Eric Showalter Teacher Blog

Genius hour or 20% projects encourage students to create their own learning path and product to display growth in certain skills. The idea is for students to pick their own topic, learn about that topic, design a product, and then share the product with a larger learning community. Throughout the process students will ideally gain a larger understanding of the topic while developing skills that will benefit them for a lifetime. These projects are really motivating for students because they are able to decide their own topic, pathway to learn about it, and the product they create. 

Three Benefits: 

Student Choice- Students are able to decide what topic they are researching and how they present the information through their product. We have learned in this class and others that the more students have choices when it comes to their learning, the more engaged and motivated they are to learn. With higher engagement and motivation comes the benefit of a deeper understanding of the content and further development of the intended life skills. 

Life Long Skills- A major benefit of a genius hour project is that students are intended to learn inquiry, research, and communication skills that will last them their lifetime. These skills usually transcend the usual skills covered in class and these activities allow for greater development of life long skills. Skills such as analysis, inquiry, communication, digital literacy skills, and many other 21st century skills are developed through genius hour projects. The benefits of learning these skills far outweigh the negatives of completing a genius hour project. 

Standard Based Learning- Lastly, these projects are standard based and could be added to your curriculum with relative ease. Obviously it will take time and effort on the teachers part to incorporate it, but the standards are already identified and therefore for teachers to use. Genius hour projects also incorporate cross curricular learning and help students see the connections between multiple areas of content. Lastly, students are able to connect their learning in your classroom to the real world and identify how your content impacts the world they live in.

Hurdles: 

Time- Teachers are constantly battling time in their classrooms. I am currently thinking about how I would add a genius hour project to my class right now and I can’t wrap my head around where I would get the time to do it. I struggle now to get through all of my curriculum and I am not sure exactly what I would cut to make it all work. To address this issue, I would probably try to link a project I already do and perhaps adapt it into a larger project that would work as a genius hour project. I can think of a few smaller projects that I do that take up time that I could skip in order to provide students with the opportunity to complete a genius hour project. The smaller projects do not have a lot of student choice and the benefits of the genius hour project would outweigh the benefits of those projects. It is also the time to plan the project itself for me as a teacher. Between coaching, my family, and other hobbies I have very little time to create brand new large scale projects for class. I would overcome this by setting aside some time over the summer to lay out the project and plan for the school year. 

Administrative and Parental Support- There is a possibility that administration and parents may not be on board with students completing a genius hour project. Parents may be concerned that this is not the best way to spend their child’s time in the classroom, or that their child may not benefit from the freedom that these projects provide. In addition, administrators may be worried that I would not be able to meet my curriculum requirements. I would overcome these hurdles by sending home a letter to parents explaining what a genius hour project is and how it would benefit their child. If parents still had concerns about the project I would offer a time to meet with them and hopefully ease their concerns. As for administration, I create a plan to present to them over the summer that displays the way I would complete the project and still meet my curriculum requirements for the year.

During the pandemic I utilized Zoom and Microsoft Teams to teach and communicate with students outside of the classroom. During the beginning of the pandemic, my district used Zoom to set up office hours for students to come and ask questions about assignments as needed. Then during the following school year, we used Microsoft Teams to run a hybrid model. I would have students in my classroom and the rest would be at home attending class through Teams. I would teach both groups of students at the same time and constantly be going back and forth between students in my classroom and students on my laptop or Ipad. Since we have returned to school, I have not really used Teams or Zoom besides some faculty or district wide meetings. I would assume if we ever went back into lockdown that my district would implement a similar learning model as to what we used during the pandemic. In that case, I would be using Teams or Zoom again to teach synchronously to my students. 

Benefits:

The major benefit that tools like Zoom and Teams brought to my classroom was a sense of community. Without these tools, students at home would have felt much more isolated and disconnected than they already did. With these tools, students were able to basically be sitting right inside my classroom with a shared screen and audio feed of myself talking. In addition, students were able to ask questions and self-advocate if they had an issue directly with me even though we weren’t in the same room. Secondly, I was able to use these presentation tools to create collaborative learning opportunities for my students even though we were not all in the same location. Students would be split up into breakout rooms and would complete collaborative assignments, projects, and discussions and then return to the main meeting and debrief what they had completed. I was even able to get students to work with other students outside of their own class time to complete assignments and build even larger connections between students. I also think that these tools allowed some students to open up and be more willing to share in the classroom. I had a few students a second time during the pandemic and they were willing to share now more than ever before because they were at home and not speaking directly in front of the class. One last benefit of these tools is the ability to still see students and connect with them through these applications. I did not always require my students to have their cameras on, but I would sometimes have them turn them on. This way, I was still able to look students in the eye and try to build connections with them just as if they were in my classroom. Again, most of the benefits mentioned above would not have been possible during the pandemic without these communication tools. 

Challenges and Overcoming: 

I always show a lot of short videos in my lectures and throughout my lessons. To display those videos to my synchronous students at home during the pandemic through a shared screen was usually difficult. Our WIFI and the presentation tool itself usually was not good enough to provide continuous videos to my students at home. The way I overcame this is by providing links and or titles to videos to students through Schoology. They would mute the meeting and view the videos on their own and then return to class once they were finished. Another challenge was the constant battles with the WIFI and internet connection in my building. I often would not be able to get into my meeting or would get removed during the class. I would be flexible and communicate with those students at home through Schoology updates and emails if necessary. These communication plans were communicated at the beginning of the school year and followed throughout the rest. Realizing that the WIFI was out of my control, I just tried to be as flexible as possible and make the best out of a bad situation. Next, the difficulty with monitoring student engagement in an online presentation tool was different. It was always hard to monitor students in class and at home at the same time. If I thought a student at home was struggling to engage, I would ask them to turn their camera on, but they could claim it wasn’t working and there was nothing I could do. I would ask students to periodically raise their hands or type something in the chat, but again it was difficult to gauge their full engagement with even those strategies. I overcame this challenge by creating various formative assessments throughout my lessons and if they were not completed by the students at home I knew who was engaged and who was not. Lastly, it took a lot of students time to get comfortable with Teams or Zoom as a method of learning and communicating. This learning curve was difficult for some and caused a lot of stress and frustration. I overcame these challenges with grace and patience with these students and encouraged them to communicate with me about their concerns. As time went on during the pandemic years, students became more comfortable with the technology and those stresses decreased with practice and understanding.

Twitter is a tool that I often use to keep up with current events, family members, and sports. It is a resource that if used correctly could be useful inside the classroom and can be useful for educators as well. Twitter is a great resource for teachers to use to connect with each other and share ideas and best practices. I have often used twitter to read about other teachers’ experiences and learn new strategies to use in my classroom. I have never participated in an educational chat on Twitter, but I have followed a few in the last couple of years and they are engaging and provide good ideas and resources for teachers to use. Another way that Twitter can be used to grow a teachers professional development is by letting teachers know when conferences are happening. I know a lot of in person conferences and professional development opportunities that use twitter to advertise for teachers to attend as well. By using social networking, professional development sessions can reach a wider range of teachers and really bring together a vast network of experience and knowledge. Finally, I think the best part of Twitter is just having the ability to connect with other teachers even on a person to person basis. This connection allows teachers to grow their own professional network and gain knowledge and strategies from that network. 

Pros:

1. You can access the latest news and information really quickly by using Twitter with a cell phone. Twitter automatically updates for various news organizations and outlets which allows people to get news fast and efficiently. 
2. Easy search function by searching by hashtags. People on Twitter are easily able to join a conversation or find news by searching through a hashtag. 
3. The ability to access a larger network of professionals in your field and sharing ideas and strategies with those professionals. 
4. Tweets are clear messages most of the time because of the character limit. People and news outlets cannot ramble about news or opinions and you are able to get a clear and concise message from posted content. 
5. Teachers can use twitter to share posts and photos with the community and share what is being done in their classroom. Likewise, schools can post pictures and posts to communicate with community members on what is going on at school. 

Cons: 

1. Anyone can sign up for Twitter and as a result there is cyberbullying, negative comments, and inappropriate content on Twitter. 
2. There is a limit to what can be posted in a single tweet because of the character limit of 280. This stops people from sometimes including the whole story or being as detailed as necessary. This can cause misunderstandings and arguments. 
3. There are a lot of fake accounts, bots, and scam accounts that share misinformation and scams across the platform. You have to spend time and energy to work around these bots and keep your information safe. 
4. Twitter can become a distraction if used in the classroom with students because it is very easy to get off task and find yourself down a rabbit hole. I often go on Twitter to find one specific thing and realize 20 minutes later that I am completely off task. If you are going to use Twitter in your classroom, strict expectations need to be made. 
5. The digital footprint is a negative as well. Once you post something it is hard to completely delete that post. Yes, you can delete it, but people can screenshot it before that happens. Whatever you post, can follow you forever which can become a problem if you are not careful when using social networking sites. 

Flickr seems like a really good resource to find images online. Students could use this application to help find Creative Commons photographs that are reliable. Another bonus of Flickr is that you can use Flickr Map to explore different areas of the world through photographs. I believe Flickr Map is similar to Google Maps and allows students to click and zoom in on specific areas and explore the surroundings. Flickr would also be a great place for students to collaborate with others by commenting on each other’s photos or using photos as discussion starters in the classroom. 

I could use Flickr in my classroom in a few different ways. First, with Flickr Map, I could have students view a city which we are discussing during class. For example, we talked a lot about Paris during the French Revolution, and students could use Flickr Map to view historical landmarks in Paris from the French Revolution. Students could also view historical landmarks in general like the Great Wall of China, the Taj Mahal, or the Pyramids of Giza. I believe this aspect of Flickr is really useful in a social studies classroom because it can help students see history coming alive. Students become more engaged and motivated to learn history especially when they can visually see important historical landmarks. 

I also could use Flickr by having students create image portfolios. Students could create image portfolios surrounding a specific historical event or time period. For example, students could find photographs about the Cold War or the Industrial Revolution and create a portfolio. Students then would be required to create captions for each photograph and comment on other students’ portfolios as well. This could be done individually or collaboratively, depending on the learning goal and the length of the portfolio. I like the idea that I could use it for a collaborative project or individual assignment. 

The last way I could see using Flickr in my classroom is by having students create a digital museum exhibit with the application. I usually have students make physical museums of artifacts and write descriptions and reasons for why they selected that artifact. With Flickr, I could have students act as museum curators and organize their photographs into a collection. Then the comments they would write could act as their reasoning as to why they were included in the museum. Lastly, I would require students to visit and comment on each other’s museums to ask questions, offer suggestions, or begin discussions. One other way that I would use Flickr is just have students look for reliable images for presentations or other smaller projects. It would be easier and more reliable to use Flickr than just having students research photographs on Google.  Flickr seems like a great resource for students to collaborate, find reliable photographs, and complete assignments.

President Of Ukraine. (2022, November 19). Flickr. https://www.flickr.com/photos/president_of_ukraine/52510693253/

After reading this question, I actually started to think about my own high school experience versus how I teach in my classroom today. I do not remember having collaborative assignments or projects that often throughout my high school experience. I spent the majority of the time taking notes while the teacher was lecturing or taking part in discussions, but very rarely did I spend time collaborating with my classmates. I fast forward to my own classroom, and almost everything I do involves some version of collaboration between students. My students sit in groups of four and everyday class starts with a “do now” question, scenario, or review and students answer that in their groups. I often assign collaborative class work, simulations, projects, and discussions during my lessons as well. The sharing of knowledge in a collaborative environment affects the model of teaching and learning in a variety of ways. 

First, as the teacher, we really are no longer just standing in front of the class and lecturing the entire period. Yes, I still do lecture, but it is maybe for 10-15 minutes a lesson and then students are collaborating together. Teachers take on a new role which serves as guiding students through activities or projects that requires them to collaborate and problem solve. Students are able to take a larger ownership of their learning and grapple with their own learning as well. One of the best ways I find that students actually learn the skills in my classroom is through struggling. Students need to figure out how to best problem solve or develop skills in a trial and error system. Incorporating collaboration in your classroom allows for that struggle and growth throughout a lesson, unit, or even semester. Another way that collaboration changes teaching models is by incorporating more technology into a classroom. Applications like Google Sites, Canva, and even blogs allow students to collaborate with each other to complete a task or create a product to share with the real world. You do not necessarily have to use technology to promote collaboration, but combining technology and collaboration allows students to work on digital citizenship skills in the classroom. 

Lastly, students and teachers can break through the walls of their classroom and encourage the creation of a larger learning community. A lot of times, students and teachers are only able to work with and communicate with the people within their classrooms. However, with technology and a teacher that encourages collaboration, students have the opportunity to work with other students around the country or even the world. Obviously security is a concern and you would want to ensure students know expectations, but there are programs or activities out there that allow students to collaborate outside of the classroom. This builds a larger learning community and can make student learning more relevant and engaging. That will be my last point, collaboration allows for the growth of engagement and motivation for many students. Students are motivated to discuss their opinions and beliefs about certain topics and ideas. If teachers provide students with the opportunity to share their opinions with their classmates and work collaboratively to create products to share those opinions, they are more likely to be engaged and motivated in the classroom. Coming from someone who encourages students to collaborate on a daily basis, the students who wholeheartedly collaborate and work together are significantly more engaged than those who do not. This is perhaps the most significant benefit of collaboration in the classroom in my opinion.

Title: 5 Tips for teaching Social Studies in any classroom 

Author: Arthur Vambaketes

Location:https://nearpod.com/blog/5-tips-for-teaching-social-studies-in-any-classroom/ 

The last article I selected was more focused on implementing Nearpod in a social studies classroom. As a social studies teacher, I thought this article would be extremely helpful in learning the best strategies to implement this new application into my classroom. The article discusses similar ideas that were presented in other articles such as the formative assessments and gamification. However, this article includes more social studies specific capabilities of Nearpod like virtual field trips and virtual reality capabilities as well. In addition the author stated that Nearpod has partnered with social studies companies like National Geographic and ICivics to create pre-made and ready to use Nearpod lessons that teachers can access. These lessons can be copied, adapted, and used in almost any social studies classroom and are included when you sign up for Nearpod. 

The author explains 5 ways to increase student engagement and utilize Nearpod in a social studies classroom. The first strategy is to use Nearpod as a tool that hooks students in a lesson topic or an anticipatory set. Students can respond to live polls or discussion boards where they can see each other’s response to get them hooked on a subject. Next, use dynamic media to engage students such as Nearpod 3D which allows students to manipulate and explore 3D models or events throughout history. Teachers can also access large libraries of videos and primary sources from the BBC and use the PDF viewer to add them to any presentation. The third strategy encourages teachers to check out the virtual reality capabilities of Nearpod which transports students into the history they are learning. On top of the formative assessment activities, virtual reality and digital field trips bring history alive for students in the classroom. The last two strategies work well together by being strategies that increase student engagement and involvement. The two strategies are utilizing Flipgrid or another interactive media tool with Flipgrid to encourage authentic learning and discussion, and using the gamification features of Nearpod to foster competitiveness and engagement. The article ends with asserting that Nearpod is the best interactive presentation tool because of the vast amount of applications and flexibility it provides. 

The applications that could be made from this article in my class are almost endless. I have been looking for a reliable way to incorporate virtual field trips into my classroom and this seems to be the application to do it. I researched a little more on the Nearpod website, and found a field trip to the Palace of Versailles and to the Berlin wall I could use in my classes this year. I also looked into the virtual reality lessons which are extremely applicable as long as I can use my district’s virtual reality goggles. These strategies would allow me to make history come alive for my students in my classroom and allow for increased engagement and participation in my classroom. That outcome is the main goal and purpose of me selecting Nearpod as a topic for this project. On top of the formative assessment, hook activities, and gamification opportunities mentioned above, the virtual field trips could really transform the way I teach about history. Lastly, I often use Kahoot and Quizizz as ways to review and include gamification in my classroom, but students seem to be losing interest in the same review activities. Nearpod will provide another alternative review activity for students to take part in. The major takeaway I have had based on the research I have completed thus far is that Nearpod is extremely versatile and increases student engagement in a multitude of ways. 

References:

Vambaketes, A. (2022, August 1). 5 tips for teaching Social Studies in any classroom. Nearpod Blog.  https://nearpod.com/blog/5-tips-for-teaching-social-studies-in-any-classroom/ 

Title: Nearpod: example of digital tools for class collaboration

Author: Emily Wood & Yu-Ping Hsu

Location:https://scalar.usc.edu/works/c2c-digital-magazine-fall-2020–winter-2021/nearpod-tool-class-collaboration 

The second source I found was an article that described the basics behind using Nearpod as well as the collaborative capabilities of the application. Wood and Hsu state that “Nearpod can be a collaborative and interactive learning platform which allows students to improve their participation.  It also gives a chance to interactive with the teacher”. This statement is basically the basis of using Nearpod in any classroom setting. This application promotes collaboration, participation, and interaction between students and teachers. The article goes on to explain that Nearpod works in collaboration with Google Slides or PowerPoint and you can upload pre-made presentations into Nearpod. Once they are uploaded you can add the formative assessment questions, gamification capabilities, or the collaborative discussions. The article goes on to discuss other applications like Edpuzzle, YouTube, and Flipgrid which can easily be implemented into Nearpod. In addition, the authors explain the flexibility that Nearpod offers by being able to be used in a self paced setting or through live participation. This allows Nearpod to be used in a synchronous or asynchronous classroom. Next, the authors explain that Nearpod can also be linked to various learning management systems like Schoology or Google Classroom to allow for easy sharing for student use. Lastly, the article explains the ability that Nearpod has to encourage student collaboration and provides an example to view. 

The example requires students to watch an embedded video in Nearpod and then respond to prompts and review questions on a live discussion board. Students’ responses would appear directly on the screen and students can comment or discuss the responses live in class as well. The other option that was presented was doing a quick draw which seems to be a popular activity on Nearpod and then using the students’ drawings to dive into a deeper discussion or review about a topic. The last part of the article describes how Nearpod increases student engagement. Through the use of formative assessment, gamification, and keeping students on the same screen throughout a lesson, students are able to be more engaged in class content. Teachers are also able to use the formative assessments provided by the students to inform their own practice. A great last point that this article makes is that Nearpod encourages total participation among students in the classroom. It reaches and encourages those quiet students to participate in class even if they would not normally raise their hands to add their thoughts. 

This article presented new capabilities of Nearpod that my previous article did not. We use Schoology in my district and having the ability to seamlessly incorporate Nearpod with Schoology is a major bonus. I will be able to put codes and embed presentations directly into Schoology for students to use. In addition, I can take my previously made Google Slides and upload them into Nearpod which also makes this an easy application to use. Instead of having to create all new presentations, I only need to add the formative assessments and interactive activity slides to increase student engagement in my lessons. I could easily implement live discussion boards through Nearpod similarly to what I currently use Schoology discussion for. However, the added bonus would be that I do not have to have my students leave my presentation to go to Schoology to participate in the discussion. Lastly, after discovering that Nearpod has the ability to work with Edpuzzle and Youtube, I can embed Edpuzzle videos directly into Nearpod. Again, the ability to have students stay on one screen at all times and not overwhelm students with transitions helps students stay engaged and focused.  I am quickly discovering that Nearpod is a one stop shop as a presentation tool, formative assessment and data collection tool, and finally a discussion tool. Nearpod has extremely diverse capabilities which allow a teacher to adapt it to their curricular needs. 

Reference: 

Wood, E., & Hsu, Y.-P. (2020, December 10). Nearpod: An example of digital tools for class collaboration. C2C Digital Magazine. https://scalar.usc.edu/works/c2c-digital-magazine-fall-2020–winter-2021/nearpod-tool-class-collaboration 

Title: A Critical Evaluation of Nearpod’s Usefulness in Teaching K-12 Biology Science Online Classroom

Author: Junhua Xian

Location: https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.2991/assehr.k.211220.156 

The first article I found was a study completed by Junhua Xian and was completed during the COVID pandemic. This study focused on the effects that the implementation of Nearpod had in a synchronous online biology classroom. The study focuses on the positive impacts that Nearpod had on the synchronous learning environment and the students. First, Nearpod helped boost a sense of belonging and classroom community in a synchronous setting by increasing participation and interaction among students. Students were able to interact with Nearpod through live discussions, formative assessments, and quickdraws and writes. These activities helped not only engage the students but also build a stronger sense of normalcy in an online classroom. 

Next the article describes the positive impact that formative assessment feedback provided by Nearpod had. Teachers were able to use Nearpod to create formative assessments using some of the strategies listed above and plan lessons and reteaching opportunities for students in the future. The data that was collected could be stored and tracked to also measure student growth over time. Lastly, the author cited that Nearpod increases student motivation, participation, and engagement in classroom activities. Students are encouraged and held accountable by the participation measures included in Nearpod and also encourages students to have fun as well. Nearpod includes a gamification option where students can compete with each other while participating in a formative assessment. Finally, the article describes the flexibility that Nearpod possesses and explains the ability to use in a synchronous and asynchronous classroom. The study uses interviews and surveys to come to the conclusion that Nearpod used in a synchronous classroom is far more effective for the reasons explained above. 

I could easily apply the use of Nearpod into my in person classroom as well as a synchronous classroom based on the information presented in this article. The benefits of Nearpod are clearly numerous and the flexibility that comes with it is a major advantage. After beginning this project, I have started to create my own Nearpods to eventually use in my classroom, and the tools mentioned above will definitely increase student engagement. Students are held accountable for their participation because their answers will be shared with the class on their own personal devices screen. In addition, I plan to use this feature to kickstart discussions and debates on course content. In addition, I plan to utilize the formative assessment features of Nearpod to create short checks for understanding, quick writes, and quickdraws throughout my direct instruction. These should give me a great gauge to understand where my students are and if I can move on or need to cover more. Next, I was not aware, but you can use a feature on Nearpod to create live discussions similar to a discussion board or post on Schoology or Canvas. Students can respond to a question and click “post” and their responses will pop up on the main screen and all student devices as well. Students can then interact and comment based on each other’s posting. The capabilities and benefits of Nearpod to increase student engagement and participation through these strategies is apparent. In my own professional practice, I believe increased student engagement and participation during my direct instruction is a skill I need to develop. I plan to utilize Nearpod as an application to help facilitate my growth in this area of need. 

References:

Xian, J. (2021). A Critical Evaluation of Nearpod’s Usefulness in Teaching K-12 Biology Science Online Classroom. Atlantis Press, 615.  https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.2991/assehr.k.211220.156 

The lesson that I normally do requires students to create a physical learning station on a topic of the 1950s American Culture. 

Original Lesson: The original lesson and project are over the span of usually three days. The first day is an introduction to the ideas of conformity and rebellion in 1950s American society. We discuss the definitions of each of these terms and how they apply to American society at the time. We then discuss modern day examples of conformity and rebellion. Next, students are introduced to various topics of 1950s culture such as Levittowns, Rock and Roll, the Beat movement, gender roles, African Americans and desegregation, consumerism, and the automobile. Once students are briefly introduced, they are assigned a topic. In a cooperative group, students are required to produce a physical learning station to teach their classmates about the topic. The station includes a summary of the topic, multiple pictures, a video, primary sources, and student made questions to share. Then students move through the stations on the third day of the lesson and answer the student made questions as they go through each station. Lastly, I review all the topics with a review Google Slides and then wrap up with a Kahoot. 

Adapted Assignment: Students will still be assigned a topic from the 1950s that was listed above, but they will now create a digital learning station. The digital learning station will be created on Pinterest. Students will store work collaboratively to create this learning station through a Pinterest board. The Pinterest board will still need the same requirements as stated above. Each group’s board will need at least one summary article of the topic, a primary source, at least 3 pictures, a video or advertisement, and finally digitally created questions to share with the class. Each of these requirements would be an individual pin on the Pinterest board. Instead of doing a physical station activity, students will create a shareable link and post the Pinterest board to a Schoology discussion board. Once all the links have been posted, students will move through the digital stations with their groups in their pods. Students will access the various Pinterest boards and answer the questions created by the groups and fill out their graphic organizers. Teacher will still finish the lesson with a Google Slides presentation review and a wrap up Kahoot. 

Why was this Lesson Chosen: I chose this lesson plan because my students create a lot of physical projects in my classroom and I thought it would be a nice change for them to create a digital project. In addition, finding resources on Pinterest to meet these requirements should not be too difficult and I believe this will make this lesson more interactive for my students. There are students who usually do not like to physically move around the room and interact with student created lessons and this will keep students in their seats, focused, and engaged. In addition, I picked this lesson because it easily is adapted to using a social bookmarking tool. The idea that students can make their own digital learning station on Pinterest was an easy adaptation to make to this lesson plan. Honestly, looking back at the pandemic, I had students make a Google Slide show for this lesson. I believe that if I would have known about Pinterest, I would have used this resource instead. It combines visual, auditory, and written learning styles all together in one platform and would have worked well in a digital classroom. 

Advantages and disadvantages of this revision: A major advantage of this revision is that Pinterest is so user friendly and once students use it once, they can use it multiple times throughout a course. Also, I believe that this revision will make this lesson more engaging for my students. Students will be more likely to view the additional resources on the Pinterest board than on the physical station they used to make. Often, when students are rotating through the physical stations, they do not use the QR codes to watch the videos or advertisements. They usually just read the summary and answer the questions and wait to move on. Having a digital learning station through Pinterest will increase student engagement with the additional resources in each learning station. Another advantage is that this lesson may not take 3-4 days as it normally does because students have to physically put the station together. Students should be able to gather the pins on the board within one 72 minute class period and I would be able to save a day and add it somewhere else in the curriculum. A disadvantage to this lesson could be that students may lose focus or be distracted by sitting in front of their computer screens viewing stations. That is usually why I do physical projects because I want to avoid the distraction of the computer screens. Another disadvantage could be that students may not spend as much time researching various sources because Pinterest provides a lot of quality information quickly. Despite these two potential drawbacks, I still plan to implement this assignment next semester when teaching my American Cultures students about 1950s American Society. I really think it will encourage more engagement and create better learning stations through the creation of Pinterest boards.

I will be completely honest, I have never even heard of a RSS or an Old Reader account until this module and assignment. I think it has its purposes and does cut down on the clutter that one usually has to look at when looking through social media. I understand the purpose of having a place where updates are collected, stored, and readily accessible for you to go back and look at. It does seem like it would be quicker when accessing blogs and google alerts rather than typing in the URL or going to favorites. It also does keep all of the blogs or google alerts that you are following or have set up in a one stop shop. In this aspect, I do think it could be very beneficial for me to review other teachers’ blogs, keep up to date with current technology, and review current events. 

I do have to admit that many of the teacher blogs that I was looking at and finding have not been updated for some time. A lot of them stopped soon after we started coming out of the pandemic last year. As a result I did not want to follow all the blogs that I found because I am not sure how useful old blog posts would be to me. I guess I could go and look at those blogs and then unsubscribe when I read all I want. This was the only drawback that I noticed when looking at different blogs to follow that would be valuable for me. I plan to use RSS feeds to continue to build onto the network of teachers that I learn from and collaborate with. I believe one of the best forms of professional development is finding what other teachers are successfully doing and applying that in my classroom. I plan to use RSS to also keep up to date with new technologies that are being created and implemented in the classroom. Lastly, I would use RSS to keep track of current events and use the information that I read through to discuss and plan lessons around current events in my classroom. At this point, I am not sure if I would have my students use an RSS feed because I am still learning how to use it myself. This is a technology that I would continue to use before I implement it in my classroom. 

Below are a few of the RSS feeds that I choose to follow and why I believe they are important. 

1. TED-Ed Lessons worth Sharing- I often use Ted Ed videos within my classroom as reviews or anticipatory activities. This RSS feed provides videos as well as lesson activities that coincide with the videos that I could implement in my classroom. By looking through the videos, I was able to find a new video on Prohibition in the US that I can use with my students.
2. Edutopia RSS Feed- I knew I wanted to follow this blog right away in my RSS feed. I did not have a lot of experience with blogging until this class, but the one blog site that I commonly visited was Edutopia. This blog has been really helpful for me as a newer teacher and served as inspiration for lessons, classroom management techniques, and technology use. This feed would continue to be useful to me to keep me up to date with what other teachers are doing and what is successful in other classrooms. 
3. Pennsylvania Department of Education SAS- I followed the standards aligned system for the PA department of education because I often go to that site to research state standards for lesson plans and curriculum writing. In addition, I have found a few relevant and engaging lessons for my social studies classroom here as well. Lastly, this feed had a few blog posts that covered upcoming professional development training and webinars I found useful. 
4. Breaking News- This feed has international, United States, and local breaking news based on your location. It provides updates on current events and will be useful for me to consolidate where I look for my current event updates. I often have to go from website to website researching current events and gathering information before designing a lesson plan or activity around it. This way, through this feed and one or two others all of the information will be found in my RSS. This will expedite the way I gather current events. 
5. Students of History Teaching Resources for Social Studies- This feed is designed to provide social studies teachers with lessons, assignments, project, and assessment ideas. By just scrolling through a few of the most related posts, I was able to find new and engaging activities that I could implement in my classroom. It is also a location where other teachers can share their lessons or worksheets with each other for free. This is probably my favorite resource I found through this activity because I love to collaborate and share ideas with other social studies teachers.