I recently had the honor of collaborating with Maite Nazario, an incredibly talented artist here at Chattahoochee High! Ms. Dorsey Sammataro sent her to me to help her think through how she might make her art piece on student immigrant experiences interactive so that the art would literally be able to tell the stories in a visual as well as auditory way. Maite wanted people viewing her art to be able to HEAR each student’s story of immigration in a way that would not obtrusive or outside of the art. After some brainstorming, I suggested she record the student stories with the StoryCorps app and then link the URL for each recording to a QR code. After I created a mockup and showed it to her, she agreed this was the direction to go so that anyone viewing the finished art piece could scan a QR code that would be embedded on each student’s visual representation and hear each individual story.
Maite immediately jumped into the technology integration piece of her art and taught herself how to use the app and even set up her own channel all by herself! I was so impressed by her enthusiasm and the way she embraced the StoryCorp app as well as her interviewing skills. I then taught her how to generate and link QR codes through virtual means by emailing her a screencast I created for her. Here is her story of how she approached her work:
You can see the outcome of this amazing piece of art and her creative talents in the A hall, and it will be installed in the main hallway later this week.
All you need is any free QR code scanner, and you can enjoy the visual aspect of her art while hearing the stories of each student, another layer of art she has richly and seamlessly embedded.
Thank you Maite for letting me work with you—this has by far been one of the coolest collaborative partnerships I’ve had as a teacher and librarian!
Like many of you, we’re always looking for ways to support students in their presearch processes. Finding starting points for topic selection is often difficult for students, especially if they have little or no experience in choosing a topic. In late March, we collaborated with Language Arts teacher Sean O’Connor and his freshmen classes to incorporate a blend of brainstorming/writing around topic ideas and a learning structure, Reading Frenzy, he learned earlier this year from Nancy Steineke at a workshop in New Orleans. Like us, Sean is a big fan of the work that both Nancy and Harvey Daniels do with inquiry, literacy, and ways to facilitate conversations for learning. Below is a video interview with Sean about the processes I have outlined below:
Sean kicked off their inquiry with having students write around motifs they had studied throughout their novel unit of To Kill a Mockingbird. Students used our large blue post-it notes to brainstorm historical and current topics related to a motif of interest; they then moved about and posed questions and feedback to their peers using smaller post-it notes.
This activity was the springboard to the reading frenzy, a learning structure that is flexible and gives students opportunities to skim, scan, and discuss multiple texts in a set time period. After we looked at the ideas students generated from the brainstorming/write-around activity, I pulled a wide range of articles related to their topics of interest from the web as well as our databases (Academic Search Complete, MAS Ultra Student Edition, various Gale databases) trying to include a variety of reading levels, publications/information sources, and perspectives on the issues and events.
Students passed around the articles and read them; they also discussed what they were reading with a neighboring buddy as something of interest got their attention. As students began thinking about more specific topic ideas as they read the article, they requested additional articles, and I was able for the most part to either produce those on the demand to go or to provide them the following day in class for follow-up. Other students who read an article that resonated with them requested I print additional copies, and I was more than happy to do this. After the first class, I decided to make article categories to make it easier for the students to go directly to piles of articles of interest to them.
We love these structures because they support students who already have a topic idea as well as those who might be a little less certain about a topic interest. It can also introduce new topics or more nuanced aspects of a topic to students. This investment of time ensured students enhanced their understandings of the novel’s motifs and connections of that motif to contemporary as well as historical events. This process also reinforced our efforts this year to really focus on helping teachers and students find ways to narrow or “crop” topic so that they can hopefully engage in deeper and more thoughtful inquiry. We feel this entry point is a particularly effective way to scaffold students who may have little research experience OR more experience at “reporting” vs. researching (see the blog of my colleagues at Letting Go for more on this idea). These activities prepared students to move forward strategically into presearch and to find articles on their own. They have now narrowed and refined their topic and are composing their research design plans to Sean. We are looking forward to seeing where they go from here with their research after our spring break as well as using the reading frenzy strategy with other classes!
Last Friday was an especially exciting day for all of us here in the NHS Learning Studio as we partnered with Physics teacher Joe Pepitone to create learning opportunities for inquiry and student exploration of circuits. Below, Joe explains the seeds of this collaboration, reflections on the lab activities, and the impact of a team effort to create “centers” and “extension” circuit activities to extend and challenge the principles behind the primary circuit lab. I encourage you to take the time to listen to Joe’s in-depth reflections on processes and insights from our experiences.
Overview of Our Day of Fun and Learning with Circuits
Joe began by explaining the paper circuit lab that was the starting point for students and the learning activity to demonstrate learning targets.
Students then self-formed groups to do the first lab where the goal was to create a paper circuit that would result in the LED bulb lighting up.
Once they had demonstrated they had created a working paper circuit with a working light bulb, students could then move through our two extension and enrichment centers facilitated by LSTC Logan Malm (a former science teacher) and Jennifer Lund (my fellow librarian). Logan worked with students using the MakeyMakey kits while Jennifer helped students work with the squishy circuits (we had purchased our materials for these last year as part of our maker activities for Teen Tech Week 2014). These “centers” were designed to provide students additional hands-on opportunities to further their exploration of circuits; these were both a big hit with students, and many were interested in doing more labs using these materials and visiting the media center to utilize them for fun. We loved hearing them think aloud and problem solve together; many of them did not want to leave when the bell rang!
We were even joined by several of our assistant principals and fellow science teachers—I think it was very powerful for our students to see adults learning side by side with them.
We are deeply appreciative to Joe as well as Logan for this kind of collaborative experience that ultimately benefited our students and elevated learning to a new level; as Joe reflected in the video earlier, having other partners to help facilitate an activity like this enables him as a teacher to meet students at points of need and for instruction to be differentiated. These partnerships, fluidity in expertise and novice, co-learning, and energy are the very kinds of learning experiences Jen and I have envisioned for our library learning studio. To see it blossom and to be part of the vision become reality is joyful and exciting. We cannot wait to see what new partnerships might be inspired with other faculty and community members by this collaborative work!
