Spring - Design Thinking -PBL-Badging and more

Returning from April school vacation and thinking about the next 4-6 weeks as we wrap up the school year.  We have been working on Google Workspace credentials and a Digital Passport with badging credentials.  This has caused me to revisit options for other 21st Century Skills here and badging. With our district focus on SEL I thought it would be a good opportunity to looks at skills such as Empathy, Resilience, Collaboration and Digital Fluency just to have a few. Many of these skills connected with the topics of Design Thinking and PBL.

Learn more about badging here 

 

In addition to exploring badging during the first trimester of school I provided students with choice boards and topics. I introduced them to a DT lesson the design chair challenge with students and after survey the them, they requested more lessons from incorporating the design thinking challenge. I have seen these challenges work well at the high school level and plan to experiment more over the upcoming weeks.

PBL https://www.pblworks.org/get-started 

Here is a resource from @CommonSenseEd 8 Steps to Implementing Design Thinking in Your Classroom https://www.commonsense.org/education/articles/8-steps-to-implementing-design-thinking-in-your-classroom 

In the past I have used the Stanford d school wallet challenge and recently found Teaching Entrepreneurship online Design the Ideal Wallet version - (Here is the Wallet Facilitator Guide & Worksheets)

I may combine the options above with student designed choiceboards eith exosndrd options.

Options from a previous post last fall as I closed out the semester  http://techdi.blogspot.com/2020/10/choiceboards-and-design-your-own.html?m=1 along with other resources to explore!

1 Caitlin Tucker https://catlintucker.com/2016/04/design-your-own-digital-choice-board/

2. https://twitter.com/shakeuplearning/status/1260361115478958080?s=21

Stay tuned as we design and post our year end choiceboards next week! 

District PD - Focus SEL for the School Year

This year we focused on SEL for our Professional Development initiative.

In the fall we selected the self directed activity option for PD.  The course Managing Emotions in Times of Uncertainty and Stress seem like the perfect caption for this school year as we dealt with the pandemic, remote, hybrid and the full return to school.  The course was well designed.  The focus started with teachers well-being before helping others.  Each module had videos, readings and a quiz.  It helped taking the class with a colleagues as we discussed parts of the class and strategized over ways to implement in a K-8 school.  

The course by Marc Brackett (Coursera Online Course) was a great option. Where it was self-directed I found myself moving through the course and assignments quickly in order to plan for classroom SEL activities and lessons.
Course info: Managing Emotions in Times of Uncertainty & Stress 

Developing the social and emotional skills we need to support ourselves and those we care about is the journey of a lifetime about is the journey of a lifetime!

1. Introduction to SEL and the Emotions Matter Mindset
2. Identifying Our Emotions
3. Managing Our Own Emotions with Action Strategies
4. Managing Our Own Emotions by Shifting How We Think
5. Becoming a Culturally Responsive Emotion Scientist
6. Identifying Others’ Emotions
7. Helping Others to Manage Emotions
8. Putting It All Together: Making Commitments to Lasting Change

We then curated our learning in the presentation and video reflection.

http://bit.ly/NRSD_SEL_Reflection_Marotta Video reflection https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ektGpgv1VXFGx-f798te4n2DIY85IqNI/view

Start of Trimester three with full return to school

Today, April 5th is the start of trimester with the full return to school.  I am glad I have been focusing on SEL not only to help with my anxiety but also the needs of students.

The scheduling of classes has shifted from not only new students in trimester three meeting two periods per week but also a mix of T1/T2 classes from earlier in the year.  

I am redesigning curriculum this week to meet the needs of classes that are continuing Digital Literacy and re-teaching introduction with a focus on digital tools and portfolios.  I am hoping to explore more option with the students I am continuing and explore topics in the area of Project-Based-Learning, Design Thinking using Howdou for Learn by Doing with Google Workspace tools.

One way to access student work in Google's Rubric feature in classroom. I have found several good resources for Rubrics depending on the project.  AdobeEDU, ISTE Rubrics posted here  You can also checkout  Digital Promise  they have "New Rubric guides for classroom technology use" to help teachers reflect on the progress on impactful use "Impactful Technology Use (ITU) Rubric" pdf here  more on Digital Promise rubrics here and twitter