Chapter 7 Reading Reflection

Classroom discussions are extremely important when a teacher is trying to keep their students projects moving along. There are three different levels of classroom discussions: Teacher to teacher, student to student, teacher to student. Teacher to teacher discussion is all of the collegial effort that has gone into project planning and continues throught the implementation phase. Student to student is when the students are talking about their learning experiences as they unfold. This discussion can occur within their teams as well as across different teams. Teacher to student discussion occurs mostly on a class website with the occasional whole class lecture when there is a new topic introduced.
Higher order questions need to be a priority in a project based classroom. They should be regulary asked regardless of whether the teacher is speaking to an individual student, to a small group or to an entire classroom. Teachers should be asking students to analyze, compare, evaluate and elaborate. These good questions will naturally lead to follow ups that probe for an even deeper understanding on the students part.
While the students are working on a project, many groups may be in different spots of the project based on how fast or slow they are able to accomplish their work. This means the teacher must keep track of many different things at once and they need to focus on what questions to be asking the groups in order to make sure they are keeping their projects moving along. Teachers should be asking questions about their procedure, teamwork, understanding and self assessment.
Teachers should optimize the technolgy that the children already know how to use in their classrooms. The students will learn new ways to use their technology for more informative and learning purposes. This will allow the students the chance to use the technology in the classroom that Sometimes there are conflicts that occur in groups and this is a great time to teach the students how to manage those conflicts within their group instead of breaking the group apart. This will help build the students social skills for later on in life when it isn't so easy to just switch groups or partners.
Chapter 7 will help the students while working on their food preservation project because they will have a better understanding of where they are at with their project and learn time management as well as conflict management. These are skills they can carry with them for the rest of their lives.

Chapter 8 reading reflection

Teacher should help students build connections and branch out from what they are used to. One way of doing this would be to help your students by connecting them with experts around the world. Teachers will do this sometimes to help students who are curious about a subject become connected with experts in order to learn more about that subject. These experts come into play when a project is based on inquiry and the students need to ask the questions to experts to continue learning in the classroom.
Teachers can help students expand their learning circle by getting them in contact with students from other schools or around the world. Jeff Whipple connected with a teacher in Korea and they collaborated an idea of how to get their students involved with each other to make their own illustrated literature project. They had their students work together and have in depth communication about their intentions and crea
tivity. They paired student writers with student artists to help them collaborate with each other and creat an end product from across countries.
Some students use the EAST initiative model to help students use technology for real life purposes while learning. This model allows students to use programs such as GIS, GPS and CAD to map the trails of Hot Springs National Park in Arkansas. This initiative started in 1996 and has grown to include more than 260 schools in seven different states. Not only does it serve a purpose in a high school but it also targets students starting in second grade all the way through pos-secondary levels. When the model started growing they realized they needed to train teachers from other districts in order for them to take the initiative back to their school and launch it successfully.
Teachers should allow students to lead their own projects because more than not they have many good ideas that they are more than capable of sharing and completing a project based on their ideas. Allowing students to lead will help them feel like they are an important attribute to their project and possibly get them more excited about it.
Building connections with students and experts can help our students with their project on food preservation because they may have questions that we, as teachers, may not have all the answers to so the experts can fill the gaps that we can't.

Chapter 10 Reading Reflection

Teachers should allow students time to reflect on their project after they have spend so much time on it. Setting time aside for reflection will help students feel like their project was important and they will be able to actually see how much they accomplished from start to finish. Reflection can be the one thing that wraps up the entire project and helps it stick in their brains for a very long time. A teacher asking too many reflection questions could overwhelm the students so they should really think about what they want to ask. There should be a lot of planning that goes into the final questions to reflect upon on the teachers part.
As students get older and can think more critically the teacher should allow them to make decisions for subsequent projects. The teacher should ask the students where they see the project going next, what questions were sparked, what they are wondering about next, what else they want to learn and how do they plan on going about it.
Teachers should build traditions in their schools so that students who are younger are already excited about their projects years before they are in your classroom or grade. One teacher, for example, left a project based classroom and ran into a young lady several years later. The lady told her how bummed she was when she found out the teacher had left because she was so excited to do the salmon project that her brothers did years before she was going to be in that grade. This proves that siblings talk and they can get others excited about projects done on a traditional basis many years before the youngest steps foot in the classroom.
Teachers should celebrate students work by hosting an event for the school to come visit the classroom as well as parents and friends. Then they should display the students work for others to view for some time after the project is over with. Having a main celebration at the end of the year to show a retrospective "year in review" of projects for people to view is always a good way to show how much the students have accomplished all year long.
Reflection is an important piece to our project on food preservation because we want students to remember everything they have done and to be able to see where else they could go with our project.

Final Concept Map

Reading Reflection 11

A good project continues even after the initial project is done. It should open new doors and could build a future project design. It is important for students to have time to reflect at the end of a project not only for the students, but for ways to improve the project. Michael Mcdowell, a high school teacher says he has a big reflection piece at the end of the project. The students tell him what they could have done better or what can be done to improve on the project.
To "bring the project home" you should first critique your work. At the end of the project it is important to get together with your team of colleagues to discuss the outcomes and to share ideas for improvements. This could be meeting with other teachers at your school, or by communicating across distances through the email or blogs.
Another thing that should be done at the end of the project is to share your insight. Designing a project takes a lot of time and effort and when you have good ideas you should share them for other teachers to use. There are a number of different ways to share your idea including sharing on existing networks such as iEarn, creating a project library, turning your project into an archive on the web, or publishing you project. You could also become a resource for your colleagues. A project could be turned into a professional development opportunity for your colleagues, and help them get into project based learning.
There are contests where you can enter your project into to gain more exposure for your project and can help raise the profile for what you are doing. This is also time for a colleagues to give critical feedback. Most importantly you should enjoy the journey. It was a long road to develop and teach your project.
This relates to our topic of food preservation because it is a good way to end the project. After we give the homeless shelter the canned food we processed students will have time to reflect on their experiences with canning, or how they felt helping others.

Chapter 11

Projects done by students in a classroom should allow them to capitalize on their investment. The more students invest into a project and the amount of time dedicated to planning the project by the teacher, the more the students will gain from the project. An example of this is the Flat Classroom Project. The students learned how to manage a project and meet deadlines in order for their peers around the world to be able to do their part while they were sleeping in the U.S. The students in both countries understood why working collaboritively is important and according to the teacher, the students were ready to be placed in college and would have no issues on their own.
The students feedback for the teachers is helpful to know what needs to be changed with the project and what worked extremely well with the project. Teachers should critique their own work by looking back through their students work over the course of the project to see how much knowledge they gained from start to finish.
When teachers post their projects to networks such as iEARN, Global SchoolNet or publish their projects, they will be able to get feedback from other teachers to help them learn new ideas and extensions for their projects used in the classroom. Entering your students projects in a contest is a great way to get their work seen by others and to receive critical feedback from teachers that also share the passion for students to work on authentic projects in the classroom.
The most important thing to come out of a collaborative project in the classroom is that the teacher has had a chance to help the students as much as they possibly can. When teachers teach the traditional way, they miss several opportunities to get to know their students. The more collaborative work a teacher can do, the better rapport they gain with their students in their classroom.
This helps reiterate the fact that our collaborative project on food preservation will help our students gain as much knowledge as they possibly can. Every style of learning will be welcome and met with a collaborative project like our food preservation project so no children will be left behind.

CH 11 RR

As a result of PBL, many positive things occur. For one, it allows us as teachers to examine our insights into our students. As international teacher Julie Lindsay puts it, "fostering student engagement means encouraging them also to think beyond the set class time...and therefore to be thinking about and constructing thier own reality". It is so important that our students take what they learn and apply it, and then for us as their teacher to watch what worked and what didn't work. From project based learning we also are able to collaborate with other teachers or colleagues. Furthermore, we can share our insights and ideas on a broader scale to get great ideas out, and then to search for different ideas if you have come upon a new idea or topic.

There are a few different ways to "bring the project home". As mentioned earlier, it is very important to make our PBL's real to our students. Once the learning becomes real and authentic, the students are truly motivated to do their best, and then hopefully do additional research on their own. When we hear of students going above and beyond the requirements, as teachers we feel as if we have truly done our jobs right.

One concept in this final chapter that relates to our project is bringing the PBL home. We don't want all of our hard work to go to waste, but to really cement the ideas in our students, and have them be responsible and motivated enough to take it home and expound on it. It is so important that what we are teaching and doing has meaning in our students lives, otherwise it can basically be for naught. By coping with the demands of the 21st century skills, we can use this in our PBL on nutrition/preservatives to keep in mind various tools and resources we can use to be successful, and then meditate on our success and make it even better the next time around.

Chapter 10 reading reflections

It is important to set time aside for reflection because it helps students to feel good about all of their accomplishments and because reflection helps students remember. When students reflect, they create their own meaning. They need to look at their project from different aspects and from a distance to get to the next learning challenge. Reflection also helps students' project have a personal meaning and to discover the importance of it to them. Students should reflect on the good aspects of their projects as well as the challenges and frustration and they should look at how they overcame those obstacles.
A successful project should set students up for the next cycle of learning. To get students to elaborate on their reflection questions should be asked such as "what are you wondering about next?" or "what do you want to learn next?"Teacher should be asking where students want to go next. It could help develop a project that the teacher would not have thought up on their own.
Schools build tradition and identity a number of ways. For example some schools are known for their sports or a performance such as a symphony. Schools using project based learning should establish a tradition of exemplary project work. To begin, building awareness in other is important. When others know what you are doing you have a foundation for tradition. When the community sees students' accomplishment they will support what you are doing, and they may want to get involved.
There are many ways to celebrate children's work . The school could hold an event, create a blog or have a party. A classroom display is a good way to share students work with others. For longer projects that last the whole school year a year-in-review retrospective could be held. This reminds students of everything that they did throughout the year. This is a part of building a schools identity in project based learning.
This chapter relates to our topic because students will need to reflect on their project. It is important for them to pick out what was important to them in our canning activity and feeding the homeless. It is also important to celebrate students accomplishments.

CH 10 RR

It is very important to set aside time for reflection. Not only is it an essential part of learning, but it is essential when students create meaning because it allows the meaning to take shape, especially when viewed from angles not otherwise thought about. When the project draws to a finish, students can reflect on what they learned and how it was personally meaningful and beneficial. A teacher can help facilitate reflection by asking questions such as how specific learning behaviors factored into the success of the project; their skill development; how they changed/improved; how their collaborations improved; how they got better at giving/receiving;how they learned to hold themselves and the team to high standards; if technology skills were used, and if they could apply their technical learning; and if they wanted to know about any other related technologies. Our students should also reflect on their growth and development as a learner, and well as graciously reflecting on how fun the learning journey can be.

There are many reasons for students to reflect and elaborate. When students become more accomplished "project-doers", teachers feel more comfortable putting decisions into their hands. Asking where students want to go is very enlightening for a teacher, because it allows them to really understand what the students want to get out of it. When students elaborate, they embrace challenges and employ skills to delve into the subject. Authentic assessments then help to solidify the information to make it realistic.

Schools need to build tradition and identity. When schools are unique and have a sense of tradition and expectation of excellence, a sense of community is created. The tradition of exemplary project work is formed partly when the students build an awareness for others, and partly when you are transparent in your activities and traditions. When community members notice and value student contributions,, they will give you as the teacher enthusiastic support. For example, the Charles N Fortes Magnet Academy in Rhode Island has a long tradition of focusing on history. Students, parents, and teachers alike feel "honor-bound to uphold the tradition of serving the community" in different ways.

Once a project has finished, it is important to celebrate! When a student spends so much time devoted to a specific project, working on it slowly and in depth, students need a finished project and a reason to celebrate their hard work. Holding a retrospective "Year in Review" is a good way to acknowledge the students consistent hard work all year long by capturing moments throughout and posting them all at the end of the year. Having an "end of project" celebration will be meaningful to students by anchoring memories, and will also help you as the teacher to learn the highlights of projects and how you can improve them in the future based on students' experiences.

This concept definitely connects to our PBL on food preservation. When designing the project, it is important to have a sense of tradition, connecting the students to the rest of the community. It is also very important to allow the students to reflect and elaborate. It helps them to expand their knowledge to the best of their ability, and allows us as teachers to know what was good and what can be improved upon for next time.

Chapter 9 reading reflection

Chapter nine discussed ways that teachers could make their assessments meaningful to their students in a classroom. One teacher tells her students that they can either be producers or consumers. She then goes on to say that we shoudl strive to be producers because we are creating something that will bring our learning to the next level. I think this is a great way to help remind students of how to think of themselves in the classroom and outside of the classroom. The teacher goes on to say being a producer is the "global goal" now instead of just being a consumer.
A teacher needs to be taking several things into consideration while assessing students' project work such as what they have created, teamwork, effort, and the creativity that went into the project. Teachers need to be fair when assessing and that doesn't mean that they need to assign everyone the exact same amount of work for each project. Some students take 3 hours to write what takes another student 20 min. The teacher needs to keep this in mind and assess accordingly. This is called establishing anchors.
The New Technology Foundation has come up with a gradebook that is shared with schools across the high school network. The grades are brokendown much more than what a normal teacher would do. One teacher has grades for how well the student knows the content, written communication, critical thinking, and work ethic. All of the students, parents and teachers have access to these grades, which can create more opportunities for meaningful conversations about student achievements.
Having students reflect on what they learned in a fun way, such as a podcast, can be another learning experience. Other students can give feedback on how they presented what they learned in their podcast in order for the creator to know what to do better next time. Another option would be to have the student create something new after the project is done to summarize or synthesize what they have learned from creating their project. An example could be having the students create a book about something that they had already been doing throughout the project then publishing the book for the students.
These new and improved ways of making assessment meaningful will help us in our own PBL project by fitting these different forms of assessment into our own work as well as the students. We will be able to assess whether the students actually know what they are doing or have done and how much they learned instead of allowing them to slack off on their work and still get a good grade becuase they know how to guess really well at multiple choice questions.

Chapter 9 reading reflection

One way to understand students prior-knowledge is to have  them fill out a K-W-L chart. Students fill out the K- what they know and the W- What they want to learn before a project begins. Once the project is over they fill out the L- what they have learned.
It is important to establish anchors for a project. By understanding what students already know you can "establish anchors," to see where students are starting, and to see how far they are going as they do the project. A project based classroom has more opportunities to have differentiated instruction so all students can be successful. When creating an assessment it is important to measure how each student has progressed throughout the project.
Online grade books can be used to assess what students have learned during the project. It helps measure students progress in several categories. The students, their parents and teachers all have access to the assessment data. Another kind of assessment was a video taped interview with students at the end of the project. There were able to be honest and reflect on the project. They could also have a real-world assessment where a professional would come in and give feedback and evaluate their work.
This chapter relates to our project because we will need to find some way to assess our students. By finding what students already know we can create realistic goals for them, and see how they progress throughout the project. Then we will need to find an appropriate assessment to go along with our food preservation project.

CH 9 Reading Reflection

One method of understanding prior knowledge of our students students could be through a variety of assessment strategies, such as the criterion-referenced assessments, alternative assessments, and performance assessments. Another method could be KWL charts, or Know-Want to Know-Learned graphic organizers.

When you establish 'anchors', you gain a sense of where students are starting and how far they are going as they work to meet learning goals. You are also able to expand the opportunities to differentiate instructions and help all learners to be successful. When using PBL, the emphasis is all on quality and not quantity.

There are several ways to assess students knowledge during a project. First, you will want to create a rubric to assess progress towards the key learning goals, or objectives you feel are the most important things your students should know. Another way to assess what students have achieved is through an online grade book, like Curtis at the New Technology Foundation created. This online grade book has different categories, like knowledge of a content, written communication, critical thinking, and work ethic. A second assessment tool could be podcasts, which allow students to be reflective, honest, and insightful about articulating their own learning.

Regarding our PBL on Food Preservation, I feel we can use many applicable points from this chapter. First, we obviously need to understand what our students already know, in order to have a base and foundation to build off of. I also think this is applicable because as teachers, we need innovative and inventive ways to assess our students, especially when traditional ways just don't measure all of the knowledge and applicable, analytical ways that our students think. As teachers, we need to think about creating assessments after they have created their projects on food preservation.

chapter 8 reading reflection

There are many ways to build connections and branch out beyond the classroom. Connecting with experts virtually through forums, video chats or students could meet face to face with them.The first step for teachers is to create a list of experts with skill pertaining to the project, willing to talk to students. Before students talk with the expert questions should be developed to get the most out of the experience. Another way to branch out beyond the classroom is to expand learning circles. This could be exchanging videos, blog entries or other forms of communications to other students and communities across distances. This give students the opportunity to collaborate with students across the country or even across the world.
EAST initiative model stands for Environmental and Spatial Technologies and is a network of schools that show the benefits of using technology to solve problems and improve their community. Matt Dozier said "technology is the hook we use to get kids into significan projects, and to get communities into significantly wanting to support those projects." The EAST model has four main ideas that were all a part of the original design. Number one is student drivin learning. Students should be responsible for their own learning. Number two is authentic project-based learning. Students should be actively trying to solve problems in their community. Number three is technology as tools. Students should have access to technologies that professionals do to solve problems. Number four is collaboration. Students need to be collaborating with the team to accomplish more than they could individually.
   Teachers sometimes find that students are able to lead their own projects. This starts with students creating a idea for a project they care about. This allows students to be responsible for their learning. This chapter relates to our project because we need to know how to build connections outside of the classroom. When students are able to talk to experts it gives them an experience they couldnt learn from a classroom. Students should also lead their project and take responsibility for it.

Chapter 8 Reading Reflection

There are many ways to build connections and branch outside of the classroom through project based learning. One would be to connect with experts. Asking experts can help students to broaden their horizons, and probe real life, authentic ways for students to learn all the facts and the opinions. Even though connecting our students with experts requires extra work on our end, both students and teachers benefit. Teachers should be continually looking to connect with experts of all different fields. When a teacher can bring in an expert, the teacher should prepare the students by having them come up with questions and preparing them. Another way would be to expand the learning circle through connecting our students with others on a national and international level. By bringing people together across distances using technology, students understand the globalization of learning. Online collaboration is really active in extending the learning experience as well.
The EAST Initiative Movement is an Environmental and Spatial Technologies Initiative network of schools that utilize geospatial technologies and multimedia tools  to solve problems and make improvements in the community. The EAST Initiative started in Arkansas in 1996, and now includes more than 260 schools in seven states. The EAST Initiative model is based on the ideas of student based learning, authentic project-based learning, technology as tools, and collaboration. Another really important component is training and support for teachers. Teachers now become facilitators, where they have to work with student teams using interdisciplinary learning, teaming, authentic projects, and student driven learning. There are different phases in EAST training, and these all contribute to the greater goal of connecting with the community.
Letting students "lead" the project is important. As students feel comfortable and learn more about their topics, they can begin to generate their own ideas and expand into a leader role. It is very important for our students to feel in control of their projects and especially their learning. When they feel in control and a real part of the project, they are more engaged and benefit more fully.
Connecting students with others on a broader scale is important to expand their experiences, as is the EAST Initiative to get students connected with their community. However, this chapter really relates to our PBL because we need to provide students with opportunities to let them lead their own projects. As teachers, our lessons must be directed towards open, authentic ways to let students really take the lead. When we are thinking of ways to create our projects and our lessons, we need to be mindful of making the project make sense, but also that it is open enough and general enough to allow students independence.

Reading Reflection 7

There are three levels of classroom discussion. Teacher to teacher discussion is when teachers collaborate even after the project has started. This is just as important as the prep because it keeps teachers on the same page. If students are struggling with a concept small changes may need to be made. For example a mini-lesson could be planned. This is a good time to use blogs, wiki and other online tools to communicate if your project colleagues are at another location or if you cannot meet face to face with them. Student to student discussion is when students are talking amongst each other about their learning experiences. Students can talk with their team members and it is also good for them to talk with other teams. Communication is very important because they need to work as a team and stay on track. Students learn and challenge each other. Teachers should be observing, and sometimes joining the conversation when appropriate. The last level of classroom discussion is teacher to student. This is the dominating classroom discussion format in a traditional classroom where teachers lectures most of the time. During project based learning this level is only used occasionally to make announcements to the whole class or to introduce or demonstrate new ideas. Teachers should be checking in on students along the way. Students will be taking different directions and working on different speeds, which is normal. There are four types of questions that should be asked. Procedural questions should be asked such as “are you getting everything done on time?” and “do you have all of the materials you need?” The second is teamwork questions. This is good to see if everyone is getting along and sharing the work equally. The third are understanding questions. This will take some observation and listening to students. This is a good opportunity to bring up ideas that they may not of thought of and encourage them to push themselves. The last type of questions are self-assessment. This is a good time to get feedback from the students on what they think about the project and for them to share their excitement or challenges about the project. It is important that technology is used as a tool and is not a distraction. Check in with students to make sure the technology is used properly is important. There are many benefits to optimizing the use of technology. It should help students reach their learning goals. It should help them stay organized as well. For example a collaborative blog allows them to log their ideas and to share with their team mates. Technology should expand students’ horizon by connecting to experts and people outside of their community. It should also be easily accessible. Teamwork is a 21st-century skill that can make or break a project. Pay close attention to team dynamics during the beginning of the project. Allow students to manage their own conflicts. It is a good idea to have the students make a contract before their project starts where students agree on everyone’s responsibilities and have them each sign it. Students can also evaluate each other on a teamwork-scoring rubric or with a journal entry. The concepts in this chapter relate to our project because we will need to implement appropriate classroom discussion. We will also need to check in with our students along the way to make sure the project is running smoothly.

Reading Reflection Ch 7

There are three levels to classroom discussion. The first is teacher to teacher. In this form, teachers collaborate together, taking every opportunity to work together, sharing ideas and resources. The second is student to student discussion. In this, students should be talking about their learning experiences as they unfold- within their teams as well as across teams. When students explain their thinking, it gives everyone the opportunity learn from and challenge one another. The third is teacher to student, which entails an announcement of some form or whole group lessons to introduce a new concept or demonstrate a skill that all students need to understand how to progress. In PBL, teacher to student can be used through project management tools, like project Web sites, blogs, online calenders, or online project work spaces.
When students are in the middle of a project, we as teachers can help our students to focus and adjust by checking in. Based on the information you want, you can ask questions based on different approaches. For example, if you wanted to focus on Procedural aspects, you can ask questions such as "are we on schedule? do we have the right materials? when's the best time to schedule various activities?" These questions will help reinforce progress towards milestones and deadlines, and also remind students of the project calender and monitor students' project logs and checklists.Another approach you can focus on is Teamwork. By asking questions like "how are team members doing? is one student carrying too much of the load for the whole team? Are students able to manage conflict themselves, or do they need my help?" By asking these question we can assess team dynamics and create open dialogue about the team. A third approach is Understanding. You can spend time observing teams at work, listening to student conversations and asking probing question in order to see if students are on track, making progress, and are able to go beyond expectation. The last approach is self-assessment. Asking question that encourage self-assessment and reflection can help students to describe challenges or frustration, ask questions they may feel uncomfortable asking in front of everyone, or sharing their excitement.
Optimizing technology is very useful for students. Students respond very positively to the experience of learning through technology. When teachers maximize the potential of technology through examination such as helping them focus on the learning goal; helping them to stay organized; using technology to expand their horizons by connecting to outside experts or a broader community; and by having technology be equally accessible. When technology is optimized, students gain greater benefits, new insights, and authentic feedback.
When keeping a project moving, 21st century skills must be employed. For example, teachers must act as project managers to troubleshoot any challenges or problems that may arise. For example, Anne Davis, a teacher in Georgia tried to match her fourth and fifth graders to high school mentors. When it came time to publish their writings, her students froze. Mrs. Davis talked to another teacher on the high school end, and he talked with his students about reassuring the younger students. This really eased the way for the project to continue  with success. By using conversation in the classroom as an instruction tool, you build your community of learners. Another 21st century skill is teamwork. If a teacher detects trouble, they can help their students to learn to manage their own team conflicts. An excellent way to do this is to make teamwork a focus of formal assessment.
This chapter on keeping the project moving really applies to our PBL on food preservation.When we are discussing making any project, we need to continue to ask our students questions to see if they understand. We need to check in with our students to see if we can do anything to help, and then adjust our teaching accordingly. When we vary classroom discussions, we can help students to grasp information, especially when we are teaching about food preservation, which can be difficult for many students to conceptualize. By optimizing technology and using 21st century skills, we can strive to help our students achieve.

Chapter 6 reading reflection

Before and after a project students should complete a self- evaluation that allows them to be reflective and evaluate their strengths. The self-evaluation at the end of the project should have students reflect on experience that helped them grow. There are certain technologies that can help student’s reflections such as a blog. Students can see their progress over time and can look back at everything they have learned. ProfilerPro is a website that surveys students to find their interests, strengths and weaknesses. These can be taken throughout the project to keep track of the skills they have learned. A survey website such as SurveyMonkey can allow students to see how their self-evaluation compares to other students in the class. There are several ways to get students’ mind ready for a project. A project should always start by seeing what students already know about the subject. This can be done with a K-W-L chart. Their thinking should be challenged to generate deeper questioning. Teachers should have an “attention grabber” to get students excited about the project. Every day the teacher should bring up the topic to allow excitement to build and to get them to think about the project. To teach the fundamentals first teachers should set the stage for independent inquiry. A good way to do this is by having students fill out the K-W-L chart. Through this students can become aware of what they do and do not know and it can serve as a starting point. Students are encouraged to think deeper about the things they are investigating. Teachers should also share the assessment rubric. Students will know what is expected of them and serves as a “road map.” Technology should not be the project, but it should be an aid to do the project. The first step should be to determine what technology will be the best to use in a particular project. Once a device has been picked out and before showing students how to use it, it is a good activity to have them learn among themselves and to problem solves. It is important to observe the students to see where a demonstration is needed. Students need to know the expectation for each technologies use and the purpose. A project log or a journal helps students stay on track and see their progress. Sometimes a demonstration needs to be done for the students. If a teacher is not comfortable doing a demonstration a technology specialist or another teacher can help. To promote inquiry and deep learning students should be guided as they choose a question and plan an investigation. Questions that students want to investigate may need to be altered to promote deeper learning. For example “what is money made of?” could be asked as “what is the process of making money and is it the same everywhere?” The concepts in this chapter will help us determine the best technology to use for our project. It also shows ways to track students’ progress throughout the project.

Chapter 6 Reading Reflection

Chapter six discusses the appropriate way to launch a project. Students should do a self evaluation before and after a project that focus on the learning dispositions that the teacher expects the to develop during the project. Self assessment is a major factor in how students view themselves as capable and how they direct their own learning. Students can use ProfilerPro to evaluate themselves or they can use a blog to help track their reflective thoughts over a period of time.
Students should collect their thoughts about a project topic before they actually dive into the project. A way that some teachers have their students practice this is by using a Know-Wonder-Learn (KWL) chart. This chart helps excite the students by establishing interest before the project even starts.  A teacher can spark a students interest in the project even more when they start the project off with a simple inquiry based demonstration that allows the students to guess what is going to happen, such as the ice cube example in the book on page 98.
Teachers should be teaching the fundamentals of what their project topic is about in order to allow the students to work more independently during their investigations. Students need to be helped and nudged before getting to the point of being able to work on a project independently. Working with 21st century technology based projects can be compared to learning how to drive for the first time. You start out learning the small things and work your way up to finally driving on your own, alone, in your car. Students should always be given a good rubric with room for brilliance to follow while creating their project.
Teachers should allow students to have 21st century technology available at their students fingertips in order to help them create their project more thoroughly. Even when they don't know how to use a piece of technology, students will turn it on and start playing with it in order to figure it out. Students can use a journal or project log to help them keep track of their progress toward their goals while working over several days or weeks. Teachers should be demonstrating this technology and the project log to their students if they are comfortable using it.
Teachers should guide their students through the inquiry process of a project. They should be their to guide the students as they choose questions, plan investigations, and begin to put their plan into action. The questions students should be asking are those of which the experts in the field of the topic would want to know more about.
When students are exposed to new technology that allows them to create their own webpages and comment on their classmates webpages they will gain more knowledge of how to utilize the technology and take on new roles and responsibilities. The opportunity for teaching about information literacy comes from the possibilities for working on the Web today.
This information will help us with our food preservation project because it will allow us to think about the steps we are having our students follow when researching the information to complete the project.

CH 6 Reading Reflection

Technology tools can be very effective and influential in students' learning. It can also help them to evaluate their own strengths. For example, a blog offers students space where they can reflect over time about what they are learning. A ProfilerPRO (which we have used in our classroom) is an online survey tool that allows you to identify the learning characteristics of an individual and also among members of a group. Another tool is the SurveyMonkey and Zoomerang, which both allow you to set up surveys. All of these technology tools really help students to tap into their prior knowledge, and allows them to evaluate how they are doing and what they are good at.
There are many ways to get students minds ready for knowledge. First, you want to tap into prior knowledge. By introducing a KWL (Know/Want to know/Learned), you can assess what students already know and how to assist them best. As a teacher, we must be intentional in our instillation of passion in order to transfer the desire to try and succeed into our students so they may do the best of their ability. We want to be encouraging, allowing students to explore and think and discuss.By building excitement throughout the lesson or the week, students' interests emerge, and they become more invested in the project. A teacher must describe the activity, answer questions, encourage students to inquire, and advice them on design. Teachers can also use technology to get minds ready. For example, teachers can use Google Earth if you are discussing geography, or they may use social media sites (safely) at school to display a project collectively.
By teaching fundamentals first, teachers must think about teaching prerequisite knowledge or skills students need to be independent. Teachers must build up to the idea in order to grasp what it means. Teachers can set the stage for independent inquiry through tools such as the KWL process.They can also share the assessment rubric with students, parents, teachesr, whomever.
The next important step would be to prepare for technology. The teacher can first set up a technology playground. Teachers can track how students are doing, but it has a large learning curve. The next step would be to tap into student expertise. Because they grew up cutting their teeth on technology, they likely know more shortcuts tan any of the teachers. A third thing teachers can apply is to introduce project-management tools such as journals or logs to keep track of all they have accomplished. Finally, teachers must demonstrate how to use technology successfully and wisely in order to be effective.
Promoting inquiry and deep learning is very important in PBL. Our questions we ask our students should be geared specifically towards higher level thinking. First, we must have a complex and engaging project. By taking a basic question/objective and really expounding upon it to stretch out as many possible answers as possible is ideal. Teachers must guide students to get them to imagine what experts might ask. We need to ask questions such as "which one", "how", "what if", "should", and "why".
In our unit of healthy living/food preservation, we need to include this in our lesson plan very explicitly. When planning hands on PBL we must plan ahead, and be sure that when we are implementing the strategies, they are cohesive and effective. First, we will lay the groundwork in our lesson plans and prepare as much as possible. Then, we can focus on getting ours students' minds ready by utilizing tools and technologies to instill passion in our students. Food preservation may not be the most exciting idea to some, so it is our job to make it have meaning. We can also think about how to incorporate technology to have a captivating introduction to a project. By understanding that we must teach the fundamentals first, and thoroughly preparing for technology, we can help our students to get the most out of it. Finally, by promoting inquiry and deep learning, we can include this in thinking about what projects we are doing and how we are approaching and presenting them to our students.

Collaborative Concept Map