Blog Post #5

Project Based Learning Part 1:Experiences of a 3rd Grade Teacher
Project Based Learning Part 2:Experiences of a 3rd Grade Teacher

In the first video Anthony Capps shares with us about Project Based Learning with his third grade class. I learned that project based learning is constantly evolving. The more experience you have with it allows you reflect back and make changes to make it better the next time. In a more traditional classroom you are assigned projects to show what you have learned about a certain topic. With project based learning, the projects are done in order to achieve the desired learning. It is a hands on teaching method that allows everyone, including the teacher, to be a learner. There are some goals to keep in mind when creating a effective project. One goal is to chose a topic that is interesting to the students. They will be driven to to better if they are totally engaged in the subject. Also, choose a audience that will motivate the students to surpass the goals you have set. Last, allow students to edit each others work. It will give them an opportunity to be engaged in the grading process and to make room for improvement for the next project. In part two of project based learning Anthony Capps states that not every project will go well. Sometimes you will have to improvise and reflect on how it can be better the next time. The project based learning method takes a lot of planing and preparation but according to Anthony Capps it has received high approval ratings by administrators, parents and students.

iCurio
iCurio is an online tool used to search websites that are filtered for educational purposes. iCurio also has several additional features for student and teachers to collect and share data. When a student is researching a project they can save data in folders for later use. Timelines and directories are also available to search historical figures. iCurio is kid friendly and can provide services to disabled students. iCurio helps all students achieve their desired and required amount of researching skills.

Discovery Education
Discovery Education is a search engine that provides text, visuals, articles, photos, and videos for projects or reports. Todays students are listener/watchers so this allows the text to come to life. Not only can they read about a particular topic they can scan through videos and photos to help link these images to the text. This tool along with iCurio encourages students to be independent learners. They can explore these websites by themselves to collect and research data.

The Anthony-Strange list of Tips for Teachers Part 1

These are some tips Dr. Strange and Anthony Capps came up with for teachers that would like to continue to be effective.
1. Be a learner yourself because it is never ending.
2. Teaching is hard work so combine it with fun.
3. Be flexible because things do not always go as planned.
4. Reflect and Revise in order to improve future projects.
5. Start with a goal in mind.
6. Engages 100% of your students 100% of the time.

Don't Teach Tech- Use it
Additional Thoughts About Lesson
In these videos Anthony states that technology comes natural for kids. Most small children know how to operate their parents iphones and ipads. Which goes to show there is no need to teach children how to use technology. As teachers we should use this technology as a tool to learn. Several years down the road these same student will deal with newer technology so learning this now will help your learning skills in the future. Introduce one technology at a time and do not expect perfection. Instead reflect and revise on the past projects to improve on the new ones. Another good point Anthony brings up is if you are worried about introducing something you are not familiar with you can try it yourself first. When you bring it to your class and they have questions you will understand where they are coming from. In the last video Anthony talks about how lessons are four layers thick. First layer is your year plan. You have a desired amount of curriculum you must cover within that year. From there you go to the next layers with your unit, week and daily plan. You must make sure your meeting goals for each layer with delivery hooks to keep the students learning.