A simple adjustment leads to a collaborative environment

Last week as myself, Keith and Marc were working in the office to prepare for the upcoming school year, we realized that our current office setup was hindering a collaborative atmosphere. 

Marc and Keith currently share an office while I am situated in a cubicle 15 feet from their door. Last Tuesday,  as I sat in my cubicle, I heard sounds of collaboration coming from their open office.  I listened intently as a small idea was presented and the two worked together to weave that idea into a viable plan.  Instantly, I knew I wanted to be a part of this! It was clearly evident that collaboration was being used to take their ideas beyond what either one could accomplish on an individual level.

I knew that I had to get in on this collaboration!  So I approached them about completely moving our office space around.  Being the awesome guys they are, we quickly equipped ourselves with a hand truck, and a tool set.  In the hour and a half that followed we literally moved hundreds of pounds of filing cabinets, took down walls of a cubicle, and thoroughly worked up a sweat in our slacks, button down long sleeve shirts, and ties!

What we were left with though, was an environment that encourages collaboration between the 3 of us.   In the short time since the office rearrangement, we have worked together to develop ideas and plans that will allow us to be more effective and efficient technology coaches.

So I encourage you to join the conversations at your school, break down barriers that may be negatively effecting collaboration, and create an environment that is open to new ideas!

Technology and the School Administrator

     As Instructional Technology Coaches, Marc, Doug and I will start the year meeting with Administrators and Curriculum coaches to discuss goals and plans for the year.  We all created a Professional Development Calendar on Outlook and have shared it with all that will play a part in the professional development of our school professionals.

     Building level administrators can play a huge role in promoting technology in the classroom, and helping to encourage our teachers to do the same.  Here are FIVE ASKS that we think can help:  

1.        Ask Administrators to allow you, the Technology Coach, to speak to their staff at an after school meeting near the beginning of the year to review the terms of CIPA, COPPA, and FERPA…as well as talk to them about the importance of teaching and modeling the practices to be Good Digital Citizens. Use this opportunity to tell the teachers that you are there to help support what they do, and that you want to help in any way you can.

 2.       Ask Administrators to ask for a VOLUNTEER Tech Team.  A VOLUNTEER army can prove to be a most powerful advocate. This would consist of a cohort of 5-6 teachers from the school that would like to VOLUNTEER to meet periodically throughout the year to plan, demonstrate, model and share instructional best practices as well as how we can best go about integrating technology.  Ideally, this Team would be teachers from different grade levels…mixing the core subject areas, and including the Elective or Exploratory area teachers.

3.       Ask Administrators to please allow the Tech Team members to showcase new technology integration and strategies at staff meetings.  Try to attend those meetings to support the teachers.

4.       Ask Administrators and Curriculum Coaches to “model” technology at staff meetings and with communication tools.   Have staff members bring their Laptops, Pads, etc. to staff meetings and use them to share and collaborate with some of the many Professional Learning Network tools available.

5.    Ask Administrators to encourage their staff to model technology integration, and have a place on their Observation Walk-Throughs that addresses such.

 

TECH TIP:  One tool that we’d like to recommend to you is Remind 101.It is a one way texting tool that allows owners to send brief messages to group members without ever seeing anyone’s personal phone number.  Just imagine being able to send reminders to students about a project that is due, a major test, an important PTA meeting, or even use Remind101 in place of the old fashioned “Calling Tree” we use to use to notify staff members about school closings due to inclement weather.  For more information on this tool, click on the Remind 101 in this Blog.

Teachers Teaching Teachers

The model of Teachers Teaching Teachers has been around for a long time.  The idea is that you focus your efforts on a small group of teachers in your building for a particular program or set of skills, then you have them go out and share with their peers.  Thus the learning is passed along to everyone.  So why isn’t this as successful as it should be?

In talking with teachers, there are several factors that indicate that this T3 approach can work.  Here’s what they say can foster such staff development and growth:

·         Providing time for small group learning sessions

·         Providing time for the group to practice the new knowledge

·         Helping to set up Professional Learning Networks (PLNs)

·         Giving opportunities for others to observe model lessons

·         Allowing teachers to “showcase” lessons for the entire staff

·         Providing curriculum support

·         Providing technology support in the classrooms

 

In choosing to focus on Communication and Collaboration in 2012-13, we had in mind the goal of moving from Providing Instruction to Providing Opportunities for students to work collaboratively to Designing challenges that promote collaboration within and beyond the classroom toward an authentic task to formatively assessing authentic tasks where students are engaged in purposeful collaboration…and therefore moving them along a continuum to having students take responsibility for their own learning...using technology and web tools just puts icing on the cake.

Need to Review Terms for EOC: Try Flashcard Stash

 Flashcard Stash - I like this site a lot for its searchable vocabulary lists, types of activities, and the lists can be embedded into a website.  Teachers create an account and the fun begins with searching for lists.  Teachers can create their own lists but again, it is that time of year, and time (see #3 above) is lacking.  Once a teacher finds a list she likes, the students can do several activities:

1. Learning Mode - Students click on word and get definition.
2. Practice Mode - There are two parts to practice mode.  In one part of the practice, you are given the definition, and you must type the vocabulary word.  As you type the vocabulary word, blue means you are getting it correct and red means it is wrong.  The second part of the practice you are given the word and must choose from a list of definitions before time runs out.
3. Match Game - You drag words to match definitions.
4. Waterfall - Reminds me of Tetris, but you don't have to move blocks to fit into a section.  Anyway, definitions scroll down from the top.  Before the definition gets to the bottom of the screen, you need have to type the vocabulary word up top.

Once you choose the list you want, you can embed the list and all the activities above into your website.  See below.

View List |Play Match Game |Play Waterfall Game

Little Bird Tales: Not Just for the "Little" Birds

Little Bird Tales is a free web-based story building tool.  It is extremely user-friendly and ridiculously easy to use.  After registering for their free account, teachers can add students and/or multiple classes.  Little Bird Tales allows teachers to create assignments for students, share their assignments with other teachers, while also providing students a creative platform to build their own projects.  The website hosts all of the tales eliminating the need to save the projects on a flash drive. Users can edit at any time, as long as they remember their username and password.
Little Bird Tales even has a Common Core Standards Template where teachers can preview lessons that address the Common Core Standards.  In our district, students in grades K-5 have created projects and completed assignments with this tool.  Don't let the name fool you, by no means necessary is this just for elementary students.

See how to create, assign, and share in using Little Bird Tales. 



Embed your Little Bird Tales into your webpage.


Student View of Little Bird Tales.

You Need Vector File? Use Online Convert to Make a JPEG into a Vector File

On May 24th, my school district has our technology fair to showcase the technology our students and teachers are using to improve learning.  We give some type of gift to the participants to show our appreciation, and this year we will be giving ear buds with our technology fair logo on it.

As we were speaking to our vendor, she asked if we had a logo and yes we do.  She said that was great and to send to her it as a vector file.  A what?  As good technology coaches, we did not ask any questions and said sure we could.  Two seconds later we googled it and learned what it was.  From what I can best tell, a vector file is a graphic design image that can be placed onto pens, cups, ear buds, flash drives, etc, and one of the file extensions is eps.

So how do you create a vector (eps) file from jpeg?  Using Online Convert, you upload your image and the website will convert it for you, no sign in required.  You can simply download the converted file.  However, how do you view your new file without a vector or eps program to run it?

Voila, you can Microsoft Word to view it; I am using the 2010 and not sure if it works on older versions of Word.

1. Go to Insert
2. Insert a Picture
3. Where it states "All Pictures" choose "Encapsulated PostScript" - Long for eps.
4. Choose Insert and your new image will appear.

How do I Embed a Scientific Calculator (or Something Else) Into My Website?

Richard Byrne who writes the blog "Free Technology for Teachers", recently posted "Put a Scientific Calculator on Your Classroom Blog."  I love the idea that you can embed widgets from Web2.0calc of the calculator into your website or blog for the students who may not be able to shell out the money for one at home.

My district's curriculum math coach and I passed this along to our teachers, but I forgot one thing.  Many teachers do not know how to embed widgets, videos, or other web 2.0 tools into their websites.  The tutorial below will go through the steps on how to embed a scientific calculator (or something else) into your website.

By the way, if you are not already reading Richard's blog or following him on Twitter, I suggest you do.