I haven't been doing a very good job "moderating" #slowAandPchat. Once the opening of school approached, I put the chat on the back burner to focus on the First Day and to focus on enjoying the last days of summer with my two kids.
So, here is what I propose: instead of a weekly theme or question, why don't we simply let #slowAandPchat be a hashtag for ongoing conversation, exchange of ideas, and the posting of questions all related to the teaching and learning of A&P? While there are only of few members of our fledgling chat group, the posts have been awesome. I have learned much from my K-16 colleagues and I think we have much more to offer. I am trying several new ideas this year in our classroom and I would like to share. Not to boast, but to get good feedback from others who can provide an objective critical viewpoint. Or advice if they have been down the same road.
I will toss this out there to our regular contributors for discussion. Thanks.
So what are the new techniques you are trying out this year? Excited to hear!
ReplyDeleteHi Cara. I don't really know where to start but here is a list:
Delete--implementing 20% Time for my A&P students (see "20% Time" tab top right of screen for blogs on that) every Friday. Decided to scrap rat dissection to make time for it (we never got through double-injected pig fetuses anyway so why not skip rats, completely do pigs and see what my students can create?)
--Periscoping (@bakerhhhs) interesting portions of dissection out to other A&P classrooms (like the endotracheal intubation and lung inflation). Your classes? Gerry's? Pete VK's? Would only allow commenting by Periscope followers (to filter-out trolls). You guys could do the same and I would put your broadcasts up on IWB for my whole class to see.
--more group problem-solving as soon as students enter classroom (brainstorming the potential reasons behind physiological phenomena like pallor, cyanosis, weak pulses, etc...)
--encouraging students to take pictures and videos during dissections and tweet them out using classroom twitter account (@HHAandP, #HHAandP; see posting under "Teaching with Technology" tab above)
--using GAFE to share more with other teachers
--using QR codes posted throughout the classroom for quick student access to frequently-used documents or URLs
--a lot more under the "Room for Improvement" tab above
--trying my hand at flipping lectures
I think my mindset has changed; spend less time on the Googlable stuff (put more anatomy on the students) and really emphasize the physiology side. Hopefully the anatomy side/Googlable stuff will fall into place.
I have you to thank for a lot of it. Started with @bobloch teaching me Twitter, then lurking in chats, then #coffeeEdu at #ISTE15 with @alicekeeler, then our long conversation about teaching A&P. That's when I caught the bug; trying new things and sharing those out. Thank you!