Sharing the Knowledge- Tech Learning Community goes on the Road!

Whew! Two weeks ago was such a crazy week! I am  happy to be back to "normal",  but thrilled with the opportunities I have been given. I love learning more about my profession and how to improve and be better
for my students. I work and learn for the love of learning and for each of my kiddos.

As some of you know, I was fortunate to attend the Google Apps for Education 1:1 Summit in Napa. My reflection can be read here. 

Immediately following Napa, I headed to San Jose for the California Teacher's Association's (CTA) Good Teaching Conference. I was asked to present the Common Core pre-conference as well as the Good Teaching Conference with the amazing Karen Taylor. Karen and I met last summer through the CTA's Teacher Leadership Cohort. Through this cohort, each member was to put together a project that would be beneficial to teachers, school, district, and/or beyond. Karen and I had the same passion for technology and recognized the need for ongoing professional development in incorporating technology into our classrooms.

Through our project, we have created our Tech Learning Community (TLC) website, professional development for teachers within our districts, and the development for an "unconference" for both districts to merge and learn from and together. It seems we have been working non-stop toward our goal of growing, developing, and learn with technology. It has truly been an honor to get to know Karen, to work with the teachers in my district and help them with their needs.

Since the creation of TLC, Karen and I have been given the opportunity to share what we have learned with others in the state (and possibly beyond!!)! That alone is connecting us with educators that inspire each of us and push us even more than we push ourselves.

Our first joint venture was at last weekend's Good Teaching Conference. Next is Common Core in Anaheim and one per month till April!




AND yesterday I was asked to present for CUE and CTAP!

I am truly thankful for Karen, CTA and Teacher Leadership Cohort and their members, and all the educators and students who inspire me to be better every day!

So THANK ALL OF YOU!

 It truly is an exciting time!

Gafe Summit: Napa 1:1

One to one...that is the move of many districts as technology grows and Common Core becomes the norm. And following the trend is Oakdale Joint Unified and I couldn't be more excited.

But where do I start? I haven't even received my class set of Chromebooks and I am already plotting and scheming on how my students will utilize them in class.

So, I BEGGED my site to send me to the Google in Education 1:1 Institute. 

Wow! I should have known that I was in for an intense and amazing learning experience. Not to mention mind blowing and exhausting!

So here are some highlights:

Day one was jammed packed with all things EduAwesome! I am a Google Certified Teacher, but as all educators know, there is always room to grow.

I spent the day with educators who have the same passion for learning and technology as I do. I was surrounded by tech geeks! It was GREAT! You could feel the excitement in the room as Jamie Casap spoke.

My first session was with Sergio Villegas on reaching students with Google lesson presentations. What was great about Sergio was his attitude. He was so gung-ho and excited about Google, lessons, and what he was doing. The one thing he wanted us to take away (other than he is a lazy teacher, HA!) is that anything we would learn in these two days was that the "how to's" are on YouTube! Someone has made a video tutorial for YOU. Once in YouTube search, go to filters AFTER the search, find videos from this month or year. And after a conference, most of us go back to the "real" world. Back to teaching, classrooms, grading etc. and don't get to use those tips and tricks learned. Or in my case, I can't always decipher my own notes on what I learned! Great that we can all go back and search for those videos! 

I have to say, I caught the excitement. Thanks to Karl and his session on Doctopus and Goobric...I finally have Doctopus working. It made my brain hurt, but the ease of sending out work to students, turning off the ability for students to edit that work, and then attaching a rubric, AND sending it back! Amazing! Not to mention that now in Google Drive, you can add voice comments and even video. COOL! His amazing, step-by-step instructions can be found here.

Then I discovered ways to make my life easier....by making it faster! Thanks to Mark Wagner for some great productivity tools in Google! In addition to the text extensions and clipboard buffers, I think my favorite tool was simply the site to find alternatives to other software. Since I have gotten my Chromebook and my preparation for 1:1 in my district, I am constantly struggling to find alternatives to software I and my students use. Through the alternatives site, I can find options for the software I use. OPTIONS. Not just one, but many! Save time and frustration and search there first!

And that was just a snippet of #eduawesome that was GAFE Summit Napa! I was inspired by may Google professionals and teachers, some I haven't seen or talked to since Google Certified Teacher's summit in Sydney or on Twitter! Simply amazing individuals! 

The best thing about Google summits (this and all summits) is the connection with other teachers who share the same passion I do. Although this was a summit leaning towards 1:1, the passion for technology, students, pedagogy, and growth is what brought us together. We, as life learners, came to grow in our profession. To teach our students for the world as it now and what it could be, the world our students will create.    

I am just so moved by my professional learning network and thrilled to have an opportunity to learn and connect even more!

I can't wait for the next! 

Thanks EdTechTeam and Google!

  

  

Genius Hour - A First Time Reflection

My students and I have officially completed round one of Genius Hour!

YAY!

When I learned about Genius Hour this past summer, I was excited and nervous. Excited about the possibilities, and yet nervous about the chaos and/lack of participation.

Silly, right?


I couldn't have been more pleased, impressed, and simply wowed by my students research and passion. I learned about dogs, saddles, a variety of sports and athletes, as well as building your own iPhone, and the reasons behind why celebrities don't have the same consequences as we "regular" folks. I was truly inspired!


After all projects had been shared and questions were answered, I gave my students an evaluation and reflection to complete. Students were incredibly thoughtful and forthcoming. Students mentioned what they could improve on, what they felt they did well, and even suggestions for me to make Genius Hour even better. Some suggestions included a time limit on presentations and to use a web-based program to access their presentations faster (Google Docs, anyone?). What surprised me most was that all students truly enjoyed the project and wanted to do it again next semester. 






Now THAT is pretty genius. 








Now that we have completed a round of Genius Hour, I now have questions and concerns for the next Genius Hour.

Although students had plenty of time to research, plan, and create; many switched their projects at least once and others focused on the lacidazical task of finding pictures for their presentations even before they had their material complete. So how do I keep my students engaged throughout the process?

Additionally, I had hoped for more in depth research and questions. Many students simply did expository research, the history of something, who created this or that, or all about this or that. For our next Genius Hour project, I'd like to see students asking deeper questions, looking for creative answers, or creating answers on their own. How do I go about encouraging my students to think beyond the history of "insert a topic here"? 


All I do know is that my students LOVED Genius Hour. Loved it so much they are asking for more. I also know my students will be blogging their process this next semester, so please follow the Duck Pond and give them (and me) some feedback.

Thank you to all who have inspired me and my students to take this venture on. It will be one that continues in my classroom for some time.

Check out some Genius Hour highlights below!

Global Collaboration Realized!

Some time ago, Emil Waldhauser, a fellow SMART Exemplary Educator and teacher, contacted me about doing a global collaboration between his class and my own. Needless to say, I jumped at the opportunity. 

Early on, our classes were going to discuss our towns, our community, and classes. Then as the holidays approached, we wanted to share our holiday and Christmas traditions at home and in town.

My students (were suppose to) set off gathering information about our little town of Oakdale, California. We gathered our history, population, and of course about chocolate and our rodeo.

However, I forgot to remind my students that the topic was changed just a little toward the Christmas traditions of our town. Regardless, we did have a little presentation on Haiku Deck: 

When today (December 16, 2014) rolled around, my students were SO very excited about talking to Emil and his Czech students. 

Little did Emil and I know about how vast our time difference was! 

What ended up happening was Emil's class waiting for us around 2pm their time, while we were still getting up and getting ready! We thought we were at a six hour difference, when in reality we are nine!


Even with that little mistake, Emil was kind enough to talk with my students though SMART Technologies Bridgit software and share his students' presentation, while my students shared theirs. It was magic! My students got to take a virtual tour of the Czech Republic and learn a little about holiday traditions there. My students even played a holiday game (intended for our classes to battle) to see how much they knew about Christmas around the world. It was a blast!

Both my students and I loved talking to Emil and can't wait for another opportunity! We are working towards another collaboration in the new year. 

It is truly amazing how technology can bridge the gap between students across the world. The questions, the excitement, and ultimately the learning that happens with global collaboration happens!

Thank you Emil and students!

Fall CUE- The Recap and Personal Learning in Flip Class

Fall CUE was nothing but AMAZING! It was my first time at a CUE event AND I was selected to present as well! I truly had my mind on triple over time!

I arrived bright and early Friday morning to experience all that is CUE. CUE thinks of it all, so before I had even checked in to get my badge and official CUE bag, I already had my schedule for the weekend pretty mapped out. CUE created an interactive online scheduler where all the attendees could select their sessions, map out their days, and see who else was joining that particular session! Additionally, you could see where others were thinking of going, read up on the presenters, sponsors, and key notes, as well as create your own persona on CUE. It was great! I just wished more attendees would have participated.

With all the new changes in education with Common Core, technology, and all that is trending in education on Twitter, I decided to focus on the needs of my classroom, namely flipped class and moving 1:1 with Chromebooks. There were tons more to see, hear, and learn....I wish I could see them all! Good thing CUE links presenter resources!

The sessions I did go to were so informative and many life changing for my classroom. One in particular was a session on "Flipping the Secondary English Classroom" by Kate Perry. Kate was amazing! She opened my eyes to what my classroom can truly be flipped. Now, as some of you may know, I have been flipping lessons in my classroom. I guess I am a moderate flipper. Anyway, Kate showed the three types of flipping (yep three!). I had already known that I was doing the traditional flipped model where students get the lecture at home and then in class we would practice or do an activity to strengthen what was learned the night before.

But since Kate's session, I now have so many ideas to take my current flipped model to an inquiry flipped class. Here is her flipped matrix:

Seeing this matrix was an eye opener! Reading her ideas led me to even more ideas! I have done the Sophia Flipped Certification and it was a GREAT jumping off point, but I knew I needed to do more and expect more from my students, I just didn't know how. This matrix and talking and sharing with the other attendees truly was an "ah ha" moment. Now I can take my students to the next level and having more face to face time with students individually. 

So, my next flipped adventure was to to straight to the explore side. In pairs, students were given sentence examples (even some of their own) with chosen words in bold or italicized. From these examples, students had to determine what our next unit of study would be. Then students had to list what those sentences had in common and then come up with rules that the unit of study followed. 

Once the pairs did this, then they connected with another pair to share the rules they came up with. From those ten, groups had to focus down to five specific rules. 

I checked in to the whole class from time to time, but mostly I walked from pair to pair. I got to talk with students, listen, answer questions, and even asked questions. It was great to hear how their minds worked and the process students took to come to their conclusions. Powerful lesson!

Was it easy, no. Was it #eduawesome? YES! I asked students what they thought of this lesson and students loved figuring out the "mystery" and they couldn't wait to check how they did through the flipped video that night. 

I was floored! 

Once again, the magic of conferences and edcamps have not only made me a better educator, but have made learning more powerful and meaningful to my students. A truly great day and flip class lesson. I can't wait to take it further on tomorrow.

Wow. 

I will close by thanking those educators out there. Thank you for sharing your expertise, your lessons, ideas, successes, and failures. Without you, I wouldn't be here. Without you, I wouldn't be learning, expanding, or experimenting, or challenging myself or my students like I am. 

I am truly grateful. Thank you and keep sharing!

Tech Thursdays Continue...but how to improve them?

Tech Thursdays are in full swing and I now have two under my belt! Tech Thursdays are a way for teachers in my district to get the training and application they need to integrate technology into their classrooms. I love having the opportunity and support of the California Teacher's Association and the Oakdale Teacher's Association to bring teachers in my community the professional development (PD) they need. 

But....

How do I improve?

I am always looking to better myself and improve my craft. But how do I better the PD I am offering teachers?

Last week was my second Tech Thursday. I had about fifteen teachers take time out of their day for professional development. Professional development that they are seeking on their own (without pay) and have ownership over. In fact, each month the participants are the ones to decide what Tech Thursday's topic will be. I even give the top two or three a final vote on Tech Thursday using Poll Anywhere. The attendees are in complete control!

The responses from those who have joined us for Tech Thursdays has been great! I get oooohs and ahhhhs and generate lots of excitement in the room.

But how do I improve?

I promote, create SMORES, send reminders, give surveys, ask for feedback, and give ownership of each event. 

I know that I need more hands-on PD, and that is coming. Yet, I still feel that I need more ideas. 

I am thinking of trying an unconference type of PD...but the teachers in my district think they don't have much to offer, when in reality they have so many ideas, thoughts, questions, and discussion that always leads to greatness. 

During the first session, teachers shared their favorite apps and the conversation was amazing! What if I put all of us in that situation and see what happens? It could lead to some true greatness!

I just want to offer what teachers need to feel and be successful with the integration of technology in their classrooms. Tech Thursdays is even opening up to other districts in the area and eventually going to culminate in an unconference with my co-creator, Karen Taylor of Tracy Unified. So many educators want to improve their technology skills, I just need to get them through that door!

This is a lot of questions, a lot to ponder, but I'll get there...One step at a time.


Any feedback is kindly appreciated!

Terrific Tech Thursdays

This summer, I was fortunate enough to be accepted into the California Teacher's Association (CTA) Teacher's Leadership Cohort. It was an intense two days at CTA headquarters to create new or expand "roles as advocates in improving teaching and learning" (CTA, 2013). 

It was great to be surrounded by like-minded educators and to take on some of the issues that plague our state, region, and/or district. The issue in my district is the lack of professional development (PD) for our teachers in technology. Don't get me wrong, our district is incredibly fortunate in the area of technology in our classrooms. We have SMART Boards and numerous other SMART products, Mimio Bords, iPads, Apple TVs, document cameras, video cameras, wifi access, etc. However, many (if not most) teachers do not know how to effectively implement the technology they have in their curriculum and classrooms. In fact, I have blogged about it before. 

That is about to change!

Through the CTA Teacher Leadership Cohort, I am working with Karen Taylor to create the professional develop our districts need to effectively implement technology seamlessly into their classrooms. So, we have created the Tech Learning Community. Our goal is to foster technology use in and out of the classroom in support of Common Core State Standards. Our goal is to provide professional development, resources, and a network of teachers to connect and discuss technology and Common Core. Our long term goal is on-going PD with a culminating edcamp event at the end of the year between Tracy Unified and Oakdale Joint Unified.

                                   

With lots of hours, stress, and planning, Tech Thursdays came into fruition. Tech Thursdays can be summarized through the following video I made as a commercial for Tech Thursdays. 

The point of Tech Thursdays is to get our teachers together to talk, share, and learn technology. It is casual and full of educators that all hold the same passion for teaching and bettering themselves for their students. 

Our first Tech Thursday was September 26th. We had food, conversation, and I introduced the how and why Tech Thursdays began. Then the real work began. Participants voted on a poll everywhere poll their "Tech Take-a-way" to learn more about what everyone else in the room was using in their classrooms for engagement. It was amazing! Teacher stood up and shared tech! Tech that others never heard about, tech that they could implement the next day! What was really exciting was that teachers were not ready for the event to end. We started on time, ran over, and teachers stayed around to talk even more technology!

Talk about inspiring!

The next S'more flier is up and running where participants choose our next topic(s). 

Exciting times in Oakdale Joint Unified!