Brown noticed that many students used text messaging to communicate, and considered how she might use cell phones in summarizing and analyzing text to help her students better understand Richard III.
Effective summarizing is one of the most powerful skills students can cultivate. It provides students with tools for identifying the most important aspects of what they are learning, especially when teachers use a frame of reference (Marzano, Pickering, & Pollock, 2001).
Summarizing helps students identify critical information. Research shows gains in reading comprehension when students learn how to incorporate isummary framesi (series of questions designed to highlight critical passages) as a tool for summarizing (Meyer & Freedle, 1984).
When students use this strategy, they are better able to understand what they are reading, identify key information, and provide a summary that helps them retain the information (Armbruster, Anderson, & Ostertag, 1987).
Anne Bubnic on 06 Sep 08Students, administrators and teachers at Gilbert Classical Academy have a new tool to express themselves that is rarely tapped by schools as a teaching aid: blogs. Blogs have been available on the Internet for years, offering Web users an opportunity to opine on various subjects and post images in a personal journal that anyone on the Internet can read. But schools have generally not utilized them as a classroom tool because officials have such worries as: What if inappropriate messages are posted? What if a hacker steals personal information on a child or staff member?
