Second Post

November 8, 2013--Today our cooperating teacher stayed home sick; she had begun losing her voice and coughing like crazy for the last several days. When I left for at the end of the day on yesterday she said she was probably going to get a sub for today. She got a substitute teacher she often uses, a friend of hers she calls first whenever she needs a sub. The substitute's name was Mrs. Peterson. On this day the students had the chance to use the school's Chromebooks to type up final drafts of their opinion essays. The previous few days they had been prewriting and drafting opinion essays. (They had been asked to write persuasively about which was better, books or movies based on books.) 

By way of backstory, the district has recently begun placing an emphasis on email communication for the students. They have sent home communication with parents with instructions and plans for what they want the students to be able to do. The district uses Google Apps for Education, and all the students have their own nebo.edu email address that is hosted by gmail. The students are all being encouraged to begin using their nebo.edu email address to access Google Drive and the other educational apps that are offered by Google. In theory, this is a wonderful idea. But it's not such a great thing when the students can't remember their username and/or password and can't login!

Right as I got there a few students were wheeling the cart with the Chromebooks and were getting them all out. Each student had a beautiful shiny silver laptop, and most were successfully logging in and getting to work typing up their final draft. 

The students had 60 minutes with the computers, and what I noticed during the hour was that there were some students who had their drafts completely typed up and finished within 30 minutes and some who wasted most of the time doing other things. There were students who had problems logging in. One student in particular, a student who struggles significantly getting any of his work done ever, spent 20 minutes trying to log in. Mrs. Peterson and I both began trying to help him log in. Finally he found the paper with his username and password in his desk, and he realized he had been typing his username incorrectly. 

It became apparent that some students had been goofing off earlier in the week when they were supposed to be prewriting and drafting. Their teacher had spent the previous three writing lessons giving them time to draft their essays, but for whatever reason some students had failed to produce a first draft before the class's scheduled time with the Chromebooks. These students were given instructions that they were not to use the computers but instead spend the time with paper and pencil coming up with a draft. The teacher wanted them to have a handwritten, double-spaced draft before sitting down at the computer. 

Later on as the hour progressed, many of the students began sending each other instant messages and chatting via gmail. Mrs. Peterson instructed them that they were to use the computers only for writing their drafts. Some students protested, saying they should be able to do other things because they had finished typing their essays. I could see their point, but it seemed like a bad idea. Mrs. Peterson and I both agreed that they should get off the computers if they were finished and read or do something else quietly at their desks.

At the end of the day Mrs. Peterson and I taught the students a science lesson about the seasons using a video clip that was saved on the teacher's computer. Mrs. Peterson had gotten the video queued up earlier, but it wouldn't play. Mrs. Peterson didn't seem to know what to do about it. I went over to the computer and was able to start up Task Manager, stop and restart Windows Media Player, find the correct file, and play it. I felt good about the fact that I was able to get it working, and Mrs. Peterson seemed relieved too. She looked panicked there for a minute, I'm sure because she wasn't sure what she was going to do with the class for 30 minutes without the video.