The term rigor is widely used

by educators to describe instruc-

tion, schoolwork, learning expe-

riences, and educational expecta-

tions that are academically, intel-

lectually, and personally challeng-

ing. Rigorous learning experienc-

es, for example, help students

understand knowledge and con-

cepts that are complex, ambigu-

ous, or contentious, and they

help students acquire skills that

can be applied in a variety of

educational, career, and civic

contexts throughout their lives.

While dictionaries define the

term as rigid, inflexible, or un-

yielding, educators frequently

apply rigor or rigorous to assign-

ments that encourage students

to think critically, creatively, and

more flexibly. Likewise, they may

use the term rigorous to de-

scribe learning environments that

are not intended to be harsh,

rigid, or overly prescriptive, but

that are stimulating, engaging, and

supportive.

In education, rigor is com-

monly applied to lessons that

encourage students to question

their assumptions and think

deeply, rather than to lessons

that merely demand memoriza-

tion and information recall. For

example, a fill-in-the-blank work-

sheet or multiple-choice test

would not be considered rigor-

ous by many educators. Although

courses such as AP United States

History are widely seen as rigor-

ous because of the comparatively

demanding workload or because

the course culminates in a diffi-

cult test, a more expansive view

of rigor would also encompass

academic relevance and critical-

thinking skills such as interpreting

and analyzing historical data,

I N S I D E T H I S

I S S U E :

Microsoft

OneNote in the

Classroom

2

4Ps for PL

Webinars

2

45 PBL Lesson

Resources

2

First-Time PBL

Teacher Shares

Her Success

3

PBL

Organization

Wall

4

Calendar 4

H a v e I d e a s o r

S t o r i e s t o S h a r e ?

D e a d l i n e i s t h e 2 0 t h

o f e a c h m o n t h .

S u b m i t t o

v e r n . b u c k @ h e n r y . k 1 2 . g a . u s

The

Personalized Learning Buzz S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 5 V O L U M E 1 , I S S U E 2

S P E C I A L

P O I N T S

O F

I N T E R E S T

Rigor Defined

Microsoft One-

Note in the Class-

room

What a First-Time

PBL Teacher

Found

PBL Organization

Wall

Building Classroom Rigor: Harder, More, and Faster are the Answers?

Coach’s Corner Teachers are collaborating

with not only their peers, but

with students, too, on using the

learner profiles to guide the

personalization of their in-

struction. HSS starts a peer

walk through beginning in ear-

ly Sept. to open a dialogue

with each other on the strate-

gies being observed to accom-

-modate more student involve-

ment. The HHS Advisory/Club

schedule will be rolling out by

the second week of Sept. We

want more students demon-

strating their understanding by

way of our Lyceums/

Makerspaces.

——- Mrs. Michelle Huffman

making connections between

historical periods and current

events, using both primary and

secondary sources to support an

argument or position, and arriv-

ing at a novel interpretation of a

historical event after conducting

extensive research on the topic.

While some educators may

equate rigor with difficultly, many

educators would argue that aca-

demically rigorous learning expe-

riences should be sufficiently and

appropriately challenging for

individual students or groups of

students, not simply difficult.

Advocates contend that appro-

priately rigorous learning experi-

ences motivate students to learn

more and learn it more deeply,

while also giving them a sense of

personal accomplishment when

they overcome a learning chal-

lenge—whereas lessons that are

simply “hard” will more likely

lead to disengagement, frustra-

tion, and discouragement.

Source:

Hidden curriculum (2014, August

26). In S. Abbott (Ed.), The glos-

sary of education reform. Re-

t r i e v e d f r o m h t t p : / /

edglossary.org/hidden-curriculum

P A G E 2

Forty-five Places to Create PBL Projects

Courtney Lewis, an HHS

junior, commented about how

she preferred completing her

math lessons the typical pencil/

lypse would certainly have

relevance to our learners.

Probably another lesson in

there about rotting flesh and

anatomy—but we will stop

here for now.

A little inspiration nudges

creativity and fosters an envi-

ronment to expand on existing

ideas. We strive to take care

of our families and responsibili-

ties and we may miss inspira-

tion or be distracted from

Ideas and creativity perco-

late from the most unique,

oddest, or common thoughts.

Sometimes a project may be a

genius epiphany or something

you missed staring you in the

face. Consider this example:

The Walking Dead television

series is filmed just miles from

HHS around Senoia, Ga. Use

this scenario to create emer-

gency and disaster prepared-

ness PBL. A Zombie Apoca-

creativity at times (video bing-

ing on The Big Bang Theory

does not count).

When you face a road-

block, research some of the

numerous idea sources com-

piled by Michael Gorman.

Search here .

Webinars Aid Your 4Ps Strategies Pace—Partnering with your

learner to agree upon a pace

at which the student will com-

plete the pathway. Designing

flexibility with the timeline

while still respecting the integ-

rity of the process.

Webinar

Place—Allowing learner

voice/choice regarding the

location of demonstrating

mastery.

Webinar

People—Encouraging stu-

dents with the opportunities to

work with others, or to utilize

resources in the building such

as other students, teachers,

mentors in order to obtain the

resources required to demon-

strate mastery of each compe-

tency

Webinar

Path—Providing the stu-

dents with voice and choice to

demonstrate their preference

for showing their mastery of a

competency. The options are

limitless ranging from 100%

online learning to all teacher-

led instruction with a myriad

of combinations mixed in.

Webinar

Source: MDC

Mrs. Mears Shares Microsoft OneNote Innovation paper way. That was her belief

until she met Mrs. Yvonne

Mears in Advanced Algebra.

Microsoft OneNote is the

innovative tool that Mrs. Mears

trains her students on and uses

in her class to organize, sup-

port, and enrich her students’

learning experience. Addition-

ally, the platform provides

avenues for lesson feedback

and collaboration. Check out

this video.

Every HHS student has an

established Microsoft Outlook

account enabling access to the

OneNote program. Media

Specialist Rick Wright provides

a tutorial for Microsoft 365 set

up for students.

Additional information is avail-

able below:

Getting Started with OneNote

Delivering Curriculum with

OneNote

Creating Interactive Lessons

with OneNote

Collaborating in the Class-

room with the OneNote Class

Notebook

Collaborating with the One-

Note Staff Notebook for

Education

P A G E 3 V O L U M E 1 , I S S U E 2

whether they would make a narrative or documentary film for their final project. I imposed these restrictions because I en-visioned losing control of a large class project, and I didn't have the resources, time, or patience to support individual projects that were allowed to grow and become something beyond the scope that I had planned. I chose to focus on collaboration as the skill that I would help them develop and build their proficiency, and I have definitely seen some stu-dents struggling with group management. Even with a very independent and responsible group of students, decision making, job sharing, and plan-ning can challenge them.

Throughout the project, from planning through the comple-tion of our films, I've relied strongly on my colleagues to reflect and bounce ideas. I cre-ated a graphic organizer to guide student research, and realized part of the way through the project that the organizer did not focus enough on my students' individual pro-jects, but on waste in general. It was through a discussion with a colleague that I decided to scrap the graphic organizer and let student groups guide their o

SEE “FIRST PBL” PAGE 4

away uneaten food, using plas-tic water bottles instead of reus-able bottles, and discarding paper instead of erasing mis-takes. My goal was to have my students think more critically about the causes of waste in

our classroom, and to target the causes in their projects. The student groups then took their focus problems and conducted research to develop a plan for waste reduction. Through col-laboration with the San Francis-co Film Society, they were able to create films to educate our school and community about the plans they had developed.

The Process

I can truthfully say that much of my first PBL unit went as planned. This, however, was due to the restrictions I placed on students' "voice and choice." My students were allowed to choose the type of waste their project would focus on, and

Teacher Discusses Her First PBL Unit

By Katie Spear

Goal #1: My First PBL Unit: Learning From My Students

. . . I was nervous and excited at this prospect.

The Project

Thinking about the purpose of PBL, which is to have stu-dents gain deep knowledge through exploration of real-world problems, I developed a project for my class that fo-cused on a problem I had ob-served the previous year: waste in my classroom. Our trashcan and recycling bin overflowed daily, with no distinction be-tween the two. Students rou-tinely threw away half-used pieces of paper, perfectly good pencils, and food they didn’t want. This was a problem that affected my students -- and me -- and I hoped it was also a problem that would interest them as much as it interested me.

So with this idea in mind, I developed a PBL unit that ex-plored waste, the effect of waste on our community and planet, and the different ways that we, as a class, could reduce waste in our classroom. After an introduction event during which students classified the waste from our room, we read articles, watched videos, and participat-ed in a Skype Education lesson to learn about waste.

I next posed our inquiry ques- tion to my class: "How can we reduce waste in our class-room?" From this inquiry, groups of students refined their focus by discussing specific problems relating to the ques-tion. The problems they chose included students throwing

P A G E 4

our content.

When I've talked and reflected with my students, I can see that each has been able to find some-thing he or she liked about the project. Some students loved do-ing research on our Chrome-books. Others enjoyed physically digging through our trash. One student focused her energy on writing a song to include in her group's film.

The best part about my first attempt at PBL was seeing my students excel in the areas they most enjoy, and giving them a chance to share these talents with their peers. My personal challenge will be to help them harness these skills in our next project, to dig deeper, and find meaningful ways to understand our content.

my students with more "voice and choice" in the direction their pro-ject takes.

When I've talked and reflected with my students, I can see that each has been able to find some-thing he or she liked about the project. Some students loved do-ing research on our Chrome-books. Others enjoyed physically digging through our trash. One student focused her energy on writing a song to include in her group's film. The best part about my first attempt at PBL was see-ing my students excel in the areas they most enjoy, and giving them a chance to share these talents with their peers. My personal challenge will be to help them harness these skills in our next project to dig deeper, and find meaningful ways to understand

(“First PBL” continued from p. 3)

own research, both in books and on the internet. I needed to let go a little and trust that they would be productive without that sup-port.

The Outcome

Was my first PBL experience perfect? Of course not. Would I try again? Absolutely.

Even though my fear of losing control limited the project, my students still stayed engaged and were able to work on the big skill that I hoped they would learn to practice: collaboration. For my next PBL unit, I will likely have my students guide our focus a bit more and find a problem (or have them find a problem) that matters to them. I will need to trust myself a bit more by trusting

Visit this link for further PBL classroom details: http://ddih.wikispaces.com/PBL+-+The+Project+Wall

Calendar

Sept. 2-4– AAF Conference

(learning space architects)

Sept. 3rd—

Faculty Meeting 3:30 pm

Sept. 8th—Start Advisory / HR

plan roll out

Sept. 8th—PLT meeting 3:45 pm

Sept. 10th— T3 3:30 pm

Sept. 16h—Graduation Cluster

Task Force

Sept. 17th — T3 3:30 pm

Sept. 21-25—Fall Break

Sept. 29th—PD Topic: Rubrics

for PL and PBL

Reminders:

Peer walk throughs beginning

the first of the month.

PBL Unit planning tentatively for

week of Oct. 12th