Are you ready for Halloween? Because we were just in time to decorate for the Open House and soon we will have a Halloween Party at school. Let’s warm-up and see some of the students’ works.
.
Poster- Shaun’s artwork.
After a strong collaboration with Melanie and Cindy, here comes our final project:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1M43T9OJlpTr1wygtWXHYZ5KJM7UJpeOmVs69stinU44/edit?ts=5f8bbe73#slide=id.g9cffd0b9d1_0_2618
Halloween_COETAIL_Final_Course3_Project
- Why did you choose the option you chose?
I look at the list of the shared groups and I thought that there was a small group also in Asia(Korea, Vietnam) and I thought that I could communicate easily because of the time zone, with them. I also often read their blogs and I found them, interesting educators, where we could find some things in common. I love collaborations and I found it very exciting coming from different fields to find a common ground to work for all of us. I wrote them straight away an email and I was accepted into the group.
The combination of an analytical mindset(Melanie- the science teacher), a wonderful designer, and teacher Cindy (a true designer guru- I always admired her fantastic designs) and me -the art teacher and artist (a creative spirit), I thought would work nicely. Also working with so experienced educators, like my colleagues, is always a great challenge to learn together, exchange experience, and get things from other perspectives.
- Why did you choose this topic? These standards?
- We were discussing in a video call various topics and standards. We were thinking about Ocean Pollution, Ceramics, and different states of matters, but the time to realize this project would have been a very long one. We wanted to be something that could connect us all and to exchange as soon as possible opinions and results.
- Because now it is the time of Halloween and the children would love this theme and it is an international celebration, we had the feeling that all the children would feel connected and happy about that. We set that the public would be the students from Vietnam.
- We set up the lesson plan together, did the researches, and I conducted a few lessons. One was online and two others at school. We sent samples of the student’s works to the school in Vietnam. The age of our students was also similar, 4th Grade(Cindy’s Class) with 5th Grade (my students) and 6th Grade( Melanie’s students). So they could definitely share many things in common at this age.
- We choose ISTE Standard 6 and 7, Creative Communicator, and Global Collaborator
- 6 B. Students create original works or responsibly repurpose or remix digital resources into new creations.
- 7 B. Students use collaborative technologies to work with others, including peers, experts, or community members, to examine issues and problems from multiple viewpoints.
- 7 C. Students contribute constructively to project teams, assuming various roles and responsibilities to work effectively toward a common goal.
- How did you grow as a collaborator and facilitator during Course 3?
- We designed together lesson plans, based on our skills achieved during this 3 rd course. We created a platform for students to exchange and get motivated, that their work reaches a wider public and it is valued.
- How was this final project different from or similar to other learning experiences you have designed/facilitated?
- I found it very useful that we had two video calls and we communicate via email and google docs comments very intensively. I found that all my peers worked very hard and then our work was smooth as the sea. A good structure was put in place from the beginning. We shared our work and responsibilities. So everyone knew what to do.
- How does this final project relate to what you learned in Course 3?
- We tried to design all our lessons based on all the units that we studied in this course. I explain to my students about visual literacy, visual hierarchy, infographics, memes, slideshows, the principle of design, CARP. Even my students mess up their Infographic, it was interesting for me to see what I could facilitate and I was clear about it and what was maybe too difficult or too unclear explained. It is good to change the roles, and suddenly I found myself from the shoes of a student into the shoes of a teacher again.
- What has influenced you the most in Course 3 and how is that reflected in your final project?
- I like very much the idea of a story behind every design(Design Zen). I found it very important how the information and the design go hand in hand together. Even I thought it would the job of a graphic designer, and sometimes I need lots of time for creating something with the computer, I think it is necessary to have a basic of tools and I found myself, enjoying canva and trying to create lesson plans with visuals for my students.
- What outcomes do you hope to see when students (or educators) complete this unit? How will you know that students (or educators) have learned the concepts?
Some of the samples of the work of my students from 5th Grade.
Some of the students responded very well but some I have the feeling they didn’t understand the task and they needed more time to finish their work.
- If you facilitated this experience, how did the learners respond to it? What feedback did you collect to inform future experiences?
- Based on the Halloween theme and our lesson plans, I conducted two classes with 5th Graders, (creating, slideshows inspired by the history of Halloween, infographics, and posters).
- I even created for the Lower Elementary students, some lessons because they loved our displayed artworks and they wanted to create something inspired by Halloween Theme as well. I taught one class for Kindy -exploring line and how to create a spider net and cut-outs of a Ghost House(one student created a beautiful drawing and cut out of our haunted school) and one lesson for the 1st Grade with Halloween Pumpkins-with line patterns and cut-outs. Our Halloween week is still ongoing and I hope the kids are full of imagination to enfold even more their spooky ideas about Halloween.
- Feedback:
- I gave too much information. I should structure more simple for elementary students.
- I still have to work on my skills in slideshows. I would like to create a better presentation myself and prepare less material with clear tasks.
- I wish I could have compiled all the pdfs data presentation in a slideshow, but I didn’t have time to figure that out. I am happy at the moment that I can use canva, the gallery in the menu for the blog, and some other tools. And, last but not least, I am very proud that in Seesaw I made huge progress. I am very comfortable with lots of functions and tools. I finished 10 webinars as Seesaw Pioneer and I was invited to attend the Ambassador training program and hopefully, soon I could become a Seesaw Ambassador.
Happy Halloween everyone!