Teaching and Learning with Testa

 For the past three weeks, I have emerged in STEM and inquiry-based thinking for both courses I am taking this half of the Spring semester.  This has been an intense three weeks of reading various discussions, articles, and videos on what is STEM and Inquiry Based Learning and how are these used in the classroom.  The material has been thought-provoking.  I have spent the last three weeks writing about the material to develop my own knowledge. I have been involved in inquiry-based learning myself as I develop my own knowledge of the topic. In an inquiry based classroom, the focus is on investigations and answering questions based upon evidence.  Students are learning by doing. STEM naturally leads educators to be inquiry-based. Although this can be done in all classes, the Learning Channel(n.d) has a great video from Urban Academy demonstrating an inquiry-based classroom in both English and History. (Note: Learning Channel is not free but you can watch one video...

This past week the new semester has started. One course is inquiry based learning.  This is a course that has interested me since I saw it was required.  I was wondering how this differs from project based learning and other teaching methods that I have used.  I was excited to dive into the material this week answering: What is inquiry based learning? According to Wikipedia(n.d), inquiry based learning is started by "posing questions, problems, or scenarios".  The teacher is a facilitator, guide and is constantly adjusting based on the students.  It is a student center classroom where students are discovering their own learning.  So what does this look like in the classroom? How does this method work? I have noticed that inquiry based classrooms can take on a variety of different looks, but the basis is that students are answering questions and fostering their own learning.  This learning can be incredibly guided by the teacher or open-ended where stud...

  It's   CSED Week !!!!! The week is to call teachers to inspire students to learn computer science.  Notice it says INSPIRE.  You don't need to be a computer science teacher or know coding in order to inspire students to learn about computer science there are so many ways: Research how technology is being used in a field today  Look at a Large Data set related to the field of study you know, let students narrow down the data  Have students read about Computer Scientists particularly ones they might not have heard about.  Such as people who invented the Internet, GPS, game consoles, smart devices, etc..  Use Twitter to connect with current Computer Scientists to ask them questions. Let students devise the questions to ask.  If you want to code there are great ways to have students start coding in the classroom.  Just search hour of code and for one hour you can do a simple project.  There are tons of places out there.  If ...

  For the Instructional Strategies class, I recently participated in we had to create a mash-up of instructional strategies to use in our classrooms.  One thing I have struggled with is teaching how to take notes.  Particularly when watching videos and learning how to engage in them.  I started to think back to college and how one of my Education professors mentioned making questions out of headings and finding the answers to these questions.  I thought about doing this and utilizing google keep as I did it.  Raising Your Bar was developed.   My goal is to have students learn how to ask good questions and keep good notes as well.  One reviewer already mentioned the goal is to get students to ask questions they don't know the answers for, and to be okay with that unease that occurs.   Check it out and let me know your thoughts!

In this day and age, thanks to the pandemic, teachers are using technology tools more than ever.  The use of technology is a great way of enhancing our classrooms and having a 21-century approach to learning.  Over the past two years, as I and my colleagues shift our teaching, I begin to wonder where each of the technologies lands on the SAMR model.  Have I moved my technology integration in a way that is productive?  Am I using this time to blow up my teaching to give less content and focus on what students need to learn? The SAMR model of technology integration was designed by Dr. Ruben Puentedura. The idea of the teachers looking at using common terminology when using technology.  The key is to always ask two questions as an educator:  How do you want to use technology and what is the purpose (Ruben, n.d).  Students shouldn't be using technology just to do technology but it should enhance the learning (Reben, n.d).  Below is an image of the lev...

  PBLWorks  is the gold standard for Project Based Learning(PBL).  They provide many resources for teachers wishing to adopt PBL into their curriculum.  PBL is different from just completing a project; the goal of the PBL is to provide a rigorous learning environment where the student learning goals are centered but and students learn to solve problems by answering complex questions and creating high-quality work (Larmer, 2020). PBL the learning goals are surrounded into the project.  According to PBLWorks and Larmer (2020) there are six essential elements of project design: Challenge Problem or Question Sustained Inquiry Authenticity Student Voice and Choice Reflection Critique and Revision Public Product Not all projects meet these standards, the following three videos from Edutopia show an array of projects that all engage the students in some manner.  The projects demonstrated clearly showed sustain inquiry, student choice, and authenticity. The role of...