Suzanne's Ed Tech Reflections

Actually, they say the best things! Last week one of the iAchieve teachers commented that it doesn’t really matter how simple the activity, just utilizing the iPods during instruction motivates and engages the students like nothing else she has seen. They just seem to become more involved in the learning because of the iPods whether it involves practicing spelling words using a whiteboard app, writing a math problem, or recording themselves using Voice Memos.

I walked into one of the iAchieve project classrooms a few days ago. The teacher ran over to me and excitedly stated that she had this great idea for using the K12 Timed Reading app. Now we’ve been using this for a while and some teachers have reported having issues with students just flicking through the reading pages and not really focusing on the reading. Then their report shows that they have http://classroomclipart.com/ read 986 words per minute or some other ridiculous number. How do we help them focus? I developed a worksheet for students to individually record their reading information but this teacher’s idea would lead to collaboration and peer feedback. She is having students buddy read with a partner. One partner reads while the other listens. They have a worksheet to complete to rate each other on their fluency and provide peer feedback on how to do better next time. Genius!

We have begun piloting oral reading fluency recordings in a few classrooms to get some practice with procedures before rolling this out to all of the iAchieve classrooms. I have had the privilege of working with a couple of student groups. It is interesting to watch them record but even more fun to watch as they listen to their recordings. They often laugh at hearing their own voices but are also becoming aware of things they need to work on as they read such as their phrasing or even specific words that tripped them up during reading.