From Post-Its to Jamboard

"Okay kids, make sure to refer back to today's anchor chart when you are responding to your prompt in our thoughtful logs". If you teach literacy and especially using the Comprehensive Literacy Model, you have said these words. But how do we assure students are using the resources we are providing? It's a tough job: they have to be engaged, routines have to be in place, there also has to be a system of accountability for students when they are working independently. So, on my Journey to Modification, I decide to try out Google Jamboard with my students. The results were great!

We have "bilingual" groups established and we work in them almost daily, so I sent out a Jamboard to my students and assigned a specific page for each group to work on. From my perspective, as I was walking around the room I could see that everyone was either typing their ideas or discussing them. Side note: this RARELY happens, there is usually an argument or two that I have to referee in order for some groups to get through the task. After the 15 minute timer went off we convened on the carpet and this is what I heard from my students as we reflected on the day's lesson:

• "That was so much fun!"
• "Everyone participated this time!"
• "Mrs. Hegg, can we please NEVER go back to writing on boring Post-its?" 
• "I love it when we use Jamboard"

Of course I won't say never to Post-its, but using Jamboard has really made a difference in my classroom. Those Jamboards that we created then became a resource for everyone, as they could access the information from all groups after sharing out, during their independent application time. As I settled in to work with a group of students I popped open my iPad and launched Apple Classroom just to check in and hold my students accountable for their independent work time.

This has proven necessary as many of them tend to wander on Safari instead of staying focused on the tasks for the day. To my surprise, I had 11 students on Jamboard using it as a resource while writing out their answers to the days prompt!! Score!!!