Novotny+Number+Ninjas

** Philosophy ** Our students live in a much different world than their teachers did. Lives are now centered on technology. The methods of teaching that we learned under are no longer appropriate for today’s learners. We need to prepare our students for employment in an ever changing world that uses technology to its fullest extent. Kids today have immediate access to ever changing information. This opens up possibilities that were never before imaginable and puts more information within our reach. We need to have greater expectations. We need to teach our kids how to retrieve new information using all resources available and how to problem solve using this vast amount of information that is always changing. This will help to prepare them for whatever jobs might be available. Employers are expecting this of their employees. In addition, our students are used to being “entertained” by all sorts of technology. In years past, kids sat in large rooms and watched a lecture given by teachers. Kids today expect to be entertained. We need to change our teaching in order to get the kids to understand the material we are presenting in a format that they are used to. With this is mind, we need to teach new important skills as collaboration and critical thinking, we need to teach them to be innovated and creative, adapt to new situations and become problem solvers. ** Ecosystem Element ** I teach AT (Gifted) Math to fourth and fifth graders. It is my goal to help them become prepared for all that life expects of them in their futures. Technology has been a goal of mine this year and I have created a Blackboard site for my classes. I want to continue this goal and work to include more activities within the transformation level of the SAMR model. With this in mind, I am going to choose the ecosystem of technology to develop in depth within my classroom.
 * CREATING A 21ST CENTURY LEARNING ENVIRONMENT **

I want to have my students become problem solvers each day in my class. To be aware of the many resources available to them. I want them to learn what to do in new situations and to keep trying when they hit a road block. They need to know that giving up is not an option. They need to learn how to collaborate with each other in new situations and how technology can help them do this.

Edmodo Problem Solving Site To achieve this goal, I am working with a team mate of mine to create an Edmodo site for problem solving. Many times the AT classroom is small, and it is hard to collaborate. There is talk of transporting kids to a couple of schools to foster this collaboration, but this is cost prohibitive, at this point. We are going to use technology to “bring our kids to each other.” We have set up an Edmodo site for our 6 schools, which we have named: “Number Ninjas”. We will teach these 6 schools to use Edmodo to blog with each other in order to successfully problem solve 5 problems each unit. There will also be an opportunity to collaborate answering the essential questions. We will begin by teaching problem solving strategies to our individual classes and how to effectively use a problem solving organizer to answer each problem in a complete way (using the extended response format). Since we have to teach the Literacy of Math, it is important that our students learn to convey mathematical information in a written response. Since we have two grade levels in each class, and must teach both levels each period, there are times I am not able to be with a particular grade level. I need to assign independent work to kids in order to manage. Each unit, we will assign 5 problem solving problems and 5 essential questions. It is our goal that the kids will use this site to pose questions, collaborate and problem solve together. The kids will be instructed at the beginning not to share answers right away, but thinking. If a student is finished, we will suggest they take a “tripto Number Ninjas to see if they can make suggestions to those having difficulty.

** Artifacts ** I will use this to review problem solving strategies
 * 1) 1 Problem Solving Strategies Handout

I will require the use of this organizer to remind kids the steps I like to see in their final answer. .
 * 1) 2 [[file:graphic organizer.pdf]]

Here is a page from our Edmodo site
 * 1) 3 Edmodo Number Ninjas website

** Success Indicators ** I will consider this technological addition a success, if I see the following:
 * Site activity
 * Independence during the Learning Center time
 * Completeness and accuracy of the 5 problem solving prompts and essential questions
 * Cross school interaction

** Other Elements Impacted ** ** Possible Negatives **
 * Collaboration
 * Instructional Strategies
 * Classroom Norms and Routines
 * Intervention and Extensions
 * Computer availability
 * Internet access difficulties
 * Sharing too much info or answers rather than suggested steps or thoughts