At the beginning of the year I had the awesome opportunity to collaborate and plan with Dr. Linton and Miss Mrazez (the other blended learning teacher). We thought through the implementation of blended learning for this school year as well as what a day-in-the -life of blended learning would look like in a first grade classroom. I was able to take all this information and make it my own as I began to provide blended learning opportunities for my students.
Last year, I had the opportunity through our region to participate in their Digital Learning Academy where I attended a session by Lucas Gillespie (@lucasgillespie) in gaming. This session got me excited about gamification and new ways to engage my young kiddos. He introduced me to the 3D GameLab which is a learning managment system used to provide gamification opportunities for students.
I hoped to jump right in to the 3D GameLab (3DGL) with my students, but after collaborating with Dr. Linton I decided to provide these gamification opportunities on paper and through the use of Nearpod before intoducing the 3DGL to my students.
I wanted to ensure my students had choice and that I was meeting the needs of my students. At the beginning of each math unit my students would take a pre-test. This gave my students the opportunity to earn experience points for those skills and concepts already mastered. I would then pass out a handout that listed possible math quests. Students would choose quests they would like to skip by using experience points as well as the order they would complete these quests. The handout would give them a Nearpod code. They would put the code in Nearpod and work through the presentation. At the beginning of the year some of these presentations would include a video of me giving directions (all students could not read), a video of me teaching specific skills and concepts (used to flip my classroom and/or for review), and a way for students to show their understanding. Others would be math journal opportunities with choice, skill practice, and hands-on opportunities. Students were also able to earn badges for quests completed for hard working behaviors (time on task, completing two quests in a day, etc.).
Here is an example of a handout from the beginning of the year.
Unfortunately, these Nearpod codes have expired. Sorry!
As my students became comfortable choosing their quests and working through these presentations, I introduced the 3D GameLab. They now get to their quests through the 3D GameLab. They are still able to use experience points to skip quests, move through the quests at their own pace, earn badges, and level up to more challenging opportunities. My students love the feel of the 3D GameLab and are ecstatic when they earn new badges!
Here is an example math journal quest from the beginning of the year.
I also provide online learning opportunities in Language Arts. Here is an example from earlier this year.
Earlier this year I presented a session titled Gamification in an Elementary Classroom. Feel free to check out more resources from this presentation.
I have learned so much this year about blended learning, but I continue to learn something new everyday! Next year my school will be a blended learning magnet school! It will be awesome to have team members to collaborate and plan with as we all provide online learning opportunities for our students.
