Blog Assignment #11

                While watching Back to the Future, I really just kept thinking about the word dedication! He is an amazing teacher. Instead of just being mediocre like some of the teachers his current students have had, he is trying to integrate so much into his classroom. Things from Wiki, Flicker, computers for everyone and a class blog help to broaden the imagination of his students. Mr. Crosby really embodies the word innovation. He is trying all of these new technologies in his classroom to make learning fun for his students. I have learned a lot from him, but mostly, I take away that teaching is about making students love learning as much as I do.

                What a great video! Building a Comic was very enlightening to watch. He used PBL to perfection. He first starts off his video by discussing what it means to be a super digital citizen. Then his students were able to discuss what that might mean, and then the project came in. His students were allowed to create a super hero that embodied a super safe digital citizen. Not only are the students able to use new software to create these superheroes, students will then write stories about real life situations using their newly created superhero. This integrates language arts into a technology lesson. Mr. Payne’s students were able to use their own faces in their comics; he says this shows ownership to the student’s’ projects. The biggest thing I took from this video- student’s love to use their imagination in school, and as teachers we should give them outlets to do so.

                Segregated learning is not the way anymore. Three teachers at a high school have worked very hard together to integrate project based learning within history, English, and information processing. PBL is used to help engage students and allow for deeper understanding of the curriculum. The teachers ran into some problems when trying to start this integration. Because students were pretty much learning three subjects at once, daily schedules needed to be adjusted. I am so glad the administration granted the three teachers the opportunity to do this. While watching Project Based Learning, I was able to look at a different side of PBL-the side where the teachers try so hard to integrate PBL into schools, and how much dedication it takes from the teachers to be able to do PBL in schools.