Students and Passions and Blogs, Oh My!

This week marks the beginning of Passion Projects 2019! I introduced the concept yesterday to huge enthusiasm from my grade 8s, several of whom have older siblings and who have been waiting for this project to begin with great anticipation.


This year, I am trying something different. A common refrain, as readers of this blog - and my students - know by now! I have asked all students to set up a blog and to share the link right away. In the past, I have had students create blogs (or paper journals) but only share them at the end of the eight weeks. This time, I want students to be able to view each others' blogs throughout the project, in the hopes that having an authentic audience will encourage them to take more initiative in documenting their progress.

All students have created their basic blog, and some have written fairly extensive first entries! I am super excited to see where this goes. There were a few students absent today, so I will update this list once they have had a chance to create their blog. Happy reading!

Tanisha - Makeup
Alex - Flamethrower
Ryland - Potato Launcher
Cole - Lego
Makayla - Getting in Shape
Emily - Learning songs on the Guitar
Emma - Nature Photography
Aidan - Free Throws
Maddy - Learning to play Violin
Monica - Cooking
Kalan - Building a little house
Skye - Learning Italian
Carmen - Composing music
Milo - Learning Norwegian
Adrianna - Protecting Sea Turtles
Julian - Cardboard Projectiles
Nash - Creating a Painting
Luc - Smoke Bomb
Adam - Creating a Rap/Hip-Hop Song
Amelia - Learning German 
Stuart - Food Delivery Robot
Ryan - Homemade Go-Kart 


At the end of working on this today, students did not want to leave for lunch. One approached me and said, "I just want you to know that this project is revolutionary. Not just for me, but everyone in the class is so excited about this." Music to my ears!

For more information on how I do my Passion Projects, you can see the website I created for students or my blog post from 2017

Creative, Autonomous, Accountable

We have been using Flipgrid quite a lot this year - it's one of my favourite new finds. I dabbled a bit last year, but this year I've made a concerted effort to use it more consistently. I've made some progress in that area, and I'm looking forward to using it more effectively as time goes by.

This is the tool fo you if you have ever wanted a way for students to provide a verbal/video response to a prompt without needing to host the video somewhere (eg film on an iPad, then upload to Google Drive, then share... so many steps!) Students can log in with their school email credentials and record a video right away. The teacher has control over whether the videos are private or viewable by other students in the class (or, in fact, by other students with the link to the "grid")

There are lots of great resources created by teachers for integrating the use of Flipgrid in the classroom and beyond. For example :

Flipgrid eBook - The Educators' Guide to Flipgrid. This has everything you need to get started. How to sign up, how to give your students access, how to go beyond simple videos.

Flipgrid Integration - So many ideas for integrating Flipgrid in specific subject areas, for specific ages!


Following Global School Play Day (see last week's post), I asked my students to reflect on their experiences. I recorded a video prompt in Flipgrid, and provided them with some reflection questions to consider.

I was out sick, so this was an activity that I was able to leave for my students to complete with a substitute (another perk to using Flipgrid!). Many responses were thoughtful and detailed some (as is often the case in middle school when there is a substitute) lacked depth. When I do this again next year, I will take more time to prepare my students to respond thoroughly.

Most of the feedback I received was very positive. Students were happy to have had a "break from the normal school day." For the most part, students felt that the expectations had been followed by their peers, and that it was a fun experience. Many of them commented on the fact that it was enjoyable to be able to do what they wanted, when they wanted, speaking to the fact that a "normal" school day is generally structured by the teacher. I am interested in exploring how more of that freedom can be incorporated into my classroom.

One of the comments that was surprising to me came from a grade 8 student. She stated first that she enjoyed Global School Play Day, but that, "I wished there were more activities I could do, because I was kind of bored. Like, if I was allowed to, like, build a fort, I would be pretty happy."

I was surprised by this response because I tried very hard to be clear that I was not putting any limits on what students were "allowed" to do. In fact, I explicitly stated that, as long as they were following the expectations we established together, anything was possible. All of the students in my classroom chose to spend most of the day playing either cards or board games, so I wonder if she felt that building a fort would break some sort of unspoken rule. I will absolutely follow-up with this particular student, to determine how I could have made it clear that any activity was possible.

Students' Flipgrid responses

Another comment that came from multiple students, and one that didn't surprise me at all, was that they wished there had been more organization to the day. They are so used to having their time scheduled for them, they struggled when they were given freedom to choose their own paths. I see this in project work as well, and I hope that having experienced this day of unstructured play will allow them to draw some comparisons when it comes time to choose their passion projects, or other free-choice ways of showing their learning.

Thinking creatively, making decisions autonomously, and holding themselves accountable are skills I strongly encourage in my students. These are the skills they will need moving forward. These are skills we could all stand to improve upon.