The significance of Referencing skills in Reading.

Referencing: Why do we need it?

Many people can easily look up anything online and learn something new or gain a new perspective. While being able to access a huge variety of information on any given topic can be a great thing, students can run into problems with fully comprehending all the information that is thrown at them. Using an important tool like a dictionary in print 😱 can actually be more beneficial to learning reading comprehension than using a digital dictionary. I think that it is important for students to learn how to properly use a reference book like a dictionary or thesaurus in print and here are a few reasons why:

1. It allows students to practice their skills in gathering information and organizing it on paper. 
2.  It makes a huge impact on their reading comprehension skills.
3.  learning the basic layout of a dictionary can be further used to navigate other reference books.

While it is one achievement to learn how to phonetically understand words, another important part of reading comprehension can be solidified through the use of a dictionary or a thesaurus.  When students are able to comprehend what they are reading, they begin to feel more confident in communicating with both teachers and classmates. Specifically using a dictionary in print forces the student to do a little more to enhance their comprehension. Instead of simply right-clicking a word and learning about that one word instantly, the student must understand the layout of a reference book in order to find the information they are looking for. Through their search, they not only find the word they are looking for but they are also exposed to many other words, their meanings and uses. In doing this, students are practicing the transferable skills needed to do scholarly research papers in their future educational careers. I remember feeling overwhelmed with my first university research paper s. I think part of that overwhelming feeling I had was because I didn't feel confident in my referencing skills. I think that learning these skills and putting them into practice as early as elementary school grades would help students in their futures. I also think that it could definitely eliminate some of the overwhelming feelings students may have when writing research papers in higher grade levels.

How do we teach 21st Century Learners to use a reference book in print? 

Of course, there is a huge number of activities to choose from online to introduce these skills to your students. While it is great to be able to have access to all sorts of information, it is our job to show students how being able to use a reference book in print is just as important as a digital version. Like I have mentioned before it is important to begin practicing these skills as you are learning to read. Having a student flip through the pages of a dictionary gives them the opportunity to gain an understanding to multiple words instead of a specific word typed into a search engine. Here are a few resources I have found online to introduce the layout of a dictionary and referencing skills in the classroom:

http://bit.ly/2yNJyfa

The Dictionary Scavenger Hunt.

This is a fun activity to introduce young students to use the dictionary. It contains a variety of questions the students must find in the dictionary. The activity gets students to explore the dictionary, get acquainted with its structure and get to understand how much information they can find in its pages. The example shown here is a very simple one geared towards primary grades, but you can always update the questions to fit the level of your classroom.

The Sound it Out Activity 

        This is a good pre-lesson activity, it can help you as a teacher gauge each individuals reading comprehension skills while incorporating the practice of referencing skills. The way the activity works is that the phonetic spellings of words and a photocopied page out of a dictionary are distributed to the students. The students must then match the phonetic spelling with the correct spelling of the word found on the dictionary page. I would like to try this lesson in a junior level class, I think that it allows students to make connections to the sounds of words, their meanings and their place in context.                                                       

                                         

                                        A Word Collection

http://bit.ly/2z3WLBI

This activity is great for multiple reasons. First it gets students to log their dictionary use, secondly it is a great way to practice writing and lastly, it helps students understand the appropriate context for a word. The activity is an ongoing collection of words in a notebook throughout the year. The students are to divide it alphabetically and as they find words that they do not understand they are instructed to look it up in the dictionary, write out the word its definition and one sentence using the word in proper context. I think that I would definitely use this activity in my own classroom. I think that it could work well in both junior and intermediate classes. 

Genius Hour Reflection 4: Learning to Sing and Play at the Same Time

So I have this new found respect for anyone who sings and plays an instrument at the same time. Throughout this process I have really had some fun, I am happy to say that I am feeling more and more confident each day with my Ukulele playing. However over the last few days I have began singing the lyrics while playing the ukulele at the same time and now I feel as if I am learning the song from scratch again. I am unsure if it is because I am bad multi tasker or I don't quite have the lyrics memorized but nonetheless it has been a challenge to combine the singing and playing together. However practice really does make perfect and thankfully this has not totally discouraged me from the project. I will keep persisting through it, but I have to say that I cannot wait until I just get to the first chorus smoothly! It is in setting these little goals for myself that I feel has helped not to lose motivation. I think that if I only had the big picture in mind then I feel like I would lose motivation because of course it has been weeks and I still cannot play it perfectly. But since I have had small little checkpoint throughout this process I still feel as if I am on track and that these setbacks are not all that significant when it comes to the main performance.

Genius Hour Reflection 3: My Sore Fingers

Now that I have found some great resources that work well for me I have just been doing nothing but practicing. That being said however, I feel like I've hit one of my first rough patches, starting to build the calices on the tips of my fingers so they don't hurt so much when I'm playing my ukulele. My fingers hurt so much right now, its not very fun! I feel like I am just waiting for this part to be over so that way I can just play without worrying about sore fingers. Right now just playing an hour a day is making my fingers pretty sore. But what is kind of cool is that I feel like I can feel the calices forming which is an awesome thing. Regardless of the pain I have proudly pushed through and I am still practicing as much as I can each day. I have to admit at the beginning I was dedicating more than an hour a day, and that's really just because I feel like I am having a lot of fun with this project. I am struggling still and I know that I am nowhere near performance ready but the process so far has been great I feel so motivated to make it perfect, and I think that has a lot to do with me being able to choose exactly what I wanted to work on over the course of this project.

Genius Hour Reflection 2: Finding the Perfect Resources.

By now I am well on my way to working towards my goal. I am set up with the perfect tutorial and I am totally ready to really start diving into this project. This past week I focused on finding the perfect tool to help me learn the song. First thing I had to do was download a ukulele tuner app, I found the App called Pocket Ukulele Tuner. This simple App has literally worked miracles for me! I had no idea what note each string on the ukulele was even supposed to be tuned to, and this app does it all. Simply pluck the string into your phone and the meter shows you when you have reached the appropriate note! It is seriously wonderful!
After I tuned my ukulele to the perfect notes I began the bulk of my research. Now my task was to find the best way for me to learn this song. I first looked up the tabs, tabs are a great source to use when you have never learned how to properly read a piece of sheet music. For me never having seriously played an instrument in my life I realized using ukulele tabs instead of actual sheet music was my only option. I practiced playing the different chords which thankfully there were only 4 different chords used throughout the entire song and that all went well until I realized that I have no idea what the rhythm is for this song.
So off to Youtube I went. I was able to find a ukulele teacher that made her tutorial fun and easy to understand and the best part was that she had made a tutorial for the exact song I wanted to learn. However before i was able to graduate to using the tutorial for the song I was learning I had to learn something called the Island strum. I was actually really glad I mastered this video first, not only was I able to get comfortable with the rhythm in the song Lava, but I was able to learn the basics of how to also play the song Stand by me, which uses the same strumming pattern. On this post you'll find the two Youtube videos I used the most through my learning process. You will also find the chord chart I used to play the song when I was confident enough to play without the teacher but still had not quite memorized the song yet. Once I found the perfect resources, I felt that this was really where the fun began for my project.

Genius Hour Reflection 1: I Finally Decided on What to do!

So in my introductory post I was talking about how I was really unsure about what I should do for this Genius Hour Project. I talked about how I was thinking of expanding my passion for performance by learning a new aspect of performance. This thought stuck with me as I continued to search for the perfect topic. Since I could not seem to stay away from doing something with performance I decide to go with my first thought which was to learn an instrument. Years ago, I received a ukulele for Christmas. I loved it! I also played with it for literally about an hour and since I never took the initiative to get lessons it just sat around collecting dust. This was something I decided I did not want to live with anymore. So I am happy and excited to start learning to play a song on the ukulele! One song that I know only uses a ukulele and voice is the Song Lava. I first heard it when I went to go watch the movie Inside out. It was just an adorable Pixar short film they played before the movie. The song is about 7 minutes long and in the next few weeks I am determined to learn it all!
I think that this will be a good experience and I am happy and eager to begin the process.

TPACK QUEST

I really enjoyed doing the PBL badge in this course. I was able to get a lot of great resources that surround problem based learning. I especially had fun with one of the tasks where I was able to generate a trading card based on my topic of choice.

In this course I have received the following badges

• Digital Identity 
• Gamification
• PBL badge
• PJBL badge

Genius Hour Reflection 5

I feel so accomplished! I am finally able to play through the first half of the song, I have the lyrics basically memorized, I am just struggling to remember the last verse, it is about a 7 minute song so there are a lot of lyrics to remember. My chord progression has been getting a lot better and I have created little strategies to be able change from one chord to the next pretty smoothly. I am really proud of my progress, although I don't feel completely ready for my final performance of the entire song, I have made an amazing amount of progress in these weeks of my Genius Hour project. I feel that with a little bit more practice I will be able to have the confidence to post the final product of my work in the last few weeks. Reflecting on this process I have been through in the last few weeks, I think that being able to choose my own direction, my own goals and the tools I used to achieve these goals was really the secret to my success. I think a huge component of that was because this project was so passion driven I felt more motivated to work towards my goal. I really loved this project and it is something that I would definitely use this in my own classroom.

Jumping into Genius Hour

Hello all!

Welcome to my blog! To be completely honest this is the first time I've ever done something like this, so I am not entirely sure what to expect. However, I am here to welcome you all and invite you for the ride!

My name is actually Giovanna, but everyone calls me "Gio". I am currently beginning my first year of Teachers college at BrockU and I am really excited to get into the real swing of things!
Earlier this year I graduated with my Honors BA in Theatre Studies at the University of Guelph. It was such an amazing four years there that to be honest, I was not particularly excited to leave. However, I do know that I will always have wonderful memories at Guelph BUT!! now I have the opportunity to create more unique and memorable experiences while perusing my second degree at BrockU!

While this is just an introductory post I promise there will be more!
This blog is meant to show my journey through pursuing one of my passions, my first rough patch, however, comes at the beginning.... I can't decide on what I want to do yet!

This idea of pursuing my passions comes from the concept of Genius Hour. What is Genius hour you ask? It's this awesome program that originally began at google. The employees were encouraged to spend one hour of their day indulging in their passions and generally just learning about something they wanted to learn about. This cool idea was then picked up by schools and integrated into classrooms and the effects of were fantastic. Students were encouraged to research and learn about a topic of their choosing while being encouraged to get creative and pursue their passions.

I think that I will do something very creative, but sout of my comfort zone. Performing has always been something that I have loved doing for as long as I can remember, perhaps I will do something with music. I have always wanted to learn a favorite song on one of my favorites instruments and maybe this is the perfect opportunity to explore this.

Stay Tuned!

MEDIA LITERACY - The Importance of "Netiquette" With Using Technology in The Classroom

http://bit.ly/2fmCn3E

It is a well-known fact that Kids spends over an hour a day on social media. In this new era of almost total technology immersion, we must now learn how to interact with one another in a respectful manner in more ways than in person. Many of us as professional adults are able to have a basic idea of how one should conduct themselves on the global platform of social media.  In most cases, this concept can be easily grasped by an adult, but it is our job as educators to pass the important lesson of how one should best represent themselves online onto the technological generation. This concept of internet etiquette is just as important as internet safety for students and teachers. With some quick research through the various educational resources available to us, I came across quite a few strategies for teaching students the concept of "netiquette". 

http://bit.ly/2fO2N19

 Netiquette, which combines the two words net and etiquette is the specific set of rules in which a person should respectfully conduct themselves online. I think that netiquette is crucial to media literacy because it teaches students that the day of internet anonymity is over and you cannot say absolutely anything you want regardless of whether it may make another person feel bad. In teaching the importance of netiquette we are able to help a student from creating a negative technological footprint. With the use of proper netiquette, we can also conduct lessons using technology without students acting disrespectfully towards one another. Using the various tools that are available to teachers we can help students learn the importance of etiquette online. With a quick google search, I was able to find limitless amounts of information and educational resources that can help students learn to be conscious of the fact that what they say online can have an impact on their in everyday life. Looking at some of many examples available for teachers online we can use a medium such as classroom posters. Much like posting classroom rules as a guideline for students to conduct themselves throughout daily activities, posting netiquette rules can serve the same purpose for lessons taught using classroom technology. As stated in the educational Blog: Educational Technology and Mobile learning  Crafting a netiquette memo for your class and informing your students about the importance of these rules will definitely help you create an engaging, respectful, and meaningful learning environment where collaboration and diversity of opinions are celebrated.

Making internet rules as important as the classroom rules can help the students use the internet as a place of shared learning, somewhere they can openly express their opinions without being disrespectful of others. Using mediums such as these will help students to understand the significance of netiquette and in turn, enhance their media literacy. Another way in which educators can further engage students about the importance of netiquette is using short videos or in the case of this video above, you can have students make a video project as a class to pass on their message about the importance of Netiquette. We have seen in practice that the use of technology and media in the classroom reaches out to students on a level that coincides with their own interests. In using more media and technology-centered sources of learning students become more engaged and motivated to learn the concepts that are presented to them. I think that incorporating lessons that combine the use of media to teach students about the media and their online presence such as the video above is an effective way to get students interested in using netiquette throughout all of their online activity. 

Knowing that I will be using technology in my own classroom practices, I think that taking the time to first teach students about online etiquette is where I would begin before using any kind of technology. I think that implementing netiquette first in the classroom before moving on to the vast range of activities available for tech lessons will help the students begin expressing their opinions on a positive note. I think that the use of video projects or interactive games for learning are an amazing tool to teach lessons, however, I think that the positivity around it is completely lost once someone begins acting disrespectfully through an online classroom discussion. Netiquette is now more than ever an important element of incorporating technology in lessons. In order for students to reach their full potential online students must feel safe and respected when sharing their opinions, achieving this ultimate potential for online learning will be through the practice of netiquette, and this will ultimately result in better media literacy for all students involved. 

YOUTUBE VIDEO LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5xlCNy37mI