Wk#2/Blog#4 Free Choice - Tony Wagner

This week, I had the privilege to attend a lecture by noted education expert Tony Wagner. Wagner has written several books; his latest is called The Global Achievement Gap. He is a first rate speaker and recently was named the first Innovation Education Fellow at the Technology & Entrepreneurship Center at Harvard (http://www.tonywagner.com/). My school sponsored the lecture and I was asked to videotape it (I own a professional video camera). Of course, Wagner spoke about everything that is taught in the EMDT program at Full Sail and in fact after the lecture, when I had him sign my book, I mentioned the program and he said he had heard of it.

Anyway, I've embedded the lecture and Q&A session that I edited and uploaded to Vimeo this weekend for your viewing pleasure. There are a lot of pieces to his talk that I liked but one of the most important I liked was that he gave a REAL definition for what critical thinking really is. I think this term is used way to much and most educators have no idea what they really mean when they use it. Until we, as educators, are able to really define what it means, we won't be able to re-define our teaching to enable this important skill.

One of the other pieces that I think relates directly to how this program is the notion of developing an online portfolio. Wagner says that the development of a digital portfolio for all students, teachers and administrators will be an important element. I believe this is something important to consider. At Whitby, I have helped the students create an iWeb this past year that is a Developmental Workbook required by IB for the middle school program, but in essence begins to help students create a sustained place to document their work over the course of their life as a student. And, the AR site I did last year serves as a cornerstone for my digital portfolio. No only did I put all of my AR work there, but I also uploaded all of the projects from each class.

Wagner said that Tufts University asked students to submit YouTube videos last year as part of their admission requirement and they were astounded at the creativity shown by the applicants. Helping our students create a positive digital footprint AND show them how to make a portfolio of this work will be something I will work on as an educator. And, of course, I will document this effort for MY digital portfolio!

Wk#2/Blog#1 Comments to Mr. Peglow

EDM613 Wk2, post 4: Free Write - ARP Pgph 2
The following was the opening of my cycle 1 plan and also is intended to be my second paragraph for my final paper for the Full Sail EMDT ARP. I welcome any and all comments and critiques:

There are many poignant opinions about high-stakes testing and whether or not it has done more harm than good for the students who are subjected to these testing situations. But, no matter what the opinions are, for teachers and students in today’s educational system, standardized and quantitative testing are a reality that cannot be ignored, circumvented, or avoided. For this reason the research conducted in this project focuses on two areas of concern in assessment of state writing tests. The first area of concern is in the shortcomings of the many students at the Middle School level who are failing to achieve a proficient score on state writing tests. "Why are our students scoring so poorly? Certainly there are a number of factors out of our immediate control (e.g., second language issues, poverty, lack of parental involvement). Dwelling on these issues, however, is counterproductive and a waste of time and energy. We are better served by focusing on what we can control—namely, our teaching" (Gallagher, 2003, p. 26).
This ARP will investigated the root causes of students performing at basic or below basic writing proficiencies at the middle school level and what teaching practices could be utilized to enhance student writing skills, motivation, and interest. "Writing is an activity that is as much emotional as cognitive. Affective factors influence all phases of the writing process. A strong need exists for researchers and educators to explore the affective factors that contribute to students' writing performance. Motivation, with its conspicuous influences, is important among those affective factors" (Lam & Law, 2007).
Secondly this ARP investigated those students who were capable of providing proficient standardized responses in response to writing prompts, but consistently fall short in achieving the advanced writing scores.

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Gallagher, K. (2003). Righting our writing wrongs: Ten concerns about writing instruction. California English, 8(5), 26-28. Retrieved from Education Research Complete database.

Lam, S., & Law, Y. (2007). The roles of instructional practices and motivation in writing performance. Journal of Experimental Education, 75(2), 145-164. Retrieved from ERIC database.

Posted by mrpeglow at 5:41 PM

1 comments:
lesliegperry said...
Colleges have noted that students are coming to their schools with very poor writing skills so looking at this issue is a good ARP. I like your first paragraph in setting up why you chose to do this ARP and what you will focus on. However, I would suggest you look carefully at the 2nd paragraph. There are a few grammatical errors ("This ARP investigated - remove "will"). But I got lost in the description especially the multiple uses of the word "affective." I think you need to find another word for some of these instances. I also think you could describe more specifically about what you see in the classroom and what you hope to change in Cycle 1. Perhaps you are doing this later in your paper but as a person new to this project, I got lost in this 2nd paragraph.
April 10, 2011 7:28 PM