Recently I have moved from experimenting with Docappender and Goobrics to using them. These are tools that I use in Google Apps for Education to quickly record observations into separate student files and assess and give feedback to my students on their work.
Like everything, there are stages that I have to go through before I can put something into practice.
Stage One-The Commercial
Stage Two-Reading the Instruction Manual
Stage Three-Unpacking the box
Stage Four-Attempting assembly
Stage Five-Playing with the toys while the children are asleep
Stage Six-Telling a Friend
Stage Seven-Helping a Friend
Stage Eight-Finding every use possible for this new toy!
The first four stages are really all one. Not all occurring in the sequence listed all the time. Sometimes I unpack the box of tools long before reading any instructions. This is often a big mistake for me, because the instructions will often help me find uses for the product (stage 8).
Stages five/six are also more one phase – the fun phase where it is not really productive yet, but becoming more familiar. Stage Six is the consolidation phase. Good pedagogy tells us that if someone can explain it, then the likely have a deeper understanding of it. Although a little out of order, if I explain it to someone who I consider “a safe person” then I am more likely to share the excitement.
I am using Docappender to keep anecdotal comments about student inquiries in science and collaboration and use of class time in my math classes. I think this will help give me a much more accurate set of Learning Skills for the final report card.
My next goal is to
1. Share the file with my students once I have a habit of using it,
2. Have them respond digitally by making comments to my entries and
3. Conference with them face to face.
Next year is too late to start, but not too late to hit the ground running.
More to follow …
Thank you to guest blogger Deacon Raymond Girard, teacher at UCC. He can be found on twitter @MrGatUCC
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