techieMusings

Since the start of the year, my AP Calculus students have been documenting growth, reflecting on new connections formed, and talking through learning strategies that have been working for them through Flipgrid reflections, corrections to homework, and in creating self-made study guides. In the second trimester, we will formalize these activities, with a final project that will require ongoing effort. Students will continue to make the same Flipgrid videos, Socratic posts, homework revisions, and self-made study guides. But it will be their responsibility to “archive” this work over the course of the trimester and to present a final product that will showcase progress over the course of the trimester

To complete this project, students will use Sutori to capture the artifacts they choose to highlight. Students are able to insert videos, audio recording, and images into their Sutori project to capture the reflective process. For each element they choose to include, they will describe why they chose that piece of work. Some of this will be calculus specific:

1. Looking back on a specific assignment/problem, what knowledge had you not yet gained when you completed the task that you now have? How has this new information taken your understanding to a new level?
2. Redo a previously assigned problem of your choice. Would you use the same approach to solve that problem now? Have we have learned something new that would allow you to come up with a more elegant or simpler solution.
3. Find a previously assigned problem that you solved algebraically. Redo the problem graphically and make note of how both approaches allow you to come up with the same outcome (ie: how do you interpret the graph?).
4. Find a problem from chapter 2 (look at your quizzes, quiz reviews, or test) and describe how your understanding of the concept asked there has grown now that you know about derivatives.

Beyond capturing individual calculus problems, their Sutori will also represent a detailed reflection and goal setting process. Some things they will talk about include:

1. What did you do well? And how will you ensure that you continue to make a habit of this?
2. What could use improvement? And what action steps will you take to boost future outcomes?
3. What strategies have you learned that work well for you as a learner? And how can you apply this to your future studies?

The goal of this project is to help students look back on past work and connect it to new knowledge. Reflection is key to learning, and this project will provide students the opportunity to develop deeper connections between the chapters we have studied. This exercise is also all about helping students learn how to learn. Research has proven that:

“When you practice elaboration, there’s no known limit to how much you can learn. Elaboration is the process of giving new material meaning by expressing it in your own words and connecting it with what you already know. The more you can explain about the way your new learning relates to your prior knowledge, the stronger your grasp of the new learning will be, and the more connections you create that will help you remember it later.”

― Peter C. Brown, Make It Stick

My hope is that students not only learn a lot in compiling the work they want to showcase and reflecting on that work but that they also enjoy this process. Students have come a long way since the start of the year, and I hope that this activity helps them see that!