Blended Learning in Action

My students have been using the Chromebooks this week to engage in an on-line learning lessons/activities about Time. At this point during the unit the students are learning about telling time. They have already explored the passage of time and units of time. They have been introduced to analogue and digital clocks and how to identify minutes and hours. This is their first on-line learning activity for the blended learning we are doing in this Measurement unit.

The activity I am showcasing below shows students the corresponding digital time on an analogue clock for time to the hour, half-hour, and quarter-hour. Students had to match the digital times to their corresponding analogue clocks.

This first shot is of the first slide of the learning activity:

Here they are learning about telling time to the half-hour:

Telling time to the quarter-hour:

Here they get the chance to apply their knowledge/understanding and practice matching digital to analog times:

The students are responding well to the blended learning so far. They enjoy working on the Chromebooks and appreciate the opportunity to 1) learn using the online lessons and 2) practice what they are learning using the technology. The students are doing a great job in this blended learning cycle. I'm finding it a challenge to get around the room and talk to all the students while they are engaged in their practice activities. I want to make sure that I know how they are doing so I can speed things up, slow things down, and adjust for their needs. Their excitement and engagement is incredible and they can't seem to get enough of the tech integration and online learning activities. Nevertheless, I still provide them with other opportunities to show their learning such as using paper & pencil to write and draw, the use manipulatives, and by conferencing with me. It is important that I continue to provide them with what they need to be successful but I also believe in producing well-balanced students who can show their learning in a variety of ways if asked to do so. 

It is important that I continue to transform myself and my teaching so that I am reaching every student. The Chromebooks are tools, blended learning is another way to reach students. My experience has shown me that the use of technology is motivating and engaging and that students tend to be more invested in their learning and achieve greater academic success. I recently had a conversation with a close friend and mentor who expressed some concern about the use of technology in my classroom and how it might negatively impact my students next year when they don't have such technology to assist/support their learning. Concerns around writing, for example, were raised. How would students learn to write a friendly letter with a paper and pencil if they are not provided with that opportunity? How will students lean math concepts and solve problems if they are not introduced to manipulatives that can assist them? These are great questions and they are valid. 

My students use paper and pencils each day. They use manipulatives to learn and solve problems too! The technology and all the "goodies" that go with it are also used. I'd like to think that my students have a variety of options to learn, create, collaborate, problem solve, and communicate. Blended learning is happening in my classroom because I am fortunate enough to have the technology and support to offer it up to my students. It is NOT the only way, it is one piece of the teaching/learning puzzle in my classroom.

In language literacy my students are currently engaged in learning how to write friendly letters. I won't get into too much detail around what we are doing because I would like to dedicate a blog post to it later, but I can tell you that we are BLENDING our learning using paper and pencil as well as Google Drive (via the Chromebooks) to write and send friendly letters. The students are learning the basics of this type of writing and are improving their technological literacy at the same time.  

I would love to hear your thoughts about blended learning - please feel free to leave a comment below, reach me by email, twitter and/or connect with me on Google +.

Sharing the Learning Summit - TLLP

Wordle created for the www.iprojecttllp.blogspot.com site where our project reflections and findings live on the Internet.

I've just returned from the TLLP Sharing the Learning Summit where I got to present the findings our our project and talk to other participants about their projects. I have created a Google Presentation of the project that can be found here if you are interested. The Summit was a bitter-sweet moment for me - the opportunity to meet with other passionate educators was sweet, the official end to our project is bitter. Fortunately, I am in the midst of another project which means that +Ferdinand Krauss and I will get to attend the summit next year to talk about Blended Learning and Teacher PD using Chromebooks.

From beginning to end, the Summit was a huge 'highlight' for me. +Mark Godin was in attendance with me and has been part of our project before it was a project. As the Principal of Our Lady of Fatima it was his vision and support that led to the purchase of the iPads. Then, it was his encouragement and leadership that led to the TLLP application to support teacher learning & leadership and an improvement in academic & social achievement for our students with Autism. I am honoured to have such a role model in our corner and was very pleased to have him at the Summit to wrap up a project that he was such an integral part of.  

Mark Godin taking a break at the Summit.

Other highlights included:

• Meeting and speaking with Dr. Ann Lieberman who told me "...I've been looking for you!". Dr. Lieberman is doing research about teacher leaders and was given my name. I will be providing her with information about my experience with the TLLP. It tuns out that the email address she had for me was not correct so I am really happy to have connected with her.

• Being interviewed by TVOnatrio about our project. I got to spend some time talking to TVO about our project and the positive impact it has had on staff and students. The opportunity to share our learning is endless!

• Connecting with people who I interact with on Twitter is always a treat. I got to spend some time chatting with Kyle Pearce (who also spoke to Summit participants about his past TLLP work) and Peter Skillen & Brenda Sherry (who are both heavily involved in TLLP training that participants experience at the start of their project journey).

• Last but not least, the opportunity to chat with a variety of people who stopped at our display to learn about our project. I was more than happy to talk about our work and next steps for this project and other work that we are currently pursuing. 

On duty at the Summit.

My only regret is that I didn't say anything on my evaluation form about the networking that spills over into Twitter or Google + from these TLLP events. As an example, I think it would be a great if TLLP participants could have their Twitter or Google + handles listed with their project descriptions. This would be one simple way to help people connect and it would provide encouragement for non users to give social networking services a chance to assist them with their professional learning and sharing. There is nothing better than being part of other peoples professional learning networks and having them join mine. 

Being surrounded by people who are passionate about their work and about sharing their work is such a personal and professional boost. I want to end this post with something Dr. Ann Lieberman said when she spoke to the participants closer to the end of the summit. She hit the nail on the head and I couldn't agree with her more.

Digital Boot Camp: Practice & Support

My students are finally starting to get a handle on the user names and passwords they need to log on to the Chromebook and enter our Learning Management System (LMS).

WCDSB Learning Management System

Today they experienced what I call "Digital Boot Camp". During their time with the device the students had the opportunity to sign on to the Chromebook, go to our LMS site, bookmark it, and then sign off to allow their partner to do the same. When all the students were done bookmarking the LMS on the browser via their account I got them to take turns signing on to the Chromebook, going to the LMS, signing on to the LMS, use one of the learning activities, and then log out of the LMS and sign out of their Chromebook account. 

This "Boot Camp" activity proved to be beneficial for the students. They needed the time and repetition of using their user names and passwords. This activity allowed them to use and reuse their authentication credentials and get to work with some learning activities on the LMS.  

An important lesson for me is that I need to continue to provide my students with instructional strategies that are effective for young students. Sometimes I get carried away and excited about what we are doing and my brain is running a lot faster than everyone else. I need to ensure that I continue to provide them with what they need to be successful - scaffolding and gradual release of responsibility - both are good examples that sometimes get missed with all the excitement. 

Today was a great learning moment for my students and myself. My hope and wish is that I continue to support my students effectively as I learn and lead and with them. 

The Power of Self Directed Professional Learning & Social Networking Services

I just finished spending two days at the Educational Computing Organization of Ontario's (ECOO) "Bring IT Together" Conference in Niagara Falls. This wonderful opportunity was provided by the Ministry of Education as part of my 2013-2014 Teacher Learning and Leadership project.

The organizers did a fantastic job of bringing together a variety of people (mostly educators) who put on great presentations. The amount of choice was staggering but very apt for people who are interested in directing their learning. My self directed professional learning lead me on the following journey:

- #ecoo13 Thursday Keynote: "Relentless Adaptation" - +Amber Mac

Amber Mac in the middle of her keynote at #ecoo13

- Google Blends with Anything! Blended Learning with Google in the Classroom  - +Julie Millan

- Google Chromebook Implementation and Use - A View from 4 Levels: Board CIO, Principal, Teacher and Student Perspective - +Mark W. Carbone, +Andrew Bieronski, +Ed Doadt

- Supporting the Development of 21st Century Competencies: Letting Technology do the Dirty Work - +Steve Joordens

- How Technology Can Break Down The Walls of School - Andrew Campbell, +Jennifer Chan

- Leadership in the 21st Century - A Model for Change - Scott Johnson

- Professional Learning and Expression - Aaron Puley, Lisa Neale

Feel free to select any of the links above to learn more about the presentations. The sessions were all very engaging, informative, and motivating. They will prove to be helpful in one way or another to my practice moving forward. With respect to my portion of the TLLP, blended learning using the Chromebook, I am building my capacity in terms of how the device works and its Google Apps for Education (gafe) capabilities. Furthermore, I am deepening my learning about 21st Century teaching/learning and the use of technology to assist. There is nothing better than learning opportunities that motivate me and allow me to immerse myself fully.

Aside from the formal learning opportunities I referred to above, I had the privilege of meeting face-to-face with some of the people who are part of my professional learning networks (PLNs) on Twitter and Google+. I also added many new people to my networks who I met at #ecoo13.

Aviva Dunsiger (@avivaloca), Adele Stanfield (@adeletweets), Andrew Campbell (@acampbell99), and Jennifer Chan (@jennzia) sharing a laugh at lunch time at #ecoo13

My PLN's via Twitter and Google+ have proven to be valuable resources. These people engage in discussion about a variety of educational topics/issues, they provide support/guidance for each other, and are always willing to share. They are excellent communicators, collaborators, and life long learners. The four people pictured above have provided me with support at one point or another and I am grateful for their time, energy, and expertise. The great thing about the two social media sites I refer to are that they allow ME to choose when, where, and how I engage others around my learning and/or their learning. It has connected me to many gifted people. They say it takes a village to raise a child. I am fortunate to be part of a huge villages called Twitter and Google+!

If you are not on Twitter or Google+ I urge you to consider joining one or, even better, both sites. They are very powerful tools that will allow you to learn, share, and network with people locally and globally. As one of my teachers once said, these social networking services are

"...akin to a river. The water never stops flowing and you choose when to come to the river and how much water you will take away." - +Anthony Carabache 

If you are interested but have questions or reservations, please feel free to ask me. If I don't have the answers we can search them out together! I look forward to hearing from you soon and seeing you on Twitter and Google+.

Teaching and Learning using the Chromebook (TLLP 13-14)

It has been a little over a month since I introduced the Chromebook to my students. During this time they have been provided with opportunities to explore the device and learn their logins and passwords. It has been, and continues to be, a multi step process with sprinkles of frustration and success. The frustrations have come from the different passwords they need to input to use the device and issues around establishing a wifi connection. The successes involve students feeling a sense of accomplishment (by continuously trying and not giving up) and system level assistance in making our learning experience a smoother one. 

My project partner, +Ferdinand Krauss, has been assisting me in the classroom and working with our IT department to figure things out. He and IT recently made the decision to enable the Chromebooks to gain access to the wifi without login/password authentication. This decision proved to be a beneficial one for my students and myself as it saved us a lot of time and frustration when we used to the devices to do some Math. I found a great Math site the other day and thought this would be a great time to lead my students to some interactive online activities. 

We are working on Number Sense and Numeration right now, specifically number relationships. We had just finished talking about ordering numbers and number lines/hundred chart. I found a neat activity called "Order Numbers 1-100" . As soon as I saw this game I thought it would be a great way to engage them in trying something relatively fun and provide me with a quick assessment of who may be struggling with number order. The students had the opportunity to use the device to get on to the Internet and have some fun applying their understanding.

The students had to pop the balloons from the smaller number to the largest number: 

Here is the shot of the first level:

A screen shot of the positive reinforcement when they complete a level:

The activity starts off simple (3 balloons) and becomes more complicated as the student moves up the levels (level 5 = 6 balloons):

Many of the students had success with this activity. The activity was colourful and fun - they wanted to play! I observed the students working well together and they helped each other out. The students that flew through this were given a challenge to find another activity or two that would connect to what we are learning about right now. The students that needed some support worked with me and a few other students. 

Their time with the Chromebook wasn't all about Math. The majority of our time was spent learning some of the basics of technological literacy. The students were taught and worked on the following:

1) signing-in on the device,

2) becoming familiar with the address bar by typing in the address that I had projected for them on the whiteboard,

3) bookmarking the site,

--> working on the interactive game<--

4) closing the browser,

5) signing-out of the device

AND then their partner had to do the same things listed above in order to have this website book marked under their user account. 

Lots of awesome teaching and learning took place during this time. The students felt really good about their work using the Chromebooks and look forward to their next opportunity to use the device and the Internet to benefit their learning and demonstration of learning. 

If you have any questions/comments about this post, please feel free to leave a comment below or send me an email at rtwcdsb@gmail.com

 

Introducing the Chromebook

Picture source http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2419670,00.asp

I recently acquired the Chromebooks that my students will be using for their blended learning. From the moment I took possession of the devices, I have been thinking about the most effective way of introducing the Chromebooks to them. Having only known my students for 7 days I feel like I have a decent grasp of what I need to do in order to effectively reach them around the what the Chromebook is and how it works.

As a whole group, I took one of the devices out of the box and gave them a look at it. They immediately made comments about its size (how small it is) and wondered about its weight. I informed them that they would each have the opportunity to power one up and work with it in a small group setting. Since they are learning about the guided reading groups that we will be having in my class I decided to roll it into our guided reading time so that I could have a small group to work with as they practice being independently engaged in learning while I guide a small group in reading. 

During our guided reading time today, I started introducing the Chromebook. The four students I worked with seemed very interested and engaged while the rest of the class tried to focus on their given task (who could blame them?). I made sure to keep things as simple as possible - I didn't want to assume that they knew anything about the device. Needless to say, they were quick to pop it open and find the power button. Once the device powered up, the students faced their first difficulty. The devices automatically prompt the user to log into their Google account with no option to log in as a guest. Having talked to +Ferdinand Krauss, my project partner, he informed me that my students would have a Google log in at a later date in order to employ the benefits of our Google Apps for Education (GAFE) account. Since we were not able to log in as a guest, I taught the students how to access the wireless network using their Internet login and password which they need to access the desktop computers at school. At this point, a couple of the students could then log on  the device as a guest but the other two could still not. With the confusion that ensued we are not certain how they ended up having the option of logging on as a guest user.

Once the students were logged in as guests and logged on to the wireless network, I taught them how to launch Chrome (the browser). Once they were on the "net" I asked them where they wanted to go in order to practice using the volume control and the track pad (on board mouse pad) - they chose to practice at Cool Math Games . They practiced using the track pad - moving up and down the page and the use of the right and left click buttons. After a short time I taught them to close their window and power down the Chromebook. 

Picture source http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/02/19/feature_chromebooks_head_to_head/

I asked them what their first impressions were and they said that they thought it was "cool". When I asked them to elaborate they said that they liked how small the device is and that they are excited to use it for their learning. 

I'm looking forward to working with my next small group tomorrow and I am really excited that we have started integrating the device in our classroom community. If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to leave a comment below or you can email me at rtwcdsb@gmail.com        

Wrapping up the iProject: Teacher Reflections (TLLP 2012-2013)

The teachers participating in the iProject (using iPads with students with Autism to enhance their learning) met today to talk about the professional learning we experienced, the successes, and the challenges of our 2012-2013 TLLP project.

In our discussion about our professional learning, we discovered that we had a lot in common about what we gained from our year long experience. We talked about how technology can be used in our classrooms to benefit student engagement, motivation, and focus. Aside from our professional learning around the technology, we realized that we had 1) accumulated a deep knowledge of how to effectively teach our students with Autism and 2) a deep awareness and interaction with our student's IEP.

This project allowed us to really examine the characteristics of our students and how to best use the iPads to enhance their learning. As we learned more about the common characteristics of Autism we also discovered the personalities of our students, which sparked more of an interest in learning how to better serve them. With respect to the IEP (which was the main force behind the apps we would choose for our students to engage with), it became a rich and dynamic document that was used daily rather than weekly or monthly. This project led to strong teacher-student-EA interaction which helped inform the creation and maintenance of the IEP.

When we talked about the successes of the project we immediately acknowledged the effective communication and collaboration we experienced with each other and our EA's. The team work we engaged in to meet our professional learning needs and the learning needs of our students was a rich experience that provided us with feelings of support and collegiality. Another success has been the engagement, motivation, and focus we have witnessed from our students. We have also noticed that the use of the technology has allowed two of our students to become more social in the way they use their device in the classroom community. It has provided them with a way to connect to other students in the classroom and to feel more involved.

When we talked about the challenges that we came across during this project it was clear that it was difficult for us to not be involved and understand everything that was going on with our iProject students. As we instruct and support the majority of our class, our EA's would be providing direct support with the students using the iPads. At times we felt like we were on the periphery of the project rather than being in the center with our EA and student. We realized that our challenge was more of an emotional/philosophical one rather than a logical one. We felt like we weren't "in charge" because we weren't sitting with our iProject student every minute of the day. With time and constant communication with each other and our EA's, we overcame our challenge by establishing a strong relationship and trust with our EA's.

Near the end of our discussion my colleagues expressed some interesting points about their experience with this project. They noted that they are not tech savvy and that they wished they could understand the technology better. They still seem to puzzled about what they referred to as the "abstractness" of the technology and how apps are found and loaded on to the iPad. They expressed concern in not understanding how all the "abstract" stuff come together and end up on the device. From my perspective, I think that they could benefit from actually participating in locating and actually downloading apps from the iTunes store right on to the device. They experienced a taste of this a while ago and after our discussion it is clear that it was not enough for them.

Overall, our reflections on the iProject are positive and it is our belief that the use of iPads with our students with Autism has been beneficial for both the students and the teachers. It has been a great year of professional and personal growth.