Crowder,+Stephen+Travis--Cool+Tools+Review

The Cool Tools Carousel was a lot of information at once, but I realized how quickly I absorbed the information. The first session was a bit disconnected, and I felt that it was slightly disorganized. Some of the information seemed to be incorrectly placed in the wiki. The resources presented were already familiar to me, but I did bookmark some of the resources for further investigation. My favorite part was the second second part of my carousel where the facilitator showed several sites that were educator-friendly, and were organized in a fashion that supplemented technology usage in a classroom. I thoroughly enjoyed the PBL session, the integration of Google docs, Google forms, etc. that were a part of the second component of the Cool Tools session. I kept finding different ways of incorporating Google docs and Google forms into my classroom, but not as the popular "add-on" that many teachers employ. These features were used in such a way that I saw the integration and enhancement of education aspect as opposed to the simplistic "add-on".

On Wednesday, I attended the Language Arts Cool Tools Session, a short seminar on using role-playing in the classroom. I was there with another member of my cohort, and we could not stop talking about the implications of role-playing, the fun our students would have, the higher-level thinking skills the students would need, and the application to real-life situations. The facilitator used the role-playing to serve as a prelude to writing an argumentative paper which I found to be a great idea. I enjoyed it so much that my dyad member and I used some of the ideas in our lesson plan.


 * Lesson Plan**

This Problem-Based Learning lesson will satisfy Common Core standards for speaking and listening, and writing.
 * R.I 8.2-3; 8.8; W 8.1-2.**

The first novel we will be reading in 8th grade LA is __To Kill a Mockingbird__. As a pre-reading strategy, students will be presented with a problem related to the novel, and in groups, students will develop a solution.


 * Overarching Question**: How do differences in people or ideas create problems in our world?
 * Essential Question**: How have cultural differences created problems during critical points in our nation's history?


 * Problem**: You are living in a southern state circa 1930. An African-American male has been accused of raping a white woman. You are a white lawyer, and it is your job to defend him. Your client insists he is innocent. Your jury is all-white. As a group, decide how you will present your information to the jury and prove his innocence. Keep in mind your time period. (This is a skeleton of the question I would pose, but since I am conceptualizing, I did not include the entire question.)

1. Students will get into groups of four and create a solution to the problem. 2. Students will record their solutions on a Google doc for the class to see. 3. Solutions will be collected into a Google form. 4. Students will vote on the best solution to the problem.

A whole-class discussion will follow the voting results.

I will tell the students that this problem is one that the characters are facing. In relating back to the overarching question, we will discuss how cultural differences, or differences in opinions have created some of the greater conflicts our nation has known.