Storybird: Making Picture Books Online

This week, I explored online picture book creation tools (or comic strip creators, although I completely disagree with that description.) Storybird is a cute website that features tons of artwork from uploaders from all around the world. You can use these artworks to create a picture book, a full chapter book, or even just a poem. Then you can share your story with others or even publish your story on the website for anyone to view.

Here is the link to the story I made using Storybird, which is the tale of a lonely young girl whose wish for a friend is granted by the Princess of Heaven. It was a fun experience to make the book, but I will say that it was a little difficult to find enough corresponding images to make a full story.

If I were to use this online picture book creation tool with students, it would be as a general writing project for intermediate level ESL students.  I could use it to test students' story structure understanding by making sure students create a story with a beginning, middle, and end, including an obvious conflict. I would also be checking the students' use of punctuation when writing quotations in English (comma placement, quotation marks, proper placement of sentence ending punctuation markings, etc.)

Due to the difficulty I encountered finding enough coherent pictures to make a full story, I would not limit the students in any way other than the objectives I stated in the paragraph above. Students would be able to write about any topic of their choice using Storybird OR they could create a picture book with pictures from elsewhere.

My First Attempt at a TED-Ed Lesson

This week I was asked to create my first lesson on the TED-Ed platform. I have been working a lot with literacy and story comprehension strategies this semester so I chose to center my lesson around the fable of The Three Little Pigs.

This lesson asks students to view one animated version of the fable and answer multiple choice questions about it. Then, students are asked to skim an advanced article about the meaning of the fable. Afterward, students watch another animated version of the fable--this one being far more detailed--and then compare and contrast the two videos. Finally, students must answer a discussion question about the meaning of "being prepared."

The objectives of this activity are as follows:
SWBAT answer basic comprehension questions about The Three Little Pigs.
SW compare and contrast two different versions of the same story.
SWBAT understand the meaning of "being prepared" and explain it in writing when talking about the third little pig.
SW practice skim reading strategies.

The first three objectives can be assessed within the TED-Ed lesson itself, as students answer multiple choice comprehension questions within the lesson, and answer short-answer discussion questions within the lesson. As the lesson creator, I will be able to monitor the student responses and see which areas of the lesson gave students a hard time. If I had a real classroom, I would make sure to go over these answers in class and reinforce the trouble areas through further activities.
The four and final objective cannot be measured on an online platform, and I'll be honest in admitting that I only included it because the assignment called for two links to be included in the lesson.

Flipping the Approach

The idea of a "flipped classroom" is gaining popularity, especially among ESL teachers! If you haven't heard about "flipped classrooms," basically the idea is very similar to any college seminar class:

1.) Teach yourself by watching teacher selected/ prepared videos or texts before class.
2.) Arrive at class having already digested the content material and spend class time collaborating and working with others on comprehension activities directly relating to what you have read or watched ahead of time.
3.) Reflect on what you have learned and practiced through some sort of writing or final statement of understanding.

According to Flipping your Classroom: A Primer and Three Reasons to Flip Your Classroom, this strategy of using class time to work on comprehension of pre-learned materials can work well for any age, not just university students. This approach can increase students comprehension, collaboration skills, and critical thinking!

What I connected to the most from the above articles was the idea that often times students go home after a lecture and are unable to complete their homework due to a lack of full understanding. I remember struggling with this all the time in high school. By moving the traditional "homework" into class time, students are able to access help from both the teacher and other students when they get stuck. This is a huge advantage, and something that has definitely peaked my interested in trying a "flipped" approach in the future.