Ed Tech Blog
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Dear Instructional Giants,
Chrome Update: You may have noticed a new control up in the right hand corner of your Chrome browser. It looks like a little down triangle. This is your “Tab Finder”. You can search all your open tabs with one click. Check it out here. Tech Tool of the Week: Insert Learning is a Chrome extension that allows you to annotate and add content and/or questions to ANY web page, effectively turning that web page into an interactive guided reading with checks for understanding and reports on participation and accuracy. Once added, Insert Learning has four basic commands (plus a series of more advanced options) highlight, add questions, discussions or “sticky notes” that can accommodate links or videos that will appear directly on the web page. Once assigned through Google classroom or a link, IL will generate a report on student participation and responses. Students will also have to add the extension. Check out this video Tech Resource of the Week: The Pedagogy Wheel is an visual tool developed by Australian, Allan Carrington that attempts to integrate paradigms of Bloom's Taxonomy, Norman Webb’s Depth of Knowledge, (DOK), Ruben Puentedura’s SAMR model with student outcomes, student motivation and Educational Technology Apps. This tool is useful in lesson planning and writing learning objectives. It also moves Educational Technology from “This is cool, I’ll try it.”, to purposeful integration of technology to achieve desired outcomes. If you have ever thought, “I’d like my students to be able to…. Wish there was an App for that”, this may help you find it. The picture below is for reference, you’ll need to click the link to be able to read it. Ed Tech March madness has been ongoing. Vote in Twitter.Championship!. I am, of course, Team Nearpod. Hybrid teaching, iPad and Application questions and concerns: What specific challenges are you having with devices or equipment with the transition to hybrid classes? Please shoot me an email with any questions, concerns or tips you have! New hardware Here are the video and written instructions from Carlos Quilis on how to set up your camera, speakers and monitor. If you need a hand setting up, or learning how to use these tools, I’m here to help. Reach out through email or visit my Office Hours. Happy Holi! Hope all are tolerating their vaccinations well!
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Dear Leaders of Learning, iPad troubleshooting: Clear the Cache! Just as Chromebooks use a cache to load web pages faster, iPad apps do as well. And just like Chromebook, when a service, like Nearpod, updates its code, the old site in the cache can become glitchy. If one of your tech tools isn’t working, try clearing the cache On the iPad, unlike the Chromebook, you clear the cache one application at a time: 1. Open the app you want to clear. 2. Hold the power button on top until the “Slide to power off” screen appears. 3. Hold the “Home” button until the application relaunches. Done. Kahoot Update: Kahoot now shows the questions and answers on the student devices! This makes using Kahoot, whether in-class, but particularly remotely, much easier for students. They will no longer have to have two screens open. Ed Tech March madness has been ongoing. Vote on Twitter. Down to the Final Four. I am, of course, Team Nearpod. Hybrid teaching and iPad questions and concerns: What specific challenges are you having with devices or with the transition to hybrid classes? Please shoot me an email with any specific questions, concerns or tips you have! Tech Tools of the Week: Demos is a free collection of math based digital activities. They have premade activities on everything from numbers sense and geometry to quadratic functions and conics. There are also check-ins, exit tickets and vocabulary builders. It is easy to create an account, classes and push out assignments. Detailed reports help collect data and see where your students are. And of course, there is a lesson builder to create your own custom math, or other subject, lessons. Check out this video. Tech Resource of the Week: The National Parks provide low cost and spectacular recreational opportunities for everyone. They also provide lots of educational opportunities! There are opportunities for real and virtual Field trips, and for completing Junior Ranger activities. While NPS is only allowing downloads of books right now, some individual parks are still sending out physical activity books. See this article for more information and resources for using National Parks in your classroom. Professional Development: Science teachers: The virtual ScIC5 Science is cool unconference is coming up on April 1. This free virtual event has updates on current trends, interesting speakers, networking and teaching ideas and a PD certificate to upload to TeachPoint. Fulbright: Last week for Teachers for Global Classroom application! Maybe too late for this round, but put it on your calendar for next year. The most worthwhile and interesting PD I ever participated in....plus free international travel. Ask for more information.Nearpod is hosting a Social Emotional Learning webinar to give tips on using Nearpod’s SEL content in your classroom. New hardware is arriving to help make the transition to Hybrid learning. Here are the video and written instructions from Carlos Quilis on how to set up your camera, speakers and monitor. If you need any help setting up, or learning how to use these tools, I’m here to help. Reach out through email or visit my Office Hours. Spring is springing! Get out and enjoy! Link to original
Dear Directors of discovery, The week after “spring forward” is always an extra cup of coffee kind of week! iPad troubleshooting: If a student forgets their passcode and continues to try to open it, they will eventually be locked out completely and the iPad has to be swapped out to resolve. If a Helpdesk ticket is put in before they are permanently locked out (after MANY attempts and short lockouts) the iPad can be reset remotely. This can save both student/teacher, as well as, technician time. Another concern is problems editing an assigned Google Doc from a Google Classroom assignment. When a student clicks on the assignment, they must take the extra step of opening the doc in a separate window to edit. Students click this icon in the top right corner: and can edit away. Ed Tech March madness has been ongoing on Twitter. It is down to the Final Four. You can follow along and vote here. Personally I think both Blooket and Gimkit should have advanced over Quizizz, but what do I know. Hybrid teaching and iPad questions and concerns: What specific challenges are you having with devices or with the transition to hybrid classes? Please shoot me an email with any specific questions, concerns or tips you have! Tech Tools of the Week: Mote is a Google Chrome extension that allows you to leave recorded voice feedback for students on Google Docs and allows students to easily respond. Mote is intuitive to use. Students can best access the features if it is added to their account, but can still use it regardless. Check out this video. . Tech Resource of the Week: REMINDER: We all have a Newsela pro account through HPS. Newsela has great text resources for current and special events like Women’s History Month as well as a library on almost any topic. Articles have comprehension and writing activities premade, but also integrate well with Nearpod for custom activities. Just attach your Newsela article as “web content” or use a screenshot on a drawing page (for annotation) in Nearpod and students can access in a lesson. Check out this editable Nearpod lesson on fossils for elementary science class, or this Middle/High school lesson on Human Trafficking using Newsela. Newsela is a great way to bring literacy into every class. MOS at school! The Museum of Science Boston is offering free remote presentations for students. They have live and asynchronous presentations and prioritize districts such as ours! Break out of routines and take your students on an adventure! New hardware is arriving to help make the transition to Hybrid learning. Here are the video and written instructions from Carlos Quilis on how to set up your camera, speakers and monitor. If you need any help setting up, or learning how to use these tools, I’m here to help. Reach out through email or visit my Office Hours. Morning Office Hours: office hours from 7:30 to 9:00 AM M-Th. I will, of course, be available at other times by pre-arrangement and always by email. Spring is springing! Get out and enjoy! Link to Original
Dear plucky pedagogues, This week I am focusing on iPads. K-2 teachers have been using iPads for several months with their students. High School teachers will be using them shortly with their pivot robots. They operate on the Apples IOS and require some getting used to if you have been using Chromebooks. Think of the iPad as a large iPhone with the same benefits and limitations. For example: with the IOS app some features in Nearpod like teacher annotation do not work yet. Other applications like Zoom controls, such as allowing participants to share screens, are in different places (under security tab instead of video). Like Chromebooks (and your iPhone), devices should be powered down periodically to clean out the active memory. iPad Charge time: like the Chromebooks, it is critical that we routinize charging nightly, especially as students begin transporting them back and forth to school. While iPads use a standard lightning cable, genuine Apple cables and boxes work best. Also charge ports can get dirty and lightning cables will not “click” into place.We can maximize battery life by closing unused applications and changing screen settings; in settings you can enable “dark mode” which will reduce glare and conserve battery life. You can also pull down the menu from the top right corner and dim screen brightness to 50%. Neither of these will negatively impact your viewing except in very bright outside light, but will conserve the battery considerably. Reinstalling Apps: One troubleshooting technique is to use the “HPS self Service” app (looks like a four color square at the bottom of your screen). When you click this you will see all the apps on the device and a “reinstall” button below. Reinstalling an app, or all apps, can sometimes resolve issues. iPad as a laptop: You can configure your iPad just as a laptop by adding a bluetooth keyboard and mouse. Unfortunately, these would be at your own expense (or “Donors Choose”), but relatively inexpensive. iPad questions and concerns: I need to know what folks' needs are with iPads to develop helpful coaching. Please shoot me an email with specific questions and concerns! Tech Tools of the Week: These tools are more for consideration as we move forward. It is hard to know the need for remote teaching resources next year and beyond. However, for the tech curious, these are tools that could be considerable upgrades to applications we currently use as our subscriptions expire : GoGuardian is a suite of applications for administration, teachers and counselors, currently used in the district by Veritas. Go Guardian could resolve some of the blocked video we currently run into, but more importantly it contains tools that allow teachers to more closely monitor and interact with remote learners, such as being able to see what screens they are viewing. Most importantly it uses A.I. to alert counselors to any potential self-harm ideation and could be a tool to help protect at-risk students. Bramble is a new video conferencing tool that uses gamification to make interacting online more natural. It allows students to go off and group themselves in separate breakouts, and to easily and naturally move between breakouts. It consists of avatars moving through a series of video game-like rooms each with a different purpose. Great for both social interactions and business/ teaching functions. Sign-up for a demo if you are interested in breaking out of the Zoom grid. Tech Resource of the Week: Mindfulness for Teachers is a free self-paced curriculum created by IBM for teachers AND students. You need to register, but can then complete and/or assign the course to your students. The platform, P-tech, has many learning opportunities in sustainability, money management and a host of technical IT skills. New hardware is arriving to help make the transition to Hybrid learning. Here are the video and written instructions from Carlos Quilis on how to set up your camera, speakers and monitor. If you need any help setting up, or learning how to use these tools, I’m here to help. Reach out through email or visit my Office Hours. Morning Office Hours: office hours from 7:30 to 9:00 AM M-Th. I will, of course, be available at other times by pre-arrangement and always by email. Take a deep breath and try to relax! Link to original Hello hybriding heroes! I have been reading up on how to make hybrid learning productive and engaging for students and not frustrating and burnout inducing for teachers. I don’t think there are any “magic tricks” that universally work. Best practices are the same regardless of context: building relationships, keeping it simple, student-centered learning, leading by example. A couple of tips that may help: give students classroom leadership roles, that is, monitoring chats, helping with cameras, and cleaning routines; Pair in-person and remote learners in breakout rooms; make sure all class materials live in Google Classroom for universal access; leverage your technology tools for engagement and collaboration. One issue that has already arisen with students returning to in-person school is uncharged devices. It is very important to establish a routine of fully charging devices every night. Please put this into daily reminders and post in class expectations. I don’t underestimate the challenges ahead! Please reach out if I can help at all. Nearpod update: Nearpod is a great self-contained lesson with easy documentation of participation and mastery. Tip: teachers in the Hybrid model have suggested using Nearpod in the “student-paced” mode. The upsides are:that students can return to the lesson and finish up if they missed something or were absent, and teachers can assign in Google Classroom without codes expiring. The downside is that students will have to follow along with the teacher, manually changing slides. Try to teach students to use the note taking tool...it’s a skill they will need throughout their lifelong learning career. Tech Tool of the Week: If you are using Kahoot, Quizlet, Quizizz or Gimkit to gamify your curriculum, Blooket will be an easy addition to your toolkit. The value of Blooket is the greater variety of game types it offers. I really like “Gold Quest''. Blooket (named after the little block avatars your students have) works like these other quiz style games: create your own set, or borrow any of the other teacher generated sets (you can make a copy and edit to suit your needs), decide the mode you want to play (practice or group), decide the specific game (there are six and counting), generate a code to have students sign up, and hit play. The variety of games keeps it from getting stale. Check out this video. Tech Resource of the Week: Women’s history month lesson plans and resources from the Women’s History Museum . Bonus resource: Global Dignity is an organization that promotes Human Rights and the worth of the individual. They have lesson plans for all levels. Dignity is an important concept behind both self-worth and civil society. They have great tools for healing both the sense of isolation and value that have been exacerbated by the pandemic and the polarization of our society driven by inequality. Check out this virtual talk on the difference between dignity and respect given by Dr Donna Hicks on Thursday March 4. Or this resource. Google Updates: Google has announced some changes across G-suite: Google Forms will now save “draft” responses, so students will be able to save answers and complete in multiple sittings. Jamborard will allow you to track and revert to earlier drafts. See the infographics below created by John Sowash for updates to Google Classroom and Chromebooks. New hardware is arriving to help make the transition to Hybrid learning. Here are the video and written instructions from Carlos Quilis on how to set up your camera, speakers and monitor. If you need any help setting up, or learning how to use these tools, I’m here to help. Reach out through email or visit my Office Hours. Keep on keeping on! |
AuthorRobert Frye is a retired 33 year veteran Of Holyoke Public Schools Archives
April 2021
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