Apparently, I am the world's most inconsistent blogger! I wanted to show off a strategy for a presentation and so opened up this blog to find the post, and wow it's been a year since I posted! Since its December 26th and I am just sitting here in my pajama's enjoying the post Christmas lazy day, I decided I should write a year in review and pick out a few things that went well in the classroom! Even though I'm not great about posting regularly I think I have managed to post at least once per year since I started! So here are some strategies from 2023.
In biology I have been trying a lot of variations of Cornell Notes. I'm writing about it as a success because I think I have some good strategies that go with the notes. If I could go back I would do a little less note taking and lecture and more activities. But, sometimes I get into something and want to make it better so that's what the students get while I'm in that phase! The basic premise of Cornell Notes is main ideas or questions on one side of the paper, and then notes/answers on the other side. At the end the students write a brief summary. The reason I like these notes is that it seems to cause more thinking for students. If you give the students fill in the blank notes they just copy and don't think. I try to go one or two slides and then stop and see if the students can summarize or get the gist of the slides. The students resist because it does force them to really pay attention and focus. I'd like to get to a point where students come up with the questions on their own instead of me providing them. And then also eventually it would be cool if the students could take the Cornell Notes and make a concept map or study guide using their notes. As I write this it seems easy...but in reality the process is complicated! It can be exhausting trying to keep students engaged and thinking! I have also experimented a bit with doodle notes as a way to help with engagement. The students seem to like coloring and doodling as they listen. I have taken Cornell Notes and put them in a doodle note format and that seems to help keep students listening.
Other things in Biology; looking back it was the year of Amoeba Sisters. If you have never checked out their biology videos I highly recommend it! They also have some resources and video worksheets. The videos do an awesome job explaining things in a way high school students seem to get. Sometimes I do the video worksheets as is and sometimes I use a cooperative learning strategy or use the worksheets as review. The videos themselves are great to start the topic or to end the topic because they are typically big picture! They work for generating interest or reviewing.
I did a group test correction activity that I think worked great! I picked out a handful (I think 5) questions from the unit test that were really big picture. The students worked in groups and used their notes to work through the questions. I did NOT hand back their test and they all had to do the group correction activity regardless of their score on the first test. This eliminated the problem of students who get a B or higher just saying they don't need to improve. If you group strategically you can get a lot of thinking and conversation as the students work together...and the part I like the best is how for some reason with this activity they really look through and use their notes. I did a review sheet at the end of my last unit, where for each section I put key questions and just a list of things they should know and be able to do. For example I wrote "I can draw and label a DNA molecule". I had feedback that they liked having this as a checklist of what they should know. I think I'll use this strategy more often. One goal is to get the students to understand that notes are useful and not busy work!
In Earth Science I experimented with trying to do some storyline teaching. I did a training with a curriculum company called Open Sci Ed and I decided to make my own unit based on a phenomenon. It was harder than I thought it would be to keep the story going. I think I will pull more their resources if I do it again! For my intro Earth Science Unit I told and had the students read about the 50 year old terrarium in a glass jar that still has plants growing. We did a lot of modeling on big post its and used it as a guide to think about what allows life to be sustained on Earth. If you are looking for resources on using phenomenon to drive a unit Open Sci Ed has a ton of free resources and they are very detailed! They also correspond to NGSS so that makes it nice to help with knowing what standards are being met.
The last thing I wanted to mention was the use of AI. I am not by any means an expert but I have been trying to use Chat GPT to help with providing detailed feedback. By giving Chat GPT a rubric, you can get comments and ideas. I don't use them verbatim but it helps to speed up length grading. Feedback is so important but it often gets pushed to the side because of time. I'm still exploring this so maybe will have more of an update and details in a future post.
Well that's a wrap on 2023! Hope you find something useful from my ramblings! Happy New Year! Here's to another year of teaching and learning!!!
