, ask questions, research to understand and navigate ideas, create a product, revise, and share with the world. Our first project focused on the topic of homelessness. After that, we studied animal cruelty, how deployment affects families, making video games, and how to build a house. 

Curriculum Connection

Rather than thinking, “How can this connect to the curriculum?” I want to challenge you with this thought: STEM, Makerspace and design thinking are just a structure and approach for teaching- not the actual curriculum.

Here is a practical example of teaching content standards while designing and creating:

To begin, my students were able to choose the topic they researched while participating in the design thinking process. Through this process, I also taught my students critical reading skills including summarizing, drawing conclusions, and synthesizing information across tests. My reading lessons followed the gradual-release of responsibility model just like they have in years past, but our learning took on greater meaning. Final projects ranged from presentations and websites to video games and physical prototypes. My students worked with me to determine how they would demonstrate the reading skills they applied throughout their research.

My Next Steps

In the near future, I don't have plans to create a designated Makerspace or accumulate bins of stem materials (although I really like the potential for using Bloxels as it can connect to our gamified classroom). I like the way my students and I are making projects directly related to our coursework. My next step is simply continuing to integrate design thinking opportunities throughout our curriculum. After this school year, I will have a better grasp of designing and making as it relates to our fourth-grade curriculum.

I'd love to hear about your take on Makerspace and STEM. Tell me about what it looks like in your classroom.

Tips for Managing Passion Projects

Before beginning passion projects with my students, I had so many concerns about management. I loved the idea of student interest driving our learning, but I had so many questions:

• How do I manage students working on so many different topics?
• How much time should be dedicated to passion projects?
• What does a schedule look like for supporting each group? 
• Can I ensure rigor and application of skills?
• Where is the balance between student-centered learning and chaos?

I can’t give a definite answer to a lot of those questions because passion project management depends a lot on the learners and the nature of their projects. I made a lot of in-the-moment decisions throughout the process. Here are a few tips I can offer from my experience.

The Process

I like organization, so the ambiguity of passion projects was daunting. I really liked the idea of using a design thinking process as guiding steps for our projects. I read about a design thinking process called the LAUNCH Cycle, and I thought it was student friendly and just right for our needs. The process follows these steps:

• L Look, listen, learn
• A Ask a ton of questions
• U Understand the topic
• N Navigate the ideas
• C Create a prototype
• H Highlight and fix
• LAUNCH the product to your audience

Beginning Together

We voted as a class and decided on our first topic that we would investigate together. Working on the same topic allowed me plenty of opportunity to model thinking and reading strategies- tying our work closely to reading standards. It also helped me to realize the amount of planning involved in supporting student groups during the research and creation phases of our process. Moreover, I was able to monitor student understanding and gradually release responsibility to students.

Working together gave us a positive shared experience that we could refer back to. Students enjoyed our first project so much that they anticipated their next passion project with enthusiasm.

Goal Setting

Managing various groups of students researching different topics was a challenge during our second passion project cycle. I quickly realized the power of setting specific goals for each day of work. These goals gave my students direction and helped them to remain more focused when I wasn’t directly working with their group. For teams that struggled with remaining on task, it also helped to give each student a specific job for the day. Knowing that I would check the progress of their work was the accountability they needed to remain focused.

Communication

I also shared a Google Doc with students so that each group could communicate with me daily regarding their needs. I set up a simple table with a row for each team. Student groups typed me a few sentences letting me know what they needed from me to move forward the next day. When I noticed trends, I met with multiple groups all at once. Other times, I was able to have students who had mastered certain skills support other groups.

Blended Learning Saves the Day

You know I love blended learning. Creating online lessons and resources essentially allows me to create my own digital co-teacher. When I had student groups wanting to create digital projects including websites, blogs, presentations, and video games, I knew just how to support them.

I created short screencast videos on topics like finding images labeled for reuse, embedding videos, and designing projects that are easy for an audience to understand. I also provided links to tutorials for using Scratch, Google Sites, and Google Slides. Teaching these basic skills in a blended environment freed me up to support students as they created the content for their projects.

Prioritize Skills

I also learned how important it is to continually find relevant resources for students. As each group began researching their topic, they refined the focus of their project and they needed specific information to move forward. For our first two passion projects, I curated credible resources for my students. We will learn how to evaluate sources later in the year and I simply didn’t have time to pre-teach and monitor the progress of that skill yet. I had to continually help students find new resources as they moved through their research.

Ask for Help

Managing so many groups was made easier because I have a wonderful co-teacher. I also wasn’t shy asking for additional help. Our director of virtual and blended learning stopped by from time to time to see our progress and lend a hand, and our instructional coach popped in while we were working on our projects. Two former students chose to help out in my classroom as part of their reward for awesome behavior, and they provided excellent peer support for my students.

Take the Risk!

I learned that allowing students the freedom to direct their learning and own the process is messy. It’s not clear cut and I couldn’t plan far in advance. Those conditions are really about me, though. If I’m trying to create a student-centered classroom, then I need to let go of some of my planning preferences. In the end, I took the risk of trying and it was worth it!

Helping Students Realize their Potential with Passion Projects

We began passion projects a little more than a month ago. Our first project focused around the student-selected topic of homelessness. I quickly realized that I had underestimated my students- and they just continue to blow me away!

To begin our next LAUNCH Cycle for another passion project, we returned to our wall of wonders- a collection of student and teacher questions about topics we are interested in. Students shared the ideas they found the most interesting, and we settled on four topics of study for students to choose between:

• How do you make a house?
• How are families affected by deployment?
• How do you make a video game?
• Why do bulls not like the color red?

Developing Topics

I was initially concerned with the topic of why bulls don’t like red. It seems like a pretty simple question to answer after a bit of reading. As my students found the answer to their question, they realized that bulls don’t dislike the color, they just dislike being teased and aggravated. Our discussion touched on animal mistreatment, abuse, captivity, and animal entertainment such as the circus and zoo. Rather than simply telling my students that their topic wouldn’t work, I encouraged them to learn what they could and then develop more questions to guide further research.

Student Projects

I’m thrilled with the projects my students created. Are they perfect? No. Are they amazing? YES! These projects are a great reflection of student learning. You wouldn’t believe how excited they were to share their projects during parent-teacher conferences.

How to Build a House

These students decided they would make a model to demonstrate their learning. They used their model to explain the process to the class. Their model included framing, drywall, electrical wiring, and roofing.

Deployment

These young ladies were very concerned when learning about the stress that families, service men, and service women face during and after deployment. After learning about PTSD, they decided to create a presentation and share their new understanding with the class. They also wrote letters to veterans and their families. See their presentations here.

Video Games

A large number of my students chose this topic. Almost every student wanted to use what they learned about world building, conflict, and character development to write their own video game stories. Student teams used Scratch to create their games. Our class spent time asking questions about the game making process and exploring the games.

One student decided he wanted to write a blog about making video games. He spotlighted a particular group of students and outlined what made their game special.

Animal Cruelty

This group of students decided they wanted to develop a website to inform their peers about the conditions under which animals in captivity live. The class was challenged to consider how they spend money at the circus and zoo.

Standards-Based Instruction

Are you wondering how I “fit in” standards? I purposefully timed our passion projects to fall during our nonfiction reading unit. As we completed our first passion project together, I introduced a simple T-Chart. The left side said, “Text Says” and the right side said, “I Think.” This super simple organizer served to guide our reading. Students were summarizing, making connections, synthesizing, determining problems and solutions, and reading with real purpose. We practiced these skills together during our first passion project, and they worked more independently on the second. I also reinforced these reading skills during guided reading groups.

Student Empowerment

One of the reasons I love passions projects is because my students love them. There is real purpose behind reading, freedom for creativity, and students have the opportunity to publish their work for a large audience. I continue to remind myself to stop underestimating my students...but do you see why they amaze me? They have so much to offer the world, not just later as adults but right now. Passion projects show students what they are capable of. I love empowering my students!

Developing a Passion for Learning with Passion Projects

One of my major goals for this year is increasing personalized learning in my classroom. At the beginning of the year, I set a few goals for implementation. One of these goals is using a design thinking process called the LAUNCH cycle, for student-driven passion projects. Our nonfiction reading unit seemed to be a perfect fit for our first project.

We began by reading the book, Giant Steps to Change the World. My students found inspiration from famous world-changers. We researched these heroes and realized that they are just people like us. If they changed the world, so can we!

Learning Process

I was concerned about managing all 27 of my students studying a different topic, so we agreed to vote and choose one topic for our first passion project. My students took some time to brainstorm wonder statements, explore Wonderopolis, and discuss ideas together. Many students found interest in the topic of homelessness. We decided on this essential question: how does a person become homeless?

We generated as many questions about the topic as we could so that we could determine the direction for our research. Next, we spent days researching. Google Earth Voyager helped us explore what homes look like around the world, documentaries revealed the disadvantages homeless children face, and articles shed light on the relationship between poverty and homelessness. Our Parent Liaison also joined us and led a student activity to help my students understand the challenge of managing resources on a budget.

Learning Outcomes

Through all of our learning, I saw my students practicing the nonfiction reading skills outlined in our current reading unit. They summarized, determined the main idea, synthesized information across texts, drew conclusions, and identified cause and effect relationships. More importantly though, my students had a genuine interest in our topic, they were invested in their own learning, and they made comments like, “Do we get to read more for our project today?” Toward the end of our project more than a few students came to school with huge smiles because, “I can’t wait to do our project today!”

The best part of this project was having the opportunity to help my students grow in understanding and compassion. We learned about extremely difficult situations and we experienced empathy. From that place, my students were inspired to take action and do something about the present problem. They were inspired to encourage others with kindness, and they were empowered to make a difference. I am so proud of them!

Product

As our final project, we assembled care bags for members of our community with materials provided by a grant written by my co-teacher. The care bags were distributed during a food pantry held at our school. My students felt so proud that they could make a difference for so many families at our school. 

We also created separate care bags so that each of my students could keep one in their car to share with someone in our city. We discussed the physical and emotional challenges of homelessness and decided to include toiletry items, snacks, and an encouraging note. Several of my students have already shared their care bag and were eager to encourage their peers to share theirs as well.

Reflection

Through this whole process, I realized a few important things. Logistically, I made the right choice in having my students agree on one topic to begin with. Working together with my students allowed me to really focus on reinforcing comprehension strategies for my students to apply as they read. For our next passion project, I plan to have my students study three or four different topics. I’ll continue to learn the best way to manage different groups, topics, and projects as the year goes on.

I also learned the importance of pacing with my students. On days that my students seemed to lose steam part way through our reading time, we would participate in guided discussion, revisit our questions, and read to find out how others are already working to help the homeless. These activities provided variety so that my students weren’t expected to read and research for our entire reading block.

Finally, I learned to stop underestimating my students. They are only nine years old, but they have amazing ideas, caring hearts, and eternal optimism! I’m so glad they chose such a serious topic because they showed me what they are truly capable of. One of the best parts of the LAUNCH Cycle is the idea that students create something and share it with the world. My goal was to empower my students to realize that they can have an impact on their world, and by the end of our project we did just that.