Rubrics, Clickers, and Inspiration/Kidspiration

      Personally, I think rubrics are a great way for teachers to evaluate their students. Not only does it help remind the teacher what he/she is looking for, but it also helps guide the students in what needs to go into the assignment. Technology-based rubrics are an even better way to assess meaningful learning. While they are time consuming, they offer great amounts of detail and clearly state the expected outcomes. There are lots of banks of existing rubrics that teachers can access when they are short on time, however, as the authors of our textbook state, teachers must be cautious when using these banks. Teachers need to make sure the rubrics are appropriate for the anticipated learning outcomes. If a teacher does have the time to create a rubric, there are a number of tools that can assist in that area. Some of these are Rubricator (www.rubrics.com), Rubric Builder (http://landmark-project.com/classweb/tools/rubric_builder.php), and others. These are great sites to make your own rubric the way you want it. Rubrics, in my opinion, are one of the best ways to assess meaningful learning in students.

     Clicker technology consists of small, wireless keypads with alphanumeric keypads that are linked to a computer and used to support assessment and engage students. The best part about clicker assessment tools is that they allow students to respond to questions without raising their hands or talking over one another. They simply key in their response and the results can appear in front of the entire class. The reasons clicker technology is a great way to assess meaningful learning is because they can be used as a quick pre-test, to make sure your students understand the material, and to make sure students understand the conceptual knowledge. This technology is also a way to “even the playing field” as the book states. More often than not, students who are able to respond quicker will answer before other students can and students who get it wrong do not participate for fear of being incorrect. This often results in students refusing to answer because they know someone else will beat them to it or because they know they will be wrong. This way, all students can answer without fear of being wrong or too slow to respond. I think clicker technology is a great way to assess meaningful learning because it does allow for participation from all students. If used correctly, clicker technology can help students be more confident in answering questions, even if their answer is wrong or they respond after someone else. I would definitely like to make use of this technology because students have a hard time in math as it is. Most students would rather not answer than give a wrong answer. Using this technology can help solve that problem because it gives anonymity. Students don’t have to blurt out their answers and that would definitely help.

     After looking at the Inspiration and Kidspiration websites, I think they would make really great tools for a classroom. They allow the students to organize their thinking in a way that helps them understand the material. Because I am going to be teaching high school math, it was a little disappointing to see that Inspiration did not really cover any type of math-related topics. Although I could definitely use the graphic organizers to help my students organize the concepts, they would not be able to apply them. They would have to apply the concepts separately from the Inspiration website. Kidspiration, however, did have a section for math. Looking at some of the examples, I think it could definitely be a big help because it allows the students to not only organize the concepts, but it also allows them to apply their knowledge. Being able to apply that knowledge allows for much more meaningful learning in my opinion.

     I believe all three of these tools could be of use in my classroom. Rubrics can definitely be used for certain types of projects, such as writing a research paper over a famous mathematician or a particular theory. As the teacher, I could ask them all to give a response to a problem using the clicker technology. I also think that the Inspiration website could be of help for understanding some of the concepts they may be having trouble with. I am sure there are many different ways that these tools can be incorporated into classrooms; however, because I am a math major, these are the ways they could fit into my classroom. Technology is a great way to facilitate meaningful learning, but it is an even better way to assess it. We just have to make sure we are going about it the right way.

Jonassen, D., Howland, J., Marra, R., & Crismond, D. (2008). Meaningful learning With Technology (3rd Edition). Columbus, OH: Pearson/Prentice Hall.

Inspiration is an excellent tool for grades 6 – 12 (http://www.inspiration.com/)

Kidspiration is an excellent tool for grade K – 5 (http://www.inspiration.com/Kidspiration)