If you’re looking for some new ways to showcase your students’ learning, whether on a bulletin board in the hallway, on a display out in the community, through a digital platform, or in a major showcase event, here are some ideas to consider.
Posting student work for an audience beyond your classroom encourages students to do high-quality work and take pride in making meaningful contributions that are of value to others. Read more about the benefits HERE.
HERE ARE SOME OF MY FAVORITE WAYS TO SHOWCASE STUDENT WORK
DISPLAY STUDENT WORK ON YOUR CAMPUS The school library or media center is a great place to showcase work, and displays can be physical or digital! Special projects set on the tops of bookshelves or wall displays can lead viewers to audio or video recordings using QR codes or augmented reality.
My first graders’ book reviews were a hit on our campus. Students read, wrote, practiced, and then made audio recordings of their book reviews which we linked to QR codes. We then created mini-posters and displayed them all over our library. My students saw the value of their hard work and the entire campus enjoyed listening to them.
If you use Flipgrid, the creators have made it easy to convert student presentations to QR codes. HERE is a video that explains how you can do this. I’ve also used the Aurasma app which students love! Static images or text on your bulletin board come to life without QR codes. You can learn more HERE. It’s worth the short time it takes to learn since there are so many other ways to use augmented reality.
When it comes to static bulletin board displays, anything that makes them 3-D adds interest. For example, a lift-the-flap display can invite passers-by to take a quiz or learn more. I’m a huge fan of Dinah Zike and the creative 3-D foldables she’s designed -all made entirely from paper. We used her sentence-strip holder foldable to display our ZOOM Book-Within-a-Book projects (read about those HERE). The photo below was taken at our end-of-the-year showcase for parents.
The wall of a hallway can also be a work-in-progress related to what you’re studying. For example, my students worked on this display as they were learning about nanotechnology (read more about those lessons HERE). Fifth graders did the measuring and figuring to create the ant and the water droplet in this photo. It may not look like much work, but a lot of brainpower went into creating this! The entire school enjoyed watching and learning as the display changed.
SHARE THROUGH YOUR SCHOOL’S DIGITAL MEDIA OR IN YOUR COMMUNITY~ Many schools and districts have social media pages or accounts, and with proper permission, you can just post your classroom photos and news there. This is a great way to start slowly and give your students some recognition for their work. Libraries and businesses are also often open to displaying student work and projects. Your community is always an authentic audience because most are interested in and care about what’s happening in schools.
SHARE ON A CLASS BLOG, WEBSITE, or OTHER PLATFORM ~ It’s easier than you think and can actually save you time! A very basic blog can serve as a digital bulletin board. When you share what students are learning in one place, you are automatically updating parents on what is happening in your GT classes, without doing a separate email or newsletter. You’re giving students a way to share their personal discoveries and interests with a real audience and the connections that result may surprise you, including hearing from students around the world. This was so exciting for my class.
One year, an important curricular goal for my gifted students was to improve clarity and form in their writing. This is one of the reasons you find so many articles by students on my old class blog. My students wrote about everything- their projects, math lessons, books they were reading, and even the fact that writing was the last thing they wanted to do! They were more thoughtful about what they wrote, and they LOVED receiving comments from students all around the world.
If you are seriously constrained time-wise, my friend and former colleague, Stefanie Schropp, has shared how she uses PADLET to create class portfolios. What’s awesome is that her students play a big part in keeping the content updated by uploading their own photos.
HERE are additional reasons with some resources that might help you get started. Your district probably also has a technology specialist who can assist you with starting a site.
HOST A SHOWCASE EVENT ~
These can happen at any time during the year and be created for a variety of audiences. My older elementary students often shared the results of their REAL TIME (Genius Hour) projects at the end of the year for parents and classmates to come in and view. In the photo below, you can see projects, some digitally displayed on laptops, stemming from the Journey-of-a-Question assignment.
A showcase event doesn’t have to be elaborate though. Parent conferences can serve as showcase events, with students hosting their parents and showing a portfolio of work and projects. One year, I held these in the library and had four students hosting their parents at once. We had refreshments at one table, and the students had rehearsed how to greet their parents, offer them something to eat or drink, and then show them to a table where their portfolio was ready to share. This experience was a positive one for the students, the parents, and the teacher!
Obviously, beginning with the end in mind doesn’t mean you know exactly how a showcase event will look in the end. Sometimes we don’t know where the learning will lead our students. Different types of projects lead to different culminations. A PBL project, for example, might end with students presenting to a board or group of experts.
My students often hosted end-of-year events in their homerooms such as this mystery event. The most ambitious end-of-year event my students and I ever tackled was the creation of a DoSeum in one wing of our school. As I’ve shared before, I documented the process on a separate blog, and I’m so glad I did! So much of what my students had learned was applied in the process of preparing this hand-on museum.
Do you have a unique or fun way of showcasing your students’ learning? We’d love to hear about it! Please consider sharing about it in the comments below. Also, if you’d like updates on new ideas, lessons, and resources added to this site, you might like to subscribe. Emails are limited to about two per month!