Technology & Literacy Showcase
Throughout my teaching career, I have always shared dual passions for creating strong readers and writers and helping students use technology in creative ways to enhance learning. While studying at Michigan State University, I was able to pursue both as areas of concentration which has allowed me to make important contributions to curriculum where I teach and to explore unexpected intersections of literacy and technology.
Technology
Language & Literacies: Integrated Curriculum
After many years of teaching a traditional language arts curriculum, I was given the opportunity to create a class that incorporated 21st century skills with literacy learning. Language & Literacies is a class that combines digital literacy skills with literacy content to meet the needs of a new generation of learners. The course uses independent reading as an avenue to explore three important digital literacy areas: digital citizenship, informational literacy, and media literacy.
Many of the concepts I incorporated started as activities learned in my MSU courses, such as learning how to examine media messages in TE 838. Last fall, my class was profiled on our school website as part of the middle school's new emphasis on 21st century learning. I am happy with the successes of the first year and excited to continue to develop the curriculum. |
Homework help on Edmodo (click to enlarge)
6th Grade Reading Lab - Introduction (online class) Class Book Whisperers Blog (student blog) |
Social Media for Learning
When I started my degree program, I was barely connected to social media at all. I had created a personal Facebook account a few months earlier and had heard of Twitter, but couldn't figure out why it so popular. Who wanted to read about what I had for breakfast?! Through my work in the online MAED program, I realized that it was possible to make real and powerful connections with others in a virtual environment. I created an Edmodo account in 2010 just as I was beginning my degree program and had wonderful experiences using it with my students (see example to left). When I took CEP 820 during the summer, our CMS evaluation assignment opened up new options and I decided to use Schoology for my online course, 6th Grade Reading Lab, which I implemented during the school year in an enrichment block. In many ways, it began my thinking on incorporating digital literacy and literacy content that I have continued to refine since. We have started tweeting as a class and student bloggers have begun posting reviews on our class website. |
MsStringfellow.com (class website)
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Website Design & Coding
Website design is something I have enjoyed learning. Several years ago I taught myself to program in HTML and have tried to study what makes good design. My MSU courses have provided many opportunities to expand my skills. Through work on my teaching portfolio for CEP 813 and ED 870, I have learned how to make websites engaging and user-friendly. On my class website, I have also included a showcase section to highlight my students' work. I now maintain several websites for my own professional interests, including the following:
I also help teachers in my school incorporate class websites into their teaching and I design other websites for school use. Below are some examples of my work:
Recently, I saw this video produced by Code.org and decided to integrate a programming unit into my class. This article on our school website details one of my student's experience with programming. |
Literacy
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Using Book Trailers to Teach Visual Literacy
A few weeks before my first MSU class, TE 831, I attended a technology workshop lead by two librarians about teaching with book trailers. I had never heard of a book trailer and loved the idea. In TE 831, I decided to create a book trailer for the digital storytelling assignment. Students in our middle school met in weekly book clubs and the book I was facilitating at that time was the YA mystery Shadow Horse by Alison Hart. I made that book trailer and posted it on YouTube and it has changed my teaching.
We had an amazing experience when the author contacted me after seeing the trailer. She exchanged letters and Skyped with our class and eventually visited the school and did a workshop with students on suspense writing. I have since incorporated a unit on book trailers with my 5th grade students and helped our 6th grade teachers use book trailers for an interdisciplinary project on China. Students build visual and media literacy skills and the projects provide excellent opportunities to discuss copyright and fair use issues. I have been fortunate to present on using book trailers with students at several professional conferences as well. |
Digital Reader's Notebooks
In TE 848, I learned a great deal about fostering literacy skills through authentic assessment and quality feedback. During this course, my school was investigating adopting a 1:1 program so I wanted to incorporate a digital element in the course teaching project.
I decided to examine how using a digital reader's notebook would affect the motivation of my students to write and the quality of their responses. After research, I could not find examples of what I was looking for online so I set out to build my own template. I chose Google Docs as the platform and found many benefits. This past school year, I moved to Google Sites to improve the navigation and to take advantage of other features. It has been wonderful and I will definitely continue to use the digital notebooks with my students. I have blogged about the project and shared at professional conferences. Several teachers have asked to use my template, so I saved it to the Google Sites template gallery so others may benefit from it. |
Children's Literature in Film (paper)
Book to Film Project Guidelines Jumanji Book to Film Essay (teacher model) Thief Lord Book to Film Essay (student example) |
From Page to Screen: Literature & Film
TE 838 was one of my favorite courses at MSU and allowed me to explore something that was already an interest, the intersection between books and films for children.
The course gave me a language to use when talking to students about films based on books. Rather than discuss whether a movie was "good" or "bad," we discuss how it connects to the book and whether it is faithful in its portrayal of character, plot, and theme. I've taught this unit for several years now. I have collected over 100 movies based on children's books in my classroom library and students are able to check them out to complete viewing at home. Before they do that, I use one of the books from TE 838 to model what I want students to do on their own, Jumanji. We watch and discuss key scenes from the film and students are introduced to film language related to camera, lighting, editing, and sound. Students use a focused viewing guide I created to record notes on the book and then later the film. The final week of the project, they use their notes in class to complete an essay in which they compare the two forms of media. It is an engaging unit for me and my students and one that definitely grew out of my MSU studies. |
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Authentic Voice in Multicultural Literature
The unit on multicultural literature for TE 849 was a meaningful one for me as a teacher. We discussed the important concepts of authenticity and power in multicultural literature and how teachers can empower students by making sure to provide books in which all students can see themselves.
The definition of what constitutes multicultural literature is a subject of frequent debate, but I found the arguments that it should reflect authors and experiences from traditionally disenfranchised cultural and ethnic groups to be persuasive. The unit inspired me to examine my 5th grade independent reading curriculum and I discovered that although we introduced students to many excellent books with multicultural themes, none of our current books were written by authors of color. As a teacher of color, that oversight bothered me and moved me to action. I applied for a summer development grant to identify high quality middle grade multicultural novels and revise our curriculum appropriately. Locomotion by Jacqueline Woodson is one of the books I added to my curriculum. The paper I wrote about verse novels inspired me to create a book trailer for the novel as well. |