I explored Pocketful of Primary with Michelle Emerson. She focuses on technology, organization, and productivity for educators in the classroom. She is active on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and has her own Teachers Pay Teachers store and website where she shares and sells resources she has created.
Big Idea: The big idea from this video was creating digital anchor charts for students. Anchor charts are large charts that teachers create in real time with students to “anchor” their learning and give them a resource to refer back to. Anchor charts are not new to the classroom, but many educators now take them a step further by shrinking them down in size, having students fill out their own copy to stay engaged, as well as glue them into a resource notebook to refer back to individually. Michelle walks viewers through the steps of creating digital anchor charts in Google Slides.
What I Learned: I have previously created my own digital anchor charts, but found it was a tedious task. I was curious to see the process in which Michelle creates her charts. Watching her tutorial reassured me that I have the process down, but there were a couple of tricks she had that were new to me.
I actually had no idea that you could resize a Google Slide. I previously created all of my anchor charts in Canva for this reason alone. I learned that I can go to file, page setup, and customize each slide to 8.5x11. Although a small tweak, this is a game changer for me in being able to create all of my anchor charts in Google Slides in the future.
I also learned how Michelle utilizes her digital anchor chart with students in real time. She creates part of her digital anchor chart ahead of time by setting up the problem but then displays the unfinished problem on the board, where she is able to edit her google doc in real time. She then fills in the anchor chart with students and walks them through the process. The students are filling theirs out as she walks them through it. I have never tried this with students, and would be eager to try it.
Key Takeaway: In her tutorial, Michelle says “digital anchor charts give you the opportunity to play around with objects and images, getting it just right for students to clearly understand the process.” I liked this point because if you’ve ever attempted to create an anchor chart in real time with students, it can be difficult to ensure you include all the elements, space them out evenly, not feel rushed, etc. The digital version allows for more thoughtful and precise planning, which in turn makes your lesson run more smoothly.
Connection: Since many curriculums that districts adopt do not include anchor chart resources, teachers are often googling or searching Pinterest for anchor chart examples to copy. However, those do not always align to the curriculum you might be teaching or might be out of date. On my previous teaching team, I loved creating resources to accompany our curriculum. I love the idea of creating one continuous Google Slide with anchor charts for each respective subject/topic my team and I would be teaching. Math would be a great example of how I could easily implement digital anchor charts. This is definitely a project I would want to take on in my next teaching position.
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