St. Clair County RESA has been producing educational videos and news segments for many years. They've recently published a RESA TV Youtube channel that has many great resources for schools and the classroom.
One video worth checking out features teachers and students at Belle River Elementary showcasing their Digital Learning Day activities and celebrations.
As I was watching some of the videos from the RESA TV channel I came across this April 2011 Dateline Schools interview of myself discussing our Tools for Teaching Digital Natives technology integration pilot program that we ran during the 2010-11 school year. I was surprised to hear how much of what we did in this pilot that is still relevant today. You can hear my reflections about this program from the 5-17 minutes mark and also hear how this program impacted one of our participants, Jill Parrot from Port Huron Area School District. Jill is an amazing educator who has gone on to do some amazing work in her classroom. Thanks for watching.
Pixabay.com is a great place for teachers and students to find beautiful, high impact images that are available under the Public Domain license. This means they are free to use in just about every way. Of course giving credit with proper citation is still highly recommended.
Speaking of pictures. I'd also like to suggest taking a moment to view this TED-x video entitled Teaching Without Words. It hits on many important Universal Design for Learning principles and the importance of using visual feedback to support learners.
If you aren't participating in the #miched chats every Wednesday at 8pm then you should be. This Wednesday was no exception with teachers sharing some of their favorite web tools and how they are using them in the classroom. I'm most excited about infuselearning.com which I learned about in the chat last week.
Here are a few more of my Twitter favorites from the week.
MASSP iPad Summit March 26 (MSU Henry Center) - Only 35 seats left for the Michigan Association of Secondary Schools Prinicipals iPad Summit conference. If your district is implementing or planning to implement iPads at the Secondary level then you won't want to miss this opportunity to learn how schools in Michigan are transforming student learning using iPads. I'm honored to have been asked to keynote this exciting event and look forward to setting the stage for the day with what I think will be a very fun theme: "iPad Magic - How to Wrangle the Unicorns"
It's Official! Save the date. April 20, 2013 Jackson ISD will be hosting an innovative conference that plans to be half edcamp half brain trust (bringing in the REMC Connected Educators from around the state). It's sure to be a can't miss. Details to follow.
How about attending Michigan's unconference jugernaut, EdCamp Detroit, on March 4, 2013. An unconference empowers educators to facilitate and/or participate in spontaneous participant driven professional development. It's the kind of event that leads to quotes like "This was the best PD EVER!"
New Apps to check out
This one's not exactly new and it's not directly educational but the Public Radio Player app recently received a major overhaul that updated the user interface and added the ability to download episodes of featured Public Radio programs like This American Life and Car Talk. Unlimited access to most music genres, news from around the country, and great programming shouldn't be overlooked as a resource for the classroom.
This week I'm also recommending that teachers take a look at the updated version of the Puppet Pals App. Like the Public Radio Player this is a major refresh of the original app. So much so in fact that it has actually been released as a new app entirely - Puppet Pals 2. With better animations and new characters and backgrounds this is a must have app for any classroom.
Roll your own professional development
I use Weebly websites for both my edtechkit.com and ilearnipad.weebly.com sites. In my mind it is the fastest, most intuitive way to get a website up an running. While there are more advanced tools out there that teachers can and perhaps should use to represent their classrooms online I feel that Weebly is an important first step for many teachers needing to make the leap to making digital content available to their students.
My Weebly training resources are available here for individuals looking to learn a bit more about Weebly. It's also part of my flipped-training model that helps me maximize my face-to-face training time.
Thought for the week
On Tuesday I participated in a professional development day with one of our local school districts. The morning session was intended to expose the teachers in this district to the Future of Learning design process introduced to our county by Dr. Bryan Setzer of 2Revolutions. One big idea that I keep coming back to is a quote from their introductory video that states, "Design is a form of activism". This idea, that the design process is proactive, empowering, and Revolutionary is important at a time when education is not only under fire but also undergoing sweeping changes. And I'm equally drawn to a quote from the IDEO design website that describes design as "solving problems with elegance and beauty". Put these together and we have the opportunity to radically redefine education on our terms but in a manner that is unmistakably attractive. Attractive in the sense that it appeals of our aesthetic sensabilities as well as our common sense and thus lays to rest the notion that we are failing our children.
I love student created content especially when I learn from it too. Check out the Tech Sherpas blog (students from Central Maine at Nokomis Regional High) for informative student created video webcasts covering all number of education technology topics. The kids are Smart with a capital "S". This week they covered the sharing features in Google Drive. This could be a great jumping off point for having your own students creating meaningful content for the world to see.
I'm a big fan of graphic organizers to help students visualize their learning and organize their thinking. I like this article by Ryan Knoblauch that unpacks how he is using graphic organizers to support his students. He has tons of resources for templates you can use plus a great glimpse into the methods he is using in his classroom.
MASSP iPad Summit March 26 (MSU Henry Center) - Only 50 seats left for the Michigan Association of Secondary Schools Prinicipals iPad Summit conference. If your district is implementing or planning to implement iPads at the Secondary level then you won't want to miss this opportunity to learn how schools in Michigan are transforming student learning using iPads. I'm honored to have been asked to keynote this exciting event and look forward to setting the stage for the day with what I think will be a very fun theme: "iPad Magic - How to Wrangle the Unicorns"
Save the date. April 20, 2013 Jackson ISD will be hosting an innovative conference that plans to be half edcamp half brain trust (bringing in the REMC Connected Educators from around the state). It's sure to be a can't miss. Details to follow.
Another date worth saving will be Thursday August 22, 2013. That's the tentative date for this year's 21st Century Learning Symposium hosted by St. Clair County RESA. This annual event has been host to some of education's leading thinkers including Yong Zhao, Will Richardson, Mark Prensky, and Stephen Heppell. This year we are excited to have Kevin Honeycutt join this impressive list along with 600+ of Michigan's best.
Last call for MACUL - Michigan's premier education technology conference is just around the corner March 20-22. This statewide event is an awesome opportunity to learn and network with some of the most innovative educators in our state. This year's MACUL conference is hosted in Detroit at the Cobo center. I'm facilitating two sessions this year - The Appcessible iPad (UDL strategies for the iPad) and co-presenting with Laura Chambless - Cooperative Learning and the iPad.
Science teachers - Take a look at Color Uncovered and Sound Uncovered to provide inquiry based resources that are sure to pique your students' curiosity. The interactive, hands-on manipulatives and informative accompanying articles are incredibly well done and very interesting. I'd keep my eye out for more apps from the Exploritorium Museum in San Francisco that developed these apps to accompany their brick and mortar exhibits.
I'm taking a second look at the Davinci Note app after coming across another interesting web app called tackk.com. Both iPad friendly programs provide a beautiful templates for mashing up pictures and text to create high impact informative writing. I'm drawn to the simple user interface of the Davinci Note app for the potential to create attractive research reports, quick writes, and other blog like reflections with students. Tackk is similar but is web based, giving it the advantage of working on multiple devices and has the distinct advantage of not requiring a student login for creating and sharing. One key piece is that e-mail sharing feature does NOT use the iPad's native e-mail to send and therefor let's students e-mail their work to the teacher without needing their own e-mail.
This week someone tweeted out something along the lines of "we don't send kids to the pencil lab". On Wednesday I was challenged to model some lessons across a K-5 building that put technology into the students' hands the entire time. To be honest it felt a bit forced, and had I not felt the pressure to model in this manner I might have dropped the tech from certain parts of some of the lessons. At the heart of my lessons was a very non-techy modified think, pair, share strategy for keeping all students accountable and engaged. Had I left this out I think my lessons would have been a disaster. What if I had left out the technology? The answer is that the delivery of content to each child's device via Nearpod personalized the information and helped hold their attention. The formative classroom response tools helped me gauge mastery of the concepts, increased accountability, and made the lesson fun. But these tools could have been less front and center and been just as effective. It didn't need to be a tech lesson. It merely needed to be an opportunity for everyone to learn. The technology went a long way in supporting this goal of reaching "everyone". Until it didn't. Until the technology became the focus. We don't glue pencils onto our students' hands, right?
I'd like to share with you a brand new app that was developed by a fellow Michigan educator, Brad Wilson. Brad was a 4th grade teacher before taking a position with Jackson ISD as an Education Technology Consultant.
The app costs $2.99 and is primarily targeting grades 2-5 but could easily be used in other grades, both younger and older as well. I could see this being used whole class as a quick write activity by displaying the app from the teacher's iPad or having students rotate through a single or small set of iPads. It could also be purchased for an entire cart using the Volume Purchase Program.
Finally, as a matter of full disclosure, Brad is a friend of mine, and he consulted me for feedback and suggestions during the development of this app. That being said, I'm confident that this app is worth purchasing for your classroom if you want to help students become more active and engaged writers. If you decide to download and use this app with your students please share your impressions with me or with Brad on how it is working and how it might improve.
Yesterday I was challenged by one of the elementary schools that I work with to help model iPad integration by using iPads 1:1 with students during direct instruction and then transition into a 1:1 iPad independent activity. I developed four different lessons targeted at K-1, 2-3, 4th and 5th grade. The lessons ranged from reading comprehension and academic vocabulary to comparative adjectives and research skills (at the teachers' request). Needless to say I was pretty pooped by the end :-)
Interestingly enough, one of the most popular strategies I used to facilitate my lessons was not tech related at all. I'm sure this strategy has a real name, but let's call it a modified think, pair, share. Whenever I asked questions, I asked students to whisper their answer into their closed fist first, then whisper share with a partner and then alternated between choral response or picking a random student depending on the nature of the question. The students seemed to really enjoy this and I had nearly 100% participation through out the lesson.
For my mini-lesson I wanted to minimize the number of apps we would use and ensure a high level of engagement during my presentation, so I selected Nearpod as my platform. I was pleased with the way that the app helped hold the student's attention while I moved through the slides and interspersed my presentation with interactive formative tools. The problem is setting up my Nearpod presentations took a bit of tech ninja skills to get the results I wanted. And after talking with several teachers I learned that many were most attracted to the whiteboard feature in Nearpod after seeing my demonstrations.
As luck would have it, later that night I learned about Infuse Learning from the #miched chat that occurs every Wednesday at 8pm. It has many similar features to the classroom response app Socrative, but with the additional feature of a whiteboard responder and (drum roll please!) text-to-speech. I have only had a brief time to test Infuse Learning but my feeling is that it this web app has great potential and a lower learning curve than Nearpod.
I'm still really pleased with what I was able to do with Nearpod especially because I was seeking a way to move seemlessly between the slides I created in Haiku Deck and the formative classroom response tools I wanted.
I loved the challenge of creating these lessons and wish I would have had even more time to develop the underlying lessons. The best part though was working with so many great students. What Fun!
I come across all kinds of great articles and resources every week. These are a few that I've bookmarked or shared on Twitter that warrant a second look for myself and perhaps a first look for you.
I'm a fan of Yong Zhao and value his insights regarding the big picture of our educational system in the U.S. It's no secret that he is not a fan of high stakes testing or the nationwide push toward standardization. Whether or not you agree with his opinions, I recommend reading this recent interview.
I was privileged to meet two extraordinary teachers, Shawn Wheeler and Ken Kozzar from Cleveland, Ohio a few weeks back at Educon 2.5. They blog under the moniker Teaching Humans about their journey creating a "school within a school" founded on cross-curricular, mastery based, project based learning (PHEW!). A current project they are running is called the Wikiseat Project that incorporates design thinking principals, Emersonian philosophy and a whole lot more. Check out one student's blog reflection about this project to see an example of the type of reflection and engagement schools should really try to achieve.
Save the date. April 20, 2013 Jackson ISD will be hosting an innovative conference that plans to be half edcamp half brain trust (bringing in the REMC Connected Educators from around the state). It's sure to be a can't miss. Details to follow.
Another interesting conference you may want to check out is the Visual Thinking and Literacy conference April, 13, 2013 at Seaholm High School in Birmingham, MI. This won't necessarily be your typical education conference since it is open to business leaders, community leaders and educators. Design thinking and effective communication across all fields will be explored.
And don't forget! MACUL - Michigan's premier education technology conference is just around the corner March 20-22. This statewide event is an awesome opportunity to learn and network with some of the most innovative educators in our state. This year's MACUL conference is hosted in Detroit at the Cobo center. I'm facilitating two sessions this year - The Appcessible iPad (UDL strategies for the iPad) and co-presenting with Laura Chambless - Cooperative Learning and the iPad.
New Apps to check out
File this one under the category of "Makes math teachers cringe". MyScript Calculator is a handwriting recognition calculator that can perform most basic math functions by interpreting handwritten numbers and symbols. It's amazingly accurate and really quite fascinating. I also feel that a tool like this has the potential to benefit students who struggle using traditional keypad based calculators. I've worked with many students who make simple input mistakes that effect the accuracy of their answers. Drawing the number 3 is less prone to mistakes than accidentally pressing the key next to the three. It might also benefit students who have difficulty with fine motor skills.
And here's a fun one. Lego Super Heroes Movie Maker is a Free stop motion movie creator. You can easily substitute Lego figures out for any objects you choose. Possible ideas for the classroom are student generated "In Plain English" style explanations of concepts and ideas, storytelling, and classroom news (ok that one might be a stretch but I have some thoughts on how I'd do it)
As I mentioned above I had a very productive Friday. Without going into all the details lest someone enamored with time clocks and seat time become upset, I will share that I was not at my desk during any of this burst of output. Blended learning is generating big buzz these days but I firmly believe that blended work environments that honor adult autonomy, comfort and schedules needs a closer look especially in education. I know. I know. - "We can't just have everyone running around making their own schedules and working in coffee houses whenever they like!" Not to mention that fact that teachers cannot "watch" our children if they are not in their classrooms. But I do believe that there are ways in which flexing our schedules and work spaces can work to the benefit of all. It involves partnerships and collaboration, utilizing technology to bridge space and time, and a commitment to innovation. And yes, integrity too but if that's not a given then we have a larger problem. Don't we?
Although my nerves probably got the best of me I wanted to share a link to the radio interview I had this morning promoting Digital Learning Day. How are you participating or supporting DLD activities in your school(s)? How can we build on that momentum to encourage year round participation?
This week Google announced a big update to its Forms tool in Google Drive. The biggest change is the look of the Forms editor which now more closely aligns with the editing tools in documents and spreadsheets by adding a tool bar to the top that organizes all of the editing features. Some of the other important changes are the ability to collaborate on editing a form with others, the ability to open the chat side bar when others are viewing simultaneously, and the ability to copy and paste lists into the answer key area to quickly generate choices. I'm looking forward to trying out the new editor and hope these changes bode well for future updates like adding images!
Upcoming Events in Michigan
Digital Learning Day is Wednesday, February 6 nationwide, and many educators across Michigan are planning to participate. St. Clair County RESA is hosting a Town Hall viewing and collecting examples of Digital Learning Day projects from across St. Clair County. How are you planning to participate?
MACUL - Michigan's premier education technology conference is just around the corner March 20-22. This statewide event is an awesome opportunity learn and network with some of the most innovative educators in our state. This year's MACUL conference is hosted in Detroit at the Cobo center. I'm facilitating two sessions this year - The Appcessible iPad (UDL strategies for the iPad) and co-presenting with Laura Chambless Cooperative Learning and the iPad.
New Apps to check out
This week my colleague, Kristin Day, did a great job demonstrating the app Videolicious to a group of teachers currently working on developing Project Based Learning (PBL) units for their classroom. This simple 3 step movie making app lets you quickly stitch together images and video with simple transitions, voice narration and a music soundtrack to create a polished multimedia project perfect for PBL presentation trailers.
Roll your own Professional Development
As part of my efforts to support a local 1:1 iPad initiative I've been creating a series of resources for using Google Drive with the iPad. My latest screencast focuses on how to use the Google Drive app and Chrome app to access as many features as possible on this device. It is directed toward students new to this process but should be useful for teachers getting started with Google Drive as well.
Thought for the week
Process vs. Product - This dichotomy came up a lot this week in conversations with colleagues and in my online networks. What do we value most in education? Is it the habits of mind and the actions of learning, the critical thinking and collaboration that is necessary to solve real world problems? Or is it the result of that work - the final, finished product we create and the proof that we what we have learned was mastered? It seems much easier to quantify products, especially products rooted in factual recall or in the performance of distilled skills. But process, especially a process rooted in inquiry and contextual application, is where real learning seems to reside. I think I agree most with Dr. William R. Hite, Superintendent of Philadelphia public schools, who said during his opening keynote at Educon last week, "It is not enough for our students to master content. They must master context."
Scott Newcomb 
Brad Wilson 
Ira Socol 
Theresa Shafer 
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Eric Sheninger 
Clif Mims 
Stephanie Dulmage 
Sue Gorman 
