Tweet, Tweet

For this lesson, I revived my Twitter handle which was created three years ago for a different tech class that I took. I am pretty sure that the account hadn't been touched since I finished that class. I have been engaged in Twitter for the past 4 weeks, and I have to say that I still don't love it. However, I do respect that there are some pretty specific questions that hands down are best solved by using Twitter. First, real time updates to various scenarios. You can't beat Twitter for finding out what is happening at X event right now. But in a more professional sense, it's also a nice way to get a quick overview of ideas from people that I am following. It's a little faster and easier than checking in on all the websites and blogs that I typically read and follow. Twitter let me see a quick overview of ideas that I could then go follow up on the blogs. As is the case with most of my social media use, I can see myself as a passive user of Twitter, taking the information that is helpful to me, but rarely posting. Although maybe that will change. After my very first tweet, one of my co-workers mentioned the very next day that she followed my link and also read the article. So perhaps I'll end up using its power.

A new resource that I discovered via Twitter is the Google Teacher Tribe Podcast @GTeacherTribe. This show is hosted by Kasey Bell from Shake Up Learning @ShakeUpLearning and Matt Miller from Ditch That Textbook @DitchThatTxtbk. This podcast seems great. The new season has just started, and the first episode did a great job of summarizing all the new updates to Google Classroom. While many of the changes are pretty intuitive, there are some new things that I definitely learned from their podcast. There are also many people in my school who are just beginning to use Google Classroom so this is really helpful for me to reference as I try to assist them. After listening to the first podcast, I am also going to listen to some previous episodes on Google Keep. They were raving about all the ways they use it, and I have struggled to figure out how to incorporate it. I have trouble getting my notes in Keep organized, so I'm interested to see if they can offer some new ideas on how to manage that.

TweetChat

My tweetchat experience was much better than I expected. I have never participated in something like this before. I initially was planning to join the #ICEilchat, but I ended up participating in the #mschat (middle school chat) hosted by @Jeremybballer. I am really happy that I stumbled into this chat for my first experience. It was very slow moving which made it easy to understand and follow. There were only 6 or 7 other educators participating and only 6 questions asked during the hour. I could easily follow it and not be overwhelmed. It also happened that most of the other middle school teachers also taught ELA and I discovered a great new story writing app, Storybird that I'm excited to try out. I also watched a lot of the #ICEilchat, but did not actively participate. That chat was much busier with both questions and people, and more challenging to follow my first time. It did look interesting, and I have marked future #ICEchats on my calendar. I may try another one. 

@Jeremybballer was tweetchat host. Personal photo.

My PLN Going Forward 

In my district almost all websites related to social media and networking are blocked which makes it difficult to develop an online PLN. Our web access is slowly increasing as our school administration becomes more comfortable with the role of technology so I think that within a few years there's a chance that our teachers will have access to some of these resources while at work. In the meantime, its up to teachers to follow and read up from home or on a personal device.

Research on Student Use and Access to Tech

Infographic Love 💛💚❤️ 

I love infographics. To me there's no better way combine words, colors, and pictures to get your point across. It's a careful blend text and image to balance this delivery so it is both informative, appealing, and easy to read.  It's not easy to do. So the Project Tomorrow findings really grabbed my attention because they were both interesting and effective.  

The Homework Gap

This section on the homework gap caught my attention. I am not a huge fan of assigning homework. Gasp! I  know, but as my children go through school I see homework from the parent-side and the teacher side. As a parent, doing homework at night can be tough, especially with students who struggle with content/skills or attention. I have two children; one who struggles with content and one who struggles with attention, and our evenings can be awful depending on the homework load. Instead of enjoying our family time and enjoying their childhood, my children are arguing and crying about homework. As a teacher, I am usually assigning for homework things that didn't get finished in class. There's no real "additional practice" for ELA. There's only, we started this in class, now finish it at home. I've changed my stance and primarily now only assign independent reading for homework. Homework adds stress to the home life, especially for the students who are part of the statistics below. Thirteen percent of students report that they cannot do their homework at all and some other unknown percentage is resourceful enough to seek out alternative places to complete assignments, but this again is taking even more time from their other responsibilities. 

Project Tomorrow: The Homework Gap
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A second point, I'd like to propose is that the same students who are struggling to find access to the internet outside of school are also already, likely struggling with traditional homework. For many students, there are barriers to completing traditional homework--access to materials, a quiet place to work, time, and a supportive adult. These are not always a given, yet if we send them home with a book or a worksheet, we have expectations. And while I understand there's a fundamental difference between not being physically able to connect to the internet and do the assignment, and not having an environment that is conducive for homework, I still think that the problems aren't all that different. Perhaps the literal CAN'T of technology is a good reminder for teachers and administrators that we need to think carefully in general about what we are expecting of students when they are outside our controlled environment. What is the purpose of our homework assignment? Is it necessary? helpful? crucial? Can it be completed without any assistance? Does it matter if students got help? Worked together? Copied or cheated? If as a teacher I can honestly answer those questions and still find value in the homework then it's a good assignment, if not perhaps it's not worth the stress.

Teaching Teachers Tech

As a first year instructional coach, I am learning a lot on the job. It turns out, teachers are not much different from students. Their backgrounds, skills, and comfort levels are all different. Their interests and preferred learning styles are varied, and they too are often too busy with "real life" to tackle homework and additional learning. Now, I already knew most of these things because I was in the same boat myself just last year. But at that time I only had my own interests to grapple with. This year my responsibilities have shifted. I am creating lessons that get both the kids interested in the lesson by engaging them in technology AND get the teacher interested in learning how to incorporate the tech. Two different target groups. While I'm not an administrator, I feel like this statistic below still represents some of the challenges I face in my new position pretty well. 

Project Tomorrow: Professional Learning
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The infographic below on professional development training probably pretty closely matches the teachers in my district. As it shows, time is always the most precious resource. Time to meet and plan; time to reflect and discuss; time to learn and apply. Teachers are lucky if we get time for one of these areas. Four out of the five areas below require series time. Only one area simply asks for additional information. It's great that my district has invested in my role as an in-school coach. I'm really enjoying it and truly think that I can offer a great service to my colleagues, but we still have to find time to meet and discuss what I can offer them and how to best implement it. I'm hoping they'll find enough value in what I bring to carve out the time, but everyone knows how tough that is.  

Teachers' PD Needs
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Personal Reflections As a Parent

I found this week's assignment both fascinating and frustrating. I loved reading all the research, but then found myself searching for additional sources to try to back up or argue against findings. In the community where I live, there has been a lot of discussion recently about limiting children's access to technology. It's primarily aimed at home use of technology and social media rather than school, but there's definitely crossover. 

For instance, this past week our PTC sent a link asking parents to participate in the Wait Til 8th campaign by pledging to wait until 8th grade to buy their children a smart phone. The campaign and our PTC cite interviews with tech company executives discussing how they limit their own children's access to screens.  We've also had community screenings of several documentaries discussing the role that social media plays in promoting anxiety and negative self-image in children. I find it interesting that there's at least some push back to the idea that access to technology is more good than bad. These parents aren't calling for an end to computer use in the classroom and would all probably concede that computer training and comfort is in fact a very important aspect of their child's education, but they are concerned about the negative repercussions of too much screen time. In fact several have petitioned our local high school to ban cell phones and personal devices in the classroom. 

Outside of CommonSense media, there didn't seem to be a lot of research into any problems associated with using technology, especially personal technology, in school. Perhaps, this is because the social media aspect, in theory, isn't/shouldn't be a part of school, but the reality is that if students are using their own devices as these stats say they are, then students are likely on social media more then we realize.

Even teens recognize what they are doing online isn't great.

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While my own kids are asking for a smart phone, we are still at least a year away from having to make that decision. There's so many benefits to using and incorporating tech into our lives, but I'll have to think carefully.

Active Learning Reflection

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by L. Gibbons

This assignment was incredibly interesting to me because I so enjoyed reading the blog we were assigned to analyze. This blog was written by a 9 year old Chicago boy to his classmates while he lived on location in Toronto to film a movie. He shared many of his experiences about life in Toronto, filming a movie, and attending school in a trailer on set.  

As students, our focus was supposed to be on analyzing the Active Learning traits that were happening in the blog exchange. But Max's story so interesting to me that I found myself just lost in his story. I found myself continuing to research his story, looking up the history of his family, following links to research facilities he worked with, and researching the disease his character had. I read his story, and then followed my own related interests to learn more based on what I had read. My experience with his blog is the very experience teachers hope to bring about by engaging students in active learning. 

Active Learning

Active learning is defined as an approach to instruction that focuses on student-centered learning. Students are asked to engage in the learning process and take an active role in their own learning as opposed to the more passive role that you find in a more 'traditional' classroom. In Active Learning, students engage in more active modes of learning including lessons that are inquiry based, collaborative, reflective, self-assessed, relevant and generally engaging to students. 

Our Padlet Assignment

While my experience with Max's blog was an example of active learning, my continuing research wasn't the task we were assigned. We were asked to analyze the blog for its active learning properties and write about it using padlet. You can see my padlet in the image below or by following the link. The blog illustrates several aspects of active learning, particularly for Max the writer of the blog. First, it's an interactive activity. Max writes a post and his classmates and teachers respond. The writers are predominantly students, although comments were moderated by a teacher. There is some group discussion, but unfortunately, Max doesn't appear to respond to the comments left by his peers often. Within the comments students were able to connect with Max's time in Toronto by sharing their own experiences with the area. Several students posted comments about people they knew in Toronto or about connections they had to his experiences. 

This blog is certainly an outstanding example of student centered work and student reflection.  There is a lot reflection by Max on his activities, experiences, and learning process while on the movie set. Some of these things are related to his schoolwork, but most are related to the research he conducts to prepare for his role. He immerses himself in the medical world by meeting with real-world patients, doctors, and researchers to study and learn. He travels to their professional environments to observe, interview, and discuss the areas he is interested in and needs to learn more about. He learns a tremendous amount in this way and it furthers his interest in science and also film-making. 

Padlet Created by L. Gibbons
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Is Active Learning Needed?

Having students engage in active learning should be a part of the classroom. I don't believe that all lessons need to be student-centered to have a successful classroom, but to achieve a balance and prepare students for their future, active learning certainly has a role. 

The avenues and mediums for engaging students in active learning have changed in recent years, but overall this is not a new idea. Technology has made it easier to develop lessons that are student-centered and inquiry oriented, but these philosophy has been a part of teacher training for many decades. 

In my classrooms, I have used many simple tasks that help students engage with learning by collaborating and communicating. We use the 'Question' feature in Google Classroom. With these questions students are asked to provide their own response and then also comment on others' from the class. I also recently discovered the polling feature of the 'Question' area and I think that would be a great way to quickly find out where students' interest lie. I use padlet to gauge what students already know (the K, of a KWL) and to spark discussion before beginning a lesson. We can come together at the end to record what we've learned new as well. Students also use the share feature on Google docs to collaborate on group projects, peer edit papers, and to solicit my feedback.  Just this past week, I have begun working with video in the classroom. Students are recording themselves conducting their science experiments, and then they are sharing them with the class and uploading them to Google Slides. This is has been far more engaging to students than the traditional tri-fold board they used to complete for science fair. 

I have not moved into the world of student blogs or websites yet. I began looking at ways to incorporate these areas over the summer, possibly starting with digital portfolios for students, but haven't found the time to introduce or manage them yet. Student portfolios is a goal for next year though. Students will keep their work organized digitally and be able to reflect back on assignments and see their own growth.  It is a good opportunity for students to reflect on their own learning, watch their own progress, and determine areas of strength and weakness. 

On a more professional note, I'd like to also create a site that would organize all our digital resources for the staff at my school. It would help people know what is available to them, but also be a way for staff to reflect on how much/which avenues of technology are they actively incorporating into their classrooms, and where they have room to grow as well. 

Mapping Digital Spaces-Visitor vs. Resident

For the past two decades we've heard the terms Digital Native or Digital Immigrant used to refer to one's age when the internet era first came about. Originally the only qualification for either group was being of a certain age when the internet started taking root in our society. At first, there was only 'us' or 'them.' It didn't take too long for splinter groups to form though. I was born in 1978; a year that falls into what many have started to label a "microgeneration;" not a digital native, nor a digital immigrant. We came of age alongside the technology. We lived an essentially analog childhood, but entered the digital world as young adults. I had a rotary phone in my kitchen as a child, but haven't had a landline since I got my first cell phone at 22.  I used a card catalog and index cards to write 99% of my senior thesis in high school, and also had to cite one source from the internet. There was a sign  up sheet, and every student had two days on the 'internet computer' in the corner to find their fact. Two days to find and cite one fact! And I remember being terrified; I had no idea what to do. And while I played Oregon Trail in elementary school, and learned keyboarding instead of typing in middle school, and once accessed the web in high school, I didn't get an email address until freshman year of college, and we didn't really use it until junior year when we had the option of sending an email with an attachment to our TA instead of handing in a hard copy. So while I used both digital and analog media growing up, one big difference between me and people just a few years younger was the the idea of online sharing and the invention of social media. The very earliest platforms started just after I graduated from college and joined the workforce. They weren't really a part of my official 'youth'. I give you this background because I think it explains a little about why I am so interested in learning and using technology, but am still so reticent to engage in it socially. I see myself pretty firmly placed in the Visitor camp-technology is a tool I use to learn and grow from others, but I rarely find myself interacting as a Resident online.  I was just old enough that the social aspect didn't happen 'naturally,' yet just young enough to witness some of my peers make disastrous mistakes dabbling in early era social media without realizing it's widespread consequences until it was too late. Plus I'm a naturally private (and slightly cynically) person. I try hard to limit my personal digital footprint.

map made by L. Gibbons

My Life as an Internet Visitor

As you can see on my Digital Map above, most of my online activities are either in the Visitor quadrants or on the narrow edges of a Resident section. And they are quite purposely that way. Even in online communities where I have accounts, I am reticent to post or engage in social media. I have a username for--Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Goodreads. However, I rarely log into them. I post zero status updates to Facebook, and very few pictures. In fact, I have taken the app off my phone so I will intentionally check it less often. I rely on it for a few specific groups that I haven't figured out how to replace, otherwise I would deactivate it. My Twitter account, Linkedin profile, and Goodreads account have sat untouched for months or even years. I have never left a public comment on the internet in my life, nor do I ever see myself doing so. It's nearly impossible for me to imagine a scenario where a perfect stranger would be interested in my opinion of his/her video, and yet I know that it all occurs. 

Moving into the Residential

The only areas that I am freely a Resident of are my Google apps and features. I share pretty freely on Google and extend to them a level of trust that I am hesitant to generally give online. I've been using a chrome book almost exclusively for five years and consider myself an early adopter of Google Drive and many other google tools. I share from both my personal and work files, folders, calendars, and maps easily and often. I'm comfortable with this because I'm always sharing to someone I know, and I always retain control of the originals. I also pretty frequently check who has access to my files and remove permissions that are no longer needed.  So even there, I am a little more closed off than many people. 

My most Residential areas are the forums we are using for this class. My initial instinct, even here, was to try to limit my exposure through this blog and the other online activities. I've reevaluated this stance and made my posts public here and have enjoyed reading and learning about some of my classmates. I think this class, and the assignments this week in particular will push me to rethink my position on social media engagement with regards to my professional presence. I can see the value of engaging with others online to learn and gain feedback from others with similar professional interests and goals. 

SAMR Model-An Easy Framework for Incorporating Technology

This week I'll be looking at the SAMR model of technology inclusion in the classroom developed by Dr. Ruben Puentedura. 

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The SAMR model is a framework for teachers to consider when integrating the use of technology in the classroom.  There are four steps to the SAMR model: Substitution, Augmentation, Modification, and Redefinition.  The Substitution and Augmentation levels use technology to provide enhancement of the lessons, but don't fundamentally change the expectation of a lesson or the way it is taught. In these lessons, learning is generally still teacher-centric and the students are using specific, teacher-provided technology tools to complete standard assignments in a slightly different way.

As teachers become more comfortable and familiar with including tech in their lessons, they move into the transformation phases of Modification and Redefinition. Lessons that meet these criteria use tech skills and resources to create new lesson ideas and plans that are not possible without using technology. Typically, these lessons ask students to complete more complex tasks and use technology to make some fundamental changes to the lesson objectives, elevating students' learning to higher levels. These lessons tend to be less teacher-centric and instead ask students to create their own new processes and/or materials to demonstrate their understanding. 

Substitution: 

In the Substitution Level, students use technology to directly replace a more traditional paper and pencil task. In these lessons the learning outcomes have stayed the same, but the method of achieving them has changed. 

As an example, students might make a Google Slides or PowerPoint presentation to display information about a topic instead of creating a poster board. 

Augmentation: 

At the Augmentation Level, students still substitute technology for a more traditional task, but at this level the technology offers a dramatic improvement to the lesson. (What qualifies as dramatic improvement is of course debatable). 

For example, students could still make a Google Slides presentation as they did above, but they might also narrate it, or provide interactive links to additional resources. 

Modification: 

In the Modification Level, teachers are moving from enhancing lessons to transforming them. Teachers are beginning to make fundamental changes to the lesson and its learning outcome with the technology. 

For instance, students could collaborate on their Google Slides and share them with classmates to receive feedback. Or they could work to create their own digital images to embed in the presentation. 

Redefinition:

In the Redefinition Level, the teacher has used technology to completely transform the lesson which increases the level of depth and rigor the student is working at. This level is the ultimate goal of lesson planning, not necessarily because it incorporates the best use of technology, but because it provides the best student learning experience. 

For example, instead of the basic presentation created in the Substitution model, students could create a video, virtual field trip, or interactive website to demonstrate what they have learned on a topic. 

Reflection:

I like the SAMR model because while it encourages teachers to move along the continuum to the transformation stage, it doesn't state unequivocally that lessons in the enhancement level should re-evaluate their use of technology like some of the other frameworks do. I like that it provides guidance on ways to challenge teachers to move their lessons to a higher plane, but also acknowledges the smaller steps that teachers are taking during the Substitution and Augmentation levels of their journey. 

The SAMR model is also a great place to start as a coach because it's commonly used and there are many examples online to provide as references. It's also nice to show more hesitant teachers that there are some small, easy steps they could take that would help them begin to meet technology standards in their classrooms.

Personally, I find that most of my technology lessons have moved into the Augmentation level, but as I gain familiarity with some of the new apps and extensions we have available I am moving into the Modification level.  As an English teacher it was a pretty quick and painless step to ask students to type essays and assignments instead of handwriting them which made it easy to substitute word processing for paper and pencil. And then it was just a few clicks to have students use spell check, thesaurus , and bibliography generating features that are easily available for Augmentation. I have also recently added Google Read&Write which is incredibly helpful with picture dictionaries for ELL students, read alouds for IEP students, and the collect highlights feature which is my favorite for research. I have begun to rethink some of my units and some lessons that could move into the Modification level. I dabbled a little in some hyperdoc creation last year which was fun, but challenging, and my class also played a lot with Google Maps while we read our class novel The Watsons Go To Birmingham. Students mapped the Watsons journey from Flint to Alabama and created their own interactive MyMap. I have not had many (any?) experiences that I would categorize as being at the Redefinition level yet. But my confidence with video apps and online sharing is growing so I'm hoping that can happen this year.