EDU 643

Revised Design

Since the lesson outline that I have submitted at the beginning of this class was already something I have revised and improved over time, I decided to approach this week's project slightly differently. I will be sharing thoughts and reflections on previous iterations and areas that I felt were missteps on my part in my design that led to my current state, through multiple personal reflections and prototypes.

Originally, when I first approached how to teach stop-motion, I began by telling my students that they were going to make a big LEGO Movie, simply because I wanted to pique their interests. This often was somewhat successful at engaging students, however, I feel this was not the best method for a number of reasons. For example, it didn't explain the genre at all, and didn't share the multitude of possibilities, nor did it offer students the choice to explore the style of stop-motion that they wanted to. I then changed this because not all students like the LEGO Movie genre and I wanted students to have a deeper understanding of what was possible with stop-motion animation.

Other big changes I made along the way as I revised this lesson was to start big, and prepare my students for a long road ahead, with a big final goal that would take quite some time to complete. However, many students, with the exception of the most resilient, would often would lose interest or have difficulty engaging with something that would take so long to see a final result. This led to me changing my lesson structure to more compartmentalised topics and developing a new learning strategy for my students, that I call "micro-projects". The concept of micro-projects is quite simple, where students learn a singular and simple concept, through hands on activities that they can see instant results with and gain feedback on quickly and easily. This feedback can come from myself, from peers, and from their own reflections. Later, students then build up a repertoire of skills from a number of micro-projects, that they can combine and later apply to a large-scale project, such as a similar sized project that I used to start with in the beginning.

Another important point of the micro-project is that students have the opportunity to repeatedly go through the creative process quickly and internalise the primary steps, which include planning, executing their plan, then reflecting on the success of that execution. With a single large project that takes weeks or even months to complete, they were only afforded the opportunity to complete that one project, and one reflection based on that project, which therefore limited their ability to learn from mistakes in that project. And with that original lesson design, not only did they have a single opportunity to reflect, students were often very disengaged by the end that their reflections were so disjointed, they became inefficient learning opportunities, where students couldn't really make the necessary connections to learn from the process itself.

Other big changes I've made to this design which are reflected in the current design is that I have purposely selected a simple manipulative (a marker) to use for students to begin with, as there are no moving parts, they won't get distracted with trying to do too much, and they can focus on only the concept they were trying to learn. In the past, I had started with a lego character or other movable object, which wasn't an effective way to have students learn simple concepts, as they would often get distracted with either playing with the lego, or trying to animate the lego to do too much, which would limit their ability to focus on simple concepts of animation they were tyring to learn for that day.

In terms of the tech, I've tried to make it as easy as possible by providing a cheap and simple USB camera for each of my students to use with their own laptops. Although the question for accessibility is valid when thinking of the need of a laptop to be successful in this lesson, being that I teach this program in an environment and context where tech is prevalent, it is a requirement to have certain tech to take my class, as well as the fact that I would likely not be teaching this program in a school that doesn't have the same access to tech, it would make that conversation moot. However, the accessibility to cameras has been a big concern. Previously I relied on students using their own phones or ipads for this type of activity, however, I found that to be ineffective, and have invested in the USB Okiocams through my class budget for equitability across my entire class. I would describe these cameras as "cheap n cheerful" that do a great job for the money spent. This is also something that I can easily send home with students in their learning packages during online learning.

In terms of how I have "hooked" my students in the beginning, I have also made changes to this over time as well. I currently use a simple intro video that introduces a variety of styles of stop-motion animation, as well as some of techniques, but doesn't bog my student down with too much information and is quick (about 3 minutes). In the past I've used longer videos that have often left students overwhelmed with too many details, and they have been focussed more on making animations with lego only, which didn't introduce students to other possibilities of stop motion animation.

Another big thing that I've changed over the years, is that I now rarely allow students to work in groups. This is primarily due to the fact that in group scenarios there are always students who do more than others, and always students who do less. This has allowed me to have a clearer idea of a students learning and give direct feedback to individual students to help them grow as creators. In a group setting, I have often heard group members say that the work was split up equally, when I know it hasn't been. Changing this group project dynamic has allowed me to ensure each of my learners are having an equitable opportunity to learn, and give me an opportunity to find problem areas or students of concern that need addressing.

To view my lesson slides for how this lesson would look now, click here.

Reflection

The revision process is an important process of any good lesson design. As I reflect upon the revisions I have made, and where I started with my initial vision and my initial design, I see how far I've come and how much more effective my current lesson design is. As I mention above, I developed a "micro-project" method of teaching. This method allowed me to teach my students more effectively, it allowed my students an opportunity to reflect more often on their own learning, and it allowed me to address areas of concern in my students' learning more easily.

Instead of starting with the big idea, and moving through it step by step, this new process involved me to think of my big end-goals, then isolate all my key skills and concepts I wanted my students to learn along the way, then break each of those up into individual lessons (the micro-projects) and gave students the opportunity to learn these skills more effectively before moving into a bigger project. This also allows students to feel more confident, be more engaged, and be more successful in the end.

This process has made me reassess the accessibility piece of my class, and if there are ways I can make the content more accessible. Although, as I mentioned above, I do teach in a context where students are 1-1, and I don't think I would ever attempt to teach this type of lesson in a school or environment that wasn't, so I do think that this lesson is accessible. To contrast, a type of lesson that I could plan that wouldn't be accessible would be one that required all students to have access to Final Cut Pro or Premiere Pro at home on their laptops, which is higher level editing software that have a significant financial barrier of entry. And this is something I simply do not do. So I do think that I have taken accessibility into account and I can defend the decisions I have made in my lessons, and I do feel that my lesson is equitable and fair, based on the context that I am in.

One area that I admittedly struggle with is thinking about ways my lesson can be accessible to students with physical or other handicaps. I think I struggle with this because I have always worked in the private system in Hong Kong, where students with major disabilities are rarely accepted into international schools. So in my context, this has never been a concern, and possibly never will be if I stay in the HK International School market for my full career, however, this is always something in the back of my mind. When considering principals of UDL, I do attempt to share content with my students in as many modalities as possible. Such as video, text, verbal instructions, physically acting out activities and physically walking students through these activities, and providing visually engaging "hyperdocs" of information for their projects for students (like me) who hate a "wall of text." However, I have never truly needed to redesign my lessons for students with physical disabilities or other concerns, and may never need to in my context.

When I consider students with physical handicaps, I consider how they can demonstrate their learning in this task. One idea that comes to mind is similar to how a teacher can be a scribe for students who have difficulty writing, and in this activity in particular, I could see that the student can be more of a director, for either myself or other students, to have students move the manipulative where they want it to go while taking pictures for the stop-motion assessment activity. Though I also think about how difficult this would be logistically, and how I likely would have to offer accommodations for the level of assessment for this type of unit. Or just not teach this unit (or similar units) altogether, to ensure no one is feeling left out.