Wendy Smith's Page

Hi Wendy,
I really like this comment that you made: "Obligating them to reflect upon their learning process is tedious but very powerful once you hold their hand through it for a unit. Then, I think they become invested."

I agree. I used to teach in a very academic high school. Eighty percent of the parents had college degrees and the expectation of the community was that the children would go to college. Those students studied because the content and the good grades mattered to them.

I'm now in a high school where the kids think they are academic and college is a goal but many of our students have a surfer mentality. They're just content sitting on the beach waiting for the next big wave to come. They don't do anything to go get that wave. We have nice kids and I really love the school I'm in, but for many of the kids seat time is the same as learning to them. It is a culture that seems to be prevalent in many of the schools today.

I'm sure our social studies teachers have not used Quizlet in the same fashion that you do and that is why the students moan when I show them it. I'll have to work on using it with your plan of demonstrating active vs passive learning.

I'm enjoying this conversation also. Thanks for the ideas. --Julie

Thanks for the info. I have a SmartBoard in my room so I have an LCD projector. We also have 5 computer labs in the building. Scheduling them is not always easy as the English department blocks off multiple weeks at a time for their students to do the required research paper but I usually can find a work around.

Our social studies department uses Quizlet a lot. When I show it to the students they mostly groan. I don't know how often they are forced to use it and if the students don't see it as useful. I think it's a great site.

Have you tried Quia? It's a paid site but it offers a lot of options for language learners. If I think of any other sites you might want to use, I'll let you know.

Enjoy your laptop school! Although I have a SmartBoard, I would love for my students to have computers while I use the SmartBoard. It would be so much better if they could do the things I'm doing on the SmartBoard with me instead of just watching me and/or one student manipulating the content on the board.

Just saw your next comment. I assess blogs over time and sometimes by assignment. I try to regularlay read their posts by setting up an RSS feed and that gives students feedback and an audience. I have set up a rubric for my year 10 students but will have to search for it.
I find that edublogs (wordpress based) will let you add links to the videos that you made, powerpoint can be uploaded to slideshare and then embedded in the blogs and podcasts can be inserted as well.

Hello Wendy, I teach in a similar situation to you. We only have one culture at our school - Australians (with a couple of NZ families who are just the same culture) So I am really working hard to expose them to other cultures and the globe. We started blogging and worked out our safety mechanisms and from there have moved onto videoconferencing, live blogging, virtual classrooms etc. It is so exciting for us as we live mainly on farms and attend school in a small rural town. We are 30 mins from the coast, where we all love to go camping and swimming in the summer.

Hi Wendy, I'm a German teacher from Indiana working in a public school. We have some technology available to us. I would love to know what you are doing differently, i.e. tech-wise with your Spanish students that you weren't able to do in your public school. I want to use more technology with my students but I need ideas from other language teachers. ¡Gracias!

P.S. I added this post to your intro comment but I thought I would add it to your Wall also.