iPad Implementation: Some Points to Consider

Effectively implementing technology is an attitude shift, 

not just buying and distributing electronic gadgets. 

Today we took a visit to Paul Ecke Central Elementary School in Encinitas to explore their use of technology in the classroom, specifically their use of iPads. The Encinitas school district has dedicated themselves to providing iPads to all students grade 3-6 and have provided a large amount of discretionary funding to individual schools for the principals to determine how to best support their students (providing more iPads for other grade levels, creating up-to-date Mac labs, etc.).
(For more information on their district-wide iPad program click here.)

Below are some things that stood out to me in their iPad implementation that are worth considering when discussing iPad implementation in other districts:

• Let students be the experts-- It will probably not shock you to hear that our students, even our youngest ones, are wonderfully adept at figuring out how technology works--especially when it comes to the iPad. Sometimes teachers are hesitant to try a new program or website because they think it will take too long to teach the class how to use it, but from talking to the PEC students and from my own experience I find that to be an overwhelmingly incorrect assumption. Yes, the teacher will still need to provide explanations for some apps/websites and model its use, but once you give the students time to explore on their own you will find that they will quickly learn more features than the teacher originally anticipated. One thing I really loved was seeing how proud the students were of their tech capabilities and accomplishments! During the visit they were excited to show us what project they were working on, what app the were using, and could easily explain how it worked. One of the teachers said it best when she stated, "The kids are the experts and often teach each other, which allows me to focus more on the content." Collaborative learning at its best.
•  Natural consequences encourage accountability-- The thought of elementary students using iPads immediately conjured up thoughts of sticky fingers, broken screens, and other horror stories in my mind. Again, this assumption is totally inaccurate and the worries hardly justified. The students treat their iPads well and handle them carefully. This is due to both excellent modeling and front loading by their teachers when they are first given the iPad to use as well as the consequence of losing their iPad privileges if they cannot treat them correctly. The 'horror' of having to use paper and pencil to do your work instead of Explain Everything or similar apps is consequence enough to keep students in line and on task. The same goes with making sure their iPads are charged and ready to go--if there's not an outlet available to charge it, tough luck, it's paper and pencil for you that day. What an quick, effective way to learn cause and effect! But the  PEC teachers are not leaving everything to chance. Students are highly encouraged to buy the iPad insurance to allow for repairs if they do happen to have accidentally break it, and if they don't the repair costs fall on the student. But again, most students do not damage the equipment so this money is put into a fund to buy new devices, repair others, and pay for additional resources.
• iPad and its apps as a medium, not the "be all, end all"-- There are so many wonderful apps and resources available when using the iPad in the classroom, but it's the content that should still be front and center at all times. With that said, one method I appreciated was the teacher who allowed their students to demonstrate their knowledge in whatever way they deemed best. She posed a central question to the students and instructed them to create a product to show their thoughts and responses. By not limiting the student to a particular app at all times the teacher allows for student choice and has differentiated the lesson at the same time for multiple intelligences. Students that feel more comfortable using iMovie can express themselves that way, while others may choose something more traditional like a poster layout. At the end of the day, if each student can successfully answer the topic question, why stress out about how they choose to do it? And that goes for all classes, not just those using iPads or other technology. If we can let go of the reins a little more as teachers and allow for student choice and creativity I think we'd be astonished by the outcomes.
• Support + Attitude shift = Success-- Teachers are busy people and learning how to implement new technology takes time, which we often don't have to spare. Encinitas has addressed this issue by building in team collaboration time dedicated specifically to technology implementation once a week. During this time the grade level teachers meet to discuss apps, sites, plan how to best use them to support their curriculum, and have specific professional development sessions on programs when needed. This time is separate and different from individual planning time, and sounds like it is non-negotiable (aka can't be taken away for another reason). Along with that, teachers are able to sign up for tech training from the district office on a regular basis or can access many training sessions/notes from the Encinitas' iTunes U account. The expectation is that both teachers and students will want to use the technology available once they see its benefits, and the support is there to make sure that happens. Another reality is that the students are savvy and have learned many of the iPad capabilities last year--if a teacher was not using the technology for some reason, they risk loosing the interest and attention of a lot of students who are accustomed to a different type a learning. For better or for worse, using the iPads to enhance student learning is simply expected and yet not scary because of the support from the training, their administration, and their fellow colleagues. 

Photo via wired.co.uk

No system is perfect and iPads are not necessarily the panacea that some people make them out to be, but Paul Ecke Central Elementary and the Encinitas school district are doing a wonderful job of using them to their fullest rather than being expensive devices that gather dust or simply word process. The attitude that the iPads are there to enhance student learning rather than be the 'answer to the problem' is evident, and with a school wide/district wide approach like that I can see them being successful well into the future. 

Some questions to ponder:

What are some of the fears/issues you see in implementing a school wide/district wide program like this that I did not address? How could you see these methods working or not working in your school?

What's a MOOC?

A brief Storify on MOOCs:

Finding the Magic in the Classroom

This week has been awesome--Thanksgiving break, Thanksgiving dinner, spending time with friends, and getting to see my hubby for more than two hours at a time. But one of the best things that happened that combined three of the four things listed above was going to Disneyland for the first time. It was AWESOME! I felt like 28 going on 8, practically skipping around the park in my Minnie Mouse ears, and I loved it! It was fun, magical, special, and something I definitely want to do again.... which got me thinking: Why can't school be like this? How can we bring the Magic of Disney into our classrooms to replicate even the smallest amount of the joy that people have when they visit a Disney park?

Here are a couple of things I've come up with:

1. Positive energy and a smile will go a long way-- Everyone that works at Disney is so nice and genuinely seem happy! That happiness is infectious, and even though it seems silly at first when a cast member in Frontierland says, "Welcome partners!" with their slight southern drawl, you can't help but smile as you climb on the ride. The same is true in education. If a teacher genuinely enjoys what they do and the content they teach, the students will notice and often their attitudes will adjust accordingly. But you can't just love what you do on the inside, you have to find a way to convey that passion through your teaching. It's ok to show some emotion, get excited, and even get the class riled up a little--it's all positive energy going into the students' memory bank that can help create an authentic love of learning.
    
2. Magic happens when you let your creativity explode--Disney is an explosion of creativity and of imagination gone wild! The designers take huge risks when developing new themes and rides, but this is why Disneyland is unlike any other amusement park you've ever been to (Disney World aside). Too often we allow others to dictate what our lessons should look like or play it safe because we're unsure how it will turn out, but if we allow our creative juices to flow we could transform an otherwise routine lesson into sometime memorable for our students. This can be difficult for people like me who feel naturally uncreative, but the magic in teaching doesn't happen in the safety of the norm--it happens when we step outside our comfort zone and let the imagination & creativity flow. So when a moment of inspiration hits, don't just wave it off--embrace it, write it down, use it, and see what happens. Chances are it will be awesome!
    
3. The difference is in the details--I was absolutely amazed at the amount of detail given to each aspect of the park. The rides, the landscaping, the decorations and the costumes all were designed to create the overall impression, but if you stop to look closely you will see the extent to which the intricate details are done. For example, when you burst through a fireplace in Mr. Toad's Wild Ride you don't just go through some doors with a fireplace painted on them--you see glimmers of 'embers' scatter on the floor and the colors in the fire shifting as if it were real. These details are not necessary, but they are the true backbone behind the experience--without them the ride seems two-dimensional and dry but with them it comes alive. Teaching is full of these types of details: going out of your way to talk to each student that day, putting extra touches on the bulletin board, adding the smiley face sticker on a job well done, using current students' names in your example problems or their favorite musical group's picture in an activity--all of these are time consuming and are technically unnecessary, but they make a huge difference when put together with the positive energy and creativity pieces. They are the little extras that students remember and that personalize the educational experience for them in a unique way. Little things often make the biggest difference.

None of these are an instant classroom fix, but rather small ways to revive the magic when we're feeling low. Educators are more like the Disney cast members than we'd like to think--it's our job to put on a show and create a special learning experience for each child we have the privilege of meeting... let's embrace it & make it a good one!

OMG Disney!!! :D
I mean, I'm not excited at all....

Loved being a big kid again with my hubby & friends!

More on Students vs. Learners

I just got done talking to one of my favorite former students (are we allowed to say we have favorites?) whose comments made me revisit the idea of Students vs. Learners again. She is a taking an honors level English class where the teacher has given her a prompt, some general guidelines, and instructed them to create a research paper and project around the topic--all while documenting their learning in a journal each class period (sound familiar?).

And she is struggling... big time. She feels lost, wants more guidance, and even told me, "I just want to be told what to do! I'm scared I'm doing it wrong."

I feel her pain. She is the epitome of a 'student'--hard working, always studying, completing the task requirements to a "T"-- and she has never really had to learn in this way before. Had she told me this even a month ago I might have told her how unfair her assignment was and how the teacher should be giving her more guidance. But today I gave her a very different answer:

"Your teacher is trying to make you be a 'learner' instead of a 'student.' It's uncomfortable, isn't it? But you'll learn so much more by exploring on your own, solving your own problems, and discovering new information than you would if you were being told what to do. I promise! Have faith. You're a brillant girl and you will do awesome on this if you just let yourself be comfortable with the unknown."

But along with this advice I pray that the teacher is fulfilling her role in this learning process as well. I pray that she is guiding them, supporting them, and giving just enough assistance so that students like mine can be successful and not give up because it's too challenging or too big of a change. It's difficult to go from a student mindset to a learner's, especially if you've never done it before, and the worst thing her teacher could do is to drop her into this ocean of learning and turn away, trusting that the student will figure out how to swim--some may but others risk drowning from the shock.

The role of the teacher is so much more important in this type of learning environment and requires a vast amount of awareness on the educator's part--knowing when to step in and when to back off, what kinds of questions to ask to promote deeper thinking without leading them too much, and modeling the type of behaviors that should be used throughout the process. This kind of knowledge is developed over time through experience, but I also wonder what we can do to better prepare educators to think in this way. Is this something that we can try to foster in the teacher education programs? Or do we just learn it on the job?

Either way, I know that my former student may not be happy right now with this shift in the classroom, but I'm excited to see how she feels and what she's learned when it's all said and done--if she's intelligent as a 'student' now, I can't wait to see how much she can do as a 'learner.'

My Twenty-Percent Project: Part 2 (Updated)

I am training to be a Ninja... Well, training to be a Gmail ninja at least, but that's besides the point :)

Part two of my twenty-percent project involves diving into the awesomeness that is Gmail. There is sooooo much to learn about gmail besides the basic creating & sending of email! So much so that the tutorial is estimated to take about three hours to complete, not counting the webinar from the Google Apps for Education Professional Development series, which in about an hour long by itself.

I'm not going to lie, this second section is taking much longer to work through than I had anticipated (especially when compared to the relatively short part 1 Introduction section I wrote about). There are eight different chapters to read through and as of now I have only made it through four of them. There's a fair amount of information that I am already familiar with since I use Gmail as my primary email address, but there are a lot of little nuances to each of the parts that I either hadn't used or hadn't even heard about before. I am taking notes along the way so that I'll hopefully remember it all when it comes down to taking the test *fingers crossed*.

I'm still enjoying this adventure and learning new, helpful tips but I'm realizing that I will probably not finish all six of the modules before the semester is over--actually I can almost guarantee that I won't considering that the Docs training is estimated at eight hours by itself(!). I am quite determined to work my way through this though and will keep you posted along the way!  :)

****UPDATE****

I AM a Gmail Ninja :)

I got stubborn after writing my post and decided to plow through as many of the other four chapters as I could stand... only to find out that the last four were significantly shorter than the first--figures! Some of the learning highlights were the group chat option in gchat, color-coding message labels (didn't know you could do that!), and learning what the task function is really capable of (hint: it's great for the list makers out there). Overall, pretty cool stuff! I plan on keeping my notes and showing some of the highlights to the class in a few weeks so we can all benefit from it--but for now I will revel in my ninja status and get myself a well-deserved cookie ;)

#LangChat-ing It Up

So last night was my first 'real' teacher chat experience on Twitter. And I survived! :D

I say survived because I had tried to follow an #edchat conversation a few weeks ago, but found myself just lurking while trying to keep up with the super fast flow of discussion. Even with using TweetChat to help regulate the influx of tweets I found myself feeling a bit overwhelmed and lost. But knowing all of the good things that can come from a chat session I was determined to give it another go... and I'm very glad I did.

I decided that since I'm a foreign language teacher I should check out a #LangChat discussion. They meet every Thursday at 5pm PST (8pm EST), so I set a phone alarm for 4:55pm so I wouldn't miss it. With my Tweetdeck open and other distractions aside I was ready to go this time! I also decided it might be a good idea to drag my #LangChat column over next to my Interaction column in Tweetdeck too, just in case, and it helped tremendously when I was trying to see who had responded to me so I could reply back.

Ok, on to the actual chat. The topic was, "What are some strategies that help strengthen students' reading skills?" The discussion was fluid, interesting, friendly, and not overwhelming at all--there were enough people posting that discussions were insightful and productive, yet not so many that I couldn't keep track of it all. I was able to give out some suggestions of my own and was happy when I could respond to someone's question or add to the conversation. I came away with a bunch of new ideas on how to encourage reading in my Spanish classroom, new educators to follow on Twitter, and some new followers myself. The best part about it for me is having applicable professional development and conversation with educators all over the world at my finger tips--pretty awesome! Overall, I highly recommend participating in a Twitter chat if you can--it was a great experience and one that I will definitely be doing again soon!

The Power of Words

Ah Election Coverage... you bring out the good, the bad, and the just plain nasty in people more than almost any other topic, and this past week was no different. There was a difference though in the way it was presented and spread about like wildfire, and I attribute that difference to the vast uprise of social media in our lives over the past four years. Now granted, things like Twitter and Facebook have been around longer than that (though not that much longer, relatively speaking), but when looking at how differently they were used in this election it's not hard to see that they have grown and evolved significantly since the 2008 coverage. 

Many times on both Tuesday and Wednesday I found myself sitting in amazement at how social media has truly changed they way we 'do' life. Status updates, Tweets, Blogs, and comments are such an integral part of our daily interactions that it only makes sense that we would want to discuss an important national decision like this through those means. But I saw so many instances of people who are friends in real life, or even family members, making mean, insensitive, and just plain rude comments to one another under the premise that through the internet such things are ok to say. People were being offensive to friends & 'friends' alike to the point that some were removing them from their profile or life altogether.

Now, I enjoy social media and all of the benefits it has brought us--never before have we been in such a place as to communicate with each other instantly around the world, learn from one another, get answers to questions, and access professional development resources--but sometimes I wonder why can't we be civil with each other? And where will we draw the line between debate and personal attack? Are people even able to find that line anymore? 

Which brings me to the world of education. I truly believe that negative interactions like these can often be avoided, but it takes a special type of literacy to do so--one that could be called something like Social-Tech Literacy or Social Media Literacy. This type of literacy does not just include things like ensuring that students know how social media works and are able to navigate new interfaces (though those are important foundations of it) but also how to interact properly with others online. This type of literacy education would include word choice and tone, but also the power that is contained through punctuation, emoticons, and other text formatting options. The teaching of social media etiquette and literacy will become increasingly important as we begin to integrate it more and more into our classrooms, and the reality is that someone needs to teach it! There are far too many adults and children alike using harsh, hateful language to 'discuss' a topic--when the topic could be addressed both critically and civilly at the same time--because they are unaware of how to discuss it otherwise**.

Words are powerful, and even more so when the 'listener' cannot hear the intonation through the internet text. If we can begin to address tone, formatting, and word choice in online interactions in our classrooms then we will be taking a huge step towards creating a future generation that is more cognizant of what they say, both online and otherwise. And who knows, maybe this is part of the formula for reducing the amount of online bullying out there too....One can only hope!


Thoughts? Agree or disagree? Comment below and I'd love to discuss it with you!


**(I'm choosing to assume that they are unaware of the effects of their word selection rather than it being a conscious choice, which would be an entirely different issue.)

Proof of Learning

What have I learned so far? 
What a loaded question! :-P I feel like I've learned a lot so far, about both myself and technology. Through this class and in cultivating my PLN I've learned that:

• I like routine and expectations, but if I push myself I can overcome that and be more of a learner than a student.
  
• I don't always need to rely on someone to show me how to do something online/"techie"--When in doubt, Google it! :) I'm more confident in my computer problem solving skills that ever before yet know that there's soooo much still to learn in many different areas.
  
• Twitter is not the "useless social networking tool to tell people what you're eating that day" that I thought it was. I've found some really great resources and inspiration there, and can't wait to get back in the classroom to try them out!
  
• it's important to not get overwhelmed with the massive amounts of information and 'time suck' out there. If I only have a short period of time that day, then I use it and leave it at that. Sometimes that means starting blog posts one day and finishing them the next, or not going through a whole column feed and maybe missing something really cool--but that's ok! I can't use it all but I can find some use for some.
  
• documenting learning experiences and cultivating materials are essential for using this information in the future. As I find great ideas or analyze how I want to change my teaching, I want to be able to look back and remember what these inspirations were. Blogging, Tweeting, and Diigo seem like great venues for this that I would have not considered before.
  
• what I create doesn't have to be perfect--I just need to put it out there and see what happens. Sometimes a tons of people will read it or comment on it, and other times it just sits there...and that's ok. (Though I'm not gonna lie, I love getting comments and retweets :) ) 

There are a lot more specifics (like how to subtitle a video or what cool things you can do with Google Apps) as well as ideas/concepts that have been analyzed (filters, passion, communities of practices) but I feel like the overarching 'learning' can't always be written down as neatly labeled pieces--it's hopefully much broader and deeper than that.

What my learning tends to look like

My Learning Process:
I wouldn't consider this a list that "all students" should follow for this class per se--but rather my weekly personal steps for fostering technology learning this semester. So far my usual week looks like this:

• Take at least 5 minutes in the morning and/or before I go to bed to check Twitter and retweet anything that catches my eye (though lately it has been a lot more than 5 minutes).
  
• Look at my Zite 'magaizine' on my ipad once a day or every couple of days to look for articles of interest to me (Education, Running, Cooking, Languages, etc) and tweet them out when helpful.
  
• Use info from my other classes/peers' posts/Twitter finds to spur on at least one original, unprompted blog post a week.
  
• Try to dedicate 1 hour a week or so to my Twenty-percent project and its write-up (though that may not happen this week due to my video editing explorations).
  
• Work on whatever class reading/assignment we were encouraged to do that week.
  
• Comment on others' posts when I can. 

If I had to put a 'time frame' around the outside classwork I have done it's been around the 3-4 hours a week range minimum, though I often get distracted on Twitter or Facebook or get really into working on something and it ends up being a lot more--I honestly have a hard time putting an estimate on it because I do quite a lot on my phone and computer, combining it with other classwork and just plain screwing around, so my usage time frames are a bit more random. 

I also realize that I am a full-time student this semester, without kids or a part-time job besides studying and normal housework things--so even though I find ways to keep myself quite busy (my class load is a bit intense at times) I know that may have more time than most to invest in some of these venues.

This is a just a half-way-ish reflection of learning up until this point--I hope there are many more things I can add to these lists before the semester is over. 

Adding Subtitles to YouTube Videos

For one of my other classes we were required to record ourselves teaching so that we could analyze it in class and find ways to improve. It sounded like a great idea.... except that I teach Spanish and very few people in that class speak Spanish.

Hmm.... How are they going to understand what I'm doing or saying to help me improve without a ton of pausing/stopping/explaining? I know! SUBTITLES! :) Perfect for a Foreign Language teacher!

The basic process of adding subtitles, or closed captioning, to YouTube videos is pretty easy and straight forward using CaptionTube, a Google-based Beta program. I used this site to help guide me, but here are the steps summarized in my own words.

1. Upload the desired video to your YouTube account. 
2. Go to CaptionTube; Sign-in with your Google account and select a video to upload/sync.
3. Click 'edit' next to the video to get started.
4. Click 'add caption' at the spot in the video where you would like the text to appear and type your text into the box. 
5. Then adjust the caption start time and duration to ensure it starts and ends where you want it to. Use the CaptionTube Help page for shortcuts, visuals, and other FAQs.
   (I did a lot of pressing 'play'/'pause' to know where in the video I wanted the caption and where I wanted it to end--if I had seen the shortcuts earlier, I'm sure it would have been faster).
6. Once you've added all the captions you want, click 'publish', and select 'Publish on YouTube'. 

And voilà, you have a subtitled video. Pretty cool, huh? If the subtitles don't show up initially on your video, click the 'CC' button on the bottom right corner to turn them on. Here's an example video I captioned to show you how it looks when it's all done:



(Note: My class video was about 10 minutes long, and I speak quite quickly, so it took much longer than expected to write the transcript of my lesson and the caption it. BUT the captioning process itself is not difficult! Just don't choose a long video and expect it to go quickly. Also, having a typed-out transcript is really helpful for longer videos--you can just copy/paste into the caption box quickly once that transcribing part is done.)