Tools, Not Toys - Becoming a Techy Teacher

This week I'm completing two online graduate courses at The University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh. I am part of their Teaching 2.0 program, entitled: Emerging Technology Meets Progressive Pedagogy. This program looks at the way education is changing, the way students learn, and the way technology can be used to help students collect information, collaborate with other students, and connect to a network that can further their learning.

One of the courses, "Learning in a Connected World" was particularly useful. Although I had begun to develop a personal learning network (PLN) before starting the course, this gave me the opportunity to look further into useful tools, ways to engage my students, and applications of these resources in my classroom.

At some point this term, I began to truly understand how to change my teaching. The big revelation, was that it's NOT about technology. It's about learning. If we are "integrating technology" just to bring computers (or interactive whiteboards, or cell phones) into the classroom, we've got it all wrong. Just using the equipment isn't enough.

We have to look at our overarching goals, and understand how technology is a necessary tool in helping students develop the skills they will need to be successful in the world they will enter. We have to look at how students like to learn on their own, so we can make learning more enjoyable and engaging in the classroom. We have to learn what presentation methods or styles of instruction are easy for students to retain, so we can present information in a way that students will hold on to. We have to look at what students will be expected to know and do, so we can prepare them for their future - not ours.

Once we have done this, technology ceases to become an end in and of itself. It becomes the means to an end, and can be used with purpose.

Wondering how to get there? Here are some tips, based on my experiences:

1. Learn - Part I. Take classes. Read posts or books by leaders in the field, or by educators who are having positive experiences in their classrooms. Do professional development workshops or conferences. Powerful Learning Practice was transformative for me.

2. Learn - Part II. Develop a personal learning network of individuals across the globe who have "been there done that" or want to learn with you. Use Twitter, blogs, or social networking to find educators posting ideas and resources.

3. Collaborate. Find a buddy to learn with, or a mentor to guide you. There are no stupid questions. Support and encourage each other.

4. Dive in. Start playing - exploring - trying. You won't break anything. Find out what is out there, and discover tools that will work with your students.

5. Reflect. Start a blog where you can talk about your experiences. Don't worry about an audience. In the beginning, a blog's best purpose is to help you realize what you believe and what is important to you.

6. Be transparent. As you begin to develop ideas and lessons, share them with your PLN. Give back to those who helped you grow, and to those who are just starting and will benefit from your experience.

7. Be patient. Change is never easy, but do you want to be that teacher that just "doesn't get it?" You will be less confident for a while, and that's ok. Things are always changing, which means you will always be learning and growing... much like your students. :)

Patti's Projects: Create - Connect - Collaborate

A presentation summary of my projects for next year...

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

Using Tools to Collaborate

It has been an amazing summer of learning... Thanks to my grad classes through UWOSH (University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh), my Tweeps (Twitter friends), and the rest of my PLN, I've come up with 6 new projects for next year.

These include tools such as Skype, VoiceThread, Edmodo, Wordle, and Google Maps. I have already set up my class Edmodo page, and since I am looping with my class, I sent them the code. More than half of them have joined the group and are enjoying being able to chat over the summer! Since they had the opportunity to choose their own books for their summer reading assignment, I recently added a small group within the class group for the kids to post book reviews. I'm going to maintain this, so that when a student doesn't know what to read, they can look at the reviews of their classmates, and when they have read the book, they can comment on the reviews!

I'm looking at one more project now - to get my students blogging. I'll be teaching 4th grade next year, looping up with the kids I had last year. I remember the time we spent last year sharing journals. Many of the kids were hungry for an audience, and after journaling (spell check doesn't like this "word"), wanted to know if we could share. While I enjoyed having them read their blogs aloud for the class and answering any questions or comments, with 22 students, this can be a time consuming event!! With 1:1 netbooks in my classroom this year (finally!!), students can grab a netbook and respond to a journal prompt when they have free time. Students will be able to read and comment on each other's responses. Using this format, I could even post a YouTube video and ask students to post their reactions.

I'm currently working on my technology letter which will address the tools and procedures we will be using this year. Thanks to our PLP experience, we are adopting the CyberSmart curriculum for digital citizenship and are rewriting our RESPONSIBLE Use Policy (RUP). It's going to be an exciting year!!

My Big Tacky Presentation Project (as opposed to My Big Fat Greek Wedding!)

In an effort to complete the project objectives AND show off a new tool, I managed to create an incredibly tacky presentation... If I used this for PD with colleagues, I might have to "class it up" a bit... :) The presentation is done with Kizoa, a slide show generator. Lots of choices for music, transitions, backgrounds, effects, animations, text, and more!

A New Culture of Learning - slide show

Ways to Create, Connect, & Collaborate!

Looking for ways to connect yourself and your students to exciting learning opportunities? Here are just a handful of ways you can get connected, and connect your students to others!

How Being a Lifelong Learner Will Benefit My Students Next Year

Photo courtesy of Sean MacEntee

So I'm feeling pretty good about the way I've spent my summer... It's definitely NOT been a vacation! Thanks to my grad classes and the need to come up with some fresh material (since I've got the same kids this year), I've really been "out there" on Twitter, our class Edmodo, and have been reading blogs to find new tools and come up with some fun projects/activities for next year. My main goals are to get my kids connected, and to provide them with a wider audience for their work.

With only a few weeks worth of effort, I've come up with the following...

1. Mystery Skype for SS States & Regions Study - I posted a link on the Skype in the Classroom site with my project and have gotten several replies. The big turn around happened in a Twitter chat though, when I mentioned the project. Another teacher, Caren MacConnell, was also assembling a list of educators who wanted to participate, and suggested we combine forces. Both of us have been promoting the project, and as of today, have 59 classes who want to particpate! Never underestimate the power of a PLN...

2. My Maps - Thanks to the intro piece to my Learning in a Connected World class by my professor Eric Brunsell, I found out about the "My Maps" function of Google Maps. Instead of a standard report, I'm going to have my kids pick a state to learn about, and use the My Maps function to identify the capital, major points of interest, landforms, industry, and natural resources. They'll be able to write about each of these at a placemarker, as opposed to just typing a report. This will also enable them to share their project/learning with other students as they present their map in class.

3. "About Me" Wordle (or Tagxedo) and Blog Project - Thanks to Paula Naugle, I've found a fun project for the beginning of the year. Since we will have 1:1 netbooks this year, this is a great way for the kids to jump in right away. They'll create the word cloud and write a post in Kidblog.org about themselves to share with the class.

4. Poetry Unit with VoiceThread - In looking through examples on the VoiceThread site, I found a great project. Students wrote themed poetry, and illustrated their poems. The picture of the poem was uploaded to VoiceThread, and the student read the poem aloud. Feedback and comments were solicited from other teachers. It is a great way for students to "publish" their work, and practice reading with inflection and fluency.

5. Edmodo - Since I am looping with my class, after using Edmodo for my graduate class, I decided to create a group for my classroom. I've invited my students, and shared a "My Maps" of my summer travel spots, an example of my "WeeMee" avatar (thanks Allison Fitzwater!), a Glog of my vacation pictures,  messages using fodey.com and pageplugins.com (one telling them to check our Diigo page for new links), a link to wonderopolis.com, and a poll about the books we read aloud last year. I want them to see these and hope they will explore them over the summer. We'll continue to use Edmodo throughout the year to share.

6. Global Read Aloud - Organized by Pernille Ripp. There are currently 200 classes signed up for a Global Read Aloud of either Tuck Everlasting or Flat Stanley. https://spreadsheets1.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?hl=en_US&key=tXuBxoFw0ftLWB3SEW13SGw&hl=en_US#gid=0 I joined the Google Group for the planning of the Tuck read aloud http://groups.google.com/group/gra11-tuck-planning/topics and also the Edmodo group for the kids to discuss (code qd93ty). It starts on Sept. 14 and I am quite excited! They are still brainstorming for other ways to connect via Skype, blogs, VT, etc.

Photo courtesy of John LeMasney

So much to look forward to... thanks to my experience with Powerful Learning Practice - Which led to my graduate study at UWOSH, and the formation of my precious PLN! So I'm "paying it forward" and posting these for others to see as well. What fun projects have you discovered using technology or web 2.0 tools? How will you be connecting this year? Will your students have an audience for their work? Are you infusing creativity and exploration into your projects? Please share in the comments!!

Tagxedo

Ok, new word cloud program that does color schemes, shapes... Choose your font, your shape... SO COOL. You can even enter your twitter address or blog URL and it will create the tagxedo from your posts. This is one made from my blogs. http://www.tagxedo.com/

Why #hashtag?

When I first joined Twitter about a year ago, I joined in order to follow my teenage daughters (stalker mom extraordinaire). Among their group of friends, they frequently used hashtags (#) at the end of their tweets such as #justsayin or #awkward to express their feelings at the time. Some of them are quite amusing!

After I began using Twitter for professional reasons as I built my PLN (Personal Learning Network), I saw hashtags being used by people at conferences such as #NAIS, #ISTE, etc. By “marking” tweets in this way, people could send a message to everyone in the group. Followers of the conference didn’t have to follow every attendee, they could just create a search column in their TweetDeck that filtered tweets for that hashtag - Brilliant! I started keeping track of tweets related to Powerful Learning Practice by keeping a column filtered for #plpnetwork.

What I didn’t realize until this summer (#slowlearner), was the ENORMOUS group of educators that are finding folks to follow and collaborate with by following hashtags. If you are an elementary school teacher, and have something to share or want feedback, put #elemchat at the end of your tweet. There are even hashtags for grade levels such as #4thchat. The list is endless - #mathchat, #scichat, #dyslexia, #edreform, #esl… You get the idea. Cybrary Man (aka master creator of educational link lists) has a page of educational hashtags here.

But wait, there’s more! Hashtag “groups” are organizing and having weekly discussions on Twitter! So if you are a 4^th grade teacher, for example, you can log in to Twitter on Monday nights at 8:00 p.m. EST and join other 4^th grade teachers for #4thchat. You can even vote on the topic for the chat in advance! I have even “lurked” during #6thchat as they discussed uses for Skype in the classroom. Great ideas! There is a new Google Doc with a list of twitter chats here.

It drives me crazy that more educators don’t take advantage of these opportunities to learn and connect through social media tools like Twitter. Scott McLeod says it best:

In an era in which the possibilities for ongoing professional learning are numerous and significant, I wonder how long will it take us for us to start expecting educators to use these social media tools. It’s been 30 years since the advent of the personal computer and we’re still struggling to get teachers and administrators to integrate digital technologies into their daily work in ways that are substantive and meaningful. Meanwhile, we now have a bevy of powerful learning tools available to us that can advance our own professional learning (and, of course, make our technology integration and implementation efforts more efficient and effective).

It took me a year to figure out some of these #twittertips (another useful hashtag). I hope this helps more educators to connect more effectively and see the value of Twitter as PD. What have I missed? Please add helpful tips in the comments! *Tweet Tweet!*

ISTE Unplugged!

I was bummed that I was not able to attend ISTE this year. Our PD budget has been slashed. I did find this link though to ISTE Unplugged which offers the opportunity to participate in ISTE presentations through Elluminate video conferencing. I used Elluminate for PLP sessions, and love it. This morning I was able to watch a presentation by a Twitter acquaintance, Paula Naugle, on Edmodo. I found out a few new things about Edmodo I didn't know:

* In Glogster, you can go to a link that says "Edmodo this Glog" and it will paste it directly into your Edmodo! Students don't have to mess with embed codes - They can send their glogs directly to Edmodo. :)

* There are Communities in Edmodo you can join where you can meet other educators and discuss uses of the tools. I haven't explored many, but there are subject areas as well as Glogster, Discovery Education, ISTE, etc.

There are lots of great sessions at ISTE Unplugged you can be a part of - Just another way to get free PD! :)

Wordle Fun

One of the challenges for me this year is to come up with lots of NEW things... Since I am looping with my class, they've seen all my old tricks! This means new icebreakers at the beginning of the year, etc. While on Twitter, I caught a chat about ideas for the beginning of the school year (have I mentioned how much I LOVE Twitter?!). I just wrote a blog post about the power of the Twitter hashtag... :)

With my new netbooks in the room, I have so many options! One of the teachers I follow posted a link to an activity she does with Wordle. This is a great "About Me" activity that combines Wordle with a blog post. I started learning about kidblog.org last year, and am setting up blogs for my students. This will be a great way to break out our netbooks the first week and have some fun with the kids. I love that teachers are so much more transparent these days, and are taking the time to post these activities to Google Docs for the rest of us. It wasn't that long ago that teachers kept their great ideas to themselves! I have to remember to return the favor, and work more transparently myself this year...

Connected Kids

As I prepare for next year, my focus is to bring some of the web 2.0 tools I am learning about into my classroom. Today I purchased a web cam for my classroom, and visited Skype In The Classroom. I created my profile and entered a project, hoping to find classes who will participate. I hope it works! I will also tweet a link to my project, and hopefully get the word out so I can give this a try. I've also found a page of authors who are willing to do free Skype calls, so I'm picking a book we can read as a class, and will hopefully schedule a session where we can talk to the author! My goal is for my kids to understand the power of being connected, and how web 2.0 tools can help to connect them to people around the world.

Google - My Maps (aka Mrs. Grayson's Summer Adventures!)

First "new tool" experiment: After seeing Eric's intro, I decided to try the My Maps feature and send a map to my students (since I'll have them again next year) of where I'll be traveling this summer. Next year as we study "States & Regions" I can see them choosing a state or region to map and identify capitals, natural resources, historic sites, etc. with a short narrative about each. I know I would have more fun doing this than writing a report!


View Mrs. Grayson in a larger map

Making Connections

Just a quick post here to capture my initial thoughts as I begin the process toward my master's degree. This blog will serve as my portfolio for the course, Learning in a Connected World.  To be honest, this course is one I didn't expect to bring great growth, since I have spent the entire last school year in a professional development program that helped me create a PLN and explore web 2.0 tools. Silly me. The course hasn't even technically begun yet, and I am already learning... 


Amazingly, I've already gotten some great ideas for next year. One idea shifts a process I have been using, creating pencasts with a LiveScribe pen for students to watch at home if they were struggling with math homework. After watching an Alan November video for the class, I've seen a way I can shift this and have the students create their own tutorials in class. The other idea involves Google Maps, which I have used countless times, and yet never seen or heard about the "My Maps" function where you can create a map with place markers and narratives, link to websites, or add pictures... Suddenly I'm thinking of how my students can create maps as we study States and Regions this year in Social Studies.


Needless-to-say, I'm getting excited about the learning ahead, and about making connections and learning from my classmates.