Beginning of Tech Tip Tuesday

Hello friends!  It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything new. Not that I haven't been doing

anything new, I've been busy!  I think that I’ve figured out writing isn’t my forte.  I’m too much

of a perfectionist and the editing takes so long and makes me anxious.  Fortunately, I’ve discovered

something that I enjoy much more!  

Screencasting!  

This is something I can do quickly, enjoy the process, and feel good about sharing ideas that

others might find helpful.  This past Tuesday morning I sat at my computer and banged out a

short 5 minute video that I shared with my colleagues.  It was well received!  It was also nice

that I could send it ahead of time and then use the time at our meeting to discuss my

“Tuesday Tech Tip”.

I'm using Loom to screencast. It's easy to use, doesn't take much time to learn, and it's fun!

Google Draw

I think this just might be the new future of my blog!  Enjoy my first attempt and learn about a
way to use Google Draw with your class!

Keep it techy!

Steph

EdCamp:TSS Style!

In my last post I hinted at the EdCamp that I was going to coordinate at my school. Well now I can tell you all about what we did!  I have to admit, I thought I had bitten off more than I could chew, but it actually went really well!  I'm proud of myself and now I know I can do it!  I"ll break down how it all went down in 3 parts so it's not too lengthy!

I know, me lengthy? Never!

Let's start at the beginning...I went home early one day with a sick kiddo (I was feeling like crud too) and took some heavy duty cough syrup.  I'm sitting on the couch, wrapped up in blankets like a butterfly in a cocoon, laptop in my lap, and a coughing kid on the couch across from me.  I'm sifting through email and I read one from ISTE on leading your own EdCamp.  What a cool idea it would be to have one at our school!  I should send this to Debbie (my division head)!  She will appreciate this, she always encourages me to do new and exciting things.

*Note to future self: don't send emails when you are loopy on cough syrup.

Anyway, she tells me a couple days later that she liked the email and sent it to the Leadership team!  Huh?  Fast forward a couple days and I bump into our headmaster and he says he can't wait to hear my ideas at their next leadership team meeting.  Again, huh?  This is what happens when your head is too stuffed up to think straight and you can't connect the dots.

A couple more days go by and I get an email letting me know when the next leadership team meeting is and the time they'd like me to come over and talk to them about my idea.  Now this snapped me out of my daze!  This was really real!!  Yikes!  What have I done?!?  I don't know how to put together an EdCamp!  Am I crazy?  Well, there's no going back.  I can do this, I was raised to be a strong, independent, smart woman.  I got this!  OK, breathe. I chewed off all my nails. That's ok, because I've got this!

**Can you tell I had some moments of "what in the world have I done"?!?  I waffled between being super excited and super stressed.

Hindsight is always 20/20, but now I realize that the day I pitched the idea to the leadership team was the most stressful part of all.  Were they going to understand the concept of this?  Would they think it fit their idea of what a PD day should look like?  This really isn't a traditional PD, would they think it doesn't fit our needs? Am I sounding like I'm a know-it-all and I don't think other folks are doing enough with the tech piece?  All these and a hundred more went through my mind as I walked over to that meeting.  Again, the nerves kick in except I don't have any more nails to chew.

Fast forward 30 minutes and I'm walking back to my class with a big smile on my face.  They thought it sounded like a good idea and that it was great to be on the forefront of new ideas.  It's a great opportunity to share new and fresh ideas among the divisions.  I was on my way to organizing the first ever EdCamp at our school!  Why had I stressed so much about this?  Debbie wouldn't have let me pitch this idea if she thought they would have dismissed it.  Wow!  They liked the idea of an EdCamp!  This was going to be great!

One hurdle over, now for the next one.  Getting this thing put together and ready to go.  I'll have all the fun details on how I got this baby off the ground in my next post!

Keep it techy!
Steph  :)

Putting together the EdCamp

Good organization and lots of positive support from my colleagues made the rest of the experience a breeze.  Thank heavens I'm an organized person or I can see how this would be overwhelming.  Let me give you the run down of how this all came together.

After the nail-biting meeting with the higher powers I got to work creating a Google Form.  In this form I listed several topics that I thought might be of interest to the staff.  We have many folks who aren't as tech-fearless (or maybe reckless is a better term) as I tend to be so we thought it would be good to give folks some ideas to get started.  I also made an "other" choice so they could add additional topics.  Then under those broad topics I narrowed things down further, such as how are others using it, how has it helped in day to day teaching, and so on.  Finally, I had an open response for any topics or ideas that folks would like to explore further.  I received some good ideas that I think need to be explored further, but maybe within smaller focused groups.  There is such a wide range of tech ability levels and grades/subjects taught on campus that it's a little hard to make topics that might appeal to a large group.

Insert a moment of anxiety when I heard some folks say that they weren't looking forward to another boring PD session.  I hoped that they would walk away refreshed and with a few new ideas.  This isn't another sit and listen type of PD!  I don't think they understood that an EdCamp wasn't that type of boring, old thing.  This is fresh, exciting, and participant driven!  I thought I explained that in my email sending out the Form...maybe they didn't read that?

From there I sorted the most clicked topics and figured out a schedule for our allotted time on our PD afternoon.  We were going to have three concurrent 25 minute sessions with 5 minutes between for a total of 9 sessions taking only 90 minutes, then a quick wrap up afterwards.  Wow, now that I think about it, that's a lot of info in a short time period!

Back to the sesion topics, we had quite a big interest group in augmented reality...I need to learn more after hearing other folks talk excitedly about it after the session!  We also had sessions on Google Classroom, Google Maps, Google Forms, classroom management, Padlet/ThingLink, our school-wide website, and a few others. I'm fortunate enough to work with a great group of colleagues who were more than willing to moderate sessions.  I tried to find moderators who were experienced in the topic so they could guide conversation if needed or answer questions.  With many staff expressing an interest in learning more about the topics I felt I needed to have a few folks in the session who could share basic information.  I know that's not the true nature of a real EdCamp, but for our beginner status I felt it was necessary.  Next time I know it will go smoother since folks know how to work the sessions.

Once conversations got started and folks understood that this wasn't a presentation the chatter got productive!  It was going well!  Experienced folks were sharing with newbies about how they started out and what pitfalls they experienced and newbies were asking questions left and right!  It was like I had died and gone to tech heaven!  My anxiety was gone and a smile filled my face!

Knowing that it would be a lot for folks to take in I wanted a backchannel to document the conversations going on.  I wanted to create an easy to use/navigate/edit way to keep track of the things talked about, so I created a Padlet for each session.  I did preload some links, articles, blog posts, and Pinterest boards for each topic to be on the safe side.  I then asked the participants to add ideas and links of their own while the session was going on.  While this didn't go as far as I'd hoped, I think only 4 other people besides myself added to the Padlets.  If nothing else, it's a reminder of the session topics.

I also created a Twitter hashtag, tssedcamp2016!   I was going guns-a-blazing, I wanted this to be like the one I went to in Baltimore! Besides myself, I think only 2 other folks tweeted.  Again lots of newbies and not everyone is fascinated with Twitter like I am.  Baby steps, baby steps.

Finally, after I was able to exhale and thank everyone for participating in the first TSS EdCamp I told them I'd send out a Form for feedback on their day.  Generally it was a good experience, they liked that it was something new, liked the opportunity to talk to other folks, and enjoyed moving around.  It was better than sitting through a 90 minute lecture on something that they didn't care about. It created some connections between divisions.  I think they liked it! They were curious about learning some more things they'd talked about.

The biggest wish was that we had done it earlier in the year so they could have tried things out and worked with them throughout the year.  I won't lie, I did have a "Negative-Nelly", they didn't learn anything new.  Mostly this person is always a grouch, so I didn't take it personal.  I had too many other folks make happy comments to let that rain on my my parade!  Folks said they heard about some things they wanted to explore further!  I think I heard angels singing!  I think they liked it!  I didn't bore anyone to death!!  My mission was accomplished!  Deliver relevant PD that is fueled by the interest of the participants and make it fun!

Overall, I think it was a positive experience.  Folks came away refreshed by a new approach to taking charge of their PD.  Yeah, I'd say it was a great experience and I'm glad I sent that email from ISTE to my division head about leading your own EdCamp.  I'd do it again in a heartbeat!

Slacker is back!!

Oh, yes!  I'm back!  I've been slacking on the blog thing, but it's time I get back into doing this.

A teacher's life is always busy, but it's no excuse to put things off.  I need to force myself to get in the groove of writing at least one entry every other week or maybe once a week so as to create a new habit.

I do so many fun, techy lessons with my kiddos that it's a shame I don't share more.  Well, it's about to stop!  My dear friend, Sheila, will keep me on track, she's my biggest blogging/tech cheerleader and I want to make her proud.

Well then, let's catch up a bit...

You all know I went to spend a few days with Richard Byrne at his awesome Practical Ed Tech Summer Camp for Teachers (PET Camp).  I just got the ok from my division head to head back to Maine to see him again, but this time for a Chromebook camp!  Hands-down, he's got to be my favorite tech guru.  I'm super stoked to go again.  I can't wait to learn even more from him.  You think you know all that you can do with Google tools and he wows you with a bunch more awesome things you had no idea existed.  I'm going to be counting down the days!

Head back farther to November and I was fortunate to be chosen as a presenter at the Thinking and Learning with iPads conference in Raleigh, NC.  I did a session titled "Comics in the Classroom".  The idea was to share with others the many different web-tools and iPad apps that allow you to create comic strips.

My spin was that comics can be fun and useful as an alternative assessment tool.  I use them in my classroom for language arts on a regular basis to see if the kiddos understand how to use different parts of speech in a real situation.  Sure they can find the action verb on an action verb worksheet, but do they really know how to use one in a sentence or a short story?  Yup, you can assess that with a comic strip!  I'll share more ideas and some samples in an upcoming post.  Just a little tease to keep you reading!  Here's a little one from MakeBeliefsComix.com to honor all my creative teacher friends!

Below is the link to this online and you can create one of your own! From the link you will see that my character is animated, it's a still here since I just took a screen shot. It's one of their new features!
Demo Comic Strip

In about a week and a half I will be coordinating our campus wide professional development afternoon.  It's a half day for the kiddos and then the other half is up to me.  No pressure, right?

Well it's not as bad as it sounds.  I went to an EdCamp in Balitimore, MD earlier this school year and was intrigued with the whole concept of an un-conference.  It was truly fascinating to see that the entire conference was participant driven and lead.  While I didn't take away a lot of info, the session topics were more focused toward public, big school, inner-city issues, since that was the majority of participants (I'm small, private school, more of a country setting teacher, therefore not too many things in common).  Regardless, the whole idea of an un-conference held potential in my mind.

Flash forward to the middle of March, I'm home with my little guy and we're both sick.  I'm reading my emails and see one from ISTE about hosting an EdCamp.  I thought, "Hey!  This would be a great thing for our school!"  So drugged up on cough syrup and having NyQuil induced boldness,  I sent an email to my division head.  She sent it on to the rest of the leadership team, and now I'm the proud coordinator of our next PD day!  Wow, how did that happen?  I'll let you all know how it goes after I get through it on the 20th of this month.  Keep me in your thoughts that afternoon and pray I don't have a nervous breakdown (or chew off what's left of my fingernail nubs).

I'll let you know how I organized the whole thing and what I might do differently next time. See, I'm already thinking about the next one and I haven't even lived through this one yet! Optimistic is the way to be!!

I think I've covered the big items in my techy teacher life.  I've got to get to work writing my next few posts now that I'm rejuvenated!

Stay techy my friends!  Steph

Web-tools, Lobster, and Richard

What in the world do those three things have to do with each other you ask?  Well, they all have to do with my recent trip to Portland, Maine to attend Practical Ed Tech (PET) Camp with Richard Byrne.  Now it makes sense!  If you don't follow him on twitter, pinterest, or his blogs, you should!  He's got great tutorials and advice that I've found to be priceless as I set forth on my tech-journey.

I spent two full days with Richard exploring different web-tools, apps, and programs to use in my classroom.  Each day I walked out of the conference room with my head filled with ideas and new "toys" to try in my room next year.  My head literally hurt from all the thinking I had done for 8 hours!

So, I'm sure you're now thinking, what things are you going to use?  Well, sit back and I'll tell you a few.

One thing I'm really looking forward to using more this coming year is Google Maps and Google Earth.  I want to use Google Maps to pin the different places in New Zealand that our school will be "visiting" this year for Global Awareness Day (GAD).  Jim Lewis (friend/former colleague of Richard's) came in and did an incredible presentation on using Maps/Earth in different ways in our class. While texting with my dear friend Sheila, we were lead to the idea that we should do this for our classes to further illustrate the country.  The GAD idea was inspired from one of the activities that he had us do, and the texting...got to love collaborative thinking/planning with colleagues in different states.  I can't wait to do the tour with my classes, I hope it's as exciting for them as much as it was for me!

I'm also looking forward to using it with my social studies topics.  I want to teach my kiddos how to use the maps and place pins on specific locations.  They can then put tidbits of info with their pin and share it with others.  I thought that might be something a little more fun than just looking at the maps of Egypt, Rome, and Greece in our textbooks.  We can use the different layers on the maps to explore more than just their physical location.  Layers like terrain and street view aren't something that you can see on an old fashioned map.  Then there are pics that people have taken that you can view, so it brings a whole different vision to the place.  The class can create a tour of their locations and tell you how far it would be to walk it! Can you tell I'm excited to get started with Maps?  Here's the link to the map I created on the left.  I put a few pins on it and found the distance between the pyramids I pinned.  It's too much fun!

I'm thinking I'll use Google Earth as a whole class presentation tool since it sucks up a lot of bandwidth and I don't want to crash the system.  I manage to break enough stuff without trying so I don't want to do something that I know I might be bad!

Richard also spent some time on blogging.  I sat up straight and was extra diligent for this part!  Did you notice that I embedded the Google Map into my post?  I even changed the width and height so it fit in my template better. Yup, learned how to do all that and I feel pretty good knowing I could make it work!  Here's a video I use with my kiddos that I'm going to embed, just because I know how to do it!  :)  Knowledge is a powerful thing!

I love School House Rock, don't you?  This is one of my favs.  The kids in my class sing it for weeks afterwards...of course I sing along with them. (Sometimes I'm the one who starts it!)

Well, I've rattled on for long enough.  I need to keep some of my new things to try for another post!  This one's long enough for today.

Happy blogging and keep it techy!
Stephanie

Old and new...

Happy belated 4th of July!!

 I hope everyone had an enjoyable day.  In spite of the downpours we experienced at our festivities, we had a wonderful day with family.  The hubby and I went back "home" to spend the holiday with family and participate in the annual "Mile Long Yard Sale" that my aunt's neighborhood has hosted for over 20 years.  It's practically become a regional event.  We saw license plates from several different states!!  While it poured most of the day, we did get a chance to walk around a little and look at the "offerings" that were put out.  It was slow going, between the rain, baby strollers, wagons, golf carts being driven around, and the gobs of people.  Reminded me of this little snail who was on my sidewalk last night! All in all, a good day spent with good friends and family.

Rewind a little, as I was getting ready, at 4 AM, I started to think about how many old computers and gaming systems people would be trying to get rid of that day.

That made me stop and think about all the tech tools and devices that I'm busily learning about and how much longer they have to live.  Stop!  Think about that...how much longer will all the devices, apps, programs, and such still be around and used in the next 5, 10, 20 years?  Made you stop and think, didn't I? What will be the newest app we all have to have?  What will phones be able to do?  Will tablets still be as hot of an item?  Hmm...my brain's still working on those questions.

 I finished getting ready and headed off to my aunt's house and was determined that I was going to look for old stuff and take pics.

This is 5:30 in the morning!  They smiled all day!

Unfortunately, Mother Nature had other plans for my blog post so all I have are pics of "Little Man" and my nieces decked out for the day instead of the discarded tech items I had in mind.

Still smiling!  This was at 3 in the afternoon!!
The rain finally stopped, but most of the shoppers were done for the day at this point.

Oh well, such is life!  Instead, you'll have to enjoy the sweetness of my little loves!  Enjoy their cuteness!!

New Google Certifications...

I started looking into getting Google Certified this past spring.

 Little did I know that they were in the middle of updating/upgrading their certification testing.  :(  That did put a damper on my enthusiasm, so I put it on my summer list of things I want to accomplish.  I also put it in writing to my principal as a summer goal so I was making a real commitment to get it started.  What was I thinking?!?  That means I really have to follow through with this!!  Well, I'm happy to say I started on that path today!!  I've begun the road to achieving my "Educator Level 1" status today.  I've worked through about a third of the lessons, but wanted to take a quick break and blog about it...plus my brain's on overload and it needs a cool-down for a few minutes!  Who knew there was sooo much to learn about a web tool that I use every single day?  And I mean I use it e-v-e-r-y single day!! Anyways, here's a link to the newly updated and upgraded Google Certifications!  I will be happy to report when I've finished my first certificate!  Happy Googling!