OLLIE Iowa

This goes hand in hand with a few others; however, I felt it was noteworthy as a reminder that online instruction is different from face-to-face instruction and effective practices will likely look different in each place. Make sure to plan with that purpose in mind.

I completely agree! This is where I think many teachers are struggling right now with remote teaching - we are trying to do what we do in the face-to-face classroom and transfer it to online. This is not necessarily the fault of the teacher as we haven't been trained on quality online instruction. This is my goal for the current school year - to develop a PD plan for our teachers on how to instruct online.

I've been trying to create a blending learning environment this year that both my students who are "hybrid" and face to face can utilize. I think if I was creating curriculum as well as a separate online course, I'm looking at burning out pretty fast. I've already noticed the amount of extra time it is taking to get my five different preps to be appropriate for both.

Communication is key in any learning environment; however, it seems to have a larger role in the online world. I appreciate the reminder of including rubrics as they serve as a great communication tool on expectations and assessment.

This is an area I need to continue to learn more about. It seems that the online environment lends itself well to differentiation.

This is an area that also presents challenges in my mind. What does that differentiation look like for online environments?

This is one of many reasons why I enrolled in the 101 course. Collaboration looks different in the online classroom and I want to continue to develop tools to provide the optimum collaborative environment.

This is something that is not included in the Iowa Teaching Standards. I like the idea of this, but I think as the teacher of the course it can be a little scary to ask students for their feedback. It should be a part of every course both face to face as well as online after students are at an age in which they can effectively offer feedback. I think there are ways that questions can be asked to get quality feedback instead of just "I didn't like this course." I also appreciate that the emphasis of this standard is on improving the course based on the feedback. The continuous process of improvement is so important for all teachers.

My professional learning goal for the current school year is to create a professional development plan for our elementary teachers as we begin to implement 1:1 devices. I think it would be important / helpful for me to incorporate these standards while I create the plan.

I find these tricky skills to instill in my 4th graders. For some students the maturity level is not there to master this. Other students have not been asked to take on responsibility outside of school.

At what age can peer and self assessments be done with a level of success? Is this feasible in elementary school?

Active learners are so much more invested in their learning. It is an awesome thing to see.

Expectations must be very clear and well laid out or this process is painful for all.

Love this!

At the 4th grade level I would not use peer assessment as part of a students grade. 4th grade is a good starting point for teaching students how to peer assess and how to use that feedback to improve their work.

I struggle with laying out the process well so students do not become frustrated with it.

This statement resonated with me because often times I hear teachers express concerns about peer assessment because students won't know how to give good feedback. It all comes back to whether or not students have a clear understanding of the expectations - the model. If students truly understand what is expected - and they value the project - they will be able to give quality feedback to each other.

I believe John Hattie would call these expectations/definitions of quality "success criteria."

I often said to my former 5th graders, "Check your work before you turn your assignment in." or "Go back and check your work." The students would simply look at their paper for a few more seconds and then try to turn it in again. I used to get so frustrated. What I didn't realize back then was that the students didn't know how to check their work. I needed to explicitly teach them what that looks like as well as what they should be checking for. Did they even know the success criteria? Did I give them any expectations for quality?

This would be an example of how an online course would be easier to do this than with a face-to-face course. The idea that as the teacher you could look over the group discussions via the LMS and have a clear undrstanding of the participation of all group memebers is something that you wouldn't have in an oral discussion via a face-to-face setting. It is also one of the most common issues with group work - what if one of the members isn't doing anything?

Would there ever need to be a situation in which you utilized all three assessments of group work - peer, self, and team?

A few important parts of this definition that stand out to me: *FA is used by teachers AND students - I'm not sure that every teacher is making sure that students are using formative assessments to improve their understanding. Are students invited in to the process? Are they given their assessments back to self-assess and self-reflect? *FA need to provide feedback - putting a grade on the top of a FA and then calling that feedback is simply not enough. How are we communicating to students / and how are students communicating to teachers with feedback? Are both parties using the information to make changes? *FA needs to provide feedback in order for adjustments to be made to teaching and learning. Is this happening in every classroom and with every FA? I don't think so. Often times, I see teachers who have a unit plan written in their grade books (today I will do this, tomorrow I will do this...). Even when they get FA data that suggests students are not understanding the material, the teacher still moves on to keep pace with the unit as it was laid out. Some of this is due to outside pressures to cover the content in a short amount of time. But some of it may be due to a lack of understanding on the teacher's part to how they need to adjust their instruction to meet the students' needs. *Finally, the goal of FA is to improve students' achievement of the intended outcomes. We have to look at FA as a navigation system for our destination. The route may be "recalculating" several times due to FA data, but if we use the data to help us, we can steer the learning back on course. *

Another common misconception. I work with many teachers who struggle to move beyond the test or quiz. An assessment is something you give to the students for them to do. However, formative assessment can come in many forms and can happen throughout the lesson and the learning process. It isn't at the end.

John Hattie discusses success criteria as well in Visible Learning. Students (and teachers) need to have a clear understanding and vision for what is expected for their learning. What is the end goal? What would that look like if the students was successful? I

This is exactly what John Hattie talks about in Chapter 7 of Visible Learning.

Students need to feel like learning is something that they are in control of rather than something that is being done to them.