The Game: 1.0

History as Semiotic Domain

After briefly considering James Paul Gee’s concept of semiotic domains I have pondered over what implications this has in my world as a history teacher. What types of modalities communicate distinctive types of meanings within the discipline of history? To parse this down even further, Gee offers two other related concepts- internal grammar and external grammar. 

When it comes to internal grammar, what are “the principles and patterns” that can be “recognized as what is and what is not acceptable or typical content” in history? (Gee, 2003, p. 30) In the case of history, acceptable content includes primary sources, secondary sources, and tertiary sources. Credible evidence used to support historical arguments, Cause and effect relationships, determining the bias of any work from historians or persons for history, and corroboration of sources are just a few of the “principles and patterns” that define history as a semiotic domain.

When it comes to external grammar, “what is and what is not an acceptable or typical social practice and identity” in the field of history? (Gee, 2003, p. 30) One thing that is not acceptable is using historical evidence out of context to support one’s own point of view.

Brainstorming a Game for History

After reading Bogost, and then exploring Twine, my initial brainstorming regarding twine as a form of formative assessment is beginning to take form. I think history is an excellent fit for this technology. History is so often defined by the cause and effect of one historical development to another. My initial thinking is that I could create a twine that considers alternate histories based on some of the possible choices certain historical actors could have possibly made and what the potential outcomes could have been. Another twine might walk students through a series of primary and secondary sources and make choices about what evidence they would use to support an argument. One of the questions from my  Assessment Design Checklist is: does my assessment task students to apply thinking skills in a manner where they must transfer their knowledge of concepts to new and/or unfamiliar contexts? I believe constructing a twine for this particular instruction tasks students with having to transfer skills and knowledge to new and unfamiliar context.

The Game

One of the skills that students focus on mastering in my classroom is historical critical reading skills such as corroboration of evidence and sources, analyzing the historical context of sources, vetting the credibility of a secondary source, and determining the bias and frame of reference from a primary or secondary source.

The twine game will be set up to help students to either corroborate multiple documents and/or determine if they are an appropriate source for responding to a historical problem.

• Students will be presented with the following historical problem:

Should President Harry Truman have dropped the atomic bombs on Japan or was this the wrong decision?

• Students will answer the question before weaving their way through a series of documents related to the decision to drop the atomic bombs on Japan.
• For each document, students will decide whether the United States should or should not have dropped the bomb.
• Based on their choice, students will then consider a document that is strong evidence against their previous choice.
• At the end of the Twine, students will be tasked to take a final position to the question and then collect their evidence from the Twine activity that corroborates with one another and supports their position.

Assessing Google Forms as a Tool of Assessment

For my CMS assessment, I have selected Google Forms. Though Google Forms is not unfamiliar to me I am a recent adopter in using Google Forms for assessment. The hustle and bustle of the school year left little to no time to explore the features of Google Forms in more depth and therefore it is very fortuitous that I have had the opportunity to do so in this course.

One of the skills I seek to teach and assess is helping students to learn critical reading skills in reading primary and secondary texts. To that end creating ways to efficiently check their understanding and mastery of these more sophisticated skills has been a vexing problem for me.

That is the purpose of the example assessment I have created for this assignment- to assess students command of several specific critical reading skills in the context of social studies texts. These skills are specific to high school social studies standards in Michigan 

One of the assessment questions from my Assessment Design Checklist asks: does my assessment offer students a space to reflect on their learning of targeted skills and content? To that effort I have employed the Google Forms feature, Go To Section Based on Answer. This is a feature of multiple-choice test items. Depending on the answer a student selects in a multiple-choice item they can be sent to a specific section in the test. If a student selects the correct answer, they could be forwarded to a written response asking them to explain why they believe the answer they selected is correct. Conversely, students who select one of the distractors can be sent to a section that will ask them to reflect on their misconception and perhaps an additional reading to assist them in correcting their misconceptions.

I see this feature in Google Forms as a significant accordance because students will have the opportunity to be involved in assessing their own learning in thinking about why they got it right or wrong- thinking about their thinking.

My screencast below is a brief overview of this feature in Google Forms and how I am seeking to use this feature as leverage toward getting students to think about their own learning of critical reading skills.

 

Critical Review of Assessment Features of Google Classroom

For my critical review of a course management system (CMS) I have selected Google Classroom which I will refer to simply as Classroom. Much of my assessment will focus on Google Forms, otherwise known as Forms. Most of the assessment features in Classroom come through integrating Forms quizzes. While I have a bit more experience with Schoology and so far feel Schoology provides more flexibility and options than Classroom I now teach in a district where Classroom is the dominant CMS used by teachers. Because of this, I think it is essential for me to remain focused on assessing Classroom and Forms.

All the features I have assessed in Classroom and Forms are organized in their own tables where the name of the feature, the features description, affordances, constraints, and implications are explained. You can review my assessment of the assessment features of Google Classroom and Google Forms here.

Assessment Design Checklist 3.0

The creation of my FAD has been a series of snapshots of the evolution of my understanding of the concepts we have been considering and gaining a better grasp of the expectations for the FAD. My instructor, Sarah Frances Keena, has been patiently instrumental in pushing my thinking beyond the abstract and into the practical. She has frequently guided me through a greater understanding of what the course has required for the FAD. Specifically, she has encouraged me to flesh out more detail and be more specific with my rationale for the choices I have made in forming my FAD. Additionally, she has directed me back to readings I have already considered and as the course has proceeded I have been able to see some of the concepts with greater understanding. One example of this is parsing out the nuanced differences between students making meaning of what is being taught and students transferring their newfound understanding and skills to new and challenging context, Of course these two concepts are not wholly independent of one another which requires greater sensitivity on my part in making sure I see with clarity where I am assessing a student’s meaning-making versus their transferring of understanding and skills to new and different contexts.

I also received some of the most thought peer feedback I have ever experienced form, Jonathan Keck. His review of my work was a superlative example of constructive feedback. He understood what I was trying to accomplish with my FAD and demonstrated a thorough understanding of the educational context my FAD was designed for.

Here is a link to my ADC 3.0 for anyone who would like to review the work I have done thus far. Your feedback is more than welcome