What's UR Rxn? A chemistry class blog, part 3

This is the final installment of my development of a chemistry writing blog project for my Organic and AP chemistry classes. I will cede the keyboard to my students for the next post as we launch our “What’s UR Rxn?” blog.

One of the problems for science teachers assigning writing projects is the necessity to assess the student’s writing. It can be a very intimidating process, especially for teachers who are more used to black-and-white answers instead of the shades in between associated with the more subjective grading of writing. For the last five years, I have done a writing/role-play project called The Ethanol Project.  (I published this project in the NSTA journal The Science Teacher in March, 2013.) The journal reviewers wanted a “turn-key” lesson, and so I produced a two-page detailed table of writing objectives and expectations. This blog project has a much looser rubric, because I wanted to allow students to write about science or chemistry in their own voice and with a style suited to their topic.

I have spent the last two days reading and assessing the student’s posts and also their comments as peer-reviewers. Oh, it has been joyful for me NOT to be reading about ethanol!!  My students wrote about deer antler spray, cranberries, crowdsourcing antibiotics, Indian silk, the need for pot-testing labs, honey, caffeine, turmeric, snowflakes, and the biology of listening to music. So many interesting topics, it was not as much of a chore as I thought it would be. 

Another goal of this project was to make it completely paper-less and cloud-based. I did not want my email inbox filled with documents to transfer to various folders. Just as each student had a Microsoft SkyDrive folder for their documents (rough draft, two peer edits, the final draft, and a checklist which included a list of sources, image sources, and an honor statement), I decided to create an assessment page in a Microsoft OneNote folder for each student. As I went through the SkyDrive folder, I would toggle over to the OneNote folder and write comments and grade their blog posts, in addition to commenting on their editing. I did not want to put the assessments into the SkyDrive folder as they are open to everyone, so the OneNote folder allowed for private assessment space. I can now email each page to each student. The following table was copied into each OneNote page.

Rubric Grading Template

Final draft (50 points)

1.     Creative title (5)
2.     Writing is thoughtful, organized and uses a colloquial voice, as opposed to an analytical one. (25)
3.     No grammar or spelling errors (5)
4.     Image(s) must supplement the writing. (5)
5.     General creativity (5)
6.     All requirements met: at least one current source, source a minimum 400 words, title, hyperlinks, and a copyright-free image (5) (Bonus points for primary sources.)
Total

Grading:

45-50 = 100

40-44 = 95

35-39 = 90

30-34 = 85

25-29 = 80

20-24 = 75

Yes, I have a rather generous grading scheme. The beauty of the student peer-review process (and the fact that I think our school’s English and history teachers do an amazing job of teaching writing!) is that there were very few distracting errors in grammar, spelling, or sentence syntax. Also, my organic chemistry students’ grades were pretty low coming into this assignment due to just finishing units on spectroscopy and stereochemistry, so they needed a bit of a grade boost!

The chemistry blog project has definitely been a success: it was fun to develop with my students, interesting to implement, and even rather enjoyable to assess. My AP chemistry students will be writing their posts during second semester. I listed this project on my AP chemistry audit document as my method to meet the Curriculum Requirement 4:  “the opportunity to connect their knowledge of chemistry and science to major societal or technological components.” I have checked the box required by the College Board, but I would have done this project even without that requirement. 

You’ll get to read my students’ posts once they have produced their own blog site. 

I would love to know “What’s UR Rxn?”

What's UR Rxn? A chemistry class blog, part 2

My organic chemistry students were given the “What’s UR Rxn?” blog project rubric shortly after my last blog post. We spent the latter part of one of our one-hour blocks to discuss ideas for their blogs. I had a stack of C&E News from the American Chemical Society for them to peruse. It was fun to watch them try out ideas on me and on each other. Their topics all were supposed to be different from one another, and I was very surprised when the first student to “shotty” an idea, said loudly, “I get chemical weapons in Syria!” 

The students were given seven days to write the rough draft.  I think one of the hardest parts for some of them was to change their writing style to fit the project and to fit themselves.  I told them that I did not want, “blah, blah, blah, citation, paraphrase, paraphrase, citation.”  Not that the teachers in other classes encourage this kind of writing, but I think the possibility of being caught plagiarizing looms large and it tends to make their writing choppy and unnatural. 

Prior to the peer-edit day, I set up a folder on my Microsoft SkyDrive for the project and created a folder for each student, accessible to all for viewing and editing.  (Full disclosure—I did my best to embrace Google Drive and Google Docs over the summer in my online class and even dabbled with Evernote and Dropbox.  I never felt comfortable until I got the new version of Office on my laptop in August with Skydrive, Word, OneNote, and Outlook all integrated together. Sounds odd, but it was like coming home! And no, I’m not paid by Microsoft, but our school has some very high connections with Microsoft, so we have always been a Microsoft school.)

At first I was not exactly sure how to assign peer-editors for each post, but as a class we decided to use a random-number generator.  I assigned each student a number and we called out numbers until everyone was matched. After the first edit, they could invite others or choose their next edit. All the folders were open to everyone, so they opened the rough draft, saved as name_edit, and used the markup tools in Word, and away they went. It was completely silent!  (At least block 1 was, block 7 can never be truly silent…) Students gave each other great, constructive criticism, (edits in red):

[This paragraph is definitely more complicated and confusing than the previous paragraph. I would suggest simplifying the process more so normal people who don’t have too thorough of an understanding of chemistry can follow along.]  (I like the fact that ‘normal’ people don’t have an understanding of chemistry!)

Or “seemingly invulnerability” yielded, [You are using an adverb on a noun.]

The students were then given another seven day period to make changes and post their final draft in the folder. They were not allowed to email them to me.  A few tried, but I told them to go back to the SkyDrive link and make it work.

Another fun piece of the assignment was that they had to pick an image/avatar for themselves for the end of the blog and add a 140 character description so the blog readers would know something about them. Here is Abdullah’s picture—I love that he included his mom.

Or Helena’s description:  “I’m Lena, currently a high school senior. I’m not sure what I want to do in the future, but I know what I’m passionate about. If you like art, 90’s bands, or Woody Allen films, we’ll get along just fine. And if you don’t, we’ll still get along fine.”

Pure Helena.  (Though maybe a few characters too long.)

What’s UR Rxn?

What's UR Rxn? A chemistry class blog, part 1

I emailed my students the rubric for the class blog project today.

Ever since starting THIS blog last April, I have been ambivalent about the whole endeavor. I tend to be much too particular to be able to write quickly or easily. The act of posting my writing to the “world” reminds me a bit of piano recitals, which were not my favorite evening growing up.

Maybe I wanted my chemistry students to experience some of this angst.  (OK, that sounds mean, but I am a chemistry teacher AND an organic chemistry teacher, I know how to cause angst.)

I introduced the assignment to my AP classes back in September. We used a block of time to brainstorm ideas for the requirements of the project. It was not a tightly structured block, so a few students rose through as leaders. These students volunteered to be editors for the project. I gathered the ideas into the start of a rubric and then let the project sit for three months.  (I’m a cross country coach—there were other things on my mind.) Just recently I discussed the project with my organic chemistry students and, similarly, I now have editors and ideas for the assignment from those two classes. I sent the rubric outline out for the editor's review.  Here are a few of their responses.

About a minimum word limit: 

“I'm not sure if any of the grading categories account for writing quality. Some pieces of writing feel as if they have "filler" information with redundant or irrelevant sentences intended to get the article over the word minimum. This sentence that you're currently reading, which is not really necessary and a bit of a run-on, restates exactly what I just said about adding a sentence to increase the length of one's writing through superfluous words, when actually it doesn't serve a useful purpose, since I just mentioned that and you don't really need an example, but I have read a lot of papers that are written this way, even if they do have interesting content. :)”

About the lack of structure:

“Anyway, while nothing within the rubric is wrong, that in itself is the problem. The rubric you created, no offense, offers mostly generalities, lacks explicit goals and instructions, and desperately needs more criteria that can be effectively evaluated and graded.”

About the distribution of points:

“I agree; the point distribution for the final draft should be altered a bit; fewer points should be awarded for "interesting/entertaining" (probably 5, at most 10) and there should be more focus on clarity and cogency of the writing itself.”

From these ideas, I have constructed the assignment. 

• 30 points for a rough draft (on time, has a copyright-free image, current source, written in colloquial voice.)
• 20 points for 2 different peer-edits (check grammar, sentence structure, sources, and give ideas for improvement)
• 50 points for the final copy (creative title, thoughtful and organized, correct voice, image supplements writing, general creativity, and meets all requirements)
• 20 points extra point assignment, if the post is published:

“The publication standard will be met only by posts that are current, thoughtful, creative, entertaining, well-written, and worthy of a blog post representing our school. The publisher will discuss selections for publication with the editors, but the ultimate decision is made by the publisher.” (I am the publisher.)

I decided to go with a looser writing rubric, contrary to one of my editor's request. If I want my students to “find their own voice” when writing this piece, I did not want them to be hamstrung with a rubric that details what I think good writing looks like. I like the bonus points for “above and beyond” needed to be met for publication. 

This assignment is a work in progress. The goal is to have my students write about science with a personal voice, but also to be involved in creating the assignment and learn leadership and communication skills as they produce the blog with the rest of the class.

I’d love to know UR Rxn!

Bricks/Mortar to Clicks/Cloud

I believe in the power of a classroom. I have started many 'philosophy of education' pieces with that phrase. Until the summer of 2013, that classroom would be the traditional space with a white board, demo table, student desks, and lab stations. Now, my new classroom will include a flipped approach with multiple sets of podcast lessons and video conferencing with a screen share of my writing tablet and uploading student structures via iPads and drawing apps.

It has been a very steep, intense learning curve for me to get to this point. I have been told that snowboarding has a much steeper learning curve than skiing, so I like to think of all the detours and struggles I have encountered in the last four months much like the time a novice snowboarder spends sitting on the slopes.

This OChemPrep endeavor started in the spring with a visit to my accountant. I told her that I wanted to start a company to help students get ready for organic chemistry in college. She said she could file the incorporation papers, and she also wrote down the name of a client who might be able to help me with website development.  It was not more than one minute later when that client, my ‘producer,' walked into her office. I gave him my OChemPrep ‘elevator pitch,’ he took the hook, and I was the owner of an edtech start-up!

I have learned so much in such a short amount of time that I sometimes feel like a first-year teacher again. Maybe with a bit more control over my life, but like then I am awestruck by those who seem to know so much more than I do. 

What have I learned?

·        Podcasting—Wow, it takes FAR longer than I ever expected to produce good educational videos.  From planning to recording (and re-recording) to editing and rendering and then compiling a list of all the links in a cloud-shared document, this process required many days, and some nights.

·        Marketing--the most time-consuming, frustrating, but ultimately rewarding part of the project. I have a healthy respect for anyone starting a new business. The effort paid off and I cheered with each and every ding from the Gmail app as a student registered for a summer 'boot camp' class.

·        Tweeting--Oh, the world of educational twitter!! The #satchat and #tlap chats with tweets flying past faster than one could read. (It took me weeks of lurking before I knew what #tlap stood for--you teaching pirates out there know who you are!!) This was the most amazing (and fun) professional development tool ever.
 

So now, having worked all summer to build a website, a blog, a forum with a set of interactive games, a video textbook for organic chemistry prep and a PLN on twitter, I am ready to take the step out of my bricks-and-mortar classroom into my cloud-based one.  I just read a post by Jake Clapp of Global Online Academy, and I will quote:  “Teaching and learning in the online environment demands creative approaches to instruction, assessment, community building, and formative feedback.”  So maybe there is a reason why I have felt like a first-year teacher again.

So into the virtual classroom I go, hoping it’s a steep curve up, but a great ride down.

A Teacher's View from the Fourth of July

It may not exactly be mid-summer (and in Scandinavia that was actually June 21), but July Fourth seems to be the day that I finally say good-bye to last year's classes and start looking forward to next year's.

Saying good-bye. This is sometimes the hardest part of teaching. The beauty of small (<20) and sometimes very small (<10!) class sizes is that each class becomes a small community of its own. In fact, many of my classes have referred to themselves as a family, like the 'Block 4 Families' that have coalesced these past two years. Teaching and learning in such a tight group is an amazing experience for all of us. This year on the last day of class, the last block of the day, my very small block 4 did not want to disband. We knew that the moment the first student left the class, the magic would be gone. We stood in a circle and waited...

Yes, someone finally had to leave, but no one wanted to be the first. Block 4 was a blessing.

(As with so many other Block X Families over the years, but this year even more so.)

Looking forward. The summer emails just went out to my future students. The teaching wheel starts rolling. Sometimes I look at those people who do not have school-related jobs and wonder what it would be like to have their year-round schedule. They can take vacations in September (!) and they can even have free weekends in the fall (I'm a cross country coach), but will they ever experience that excited, first-day-of-school (or practice) feeling that comes with teaching and coaching?

Other post-7/4 questions start to rattle around in my brain. Will my next year's classes/team learn to work together and with me? Will I find new ways to present chemistry to make the classroom better for my students and to keep teaching interesting? Which of my students/athletes will attain the badge of legend? ("Legends" are those characters who for better or worse, usually worse, become part of my many stories of teaching.) Which block, if any, will transform into a Block 4?

So tonight we watch the fireworks over a lake in northern Michigan. As far away from my classroom in time and spirit as I will be this summer. But tomorrow starts the slide toward the new school year. The cycle begins again.