Online Learning Communities:

Promoting Collaboration, Inspiring Creativity,

and Giving Students a Voice

Ashley VanValkenburgh (Miss V)Battle Creek Central High School

9th Grade English

What Piqued My Interest

• Computer literacy is a requisite in today’s world• They are used to: downloaded music, phones in their

pockets, libraries on their laptops, hypertext, and instant messaging.

• Young adults “have been networked most or all of their lives” (Prensky 2001).

• “Students have an uncanny ability to outpace faculty ability to master technology. …methods of electronic communication have supplanted more mundane methods of communication” (Custin and Barkacs 2010).

• Therefore, “…the world of writing is a mural, not a snapshot” (Romano 2007)

Research Questions

• What can an online learning community (in the form of a class website/blog) add to a classroom?

• What are the benefits and drawbacks to such an endeavor?

• Can student learning be enhanced? Can teachers effectively measure student progress and understanding?

My Classroom Make-Up

• Primary Mentor Teacher: Cortney Coats

• Honors English 9• Why target this group?– Curriculum involves various pieces of

literature– Supplementing the text with online

activities and aiming to increase students’ understanding of the material

What Some Studies Have Found

• “…by completing the required readings and then posting discussion questions and reflections on topics of interest to which their classmates can respond--essentially beginning the conversation prior to the class session--students become more engaged in the course material” (Davi, Frydenberg, & Gulati 2007)

• Blogs are “personal in nature and a part of a community and… blogs make the Internet more ‘human scale’” (Trammel & Ferdig 2004)

What is Edmodo?

• “Provides teachers and students with a secure place to connect and collaborate, share content and educational applications, and access homework, grades, class discussions and notifications”

• Its goal? “To help educators harness the power of social media to customize the classroom for each and every learner”

Integration of Technology

• “Laptop carts” as a resource• Posting writing prompts each week relating to

the novel being read– Example: Do you think the Friar and Nurse are acting like

responsible adults? Are they moral characters? Analyze the motivations of both the Nurse and the Friar in their attempts to help the young lovers and discuss the rightness (or wrongness) of their decisions.

• Making expectations clear and providing students with a detailed rubric– “No abbreviations or text-like words. Complete

sentences and formal language are a must.”– Inappropriate comments, personal attacks, and the

like are prohibited!

Excellent/Exemplary Good Minimal Non-Existent

Use of examples and textual support

I express a thorough knowledge of the material by discussing specific examples, giving textual evidence, and offering

I express some knowledge of the material by using an example or incorporating a quote from the reading

I express a vague/general knowledge of the material but fail to provide substantive details, examples, quotes, etc.

I have not been keeping up with the reading (and this can be seen in my posts)

Strong, professional voice

My opinion/viewpoint is clear and expressed in a tactful manner

My opinion/viewpoint is somewhat clear and is usually expressed tactfully

My opinion/viewpoint can barely be determined by readers and/or I was lacking tact

My opinion/viewpoint is lacking completely and/or I attacked another participant verbally

Participation I have gone above and beyond the requirements and have posted more than three times this week!

I have met the class requirement in posting three times this week.

I have only posted once or twice this week on the class blog.

I did not post at all on the class blog.

What Happened1) PARTICIPATION FROM OTHERWISE QUIET STUDENTS (GIVING

STUDENTS A VOICE)

S.A. : I look forward to going to college so that I can become an obstetrician. I want to live in a nice house NOT in Battle Creek!! I want to travel and do everything I possbily can before I have children. These things will make my life better becuase I will make alot of money and I will have a place to live and not be homeless on the street like others, and I just love to travel!!! Similarly, Napoleon allows Moses to tell these stories of Sugarcandy mountain because he wants to give the animals something to look forward to in the future. The animals were working for little of nothing and were not very motivated. These stories gives the animals a purpose to work, a purpose to stay motivated. Napoleon knows that this is the only way to keep the animals working for him.

• M.R. - I agree with you when you say that if they dont have anything to look forward to they will not be motivated, and then not much work will get done around the farm if they think they are doing it for nothing.

• G.J. - I absolutely agree because if the animals dont have anything to look forward to then there would be no reason for them to keep on going.

What Happened2) STUDENTS ENCOURAGING AS WELL AS CHALLENGING ONE

ANOTHER & STUDENTS ENGAGING IN PEER MENTORING (COLLABORATION)

S.S. : What will Romeo and Juliet do after they get married? Are they going to run away, keep their marriage a secret, tell the parents, what are they planning to do? what is the best choice for these two love birds?

• J.W. - I think romeo and juliet will tell their parents that they are married and see how it goes over with them if it is a bad reaction then i think they will leave and live a better life without the parents

• G.J. - I think that Romeo and Juliet will keep their marriage a secret. But I believe that their marriage won’t stay a secret. I think that the friar will tell their parents because he thinks that it isn’t a good idea to be married in secret. I believe the best thing to do right now is to just lay low and not make it obvious that they are married.

What Happened3) BEING ABLE TO ANSWER STUDENTS QUESTIONS OUTSIDE THE

CLASSROOM TO AID IN COMPREHENSION OF THE TEXT

G.J.: Do you think that Juliet is going to go through with the whole marriage thing with Paris? Will the father change his mind about having Juliet marry Paris?

• Me - It's definite a tough decision for her... I do not think that Lord Capulet will change his mind. He seems very adamant about the marriage and is stern when he says, "She'll be ruled by me" (paraphrasing). It will be interesting to see what Juliet does next... What plan is she concocting? Will she avoid the marriage? Will she pretend to love him, marry him, and then run away at the first opportunity? We shall see....

• Me - Wow.... I just saw that in the first line of that response, there is a type-o! Way to set a good example, Miss V!

• G.J. - Hahaha I know right :)

Further Issues/Implications

• Funding and resources (or lack thereof)

• “Technology doesn’t make our work any tidier” (Kajder 2007)

• Requires intense supervision, explicit guidelines, planning of alternative assignments, and willingness to work outside the classroom (but don’t most aspects of teaching?)

Where To Go From Here…• Encouraging more student dialogue, giving

students more freedom to choose topics and ask questions– “It’s as if our instincts lead us to take what we’ve

done in the past and reproduce the process using different tools to create the same product” (Kajder 2007)

• Developing more alternatives for students with physical handicaps, learning disabilities, and other special needs

• Changing my method of evaluation/grading – Certain number of responses per students per week

may lead to student dissatisfaction (Custin & Barkacs 2010)

A Thank You To…All faculty members in the

Fritz Shurmur Center for Teacher DevelopmentMichael RoesslerSuellyn Henke

Jason MoritzGuy Cox

Mary Weicht

Mentor TeachersCortney CoatsSusan Jordan

Friends and Family!

Sources of Information

Coats, C., Personal communication, January-March 2012.

Custin, R., & Barkacs, L. (2010). “Developing sustainable learning communities through blogging.” Journal of Instructional Pedagogies, 4.

Davi, A., Frydenberg, M., & Gulati, G.J. (2007). “Blogging across the disciplines: Integrating technology to enhance liberal learning.” Journal of Online Learning and Teaching, 3.

Kajder, S.B. (2007). Unleashing potential with emerging technologies. In K. Beers, R. Probst, & L. Rief (Eds.), Adolescent Literacy (213-229). Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Prensky, Marc. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants. On the Horizon. MCB University Press, 9, (5).

Trammel, K.D., & Ferdig, R.E. (2004). Pedagogical implications of classroom blogging. Academic Exchange Quarterly.

Questions, Comments, Suggestions?