NEH Teacher Tech - Share Out

Class: 8th Grade US History
Technology: Google Maps
Content: Civil War
Best Practice: Collaboration/Team Work

Comments: Students had to research, use maps, identify, locate, create civil war maps
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Class: High School Health

Technology: Computer - research, found related edu-game to review

Content: Endocrine System

Best Practice: Compare/Contrast

Comments: Defined communication, compared how the human body related to communication systems/mail system

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Class: Spanish I

Technology: Wikispaces

Content: "Gustar" with food vocabulary, conversational verbs

Best Practice: Writing practice

Comments: Students demonstrated 20 spanish sentences using "gustar". Students were already familiar with wikis, so they took off, they had to find out how to use accents on the wiki. Kids created a "contest", able to read sentences and not deal with trying to read handwriting - it was harder to give feedback because of wait time, couldn't show them where the problem was specifically on their writing - but addressed this with individual conferences

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Class: Guidance

Technology: Group Email

Content: Local Scholarships

Best Practice: Equity in distribution, access

Comments: Parents were excited to get emails, everyone was getting them, time saver - more efficient, simple, worked well

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Class: Kindergarten

Technology: Tagxedo

Content: Word Families

Best Practice: Computer skills, beginning reading

Comments: Kids enjoyed the program, matching, did one lesson first with me, high school kids/helpers, and then did another lesson using their Read Well words. The second time around 2nd grade came in to help the Kindergarten students keep track -students took home work. Surprised at how easily some of them typed! Growth was fun to see! Students were excited about work

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Class: 1st Grade

Technology: Little Bird Tales

Content: Story Writing

Best Practice: Collaboration

Comments: Students cut pictures out of magazines, wrote stories with 4th grade buddies about the pictures. Took pictures, the 4th graders typed in their text, 1st graders recorded stories, and saved the books to Little Bird Tales that can be shared online - wants to put on teacher page!

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Class: Creative Drama (11th, 12th)

Technology: Wiki, Youtube

Content: Methods of acting

Best Practice: Writing, discussion questions, viewing

Comments: Found episodes of Inside the Actor's Studio - watched Jim Carey together, wrote summaries on wiki, responded, then repeated - students knew how to use the technology, Tech Team member was in her class to help with trouble-shooting. Problems - needed a rubric or guidelines for how to properly respond

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Class: Biology (10th-12th)

Technology: Research/Twitter/TweetDeck

Content: Genetics/Mutation

Best Practice: Guided resources/scaffolding, summarizing

Comments: Used guiding questions to find characteristics of mutations - when they found them they had to tweet the answer, which forced them to summarize, address a public audience - let them use personal devices so they were able to get started right away. Pulled up TweetDeck and showed kids the feed, and used #nehbio to log their responses. Kids who don't normally participate were given a voice, people other than the kids in the biology class started using #nehbio - but then kids started trying to get #nehbio to trend (not as focused). Next time would have kids search Twitter themselves, would like to find more YouTube videos about mutations - they missed out on a lot of good information on YouTube.

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Class: 6th Grade Reading

Technology: Twitter, websites, research

Content: Biographies

Best Practice: Informational reading

Comments: Used twitter to find ideas, resources, and websites. Students researched biographies, but had a lot of computer issues, library needs updated biographies. Students need help searching the web.

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Class: 8th Grade Reading

Technology: Socrative

Content: Killing Mr. Griffin (novel)

Best Practice: Group Discussion/Reflection

Comments: Started out as a quiz - turned into really good discussion - you can choose whether or not to show their responses, you can upload your own quizzes, use app to create quizzes (works on phone or online) - kids asked to do it again! Kids like to use their phone. 

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Class: 7th Grade Geography

Technology: Google Forms quiz

Content: Maps - State capitals

Best Practice: Retention check

Comments: Kids did a review test to see what they had retained from first semester

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Class: 4th Grade Science

Technology: Google Forms quiz

Content: Body Systems 

Best Practice: Review

Comments: Name required, printing size was an issue, printed out a nice spreadsheet

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Class: 5th Grade

Technology: Super Scribble Nauts

Content: Vocabulary

Best Practice: Create/Describe

Comments: Get a person from one island to another when there was a shark in the water - kids had to talk and work together, prompted class discussion

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Class: Art

Technology: Wikispaces

Content: Project analysis

Best Practice: Compare/Contrast

Comments: Prompted one question at a time to help students develop their critique of their projects along the way

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Class: Pastries

Technology: YouTube (How To videos), Cell phones, Wikis

Content: Cakes, Decorating

Best Practice: Modeling

Comments: Students used their phones to take pictures of their decorated cakes to post on the wiki

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Class: 8th Grade Math

Technology: Phone/Computer

Content: Currency Rates

Best Practice: 

Comments: Class did proportions of currency exchange rates 

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Class: 3rd grade Social Studies

Technology: ICN

Content: My America Series

Best Practice: Multiple learner types (visual, audio)

Comments: Haiku poem - students really want to share what they are doing, so they typed them in their wikis, then they used their wiki to do a student-led conference for their parents. Teacher copied and pasted Haikus and used pictures and recording to create a voicethread - used these at conferences. Using their individual projects to create group projects for wiki and to share with parents outside of classrrom

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Class: Horticulture

Technology: Internet research

Content: Gardening - site, plant, date selection

Best Practice: Student investigation

Comments: Created plot of what to plant when and where - had to look on the internet to find the appropriate plants, students had to define/find own vocabulary words (crop rotation, alleopathy, etc) without clues - looked it up themselves and then had to relate it back using prior knowledge (walnut trees & alleopathy) Concerns: Keeping students on task

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Class: 5th Grade 

Technology: iPhones, iTouches, Flip Cameras

Content: Students Empowering Students - Recycling

Best Practice: CREATING

Comments: Scripting, Filming, Editing a commercial - bringing 5th and 9th graders together to do different stages of the process

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How do we continue to use technology after this "assignment"? What concerns do we still have?

Tweet - How would you use wikispaces in an elementary classroom? Individual student pages? Class Wikis?

How do we deal with technical issues? 

One teacher taught 8th graders how to save on flash drive & email to her so she could print it for them

What about families and students who don't have internet/computer at home? Some kids can get to the library, but not everyone has that access. -A speaker at the TICL conference a couple years ago wanted districts to go 1:1 with Smart Phones so that students have access no matter where they are.

Not every use of technology has to be "homework" - many things can be done in class

Getting internet access in the Elem. Computer Lab is really difficult - especially for young kids

How do you decide who has access to what?

We are looking at upgrading wireless again, broadband - going from 10 up to 20 or 25, but the problem with that is that any kid with a phone, ipod, ipad, etc is using our broadband

We need to teach kids how to print responsibly - and train them to ask for help when they need to change things or if something breaks down

Do we need to go to 1:1? School board will have to discuss this - laptops, tablets? High school, middle school? Computer carts are outdated or not well-cared for. 

When do we start teaching how to log in, turn on, etc - none of this is in the standards/benchmarks - where does it get done? Who is responsible for that?

Webquests work well for research so that kids are more focused (Zunal, TrackStar). 3rd grade set up the wiki so that kids have direction. 

MISIC is building out its resource database (at least for Science)

Ten Marks Math - differentiates for students, gives individual reports, formative feedback - give different numbers of problems (10 today, 20 next week, review), vocabulary and concepts are challenging - they (the company) are looking at their data - kids can get "helps" - video or vocabulary - a lot of information is covered that is on the Iowa Assessments that teachers may not have gotten to or isn't covered in the curriculum.

"I don't force every kid to do every thing I have anymore. You can do this or you can do this. You can work on geometry or you can do probability."

BudderBall Brownie has his own blog for journals and pictures (3rd grade take home bear - similar to Mr. Bunny's journal)

Teacher Sharing Soon!

This afternoon for PD, after a long day of fun-filled activities at "VIP" Day, we will reconvene to share out what exactly our teachers have been doing with their technology inspired lessons! I can't wait to share their ideas, successes, and challenges. Stay tuned for an afternoon update!

Until then, I wanted to share a few links:

Mr. Bunny's Journal (Kindergarten Little Bird Tale)

Virtual Museo Galileo (Virtual Museum)

What Does It Mean To Be Global? (Interactive App based on the book)

Newsletter Article

NEH Ed Tech

Leslie Pralle Keehn

Over the last two months I’ve been working on a self-designed internship for my graduate coursework that is based in educational technology.  As a part of this project I have gotten to be a part of some amazing projects with the teachers and students at Northeast Hamilton. The following are some examples of the kids’ work.

(See example in previous post)

These are word clouds that Owen Jones (K) and Lillian Chamness (9th) and Rylee Keehn (K) and Kyler Rapp (9th) created. The Kindergarteners read books to the 8th and 9th graders (who practiced new technologies and citizenship skills) and created hats shaped like the hat from the Cat in the Hat to go along with their study of Dr. Seuss and word families. The third graders joined in on the fun, as well so they could learn about making this type of word cloud in the future.

The first and fourth graders have been working on writing stories based on pictures they found in magazines. Mrs. Schimp, Mrs. Smith, Dylan Greenfield, and myself are getting the students set up to load pictures for their stories onto a computer program called Little Bird Tales so the students could record their stories to share as e-books. The Kindergarten will be working on a similar project using Mr. Bunny and his journal so that they can all share in his adventures. 

Several teachers were also able to get together to Skype with Shannon Miller from Van Meter school district to learn about the different types of technology that they are using in their one-to-one school. 

Mrs. Leksell has created a Wikispaces page for her English students to use for discussion and collaboration, Mrs. Brandt uploaded her concert videos to her teacher page so that her students could view them and reflect on the concert, and the 8th graders are creating Google Maps that encompass the highlights of the Civil War. These are just a few examples of the ways that NEH teachers and students are coming together to use more technology in the classroom to really enhance student learning.

The Trojan Tech Team also came together to work with the teachers at their professional development meeting earlier this month. Several members, including Jacob Brim, Tristan Nicholson, Hunter Dilley, Tyler Dilley, Dylan Greenfield, Taylor Olson, and Mark Frohwein came into school early to lead sessions and work with me to offer training in Google Apps, Wikispaces, and Twitter. These students have also stayed after school to work with teachers in a one-on-one setting.

I have had a lot of fun getting to work with new classes and different teachers over the last two months, and I cannot thank the students, staff, and administration enough for the experiences. Seeing students creating, leading, and volunteering has truly been the highlight of this process, but it wouldn’t have been possible without our amazing staff, who have all stepped up to the challenge of including new opportunities for students in the classroom.

Kindergarten Chaos

Having never taught elementary, although sometimes I think my seniors revert back to those days - just kidding guys - kinda :) having 20+ 5 & 6 year olds in one small computer lab was a new experience. Plus 25 8th & 9th graders, and a few 2nd & 3rd graders! It was loud, it was busy, and it was FUN! My favorite way to learn!

We ran into some time constraints, so not all of the Kindergarten students got to type their own project, but they did all get to read their words to the older kids, and create a picture like the one in my previous post.

We have another join venture using Build Your Wild Self when the Kindergarten students start their zoo study before their big field trip. I definitely have some adjustments to make before then, but Mrs. Oakland was a great sport, and the kids had a good time, so she wants to do it again!

So we all learned something, and we have ways to make it better for next time!

New Elementary Opportunities

Thanks to the amazing Shannon Miller (@shannonmmiller) at Van Meter the NEH elementary teachers are super excited to try out some new technologies. I have 3 new projects that I'm working on over the next week.

1. This afternoon my US History students (9th grade) will pair up with both a 3rd grade student and a Kindergarten student to collaborate on a project. It is a good "citizenship" activity for the 9th grade, a great teaching/technology/learning opportunity for the 3rd grade, and a great technology/literacy opportunity for the Kindergarten!

The Kindergarten has created a list of word families during their study of Dr. Seuss. The 3rd graders are going to share their class wiki with the older and younger kids to access the Tagxedo website and a graphic of the Cat in the Hat's hat. The US History students will mostly be around for technical support, but it's a good chance for the students in our PreK-12 building to make connections!

The Kindergarten students will then get to practice their typing skills and enter their word clouds into the Tagxedo program. Tagxedo will create for them a hat made out of their words! I will share my daughter's hat later, once we have completed the activity.

2. The 1st graders are paired with a 4th grade buddy. Earlier in the quarter the students cut out pictures from a magazine and created a story about the pictures. Now we are going to upload their pictures (magazine and some that they drew) into Little Bird Tales, type their stories, and then record them reading their stories. The first grade teacher plans to share these digital versions of the books with parents at conferences. The parents will then also be able to access them and share them with family anywhere in the world!

3. This last project idea came from the first grade project. My daughter Rylee is in the kindergarten class here at NEH and she has been thrilled to bring home the class pet, Mr. Bunny. Each kid in the class brings home Mr. Bunny, takes care of him for the night, and then writes about him in the Mr. Bunny journal, chronicling their adventures with the pet. The activity is great, and assuming that the other kids have half as much fun with Mr. Bunny as Rylee does, the kids learn a lot and have a blast with it, too. The first time Rylee brough Mr. Bunny home she wrote 4-5 sentences (they are asked to write 3). This time she wanted to log every minute detail of their time together.

The other thing she was excited about was Little Bird Tales. While I was exploring the program for the 1st/4th project she was watching the tutorial video over my shoulder. Her immediate response was, "I want to do that!" First, I told her to write and illustrate her own story and we would put it online. Then the following idea came to me:

Anyway, so my project idea was this (and thank you Mrs. Oakland for running with it): The kids each drew (this morning) a picture of their adventures with Mr. Bunny. Tomorrow we will upload their pictures, and next week I will pull each of the Kindergarteners out individually to share their story about Mr. Bunny. I'll type this into Little Bird tales, record their version of the story, and we'll be able to share this version of Mr. Bunny's journal with the entire class. It's something they'll have ten years from now and maybe even twenty years from now. My goal is that Mrs. Oakland (NEH Kindergarten teacher) will be able to share this digital version of the kids' journal with the parents at conferences much like the first grade teacher will be doing. I know Rylee will be excited to share the journal with her grandparents, and I hope the other kids will be excited about it, too.

How will I know I'm successful?

Last week my mentor asked me how I would know that I had been successful in my project. I decided that in the short term, it will be if I can get 50% of teachers to incorporate a new technology into a lesson plan for students - AND successfully teach the lesson. In the long run I would like to see at least 25% of teachers continue down a journey of slowly but steadily increasing their technology use in the classroom - beyond my practicum! If I can inspire even a handful to continue down a journey of meaningfully incorporating technology into their content lessons, and to continue on the path of bettering themselves as educators with new practices, thinking outside the box, and creating new ways for students to learn, I will consider myself successful.

So far I have had the choir teacher help me upload videos of her concert for students to write reflections, and I'm doing a joint project with the Kindergarten, 3rd grade, and my freshmen, and I helped the English teacher get her students set up with wikis. This is a step in the right direction - all of these are lined up within 1 week of having done the initial professional development day. I look forward to continuing this journey with my colleagues!