Summer reading for inspiration!

Wait! Summer is already half over! I can't believe I haven't already shared some books I'm really diggin' these days. If you're looking for some inspiration to motivate you and prompt you try some new strategies in your schools/classrooms, then give one or all of these a shot!

My most favorite read of the Spring (probably of the past few years) was #EdJourney by Grant Lichtman. (I need help enunciating his last name as I was corrected by a friend of his at ISTE, but anyone who knows me knows it was unintentional.) I'm REALLY into his work and so inspired by the book!

Grant drove across/around the country visiting schools and interviewed more than 600 teachers, admins, students and parents asking them questions like:

• What does innovation mean to you?
• How has your school changed to meet the challenges of a rapidly changing world?
• What do we really need to teach and learn in schools, and how are you doing that?

He unfolds their responses and his learnings into three parts: Roadblocks, Blazing the Trail and the Road Ahead. Each chapter begins with a journal entry, his ponderings and experiences on the road which were fun to read. I thought here, wow, he is a great storyteller. I really enjoyed his voice.

The story of our challenges (and I say "our" because even though he didn't visit SBISD, we are along on the same journey) provide you a lens into how others are making paths around and through challenges. For me, Grant's stories confirmed the importance of being a community of learners and the key role of leadership (at the campus level), You'll read about many different approaches schools are taking which might give you some jumping off points to get started.

In the last few chapters, Grant challenges us to think differently through a variety of models and strategies for the future of learning and how we need to think forward (probably not actually grasping everything through those words).

When I started thinking about the "What ifs" in my world, what if we approached technology at the district level in a way that provides a level of resources yet allows for each school to create their own plan (for learning). Still trying to figure out how we can support innovative practices in meaningful ways.

This is definitely a book that I will reread and return to often over the coming year. It challenges my thinking!

The book I'm currently reading (about halfway through my first read) is Creating cultures of thinking: The 8 Forces We Must Master to Truly Transform Our Schools by Ron Ritchhart.

To me, this book will give you the tools to effectively innovate and create a community of learners! We're actually blogging about the book here.

ISTE 2015 - Reflecting and actions!

As I flew home from ISTE 2015, I began to wonder how I could possibly share everything I had heard and experienced over the three days I was there.

• I saw many exciting examples of ways teachers are developing literacy skills, personalizing learning, encouraging coding and robotics, and more in their classrooms.
• I saw new and "re-experienced" several Google tools that can really help you take your kids places and experience them as never before.
• I heard some strategies for helping us question and challenge our practices to help push our students' thinking.
• I listened as really thoughtful educators shared their thinking and findings on schooling and factors they have found that impact implementation and ultimately student learning.

The list could go on and on.... I started thinking my head would explode as it filled with ideas of ways to share everything with you... bubbling up like the clouds as we zeroed in on Houston.

So, stay tuned for posts... coming soon!

Where did the year go?

It's hard to believe that I last posted on this blog back in October. A lot has happened since then. Here are some brief highlights of my journey:

To begin, I did follow a student at one of our high schools for an entire day in November. See previous post. It reminded me a great deal of my high school experience back in the 70s. From Algebra, to Study Hall, Economics, Science, English and History, the experience was much the same. We all sat in our desks (in rows), teacher presented a lesson or activity, we were allowed to work in pairs/groups at some point during the class (possibly even physically move when the class was big enough to allow for it), The biggest change from the 70s was the use of an ActivBoard or a projector
by a few of his teachers. But, it was used mainly as an overhead or movie projector would have been back in the day. The technology that was used by the students during the course of the day:

• a graphing calculator in Algebra, and
• their phones in Economics to look up their stock prices which were then relayed to the teachers to put into a spreadsheet, and
• Kahoot was displayed on the ActivBoard in History to review for a quiz given during the period. (I took the quiz and made an A having never been in the class before that day. I didn't major in history, trust me!)

Conclusion: For the most part, we all have a similar experience. AND, what we know is, what we know. As Grant Lichtman points out in #EDJourney, 

"In order to change our schools, we have to "paint the picture" of what a learning ecosystem looks like. This means exposing our educators in person and virtually to the many, many brushfires of classroom and organizational innovation that are burning in this country... Then we need to provide the resources - most critically, time - for them to retool their professional skill set and gain comfort with the learning ecosystem as opposed to the learning assembly line."

In the fall, we also began exploring the potential for a 1:1 in our district. It is time to refresh the classroom devices, and it was determined the had the money to purchase a Chromebook for every 3rd - 12th grader. We spent he fall and winter researching district implementations far and wide and made several determinations:

• consider purchasing a Learning Management System beforehand or at the time as others who didn't were doing so now,
• expectation (and it appears true) that there is more ownership/responsibility for the device when each student is responsible for own,
• a keyboard is crucial for production,
• need for campus technical support,
• need for extensive teaching & learning support (see Grant Lichtman quote above),
• deploy by grade levels, to have the opportunity to really change the day, not just a 45-55 minute segment of it,
• campus leadership is the driving force of a successful transformation.

The more we learned, the greater the focus because on our goals for teaching & learning and less about the device. We know that we want to change what happens in our classrooms - see above. We need to make schools more relevant and more reflective of what is happening outside of them. We see it is an "all-in" proposition in order to succeed.

Knowing where we are as a district, we decided to create an application process for those campuses who are interested in making such a shift. We have plans to select between 3-5 campuses (supporting any more than that isn't currently feasible), and 10 campuses applied. However, with a shift in leadership at the district (our new superintendent was named last week), the project is currently "under further discussion,"

As of this post, we are going to RFP for a learning management system.

Stay tuned!

Follow a student... what might you find?

http://davidwees.com/content/20-things-every-teacher-should-do

Following a student is something that has been on my to-do list ever since David Wees shared his 20 things every teacher should do graphic. In fact, today WAS the day, but other projects have gotten in the way (rescheduled in 2 weeks). The list has many terrific practices that we all should consider. In my role as an EdTech facilitator I found the practice of actually following a student through an entire day one that could be rather informative on actual practices as we look at models for technology in classrooms and how teachers and students actually use devices for learning.

Today I ran across this te@chthought post! Posted by Grant Wiggins, it is the account of a veteran HS teacher who just became a Coach in her building. It is rather informative and is potentially something very similar to what I may experience in one of our classrooms. In takeaway #2, I was struck by the following:

I think about some of the practices we advoacted for in the past and how capabilities and technologies have changed. We encouraged the use of ActivBoards in classrooms. Could we possibly have left our teachers believing that they should stop there?  Were there more resources devoted to that initiative than any that has occurred since? I'm wondering....

In Takeaway #3, I realized that we have changed some of our practices and do not offer all-day EdTech trainings anymore because of the very observation made in the post:

How do we provide time for students to question, to pause, to reflect? How might we come together to consider the student experience. Should we follow our students? I'm wondering...

I encourage you to read the post! Might we see similar results in our schools? What questions might we ask? How might we change the school day? Are there steps we can take to broaden our perspective of our students and create a better experience for them? I'm wondering... and hoping to conduct this exercise and encourage you to do the same!

Google Forms upgrades are a real winner!

Recently, Google  made a BUNCH of upgrades to Google Forms. In addition, in Spring Branch, we finally have all students and teachers in the same domain - which also improved what we can do with Forms! Let's take a quick look at what these changes mean for you in classrooms!

Form Settings
With moving everyone into same domain, we can now collect the GAFE Username of the person logged into the form. If you recall, in the past, we always added a Name field because this feature was unavailable to us! So, as a teacher, you at least know who is logged in and responding to the form.

A new feature from Google allows us to limit each users to one response which can be handy. For example, last year one of our high schools wanted to use Google Forms for the selection of their Homecoming Court but we couldn't limit each student to one vote. Now, we can! No more worry about stuffing the ballot box!

And lastly, from the Form Settings at the top you can also select to Shuffle question order which again, is another great feature for a teacher when using Google Forms as a quizzing tool.

Enhanced Themes
As any avid Google Forms user has known, the themes available for user in Forms were very limited. well now, not only are there lots of new themes from which to choose, but you can also customize and add your own images to Google Forms. Watch this brief video from Google Gooru: Customize themes in Google Forms for a quick glimpse into the feature!

Embedding YouTube Videos
Think how cool it would be to actually insert your instructional video into a Google Form and then ask your students questions based on the video!

Create a Google From. Then go to Insert in the menu and select video. Either search YouTube or enter the URL you have already copied and pasted to the clipboard. Click Select.

Then, you can title the video. Add a caption and align the video as desired. Click Done.

Now, create questions based on the video! How easy is that?

Got other Google Forms features you like! Share them here!

Who will come with me?

Last night I was on Connected Learning's Connected K-6 Educators: Supporting Openly Networked Learning webinar listening to and questioning @SimplySuzy, @MrsWideen, @benschersten on their practice. It was a wonderful conversation that has me reaching out this morning to find a teacher in

Spring Branch who is interested in becoming a connected educator - someone who sees the value and finds the time to connect his/her classroom with other classrooms around the world! Last night, each educator shared how they struggle with finding the time, but how the benefits for their students far outweigh the challenges!

I also believe that connecting our students with others can be encouraging, engaging and enriching! Do you remember penpals? I remember we waited for months to get our letters back from Iceland (I think the connection was a student, Ingmar, who was living here for a few years.) and how excited we were as we read them and how we couldn't wait to write back! I don't think I asked my teacher how many paragraphs my letter needed to be! We wrote, and wrote...

Today, with technologies, not only can we write to them, we can write with them! And, we don't need to wait months to receive their feedback, but only minutes or hours! We can even peer into each other's classrooms and see the similarities and differences. We can challenge each other's thinking, create together and grow in our learning!

As Annie Mitchell shared in a Google+ post yesterday, she questions whether technology has really made us more antisocial as she shared a similar image.

Some great ideas I left with last night to help get us going:

• Use Twitter to find and make connections.
• Use our natural connections with parents and community to gather information and contribute to the class! Create a parent "commenter"club to provide feedback on student posts! Have travelling parents use Google+ Hangouts or Skype to conduct "field" experiments with your class!
• Have your class decide together if they want to participate in a global project to get their buy-in.
• Use a Google Form for students to submit blog posts if you're no ready to add them as authors. Use their submission as a talking point on appropriateness, grammar, punctuation (depending on your objective)
• Get into Quad-Blogging to support each blogger with feedback on their writing.
• Try the TeachersFirst XW1W (Across the World Once a Week) Project 

So who will step out of their comfort zone and come on this journey with me? I'm willing to commit some time working with you 1:1! Let's get together, open your door and explore the world! It really is out there waiting! :-)

Cloning Yourself with Camtasia Studio

Who's got time to come to skills based training without a clear model of how it could be used in the classroom? Certainly, not teachers! Teachers, at times, come to technology skills training without a clear notion of how the skill might be applied for teaching and learning. They are interested in the technology, but haven't had time to even learn what the tool might do for them. And, some times, teachers may hold a vague idea of  a hot topic such as "flipped learning," "blended learning," etc. but if the training doesn't provide concrete examples that fit their

comfort zone, they leave not knowing how to implement. We all need models and for some the training might be their first introduction! Very understandable given all that teachers are responsible for doing - at least in our district!

It is also possible that there are additional skills required to be able to put the training into practice that they need to add to their "toolbox." One tool leads to the next and while none are enormous additions, they do require some knowledge - such as where to even find the tool! :-) This training is certainly a poster child for that!

This Camtasia training is enhanced by also showing Google Docs and QR Codes! My hope is that this post will help some teachers solve some of those challenges. This is my most recent attempt to help bridge the gaps and model an approach (where technology is a tool) from start to finish.

This is also an attempt to take a face-to-face training and digitize it so learners can sit in their" jammies" or in the car (passengers only, please) and be supported in their learning.

WARNING: This is only ONE example. There are many variables that can change and it is in no way intended to be "the way!" In fact, I invite you to share the tools you have used and the way you have "smashed" them together to create something of value for your classroom.

The idea started one day when Donald Burken and I were talking about ways to model literacy in the science classroom. He shared some examples that he had, and I presented a session at the Literacy Conference using those ideas. when I started toying around with making an introductory Camtasia class that was more relevant from teachers, I thought I'd stay in the science classroom building off my experience.

So, here are three videos that walk you through the the creation of an independent science workstation. It begins with cloning the teacher by recording the directions for the workstation. This frees up the class time that would have been used to give students the directions and also allows for students to hear the directions more than once if needed, since it is a multi-step process.

After recording the workstation directions, as well as editing and producing the recording in Camtasia, the next step is to create QR codes for students to access the directions. Also, you create QR codes for the videos they are to watch and the Google Doc on which they will collaboratively share their thinking.

This first video describes the workstation and shares the information you need to actually record the directions.

Here is an example of the actual recording:

Next, is a video that walks you through the editing and producing process in Camtasia Studio.

And, lastly, is the video on how to create the QR codes!

How might you take this example and build on it? Please reply with your ideas!

Automating the Peer Critique Process with autoCrat

This past spring, I was fortunate to connect with Amanda Breland at Northbrook HS, a 10th grade ELA teacher. She was grappling with how to increase student engagement and decided to try a project-based learning unit with her 10th graders. She allowed me to come in and brainstorm through the process. We both learned a lot during the unit.

One of the biggest challenges proved to be student academic conversations. Amanda really wanted to get her students sharing ideas and offering feedback to one another. She quickly realized that it was a process that she would need to start earlier in the year.

During the first peer critique, not only were students struggling with the thought and communication processes, but they were also struggling with the paperwork. Students were completing feedback forms, quickly showing them to the student in need of feedback, but then filing them in the paper tray for Amanda to have evidence of conversation and to ensure students had the feedback the next day. Some students though, were willing to work on their projects after class, but didn't have access to the feedback.

I had heard about autoCrat and thought this might be just the project to try it. We made a peer feedback rubric using Google Forms and had the feedback sent to all parties involved - the "critiquee:", the "critiquer" and Amanda had the submission spreadsheet with links to the pdfs there. Watch this video to learn how we did it!

Don't want to watch the video? Here are the steps:

1. Create the Google Document (using your rubric)
2. Create the Google Form (using your Google Document and/or rubric)
3. Set up the autoCrat script to run
4. Have students complete the Google Form

We are both looking forward to working together in the fall to improve student communication and can see lots of opportunities to use autoCrat!