Persuasion & Creation: Students Using Video in TRCs!

Video can be a powerful tool for enhancing the learning experience for students and adults alike. As with any technology tool, video is only as effective as the instructional strategies and activities that surround it. For the WHIRL blog post this week, I wanted to share a few ways that two, award winning, TRC teachers have effectively facilitated the student use of video in their classrooms. No matter what grade level or content area you teach, hopefully the following lesson plans and student samples will inspire you to give video a WHIRL in your classroom!

At the end-of-year Celebration this year, Monique Woods and Stacy Harris both took home awards for their efforts in TRC! Ms. Woods took home one of the Phase 7 Lesson Plan of the Year awards for her language arts lesson. She enticed her 5th graders in Wichita to explore the elements of a story by asking them to create book trailers for younger readers. You can find her lesson plan, assessment rubric and storyboarding tool on the TRC Ning. You can also find a sample of her students’ book trailers at the Wichita TRC site.

Stacy Harris authored a creative project where her students created videos to demonstrate their understanding of angles. You can find her lesson plan, assessment rubric and student information sheet on the TRC Ning. You can also see her instructional video that won the TRC, People’s Choice Award for 2010 under the Video tab. This video helps further explain the implementation and completion of the project. In addition, take a look at a student sample that resulted from her implementation of the lesson plan.

Mrs. Harris also had her students create decimal raps this year to try and help their peers better understand the rules and concepts of this tricky topic. Take a look at one of her student samples posted on School Tube!

Many thanks to Monique Woods, Wichita TRC teacher, Jenny Gridley, Wichita TRC facilitator, Stacy Harris, Manhattan TRC teacher, Kristi Timm, Manhattan TRC facilitator and Stacy Aschenbrenner, Manhattan TRC facilitator for sharing their hard work with us!

~Amber Rowland, TRC Project Coordinator