My previous post was about the start of Genius Hour. The students are now beginning to complete their first projects so I’d like to share a bit about what they’ve been doing. From coding to collecting recipes to cooking to various kinds of slime to lava lamps, and much more, the fourth graders have been researching a wide variety of topics!
Our fourth graders are in a Music/Art/Technology rotations. Each class comes to me every third week for the entire week. My original thought had been to have Genius Hour just a couple of days a week. After we started, I quickly realized that was not enough time. Judging from the excitement, my initial thought was, “Why didn’t I do this sooner?” Below are a few anecdotes from the three classes:
One of the boys was walking out of the room with his paper on which he’d narrowed down his topic. I mentioned that he could leave the paper with me. His response, “I just might want to do some work at home!” This from a boy who has trouble staying focused!
A kindergarten assistant came to the room to bring some supplies while the 4th graders were there. I heard a “Oooh” and glanced up to see her do a little leap. She started laughing and exclaimed, “Two little ball things just rolled out the door!” A few of the students were busy programming the Sphero SPRK+ robots. The door opened and out they went!
One girl started her research on guinea pigs three weeks ago. She took some things home to work on. The next time her class came for the rotation, she brought in her finished poster containing facts on guinea pigs; all done at home!
And, then there were the two boys who rushed in one morning with ingredients to make some type of candy. Apparently one had raided his pantry and collected items (I got the impression that his mom had no clue that items were going missing from her kitchen) although he didn’t bother to check the quantity needed for the recipe. That afternoon they appeared with a hot plate and very large beaker. My room is really not set up for cooking! Keeping a close eye on them and hoping nothing would spill or burn, I walked over as they were trying to figure out how to take the beaker off the hot plate (no pot holders). Fortunately, they had a towel so, to avoid spills, I took care of that. They kept looking at their mixture, saying, “Hmmm. It’s supposed to be thicker.” Well, turns out they hadn’t quite followed the recipe! Not enough sugar, cornstarch! They’re eager and don’t give up easily so I know they’ll try again.
From the mouths of babes . . . Two students were interested in Starbucks so they gathered some facts, made a sign, and fixed frappaccinos for the class. As they were sharing facts about Starbucks, the said that the company planned to hire several thousand “veterinarians” over the next few years. Well, veterans – veterinarians; the words are kind of close!
Then, I received this sweet note from a parent:
Hi Karen,
Olivia was inspired to make a movie related to her genius project. This is the trailer she made tonight. So impressed with how she jumps right into technology. No fear! Thank you for inspiring her!
Best,
Danielle
Her first trailer included her last name so I asked her to redo it so that I could post on this blog. Within minutes, her mom had emailed the new video.
I just love the following project about tying flies. Tappan is an avid fisherman and watching him tie the flies was amazing. Even more incredible, though, is how he overcame a problem with his presentation. He used the time-lapse feature in the iPad’s camera app then pulled the videos into Book Creator. More content was added, the project was saved as a video, and uploaded to Seesaw. That’s when he noticed a major problem – the time-lapse videos didn’t play properly, they were running just out of view of the main frame in Seesaw. I couldn’t figure out why this was happening and suggested transferring everything to iMovie. Here’s his finished project:
And, here is his reflection that he wrote in Seesaw.
He came to me to ask how to spell my name. “I don’t want to get it wrong,” he said. Needless to say, it’s little things like this that make a teacher’s day!
A few years ago, after reading a bit about genius hour, I decided to give it a try. Well, it didn’t go as expected – it was noisy and chaotic and I really struggled with, “Are the students really learning anything??” What that taught me was I needed to make sure expectations were clear to the students while still allowing freedom of choice.
Fast forward a few years . . . last July I attended Alan November’s Building Learning Communities conference and was able to take a workshop presented by Joy Kirr, the guru with Genius Hour. Joy has collected a vast number of resources over the years (visit her Genius Hour Livebinder). Between this fantastic information and her encouragement, I began to believe that Genius Hour was something that I needed to try again. Am I glad I did!
What is Genius Hour? We started with this excellent video by John Spencer.
Genius Hour is a time where students are allowed to learn about something in which they are passionately interested.
The students were amazed that they were being given time to learn something of their choice! But, trying to zero in on a topic proved to be a bit more difficult than expected. Some had so many choices that they weren’t sure what to choose, while others couldn’t seem to think of anything.
First, I had the children define genius.
Next, we brainstormed things we wonder about. These thoughts were written on post-it notes and added to a chart.
The hardest step was to narrow down exactly what their interests were. Students were asked to jot down three topics that they were most interested in researching. To the best of their knowledge, they had to let me know about materials and costs. We had a serious talk about NOT going home and telling parents that they needed all kinds of supplies!
The guidelines were simple:
You must research something.
You must create something.
You must present something.
You must reflect on your learning.
Oh, my! I have NEVER seen so much excitement! In several cases, students stopped by in the mornings, arms filled with supplies as they chattered away describing their plans.
One afternoon, I glanced across the room to see a boy who usually had a difficult time staying on task, sewing away. He’d found the plastic needles and yarn and was stitching a word into a scrap of acoustic foam! I’d never considered that to be a tool for sewing and I certainly was proud of his ingenuity!
The joy experienced when what you’re working on actually does what you want it to do!
Student Reflections:
I’m having a difficult time getting the reflection time in because the students only have 40 minutes with me. Add in short group meetings and clean-up time, we’re lucky to get 30 minutes of work time. My plan of reflecting every day has had to be adjusted. I’m thinking a quick blog reflection at the beginning of the week and then another at the end of the week might be better. It’s a critical part of the process, though, so it’s very important to include this step!
Here’s one post that I absolutely LOVE! This girl had an idea in her mind but when she attempted to build it, nothing went right. She realized that failure was absolutely OK!
Here’s another post about building a gumball machine. She’s not sure if it will work but she’s eager to try out her ideas.
So far, not many students have reached the presentation stage. Most are still hard at work. Does everything always run smoothly? No! Are there students who are often off-task? Are there students and/or topics that need a lot of guidance and direction? Yes! But, that’s okay – we are ALL learning!
What are they learning? It’s not necessarily the content or even the topic. Instead, it’s the research skills, the ability to compile information and find the best way to present, the figuring out what to do if something doesn’t work the way you expect, the confidence that comes from speaking with assurance in front of others or on camera – these are what will help students succeed in life!
In between having to work very quietly while our Upper School students took AP Exams, Mr. d’Auteuil’s class was able to fit in one more genius hour in the technology lab before the end of school.
Due to a lack of time, I established some parameters. The students could work in small groups and could choose from:
Mrs. Malone’s class has truly enjoyed having genius hour this year. In fact, the previously scheduled hour turned into a genius week! That’s the nice thing about having the students in the lab – I have much more flexibility with the curriculum.
Because of the music, computer, art rotation, last Friday was the final time that Mrs. Malone’s class came to me. So I decided another genius hour was needed!
I gave more parameters this time because I wanted the focus to be on coding. But they still had several choices:
Only one student asked to do something different – she really wanted to draw and that was okay. For the others, I provided any materials they needed and let them go. They did a great job!
I was especially thrilled to watch the ones who chose Makey Makey. I was available to help but let them make all the necessary connections. The response of one student was, “I really want one of these to do at home.” That’s what makes this worthwhile! ☺
I’ve been wanting to try a genius hour with our 4th graders for awhile. The problem is that I’m the technology teacher and the students are with me for such a a short time! But, I was determined to give it a try.
So, early last week I talked to the students about the plan. I told them we’d be doing some things at the beginning of the week but I wanted them to be thinking about what they could do for their genius hour. We talked about passion.
“What is important to you?”
“What do you want to learn more about?”
“What do you know a lot about that you could share with others?”
“If you were given time to learn or create something, what would it be? How would you do it?
The students were to share whatever they did but other than that requirement, as long as they were productive, they could create in any way they chose. Several asked questions about what they could do; throwing out ideas and checking to see if it was okay. By talking about this early in the week, interest built day by day! The idea was to have Genius Hour on Friday but by Wednesday afternoon it was obvious that we would need to start on Thursday. I have NEVER seen students work so diligently to complete their assignments!
By class time on Thursday, excitement had built to epic proportions (Well, maybe that’s an exaggeration but there was definitely more excitement than I’ve seen in quite awhile!). Several arrived toting all kinds of props.
Mrs. Malone’s students with their props
Here are some of the projects students chose:
Khan Academy – writing code
Explaining how to do a PowerPoint
Making “how-to” soccer videos
Practicing the passion of drawing
Creating cartoons
Finding ways to explain different types of dance
Khan Academy – coding
Observations for the first Genius Hour:
This was hard for some students. Often children are so used to being told what they will be doing that, when given a choice, they get “stuck” and don’t know where to start. A couple questioned me over and over, “Are you sure this is okay to do?” “Can I do this?” This was really thinking outside the box for these children but they’ll get more comfortable the more we do activities like this.
The other observation concerned me – I discovered that it was hard for me to let go! I had students doing all kinds of activities, inside and outside of the lab, and they didn’t need ME! I was a coach/guide and that’s what they needed – not someone to tell them exactly what to do! It was a change but something that I need to make sure I continue to do.
I’d like to say that there were completed projects in our two days of Genius Hour, but there weren’t! But that’s just fine! I have never seen such “focus-ness” in our 4th graders. They were in charge of their own learning and most were doing an awesome job planning, creating, discussing, and doing. It was amazing to watch! Next time this class comes to the lab, we will continue with Genius Hour so that they can share what they have accomplished with their classmates. And, we’ll definitely be doing more Genius Hours (or days) this semester!
He came to me to ask how to spell my name. “I don’t want to get it wrong,” he said. Needless to say, it’s little things like this that make a teacher’s day!
