Tagged with improvement

Show Administrators Good Learning, Not Mobile Learning, to Convince them of Mobile Learning

Some administrators still prohibit cell phones and other mobile devices  in the classroom.  They do not change their  minds when their teachers send them articles about the benefits of mobile learning; in fact, they may not even have time to read the articles.  Often when a teacher approaches the administrators with a statement like “Mobile learning is great”, they turn a deaf ear.  They are not interested in technology per se.

These administrators focus on student improvement.  However, when a teacher says, “I want to show you how much more students have gained in their learning since the beginning of the year”, the administrators become interested.   For example, Miss Thorp  shows her  administrator, Mr. Verona, how students have grown in their learning on a major subject area goal.  She demonstrates the low starting scores on math word problems and their now high scores. She does not talk about  or show mobile learning.  Once Mr. Verona acknowledges the students’ major learning   improvements, then she shows that students used  mobile learning to work on grocery store word math problems with students in other states and tells how important the mobile learning was to the learning.  Mr. Verona  now realizes that mobile learning  can be a valuable tool  in the math class.

How do you show your administrator improved student learning as a result of mobile learning?

My three formative assessment books, Formative Assessment: Responding to Your Students,  Improving Foreign Language Speaking Through Formative Assessment, and Successful Student Writing Through Formative Assessment, are available at   http://is.gd/tbook

My modern language blogs are  now at  http://bit.ly/imprml

I have developed 25  Spanish activities  and 4 Modern Language Visual activities that allow students to begin to express themselves and to begin to move toward spontaneous speaking as in a natural conversation at Teacherspayteachers:  http://bit.ly/tpthtuttle

Online Grading For Communicating Students’ Learning Problems and Successes

Administrators want accountability for learning in schools.  One way to build greater accountability is for teachers to use online grading programs that give students and their parents access to the  grades.  For example, the teachers can use the free program of Engrade or a commercial program such as Blackboard.

As soon as the teachers enter  a grade for any assignment, the overall grade is updated. If students know their updated grades on a regular basis, they can decide how to improve.   Parents who have access to  their students’ online grades do not have to worry if their children are correctly relaying their grades; they can help direct their children in areas for improvement. For example, when students and parents see a grade of 40/100 for homework, the students and their parents become aware of a critical area for improvement.  When students and parents know grades on a daily/weekly basis, they feel on top of things; they do not complain that they did not know the grade until the five week period.  Administrators and guidance counselors get less complaint phone calls about grades when students and parents receive constant updates on class grading.  When students and parents see on-line grades as they are entered, they can nip any problem in the bud.  Students can do much better in school.

Likewise, administrator have greater accountability since the teachers become constantly aware of the overall progress of the students.  As the teachers enter the most recent quiz grade, they see the previous quiz grades  as well as the overall quiz grade. The teachers see the class average on each quiz so they can decide if they have to re-teach  the concept in a different manner.  Administrators realize that when teachers use online grading programs, these  teachers  have up-to-the-moment feedback on how well or poorly the students are doing.

How does your school communicate grades to students and parents so the students can be more successful?

I have 15+ Spanish spontaneous speaking activities at Teacherspayteachers:  http://bit.ly/tpthtuttle

My formative assessment books:   http://is.gd/tbook

Improve Speaking Fluency With Formative Assessment -Presentation Notes

Improve Speaking Fluency With Formative Assessment
Harry Grover Tuttle, Ed. D

Importance of Speaking:

Reasons for increasing the amount of student speaking in the classroom:

Formative Assessment (Tuttle, 2011): The process of helping students to immediately move forward from their present diagnosed learning to the expected learning.

Formative Assessment process:

Student response → Monitor → Diagnose → Give feedback → Time to incorporate feedback →

Re-assess → Celebrate success

Formative assessment create a culture of success, of constant improvement

Base speaking on ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines

Focus on language functions, not topics, such as socialize, ask questions, persuade, …

Use peer assessment to maximize assessment

Provide speaking assessment for fluency: Identify the specific language function and level.

Frequent short assessments that provide immediate feedback

Do a peer assessment in groups of two

Supply multiple strategies for speaking improvement for a language function

Narrate – Identify three strategies for describing what is happening in a visual

1

2

3

 

Have different speaking formative assessments:
1 Narrate a visual
2 Ask and answer questions – Walk
3 Tell preferences – 3×5 cards
4 Tell a story – Image
5 Give info -Ws
6 Mystery/Gap – Visuals
7 Provide rich details – Fluency +Variety


Resources:

Tuttle, H. G. (2012). Improving Foreign Language Speaking Through Formative Assessment

Larchmont, NY: Eye on Education. Description of book: http://wp.me/p262R-z0. Website:

Tuttle, H. G. (2009). Formative Assessment: Responding to Students. Larchmont, NY: Eye on Education. Website:

Teachers Pay Teachers. (Website of Teacher Created Resources -with some speaking activities I ‘ve made) http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/ Search for Harry Tuttle

Formative assessment keeps students from getting stuck in pot holes

The more I teach and the more I observe other teachers, the more I see formative assessments as avoiding or filling in the pot holes as soon as they show up in students’ learning.  Our students can only hit so many pot holes in their learning before they get an educational flat and cannot continue.  If students do not get the help to overcome these pot holes, then they give up. The students know when they hit a pot hole but they do not know how to avoid it in the future.  If we do not give them a new strategy, then they will continue to hit the same pot hole in their learning. They will get stuck and not be able to proceed forward in their learning.  Let’s keep students on the road to learning, not stuck  in their learning gap pot holes!

Formative Assessment books by Harry Grover Tuttle

Baby Walking and Improving Student Learning

My grandson is beginning to walk. He takes about ten steps and then falls down. He crawls over to the nearest table/chair and gets up again. He does not get discouraged about failing to walk many steps. He walks some more and falls down again.

How do we help our students to not get discouraged about their failures?  Do we use the “fail forward” mentality that a failure is simply an indication that we tried something that did not work and now we can try something that can work?  A mistake is an opportunity to learn. When students see their answers and work  as work in progress, they are more willing to take chances and move forward. When we do not criticize them but help them to see how to improve, we encourage them to see failures as stepping stones as opposed to stop signs.

How do you show your students  that learning from  mistakes is a sign of growth?

My book, Formative Assessment: Responding to Students, is available through Eye-on-Education.

Reponding to Your Students