Blended Bulletin, Issue 15

Blended Brags

On Wednesday, December 16, Education Elements hosted a Launch Academy at the Mark Twain House for a group of teachers and administrators from BHS and JMA, as well as Central Office team members. Throughout the busy day, attendees had the opportunity to develop and refine key plans for the implementation of blended learning. The day started with a little warm up with our favorite yoga instructor, Maximo, at GoNoodle.

After this little bit of silliness, the group continued to work on their Design Workbooks with peer sharing through a gallery walk.

To close out the morning, attendees were able to pick 2 of four sessions to work through: Developing Self-Direct Learners; Teacher Role in the Student-Centered Classroom; Formative Assessment; and, Conferencing, Student Reflection and Feedback. These sessions were all taught through different modalities, and at the end, everyone was asked to state one intention to act on based on their new learning. 

In the afternoon, the group had much-needed work time on a few specific tasks: creating a walk-through tool for blended learning, developing a PD plan for blended learning, and revising design workbooks. Finally, the day ended with a Demo Slam for attendees to share their new learning from the day. This also gave Danielle Knobloch to show off her new selfie stick that she won earlier in the day!

If you are interested in seeing more details from the Launch Academy, please check out the agenda from the day and our very own website that we are building in collaboration with Education Elements. On the website, click "Launch" to view resources from that day!

Cool Tools

CommonLit is a free resource that provides high-quality material for teachers and students. The website hosts a collection of texts tied to certain themes and essential questions. For each theme, there is a range of texts for each grade level and genre. Each text also has embedded footnoting for vocabulary support, text-dependent comprehension questions, and discussion questions. It is not a curriculum, but rather materials that can be used in many different contexts.

Chronas is a tool that will help you and your students answer "How did the world look when...?" While it is still in beta testing, this website seems to have amazing potential. At key events in history, starting with the fatal ambush of Roman Legions in 9 AD, you can view a map of the world highlighting certain regions and cultures. By interacting with the map, you can open up Wikipedia articles tied to place you click at the time of the map. If I didn't have to write this blog, I might still be playing with this site. If you want your mind to be totally blown, check out this video.

If you were excited by Gina Rodriguez's video on Kaizena, you might also consider checking out SnagIt. Either as a desktop tool or Chrome extension, SnagIt allows the teacher to offer feedback on student work through audio or screen-capture recordings. Check out this more detailed tutorial from Alice Keeler.

Professional Learning

Future Ready update adds new resources and PD for leaders discusses the exciting updates to the federal Future Ready initiative that now seeks to develop superintendents, principals, and teachers in digital learning through personalized modules.

21 education technology recommendations for 2016 highlights the new National Education Technology Plan and its focus on ensuring that learning happens anywhere and all the time.

What Does the NCLB Rewrite Mean for Personalized Learning? shares thoughts about how the new federal education bill can potentially help or hinder student-centered learning.

5 Issues Every ‘Future Ready’ School Leader Must Address discusses the critical issues innovative schools must think about to ensure success. Embedded in the article are useful resources for each issue.

Students at the Center is Nick Donahue's TED Talk about why our work, and the work of the Nellie Mae Education Foundation is so important.

Blended Bulletin, Issue 14

Last week, I had the opportunity to meet with many teachers to work on blended learning designs using Education Elements' "core four" as a framework. Starting with Hartford's vision of placing students at the center of their learning, teachers developed problem statements to finish the thought, "I need a way to..."
To solve the problem, they then considered tactics in the areas of Small Group Instruction, Data Driven Decisions, Integrated Digital Content, and Student Reflection. I enjoyed many fruitful conversations and appreciated the teachers' willingness to be innovative practitioners.

In reflecting on these meetings, I was struck by the thought of how important it is to continue to push the boundaries of what is possible in our teaching and in our students' learning. Often, this idea is captured as "growth mindset," and while I think that is an important theory, I would like to offer a more practical approach. In brainstorming new teaching and learning designs, it would have been easy for the teachers to stick to the phrasing, "I wish that..." However, in our discussions, we mostly spoke through "What if..." and "How can I..." If you stick with wishes, no matter how positively intentioned they are, you run the danger of waiting for a new reality. Implicit in "I wish that..." is the idea that you do not have the agency or capacity to achieve the wish. In "What Ifs" and "How can I's," there is a promise that you will act to make your idea a reality. As we continue to innovate in our teaching, I would encourage this community to keep asking "What if..?" and then, "How can I...?" to make student-centered learning the reality in Hartford.

Cool Tools

For yet another way to produce instructional, Khan Academy-style videos, try using Office Mix. This is an add-on that will appear right in the menu when you open PowerPoint. Because it is built into PowerPoint, Office Mix has the added benefit of familiarity; therefore, it is quick and easy to use. It also has some built-in editing features, though not to the same extent as some other tools. Here is an article that explains how to use it. The new way to create flipped video in 60 seconds without adding software.

Professional Learning

Can a Truly Student-Centered Education Be Available to All? discusses the reality of public demand and skepticism of student-centered learning.

5 Ways to Build a Student Agency in the Digital Age shares ways to ensure students are building a sense of self in school, rather than losing it.

Blended Bulletin, Issue 13

Cool Tools

If you do one thing today, you need to check out the NEW Smithsonian Learning Lab. As a fair warning, it may be the only thing you do today, because it will be easy to get lost in all of the open educational resources (OER) on this site. The Smithsonian Institute has put together a comprehensive educational website that allows students and educators to discover materials from any of their museums/zoos, create collections of the materials, and share with peers and classes. While they have not created quizzes or anything like that about the materials, they have made a clean and simple website that puts the Smithsonian's vast collection at your finger tips. In a quick search, I came across a photo of the Seinfeld "Puffy Shirt" from the National Museum of American History, a video about astrophotographers from Smithsonian Education, and a video of the National Zoo's adorable Sloth Bear cub playing harmonica. Have fun with this one, I know I will!

If you are worried about the degradation of the English language caused by texting, then you and your students need to check out Words U. Available in the App Store for iOS, this free app integrates into the phone's messaging system, much like integrating emojis. When turned on, a user will type a text as normal, but upon clicking send, the app will replace certain words with SAT-level with vocabulary while maintaining sentence structure and even idiomatic expressions. The vocab. word will be highlighted in blue and the user can click on the word to get the definition. Sounds like a great way to learn vocabulary in a very frequently used context. Check out a demo video here.

Interested in creating instructional videos in your class? Read these reviews of three tools: Screencastify, Screencast-O-Matic, and Quicktime (for Mac only).

Professional Learning

Courtney Belolan, an instructional coach at a Nellie Mae school in Maine, shares tips on the intricacies of student-centered learning in Learners in the Center, Not Learners on Their Own.

In Reflections on Student-Centered Learning Part 1- Student Perspective, Sarah Hatton from Students at the Center Hub shares her lessons learned from the student panels at the International Association for K-12 Online Learning (iNACOL) Symposium. These panels were by far the most popular sessions at the symposium (I should know as I couldn't get in the door!).

My former assistant principal in high school, and current superintendent of Meriden Public Schools, Mark Benigni, makes the case for bringing back the fun in learning through student-centered and blended learning in Putting the Fun Back in Education: Incorporating Enrichment Into Your Daily Instruction.

Read about how the Every Student Succeeds Act, the bill replacing No Child Left Behind, seeks to define important language for digital learning in Revisions to No Child Left Behind Attempt to Define Education Technology.

Here is what looks to be a great, free webinar. Even if you can't view it at the scheduled time, you will get a recording sent to you later! Questioning for Classroom Discussion: Developing Students As Thinkers and Learners.

CHROMEBOOKS APPS

Chromebook apps

CECA took place at Mohegan Sun Casino, this conference showed me how many tools we have to work with our students. Here  I have some notes about  excellent apps to implement our Chromebooks. I am really sure students will be engaged with all this new material. You only need your google account  to sign in here.

Padlet-is a virtual wall that allows people to express their thoughts on a common topic easily. It works like an online sheet of paper where people can put any content (e.g. images, videos, documents, text) anywhere on the page, together with anyone, from any device.https://padlet.com/

Wideo-Engage your students with animated lesson or inspire them with new projects.

http://wideo.co/en/

Kaizena- is the best place to help students improve their work on Google Drive. Voice feedback for writing is nothing new. Stanford experimented with recording verbal feedback for students on cassette tapes back in the '80s, and there's been a steady stream of research ever since Aug 2014

https://kaizena.com

Lucidchart-is a web-based diagramming software which allows users to collaborate and work together in real time to create flowcharts, organisational charts, website wireframes, UML designs, mind maps, software prototypes, and many other diagram types.

https://www.lucidchart.com/

Socrative-is a cloud-based student response system developed in 2010 by Boston-based graduate school students. It allows teachers to create simple quizzes that students can take quickly on laptops – or, more often, via classroom tablet computers or their own smartphones.

http://www.socrative.com/

Piktochart-is a web-based infographic software which allows users without intensive experience as graphic designers to create professional-grade infographics, using templates.

http://piktochart.com/

2015 Christa McAuliffe Technology Conference

Three takeaways from the 2015 Christa McAuliffe Technology Conference:
1.Received a basic review of the blended learning models
2. Lots of new information that I can use with all of my classes on the application of Google Education apps and add-ons  such as, Goobric used with Doctopus, and Google Forms and Sheets with the add-on of Flubaroo and using Google Drawing.
3. Socrative.com for a last minute exit slip and quick way to ask students questions and get responses and data back from students.
4.Let them ask questions session is about QFT and how this method gets students to develop their own questions for a more student directed lesson.  Also how to use these questions for assessments and to track students engagement in the topic.

Blended Bulletin, Issue 12

Cool Tools

Listen Current is a freemium tool that curates interesting public radio stories and provides teaching resources for them. Listen Current organizes the story by subject matter and current events. It offers suggested comprehension and discussion questions for each story. Listen Current also has a partnership with Socrative to provide quizzes for their stories. The paid version allows teachers to create classes and track student progress. The paid version also offers support for ELLs.

Google Art Project is a digital collection of over 200,000 works of art from art galleries and museums around the world. Users can view the art, read pertinent details, and even create their own galleries of interesting pieces. Read below for an idea of how to use this tool in the classroom.

Block Posters is a neat classroom design tool that simply allows you to upload an image and create a poster from it using standard 8.5"x11" paper. If only it laminated, too!

ThingLink is a freemium tool for educators that allows users to upload an image and make it interactive through links. It is hard to explain exactly what this tool is, so a better way to do it is through this example.

Professional Learning

8 things every teacher can do to create an innovative classroom offers ideas about how you can be an innovative teacher by allowing your students to innovate through projects.

In A New Vision to Personalize Writing Instruction, the author discusses one of the frontiers of edtech: writing. Google add-ons Doctopus and Goobric are used as examples of technology that can enhance writing through feedback and revision, but the edtech world is still looking for a more comprehensive strategy.

Caitlin Tucker, edtech teacher and blogger extraordinaire, shares ideas for using Google Art Project in classes other than art: Design a Thematic Art Gallery with Google Art Project.

In early November I had the privilege of attending the Vermont Fest (a 2 day technology festival).  There were break out sessions, a keynote speaker, the "un-convention" sessions, and opportunities to talk one on one and in small groups with experts in different fields.  What I decided to share will be my notes from the 3 sessions I felt were the most useful.

Using Open Educational Resources:An Introduction to Gooru Learning

Opening up choices for students and professional development for teachers

Curriculum Development (takes years to write and roll out)

   Design-develop-implement-monitor-evaluate-renew...repeat cycle

   Compliance vs Fidelity

   Look up Act 46 in Vermont (8 years to create)

   Too slow (18-24 months per subject area)

   Too cumbersome for current context (CCSS, other Standards)

   Expensive

   Development and implementation (look at the gaps)

   Inflexible (standards based vs personalized education)

Open Development Model

   Build curriculum from the ground up (like open source software)

   Connect teachers across schools in a common development platform

   Standards used as a "tagging" scheme

   Closes gab between curriculum design and implementation

   Leverages internet based content

   Minimizes reinventing the development wheel in each building or district

   Serves to expand the curriculum

   Educators own it

Hewlett Foundation- OER

OER Adoption

   Curriculum materials developed using public tax dollars should be licensed for open use (Creative  

   Commons)

   Less expensive to develop

  Better knowledge sharing and development

   Supports personalized learning in depended learning

   Up to date (curriculum and textbook)

   High quality instructional materials to all students

   State and federal policies promoting adoption

In Vermont

   Curriculum development shifting to Cloud based tools

   oercommons.org.  Curriki

   LMS usage increasing

   Connection between external clod based resources and internal local systems (LMS)

   Connect state and regional work (proficiency based learning)

   learning Tools Interoperability (LTI)-a standard for integrating web based tools

LTI

Gooru Learning...look at the California School District

Haiku Learning

Gooru

   You can start fresh or use somebody's presentation

   Slides, videos, pictures,etc

   Custom collections- your content you saved and manage learning, see progress and analytics, etc

Sharing a cMashing it up

   Connects educators I a single ecosystem

   Common communication system and collaboration

   Connecting ecosystems (connecting between districts and state)

   Leveraging content from outside state (use from other states, districts, countries, etc)

   LMS-learning management systems

Hunters/Gatherers of information, lessons, materials, sources, textbooks, etc.

   Collective borrowing/borrowers

   Selective borrowing/borrowers

Federal Government

   OER- you create something for education using federal tax money this will become part of OER (you 

    receive credit)

 We need to look into OER and how schools in CT can support each other.

Overhauling Tired Learning Spaces-A Collaborative Conversation

Look up VITA Learn

Innovative schools changed their work spaces.  (Desks facing forward and teacher desk facing front-no innovation)

   Look at lighting, room color, flooring, etc.

The worse consequence of your best idea

Need to shift your paradigm

Look up Burr and Burton School...Reggio Amilla education Italy

Look up student desks at UConn...what are they called and how much ?  Does UConn help schools purchase chairs?  Grant? Webpage funding?

   School Node Chair with Casters Classroom...the chairs I want

   Can we change the flooring?  Can we change the lighting?  Can we change the paint?  Can we purchase  

    paint?

   paletton.com . Look up site for colors and matching colors.

(Civics and Int Stud- working together, representatives, compromise, vote, debates, elaboration, critical thinking, )

High Tech High School California..design and colors..minimalist

bsdvt.org or wsesu.net

As educators we need to look at the classroom, how it is arranged, and the psychology behind this.  All of this impacts the level of learning in the classroom.

Node Chairs gives you the ability to move chairs into any configuration you and your students would like (at any moment with limited disruptions and complications)

Level Up with Games Based Learning...Engaging students using game based learning and gamification

Goosechase Adventure-digital scavenger hunt with Leadership board (10 teams for free)

7 Principals of Game Like Learning (quest to learn...high school in New York)

   Everyone is a participant

   Failure is re framed as iteration

   Everything is interconnected

   Learning by doing

   Feedback is immediate and ongoing

   Challenge is constant

   Learning feels like play

Essential Play

   People develop problem solving skills, critical thinking, and social skills

   Immersive games enhance these three skills

   How can teachers harness immersive play?  (Immediate feedback)

   Game experience-create or use a game to support students In learning the concepts associated with      probability

   Game, game like, and gamification

Game design

  Start small, redacted, get fancy.  Repeat.

   Create a game using paper, a die, markers, and a dinosaur.

   Game play, board, rules, etc can be modified

   Write code for the game later

Classcraft

   Gamified and game like

Gamified

  Immediate feedback

   Layers over any content area

   Use it anywhere

   Experience feels like play

  Randomness

  Does not replace your classroom

   Time needs to be set aside

   Keep up with rewards or punishments

  Rejection and obsession

  Connecting to academics

Institute of Play (school)

   Print and play games

  

Kahoot

Quizizz

Someday-identity/beyond borders (teacher created)

   In Wiks and Google form

After returning I had my International Studies classes create games, with limited supplies.  We were learning about cooperation, collaboration, and competition.  They had several days to work in groups.  They created the games, rules, cards, money, board, etc.  After 3 days they played their game and one other group's game.  They provided feedback to each other.  They loved this idea and could easily describe how the concepts of cooperation, collaboration, and competition were embedded throughout this lesson.  (These 3 concepts will be part of the underlining themes throughout the year).

As for my classroom I am looking into seeing how I can obtain funding for the Node chairs and possibly paint.  I would like my classes to come up with designs about how the room should look and feel.  This would change the dynamics of the room.  Having the ability to have a variety of seating arrangements in the classroom appeals to me and my students.

 I am looking into open educational resources.  This concept appeals to me.  If all of the teachers in one content area (high school Social Studies) worked collaboratively on a grade specific course we could share the best of all of your work.  This could create a new curriculum with input from every teacher.  We could see what other states are using and modify this to meet our curricular needs.  Think of how powerful this could become.