The third-graders at Hannah Gibbons Elementary interact with each other and with their cooperating teacher based on the mood that they are in for the day. Some days the students are excited and ready to work, willing to work together on the assignment. However, this classroom lacks respect for their teacher and their classmates. Many times when one student is upset that will set off another student and then it ends in a chain reaction of yelling, name calling, and students being sent out of the classroom. I have noticed however, these students accomplish more and are able to gain the knowledge better when they are in small group learning. Whether they are working together or at the table with the teacher, these students love having the support.  The teacher has set up a designated schedule on who works together during small group work. For the most part, students are able to collaborate and work together to work on the task at hand. 

Our teacher incorporates many different types of digital technology that the students use on a daily basis during class. Our teacher incorporate iPads during center time where the students use apps like Seesaw and eSpark. Seesaw is a classroom app for meaningfully engaging students in their learning. Student are able to build in annotation tools to capture what they know in Seesaw’s digital portfolio. This app also allows the teacher to deeply understand student thinking and progress to enable them to teach better. Seesaw’s tools are intuitive, open-ended, and meet students where they are, so students at all levels have more options to show what they know. When students can demonstrate their learning in ways that work best for them they thrive. eSpark Learning is also an app that allows for student to engaging in ways to meet the students unique learning needs. This app automatically differentiates for the students based on their current needs, giving them targeted instruction in reading and math. There is also diverse third-party games, video, and resources to spark love of learning. eSpark also is helpful for your students for practicing new skills. Within the app it is adaptive, self-paced for your students will master standards. During this time student are receiving immediate feedback, and synthesize their learning along the way. 

After asking about their uses of digital and social media outside the school a student told me that he uses his ps4 to play games with his friends and siblings. He also uses his phone to text his friends. He also has an iPad that he shares with his siblings that they play games on, watches YouTube and plays on other apps that he has downloaded.