Guerilla Educators

International Student "TechPals"

Throughout much of the 2012-'13 school year, students 7th grade students at East Norriton Middle School in East Norriton, PA, have been communicating with their peers at International Schools in Hong Kong and the French Caribbean Island of Guadeloupe.  What began as simple introductory emails between the students has increased in scope across a variety of platforms.  This video, below, is the latest effort by the ENMS sudents.  They wanted to introduce their "TechPals" in Hong Kong to their school so they filmed and edited (with a little help from their teachers, Margie Rothfeld and Donna Sole) "a day in the life" at ENMS.  The 7th graders at the Chinese International School in Hong Kong are spending 2 weeks on mainland China (now that's some class trip!) and plan on their return to respond with their own video to the ENMS students.  As relevant as the Project is for the students, it is, in my view, even more significant that these teachers are beginning to collaborate with each other from across the globe.  Now THAT is interesting!

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Senor Peye's Moon Buggy

 

 

Sr Peye, the "shop" teacher at Isidro Sanchez High School in Luquillo, Puerto Rico works with his students to conduct amazing Projects.  In the last 5 years, Peye's students have won NASA's Moon Buggy competition held every year in Huntsville, Alabama where students from around he world compete in various categories.  His students are busy re-designing their Moon Buggy in preparation for the competition set for April.  Buena Suerte!

CLick here http://guerillaeducators.typepad.com/ge/2012/03/rafael-cordero.html to view another video shot at Rafael Cordero Elementary School in Catano, in February, 2012.

Project Based Learning Development Guide

Developing the Project Concept:
•    What type of Project do you want to conduct with your students and why?
•    Will you be collaborating with other teachers in, or out of your school?
•    What content areas do you want to craft this project around?
•    Take a real-world topic related to the selected content areas.
•    Create a Driving Question that will drive investigation into the topic.

Develop a Driving Question that:
•    Is aimed at solving a problem
•    Will lead to deep inquiry
•    Will invite future learning
•    Is meaningful to the student, the school, the community, and/or the world
•    Is an issue that students believe in or have a passion for
•    By answering, they are having a positive impact on something or someone

Understandings/Outcomes:
•    What specifically do you want students to understand?
•    What facts and basic concepts should students know and be able to recall?
•    What will students know and what will they be able to do?
•    What curriculum, standards, and performance-based objectives will be addressed?
•    Will the learning be meaningful and applicable in their lives?
•    Project activities should be connected to curricular objectives.
•    Build planning time in to address curriculum connections.

Skills:    Students will be able to independently use their learning to:
•    Demonstrate citizenship and leadership
•    Work through real-world problems by trial and error
•    Collaborate and problem solve with others
•    Utilize technology to actualize and express ideas
•    Guide future independent directed learning across disciplines using the PBL process

Project Design/Features:
•    What teachers/colleagues should be involved in the collaborative brainstorming process?
•    Is the project part of a curricular unit?
•    Do students have choice of topic within a curriculum?
•    Will the teacher be guiding students in the framing of a driving question? Will students create their own driving question?
•    Is the project interdisciplinary and thematic?
•    Will you be collaborating with other teachers in, or out of your school?
•    Will students work independently or in groups or a combination?
•    Will the project involve class trips and or individual student experiences outside of the school day?
•    Does the project have community partners?
•    Will the project have a service-learning component?

Technology:    How will technology be implemented to enhance the Project by:
•    Communication Collaborating with other students/educators via technology
•    Information sources, information sharing
•    Creating, producing, presenting (Website, documents, etc)

Community Partnerships/Resources:
•    Which Community Partners can help you with your project?
•    In what ways will Community Partnerships model good citizenship/leadership?
•    What resources do you need to see the project through to completion?
•    Will project related class trips be taken?
 
Project Timeline:
•    Overall length of time
•    Time per week
•    Weekly Schedule

Project Activities:
•    Planned to achieve overall project objectives.
•    Connected to grade appropriate curricular objectives in at least 2 subject areas.
•    Engage students to take ownership of their educational processes
•    Are the activities FUN?

Benchmarks:
•    Set clear time referenced deadlines for each task and/or product.
•    Should be scaffolded to build on previously achieved objectives towards success of the project.
•    Help build the guidelines in which the project can take place
 
Reflection/Journals:
•    Student journals will offer students the opportunity to continuously reflect and assess their progress toward completion of the project.
•    Teachers can use student journals as valuable assessment tools.
•    Offer students the opportunity to learn from the strategies that did and, perhaps more importantly, did not work to achieve project objectives.
 
Assessment:
•    Will student be assessed throughout the project cycle or on a final project? Formative/Summative
•    An effective assessment program uses multiple strategies to demonstrate growth and performance, and should be closely correlated to your stated goals.
•    How are rubrics used as an effective assessment and evaluation tool?

Reporting Out:
•    Students will report out to peers, school staff, and the larger community:
•    How they addressed their driving question.
•    What they learned.
•    Their final project products.

Celebration:
How students will be celebrated and recognized for their important work at a Reporting Out Celebration!

Hamilton in 5D

This "quick and dirty" video captures in microcosm how a unifying theme for Project Based Learning can be effected systemically.  In this case, we captured a small slice of a post-industrial small midwest city.  Using the river that runs through it and where much of the history of the place has played out, the video underscores how the city can be used in 5 dimensions (including realtime and cyberspace) as a unifying theme to achieve proficiencies across a variety of curricular and civic objectives.  Take a look...

Seeds to Trees, 2nd grade Best Practices; Science

Students in 2nd grade from an inner city school in South Philadelphia planted acorns  from native oak trees at the Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education. They were part of an initiative to reestablish native deciduous hardwoods in the Schuylkill River Valley.  When the acorns germinated, half of those oak saplings went back to their public school in South Philly.  Seeds to Trees was a powerful catalyst to help these students achieve curricular proficiencies across a variety of disciplines, demonstrated the 12 Hallmarks of Effective Teaching and Learning, and modeled the best citizenship and leadership skills.  Take a look...

Project Based Learning; Best Practices; Building a Bridge in 4th Grade

This video captures an activity conducted with my students as part of a bridge building project conducted in cooperation with the American Institute of Architecture's, Architecture in Education program.   It was also my first video.  My students were to measure the height of the Henry Avenue Bridge using a plumb bob.  Take a look...

This is a very powerful project that incorporates historical aspects of the American Revolution, geometry, public speaking, working cooperatively, ratio and proportion and a whole menu of grade appropriate curricular objectives and state mandated standards.  It also demonstrates many of the 10 Hallmarks of 21st Century Teachng and Learning.

Professional Developments for Educators at Rose Tree Media School District

Guerilla Educators has added a new client.  We recently completed  2 day Professional Development for the hard working educators at the Rose Tree Media School District that focused on how to successfully implement and complete curriculum and real-world based Projects with students.  The workshop was given through the prism of our 12 Hallmarks of Effective Teaching and Learning.  We'll return to ongoing work with the teachers throughout the 2011-2012 school year to assist with implementation and successful completion of the proposed Projects developed in the planning phase of the training.  Welcome to our family of clients, Rose Tree Media, that includes:

• American Institute of Architects
• The School District of Philadelphia
• Council of Educational Facilities Planners International
• Delaware Valley Green Building Council
• SchraderGroup Architects
• Fielding Nair International
• Philadelphia University
• District of Columbia Public School System
• Milwaukee School District
• Alliance to Save Energy
• York Suburban School District
• University of Wisconsin
• Environmental Protection Agency
• Education Environment Planning Consultants
• Regina Board of Education
• Philadelphia Zoo
• Re:Vision Architecture
• Wallace Roberts & Todd Design
• LOTI (Levels of Technology Integration)
• IQity
• Journal of Teacher Education
• Edutopia
• Barack Obama Green Charter High School
• MaST Community (Math, Science, and Technology) Charter School
• Friendship Public Charter Schools
• Rose Tree Media School District

 

CEFPI Southeast Region 2011 Conference

Arrived in beautiful downtown Savannah for the 2011 CEFPI Southeast Region Conference.  Presenting Monday morning on the topic, "Connecting Students, Teachers, and Curriculum Via Project Based Learning". This year 5 themes will guide the event:

Collaborate

Educate

Facilitate

Participate

Invigorate

Here is how the themes will be related to my topic:

*Collaborate - Educational Facilities Planners/Designers/Architects can demonstrate that their design processes, when used in collaboration with educators and students will have powerful circular ramifications on more effective school design and more effective teaching and learning.

*Educate - The session will educate the participants about what we believe to be a vastly under-utilized asset, i.e. how physical teaching and learning spaces are powerful resources for effective teaching and learning.

*Facilitate - Understanding the participatory and Community Based power of Project Based Learning will facilitate more effective design.

*Participate - There is a tremendous feeling of satisfaction for Educational Facilities Planners that comes with knowing that they are participating in the whole education of the students who are their end clients. This process encourages school architects to establish real-world, in-class Community Partnerships with their clients and see the positive effects their participation engenders.

*Invigorate - Imagine students coming into teaching and learning spaces excited about being there because of active hands-on Projects in which they are about to participate. Imagine educators and educational facilities planners being active participants in those Projects. Imagine more effective educational facilities design as a result of the school architect as teacher/learner. This is what the session will address.

See you in Savannah!

Guerilla Educators at the CEFPI Southeast Region Conference

On Monday, March 28, Guerilla Educators has the privilege to be a Featured Presenter at the 2011 CEFPI SouthEast Region Conference. in Savannah, Ga.Our topic will be:

Connecting School Design to Students, Teachers and Curriculum Via Project Based Learning

Our Course Description is as follows:

Just as Project Based Learning is the gold standard of effective teaching and learning, school design is one of the gold standards of PBL. This session will explore how Educational Facilities Design processes can be used as a powerful resource in the educator's pedagogical toolkit. Through the prism of our Hallmarks of Effective Teaching and Learning, we will learn how Educational Facilities Planners can become real world Community Partners for curriculum-based Projects that use the physical facility as a 5 dimensional (including Real-Time and Cyber-Space) teaching and learning tool.  Once we understand the premise that the educational facility can be a catalyst for the development of academic and social proficiencies, regardless of demographics and  even independent of whether the spaces have been designed effectively, then Educational Facilities Planners can begin to see the positive effects of these “inside out” understandings on the bottom line. In the session, we will use authentic short videos of real students conducting real projects in and out of real classrooms with real school architects, to demonstrate these processes and to show how they may be incorporated into your Planning.  Plenty of time will be built in for discussion so Planners, Designers, and Architects can walk away with a deeper understanding of what takes place inside the physical teaching and learning spaces they create.

See you in Savannah!

Grade 6 Archaeology at MaST Community Charter School

Differentiated Instruction stems from beliefs about differences among learners, how they learn, learning preferences, and individual interests.  For this process to authentically take place, it is important for educators to get to know the learners in front of them before they can best match their practices to meet the needs of the students. In this video you will see how Tarra Gordon, a sixth grade teacher at MaST Community Charter school used an archaeology project to teach content as well as to learn about her students’ likes, interests, and families.  This will give Tarra insights about her students so she can use the differentiation process to help her students achieve.

Click to view another video from MaST Community Charter School about best practices in 5th grade math.