KMS Coaches' Corner

Research

4/9/2009

7 Comments

 

This is the research season!  Many of you are shepherding your students through a research project.  What strategies have you found that really help the kids with the process?  Anything from choosing topics to developing questions to selecting resources to taking notes to citing sources to putting it all together...   Share any ideas, or questions and issues you've run into.  

7 Comments
reese
4/19/2009 11:58:10 pm

Thanks, Debby, Cara and Beth, for the resources.

Debby, the discovery streaming videos for careers are excellent. I am also able to tie in the reading strategies to help them choose the video that best fit their individual needs as it ties into their powerpoint.

Cara, the questions came just in time as we read through all the technical writing on the occupational outlook handbook website!

Beth, thanks for the websites and tools for databases and spreadsheets! The kids really enjoyed the 20 q's and it tied in so perfectly to explaing filters, queries, and sorts!

Thanks again! You guys help make things so easy!

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Watson
4/22/2009 02:31:54 am

At Debby's suggestion last fall (thanks so much!!!), I created a table for my kids to use to put all their research in. It helps them organize their information when they are doing a project in my class and it helps them make sure they have found everything they need to get a good grade. It also comes in handy for organizing a power point (if they are doing one). I save it as a Microsoft Word template and then they can open it and save it as their own document.

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Bernard
4/23/2009 10:41:34 pm

I am struggling with doing technology based projects in pairs because of the way the students save to the network. It is my understanding that they can only save to their folder, and they do not have access to anyone elses. This means that if one partner is absent (which happens frequently) then the student who is here does not have access to that information for that day, or two days, or three days...

I know I can access the drive, save it to a flash, then transfer it... this is too time consuming when I often have 3 or 4 students missing. By time you get to the last one half the class has been wasted. (Also, I seem to have a lot of problems with our laptops and flash drives. They do not want to eject properly. Am I doing something wrong?)

What are some good solutions?

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Debby
4/25/2009 09:54:38 am

Excellent points and observations, Bernard. No easy answers, but we certainly can and will brainstorm possible options. We want the kids' efforts to be directed to information-seeking and -gathering activities, and when the logistics of technology distract and frustrate them, we need to figure out what we can do better. To be continued.... But in the mean time, do any other teachers have suggestions that will help?

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Hodge
5/12/2009 11:40:04 pm

Bernard,

I have used the WIKI page for similar situations. I often upload a document that I want multiple students to be able to access; they can then download and save it to their documents. Similarly students could upload their work at the end of class and then whoever needed to access it the next day would be able to do so. It's a little bit cumbersome but does give everyone access to what they need.

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Brenda
6/14/2009 11:17:10 pm

Debby, Cara, and Beth,
At ALBHS, we give teachers access to their student folders when requested. That allows the teacher to get to student information when needed.

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Bernard
9/28/2009 09:00:12 pm

I am mourning the death of this here poor blog this morning. So sad.

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