Kristy Ardinger's 20% Project Part II

For my 20% project, I wanted to create rubrics that tied to our writing curriculum.  I thought about each final project that the students publish and I wanted to have a rubric for the students to use.  I am really excited to use the rubrics next year and I know that I will probably make a few changes as integrate them into my teaching.


Teachers design, develop, and evaluate authentic learning experiences and assessment incorporating contemporary tools and resources to maximize content learning in context and to develop the knowledge, skills, and attitudes identified in the NETS•S. Teachers:
I think that creating rubrics has really allowed me to think about how I can use assessments to help students rather than just thinking about it as the end to a project.  Using rubrics with the class allows us to have a conversation about what quality work really looks like.  I think it also gives kids a much better understanding of the expectations and what they can do to meet the requirements.  I have always known that rubrics are a good tool, but having the time to explore different sites and different rubrics that are already created gave me a better understanding of how I can tweak them to fit my classroom.


Teachers continuously improve their professional practice, model lifelong learning, and exhibit leadership in their school and professional community by promoting and demonstrating the effective use of digital tools and resources. Teacher:  

evaluate and reflect on current research and professional practice on a regular basis to make effective use of existing and emerging digital tools and resources in support of student learning.

During this course I had a chance to think about the digital resources that are available to me as an educator.  I spent some time looking at rubrics that were already created and then I changed them to fit my needs.  I also had a chance to think about a problem based learning project for my students.  It has been fun to think about how I can get my students more involved in their learning and how they can interact with each other.  I think using Moodle is a fun way to have students share their thinking and it's a great way for students to learn from each other.  This class has given me the chance to share ideas with other educators and to collaborate about how to make my classroom an even stronger place for learning.

Rubric Example

Fairy Tale Rubric

Small Moments Rubric

(I have more if you would like to see more)

Kristy Ardinger's 20% Project

My 20% project began with an idea of creating a Moodle site for my students to document their nightly reading.  I actually got so involved into this project, that it turned into my integrated unit and my integrated unit became my 20% project.  So . . . my 20% project is now focused on our new FOSS unit titled New Plants.  This unit is new to second grade, so I wanted to spend some time looking for resources and creating SMART slides that I can use in my classroom with my students.  I wanted to try to make this unit more interactive and i wanted this unit to extend student learning beyond observing their plants.


The first standard and second standards focused on designing and developing digital-age learning experiences and then modeling those to my students.  Throughout this unit I have developed activities that students participate in using the SMART board, and I found online activities they can use to reinforce/extend their learning.  By keeping these standards in my head as I was developing my SMART slides, I was really thinking carefully about how I was going to include my students in the technology/learning rather than just creating SMART slides for me to use.  One example is that students will be creating an online journal using Prezi, rather than their journals.  I thought this would be a great way for students to colloborate with other classmates and it would also allow students to add more of their learning (such as links, videos, pictures, etc.) if they wanted a challenge.


The last standard talks about how I am engaging in professional growth by evaluating and reflecting upon my practice.  I think I really tried to think about how the actvities I am providing my students are going to allow them to extend their thinking and about I thought about what my goals really were for student learning.  I think the standards made me think about how my use of technology was really going to enhance student learning, rather than just providing some "glammer" to the information.  I think we always need to think about our true purpose and expected outcomes, and then think about how the activities we have planned are going to build upon that.  Too many times I see that students can get sucked into using technology and yet it doesn't always help to enhance student learning.


Looking forward, I would like to continue building SMART slides for more of the lessons in this FOSS unit.  I want students to have real activities that incorporate technology and enhance the objectives of the unit.