Stop Motion Studio

The wording of the NGSS Performance Expectations often explicitly ask students to be able to "model" which is a difficult thing to do with pencil and paper. Stop Motion Studio however allows students to show how a model can actually operate and works well as a form of summative assessment at the completion of a unit of instruction. The process of creating the animations the first time does take some instruction as well as requesting that students, at least some, download the free app. Modeling kits are also needed. But once these things are established, students seem to enjoy being "movie makers" and animators. They want to watch and critique each other's work and offer suggestions which gets at the heart of the standard. Once the videos are created, they are ideal for review purposes or to supply to absent students.

This student video example is of a section of the electron transport chain in cellular respiration that corresponds to the NGSS Performance Expectation HS-LS1-7: Use a model to illustrate that cellular respiration is a chemical process whereby the bonds of food molecules and oxygen molecules are broken and the bonds in new compounds are formed resulting in a net transfer of energy.

Google Forms

Before I started the Ed Tech program at Loyola, I had already started flipping my classroom by using videos and questions as a way to formatively assess where my students were. As my school pulls students from the entire city of middle schools, it is imperative to know what level of understanding of physical science content my students have before we dive into topics. This allows me to tailor my instruction and create targeted materials to use in class. Typically a video and question set are assigned on a Tuesday to be completed by the following Monday night. The video is focused on material to be covered in the classes right after the Monday due date so I have time to make curricular adjustments over the weekend as I begin to look through the student responses.

My school district does not utilize an off the shelf Learning Management System (LMS) that integrates grades, assignments, attendance and communication. We utilize Aspen to warehouse attendance data and grades as well as access student records and contact information. Students, parents, and school staff all have Aspen accounts. While Aspen seems to be a solid database management system for student records and data, it was not designed as an integrated grade book and communication platform. So while I enter attendance and grade data in Aspen on a daily basis, I have no method of communicating with my students and parents about that information through the platform. I utilize Remind to bridge that gap. Since Aspen can not push out assignments to students, I post the assignments in Aspen, and then send links or descriptions of them through Remind several times a week. As deadlines approach I often send reminders to students letting them know how many people have or have not completed assignments. When students take a quiz, I send out a message letting them know that they are graded and entered on Aspen as a cue to have them go look. By prompting my students to go look at my class in Aspen, they often spend time looking at their other classes. My students and parents always tell me how much they appreciate my communication and timeliness with grades, and often comment that they wish their other teachers did the same thing. By training my students to check their grades frequently, my hope is that they at least learn to self advocate with their other teachers when they do not see grades entered or to question when they think a grade is in error.