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Before I wrap up my Free Inquiry posts with a reflection of learning over the semester, I wanted to share a post showing my progress. I have attached a youtube video, as you can see, to show what I focused on when learning ASL. I did not film every time I was practicing, but I had enough content to put together a bit of a montage. You will see that I am similar to a cat, as I love sitting on the floor and absorbing the sunny spots in my home.
Enjoy watching me learn!
Reflecting on the term. This weeks class was a focus on going back and reflecting on all that we have gone over throughout this semester. Using sketchnoting, we were given sticky notes to brainstorm how we would like to lay out our reflection, and then were to bring it to life afterwards. My take was to create a maze of the layout of our classes to show everything that we have learned. It is definitely busy, but I really like how it turned out. Looking at all the sketches, I am able to recall parts of the lesson. My design has the introduction of blog posts in the bottom right, to the discussion of the cell phone ban in classes in the top left, along with everything else we have learned in between.
This is a video on what sketchnoting is as a reference to what I have created.
Whether students have read this book before or have never heard of the Gruffalo, this is a lesson that is designed to keep students engaged during its entirety.
Teachers, use your discretion with your class in what methods would fit the students best. Attached is an image bank from the picture book: ‘The Gruffalo’ by Julia Donaldson and Axel Sheffler.
Print out the images and cut them so that they are all individual pictures. You may do this for each group that will be working together. I recommend putting students into groups of 2-4.
Once students have the images in front of them. The objection will be explained. All groups must organize their images into a timeline, explaining how they believe the story runs its course. Whether they are true to the original story or not will not matter. When all groups are finished, they will gallery walk around the class, looking at other students timelines. Each group will then explain their reasoning behind the timeline that they created.
Students will be assessed on the making of their timeline; not how accurate it is to the original, but if they have a clear Beginning, Middle, and End.
Students may also do a written portion, describing their storyline in their own words. Here, teachers may assess spelling, grammar, and structure.
If students are ELL students, or students that may have an IEP, then the assessment of creating the physical timeline maybe the assessment itself.
Again, the objection is for students to create their own story from the images provided.
After all groups have presented in their own form, the class will read the true storyline of the book: ‘The Gruffalo’.
Online book link: https://online.flipbuilder.com/rslc/tadp/
Attached are the images that are used in this lesson.
This activity surrounds itself on the creation of a main character. When discussing story timelines, it is important to include all aspects of the story. Building from the basics, creating your main character is a great first step.
Students will pick their character from the three provided and give them a name, age, and provide some characteristics about them.
Ex: This is Mabel. She is 9. Mabel likes to have her hair in a ponytail because she loves playing sports like soccer, baseball and tennis.
These points can be provided verbally, written, or visually (including drawings around their character to describe them).
Once students finish building their character, they will then be able to start their story timeline of what ‘A Day in the Life’ of their character looks like.
Assessment is done through verbal, written, or visual based work depending on teacher’s decision for student.
Below are the characters that students may choose from. These characters were created by the Autism Parenting Magazine.
This activity is a purely tactile activity that engages students in a 3D creation of a story timeline.
A book will be chosen for this activity by the teacher… any book out there. The lesson will be surrounded by the book.
The teacher will pick small scriptures from the book that they believe to have good imagery. Those scriptures will be printed out onto little slips of paper for students to read off.
Students will be put into groups up to 3.
After groups are organized, each one will be given the scripture slip. Using materials, such as the loose parts kit, that is demonstrated in the images provided. Students will create the scene out of the given blocks. This may also be done with any sort of materials from the classroom (blocks, toys, office supplies, paper etc.).
Once the scene has been created. Each group will pair with another and share what they have created.
Assessment will be on their creativity in their creation and their collaboration in their efforts.
After sharing amongst everyone, the teacher will read the original chosen story to the class.
This is a chance for students to learn and be in nature simultaneously!
Choosing a route nearby, the class will head out on a nature walk all together. Before doing so the teacher will explain the objection of the walk. Prompts will be given throughout the walk.
The prompts will explain what students should be looking for from objects found along their walk. The objects cannot be broken off any living organisms (trees, flowers, grass, etc.), and may not be bigger than students’ hands. They are carrying everything with them, which means if it is too heavy to carry, then it is not the object for them.
Prompts:
“Can you spot something that you are able to give a name to right away?” (a rock, stick, leaf etc.)
“Can you see something that your new friend is intrigued to? A tool for them, something to play with, maybe something that is related to them?”
“Think about your new friend. What do they enjoy doing? Where do they like to be when they want to relax? Do they have friends they like hanging out with? Is there anything that they really don’t like?”
“Pick one more thing that you think goes along with you are your new friend.”
Forming a circle, the students will individually share who they have found on the walk. Students are allowed to pass their turn if not feeling up for it.
After students walk back to class with their objects that are being brought to life, students will be given a piece of paper to draw a scene of their new friend’s life.
Below the picture students will write a sentence explaining what is going on in the scene.
Assessment will be done through the sharing of who their new friend is orally, written and by illustration.
=> Later lesson potential could be the creation of a story. Students will create 3-5 scenes within a story timeline, showcasing their found friend as their main character.
Students may do this in illustration form, written form, or using building blocks from the classroom.
Within this resource bank are activities that can be placed within lessons that involve many different forms of learning. The objection is for students to tell their OWN stories using the images and materials provided. These activities are designed to adapt to multiple different types of learners and should be understood as approaching the student for where they are at. Teachers may decide if these would be a verbal, written, or visual based assessment, depending on where their students are within their learning. These are only a few to the many ideas that are out there, but the goal is for resources to be more accessible in one place. I have created these from being inspired by social stories, sequence storytelling, and loose parts approaches. I would like to continue to add to this bank of resources as I move through my education and career to further resource sharing between teachers. These activities are designed to be compatible with assessing ELL students and students with various needs and potential IEPs. I appreciate you reading the why behind these resources, I hope you enjoy them!
Lesson shortcuts I have created:
Nature Storytelling, Loose parts Storytelling, Character Building Lesson, Gruffalo Lesson .
Resources used:
This is a fun trailer I made for my final video that is attached via YouTube link afterward!
Over the course of the last few months, I set out my goals and intentions to learn the basics of ukulele playing. I surprised myself in how much practicing the ukulele grew on me. It became a break from doing schoolwork, while still chipping away at it, and would leave me feeling productive. I would bring my ukulele to work as well and would play during my break.
I met all of the goals that I set out in the beginning, and that is displayed during the course of the entire video. My two songs that I learned were ‘Three Little Birds’ by Bob Marley and ‘You are My Sunshine’ Charles Mitchell and Jimmie Davis. These were both beginner level songs, but I also learned multiple strumming patterns for both. I was quite proud of myself for doing so. My other goal that I accomplished was learning 6 chords. I chose to learn: C, G, D, Aminor, A and F. If I ever felt that I was in a lull in my playing or was frustrated in my efforts, I would often strum in different patterns and go between each note. Overall, I am really proud of my efforts I put into learning this new skill and was pleased when it came to how much I enjoyed doing it.
Enjoy watching me learn!
These are the videos and apps I used to help me out in my learning:
App: SimplyTuner
I searched “ASL” on unsplash and this photograph popped up. It does not have anything to do with ASL, but it is stunning, so kudos to Piermario Eva.
Over the course of the last two and a bit months I did my best to contribute time to learn American Sign Language. Although that may seem like a good chunk of time to learn the beginnings of a new language, I felt like I struggled with the task when combined with other schooling, work, and making time for exercise and outside time. I have always wanted to learn ASL, thus I took this as a sign of an opportunity. I did my best; however, I definitely am not where I wanted to end up with my knowledge.
There are still positives to having this experience of learning. I have brought in a new language into snippets of my life; I also found out that there are others in my cohort that also know ASL, so at times, we are able to communicate little things to one another using sign.
The negatives of the experience can be categorized into two sectors. Number one is the issue of time. It was really difficult to dedicate practice time to learn aspects of a new language while also balancing all the factors in life. I knew that it was going to be difficult from the start, but I definitely bit off more than I could chew. Being in school, working, and still trying to be a functioning human being is difficult in itself sometimes, so it is just a balancing act. The second issue is exposure. Because I was doing this inquiry on my own, not in a class setting, I did not have anyone to communicate to, or practice with. No one in my household can sign, so I was left to practice on my own. A lot of learning a language is exposure. Having the ability to try and converse with others is a huge part of learning a language. I think that is what I would consider to be the biggest flop of this process.
Overall, I am really proud that I made the effort in trying to learn ASL because it is something that I have been so interested in doing for so long. I am sad that it did not go as planned, but I found some great resources in the mean time for trying to stay connected with the ASL community before I can make the time to take some in-person classes.
Learn How to Sign is a resource that has always helped me and will continuously help me throughout my learning. I really appreciate the speed of the content. I have included it in my final reflection because it is the one resource that I will continue to use.
This week focused on the implementation of the Phone Restriction in the new BC Ministry of Education guidelines. The use of phones varies from school to school and district to district; teachers may even decide to implement different standards on a classroom basis. The rise of phone use for the younger generation has gone from a recreational amount to an abuse of their time. Ultimately, students have a constant distraction in their pocket, and the Ministry of Education felt they needed to change that.
At the grade level of 4-7, students may or may not have their own device depending on their guardian’s choices. With that in mind, some students may be distracted from time to time by a notification coming through a device in their pocket. Although devices have a negative connotation with their use during school time, they can also be used as tools in their education development.
Engaging in online based games as a class such as Kahoot, Science Journal, and computer science online platforms can assist students in their learning journey. As pairs or individuals there are also online forums, such as Coolmathgames, that may also help with the understanding of topics that might seem tedious. Overall, going into teaching for myself, I do not think the strict banning of cellphones solves the issue in front of us, if anything, teachers need to build relationships with students that can navigate through tough conversations, such as appropriate phone use.
In terms utilizing Science Journal, I believe it may be a helpful tool for the age range that I would like to teach, especially if done as a class. Some of the activities might be too difficult to do individually or in pairs, meaning that there is a high chance of distraction while students have tablets and/or devices out.
Below is the activity that I worked through. I found this activity to be appropriate for the age range that I would like to teach, as a class or as individuals.
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