BLigon's Best

Monday, February 1, 2016

Digital Task Cards with Google Slides

Happy Monday to everyone!

I've been spending part of my day today thinking about and Googling and Pinning various ideas for Task Cards. There are some really fantastic ideas out there about how to implement task cards into your instruction so that students remain engaged.

My specific interest today was attempting to find ways to create digital (paperless) task cards. All of sudden, the examples dwindled to next to nothing. How sad.

One idea that seemed like a no-brainer (and therefore, I replicated it) was to use Google Slides.This example I found online does a nice job of demonstrating how this digital work can even be differentiated.

What I chose to practice in my sample below is to actually have students respond on the slides. Because we have access to Google Classroom, this method would be simple to keep paperless.

The other thing that I did on these cards was to create hyperlink for hints. Go ahead and try it out! The slide deck is active and those links should take you to another item that would be helpful to complete the task. That's the thing that I LOVE about the digital factor that may or may not be available on a paper version of task cards. Sure a teacher could use QR codes or even Aurasma, but if you don't have time to fiddle with those, this option may be just what you're looking for!

Offering my BEST to you!
-Bethany

Have you used task cards in your instruction? What about using a digital or paperless format? What works best in your classroom?
Can you think of a way to make a digital task card assignment collaborative with students?

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Monday, January 4, 2016

#oneword2016: Thrive

It seems as though more and more people are choosing to participate in the #oneword movement rather than making a New Year's resolution.

If you're not familiar with the concept - a word is carefully chosen to be a focus for the year. It's not a decision to be taken on a whim. It's only after reflection of your current circumstances (professionally and personally) that a word is selected.

2015 was the first year that I participated. After reading through My One Word by Mike Ashcraft and Rachel Olsen I decided my word for the year would be COMPASS. Several years ago I went through a mentorship in which I created vision statements for different areas of my life. I felt that I had gotten away from those visions and I wanted to re-direct my attention and choices back to those statements. The word COMPASS helped me do that and as a result I feel that my life is now back on track to where I want it to be heading.

As part of my reflection process for choosing a word for 2016, I came across a blog post by @MindaZetlin: One Word Can Change Your Life in 2016: Here's How. In this post, she shares several questions that the authors of One Word That Can Change Your Life posed in their book:

What do I need?
What's in my way?
What needs to go?
What needs to be done in and through me?

While I can't personally vouch for the book because I haven't read it, it does have good reviews on Amazon and I did find these reflective questions very helpful.

So what did I come up with for my word for 2016? THRIVE. This word excites me; there's a resonance of adventure and challenge within it.

What will I do because of this word?
Where will I go because of this word?
Who will I meet because of this word?
What will I have to give up because of this word?
What new skill will I learn because of this word?
Will I laugh more because of this word?
Will I create more because of this word?
Will I pray more because of this word?
Will I love more because of this word?

This word isn't about success, it's more about shining brightly, all while I continue to grow. Maybe that's a formula I can use:

shining brightly + growing = Thriving

And to make the word even more relevant, it's appropriate for both my personal life and my professional life and wherever and whenever the line between the two blur.

So Cheers to you in 2016! Make it your best year yet!

Offering my BEST to you!

-Bethany.

Have you participated in One Word before? How'd it go?
Will you choose a word for 2016? What will it be?

Thursday, December 17, 2015

Aspire to Inspire

Aspire to Inspire. That's the dream isn't? As educators, we sign a contract every spring and commit to a yearlong journey of inspiring others to be a better version of themselves on a daily basis. We aspire in inspire.

We aspire to inspire the math student to grapple with a math problem until she can not just get the right answer, but explain how and why she took the steps that she did.

We aspire to inspire the student learning a new language to start a conversation with his peers.

We aspire to inspire the quiet child to try share her thoughts with the class.

We aspire to inspire the student who is failing a class to make sure that school attendance is a priority.

We aspire to inspire the student who tends to make poor behavioral choices to stop and think before reacting to a situation.

We aspire to inspire a colleague to try a new teaching strategy or a new technology device in order to keep his instructional delivery relevant for the class.

As we wind down the first half of the school year, you may feel drained from all the inspiring you do on a daily, sometimes, hourly or moment-by-moment basis.

Photo by: @BethanyLigon (Dec 2015)

Take time for yourself during your time away from school this Christmas season. Sleep in, read a book, go for a walk, hug a child or get your face licked by a puppy. Take time to savor your favorite holiday sweet and watch a cheesy movie that makes you laugh.

Make sure that you are rejuvenated because your yearly journey is only halfway through and when you return to classes in January, you have a lot of inspiring to do.

Thanks for all you do! It doesn't go unnoticed.

Offering my BEST to you,
Bethany.

Thursday, December 10, 2015

Say What?!? I'm a Finalist?!?

Edublogs has an annual recognition for bloggers in the educational fields. It's to highlight teachers and students who are adventurous enough to post their ideas and learning experiences to the world. Classroom blogging provides students with a worldwide audience that is authentic and tangible. This is the time of year that Edublogs opens its polls for participants to vote on their favorites.

So yesterday morning I went to the site to vote because our district's junior high, Cactus Canyon, has an award winning blog, the Cougar News Blog and I wanted to show my support.

Out of curiosity, I clicked on the various categories to see if I could recognize any other blogs and to my surprise, I found that my blog had been nominated.

Photo by @BethanyLigon (March 2015)
Modified by @BethanyLigon (December 2015)

Maybe I'm alone in this, maybe I'm not the only one, but when I started this blog, I had no idea if people would read what I had to say. But I knew that I wanted, maybe needed, a space to share out my ideas. And so every post I have written and will write in the future is composed simply because I want to connect with others. Whether or not we agree is besides the point. I want to challenge you in your thinking just as much as I want to be challenged by your thinking.

If what you read on this blog resonates with you, you can voice your vote by CLICKING HERE. You can vote once a day from the same IP address until December 16, 2015.

Thanks so much!
Offering my BEST to you,
Bethany.

P.S. Thanks to @MeaghanDavis19 for her nomination of this blog. She's a dynamic individual who has amazing thoughts. You can check out her blog: We Make the Weather.

How has blogging affected you professionally? Or personally?
Has anything that you've read on this blog specifically made you think a little bit differently? How so?

Thursday, December 3, 2015

Using Google Slides for Scientific Argumentation

As part of my learning today, I read two blog posts that have inspired me to think of using Google Slides for Scientific Argumentation.

The first blog post is from www.erintegration.com - Making digital books with Google Slides. This seems like such a simple way to integrate tech into daily instruction. Students can easily combine text and images to tell a story.

Students also tell stories in science. They make not necessarily think that they are storytellers, but when they report their findings, make claims with evidence, and defend their ideas through scientific argumentation, that is exactly what they are doing - it just happens to be using observations and data rather than imagination. So why not use Google Slides to tell their scientific investigation story?

Here is what a template that students might use to tell their story.

What makes scientific argumentation so powerful is the dialog between students because they have the opportunity to question and critique each other's work. Continuing to use Google Slides, I see this playing out in several ways.

Way #1 - Student groups can give a presentation to the class. This is a more traditional instructional strategy, that certainly has its benefits, but has a high risk of only a small percentage of students being involved in the conversation.

Way #2 - @alicekeeler has often shared the positive attributes of using Google Slides for class discussions. Using this technique, there would be ONE slide show for the entire class. Each student group would get a set of slides to share their work. I might differentiate the groups by using different colored backgrounds so viewers would know when one groups' work starts and ends. Once all work is compiled, students can make observations and ask questions on other groups' work using the commenting feature.

Way #3 - Once students are comfortable with the scientific argumentation process of reviewing each others' work and providing constructive comments and questions, they may be ready to jigsaw the discussions. Students from each lab group will become a representative in another group. Each representative will be responsible for communicating claims, evidence, and reasoning; therefore, each representative will certainly need to be able to defend their groups' position. Here is a blog post of how this might be employed into your classroom.

Whichever WAY you choose to use Google Slides for Scientific Argumentation, I'm convinced students will realize that their work is a story for an audience of their peers and not just some meaningless data sitting stagnant in their science notebooks - or worse, a packet to be completed, turned in & graded, and returned only to be buried in the bottom of their backpacks and never thought of again.

Offering by BEST to you!
-Bethany

Have you used Google slides as a way for scientific argumentation? What suggestions can you offer?
How have you used collaborative slides in your instruction in other ways? What worked, what didn't work?
How else have you employed scientific argumentation in your science class? How would you recommend starting off to someone who wants to make that leap with their students?