When I took the job at Hyatts Middle School as the technology teacher in the 2007-08 school year, I was concerned that I wasn't going to know how to really assess the student's work through projects with rubrics and checklists. All I knew was 3rd grade reading, writing and math. Assessments were straight forward. Vocabulary test, spelling tests, everybody did the same things and took the same test. Boy, how education has changed... Then in the middle school technology classroom, I was teaching projects, providing rubrics and doing my best guiding my students through the work that I was told to teach. As Eagle News evolved into the program that it is, I have been working on, and changing, the way that I assess their video projects. In other years, I would have the students turn their projects into a portable hard drive that I would take home with me to assess. I would sometimes, copy that hard drive onto another drive so that I could bring just the back up drive home with me to watch videos and assess in the dining room of my house in the wee hours of the morning. Doing this type of assessing does NOTHING for my Eagle News students. I would look for the basic video skills that I taught my students and assess base of those skills and storytelling aspects of the video and any spelling mistakes that may occur in the video. Then give a grade and post it. No feedback from ANYONE was provided for the work that was turned in to anybody. What is the point of this and boy, it was no fun for me either. So how was I going to fix this. I asked myself how can I provide feedback to my students and help them immediately with the work that they do in class? What ways can I keep up with my gradebook and keep up with assessments so that I am providing the best experience and not grading everything at the last minute. In my experience, even I was getting confused what I did grade, watch, help groups with, and I needed a way to assess the best way possible. What I decided to do was to have the kids provide the final product to me in class, during class time. My classroom has 5 big screen televisions and each tv has an Apple TV connected to it(I named each "station" after a famous Pittsburgh athlete--Here in Columbus, my students do not like the Sydney Crosby station). I also have 30 Mac computers, either Mac Minis, Macbook Pros or iMacs that all have the ability to stream their screen to any of the Apple TVs. When a group is finished, some of the other students in other groups will gather around the tv to watch and assess the video being played. After the video ends, I will offer up immediate feedback, offer solutions to fix elements for a better grade or offer up a final grade for the group. I will then ask the other students to offer up constructive criticism or tell me what they have "stolen" from watching the other group's video. This way it allows me to keep up with my grades, offer feedback to my students and be organized so that our broadcasts offer up the videos that are being turned in on time.
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Today, Adam, his cousin, Cora went to the movies at Marcus Cinemas with me to see Penguins of Madagascar. The entire process of going to the movies has changes since I fell in love with movies and movie theatres. When my wife and I knew that Adam had earned this trip to the movies, I proceeded to look up the showings for the movie on my phone. I then confirmed my rewards card with Marcus Cinemas and found the time that I wanted to go. I had to confirm my card because I would save the $1.00 fee per ticket! Buying advanced tickets is special for movie theaters but not new. When I worked at the Arena Grand Movie Theatre (this link is about the news SMG Arena Grand) in 2008-2011 we sold reserved tickets all the time. Then it was just a reserved balcony section. Now, it makes sense to reserve any time that you go because, at Marcus, every theatre has these large recliner seats that take up more space, therefore there aren't as many seats in the theatre. Therefore more showing are selling out. There is also a comfort when you arrive at the theatre that your seats are there waiting for you. You know that your seats are ready, almost like a running car being nice and warm when you turn it on early to warm up your car. It also calmed me down when we had to wait in line at the concession stand for about 15 minutes. Anyways, today, the day after Thanksgiving, is usually reserved for getting the Christmas decorations up and ready. It turned into a day when my wife and I, but mostly my wife, would look at all the toys that my kids have and DO NOT play with, so we got them all together to sell very cheaply on Facebook. She sold a bunch and made about 40 bucks. That pretty cool and it is clearing up some space. It's now 2:45 am and I am looking back at the day...It started with looking at movie trailers for Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Jurassic World, seeing Penguins, selling toys then finally getting my platform and Christmas tree up. It's a long day, but productive. Below are the two trailers that really got me in the movie going mood today! It also reminded my how much I love going to the movies and how much I love going to the movies during the holidays and the summer! Enjoy the trailers! Oh where to begin.....I am writing this on Thanksgiving Day, during our "down" time. This year it is a little slower of a day for a particular Thanksgiving Day for me. My wife's brother and his wife brought home their son, Ben, from Korea yesterday and because we are blessed to have our nephew home with us this Thanksgiving, we are hosting a very small, low key Thanksgiving. A HoneyBaked Turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, apple pie, cranberry and a green bean casserole is all that the nine of us will enjoy this Thanksgiving. I am happy that we are having this small celebration this year. It made me look back and think about how crazy other Thanksgivings have been for me as a child. We always would travel to my Nana and PapPap's house where my 5 Aunts and their husbands and my cousins would all meet to eat. On average it was about 25-30 people in Lawrenceville and I loved every minute of this day! There would be football, aunts and uncles fighting, arguing with my Grandpa over the salaries of the Steelers' players and FOOD! My cousins and aunts would fight over my Nan's cinnamon rolls, which I thought were never a big deal! We would play football in my Nan's very small back yard, making sure that we didn't step in the dog's poop piles over the yard. We would then whine about having to drink milk or some special fruit juice that was available instead of pop. What is not to love about Thanksgiving. Heck, even one year, my Aunt Carol and my mom got into a fist fight at the table! My dad and my uncles took us kids to my Nan's Craft Store to get out of the house so that the aunts could make up after the fight! Although I miss being a kid, all wrapped up in my wonderful, crazy family, I really enjoy the quiet, chill version of Thanksgiving that I celebrate with my family, as an adult, here in Lewis Center, Ohio. This weekend, Adam and I went to see Big Hero 6 on Saturday afternoon. It is really cool to spend the afternoon with my son. We went to lunch, walked around the mall looking for a birthday present for my wife and then went to see the movie, Big Hero 6, at the Marcus Cinemas at Crosswoods. The movie was really good, not as good as Frozen, but really entertaining, especially for boys who like robots and science and superheroes. It had great characters, a great story and was lots of fun to watch. But the main attraction wasn't the best part of our experience at the theater. There was a short, by Disney, called Feast that premiered with Big Hero 6. It's about a dog who eats everything in its path and his owner who feeds him all this food. It was the best 6 minutes inside the theater. Many of the situations that were a part of the film, I connected with because it was exactly how we fed our dog when I was in high school. Check out this clip, it is a good look at the film, mark my words, and I probably won't watch any of the other animated shorts that will be nominated for an Oscar, but I am predicting already that "Feast" will win that award! Ok, I have decided to let the Eagle News all year kiddos create their first music video. As excited as they were, now they have realized that they have to do a Mother Goose Song. As last years kids weren't too happy about Elmo, these girls/boys will really enjoy this once they get started. Here is an example of the music they get to choose from, this is a cover of Shania Twain. Apparently, none of my students know who this person is. What can I say, it was another wonderful week in Washington, DC as our 8th grade students traveled there with Prodigy Student Travel. We started our trip by leaving Hyatts at 5 AM on Monday morning. We visited Mt. Vernon for our first stop, but we got there late because of falling behind at a couple of rest stops. Mt. Vernon, for me, is always one of my favorite stops in DC because I get to spend time with my group to get to know them a little bit better as we walk the grounds at Mt. Vernon. But instead, we rushed through the museum and ran to the house, so that the kids could see the main attraction there. Although it was a short visit, it was still very nice and a worthwhile visit. Later in the evening, we stopped at the FDR Memorial, MLK Memorial and the Jefferson Memorial. The FDR is my favorite memorial because of the many sections, the running water and if you really look at the quotes, and take a step back to really see what this man had to deal with, it is truly an amazing visit. Other stops during the week, were highlighted by the Lincoln Memorial, The World War II Memorial and the Holocaust Memorial. At the Holocaust Memorial, I was walking through one of the rooms with 4 students in my group when one of the workers asked the kids if they understood the gas chambers and what the people endured and went through as this was happening. At the time when the man approached us, the kids were looking at the model of the gas chamber and how it looked like a shower. The gentleman proceeded to spend 15 minutes telling us the story on what these people went through to get to the chamber. The 3-4 day train ride to the camp, thinking that they would be cleaned up, to only be cleaned of their belongings and then to be murdered and incinerated. This man told the kids this story in the most emotional way. After the man moved on to tell another group of people another story, the students and I went to the next part of the room, where we watched what happened to the people who were not killed but had to live in these camps and these conditions. I was so proud of the respect these students displayed those 2 and 1/2 hours we spent in this museum. This was the real reason to visit the museums in DC, to learn, to respect, to live what had happened in history. This was my most memorable moment. To finish the week in DC, it is customary to have a dance. This year, we had our dance at the Hilton. As we walked into the ballroom, it reminded me of a wedding reception. The kids and chaperones sat at a table where we were served, buffet style, a wonderful dinner of roast beef, mashed potatoes, pasta, salad, rolls and wonderful desserts. After eating the kids danced the night away as 8th graders dance, by JUMPING! The dance was a lot of fun to participate in and at the end of the night, Dr. McFarland had the kids give us a shout out and a special shout out to Mrs. Miller and I for being in charge of the trip. It was an amazing feeling when you have 300 kids clap for the work that you had completed. I was proud of the work that we did, knowing full well that Mrs. Miller is the glue that kept this trip together, I do my part, but it is not nearly as big as Mrs. Miller's was. Leaving DC has been always sad for me, but this year it was ok, because I was ready to see my kids and spend time with my kids. Finally, reflecting on the trip, I would be remiss to say that my bus, BUS 4, was a lot of fun and without Mrs. Rager and Mrs. Kern, I don't think that the trip would have been as much fun. I couldn't have asked for better people to spend hours among hours on a bus with. There was always an entertaining conversation to have or a selfie picture to take! Thank you ladies! Mr. Meta To think that one of my old third grade students is marching in this very complex routine for The Best Damn Band in the Land.(CHECK OUT THE VIDEO BELOW!) Drew M., who is a freshman at OSU, worked out for hours amongst hours on the football field at Liberty High School this summer to prepare himself to try out for the band. That work paid off as he and his mom texted and called me the day that he made the Ohio State Band! They called me, now I assume that they called me after they called their family members, but what an absolute honor it was for me to get these texts/calls on that day in early August. Drew was such a quiet kid in third grade and then continued his quiet ways in middle school. Even though he was quiet, he was ALWAYS one of my favorite students. Even though he wasn't in Eagle News, he and I always would say hi and keep close through his time at Hyatts. I didn't get to see him much throughout high school, but the 2-3 times a year that I did, he had grown up, he had become a big dude! Every time I had seen him, I was so impressed with him. With his successes in band, lacrosse and whatever he would tell me was going on with his life. THIS IS WHY I am a teacher. I am a teacher to see these wonderful students accomplish so many things after they spent a school year with me. Drew asked me to shake his hand at his high school graduation ceremony. When he came to my classroom to ask me, he was with him mom and his sister and when I had seen him, I was brought to tears, because I hadn't seen him in a while and he was asking me to shake his hand! I am so very proud of what Drew, his older brother, Tyler and his younger sister, Allison have accomplished in their lives. That all has a direct correlation to their parents, Connie and Todd. You two should be so very proud of what you all did for your kids, I hope that I can be parents to my kids like you have to yours! I love my work, but I love to follow all the great things that my "graduates" do with their lives after they leave my classrooms. Drew's experiences are pretty COOL. I hope to follow them for the rest of my life! What will you do after being in my class? Mr. Meta I just spent the past hour taking notes on my students blogging and what they wrote about. It is truly amazing what is going on in their lives. Whether I read about soccer, tennis, moving, family, sickness, DC trip, old Eagle News videos, hobbies or "butter beer," it amazes me that what kids can do when they are motivated to do them.
Now, there needs to be others to participate as well, but the goal in the long term is to get the students to produce a blog/website that will allow them to speak their minds and share the work they do, not just in Eagle News, but in all their classes. The next thing to do is to get the students to use their sites as student portfolios. Let's see how that goes... Something that I wanted to do this year was to make it a bit harder for the students to stay in Eagle News all year. Last year, all they had to do was write a small letter stating why they wanted to stay in Eagle News, get a parent signature and then they were good to go.
This year, I developed 18 "badges" for the kids to work on, they have to complete 8 of them, in addition to, the 4 assignments that I assign to Eagle News students during the first 6 weeks of the year. That means that a student who wanted to work in Media Production in Eagle News for the entire year, had to work on 12 activities for Eagle News, on top of learning what is expected in Eagle News, on top of getting the expectations for all their other classes. I wasn't sure what to expect, but I knew that the numbers would be lower than the amount of the students that stayed last year. I needed the number to be lower because having 66 kids in a class wasn't going to work again this year. Another helper this year is that the administration gave me another section of Eagle News and one less section of my 7th grade class. So the numbers were lower in all sections to start. So, after 6 weeks, out of the 100 students that took Eagle News, 56 of them did all that work, in a 6 week period to stay in Eagle News and I couldn't be more excited! It is absolutely amazing to work with so many wonderful students who want to WORK! They spend their entire study halls working on projects that need to be completed. They want to do extra jobs that take extra time. They fight over projects that are EXTRA work to do, because they want to!!! Bottom line is, video work, whether with your camera, video camera, phone, iPad, etc isn't going away and students in schools today need to know how to use this tool, edit the work, create the final product using appropriate music and titles and share it with the WORLD. I can't wait to see what these students will come up with this year! It is always an interesting dynamic in Eagle News when students get about 3 weeks into the class. They are feeling the pressure of getting work completed as well as being able to communicate with his/her group to piece together a high quality video project. Several groups are having this problem now. Parents are calling me worries about how "Sally" is going to complete work or how is she while working with another student. Through observation, which is tough to do because it's a very active class, I don't see many problems. What I do see is, "fighting over the mouse" or the "let me do it this way." I see groups that don't know how to communicate or they don't know how to express their ideas to their partners without insulting them. As the year progresses, they will get better at this, but for now, I play the referee. The guy who comes in and tells the group how I would handle it, through words and honesty. When it comes to critiquing a video, I will tell the group what I would do in the project, regardless or whose idea it was when the group asks me to watch their project. Check out their work on Eagle News as we have now completed 13 episodes of our broadcasts for this year! Ok--the beginning stages of Eagle News is over and now it's my turn to find out how many of the 89 students want to really master their skills all year in Eagle a News. It's a lot of work, but in the end it will be all worth it. These students are ready to work, they are working on all different kinds of badges, individually and with help, whi ch is great. They want to do well. They want to succeed and improve on last year's successful crop of Eagle News students. This year the students who want to stay are performing tasks that last years group didn't work on until they were sure enough that they knew what to do. This year's group, they are taking chances! They want to really make and create. So it's time for me to observe, critique, honestly evaluate and show these students what Eagle News means to me. It's going to be a fun year! From a student today via an email:
I would just like to take the time to sincerely thank you for aiding in my discovery of Aurasma. I now feel like my life is complete and nothing matters more than eagle news and aurasma, and of course making someone run from a Dragon using aurasma and putting it on eagle news. I downloaded the app tonight and it is AWESOME!!! I hope that the enthusiasm that this student shows for the app, Aurasma, shows off with all the students who will commit to the class this year! As I struggle to stay awake on this Wednesday night, I wanted to try to start to write a little bit about each day. About what we do, things kids say, etc. Today, after 2-3 days of rules and regulations in Eagle News, I finally gave out the assignments in class. The thing that I am excited about is the use of the iPads this year. We are going to create some ebooks using Book Creator. We are also going to use Aurasma, where we can use Augmented Reality to do more with the tools that we have. But the real fun begins. The kids will get the cameras, the microphones, the editing tools in their hands. They will interrupt classes, sorry teachers at Hyatts Middle School, and they will create! The power of video is such a powerful tool in schools and the tool is not used enough. It is truly amazing to watch these students run into class, learn something new and then run with their tools to create. We will be posting our work on this site. I hope you enjoy. Here is a video from the first day of school. I know that I am not a good writer, but I will tell you that these late nights up watching the Olympics and a TV show on Netflix and spending the last three weeks watch my father-in-law slowly pass away has got me thinking about a lot of stuff. I am so sad that my Father in law, Jim, who is a wonderful, caring person, father, husband, grandfather and teacher is soon gonna be no longer with us on this Earth. With a tear in my eye, I am so sorry for my wife, Beth and her brother Mike, for they are losing a dad. Jim was great to me. I remember our times in Canton, grilling burgers on the grill on the driveway and talking until we both would fall asleep on the blue chairs in the living room. Up until a couple of weeks ago, he was still telling those stories, and I will miss them and Jim, he was and will always be a great father-in-law. The Olympics are always such a great spectacle! From the opening ceremonies, through all the games, the winners, the failures, the mistakes up to the closing ceremonies, the Olympics are a sight to be seen and should never be missed. They are events that don't happen every year, and the tear running down this bear's face makes me miss the events that we watched loyally every night from 8-11:30 PM on our TVs. And then there is this TV show that I just completed. I watched all 5 seasons of this show on Netflix and I will not name the show because it is too inappropriate for 8th grade students. But, it left me wanting more. It left me checking on my kids to make sure that they are ok. It left me wondering why people live the way that they do. Why do people choose the paths that they chose, but it also left me valuing my family and how truly wonderful my wife and kids are. When I stay up late and check on them, I miss them. It is such a beautiful thing to watch all three of them sleeping so gently in their beds, that it cheers me up, knowing that I will wake them up in 5 hours. Saying goodbye is hard. |
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AuthorMr. Meta is in his 8th year as the Eagle News/Technology Teacher. He really loves his Apple products, Eagle News Broadcasts and the Hyatts Film Festival Archives
October 2016
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