KIVA - Micro LoansToday I was able to meet with a teacher who was just awarded a grant by our district's Education Association. The grant is for micro loans to be used via the non-profit organization KIVA. If haven't heard of KIVA before, take a look at their organization at kiva.org. KIVA is designed to put lenders, in connection with borrowers. This is the cool part, anyone can be a lender. You register for an account, add money to your account, and then decide who's project you would like to fund. KIVA in the classroomThe teacher I met with today, was looking for some assistance in his endeavor to empower his students through the use of the KIVA loan program. I went into the meeting understanding what KIVA was about and that he had received some money to be used by his students to provide opportunities for real people around the world who were trying to improve their lives. I didn't know what his vision for how he was going to do this. I had spent some time looking at the KIVA site for potential borrowers and read over some of their projects and stories. Each one was a compelling narrative as to why they were deserving. A few thoughts rushed through my mind as I read these stories, how can I get more people involved in this? How can anyone decide who is most deserving? When meeting with the teacher today, those two questions popped up as we were planning the lesson around the students using their grant money to fund KIVA projects. We first proposed having a small group in each class make the decision as to where the money should go. Then we began to realize the potential impact of the decision to change lives shouldn't be limited to a few students, but should be opened up for all students in the class. Lesson ConceptHow do you decide who is deserving of funding for their life changing project? And how do you get the largest group of people possible to experience the opportunity to make a life changing decision? The first question is difficult, which led to the second question. We know there are thousands of potential projects and people on KIVA looking for assistance, so how do you decide which to fund? Should this be left up to a small group for each class? We decided that this was too important a decision to allow just a few students to have this power. This led to the discussion of the teacher narrowing down the projects to a more manageable size for each class. Some may like this, others may say this gives the teacher a lot of power in the process. We decided that each class would get to choose from about 20 projects and with 5 classes this would still be about 100 potential projects. Yes this isn't a perfect solution, but to leave it completely open would have made it unmanageable for students in our time frame. Next, how do we narrow the projects down from 20 to a number that can be openly and vigorously discussed as a class? How can you engage all students in this project? This is where we came up with two options for moving from 20 down to about 5 topics. Option 1- put students into groups and allow them to select the project they would like to fund. This would mean that all students in the group would need to agree on the decision. Option 2- allow all students to read about each project and get into groups based on which project they would individually like to fund. This would allow groups to be formed around a topic they support. The drawback is potential for too large of a group forming around 1 of the topics, so you could have students select their first and second choice and then putting them into groups if group size became an issue. Now that we have groups, how do we decide? We still haven't discussed the decision making process. With groups created and topics selected, we have the topics narrowed down, but still don't have a winner. SalesmenshipStudents have by this point made a decision on which one they think is worthy, but we are still looking at possibly 5 projects to fund. So how do we decide which is MOST deserving of funding? Students must create a sales pitch. In their groups they will need to create some type of presentation that helps them demonstrate the potential benefits of funding their project. The difficult aspect of this is the fact that all are worthy projects. It is a matter of the groups creating a more dynamic and persuasive presentation to sway the voters to their point of view. Students need to be well informed about their project and be creative in how they present. They will need to create compelling arguments, eye catching visual aids, and present with some flare. The students are all selling worth while projects, but they have to show their classmates why their project has merits beyond the others. On thing we discussed as part of the presentations, discussion and voting was that this isn't about winners and losers. The voting should not be done based on who is in a particular group, or your desire to win. The selected project will be a little closer to their goal, but those not selected are still worthy projects that didn't get selected. The people and causes in those not funded should never be looked at in a negative light or described in such a way. All have merit, students are simply voting on which they believe are MOST deserving because they are all worth assisting. The potential takeaways!This lesson has the potential to be life changing, not only for those who receive funding, but for the students who make the connection between their classroom activity and real world people, places and events. Students are participating in real world activities and hopefully see the difficulties in making these types of decisions. It would be my hope that some would be compelled to want to find other ways to help fund their project even if it wasn't voted on by their peers.
I am excited about this opportunity to work with these students on this project. I can't wait to update the post to share the projects that were funded. I also want to see if there are others in my department who want to work together to make this happen for others. Lastly, I hope you take something away from this and could find a way to make global connections like this for your students. Keep working to create experiences for your students that they will never forget. They will forever be grateful for your passion to make a difference in their lives. The question is why do I use Twitter?I was recently asked to explain the allure of Twitter. Why would people choose to spend their time on Twitter when they could be engaging with family and friends. This is my response. Well, it is a loaded question with a potentially lengthy answer. Everyone has their own reason for using technology. Technology by definition is a tool, and we tend to use tools to make our lives easier or better. I personally love technology because it has allowed me to create and provides efficiencies?. It provides me opportunity to make things that I otherwise wouldn’t. But that is technology in general. What is the appeal of Twitter?I was skeptical about Twitter when I first learned about it. I didn’t understand it, or why people would spend time posting what they were doing at every moment. That was until I connected to an educator in California. I was looking for resources for my sociology class and he shared with me everything on his Google Drive for his sociology class. Let me say that again- he shared every file, lesson, presentation, test, and activity with me. I never met him in person, I emailed him, talked to him a little bit, and he shared with me his year’s worth of work. He then explained that educators are using Twitter to connect and learn. He pushed me to try it. He suggested my first Twitter chat which was based on a book his colleague wrote, Teach Like A Pirate. I checked out the chat, purchased the book and have been hooked ever since. I have found other Twitter chats that have helped me become a better educator. I started out looking through the feeds for resources and people who were passionate about the educational topics I wanted to learn about. I could share with you examples of Twitter chats, explain how they work, but that is for another conversation if you are interested. For me Twitter is an opportunity to learn and grow as an educator. Twitter never turns off. I can access it anytime I want. I can be part of a chat, or I can look through the archived records when it is convenient for me. I can choose to engage or not engage in conversations. I can ask questions and receive answers, support and resources within minutes. The question I have for those who don’t use Twitter is: how do you grow and learn?What do you do for Professional Development? I seek it out. I am passionate about learning and improving as an educator because my students deserve it. I have the potential to improve, so I owe it to myself and my students to get better. I have worked hard to develop a PLN (Professional Learning Network) of Twitter community members that have relevant thoughts and ideas to share. These people are my support system. They help me by sharing out the great ideas they have developed and by providing me feedback to improve my lessons. We share lessons via Google Docs and collaborate on them. In the end we create better - more engaging lessons - that all of our students benefit from. I have many examples of these including my Survivor Renaissance, Presidential March Madness, Speed Dating, Reconstruction, Indian Removal Act to just name a few. All of these were lessons made better through collaborative efforts that started with Twitter. Why would you sit in front of a computer for more hours?I don’t see it as staring at a computer screen. My time on Twitter is interactive. I am conversing with other passionate educators. I am enhancing my own practice. I am fostering relationships. Some of the people that I am connected with on Twitter I have met face to face at Edcamps. Edcamps if you are unfamiliar are voluntary, free educational conferences that usually take place on Saturdays. The people who attend these are giving up their own time because they see the value in collaboration and expanding their own abilities. It provides opportunity to fill our buckets with inspiration, motivation and excitement about the profession of education and working with students. To the question about missing out on time with family and friends. How can you justify this?Well to be honest I can’t completely justify this. The reality is anyone who has a job has to leave their families and with that there comes sacrifice. When I was in the classroom I spent too many hours to count creating lessons, grading papers, studying to keep ahead of my students. I did this for about 13 years in isolation most of those teaching a multitude of different classes (about 18 total 7 different in a 1 1/2 year span). All of which demanded subject specific knowledge. The past 2 years, the time since getting on Twitter, I have spent less time planning lessons. The lessons that I have created and used are better than I have ever made in previous years. I have forged friendships with real people who support my efforts to take risks and improve in my practice. My time on Twitter is more productive than the time I spent working alone, and that time was significantly higher than the time I currently spend on Twitter. So the real question is how to balance teaching and family? I come home hangout with my kids make supper clean up, read stories, play and get them ready for bed. When they are tucked away in bed, I then have the option to engage in conversations on Twitter. I host a chat on Thursdays that I am committed to, but otherwise I can pick and choose when and how long I engage. In the end Twitter is revitalizing to me. Where else can you go to connect with so many passionate positive educators? People who are negative or bitter about education or their situation aren’t on Twitter, or they don’t get the response they are looking for. Twitter is a platform to discuss educational issues in a non-threatening way. I have modified my educational practices including homework, grading, student projects and many other areas because of these conversations. This leads me to a few questions for those who aren’t connecting on Twitter- Who are they collaborating with? How do they get their passion reignited? Crowdsourcing Resources for Twitter UsersOne of the hardest things to do when you get started is to find quality people to follow and learn from and with. To assist in this endeavor, I started a list of people I follow, then posted this to the Twitterverse to Crowd Source other’s ideas. I hope this list will grow and we can continue to learn from and with each other.
I have also divided the tables into subject area or position to help in finding what you are looking for more quickly. When filling out subject/position, you can include grade level, subject taught if you know more specific curriculum they are more knowledgeable in. I am including my information so you know who to contact in case have questions, or see information that you don’t think is accurate. If there is a group of educators I left out or should be classified in a different way, please let me know. Final note, I have the utmost respect for all the people I follow and learn from, however I don’t have time to include everyone on my list. I do not mean to slight anyone in this process, but instead am hopeful that over time and with the help of others we will create a comprehensive list of amazing educators that will help both those new to Twitter and those looking for new educators to connect to. Thanks. I am Ben Brazeau @Braz74 former social studies teacher for 15 years now Technology Integrator. Disclaimer- because I opened this up for public editing, I cannot verify the accuracy of information shared i.e. someone adding themselves to grow their own followers, especially for purposes beyond education. It is my hope that those who add are doing it in good faith. Click the link below to add your contributions to who new teachers to Twitter should follow! Please and Thank You! Twitter for Educators- Who do you follow and why? Reading Skill Development and Assistive TechnologyThe world of education like the rest of the world is rapidly changing and evolving. To help educators keep pace with this change, we turn to the world of technology. Before I get too far, this post is not about how technology will be the answer for all of the issues facing education today, nor do I think that if you aren't using technology on a daily basis you aren't demonstrating good teaching. Technology is a tool that can enhance teaching and more importantly LEARNING when used appropriately. In my new role as a tech integrator I have been exposed to some amazing new technologies. I have met with teachers who are adventurous and want to try the latest and greatest tech and tools. I also work with teachers who are reluctant to engage in the use of technology. I sometimes have to take a step back and analyze why teachers might now jump right in to the use of these amazing tech tools. Well this could be a whole post about getting the reluctant teacher to embrace technology. For time sake we will focus on the short version could be simply their lack of knowledge of what technology tools are even available. I think there are a lot of teachers who want to do more, but need to be exposed to the tools at their disposal. So today I put together a sampling of tools that could be used in the classroom to assist in reading skill development. Upper Elementary and Middle SchoolNEWSLEA- Do you want your students to be more knowledgeable about the current events happening in the world around them? Do you struggle to find resources that are age appropriate for students? Well Newslea has created a site to assist you in and your students in this endeavor. Newslea is a site that offers news stories written for students and is capable of providing modified articles based on Lexile levels. https://newsela.com/ REWORDIFY- Rewordify is a site that allows the reader to insert a passage of text and it will convert the content into a simplified format by identifying difficult vocabulary words and rewriting those passages to include easier to understand verbiage. Teachers can insert text into rewordify and adjust the levels of difficulty. You are then able to print the text to provide students differentiated readings of the text. Students could take a passage they are working with online and insert this into rewordify to assist their understanding. rewordify.com/ READTHEORY- Readtheory is a site to assist with reading comprehension. The site is designed to help students work on their reading comprehension. There are over 1000 passages available to students. When students sign in using a username that you create when setting up your classroom account, they are able to select their level, typically based on their grade level. You could assist them in selecting their initial grade/reading level. When students are reading they are given quizzes at the end of the passage much like any standardized test you have ever seen. The cool thing about this site is as a teacher, you are able to see analytics of student progress. You will see information about student reading levels, how they are answering questions, and feedback about areas where they are having success and struggles. The program adjusts the students reading level according to their success with the quizzes. Students will see their level on the side of the screen to help inform them of their progress. http://readtheory.org/ CURRICULET- Curriculet is designed to work in conjunction with novels, many of them the classics like “Moby Dick”, or “The Scarlet Letter”. With this site you can use some free and some paid books to create guided reading tasks for your students. You are able to add video clips, annotations to help explain or ask students to think deeper about the passage, or multiple choice questions to have students do a check of their understanding. I have just started to explore this site, but I think it has potential to add depth of understanding. You can use or modify existing questions and quizzes, or start your own. https://www.curriculet.com/ “The Scarlet Letter” example https://www.curriculet.com/c/3435-the-scarlet-letter Exit Tickets-Tweets as exit tickets- Have students explain what they have learned from today’s lesson in 140 characters. In other words have them create their own reflective tweet. https://www.dropbox.com/s/c3gp81hg6yln478/TweetsAboutTodaysLessonAFunExitPassToCheckStudentUnderstanding.pdf Lower Elementary ResourcesMatt Gomez is a Kindergarten teacher in Northern Dallas, and had created a plethora of resources for teachers to assist in their classroom practices. He has created several symbaloo list of resources for teachers to use with students. The examples shared here are of e-books. Audio books that students can flip the pages and read themselves, or click the speaker button on the screen and have the book read to them. http://www.symbaloo.com/mix/uflbooks1 list of e-books http://mattbgomez.com/170-online-ebooks-for-young-kids/ other e-books Another exmample of e-books is http://www.symbaloo.com/mix/e-book1kinderchat this one is a little different in that actors read the story on video. Bonus Tech-SCREENSHOT- Ever want to explain something using but were lacking the visual cues to help enhance the clarity of your instructions? Try using a screenshot of what you are trying to illustrate to your students, staff, parents etc. Mac users have had the advantage in creating annotated screenshots, but not anymore. There is a new Chrome extension that allows you to not only take screenshots. Yes you could take them of the entire screen before using printscreen, but now you can select just the area of the screen you desire. You can also add text, arrows, and other annotations to enhance the image to create a more descriptive visual. http://awesomescreenshot.com/ Organizing resourcesSYMBALOO- Symbaloo- looks similar to launchpad- you create links to sites you use for your content areas. You can also share them with others as the examples above demonstrate. There are examples of this under the Lower Elementary e-book links above. Put resources all in one place.
FUR.LY- Fur.ly is another way to provide students with a mutlitude of resources that will assist them in gathering information, or completing projects all in one central location. http://fur.ly/ Here is an example http://fur.ly/b9xq from a sample science video project presented at WTI in Stevens Point Wisconsin by Karla Lockman science teacher at SPASH. Are people on Twitter Real or Fictitious versions of reality?Are people on you see sharing great lessons, amazing pedagogy, and endless amounts of practical and relevant information on Twitter real, or a contrived version of reality? People on Twitter are 90% real- well I have no real basis for that number, but I think about the idea of perception. The most positive person on Twitter, the person who always seems so happy that you think they are most likely singing along with each and every tweet they post. Those people that sometimes get under our skin because they never seem to have a bad day, you know who I am talking about. They can't be like that all the time can they? Maybe some of them can, but my bet is that there are times when they too get frustrated, annoyed, maybe at the negative people around them, but yes they get annoyed too. So what is the real personality of these people? They are human just like the rest of us, they are imperfect, they make mistakes, and they work to grow and learn each day like the rest of us. We are all human!The best example of this was a priest who swore in church during our confirmation class when I was a teenager. I was shocked, I thought OMG (yes I like to think I was so cool I created OMG decades before it caught on) he just swore, priests aren't supposed to do that. He went on to teach us that he too is human, he too makes mistakes and yes when he smacks his finger with a hammer he has not chosen his words as carefully as he would like. My point is I learned that although he dressed up in the pristine white robes each Sunday, he too was human and couldn't maintain the appearance of perfection in all facets of life all the time. Perception versus RealityDo I think there are people who pretend to be more infallible than they really are more often than not? Sure. There are those who want us to believe they are better educators than they are able to be at this time. I think most of us share the best of our selves publicly. I also know many of the educators that I have connected with via Twitter, when meeting Face to Face are as passionate, if not more so than what comes across on Twitter. I think people who showcase their best work aren't intending to seem perfect, but rather see the value in the good things they have created and would rather discuss those aspects of their professional body of work than their failings. I do however think that as educators we need to share our failings too. We want to show students that it is okay to fail. It is how you respond to that failure that matters. In that vain, I hope that we learn from good practices in our classroom to model the realities of learning by sharing the whole learning process, both the success and the struggles to achieve that success. None of us are perfect, we are just people. That should inspire all of us to realize that the great things we are seeing from others is achievable in all of us. The challenge is to Leave mediocrity behind and strive for greatness!Education is becoming more complex in terms of the demands and constraints placed upon us as educators. There are more challenges to overcome and more demands on our time than ever. Last year I went through educator effectiveness for the first time, and I think I had the best year of teaching in my career. I am not crediting educator effectiveness with this success, although I do think the push to be reflective on our teaching practices was a positive. What really allowed me to overcome the obstacles of mediocrity was the development of my PLN. I was pushed to check out Twitter by an amazing educator and this led to the connections with other passionate educators that have forever changed my teaching experience. I have made friendships, have collaborated on lesson plans and have learned to fail with these people. I have opened myself up to trying new things, reflecting on my shortcomings and working to improve my own practice. I am better off as an educator and human being because of the amazing people in my PLN. So I thank each and everyone of them for connecting with me and assisting me in my journey! The Anthem to live by!This summer I found myself singing along (alone in my car) to this song frequently. It is a catchy tune and while this summer had it's share of trials and tribulations, I belted out the lyrics of this song in my own tone def manner as if it were my own personal anthem. I felt like each and everyday was ripe with possibilities. The only thing that could prevent the day from achieving its full potential was me. I included the video for the song below. Setting the Stage-Before I get too far into the post, I am very excited about what happened in my professional career yesterday. However, I don't want to diminish other days in my life. The day I married my beautiful wife, the birth of my two daughters, and a list of other are definitely on the top of the list for Best Days in My Life! Yesterday stood out because of the powerful connection being made between a father and daughter in a colleagues class due to a technology app I shared with the teacher. This amazing experience was the result of a simple app called Homeroom. @gethomeroom on Twitter APPstravaganza!What made this connection possible? An app called Homeroom. It is an app I found via Twitter a couple weeks ago. I began playing around with the app after having conversations at #edcampgb with other educators, especially Michael Matera @MrMatera. Michael and I were presenting on sharing the events of your classroom with parents and community. I talked about blogging and inviting parents into your classroom. Michael brought up using apps like Remind but preferred Celly to share out with parents. These are apps that allow teachers to send text messages to parents or students. Remind is one way only, the teacher sends messages but parents or students cannot respond. Celly does the same but has some added features to allow for group discussions in your class. Both are able to be archived to reflect the conversations that took place between the individuals involved. Okay back to the use of these apps, he suggested sending conversation starters to parents such as "Ask your son/daughter about today's Ellis Island Simulation." This breaks down the lack of communication or the traditional - Parent: What did you learn or do in class today? Student: Nothing! This creates opportunities for communication. Instagram is another example we discussed during our session. I have used Instagram in my personal life, but never saw it as a potential method of sharing out classroom happenings. Michael also suggested using Instagram to share out pictures with parents in a quick more private manner. Parents have to follow his Instagram feed in order to access images of his classroom. Making the most of the potential possibilities!All of these examples, along with many other apps and application of these technologies will allow you to bring your classroom to life for parents who are not able to be present with you and their son/daughter daily. They all invite parents to see what is happening and open the dialogue between parent and child. In the end these conversations strengthen the relationship between all involved. I began this post with the app Homeroom in mind. Homeroom is a very new app just released in the beginning of October. I started to explore what the app can do by taking pictures of the cool things I was seeing in the schools I work in. I put them into my Homeroom feed, but that is where it kind of ends. I don't have students I work with on a regular basis, so I don't have a group of parents to share this app with. I wanted to see how this app would work to do some of the things I previously discussed in the other apps. I needed to find teachers willing to give this a try. I was able to find a few willing participants in the past couple of weeks. My hope was to test the app, see how well it functioned, and give those teachers a leg up in documenting their classroom practices as well as building relationships with their families. To be honest, I didn't think there would be a significant impact on the relationship piece. This isn't in terms of the meaningful connection it would make with those who used the app and received the updates of class events. My skepticism was due to the fact that I didn't expect a lot of parents to sign up for the app. As of this post, I don't think there are a lot of parents who have signed up, but the teachers have only been doing this for a few days. I am hopeful this number will grow, and even if it isn't a large number the potential impact for those students and parents is tremendous. The moment that made it all worth while! One of the teachers sent me an email yesterday that her students came into her class talking about the pictures she had shared via Homeroom. Some of the students parents had already shown their son/daughter the pics and started a dialogue with the student. With this I must admit I was excited to see the quick response and interaction that resulted. When I got to the school and was able to meet with the teacher, I was caught off guard by my emotional response to the story she shared. When students began talking about their experiences at home the night before, she decided to show the rest of her class the app projected on the screen in her room. Students saw the pictures that the teacher had taken and were able to see that some parents liked and commented on the images. This is when one young lady saw who liked a picture of her. It was her dad. About a year ago her dad had moved out of state to take a job to support the family. When this young student saw that her dad had interacted with her picture, she asked- Can my dad see what I am doing in class? The teacher responded yes, at this point the student broke down. This was a connection that she had been missing in her life. Hearing this story I was emotional- I couldn't get over the fact that a simple app allowed this dad and daughter to reconnect. Another cool part of the experience was other students began to think about other possibilities. Could my grandparents in Germany see this? They were excited to share their classroom experiences. They wanted to connect with their families. I can't take credit for the experience this teacher, or these students had using the app. I consider this to be one of the greatest days in my professional career because I was able to witness the power a compassionate teacher can have on the lives of her students. In my new role as a Tech Integrator I am allowed to interact with more amazing teachers, talk technology, ideologies, and most importantly share amazing stories about student successes. I am so excited to be part of an amazing district with so many passionate educators. Schools are supposed to be institutions of learning, places where students come to quench their inexhaustible quest for knowledge. It should be filled with teachers and students forging bonds as they collaborate to solve problems, overcome obstacles and learn the skills to prepare our youth for their futures.
Fifteen years in education has provided me some experience in professional development. I have enjoyed some, and others I couldn't wait to get through. I believe this is like our classrooms, some days the students are excited to be there, totally engaged, and other days they want to just survive till the bell. In the past couple of years I have been involved in conversations with some amazing educators who are on a mission to bring engagement into their classrooms. They have come up with so many cool ideas to make their classrooms more exciting while still covering the content, meeting objectives, and preparing students for the measurables.
We step into professional development, often led by educators, people who were trained in the art of teaching and learning. So why do so many professional development sessions lack that element of engagement and excitement? I don't necessarily have the answer to that question, but I do have some thoughts on how to improve those sessions. Above all other ideas- think about the session as a classroom, and put yourself in the place of the audience. What can you do to make this a dynamic, exciting experience for all involved? 1. The focus should be the audience! If you don't contemplate how your content and activity will be perceived, used, and engaged in by your audience, you may have already lost the battle of engagement. 2. What do you need people to know by the end? Focus on the must know ideas and provide resources for the nice to know. 3. Hooks! - How can you get people engaged, moving, collaborating, and out of their seats to learn the material. Shift the focus from presentation to engagement! I am sure there are more aspects to make a dynamic professional development experience. My focus is to have planners and presenters think about it as a classroom and their best experiences in a classroom. We talk about good teaching being the shift from sage on the stage to participation. We discuss objectives and measurable outcomes being the goal of lessons, so don't loose site of this in the planning. To this end, keep in mind what people should learn and how will they demonstrate this understanding. If your intent is to just give information, there are better ways than lecturing at them for an hour or more. The last part is engagement. We want to add activities to our presentations, but they need to be, well planned, and purposeful. I have experienced many activities interjected into a meeting just because the presenter thought we need to break up the lecture. Activities- 6 Word Memoir is a way to have people express ideas in a concise manner. I included the link as one example, but I have seen it utilized in a multitude of ways in many different settings. Teachers- describe your classroom in 6 words. Students-describe what you learned today in 6 words, or describe your year with this teacher in 6 words. Professional Development could use this for many different topics that help participants think about the content and learning they have experienced. Speed dating- This is one of my favorites partly because I had success with it, and saw others repurpose it. I can't take credit for the concept obviously, but I took a risk with it during a Twitter chat and the results were amazing! I had seen others use this concept to learn about important people in history. I had used this in my sociology class in the past as well. The really cool thing for me was to use it with my PLN who were able to engage with each other on a personal level. I have written a blog post about this, so I won't share more at this point, other than I am looking to try this at an upcoming edcamp. Edcamp discussions- Edcamps are professional learning conferences where no one is the expert, and everyone has a voice to determine what learning will take place that day. People congregate based on shared interest in a topic. They discuss ideas they are interested in. They are free to ask questions, share ideas, and connect with others on equal footing. There are not experts to push the discussion in a predetermined direction, but a free flow of ideas. While edcamps are events in and of themselves, take the concept of giving people choice in what they will discuss and see what happens. A Middle School I am working with this year tried this idea for their first Professional Development Day. I was fortunate to participate, and it was an amazing experience. Teachers were excited to learn with each other. Many had questions, some had answers, and all were passionate and engaged in the conversation. GHO - You don't have to be present to be present. Google Hangouts, Skype, and other video conferences allow people to participate from across the world. Think about the possibilities to connect and learn from others. You are not longer limited to those in your building. You can get into a large professional development opportunity like EdcampHome, or just have a video conference with another individual to discuss a specific topic. I have done many of these and have found them to be amazing learning experiences. I helped organize my last districts first attempt at professional development from home. Teachers were able to connect to each other from anywhere they wanted via a GHO. Another example was a teacher who went to Africa where she had previously taught, and was able to do a GHO with our Global Studies Classes. It was amazing for our students to talk to people thousands of miles away about how similar and different life was for them. These are just a few examples of the amazing things I have seen done with GHO. Social Media- Twitter chats, Today's Meet and 81 Dash can allow for a multitude of responses from participants instantaneously. This provides everyone an opportunity to have a voice, as well as so many more ideas to be shared during the learning activity. People are able to engage in conversations with others across the room, or across the world. The difference between the two formats is Twitter is public, and Today's meet and 81 Dash can be set to private. The ideas suggested above are not supposed to be the ultimate list of professional development game changers, but simply a few examples of ways to create a more engaging learning environment. Some of the examples won't fit your purpose or learning outcome needs, but I hope in the end you are at least challenging yourself to rethink how you present in your classroom and your professional development offerings. Would you want to be in the audience of your professional development? If not, it is time to make changes. Engage your audience and the learning will happen! Good Luck! It has been 4 weeks since I began my new position as a technology Integrator at a much larger school district than I have ever been a part of. It has been a whirlwind adventure so far. There are lots of new things to learn and do, and while I started another post about the changes in moving to a big district, I found myself compelled to reflect on my new experience specific to the role of tech integrator.
Identity crisis- being TI as you leave life as a classroom teacher What they don't tell you in job interview -teacher Paper work Hours of grading Parent attacking child Breaking up fights Counseling Seeing the kids succeed! The joy in graduation Meetings First few weeks in new position Edison success Seeing eduwin - Passionate educators The journey to put best practices into reality |
AuthorBen Brazeau Archives
April 2018
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