Snapshot
Critical Thinking, Communication, Collaboration, and Creativity.
October 2016 Presentation:
According to Daniel Pink in his book Drive we are motivated by autonomy, mastery, and purpose. In his book A Whole New Mind: Why Right-brainers Will Rule the Future he argues that it is essential for 21st century students to be creative thinkers. Students need authentic opportunities to develop the “4 C’s” which include critical thinking, communication, collaboration, and creativity. I believe lack of opportunities for students to create may contribute to disengagement and reduced intrinsic motivation. This past year I worked as a district Technology Integration Specialist with K-6 students in four elementary schools. I consistently noticed students were reluctant to create original projects and make presentations. Another concern was during Skype Classroom sessions students were hesitant to ask and answer questions. I will address this problem by collaborating with K-6 teachers to design lessons using The Inquiry Design Model. These lessons will include compelling questions, staging the questions, supporting questions, formative tasks, featured sources, summative performance tasks, and taking informed action. The Question Formulation Technique along with Google Cardboards will be used to stage the question and increase student engagement.
Students will design presentations to showcase work products for the summative performance tasks. Students will have the opportunity to record themselves using Soloshot to practice presentation skills prior to making public presentations. Additionally, students will take part in Skype Classroom sessions where students will engage in appropriate conversations with global participants.