"I'm just checking my feedback..."

It was a good day yesterday. I was determined to start the new year fresh, and be on top of my game. I was really going to focus on my low and struggling students, and consistently meet with them everyday, specifically about the work they are doing during the literacy block.

I had my "high" group started (that hierarchy I've implied is, in and of itself, worthy of another post), freeing my up to float around the room and check in with my struggling students who are working away on the computers. I made my way over to O, who traditionally, and in every possible way, avoids any and all work, responsibility, liability. He lives to not work. I braced myself for the reply to my now-routine question: "What's your plan today O." I was presently surprised by his reply.

"I'm just checking my feedback," he said. "Then I'm going to do some writing."

Now, I'm not hoping for miracles here, but it was yet another reminder about why I love my MOODLE. In another setting, O would have quickly lost the original assessment, forever gone with the descriptive feedback I had so carefully constructed for him. Now, it is always at his fingertips. All the work is centralized and neatly displayed for him. He simply has to access it, then go from there.

Now, as I've just said, I'm not hoping for miracles. This is one small step solved in the many that will help O be successful. He still needs regular and intense interventions, but he is more empowered in his educational choices.

Here's hoping the miracles do happen though!

M.

They call me Mr. MOODLE

This is the name of a workshop I have led last year. The name speaks to my (slight) obsession with my VLE - Virtual Learning Environment. In this case, my District School Board is using a MOODLE. I have had the distinction of having one of the most accessed MOODLEs in all of the Board. Yeah me!

When I describe a MOODLE to the un-initiated, I often resort to the somewhat snide: It is like a website on steroids! My MOODLE is so much more than that. It is my classroom. It isn't an extension, or a place for the kids to play - it is a space where we all learn together.

In a previous post I had written about my vision. My classroom values collaboration, innovation and creativity. The MOODLE is where all of this can take place.

For years I have experimented with blogs, wikis, pod casts, websites, etc. In fact this blog space has been refurbished, if you will, from a site where I used to get the kids to share. However, the MOODLE is now a space for all of this to occur together, in a real and authentic way. In the past I haven't been happy because I have had to control the learning. I was the one who posted the entries for the kids to respond to. I was the one creating the wikis that the kids would add to. With the MOODLE we all create together. It is OUR space.

In the coming posts I plan to describing in more detail how my MOODLE enhances my program.

M.