Self-Diagnosis: Genius Hour Experiment, part 2

The next step in my Genius Hour experiment is starting my own e-portfolio to track my progress. The setup doesn’t really count as a genius hour, but it’s necessary to record and measure the success (or lack thereof) in my novice endeavors. I have to establish that I am indeed starting where my kids are starting and that I end up somewhere somewhat further along–even though I don’t have the benefit of a guide-on-the-side or structured class time, like they do, the lucky devils!

I wanted to track my Portuguese progress on eLinguafolio.org, as I believe my students will, but it turns out Portuguese is not an option! Fortunately, I’d already cribbed the “I can” statements since the site was so wonky last year. I used the statements from the template I’d made to copy into my project blog and evaluate myself instead. In short: I am truly Novice Low, and I need some speaking and listening practice stat! I did give myself credit for some things students might not have been able to do primarily because of my Spanish background.

I plan to have the self-evaluation conducted outside of Genius Hour time, but I do think I want it combined with their project blogs, just tagged separately. I might even have them blog the modes in separate posts (with separate tags) to facilitate tracking progress in specific areas. This could allow students to update as soon as they feel they’ve advanced in one area while cutting down on redundancy if they have not yet in another. I could also do a quick check on which areas they’ve posted in by checking tags, if all goes according to plan.

Also when they update, whether by section or as a whole, I think I’ll have them copy what they had before, italicize past “I cans” then move applicable “I will” statements under “I can” and bold them to show they’ve graduated from goals to accomplishments. Remaining “I will” statements can just stay where they are unchanged.

I’m not sure if the evidence will fit in the blog posts so well, but I think that’ll be more important after the first self-evaluation anyway. I might require evidence before they can move on to the next level in that area, but not before. They should have an easier time producing evidence–especially the person-to-person–than their poor lonely teacher, at least.