"Prayeraoke"

For years I have enjoyed my Hebrew teaching but found it to be challenging.   As you well know, those of us who teach in after school programs have very little  going for us.  With only an hour a week per class, students arrive to us tired, hungry, stressed and certainly not at their best.  On top of all of this, they have no incentive to do a great job or study at home,  since no one has given students the sense that we are giving them a skill that will be useful to them, outside of classic Bar Mitzvah preparation fear.

So naturally, teachers like us quickly realize that one way of motivating students to learn some Hebrew in the classroom is to make it fun.  There are lots of kitschy Hebrew games to play in the classroom, however the mileage varies with such games and usually we sacrifice content or leave someone behind as we give in to the feel-good.  We acquiescence to the begging for games.  In essence, we water down our efficacy by avoiding what really works for mastering Tefila skills.  Repetition, repetition, put it away, then repetition.  Did I mention repetition?

As a long time bar mitzvah tutor and Hebrew teacher, it has been proven to me time and time again that this is the simple formula for learning prayers and melodies.  Repetition scientifically contributes to short term memory,  and returning to it often contributes to moving knowledge to our long-term memory.

My final project started out with the intent to create a Hebrew prayer version of karaoke, called Prayeraoke. I have had this idea for years, but have never found software or a person that could create it for me. This remains in my list of things to do.  (Please feel free to use my idea, in return for free rights to use it!)

Quickly realizing that I wasn't going to fulfill my dream of creating real Prayeraoke, I started to think about my use of music in the classroom and out.

In many places that I go, I consider my guitar and my song leading skills to be tools that not too many other people have. So when GarageBand was introduced to me in TTF, I naturally gravitated to it.  I layed down a few tracks, using only a quiet room, the iPad and my musical ability (which is mediocre) as tools.  Very quickly and gratifyingly, I produced something that sounded decent and could be used in order to tell a digital story.

Once the audio was complete,  I was able to export it to iMovie and smash it with a little bit of ExplainEverything and Drawing Pad.  iMovie seems like an appropriate app to bring it all together because it is versatile and accepts virtually any media as an import.

I ended up using the final product to tell a digital story (visual and audio) with key values intertwined in the text and subtext.  Students were asked to sing  along with the intermittent prompts on the screen to snap them back to attention, if needed.

Below, I'm including the 5W's and an H as to why one might use this combination. While it lacks refinement that I would want to use it for REAL humans, here is the link to the beginnings of the project:  http://youtu.be/_TKSYYDpbRc

Stop reading here or read on to learn why this might be an interesting medium:

Using Music and Digital Story Telling to Teach Values 5 W's and H

Why?  

• Digital story telling may be a medium that better catches attention of our kids, due to conditioning and maybe wiring?
• It is a way to combat students' desensitization to the teacher talking all the time
• It may allow for greater creativity and encourage students to take on similar projects of their own
• May appeal to different learning styles due to use of visual and auditory sensory input
• Can be repeated more than once to reinforce, if needed

Who?

• Teachers or students can create edit, embellish, or just be receivers of media
• Parents can receive exactly what the kids saw via electronic media or email, blogs, etc.

How?

• Can be used in a flipped classroom, PBL, Philosophical inquiry, or other modalities
• Knowledge of the medium and software/apps can be part of the discovery process or part of a prerequisite
• Assumes that materials are available for presentation:  ie internet access, projector, smart-board, iPad, etc.
• Work toward goals and check in frequently on progress toward goal.  Don't use it if it will not help.

When?

• When you need a change of pace in your classroom
• When the goals of the lesson support using it
• When you can create or find appropriate materials
• The technology will not work against you
• You need to reach more or different students than you might usually
• Someone in contact with your material  (students, educators, parent) will  appreciate  the work

Where?

• This sort of materials can be used in informal settings, home, school, etc.  Important to use in appropriate setting.  (Example:  video around a campfire may not be the mood we are looking for)

What?

• We can create a digital version of almost any lesson.  Content can be anything
• Engagement is key - ask how often in your presentation people are asked to do something. Is it appropriate for your goals?

Values planned for this lesson:  Shalom and g'milut chasadim.

Shalom:  Lo Yisa Goi - Nation shall not lift up sword against nation  (Isaiah 2:4, Michah 4:3)

G'milut Chasadim:  Story of Two Brothers

Thanks for reading!

New Reel/Movie Trailer Assignment Idea

One of my ideas for an assignment for my class this coming year is to have the students make news broadcasts or movie trailers on the iPads about significant topics in the history portion of our sixth grade curriculum. I plan to divide them into groups and allow them to choose their topics. Once they have chosen a topic I will allow them class time and homework time to do research into the event, movement, etc.
Hoping most of the reading and research will be done at home (utilizing a flipped classroom set up) and the students can use class time to interact and create their videos I would allot a fair amount of time for them to get to know the apps in the iPads and allow them time to edit their footage together. I would encourage them to utilize videos found online to splice into the footage they are shooting of their group members for added interest.  I would have the students use iMovie or Green Screen to create the news reels or movie trailers.

Once the videos were completed I would have the students share each group's work with the class and present a lesson on their topic to teach the other class members about their topic. After this work is shared with the class I would post the students work on our class' website Popplet.
The Popplet will be utilized to share the ever evolving and expanding curriculum with the students and parents. By posting the work on the website the students will be able to share their hard work with family members at home to instill a sense of pride. By consistently showcasing the work the students have done in this manner it will encourage them to put more effort into their classwork and constantly encourage them to strive to do better.

Technology Plans

In regard to my final project for the seminar, I've prepared a flipped classroom lesson.  It would be a segment in a series on Biblical cantillation aimed at an audience of grades 6+.  It is a video-lecture that was prepared by smashing the following apps:

• iMovie
• Green Screen by Do Ink
• DavkaWriter
• Explain Everything
• Garage Band
• Drawing Pad
• Tellagami
• Action Movie

After viewing the "lecture," students would be directed to an activity such as:

• Blogging observations and questions.
• Practicing skills using auditory feedback.

For this coming school year, I hope to utilize the flipped classroom approach frequently for instruction, demonstration, and modeling in a variety of subject areas.  Then, depending on the subject, the learning objective(s), and the need for accommodation and scaffolding, I have the choice of many tools for:

·      Guided Practice – helping students start practicing new skills and applying new knowledge (Google  Docs (recording/audio feedback, project based learning, webquests, Google Docs self-grading quizzes, Quizzlet, and more).

·      Independent Practice — turning them loose to work on their own and in collaboration (digital storytelling, blogging, et al.).

I also look forward to the innumerable benefits of encouraging students’ creativity and providing opportunities to publish and share their individual and collaborative work with one another and the school community.

Hazzan Devin Goldenberg
5th and 6th Grade
B'nei Mitzvah Tutoring
Temple Beth Sholom
Framingham, MA

Big Ideas from TTF Seminars

One of the strongest ideas I’m taking away from the TTF is the potential for a collaborative dynamic that’s infused in the classroom utilization of the iPad.  Before taking the seminar, I was wary of the potential for students becoming locked in to their own “zones” with iPad.   I’m so happy and thrilled to say that I could not have been more mistaken.

What do I mean by collaborative learning?  It’s learning in which collaboration, teamwork, and the collective talents of all participants are an integral part of the learning process.

This means not just publishing ideas (iBook, iMovie, etc.), but publishing them in ways in which creators can receive feedback, reflect and revise their own output and that of others.  This feedback and revision process is not merely an add-on but at the heart of the learning process.  This blog is itself a good example of this as we post our thoughts and plans with the primary intention of promoting feedback and interaction.

And it also means working together in real-time to accomplish collectively forged and monitored goals, whether we’re smashing apps in workgroups to create an audio-visual guide to holiday observance  or communicating and working with experts outside of the classroom on a presentation using Google Drive.

I’m excited about using technology in my classes to create and enhance such a collaborative learning process.  One in which all participants are learners/teachers – one in which I can spend more class time functioning as a guide and facilitator.

As my actual group class and individual tutoring time is very limited, I’m especially intrigued by the possibilities of the flipped classroom approach.  I hope to use what I’ve learned in the TTF to more successfully engage students from home.  The knowledge and skills I’ve gained will allow me to produce entertaining presentations of curriculum content that I feel confident students will enjoy watching.  Who knows? – their parents might get involved in the learning as well.  This will hopefully save valuable class time which can be better used for hands-on work, project based learning, and differentiated instruction that will benefit both the advanced and less advanced learners.

Learning Center/Parent/Teacher Resource

Being the Learning Center Specialist at two temples is challenging. Not to mention that one is conservative and the other is reform. I see students from Second through Sixth Grade so the needs are very diverse. My plan is to make a place where teachers, parents and students could go to and learn, explore, practice...

I have started on this quest for the "ultimate website." It is still at the planning stages because it will take me all summer to complete. However, a great majority of it is done and her is a sampling of what it will offer...

Click on the hyperlinks to get a navigate through a sampling of my blog.
Learning Letters
Learning Words
Learning Prayers
Holidays
Games

Reflections on TTF at 6/28/13

• I believe that much of the technology that we (CJPTTF fellows) have been exploring over the past few months will allow for deeper content exploration for more learners within the classroom. Technology provides great tools for project-based learning by providing portals into resources online not easily accessible offline and also expands the possibilities for creative student-directed exploration. I have learned about many tools that will assist and support students who need to move faster, those who need to move either more slowly or those moving in different directions or those taking alternate routes to the same destination. Using wikis and webquests, google docs and other tools along with appropriate scaffolding provides a safe way for shifting greater responsibility for learning into the hands of the students.

• I have already begun integrating a little technology into my fourth grade class this spring. In a lesson reviewing the Ten Commandments, I located a YouTube video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AoXyk5AFAvs with kids doing a “rap boogie” (my definition!) of the Ten Commandments. Before giving my students the assignment to dramatize the meaning of a Commandment of their choosing, I shared this video. By the end of the short video, most students were already doing their own interpretive dance and rap. They also volunteered where the commandments were slightly different from what we had studied (i.e. resting on Sunday). I then handed groups a video camera to record their Command(ment) Performance. We did not have time to view the videos during that class so I created a Ten Commandment video loop for the next class and left it running as they arrived. They loved it and they demonstrated what they had learned.

• This positive experience linked with the work we did in and out of these seminars, has set me off on another adventure of creating a wiki and webquest for the first half of the coming year. I already have the complete buy in of the grade coordinator and director of congregational learning in re-creating the Judaic curriculum for the coming year using whatever technology/creative tools I can. At a minimum, the months (about 4) devoted to exploring Bereshit will be learning constructed through a grade wiki and using many different internet/digital tools. In addition, the website I created this past spring for the entire 6th grade as a home base for creating a siddur, will become a wiki so that students can be their own editors in the same process of creating a siddur. The wiki will also connect students to diigolet to find useful information in building their understanding of prayers and the construct of a Shabbat shacharit service. The siddur they create serves as the liturgy for a 6th grade family service near the end of the school year which the students lead from beginning to end including chanting from Torah. Students will be able to access trope, prayer and their individual verse melodies directly from this wiki as they prepare for this service.

Shabbat With Moses - A retreat

Shabbat with Moses: A retreat for Grades 3-6

One of our projects for the Teaching Technology Fellowship  at Beth El was a movie making retreat during which our students created a video of the life of Moses.  The retreat lasted from Friday evening until Saturday evening and the goal was to shoot the footage on the retreat and edit it when we got home so that we could show it to the students and their parents on the last day of school, which is also our Fiftieth Anniversary Birthday Party.

We shot the video in three separate sessions, working around the usual Shabbat retreat activities (dinner, Maariv prayer,  Breakfast, morning prayer, sports, Havdallah).  We used the new video camera we got at the last session on a tripod, and a second camera for close up shots We knew we would not have time to make the scenery so we shot against a green screen (a trick we learned from the Cameron video).

We began the first session by teaching them three songs that were written for the movie. Then the students heard the script and recommended people for parts (We allowed students to reject the part if they chose, but we did not allow them to volunteer.  They had to be volunteered by someone else).  Then the students in the act went off to rehearse while the rest of the students worked on making props (They made the Nile River,and  a doorway) We shot the scene before lunch.

At the second session the teen volunteers shot a funny scene of their own making (a video within the video about Moses killing the taskmaster) to the "live audience" of the students interacting with the teens.  Then we shot the three songs they had rehearsed in the morning. 

At the final session, which was held after free time, we incorporated our traditional retreat talent show into the video by presenting the short talent skits as performances that were done before Pharaoh's throne.  While they were presenting these, another group rehearsed a second scene (the burning bush) , and we shot that scene as well. 

The final scene was shot on the Sunday following the retreat , when we were back at  Beth El.  The final movie is still being edited.  When it is done we will upload it to the wiki.

The retreat was a huge success.  It was wonderful to see the students of different ages cooperating on the project, and the combination of music,drama, and art allowed everyone to find their strength.  The students are excited about seeing the final result.

Judy and Mark