Thanks...I Think?

In the State of Indiana, as I'm sure in other states around the country, the legislative body has recently signed into law new Computer Science (CS) Standards for all students in grades K-8.  This is in response to two influences.  First, our Federal Government has committed significant financial resources to expanding CS education so that all students develop proficiency in computer science, digital literacy and digital citizenship.  The other reality is that technology continues to exponentially increase its role in our our modern world and will only continue to proliferate in the future.  The first-order need is that our students will know how to appropriately use technology in their lives, both now and  after graduation.  The second-order need is that we reduce our role as consumers and start to build our capacity as producers.

So what does this mandate look like for a typical K-8 student?  How will they receive adequate instruction and experiential learning?  One thing that I have learned in my experience as an educator is that, unfortunately, scheduling needs can have a negative impact on the quantity and quality of teaching and learning.  Whether it's the challenge of assuring that every elementary student has all creative arts classes with a traveling teacher or trying to get all 10th grade students through online standardized assessments with only one computer lab, scheduling is a nightmare.  So how can we ensure that all students receive ample, high-quality, relevant instruction and learning experiences in computer science? We have to start by changing our mindset.  Instead of saying, "It can't be done," we need to start saying, "I'm not sure how, but we can figure it out."

After reading a recent article by Doug Belshaw, our team has recently adapted and adopted a framework  based on Stephen R Covey's leadership philosophy that we hope will allow us to refine our focus on where individuals and groups need the most support in terms of instructional technology.  This model has three domains: Skill sets, Tool sets, and Mind sets.  We are trying to guide our teachers and students to growing in each of these domains.  Tool sets are the easiest.  We can buy all of the devices, curricular resources, apps or other software that we want, but unless we help develop the skill sets of our teachers and students, we will not experience growth.  Skill sets come from practice, application, and opportunities to fail.  The toughest domain to affect is mind sets.  This is not a matter or convincing, bullying, or having people "buy in" to what you are advocating for, rather, it means encouraging them to embrace new ways of thinking because they have experienced and benefited from the improved results.

I believe the mission statement of an educator is to prepare students to not only survive, but thrive, in a world very different than the one that many of us graduated into.  As such, it is imperative that we integrate the development of the CS skills and conceptual understandings of how and why responsible use of technology is so critical.  This simply cannot be accomplished by cramming all of the the CS standards into a 9 week class in middle or high school.  Nor can it be adequately learned from 30 minutes of computer lab time every other week in an elementary school.  Are these options better than not providing learning opportunities at all?  Absolutely!  Is there another way that we can develop deeper levels of understanding and instill the appreciation of how technology can be used in a variety of applications and environments? Yes!  As classroom teachers, instead of having a "technology" project in the spring of each year, I contend that an element of technology can be infused into virtually any lesson or unit.  The reason for doing so isn't just "because."  It is done to give students a regular and consistent opportunity to apply the skills that they are learning about in their technology class or have acquired on their own.  Give students a chance to explore and learn new and different ways of learning and demonstrating understanding so that their skill sets and tool sets continue to grow. All the while, they are developing a mind set that will benefit them greatly throughout their school career and beyond.

Change cannot happen overnight, although it sometimes feels like is does.  Start small.  Invest 10 minutes per week "playing."  Follow other teachers on Twitter or Google+.  Be willing to make mistakes.  Ask kids how they think they learn best.  Be vulnerable.  If students aren't learning, take the human element out of it - it's not you, it's not them, it's simply the method or strategy that has been chosen to develop understanding by the student. The bad news is that you cannot change people.  They are who they are, regardless of their age.  The great news is that you can change how content is delivered to students.  Interweaving the Computer Science standards is just one way that you may be able to effectively bring students to the understanding of content instead of forcing understanding in a way that is not native to today's learner.

Kevin Schamel
Twitter: @schamelearning

Kirsten Phillips
Twitter: @kear734

#RCSeLearn
www.werrichmond.com/elearning

The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus

Have you ever seen a Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus?  Go ahead, click the link.  They are very rare but if you look in just the right place you can find fascinating research about them.

Retrieved from: http://zapatopi.net/treeoctopus/

Simply because it is on the internet does not make it real, but many of our students have a difficult time understanding that someone would intentionally post "bogus" information.

When teaching research skills, we must model best practice.  This includes citing our source when we use a picture in a media presentation.  Just last week I was in a class when the teacher said, "just grab a picture from Google."

 Wait....what?

Are we opening Google images up for our younger students to stumble upon inappropriate material? We have a great filtering system but it is difficult to completely filter Google images.  Did you know that? Here in lies the problem, you don't know what you don't know.

So many of you are doing your best differentiating lessons, grading papers, analyzing data, building relationships with parents and students, and then your own personal growth, family, and relationships that we miss the little things.

We have been quoting the ISTE standards in our professional learning opportunities and in this blog, but have you had time to check them out?  Did you know they even existed? I didn't until I began this edtech journey.  Now, more than ever, we have to be prepared for our students.  The state has recognized the need to produce responsible digital citizens. In order to help with this shift to a blended learning environment,  IDOE has created new Computer Science standards that your students will be responsible for learning.

In working with many teachers, the one thing that I've learned is if we show you the how and why to use a strategy or tool, you will implement it into your daily schedule, if there is value.  We wanted to show you the value in a few resources that will help guide your students in their research.

Kiddle.co , Kidrex.org, and Kidzsearch.com are a few kid friendly search engines that use Google's safe search filtering.  Teaching students to begin with these search engines, finding facts across multiple sites, and putting research in the students' own words is a great foundation.  Once your students enter intermediate grades, they will begin to create media presentations that will include pictures.  Photosforclass.com is a website that will not only find Creative Common licensed pictures but will also include the source within the upload.  This is another great resource to introduce your students to when teaching digital citizenship.

We cannot protect our students from everything, but we can prepare them as responsible digital citizens.  It is a shift in our thinking and one we must give priority because technology integration is becoming more prevalent in our students' daily lives.  No matter what route you take in protecting and teaching your students responsible researching, it is important to have a plan in place when using technology in your classroom.

 Continue to grow, learn, and reflect on this #edtech journey!  Your students need you! As always, if you would like assistance using any of these tools, please contact our Office of eLearning.

Kirsten Phillips
Twitter: @kear734

Kevin Schamel
Twitter: @schamelearning

#RCSeLearn

www.werrichmond.com/elearning

Text is Dead?

I was participating in a webinar this week and the presenter made a statement that made me sit up and take notice. He said, "Text is dead." Taken out of context, a person could truly take offense to this claim. When you reconnect it to the context however, he went on to say, "Text is dead.  Our students comprehend better when text is accompanied by other media, such as video, audio, or conversation." Less brutal, huh?

Are we sometimes, or all of the time, imposing our biases and learning styles on our students? Are we guilty of thinking, "this is how I learned to (insert skill here) so they should be able to as well?" Let's face it, those of us who were born before 1990 were educated and raised in a very text-dominant world. If we needed or wanted to learn about something, we relied heavily on text-based resources. If we wanted to be entertained, we were limited to the minimal choices of programs on television or could escape through reading books. In today's world, our children have access to a limitless supply of information and entertainment that is only growing exponentially by the hour. How are many, if not most of them, accessing this "infotainment?" I know my son isn't the only 4 year old that is compelled by YouTube videos (YT for Kids, of course!)  He has learned about everything from the latest toys to creative uses of Play-Doh and plastic Easter Eggs. My wife and I try really hard not to use his iPad as a babysitter. Does it give the two of us a chance to talk to each other about our day, pay bills, or make dinner together? Absolutely! My justification is that what he's watching (which we monitor) or the 3rd grade leveled eBook that is being read-aloud to him is exposing him to even more oral vocabulary than we already do. We talk to our son, encourage him to talk about his day at preschool, complete his homework and do projects with him. We read to him and listen to him read to us almost every night. We believe that it is important to establish a balance between screen time and real time.

So where was I? Ah yes, "text is dead." What this means is that with our children, and more and more adults, reading text alone often does not foster understanding. (Maybe that means I should be providing an audio recording of this blog then, huh?) To maximize comprehension, text should be accompanied or supplemented with video, audio, and opportunities to interact with it. It is safe to say that on virtually any device and any operating system, text can be read aloud to the reader. This helps struggling students that are below grade level. Additionally, this allows on-level readers to interact with above-grade level texts to help them stretch their learning.

This brings us to the the tech tool portion of the blog. How can we make videos interactive for our students? What if there was a way that I could insert questions or tasks into the YouTube video that my son is watching starring two kids dressed up in inflatable Sumo Wrestler outfits? (If you have kids that watch YouTube for Kids, you know the one...) What if I am a teacher that is dipping their toe into the Blended Learning pool and want to utilize Khan Academy, TeacherTube, SchoolTube, Flocabulary, YouTube or YouTube for Schools videos to provide on-level, below-level, or above-level instruction? Better yet, maybe you are a teacher that would like to record your "mini-lessons" (sounds so much nicer than "lecture," doesn't it?) and make those available to your students outside of the school day so that you can front-load and build context and schema in order to dig deeper during class time. These embedding tools allow the user to "free the copier" by inserting questions, pauses for thinking and reflecting, slides, links, and other features right into the video.

Why would a teacher decide to use this? Well, if you are now a little less offended by the statement earlier about text being "dead," you may be more open to the idea of utilizing a media that is engaging, relevant, and native to help your students learn. I say engaging, but on its own, watching videos is a rather passive action. Are students able to apply skills that they learn from watching the video? Perhaps, but in order to help create a more active participant, embedding comprehension or thought-provoking questions throughout the video will help our kids further develop their critical thinking skills.

There is no shame in admitting that the prescribed strategy that you chose to teach a skill, concept, or strategy did not work for a class, groups, or individuals. You can even say "its not me, its them. That kid is ... (insert reason here: home life, attention span, hormones, disability, etc)." Once you get past the denial phase its time to move on, because it is still our responsibility as educators to do everything that we can to ensure that all students demonstrate mastery of grade level standards. We have to shift our thinking - using video to help students develop understanding of grade level content is not a short-cut, lazy, or easy way out. If it has the desired impact that you are hoping for, isn't that the goal? As educators, we need to make instructional decisions that we believe, or have the data to back-up, will have the greatest impact on student mastery and true understanding.

Oh yeah, if you can make videos and embed questions and content to help students better understand a topic, I bet the kids can too!  As a teacher, would you rather your students create a five slide PowerPoint with three facts from three different sources with 20 point Times New Roman font......sorry, fell asleep there for a second. The point is, let kids record a video of themselves talking about the President that they researched or demonstrating that they understand the steps necessary to solve a given math problem or concept. They can insert questions that the other students can answer with immediate feedback.

The tools that we have used are Zaption, TedEd, Playposit (formerly EDUCanon) and EDpuzzle. All of these allow you to set up free accounts, and many even allow you to setup classes and student accounts as well. You do have the option of upgrading to premium accounts which give extra storage, additional question types, and other features. The free versions are great for getting started though. Essentially, they all work the same way: you paste the URL of the video into the project.  You then insert the different question or response types in at the times of the video that you want them to appear. After you are finished, you can either email a link, send out via Social Media, or embed the video into a webpage.

Teachers utilizing tools such as these listed show evidence of multiple ISTE Teacher Standards. Specifically, Standards 1, 2, and 3: Facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity, Design and develop digital age learning experiences and assessments, and Model digital age work and learning. Use by students places the artifact higher on the SAMR continuum, indicating that the task has been augmented through enhancements made possible through the use of technology in such a way that it establishes deeper levels of understanding by the students.  The same is true on Bloom's Taxonomy.  Depending on how the student chooses to use these tools to provide evidence on learned concepts or skills, it moves well beyond "understanding" and into the realm of "application" or maybe even "creation!"

The best way to become familiar with these tools is to set up an account and explore. Let Kirsten or I know if you run into any issues or would like some help navigating these, or any other tools and resources that can help you better get your message across to your students or help them get their message across to you!

Kevin Schamel
Twitter: @schamelearning

Kirsten Phillips
Twitter: @kear734

#RCSeLearn

www.werrichmond.com/elearning

Get Your Hour Back

Daylight Savings time is quickly approaching. We already have too much to do in a day to lose an entire hour.  This week, we hope to help you save time and give you back your hour, in your planning.

Every week I have teachers asking for specific resources and apps to use with their students. They often don't have the time, to put in the research it takes, to find quality resources to use with students. That is part of my job and what I love to do.  Even for me, there comes a time when I realize I have to be more efficient when looking for and storing these resources.  Kevin and I have a wealth of knowledge when it comes to finding tech integration resources but how do we share it without it being overwhelming?

I started looking at my browser tabs, then my bookmarks, and realized I needed to do a better job of organizing all this "knowledge" so I could easily share it with teachers.  I was tired of having to sort through tabs, websites, iTunes, Twitter post, email, etc...to find where I last read about the latest resource for....

Then we started TLC training.  This Technology Leadership Certification was a way we could be more accountable for what we are learning and how we are sharing it with teachers.  One of the first resources that caught my attention was Symbaloo.  Symbaloo is not a new resource.  Actually, our good friend Jim worked off his Symbaloo daily, but we never took to it, until now.

There really is no way of knowing how much time we spend looking for resources because that's what we do, but I will say these two are enormous time savers. With the time change and the lack of time, hopefully these resources will give you back time.

Symbaloo is a web 2.0 tool that allows you to save, organize, and share your websites, resources, and tools.  It's literally an interactive visual bookmarking tool.  You can set it as your homepage and all your resources are organized in a one-stop location. You can create as many webmixes as you need, share them with your colleagues, and even take it to the next level and use it with your students. Symbaloo offers a valuable search feature to get you started as well as video tutorials.

As we are working on advancing into the digital age with the guidance of our ISTE standards, it's important to reference the why behind a tool such as Symbaloo.  ISTE Standards For Teachers state that teachers must "demonstrate fluency in technology systems and the transfer of current knowledge to new technologies and situations" (retrieved from www.iste.org).  While saving you time, it is also "contributing to the effectiveness, vitality, and self-renewal of the teaching profession" (ISTE, 2016). We must continually collaborate with others in our profession to stay fresh with all that is at our fingertips; because our students have everything they need at theirs.

Check out another free resource!

Edshelf is another time saving resource when looking for digital curriculum.  If I need a resource that has proven effectiveness, with peer reviews, and a quick overview, I check out edshelf. I can create, maintain, and share a "shelf" of resources.  I can build as many shelves as I need, and I can even curate from other shelves that have already been developed.   I can follow fellow educator's shelves to see what they are currently using with their students or in their own professional learning.  Edshelf is a great starting point when I need a resource. I combine both tools by putting edshelf on my tech integration Symbaloo. With just a few clicks, I can save time and have a valuable resource waiting for my students.

We hope that you find one of these resources helpful in your daily planning.  As always, if you would like help getting started or have any questions regarding these resources, please contact our RCS Office of eLearning.

Kevin Schamel
Twitter: @schamelearning

Kirsten Phillips
Twitter: @kear734

#RCSeLearn

www.werrichmond.com/elearning

Check Please!

As I was training students this week on how to use a new productivity tool, I could not help but notice a few of them having a great time violently shuffling their mouse back and forth in a way that made the screen flicker.  They, of course, thought it was hilarious and so did those around them.  I then found myself saying out loud what I was thinking in my head: "Is this the first time you have ever used a computer?"  Over the years, I have developed a pretty effective filter regarding what I say versus what I was thinking, but this one slipped and I felt really bad about it.  I was sure to attend to those students very closely during the remainder of the lesson and actually used them as leaders later on.

That rhetorical question that I asked, however, led me to think deeper.  While this was obviously not the first time that these students had used a computer, it was quite possibly one of the first times that they were provided with an opportunity to use computers at school for something creative, instead of taking a test or playing games.  We can't expect all students to know what the expectations for use are until we give clear direction, hold them accountable, and, most importantly, provide ample and consistent opportunities to utilize these devices in a creative setting!  Like many school districts already have or will do, ours is preparing to significantly expand student access to technology.  Using devices will be less of an "event" and become much more commonplace.   Teachers and students will be given the opportunity to use technology for teaching, learning, creating, collaborating, problem solving, and yes, assessments.  Our team wants to be sure that all teachers and students get the support that they need to continuously expand their experiences in ways that make educational sense.

With that in mind, the video that we wanted to share this week focuses on making checks for understanding fun, easy, "gamified," and informative.  These tools, Kahoot, Quizizz, and Plickers allow teachers to easily create (or borrow) questions of varying types and administer them in ways that use technology to collect and track the information that it provides.  This gives the students the feedback on their progress as well provides the teacher with valuable and timely data to guide planning, reteaching, and intervention.  If you would like some help getting signed up, navigating, or using any of these engaging assessment resources, please let us know!

Kevin Schamel
Twitter: @schamelearning

Kirsten Phillips
Twitter: @kear734

#RCSeLearn

www.werrichmond.com/elearning