Using Social Media and Web 2.0 to Differentiate Instruction
By: Mary Marotta Instructional Technology, Professional Development Consultant and Adjunct Professor
Back to School season!
Whether you’ve already welcomed your students or enjoying the last few days of preparations, I would suggest you read this inspirational
post by Jennifer Gonzales (a.k.a. Cult of Pedagogy):
Check out the post, Find Your Marigolds.
It’s become quite a viral post, especially this busy time of year. I’m sharing this with my colleagues and many of her other podcasts (Jen’s podcast )at Cult of Pedagogy.
I highly recommend following her on twitter, her blog and podcasts are very inspirational! It's time to find your marigold or better yet, be one!
There are always resources online for learning and improving classroom delivery. Here are three
themes, four #GooglePDWeek Youtube Live streams about professional growth, time savings and student learning goo.gl/AF4Mtg and link to presentation. Here is a link to managing change in a 1:1 ennvironment, more on planning and managing change here.
Eariler in the month I blogged about our PBL late start and all the projects teachers worked on. Today the published books from Lulu arrived for Mrs. Foley's class! I wanted to capture the excitement with twitter and curate using Storify/link to model reflecting as part of the PBL process. I couldn't be more proud of this teacher, class, project and group collaboration!
I attempted to bring one of the books into Book Creator on the ipad and record a few of the pages and test out the new publish feature on the ipdad. Here is a sample of "Colorful Crowie" link I am excited to read that Book Creator will be available for the web and chromebooks next year! We keep reflecting on ways to improve as part of our design thinking process and I hope we do this project again! I am anxious to see the student do a Google Hangout with other schools in our district and share their work!
Our PLT's allowed us time to collaborate with each other and to understand the elements of projects versus true PBL. What a great way to wrap up the year with PBL projects and showcase!
Our PLT that met during late starts for the 2016-2017 school year will be sharing our PBL story here with out staff today. Our group created many great projects that will will share with our colleagues. Some of the projects include cooking videos, children's books, coral reef project, DECA Best Buddies and Graphics with our Vinyl cutter just to name a few!
Presenting to our colleauges is a great way to reflect on our teaching practices and decide how we will continue to improved our teaching practices.
Link here https://spark.adobe.com/page/BNS9cp5BF3RqG/
We hope to blend PBL with Design Thinking next year and launch new products!
We will also look to submit and RFP to MassCUE next fall and present this presentation to a much larger audience!
If you are intereseted in defining our PLT for next year contact me before June 1st ifyou would like to provide input and/or help facilitate our PLT next year along with Tim Castner's book club on "Shop Class as Soulcraft"
In the past I have used Google Lit trips and Google Earth on a windows platform by downloading a KMZ file and running in a lab evnironment. With students using more chromebooks I have not been using as much over the last few years. So, I was very please to see there is now a new version of Google Earth that runs in the chrome browser on the chromebook. I plan to revisit lit trips this week and how it works with Google Drive and test out with a class.
Steps below for lit trips:
1. Google Lit Trip Library here
Other topics:
On twitter this week there was apost on EquatIO, by Texthelp, that is now available in the Chrome Webstore.
EquatIO is a Chrome extension that will allow you and your students to create math equations in Google Apps…. and other places. Today’s release only works in Google Docs and Google Forms but Google Slides and other web content sites will soon be able to utilize EquatIO.
This in combination with the new Chromebook Acer Spin 11 (with a stylus) coming out this spring may allow for many of the interactive features we using out Tablet PC's and touchscreen devices. Here is an video review of the Acer Spin 11 along with some ways to use the new Acer Spin 11 one of my favorite apps Google Keep. I have been a big advocate of Tablet PC's, inking and Google Keep it's great to see these items availalbe on new touchscreen chromebooks. I hope to convince my school to take a look and I am hoping the price in only slightly more than a standard chromebook!
More info here by two bloggers that I follow ... here and here
I have done lots of Pd over the years but one of my favorite sessions has to be a Demo Slam. This is where you get to share out quick tips and trick with colleagues. I will be part of a panel this afternoon and some of the items I will focus on will be:
CastEDU
Expeditions
Flippity
Thinking back to our first slam when teachers saw Kahoot for the first time. It kicked off a year of engagement and students loved it. Now that our 9th graders are 1:1 the level of consistent usage of technology continures to grow! I am excited our district is now using Sched to list our PD sessions!
