Personalized Learning in a 1:1 Classroom: A Tour Through My Inbox

I know there is a lot of buzz about personalized learning these days. Lots of it comes at a cost where some service will assess your students and provide just-in-time learning. It is tempting to purchase one of those and feel comfortable that the curriculum is being covered at a pace that is right for each student. Although I do use many tools and apps,  that's really not what personalized learning looks like in my 1:1 language arts classroom.

So, what does it look like?

I don't think I can answer that question in a short post. However, I believe that a little tour through my email inbox may provide a glimpse. It hit me last night when I opened my school email.

Literacy= communication, and I do use email as one tool for communicating with my students. 

We read. We write. We edit.  We discuss. We think. We reflect. We create. Why would this look identical in a group of unique individuals?

What follows represents a sample from my current inbox. These are waiting for my reply, feedback or next steps. I have not chosen anything on purpose. I'm just sharing the process. This represents the ongoing learning conversation between my students and me. 

A 5th grader emails to tell me what salary he would like for the documentarian job. He also suggests two new jobs.

A 5th grader shares his updated narrative writing with me. Below is a short snippet of  an 8 page story

Another  5th grade narrative

a 4th grader shares a link to the book quiz he wrote on Goodreads

A 4th grader wrote an epilogue to Wonderstruck using Book Creator

5th grade character trading card

4th grade "visual vocab"

This conversation and creation, this journey, is why I love my 1:1 iPad classroom. 

Writing a Class Mission Statement

Exciting Update: 2016

The course I have created is up and ready!

Check it out here!
If you just want the downloadable materials, they're here (only $2.99!!)

Here is the course trailer:
Mission Possible! How and Why to Create Class Mission Statements from amplifiEDucation on Vimeo.

After working through these ideas and lessons with my own students and other teachers for many years, I am a true believer in the power of helping students take ownership of their behavior and learning through exploring goal-setting, values and mission statements. I learned so much more from authoring this course, and I hope it will be a wonderful addition to your classroom community and culture.

Here is the original post I wrote (in 2010), when I was first beginning to learn about this!

In thinking about the digital portfolios, I have decided that a good place to begin is by having the students in 5th grade and 8th grade write personal mission statements. Since hearing Stephen Covey and his son, Sean Covey, speak about The Leader in Me, a program designed to teach leadership skills to young students, I have had a revived interest in the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (and teens and happy kids...they're all the same habits).

Habit #2 "Begin with the end in mind" is the habit that inspired the personal mission statement. This is the hardest habit for me, personally, so maybe I'm projecting, but I think that for a lot of students it is also hard to think of the future. They may not understand how what they are doing in 5th grade or 8th grade is part of the foundation for who they will become.

I like the idea of writing a personal mission statement as a focus for the portfolio because the portfolio is about reflective growth as a learner. What better way to begin... than with the end in mind. Why are you in school? What is your purpose? What are your goals?

I see the personal mission statement as being more general, more direct, than a list of learning goals or, as in the case of a teacher's portfolio, a teaching philosophy. It will not necessarily take the place of these; both could be included.

In trying to craft a lesson on writing a personal mission statement I looked at lots of tools, examples and ideas. This is what I have come up with for 5th grade.

As an introduction to the concept, we will read together our school's mission statement.

We will view this video created by a 4th grade class to illustrate their vision for the year.

Next, we will use wallwisher to collaboratively brainstorm a class mission statement. Students will answer these 3 questions:
-Why are you here?
-What do you most want to learn this year?
-How will we accomplish our goals?
Students will then organize their answers into categories and use each category to create a sentence or two for the mission statement.
That will probably be enough for one day. I see this exercise as a stepping-stone on the path to writing a personal mission statement. I am going to work with 5th grade this afternoon, and I will share results.

The Wordle Meme

I've been double tagged for the wordle meme by Silvia Tolisano and Terry Shay. 

1. Create a wordle from your blog's RSS feed. 

2. Blog it and describe your reaction. Any surprises?

3. Tag others to do the same. 

4. Link back here and to where you were first tagged. 

I tried changing my settings, as described by Ann Oro in order to access more posts in my wordle, but the wordle was the same before and after changing settings. It draws from my most recent posts only.  According to Silvia, that is okay because you can do wordles over time and document your "Zeitgeist" or spirit of the times. In fact, she has added to the meme:

5. Create different Wordles of your blog's RSS over a period of time. Do it once a month for the next year. 

Without further ado, here is my blog's wordle, my Zeitgeist for Fall 2008-

What do I see? Students, front and center, loud and clear. Yup! 

I don't like the fact that SCHOOL figures more prominently than LEARNING. 

Think, teachers, kids, groups, technology, project, create- no surprises there. 

Election, survey, political, issues- these words help illustrate the spirit of the times this fall.

Silvia also adds a #6. Share other uses (at least one) you have found for wordle (for your students or personally) to your blog post. 

I've been working on an application, and I decided to wordle a few of my answers to the questions. I think it is interesting to see what words you might be overusing in written proposals, grants, etc. and to make sure that the words that figure most prominently are representative of the ideas you are trying to express. This could be used in the teaching of writing as well, as a fun, new way to "see" your writing.

The hardest part of the memes for me is the tagging. If I tag you, I hope you want to be tagged. If I don't tag you and you DO want to be tagged, please consider yourself tagged!

Tagging--

Ken Allan

Clay Burell

Angela Stockman