The View From My Window

Congratulations on your selection as one of this year's winners of the ACTEM ACHIEVE award! Your work is a marvelous endorsement of your 21st-century skills of knowing and doing.

ACHIEVE Award winners are professionals who effectively apply available technology now. They move forward utilizing current best practices and cutting-edge approaches. They see students as real people by activating student voice and choice in education. They teach through relationships, inspiring, encouraging and nurturing. These professionals also recognize that further change is necessary, but understand that it is a process for all stakeholders. They realize that teacher and student empowerment is the key element to technology integration. ACHIEVE Educators expect success and motivate through awareness and access to information.

Wednesday, October 11, 2017

Spirit of Excellence

Tuesday, October 10, 2017

Differentiating Staff Development

On Friday, October 6 many districts in the State has a designated day for Professional Development. For our school, Feedback had been collected after the August inservice days to create a meaningful day for teachers.

1) We had time to collaborate and plan with other teachers with an end goal in mind.

We would like to extend an invitation for you to design your own workshop session, tailored to meet your needs. Relative to our school wide focus on Innovation in Teaching and Learning, this is an opportunity to meet with colleagues to collaborate on an idea or investigate something new on your own. Spend time on common courses, curriculum, or your professional goal. The only requirement is that the work needs to have a positive impact on teaching and learning.

During Wednesday’s LA time you will be asked to fill out a simple form to describe how you will use the 90 minutes of flex time on Friday. After the flex session is concluded, we will also ask you to reflect on the work and identify possible next steps.

2) We got together in groups to read a choice of articles (below) and have a discussion using a protocol. (articles had been collected ahead of time from teachers).

3) Open Technology Sessions
A continuation of the technology sessions in August. We recognize that teachers need time to "play" with the new tools if they are going to incorporate them into practice.
I polled teachers ahead of time to find out if they wanted support or just wanted to work. We all met in the cafeteria. I had signs for each of the tools. teachers could sit at a table and work together with other teachers on the same programs. Some teachers were also guides. I wanted to honor their time for learning as well, so they could go to any table, but were willing to be asked a question if needed. I was able to get around to all the tables for help where needed. The atmosphere was very positive. Thank you to all the guides!

Saturday, October 07, 2017

Weekly Links (weekly)

The Affordable Care Act isn’t

tags: mepolitics windowviewfavs

The Affordable Care Act isn’t collapsing – it’s being mugged. #mepolitics https://t.co/3uYraSwWMM
BrewCUEME

Happy to announce latest #Brewcue Hope you join for a few hours of conversation at #ACTEM2017 next Thurs. Register https://t.co/ud0cSeyyUB

tags: Brewcue ACTEM2017 windowviewfavs
Control Alt Achieve: Multiple Correct Answers in Google Form Quizzes

tags: googleforms

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Saturday, September 30, 2017

Weekly Links (weekly)

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Saturday, September 23, 2017

Weekly Links (weekly)

https://t.co/OuIiaYalf9

tags: edtechteam campchromebook windowviewfavs

#edtechteam #campchromebook @kerkelley @alicebarr https://t.co/OuIiaYalf9
9 Google Sites Tips - Teacher Tech

tags: googlesites
How to download a GIF from Twitter? - GIF FAQ

tags: twitter gif googleslides

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Saturday, September 16, 2017

Weekly Links (weekly)

Google Doc Tips - Google Slides

tags: googledocs sketchnote
HIGH SCHOOL — Breakout EDU Games

tags: breakoutedu highschool
C.L. Engvall on Twitter: "Schoology information session for parents prior to Open House. Our students give awesome demonstrations! #ghscommunity @Schoology https://t.co/Dg2WuY4ssn"

Schoology information session for parents prior to Open House. Our students give awesome demonstrations!… https://t.co/1Ygnbl1qAN

tags: windowviewfavs
Call for Proposals | New England Secondary School Consortium

Educators, students, parents, community members: you can now submit your proposal to present at #NESSC18! FMI: https://t.co/08KT4wnPmz

tags: NESSC18 windowviewfavs
Jen Bishop on Twitter: "Here are my choices for student learning & research log reflections... What questions do you ask? What would you add? Why? https://t.co/BJ0Z3g87SE"

Here are my choices for student learning & research log reflections... What questions do you ask? What would you ad… https://t.co/UrFNaL4xlN

tags: windowviewfavs
Extended Learning Opportunities - NHDRC Collaboration Ring

tags: elo seniorproject yhssenioryearexploration
What's a Good ELO?

tags: elo seniorproject yhssenioryearexploration
ELO Program Design - ELO: Beyond Classroom

tags: elo seniorproject yhssenioryearexploration
rosterSync - Teacher Edition - Google Sheets add-on

tags: addons googleclassroom googlesheets
8 Ways to Support Digital Citizenship Skills with Google | Shake Up Learning

tags: digitalcitizenship digitalfootprint
Google Tricks and Tips: Image Search Tricks Every Teacher Must Know!

tags: searchskills images
So glad, thanks for the feedback! Hope your school

tags: windowviewfavs

@alicebarr So glad, thanks for the feedback! Hope your school year is going well :-)
Google Classroom, The Why and How - Leah Cleary: Secondary Resources for Social Studies and English

tags: googleclassroom
The Periodic Table of Educational Tweeters to Follow – ICTEvangelist

tags: twitter twitterforeducation

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Saturday, September 09, 2017

Weekly Links (weekly)

How to manage Google Classroom like a boss with notifications | Ditch That Textbook

tags: googleclassroom
EdTech Situation Rm on Twitter: "Ep 64: Talking #AppleEvent #iPhone8 rumors, Android on Chromebooks, podcasting renaissance, Bored & Brilliant, more! https://t.co/mljVHKcDfp https://t.co/5yC4kItXzW"

s/o to @bobsprankle @cheryloakes50 @alicebarr on tonight's @edtechSR Ep 64! https://t.co/YVqmbuHTJJ

tags: windowviewfavs
Parveen Kaswan, IFS on Twitter: "Fabric and embroidery map of India. Pashmina shawls to the Kanjivaram saree every artwork is unique and woven with love and pride.

#worldgeochat https://t.co/mdo2wI1pes

tags: worldgeochat windowviewfavs

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Monday, September 04, 2017

August PD: Part 2

Our focus question for this year is HOW MIGHT WE? We even got temporary tattoos and stickers to help us keep this question in the forefront of our work during in-service days.

Day 2 the question was: How might we use our collective strengths to improve teaching and learning?

Teachers often ask for time to learn new tools that have come out during the year. The team organizing professional development came up with 9 tools they thought teachers would want to know more about. Some, such as Classroom, has been in practice in some classrooms and others, such as FlipGrid were new. We also wanted to show teachers the idea of student choice.

With our goal of using our collective strengths, I came up with a choice grid, based on a Hyperdocs template.

There are 9 tools to choose from. Each square goes to an individual doc where a description of the tool, the room to meet in, some links, and the ability to take notes was available. Using the Edcamp model, I encouraged teachers to switch sessions if something wasn't working and to take notes so that other teachers could benefit if they missed a session. In the center of the choice grid is a link to share #onenewthing they learned or wanted to share.

Casey Bell came out with a very timely article which fit perfectly as a take away for the activity: How to Push the Boundaries of School with Dynamic Learning. This activity was well received but we could have used about a half hour more for time. We will use it again later in the year.

Sunday, September 03, 2017

August PD: Part 1

All teachers and students in the high school are getting new computers this fall. It's hard to believe, but this is starting our 12th year of being 1:1. I am always asked to kick off the in-service days with an update on what's new. Frankly, there are not a lot of updates anymore. I prefer to concentrate on how we're learning using the machines to help us.

Over the summer I read Dan Ryder and Amy Burvall's book Intention: Critical Creativity in the Classroom. There are so many great ideas in it. They encourage remixing their activities. I also saw Lisa Thumann present #onenewthing at the EdTechTeam Custom Summit in Pulaski, Arkansas.

Something that we have done in the past is to share a new idea using technology at faculty meetings. Either the principal or I would point out something we had seen in the classroom. The teacher would then do a quick overview. We called it "Geek of the Week" and it was modeled on the Seedlings podcast that I used to participate in. So I remixed "Geek of the Week" and a Lego activity and came up with #onenewthing.

Find a partner. Decide who is one and who is two
Grab a cup of Lego (half filled Solo cups with random pieces of Legos)
Ground Rules:

No talking
You will have 4 minutes to build something which I will tell you about in a minute.
While building, you may trade Lego pieces with your partner, but it must be a one to one trade.

You will have 4 minutes to build a representation of something new that you learned this summer.
After the 4 minutes is up, Turn and Talk.

Partner 1 - try to guess what Partner 2 made. Partner 2 then shares what they learned.
Partner 2 - try to guess what Partner 1 made. Partner 1 then shares what they learned.

Who would like to share one of their creations?

Now let's think about our classrooms. What is #onenewthing you would like to try this year? Share with your partner.
If you would like to show your creation - leave it on the table in the back.

Instead of Geek of the Week, we are going to share #onenewthing at our faculty meetings. More to come!