I have used Padlet as a resource for myself and students for various activities so creating my portfolio was fairly easy.  One thing that I probably would have done differently if I had to do it again is to keep a little more organized and create each discussion in a doc before submitting.  When I copied each discussion directly into Padlet, it created extremely long posts that made moving each around to organize them difficult.  As a result, I put all the discussions to the end rather than including with the rest of the posts from each chapter to make things easier and give a clearer look to the page overall.  If I had them in docs and just uploaded each doc all the posts would have been the same size and when clicked would bring up the information in a more user friendly reading format.  

We have created student portfolios for years, but 2 years ago we finally made the jump to digital portfolios and I couldn’t be happier.  Each student creates a “My Story” site in Google Sites where they collect and reflect on their work in every class including enrichment areas. Many even include things outside of their school lives almost like a digital diary.  Students write, upload assignments, and include images and videos they create or of activities they participate in, all from their chromebooks.  No more 3 inch binders.  No more lost papers.  They can work on their portfolios anywhere, at any time, and they can include “experiences” that could never be captured in a binder. We run into hiccups, but overall the experience is more positive and better showcases what the students are doing. It is also something that they can look back on years from now.  I am sure that few of the materials from the old binders were ever saved by students.  I can’t ever imagine going back to the old way.  

The biggest roadblock for myself was time. With only 15 class periods, I felt like I had to shortchange other parts of the curriculum to try the project out. Limited time didn’t really allow for students to explore possibilities as much as I would have liked. It also meant that certain types of project ideas were not possible. One way to overcome this that I have also tried is to make the project a year long activity where each group coming in completes one part of the project. Each group reviews what the previous group did and builds on that with the next step. This also has issues as some parts of the project more “fun” and students might feel like they get the short end of the stick. Students might also not like some of the choices made by groups before them. Eventually I hope to find a solution that works for all students. 

Privacy in my district begins with a general consent form for posting photographs of students for school related purposes. This would include posts to district and school websites as well as school related teacher websites. Beyond that, parental and administration consent would be required for posting personally identifiable information about students in a public forum. An example of something that might not require that consent would be student ideas posted from a teacher account including only the student’s first name or initials.  

Chapter 6:  What are the challenges of creating lessons that reach all learners?

There are a number of factors that can challenge the ability of a teacher to reach varied learners.  It takes time to differentiate lessons and good time management to organize the simultaneous activities that will be taking place in the classroom. Those activities will require a variety of resources to reach students with different interests and to provide resources that students on different academic levels will be able to successfully understand. More specifically, reading levels may require teachers to find multiple resources on the same topic to keep students engaged and understanding content.  In the absence of leveled resources teachers will need to find applications that can read content to students. Special needs students including those with IEPs and 504s may require modifications to curriculum or extra attention. Teachers may also have to find ways to enable students to access curriculum who have struggles outside the classroom they are dealing with. Home life, access to Internet, relationship struggles can all impact a students ability to succeed.  

Chapter 7:  Consider an upcoming assessment (formative or summative) for which you’d like to rethink the feedback process. Which of the six strategies identified in chapter 7 do you think can best support your students and ease your workload and why?

This week we have transitioned to online learning in response to the Coronavirus outbreak and as one of two technology specialists who also teaches classes in the building, we have been slammed with questions from both teachers and students.  So, something to ease the load would be nice! I already try to give written feedback often, but I sometimes find myself copy and pasting the same things from one assignment to the next.  For that reason, I think the Frequent Feedback option might work well for me. If I had a shorthand that students understood or could look up that could save me time that I could use for more important lesson development as we rethink what we are doing for the next few weeks. I would also like to do more with verbal feedback. I would have to play with that more in various forms to see if it speeds up the feedback process. When things are back to normal, I definitely think that verbal feedback will be more effective at engaging students.

Neebe, D., & Roberts, J. (2015). Power up: making the shift to 1:1 teaching and learning. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers.

Once students have devices in their hands all the time, it frees up the teacher to flip the classroom and enable students to take more charge of their learning. Now students have access to information with a few clicks of a button. Students can get answers to many of their questions on their own. Teachers will have more time to take lessons deeper and provide individual help to those students who most need it. Students will have access to a variety of tools all the time, not only when a teacher can get access to a cart or a lab. Collaboration goes beyond the school walls across the world opening doors to experiences students could not otherwise have.  

However, while many great things come out of a 1-1 initiative when teachers rethink their teaching strategies, they will need to keep in mind potential new sources of  student distraction. Teachers will need to find new ways to engage students that will be more enticing than the vast alternatives found online. Teachers will have to get up and move around more. They will have to find ways to monitor student progress that they have perhaps not had to in the past. In my Digital Citizenship class, we begin with digital footprints. One of the first assignments involves groups using shared Google Docs to record their thoughts as they move through 4 activities. I explain how I will use the version history tool to help me grade their assignments. We take a look at a group’s assignment through the eyes of the version tool so that students understand what I can see and how that connects to the idea of digital footprints. This is just one of many ways that teachers may have to adjust to a world in which students are tech comfy but not always tech savvy.   

One of the engagement strategies I have been thinking about doing more with in my Digital Citizenship class is connection. Reading about the interactive stories reminds me of a project students came up with when I used to have an open ended design thinking assignment with many choices at the end of the course. In hindsight, it was way too ambitious to try as set up, but I got some interesting projects out of it when I let kids just explore their ideas. One of those ideas was the creation of Choose Your Own Adventure style stories using Google Slides. Students already take on the roles of various characters when they play similar stories on the Digital Compass website provided by Common Sense Media. However, this group then took that idea and created their own with more relevant types of scenarios that connected to events they were likely to experience in real life and organized it using a Google Slideshow. Students could work through the story and depending on their choices the navigation would take students to different slides. I could see making this a lesson in that 6th grade class and then take the results and have my 7th grade Digital Communication class (where they study basic video production) bring those stories to life by shooting video versions. I would then cycle those back to 6th grade for students to try when learning about various aspects of digital citizenship. 

There are many ways that colleagues can collaborate to share resources and facilitate working together.  A while back I created my Ed Tech MegaPadlet to share resources with teachers when we first went 1-1.  That padlet was connected to individual Padlets for each of the different apps on the main page.  Because they were public anyone could add their own examples and links regarding how to use each of the apps. In Canvas, we have a commons area where teachers can post courses for others to use. Sometimes teachers will add other teachers to their courses to give them access so they can see what each other is doing. Teachers can always access Twitter and other social media sites to expand their connections to teachers outside their local communities. They can also use those apps to stay in touch and collaborate with professionals they meet at conferences.  Virtual meeting spaces are another option. I just sat in a meeting today discussing how we will deal with coronavirus and am supposed to head to training Wednesday to use Zoom. We will use Zoom to hold daily staff meetings in the event that schools need to close. 

Neebe, D., & Roberts, J. (2015). Power up: making the shift to 1:1 teaching and learning. Stenhouse Publishers.

I also think I am fairly comfortable using technology. We regularly use a variety of tools in my 3 tech classes: Digital Citizenship, Programming, and Digital Communications. Canvas is our LMS. We use Google Drive and shared Google Docs almost every day. Students create screencasts using Quicktime or Screencastify and iMovie to create video tutorials. I use Google forms to gather information or have students self reflect.  We have online discussions and use tools like Padlet to organize and share information. Students have access and experience with markup tools like Kami and presentation tools like Adobe Spark. I also incorporate activities from Smart Learning Suite Online and other sites that help to engage students. 

The one thing I don’t have enough of is time. I only have students 15 class periods for each course.  If you factor in field trips, testing days, sports dismissals, assemblies, etc., sometimes that number can be reduced to 11 or 12 class periods.    

After reading chapter one and thinking about shooting for the moon, two long term goals come to mind.  First, I would like to find ways to increase classroom efficiency with technology solutions to increase usable class time. Having everything in Canvas helps as students have easy access to material and students who are absent can quickly find out what they missed and any related materials that might be needed.  GoGuardian, which allows me to see student screens helps me to see who is struggling to get to where they need to be, enables me to push out websites quickly, and can help reduce distractions that might take time away from other students. However, I think I can still find ways to improve.  

A second goal I have is empowering students to take more charge of their learning. With such a short course, I have a hard time letting go of control over activities to give students more options that might take more time and require more student training. We do use a variety of tools and they seem to be engaging for the most part, but it would be nice to see what actions students would take if given a little more freedom in reaching class objectives. This includes how they acquire information as well as how they communicate understanding of that information. Perhaps once I figure out solutions that will help me achieve my first goal, the second goal will become easier to realize. 

References:

Neebe, D., & Roberts, J. (2015). Power up: Making the shift to 1:1 teaching and learning. Stenhouse Publishers.

When I do explore on Twitter, there is so much that I feel a little overwhelmed. I am the kind of person who wants to jump right in when I see something new.  I have trouble taking baby steps and that poses a problem. There is so much good information out there, but it also takes time to sort through it all to find those diamonds in the rough.  Finding good people to follow helps, but by the time everything else around the house is done I need to turn my brain off with some mindless activity that will allow me to sleep, and Twitter does NOT fill that need. One little thing will sometimes spark a thousand ideas that can keep me up for hours as the ideas marinate and develop into new lessons or future conversations with fellow teachers or admin. Perhaps I need a professional consultant to come in and help me revamp my schedule as time management is not one of my strengths, which my wife and the librarian at my school will happily confirm. I will probably try again after the experiences in this chapter, but chances are I will fall off over time unless I can find a way to ease myself into a routine that is manageable. #fingerscrossed

Neebe, D., & Roberts, J. (2015). Power up: Making the shift to 1:1 teaching and learning. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers.