Tag Archives: teaching Strategies

February 4, 2012 · 12:35 pm

Technology in Education: The Digital STEM Fair

You’ve been to a science fair, right?  Tri-fold boards, volcanoes and blue ribbons.  This month, my colleagues and I shepherded the “STEM Fair” into existence.  The STEM Fair is a showcase for any Science, Technology, Engineering or Math project our students produced over the course of a month.  My school produced forty to fifty blog posts, hundreds of digital pictures, a dozen two minute videos, thirty presentations and about ten individual physical showcases.  I have a room filled with Japanese art-chemistry, rocket cars, rockets of various propulsion methods, a small robot, a Lego-Branded robot, paper gliders, a seesaw and more.  How can a teacher show off his students work to parents, grandparents, etc who may not be able to attend the event physically?

The Digital STEM Fair.

I have I ever told you this is my other…other….other blog?  I have a handle at Lumberjocks, I blog here and I blog at school.  Well, my students blog.  I facilitate the school’s Website Committee.  Last year, I revamped the committee’s operation – launching a WordPress-powered blog.  This year, I opened the site to the various other parts of school – student newspaper, various academic classes and clubs.  This week, I will use this student-centered, student-owned tool to create a digital gateway into the Math/Sci department at my school.

The Plan:

A splash page which directs parents to the different classes.  The classes will link to STEM Project Proposals, Updates & Final Posts.  All of this can be sorted by a strong tagging system.  WordPress also makes certain posts “sticky” – meaning they always lead the blog’s front page.  I’d like to “farm” this work out to my students, but most likely I’ll need to do this, as I have administrator access.

Next, I’ll have the students upload their videos to a web-hosting service and embed those videos into the posts itself.  I use Youtube as a video host, so I need to turn of the “suggested video” option.  If a “suggested video” happens to be controversial, we don’t want people thinking it’s the school’s issue.

Lastly, my students will create a inclusive slideshow of the work they did, embedding this into the splash page.

Our school does have some rules which I should be aware of -

1. Each kid’s parents/guardian signs a media release.

2. Only use first names.

3. Any video is unsearchable & password protected.  WordPress can password protect individual posts and many sites like Youtube have an unlisted option.

4.  Don’t put anything up which shows the school in a bad light…

5.  Last but not least, turn comments off.

I like these rules – if you blog about children, take them into account.  Teacher Tom only posts pictures of kids hands and keeps the screen squiggly.  Other bloggers do the same.  I tend to only take shots of the finished products. Unlike my examples, the student blog has a kid-driven focus – its intent is to show our students and their competence.  I try to keep that in mind as I put student work “out there”.

Make it safe & keep the rubber side down.

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January 26, 2012 · 1:12 pm

Curriculum Archive: Spring 2012

In the Spring of 2012, I began my third year as a classroom teacher.  I planned on teaching the courses below.  It didn’t happen.  Instead of a woodshop/technology resource, I became a project-oriented classroom teacher.  I taught 6th grade Math/Science & MS/9th Grade Math/Science and took part in two environmental education program periods.  The pace (four classes, no planning periods, co-teaching nearly everything) forced me to create or find flexible curriculum, taught me the value of three week (half a quarter) units and helped me become a stronger teacher.

The breakdown of what I wanted to teach after the jump.

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January 2, 2012 · 10:55 am

Course Curriculum: Computer Applications:CAD

After my quick reflections on the Tea Box project and my computer science course, I’d like to take a spin over to my most successful, challenging and rewarding class(es) this semester.  I had the opportunity to teach 2 CAD courses with a great, energetic group of young men (and one woman).  As the year progressed my classes split into three distinct groups – a developmentally young (think elementary-school-age brains) group, a progressing (middle-school-age brains) and a developmentally-ready (high school or middle school) group.

My CAD course description:

In this course, students will create and build physical and digital representations of the world around them. Piaget’s four stages of cognitive development will frame the instruction to the appropriate cognitive developmental level for each student. Computer Assisted Design is the use of computers and specialized software to create digital objects; be they animations, skyscrapers or the interiors of engines. Students will use Google Sketch Up 8 to re-create and re-imagine the world around them, beginning with a floor-plan of their bedroom and ending with a self-directed project.

What made this course successful?  My answer after the jump.

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December 28, 2011 · 11:44 pm

Course Curriculum: Computer Science & Electronics

The Fall 2011 semester came to an end last week.   I’m taking stock of what-used-to-be (my previous semesters classes) and re-tooling, re-gearing and re-searching my way into new course-load.

I’d like to start with my Computer Science & Electronics course.  I described this course as:

This course introduces computer programming to students with little or no prior programming or technology experience. Students will use Alice, 3D graphical computer language, to introduce basic computer science theory. Topics to be covered include program design and problem solving, Boolean operators, logic statements, loops and flowcharts. Unlike other languages, Alice lends itself to an exploration of thought, rather than an exercise in coding or mathematical ability. If time allows, the Python language will also be explored.  In the electronics portion, students will explore basic electronic concepts of resistance, current and voltage.  Students will learn to build, manipulate and understand basic circuits & operate the tools necessary to create these circuits.  Students will identify basic parts, such as resistors, switches, wires and capacitors.

So, let’s go over the class and see how I did and what I will do better in the future.

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December 9, 2011 · 12:11 am

Toy Making Jigs

My son has very strong feelings about woodworking show hosts.  “Herm” (Norm) is his favorite – he’s in love with power tools.  Me?  I prefer St. Roy.

In this episode, St. Roy discussed and built several toys from 18th century America.  I was especially fascinated by the jig he uses to create small parts.  I saw an opportunity to move the jig into the classroom, especially as I wanted to build small wooden sculptures made from patterns created in Google Sketch Up.  I can’t say much about the project yet – somethings work, somethings don’t.  It’s quickly running away from what I originally envisioned.  Not in a bad way either – just different.  The students start by making geometric patterns with blocks and polygons.  Kind of like this:

Then the students turn these geometric patterns into a CAD rendition.  I’ve set up the pattern blocks in a CAD file.

Either way, the jig is up – or rather, the jig works beautifully well.

You can see the entirety of the jig here.  I use the jig upside-down on tables.  The crossbar usually sits in a vise as in St. Roy’s show.  The students are able to cut safely and securely with a coping saw.  I’m going to get a lot of mileage out of these jigs.

I hope to post more as the project develops over the next two weeks.  I’m also working on a semester review of the technology classes.

Make it safe & keep the rubber side down this weekend.

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September 22, 2011 · 10:12 am

Physics Carriages

In my MWF fourth period class, my students have been discovering and elaborating on the scientific method. I chose cars & ramps (aka pinewood derby car) as an opening project.  We spent two weeks learning the different parts of the scientific method and how to measure our results.  We create reports (I’m on my fourth week of school and the boys have created at least two science reports a week).  My lessons look something like this:

Intro:  Pose a Question to Students.  What type of Hot Wheels cars goes the farthest?  How would we measure that?  How do we tell other people our results?

Activity One:  Populate The Science Report.  Students create a hypothesis, decide on and gather materials, work out a procedure and then get to..

Activity Two:  Experiment.  After two weeks of experiments with toy cars, wooden contraptions and old derby cars, I led the students in building “Physic Carriages”.  I wanted something cheap, something make-able by ten and eleven year-olds within thirty minutes and something modifiable.  Here’s a pictorial of the build & results.

The physics carriage is made from paint sticks as a chassis, machine nuts as axle bushings, small steel rod for axles and CDs and cardboard for wheels.  Hot glue held everything together and I used medium-sized bolt cutters to cut the axles. 

Half Assembled Physics Carriage

The students glue two nuts onto the paint sticks.  They also cut small squares to glue onto that big hole in the CD wheels.  A little glue and assembly…

Here’s a complete carriage with a few modifications. We race them on tracks made of hardboard and 1/4 inch thick strips glued on to stiffen them up.  I made a number of these little tracks in 1 ft, 2 ft, 3ft and 4 ft lengths.

Activity 3: Reflections & Beyond.  Here, the students discuss their results and try to answer the question, “What Happens Next”?  We blog if we have time.  Science reports get turned in and we go home.

Notes:  Why did I set the lessons up like this?  First, my school does its best to provide project based learning opportunities to its students.  Well, hell-fire and brimstone, if building and launching a car ain’t a project then I don’t know what is.  Second, I find the 3 activity, mostly hands-on offers me an enormous amount of flexibility – I can move between student groups, I can impede progress to prove a point (I booby-trap projects in order to illustrate principles) and I can revise, reflect and instruct as needed.  Lastly, the materials become the planning instead of long chunks of texts, worksheets or lists of directions.

Tell me what you think -

– make it same & keep the rubber side down.

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August 27, 2011 · 11:36 pm

The Google Sketch Up Lab

This year, I’ve been working closely with another colleague to create, a project-based CAD course.  When I was presented with the challenge, I dove in head first.

This week I have been presenting various perspective/drawing challenges to my students in an effort to assess their current capabilities.  I’ve been enjoying a curriculum challenge, and after two days, I am pleased by the success and interest posed by my students.  The room has been split into three themed stations: a perspective/assessment area, a guided-step project area and a digital manipulative lab.

The assessment area has produced some fascinating results.  When confronted with three solids placed as so and asked to draw a different orientations -

some students returned this,

and others struggled to grasp this concept.

Students also built maps of the Math/Sci room.  I think I’ll use this one as an official planner.

Next up, the students will measure the length of the sides and create a floor-plan in Google Sketch Up.  I will post some results when they happen!

As for “digital manipulative”, I created a rudimentary block set in Google Sketch Up.  The students move the shapes to match a block sculpture. I’ve only created puzzles which explore the move and rotate function in Sketch Up, but I expect more labs (I’ll probably make these challenges once or twice a week) which explore other functions.  Here’s the Sketch Up file. Recreate this object with the blocks provided.  You should only use the Move and Rotate tools. My fastest student moved  from loading the file to instructions to completion in fifteen minutes. It took other students an hour and half.  How did you do?

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April 22, 2011 · 10:08 am

Weather Stations, Web 2.0 Tools and John Merrow

This week, my colleague shanghaied one of my chalkboards for a weather station.  While the chalkboard & wind unit may not seem like much,

The hand-held reader really catches a teacher’s eye.

This type of scientific information begs to be utilized in the classroom.  Daily, nay, hourly temperatures can be recorded and used to find the mean temp, daily temp, range…mode, slope, points on a graph, equations for the daily rise in the temperature, regression lines, etc.  Science classes can study weather patterns, climate change or stasis, the water cycle.  A physics classroom can turn wind speed readings into kilowatt-hours.  Those figures can be amended into proposals for the installation of a wind turbine.

Wait…that’s my collegue put that device up there.

An English teacher can illuminate the difference between lab reports, short stories and literary analysis.  The data gathered in science class, analyzed in Math, interpreted and presented in English, can finally be acted upon in Social Studies.  In fact, this little weather station can become the technological center-point of a curriculum which could, theoretically be scaled between schools all over right?  A revolution? Continue reading →

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April 19, 2011 · 8:53 pm

Teacher Tip: Use Pilot Holes for Hammering!

When installing finishing brads and nails, I usually chuck the nail into the bit and punch a hole through the lumber.  This results in a minimal hole (the length of the nail minus the depth of my drill’s chuck jaws) which prevents most splitting.

I recently “discovered” a secret – the deeper the pilot hole for my seven-year olds (2nd grade) the more successful the hammering.  Look at that kid go!  One handed, 7 oz claw hammer.

He hammered those nails flush.  He could feel the excellence in his small act, see the effect in the larger project, and you can sense his excitement getting to use the hammer.

I only wish had a Archimedes drill in the shop somewhere.  Then I wouldn’t be in the picture.

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April 15, 2011 · 3:52 pm

A Quick Reminder – Keep Safe Today

This article from Makezine.com hit my inbox recently.  Woodshop, machine shop, handsaws and chisels can all cause injury and at times, death.  Constant vigilance and evaluation of our skills is the only way to reduce the our chances, and our students chances, of injury.  Take a moment today to evaluate your own practices and routines and maybe talk with a colleague to get a fresh pair of eyes on the situation.  Don’t settle.

Make it safe – When you create, create in a way which will keep your toes, fingers, golden locks and good looks intact.

Keep the rubber side down – The last words my father and I say to each other (well, sometimes) before we hit the road before a motorcycle ride.  Keep yourself within your “bounds”, meaning working within your current skill limits.  Ride below your performance envelope, so when it hits the fan, you have enough in the reserve to ride it out.

Make it safe & keep the rubber side down.

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