6 Ideas for Women's History Research!

As we embark on Women's History Month, why not hunt down a classroom partner to meet the Common Core Anchor Standard:  Research to build and present knowledge.   Here are five essential questions to help spawn a great project.   Just layer technology or another way to "present knowledge," and you will have a student-centered research activity aligned with the new SS C3 standards, ISTE standards, AASL standards, and CCSS Standards!  




EQ: If you were to award a Nobel Prize for Women's Influence, to whom would it be given? Why?  [Build an EBC - Evidence Based Claim- and support your nominee with reasons and real impacts.] Be ready to plead for your nominee at our "Circle of Influence." {With this choice, influence is the focus, not necessarily fame.  This gives the students opportunity to be creative and choose lesser-known people such as Marjorie Merriweather Post, Admiral Grace Hopper, or Anne Hutchinson}

EQ: How could we build a timeline for Woman Change Agents?  Please note when, where and why they were of influence.   For each women on your change-agents timeline, write a paragraph in the first person voice of this person addressing our modern-day culture.   We will be building a wall of fame.   {With this choice are examining change over time...}

EQ: If you could testify at a mock-19th Amendment hearing, what would you say?  We will be voting on whether to pass the 19th amendment. Who will you choose to be and what argument will you bring to the table? We need all voice represented.  You must speak with authority and credibility, based upon your thorough deep research.  {We need many voices: Lesser, Garnett, Minor, Stanton, Anthony, and others you discover.}

EQ: Who do you believe impacted women's role in our culture or history the most?  Research and build an EBC to support your choice.  Be ready to share your knowledge.  {With this choice we are taking a persuasive-evidence angle...}

EQ:  How have women "come a long way baby?" Examine "women's roles" in culture during three centuries of your choice.  Build a storyboard with primary source photos, legislative changes, avatars (or others) and document the women's story of suffrage. 

EQ:  So what would you include in a Women's Evolution Journal? - Use the Social Studies "lenses," build a portrait of women's evolution--ending with the 19th Amendment passage in 1920: Culture, politics, economics, geographical, time (era), and {With this choice we are using the SS lenses as a focus} 

Weave together a few of the choices above and brainstorm a good new end-product such as either a real-life "wall of fame," virtual wall of fame, discussion and debate, or trial for the 19th Amendment Legislative vote.

Research: Are you anchored?

As a kid I grew up near the water where we knew the value of an anchor.  No one in their right mind would ignore the condition of their anchor line.  If you were out for a sail on a sunny summer day or out fishing on an incoming tide, you needed to know you could drop your anchor and that it would hold.  That's what an anchor does: It keeps you rock solidly placed where you need to be…for a reason.

The ELA Writing Anchor standard, Research to build and present knowledge, is  there for a reason. However, teachers all over are ignoring this. They haven't checked on their anchor.  They haven't thrown it overboard in a port of call where kids could engage in this activity, and many haven't learned what real research is.

A sailor should never be afraid of an anchor.  An anchor is a friend.  It's a tool.  It's an essential piece of equipment.    Tell your teachers you'd gladly "cover" this ELA Writing standard for them.  Invite them to your port of call to participate in an investigative, research and writing project.  Model how this tool can be used to experience depth of knowledge and deep understanding.

Celebrate the ELA Anchor standards which will help keep students grounded in a sea of misinformation.

There are many reasons why students should be dropping anchor in your library.  Here are a few from the Common Core: 

Remember. It's all about the kids.  Let's teach them to anchor their views with credence.  Anchor them in data, information, evidence, credibility, reliability, and safe ports of call.  

Repackaging Research for the Common Core

While preparing for my  AASL breakout session scheduled for Saturday,  I thought I'd share some documents with our virtual library world.   Many of you cannot attend this national conference in Hartford for various reasons, and we will miss meeting you face-to-face!  

Since we are all in this paradigm shift together, I thought I'd share two research tools that I crafted to help inspire your teachers to "Repackage Research" for the Common Core:  A teacher self-assessment and a student self-assessment for research--Common Core style! 

There's a great deal more in my session than these two self-assessment checklists, but in case you can't attend, I didnt want you to miss out on what I believe is an incriminating self-assessment for teachers who are caught in the old paradigm of "fetching facts." 

If you attend my Saturday morning session, we will do some hands-on activities to understand how classroom  activities can evolve into "short term or more sustained" research activities.  We will share a recipe for creating Essential Questions and attendees should leave feeling that they understand how research within the CCSS should be vastly different that the old-school, low-budget, fact-fetching lame-excuse-for-research endeavors.   As Ross Todd says, "why bother?"  

 ResearchSchematic NYS (PDF -484 KB)

 SCDN Synthesizing! - Student (PDF -396 KB)

 Teacher self-assessment (PDF -314 KB)

 Repackaging Research Handout (PDF -865 KB) Sat @ 10:00 

When we return to work on Monday, our NYSED governing board will be voting on whether a research paper will be a requirement (postponed until December meeting) for HS graduation.   Most high performing schools are there already,  but we all know that some schools and classroom teachers are "territorial"  and do not collaborate with their librarians.  That is not CCSS aligned and you can diplomatically inform them.    

Here is our Commissioner of Education, Dr. John King,  speaking to 1000+ NYS Network Training ELA teachers last May about "research."   Long live the King!  

Also on Friday at 8:00  we are presenting Raising eReaders:  Rising above reluctancy 

Please join us for that session, if you are sitting on the fence wondering why or how to get started with eBooks for popular fiction!    

Here is a handout from that session:  Raising eReaders (PDF -270 KB) - Friday @ 8:00 

Synthesis and Smoothies

I love smoothies as they are the greatest for life-on-the-run. In the morning the blender gets filled with kale, walnuts, soy milk, bananas, blueberries and flax seed for a breakfast shake that rivals the mulch-pile. These seemingly unrelated ingredients get pulverized--synthesized--into a high-powered drink that sticks with me. That is what we long to see in our students -- Synthesis of seemingly unrelated ingredients (information) into a smooth conclusion supported by evidence.  

Two years ago when we ventured down our Repackaging Research campaign, we had stickers printed that say, "I SYNTHESIZE." These are coveted in our libraries and distributed and worn as a badge of honor when students conclude, or make sense of, information they have found. Even high school students prize the recognition, says Jan Tunison of Scotia-Glenville High. Yesterday a colleague posted on a listserv that she was looking for tips on Synthesis and it compelled me to share a few thoughts to encourage synthesis: 

• Research should be packaged as a question in need of an answer 
• If a student only has to find facts and spit them out, they will not get to the synthesis stage 
• Synthesis comes when they have to answer a question, based upon the facts  
• When they synthesize their facts, they usually draw a conclusion based on evidence (facts) and that becomes their hypothesis about which they write.   

Students have trouble synthesizing because they have spent years merely "fetching facts."    
(See my fetching facts post here..x.) 

In our upcoming book, Rx for the Common Core, we have a few pages on synthesis and a number of graphic aids to help teachers and librarians foster synthesis in their research reports.  

Are You Up to CCSS Snuff?

Not very long ago, 'snuff" was not only accepted, but it was also "fashionable."*  Nicotine and soft drinks were laced with opiates and everyone was having a grand time...if they had money.  If you were really something, you were "up to snuff."   

Today in education, it is impressive if we know  how to compel our students to dig deeply, investigate, read, discover, conclude, discuss, debate, and more.  However, most educators aren't really up to snuff, yet. Some even are say it's damaging material and there should be laws against this...invasion of my classroom. 

The three links below provide self-assessment tools for measuring how well you have crafted a CCSS-aligned lesson.  Everyone is in the literacy business.  Use these "evidence guides" as toosl to improve the rigor and focus of your lessons. Please keep in mind that you do NOT have to hit all shifts and bullets in one lesson.

Lesson Evidence K-2                   Lesson Evidence 3-5              Lesson Evidence 6-12   

As I examined these three documents, which NYS is using, I discovered you could generalize this to the following checklist:  

Your lessons should demonstrate student-centered activities where kids are manipulating information, answering text-based questions, digesting rigorous passages, vocabulary, and more.  If I were not in administration myself, I would love the opportunity to demonstrate how effectively I could support student achievement.  This is a time to shine!  

*http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/up-to-snuff.html

Are Your Students Sleuthing?

Detectives, investigators, criminal prosecutors and auditors all have one thing in common:  They presume guilt.   They assume there is something wrong and look for the evidence on their side. That same mode of operation should be used while "investigating" on the web. Are your students sleuthing?  

http://www.flickr.com/photos/myhobosoul/
301624376/in/photostream/

This generation enjoys criminal series, wants to study forensics, and genuinely has their interest heightened by criminal investigations.  Librarians can tap into this innate curiosity by using similar language and embracing a detective MO when searching for information.  Why not use this as a ploy to remind your students to "consider the source!"  

Another CCSS sleuthing idea we can capitalize on is to use detective riddles to compel students to read closely, re-read closely again, and re-read and discuss a detective riddle looking carefully for details.  If you examine the old Donald Sobol, Two Minute Mysteries, you will likely find a number of fine literary specimens which:

• have rich vocabulary words (SAT words)
• present intriguing detective scenarios
• provide an opportunity for reading, discussion, higher level thought, and more goals aligned with the CCSS. 

Before you know it, you have tricked your 4th, 5th, or 6th  graders into closely reading a short passage, multiple times, sleuthing for evidence in the text.  If you choose your passage carefully, they will read, discuss with their peers, and add vocabulary to their "receptive" or "productive" vocabulary. How's that idea for a 30 minute Common Core aligned library lesson.   

So when you are not "collaborating" with classroom teachers on research endeavors with Internet sleuthing, embrace the tenants of the Common Core and remember you are a teacher yourself. Package a 30 minute Common Core aligned library lesson yourself.

________________________________________________________________________________
Read Web of Deception to understand why students should be "sleuthing": click here for Google Books link (Yes, this book is older and perhaps "dated" but the premise still holds.  The mere thought of "content farms" should scare teachers into using databases.) 

Common Core Bulletin Boards Ideas for Your Library:

Focusing on the "shifts"  here are a few good ideas for interactive bulletin boards.  Remember, bulletin boards should not be static, but should be interactive making them dynamic.  Learning is not a passive activity but an engaged process.  With that in mind, here are nine new ideas to support the CCSS via your big fat bulletin board! 

1. Vocabulary shift -  Choose a label such as "Word Families - FIND A BETTER RELATIVE"   and place  papers with big bold simple academic  words printed on top such as:   ARGUE,   LOUD,   KIND,   LOVELY,    TRASHY,   RICH,    POOR,    UGLY,    YUMMY,    and ask your students to contribute BETTER word choices that will help them sound  richer, smarter, and ready for success.       These suggestions may include "relatives"  such as quarrel, boisterous, benign, exquisite, shoddy, philanthropic, destitute, hideous, scrumptious, etc.    
2. Vocabulary shift -   Your BB heading could read "Words are the Building Blocks of Success"  and then you can have pre-made/copied Lego blocks, building blocks, etc... for the kids to suggest "cool"  words they find within books.  Together all the students could build their word wall from books.  
3. Positive vs. Negative words - Another Vocabulary BB idea was suggested by a librarian from Ossning, NY:  Wanting to build vocabulary subtle differences in word meaning, Dawn divided her BB into 2 halves and labeled one side "positive words" and one side "Negative Words."  Her students built the wall with words innately having  subtle differences in connotations.  She said the kids "got it."  They had to critically view the word beyond just face value meaning.  
4. Citing Evidence from the text -  BB heading could read "Why Earth is a cool place: 100 places I'd like to see someday...."   and  whenever someone comes across something cool in their reading, they could "pin" it on your world map."  You could even have citation cards with the book and page number where the student read about this cool location, building, cave, mountain, sea, etc.  
5. Citing evidence - "Fiction or Fact" - True or False?   This bulletin board could have hanging cards posted.  Each card would contain a question a student had from a fiction book, that they had to investigate to ascertain whether this was fact or fiction.  This has often been called a "Wonder Wall"  when the purpose is to get kids to ask questions needing investigation.  
6. Close Reading -  "What did you learn today in a library book?"   Colorful index cards will provide your students an opportunity to share their knowledge based upon what was in print (rather than their opinion).  
7. Complex thought -  "Today I had to digest this difficult word meal:"  In the center of the board, you could place a captivating poem, with difficult words.  This doesn't have to be stodgyl, but could be Sid Fleischman's Headless Horseman Rides Tonight, even... Checkout the vocabulary in that book!   Or, a difficult quote needing digestion.   Challenge a few students to post a sentence that tripped them.  If they have to "stop in their reading" to digest something...then it deserves to be digested.  
8. 50%-50% mix -  With the CCSS claiming kids should read more non-fiction to build their "common knowledge"  or "prior knowledge"   you could have your students build their own "Knowledge is Power"  wall.   Once again using a template such as a power plug, lightning bolt (or something to denote power) you could have students write down great "facts" they found in their books.  
9. 50% - 50% Connection - Quotations worth sharing -  Challenge students to value ideas found in books by asking them to share meaningful lines found in either fiction or non-fiction texts.   Kids could denote whether this was in a fiction book or a non-fiction.  

Wonderopolis and the Common Core

Every now-and-again while walking on the Internet Superhighway, I stumble upon a site that is so great that I just want to give it a flash-mob-shout-out.    Wonderopolis was one of those stops this morning.   While investigating new summer sites for students, I chuckled over a few of these wonders and in surprise I said... "What a great Common Core tool!"  This simple site:

• models Inquiry phase 1... 'Wonder" 
• teaches kids to answer questions with fact 
• answers questions with evidence and authority 
• embeds vocabulary of the discipline in its answers...so that you can introduce that trick to your students--If they understand essential vocabulary to the "topic" then will likely understand the topic.  

If I were still and elementary librarian, I would display this on my Whiteboard and ask the kids to pick a wonder such as Wonder  of the day #984 (www.Wonderopolis.org) 
  Do Sheep Shrink When It Rains? 

  

 Here's a quick CCSS aligned library lesson: (pick an EQ...)
 EQ-  How can our non-fiction books help us to answer questions in life? 
 EQ:  How can I answer questions using facts, rather than just what people tell me?
 EQ:  Can you make an evidence-based claim to support an answer? 
 EQ:  How can keywords help you find information? 

• Display WONDEROPOLIS  on your whiteboard or LCD. 
• Have the students "pick" a wonder question.
• Have them work with a team to: 

1. find resources on the [topic] - identify keywords, search, use index, read for details
2. find "evidence for the answer" 
3. make an evidence based claim to support their answer to the "wonder" 
4. Re-group and compare answers -- play the WONDEROPOLIS  video at the end and see if it matches the "evidence based claim"  your students created.   

Now I've found one good thing my Verizon bill supports, besides my own connection to friends and family!  Thank you Verizon, Thinkfinity! http://wonderopolis.org/

A Baker's Dozen (or more) Questions for Research

The Common Core is hot on getting kids to think--to support, to validate, to wonder and more.  This should be the “Year of the Question”  since research is “the next big thing” for the Common Core.  So what’s the difference between an essential question and a guiding question?  What’s the big deal?  And, how can I spotlight the difference?   Here’s the scoop: 

An EQ should drive a research unit.  These EQ's should be "umbrella questions"  or "big idea" questions that  ask a question for investigation.      Ex.  How are countries globally interdependent?       Ex. What would your Patiot say to America today?       Ex.  How do themes in literature reflect real-life scenarios?       Ex.  How do I access, analyze and synthesize information and why should I care?
Guiding Question’s  These cause students to think and may not always have the same answer	Skill Questions These usually have the same answer and can be used to assess
Is all information good?
Is this information usable?	Where can I find good information?
Is this information biased?	How do I assess information to determine whether it’s good?
Is this information credible?	How do I assess information to see if it’s usable?
Is this information timely?	How do I tell if information is biased?
Is this information reliable?	How do I tell if information is credible?
Do I see any groupings in my information?	When do I want timely information?
What can I conclude from this information?	How do I assess reliable information?
Does this information match other information I   have received (supported? Vs. outlier? ) –
What information supports my conclusions?

Cook up a Common Core lesson with this easy recipe!

Recently during PD a teacher shared she was "doing"  the Common Core.  She was just treating it as a new checklist where she:  must "do" a close reading; must "do" an evidence based writing task; etc.  Teachers often think, "If we increase rigor in our current ELA novels, we'll be aligned."  

We wish the instructional paradigm shift in the CCS was so easy.  This Millennial generation needs relevance to care and to foster motivation. The rigor is to foster intelligence.  We like to tell students that these lessons will make them....smarter, richer, and more successful in life.   

The schematic below is one good little recipe to try, if you don't know where to start.  Please note the inclusion of a research task.  This is to embrace the Writing Standards 6,7,8,9, which say students should "research to build and present knowledge."  All too often, teachers stop at the close reading task, and do not follow the "read" up with a task to make it "relevant."   Why just read a primary source or "rich text," when this could be coupled with a "short or long term research" task which gives the students an opportunity to dig deeper, conclude, synthesize, form opinions linked to evidence, and other higher-level-thought tasks.  Why not try one of these Common Core pedagogy verbs, listed below, which were taken directly from the CCS...?

• Evaluate
• Comprehend
• Critique
• Analyze - think analytically
• Address a Question
• Solve a problem
• Conduct a short research projects
• Conduct sustained research projects
• Students generate questions
• Explore a topic
• Draw evidence from texts
• Support analysis
• Research and reflection
• Gather information from print and digital sources
• Assess the credibility and accuracy of sources 
• Integrate information avoiding plagiarism
• Produce and publish writing
• Interact and collaborate
• Debate
• Write arguments to support claims
• Formulate an argument
• Comprehend
• Prepare and participate effectively in conversations. 
• Build and express persuasively
• Express information and enhance understanding 

Couple a close read together with a research task to embrace information literacy for the Information Age.   After all...30% of the PARCC assessments will be a "simulated research task."  (Or, 25% of the Smarter Balance assessments....) 

The Common Core Does Not Say "Fetch"

This week I heard from librarians across America that they are discouraged by students showing up at their door with low-budget-research "packets."  We don't send kids down to the Home and Careers classroom and say, "I want to send my kids down to bake a cake, and here is the recipe I want them to use."  Or, we don't send our students to gym class and say, "I would like my kids to get physically fit and here are the exercises they should do."   So let's encourage teachers to plan with their information specialist.

If you are an administrator reading this blog, I would recommend a litmus test for "research" endeavors in your building.  If research is merely fact-finding, the project should be "repackaged" with the librarian using an Inquiry framework. 

• The Common Core calls for students to move beyond the compilation of factoids to build and share knowledge. 
• The new C3 SS Standards encourage students to operate within an "Arc of Inquiry."
• The new C3 SS Standards encourage lessons to launch with a "compelling question."  We often call that the Essential Question or "research question."  Something that has to be uncovered and discovered -- not "covered" or found on Google.

Here's a Crazy Talk video clip created by a secondary student who did his homework for a research project that was filled with "transfer." This exemplifies how you can turn information fact finding into knowledge-analysis and synthesis. The compelling curriculum content for this could be....Imperialism? Movers and Shakers? Biographies? Colonists?  

Question: Where would you Imperialist fall today, if he were living among us now? 
Or, 
EQ: What would the founding fathers, patriots, and other American hero from the past, say to America today?

This knowledge product displays an understanding of TR, who he was, his impact, and a compare and contrast analysis. It wasn't just a venture for facts. (Even though this is a couple of years old, it reflects synthesis -- what we want to see in our students.)  

This is one example of using technology to embrace higher level thought and analysis.  We have seen this used for animals at the elementary level talking to America about their habitat, difficulties, and challenges in life; for Explorers discussing how their adventures impacted the world; for Signers of the Declaration talking about why they chose to stand with independence; and at the HS level this has been used for Chemical discoveries and properties, animating inanimate elements advocating for reactions, fusions and transformation.  Biography units have also been transformed into advice for teenagers: What would your person say to teens today?  

The important Bloom's component is to move beyond fact-finding to synthesis.  Make your students "interpret" the facts. -- please.    Here are some important things to consider for synthesis:

• How can your students use these facts to "understand" the "moral of the story" -- the main point?
• How did these facts change [society]
• Do I see any patterns? 
• Do I see any similarities - can I group these facts somehow?
• Is there a cause and effect? 
• Which facts are the most important?  Group your facts from important to least important, and ask why.
• Which facts support the answer to our Essential [research] Question? 

This Teddy clip was originally posted in 2009, but is more relevant now that every educator is being challenged by the Common Core Standards to create engaging research units that require kids to think, analyze, quote, draw upon evidence, argue, synthesize, and create knowledge products that are proof that they have embraced the vocabulary of the discipline and seen the relevance of the content to their lives.

The applications are endless!                http://www.reallusion.com/crazytalk/ 

(It was in my AASL  eCollaborate course that librarians from the Virgin Islands to Virginia were lamenting low level research, despite the demands of the CCSS.  Instructional time is too valuable to waste on tasks that will not teach the students anything.) 

Adopting or Adapting CCSS Curriculum

As more and more "exemplar" curriculum is posted on state websites, we have to scrutinize whether all these "lessons" align with our best practice teaching skills. Let's face it: All best practice, is not really "good." However, many best practices that we embrace should serve as a litmus test to judge whether you want to ADOPT exemplar curriculum hook, line, and sinker.  Or, they can serve as a benchmark to decide whether you want to ADAPT that material for your use and embed some of your best practices. 

That is what I recommend with the NYS Exemplars that are being unveiled on the EngageNY.org website. Most of these modules are very good, but were created with every single book defined, even the "10" that should be used for "research."   Many schools do not have money to purchase the "research" books.  Therefore, adapt the modules and substitute your library's books. However correctly those defined books' Lexiles may be in a plan,  they should not be substituted for a research activity where students get to wonder,  explore, investigate, synthesize and create knowledge products.  

Most best library practices, do not define specific books for "research."   Therefore, if your teachers substitute a trip to your library, rather than using the defined, pre-chosen, correctly Lexiled books, they will be more likely to learn real research skills.  

 We librarians know that when students are given the opportunity to investigate, they will most likely read above the Lexile, below the Lexile, and more than originally intended.  

It is in the adaption of the modules, that educators  NEED to understand the shifts intimately.    Educators need to know how to embrace complex text, vocabulary focus, and more…to insure they are meeting the same goals when the modules are ‘adapted.’  

Tools such as the Empire State IFC are valuable as we adapt the modules or as teachers adapt their local lessons (“repackage”) for CCSS alignment.  It’s supposed to be more than repackaging, but in reality, that’s what is being done.  It is supposed to be re-designing lessons into deeper learning experiences. 

I’ll be doing another webinar for AASL in either February or March on Complex Text for the Librarian – It is in understanding complexity and the shifts that we can justify how the modules can be adapted with library integration – because… the modules in their current state do NOT send kids to the library.  

Empowering the Learner

Generation M, Generation Y, or the Millennial... whatever you call them, like to be in control.  If you design your lessons so that they have "control" of some part of the content, you are likely to get buy-in, motivation, and completion.  Without buy-in you get--apathy and create a bureaucratic box checker.   What America needs are kids that are motivated to learn.  

The movie Two Million Minutes, divulges the differences between American, Chinese and Indian high schools.   One poignant line in the movie shares that Indian students are motivated by poverty.  Their education is their ticket out of poverty. When I heard that line, I thought how true that is.  In America there are so many social programs that impoverished students still get to eat their potato chips while they play  with their XBox and they feel no pain.  Our students don't value the education they are receiving, even thought most places deliver them a first class experience.    


Well, if you can motivate, repackage content for collaboration, and energize this with information and technology, then you have a winning formula which will empower the learner.   This is not rocket science -- It's just good new pedagogy called Inquiry Based learning (or Problem Based Learning, Or, Challenged Based Learning, or Activity Based Learning....) 
Here are a few steps in the process:

1. Identify your content - Common Core aligned 
2. Come up with an Essential Question to make students ponder, care, and get concerned about the content. 
3. Brainstorm a knowledge product which will wrap up their knowledge (found from information, research and reading) in a presentation tool. 
4. Craft lessons within the unit that staircase complexity, embed rigorous reading requiring close examination, purposeful reading, and require a task 
5. Insure that you have embraced the "relevance" to the learner's life.  If they don't care, you've lost the learning battle. 
6. Spotlight vocabulary wherever and whenever you can - instill a love for words and the value they have to communicate creatively and effectively.
7. Embed technology wherever you can to engage the learner.  Require the technology to work with information (find information, present information, manipulate and synthesize information...) 
8. Give them the opportunity to present, contribute, argue, persuade, convince, quote, conclude, and more....all found in the Common Core.  

 Here are a few examples:

• What advice would you give Lincoln as a member of his cabinet? 
• If you were living as a slave during the Civil War, would you have tried to escape? What would you have done and where would you go?  
• Are you for or against genetic engineering?   
• Does the FDA take a lenient or too aggressive role in regulating pesticides in America? 
• Why does the sun deserve the golden globe award? 
• What is more important English or Mathematics? 
• Why will this content make you wiser, richer, happier or more successful? 
• How has the Bill of Rights protected you--even when you haven't realized it?  Why don't we offer the Bill of Rights to our Middle Eastern neighbors who have just upset their dictator?  

Heaven help us all, if we don't motivate this generation to achieve, succeed, learn and care.  

Information Trumps Technology in the Common Core

While educators all over America are trying to wrap their heads around the Common Core, there is one word that may come as a surprise: INFORMATION.   We've heard all about writing, text-based answers, text complexity, evidence from the text and more.  The one word I haven't heard touted much (outside the library world) is INFORMATION.  

If you search the ELA standards, you will find that the word information appears 243 times.  That can be discovered through a simple PDF binocular search on Internet Explorer. 





[Tagxedo created with the ELA CCSS Standards}

I hear some colleagues trying desperately trying to embed technology into their lessons as they believe that is the magic formula for fostering 21st Century Students. -- But, technology alone will lead them no where.   Technology without information is a bit useless.  We use technology to: find information, communicate information, evaluate information and amass information.  Likewise, information without technology is dull, archaic (dare I say), and difficult.  My question is, why are we not hearing teachers and educators stress the word information?  We see districts with a 5 year technology plan, they post bonds to upgrade technology across the district, but where is the 5 year information plan?   

Technology in the CCSS is only mentioned 24 times in the ELA CC Standards. Information is mentioned 243 times.  That's a ratio of 10:1.  Following that formula, we should hear people talk about information ten times more than they focus on technology?  Technology alone wont build College and Career Ready students.  Information and technology work together to prepare students for the future.    

So next time you ponder what to do with technology, consider the following essential questions:

• What information can my students communicate with technology? 
• What information can I embed into this project?  
• Can my students access information to synthesize, critically? 
• Are my students information literate as well as tech-savvy? 
• Am I asking my students to JUST find information? Or, have I asked them to do anything with that information?  Synthesize?  Create? Debate? Transform that information into a position, problem solve,  etc,?  

Please see my article in this month's School Library Journal for additional insight into this discovery.  
(If you liked this post, you may also like this previous post: click here)

Instant Relevance for the Common Core--Movie Clips Gold Mine!

We are teaching a visually dominate, transliterate generation that would rather "hear" information than read it.  That is why technology serves their hyper-connection needs to provide engagement in your curriculum content. BUT -- technology without a purpose is almost useless.   

I was excited to stumble upon this wonderful visual movie fodder for "hooking" our students into curriculum content.  What a gold mine of "purpose!"   With the Common Core requiring educators to infuse "relevance" into our curriculum, this site will help to connect the transliterate learner to the content.  Once they are hooked, then the teachers will have an easier time getting them to dig deeper, research, investigate, discuss  debate, research to support their position and more.  

I love this clip below from  The Emperors Club.  We watched this movie last week because it was filmed locally (at the Emma Willard School and  Caumsette State Park... for all you New Yorker's...).  When Professor Hundert poses an essential question at the beginning of the film, I thought, "How poignant for a biography unit!"   You could pose this same essential question as he does, and instantly infuse CC relevance into your unit.  

Thanks to this site, we don't have to carefully craft "fair use" clips from movies to inspire our students to think.   Wingclips.com has done this for us and even indexed them by topic.   Thank you! 

 
http://www.wingclips.com/movie-clips/the-emperors-club/how-will-history-remember-you?play=1

Essential Questions for Common Core biography units:

• What legacy did this person leave?   What legacy will you leave? 
• How would history have been impacted, if this person did not walk the earth? 
• Conquest without contribution is worthless.   What did your person contribute to the world that made the world a better place?  Or, for notoriety-- How did you person ruin the lives of his countrymen or negatively impact the world? 
•  How will reading this book and studying this person help you become wiser, smarter, happier, richer or more successful?  

Why Students Plagiarize...

It makes total sense  that students are cheating, when they have no motivation to learn the content.  If students don't care about what the assignment is, then why would they care about how they obtained the content in their assignment?    On the other hand, if we craft assignment with compelling content, which makes students think, investigate, and  synthesize-- they will want to draw original conclusions which are then supported from the text--drawn from evidence in the text--taken from what they have 'read closely,' and supported by concurrent conclusions they found in their research to support their point of view, opinion, and conclusion.  That my friend, is a mini summary of the Common Core ELA standards. 

Watch this new video posted from Tara Barbazone at the University of Bolton, UK.  This professor, teaching "Scholarship" investigated to understand and helped uncover and discover the roots of plagiarism: The lack of creativity, original thought, and more.  The kids admit it.  Until we motivate the students to think on their own, will they claim the thought of someone else, and plagiarize, because they are ashamed that they can't think themselves.   And, we thought they were just dishonest or lazy.  Shame on us. 

A properly prepared unit should by nature avoid plagiarism.  However, teacher themselves need instruction on how to repackage their units for higher level thought and student originality.  Heaven help us all.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twnmZ2tLgUo

7 Tools to Empower the Common Core

I love to shovel snow on a peaceful morning when there's only a few inches.  The silence is golden, the beauty is unsurpassed, and the finished job is rewarding.  However, when the wicked Nor'easter dumps a foot or more...I choose the snow-blower.
 
That's how I feel about tools for the Common Core.  In a perfect world, where you could pick all the content, the perfect students, and had all the time in the world, we might write with calligraphy pens, read captivating classics and saunter down the road of learning.  The truth is we have limited time, huge loads dumped on our plate, challenged learners, and students with little attention span.   That is why we need technology, power tools, power verbs, and information resources to infuse energy into the Common Core.  The Common Core without information, Inquiry, and technology is deadly. 
 

It is the information, technology, collaboration, Inquiry learning tasks, which will excite these pedagogy recommendations from the Common Core.  Try some of the tools below and see whether they make your demandind job more exciting:

TOOL	USE	CCSS Verb
www.VisualThesaurus.com   (fee based)	To understand vocabulary of the discipline (SHIFT) – We call these “cool words” that will make you sound smart Finding research searching synonyms Writing tool	Comprehend, analysis, explore, f Research Express
VocabGrabber  (also from Visual Thesaurus.com)	Upload a text and this tool will analyze it for SAT words, math words, science words, and a teacher can customize a word list (SHIFT) Differentiated instruction	Analyze, think critically, explore a topic,
www.Piktochart.com   (free)	‘Knowledge product” tool –alternative to ‘tired’ Powerpoint presentations.  Summarizing tool for data	Express persuasively Summarize Draw evidence from the text Support analysis Produce and publish writing Gather information Formulate an argument Visually represent data Enhance understanding
https://vialogues.com/    (	Show a movie clip and get ready for online, collaborative discussion!  AASL suggested best site for teaching and learning	analyze – think critically address a question solve a problem conduct research explore a topic Students generate questions Solve a problem
www.stixy.com	No fee, site for online comment. Post a photo and ask a compelling question.  Use this for assessment, lesson hook,	Interact and collaborate Generate questions Debate, brainstorm, virtual classroom discussion,
http://www.historypin.com/ Video explanation here	This great new site is a mashable of GoogleEarth and Pinterest.  Immediately I saw the value in connecting to real world problems, history to happenings and engagement.  A must try.	‘relevance” Engagement Explore a topic Document with evidence, Create and share knowledge
www.Scoopit.com	Online News Scooper – this tool aggregates ‘news’ from around the web, based upon keywords – Not only can this be used for ‘getting’ information, but this could be a way of assessing whether a student understands what is credible, accurate, reliable and supported (CARS)	Explore a topic Research Reflect Gather information from online sources Assess the credibility and accuracy Prepare to participate in conversations

 See the AASL Best WEbsites for teaching and learning for additional recommendations.  They have new and tried-and-true tools for your delivery.   Stand and deliver is dead.   Long live Information Infusion imbedded into technology in order to achieve, understand and succeed in a 21st Century environment.  

www.visualthesaurus.com