Identifying Similarities & Differences
One of the recommendations for this strategy is "Have students use graphic organizers as a visual tool to represent the similarities and differences." Whenever applicable I do have my students use graphic organizers to arrange information in a logical, visual manner. I LOVE the new SmartArt tools in Microsoft Office 07 & newer; the word clouds, mind maps, flow charts, etc are super easy to use and look great! The SmartArt graphics are broken into categories which helps the user easily and quickly select the best option.
Homework & Practice
I rarely give true "homework" in my classes where students have to complete/finish activities outside of class. 99% of the learning activities take place during the class block as long as the given time is used wisely. Right now in one of my classes the students are working on a group project. There was class time given but a few of the groups will need to finish up the project outside of class prior to class on Thursday. One group in particular was listing off a million reasons why they wouldn't be able to finish their project; here are just a few given to me... "Some of us are in extra curriculars after school so we can't all get together to finish it then", "None of us have PowerPoint at home to finish up the project", "Ya de ya de ya da!" I realize that these "excuses" are not totally legit but instead of fighting that fight I just calmly told the group that all of what they told me was okay. I told them, "Just upload what you have done to Google Docs & finish your presentation online whenever you each have time to work on it." We've used Google Docs for many activities in that class so I'm surprised they even tried to give me all of those excuses regarding why they wouldn't be able to get the work done when they knew I'd probably "gently remind" them about Google Docs. Funny students.... :)
Generating & Testing Hypotheses
In my Intro to Business class the students complete an online business simulation called JA Titan. The students are put into groups, and they make various business decisions. After the decisions have been submitted they receive instant feedback. The students then look through the business reports and make the next quarter's decisions based on what happened in the previous quarter. This simulation certainly requires them to generate & test hypotheses each time they submit their decision and then review their reports. The students enjoy this simulation because it is very much "video game-like" and gives them instant feedback based on their decisions in the simulation.
Becky,
ReplyDeleteI always feel like I'm locked in the 20th century when I read your posts or hear you tell others of what technology you are using. You're on the cutting edge. What advice could you give to someone like me, who has a new district issued laptop with Office 2007 and still is using Office 2002 on my 2 other laptops (I may have answered my own question there). But I, and my colleagues are so used to where everything is on the older versions. When my wife and I went up to Door county and Northern Wisconsin this past August, I brought a map into the restaurant where we had breakfast. Didn't show our ages at all at that sitting... Ha ha.