What To DO NEXT with Depth Of Knowledge (DOK)?

OK...we have had multiple PD sessions about DOK...they have all been worth it

I recently read an article from 2014 on the edutopia site.  That is a great website with multiple resources.  You can type a topic in and you will get a lot of resources.

Click here to read a short article about possible next steps with DOK.  If you don't want to take the time (it will be minutes) to read the article only focus on the section labeled 1-5.  Those are five possible ideas on how you can start using the information that you have about Depth Of Knowledge.

Using the information you have about DOK, will help out with assessment literacy.

Questions To Consider:

1.  Did you ever want to just see a list of tasks that are specific to your content area and where they would fall in the DOK spectrum?  The article has a great resource for that.  It will give you an idea of where some of your tasks may fall and ideas about new ones.  it is labeled "These examples of DoK levels for four content areas "  
Or you can click here to see that resource.

2.  One of the tasks suggest analyzing patterns of where you place tasks you have students do on the DOK spectrum.  Is there a way to do this on a micro level, don't make it too overwhelming...How could that benefit you?

3.  This article has some great possible activities for upcoming TBT meetings.


By The Way (BTW)-  Our little local PD blog done weekly will, this week, surpass 1000 views since its inception.  I appreciate you taking a look.

Making Failure "Hard"- Reflection

Click here to read an article titled " Making Failure Harder Work Than Passing."

This article is by a woman named Angela Campbell (2015), who is a high school Chemistry teacher.

The article discusses practices that Angela Campbell uses in her classroom.  She wrote the short article in 2015 for edutopia.  I just happen to come across it this weekend when doing some online reading within my PLC (professional learning community).

To me PLC just means the people that I follow online/spend time visiting that help me in my profession.

Angela Campbell describes how she assesses students from start to finish for a unit or chapter in her Chemistry classroom.  The premise of her article was that she felt, in her classroom, failing was more work than receiving a passing score.  I just thought that reading the article would be good for all of us.

Maybe you can't/won't implement anything learned from this short read.  Maybe you already do many of these things.  But their is nothing wrong with reinforcing or looking at new ideas.  Especially within the are of student assessment of learning.  I have been reading a lot lately about "mastery learning," and this fit right into it.  (I will have a blog post on that real soon.)

Questions to Consider:
1.  Though you may not teach chemistry, can any of the information presented be helpful to you?
2.  She uses the phrase "guided practice opportunities"  as a way of measuring students informatively in low risk situations.  Does that make sense?  Is it too low risk for you?
3.  Angela Campbell has quit the method of having students show mastery on assessments.  Do you do something like that?  Would that be doable for you?  Does she really know what the students know?
Real Question- Do you know we have someone in our building that uses this very method....?

Personal PD: Expanding Your Horizons

I once was told that the best way to learn is to teach it.  That seems to be something that is often used in education too.  We hear things like first year teachers/administrators being "one day ahead of the students/teachers" or the duck premise of paddling at an unbelievable pace under the water but looking calm and collected above the water.

To continue with ideas about Personal PD, I challenge you in expanding your horizons.  For me, this challenge came in writing this weekly PD blog for our staff.  It took me outside of my regular routines and I really like being able to publish a (hopefully) useful blog.

Here are some ideas to maybe "expand your horizons"
1.  Start a class twitter or facebook page- tell your "story" through that social media
2.  Write a research based article or a PD article for the Ohio ASCD journal
http://issuu.com/ohioascd/docs/oh_ascd_winter_spring_2016__2___1_/1?e=25933408/37866907
3.  Attend a PD and share out what you learned to your department or our staff
4.  You know something that has been nagging at you to "expand your horizons," now may be the time to take that on.

Questions To Consider:
1.  What does it hurt to give it a try?
2.  Give it a try, it may be something you really enjoy.

Personal PD: Learning More About Google

This week I am going to introduce you to a resource that will be very helpful to everyone that uses google at anytime.

This resource is:  http://alicekeeler.com/

The Author of this website can be followed on Twitter: @alicekeeler

She is a great follow on Twitter.  She has opinions about other education related items but most of her tweets are what I will call "Google Hacks"

Below I will link some of these "Google Hacks" that might be useful to you:

http://alicekeeler.com/2016/08/17/offline-settings-google-drive/- Changing settings so that you can work offline in Google Drive.  It will sync once you come back online.

http://alicekeeler.com/2016/09/01/google-classroom-parents-need-google-account/-  Guardian access to Google Classroom

http://alicekeeler.com/2016/06/20/go-further-google-classroom/- 50 further tips for Google Classroom.  Extend your thinking

While at the website, I would suggest clicking on "all posts" to see her activity in the last month or so.  She is very willing to answer questions, as I have found out.  Emailing her or tweeting at her seems to be the most useful method.