Why Elementary Teachers are Choosing this Project-Management Tool
Jennifer Winning is a 4th grade teacher who has been teaching for 14 years. As a competency-based and project-based teacher, she put student agency, skill awareness and self-reflection at the forefront of her teaching goals. Spinndle eases her workload by turning over the management role to her students. It’s a win-win.
She uses Spinndle for 3 reasons…
We Now Value Process > Product.
I use it for Inquiry so it allows them to explore a topic of interest in a way that’s motivating for them. They like that they’re “posting” like on social media so they’re eager to show their thinking and learning. When they’re on Spinndle, it motivates them to a level of quality that you wouldn't necessarily get in regular draft work because now they're sharing it with others. And because it's fun.
2. My Students are Engaged in Knowledge Sharing
Students as young as 4th grade work through Spinndle independently.
It gives the students a chance to work with each other in a way that they wouldn't get to in the classroom--even beyond pandemic times--students don’t always have the ability to see the work or the process of other students.
In my classroom, I often do a gallery walk part way through a project. Everyone checks out other people’s ideas and what they've been working on; but Spinndle gives them access to everyone's process throughout a whole project. Not just the people in their group or the people who sit near them or their friends. They get to see how everyone is responding and they're motivated to actually take a look at it critically because they're giving feedback to each other.
Students are actively experiencing feedback. When they look at each other’s work, they are having to think about what they're seeing, which just gives them that extra step of processing the information.
Spinndle gives them the ability to encourage each other and to give and receive feedback in appropriate ways. Most importantly, they get to practice handling feedback, and how to respond to it.
I've always been getting them to do that with peer editing, but with the time we have in a classroom to facilitate that process, you can't do it for every assignment. And Spinndle speeds up that feedback process. They get it in real time. It happens organically and it’s more authentic.
“They get to practice handling feedback,
and how to respond to it. ”
I also love that they are getting feedback from their peers and not just from their teacher. That's a big deal too, the amount of quality feedback that they're able to get from their peers is greater using Spinndle than when you just do it with regular, everyday classroom activities. I think it’s because there's volume and there's motivation to provide quality feedback, because your peers see it and because they have chosen when to comment. There’s ownership to their feedback.
3. My Students are Building the Skills to Learn for Themselves
“What I like is that on Spinndle they get repeated, meaningful practice with skills that might otherwise be boring to learn individually. ”
Communication is huge. Not only just socially and the feedback piece, but also being able to follow instructions: read a task, understand it, respond to it. I mean, it sounds so, so basic, but they need a lot of practice following steps and instructions. Spinndle’s structure keeps students on track because it allows more practice with communicating about one topic.
Critical Thinking skills around giving feedback but also reflecting on what counts as evidence. Thinking about, “How can I show my work? How do I prove my learning? What are some new and different ways I could try to do that? ”
Building tech skills (Digital Literacy) is also a big benefit: how to take a screenshot, how to find things on their drive, upload things from their drive, even editing their photos to highlight what’s really important to them.
What I like is that on Spinndle they get repeated, meaningful practice with skills that might otherwise be boring to learn individually.
As an extra from Jennifer: I'm using it as an enrichment activity too!
I’ve set up projects that maybe six or seven of my kids can do without much direction from me. So for early finishers, rather than telling them to go read a book, or do enrichment activities by themselves, they can keep pushing their thinking further and further with a small peer group motivating and supporting them.
“When they’re on Spinndle, it motivates them to a level of quality that you wouldn’t necessarily get in regular draft work because now they’re sharing it with others. ”
Spinndle is currently offering discounted pricing for licenses and free pilot opportunities for schools.