This week we would like to share a few Digital Learning Coaches Blog treats. Weekly, we share our learning with you and provide helpful resources through our blog. Today we are playing “Blog Trick or Treating”, so that you can also learn from other members of our team just like we do everyday. Check out a few “treats” highlighted below:
How is success defined in your classroom? How much of your assessment is done to learners instead of with learners? Digital portfolios can be a way to celebrate learning and growth for all.
Some of the Reasons We Love Digital Portfolios:
An opportunity to capture the process of learning, not just the end result.
Provides a picture of the whole child as a unique individual and personality beyond a test score.
Serves as a reflection space for learners and an opportunity to justify their own grades and develop their academic voice.
Improves the home-school connection by giving parents a broader window into the learning process.
Teaches digital citizenship skills in a world where learners are already developing online reputations.
Getting Started
Our district has adopted Bulb as our digital portfolio platform with easy to copy templates for learners and educators. If you are ready to get started, here are some instructions to get you on your way.
Should our kids learn to code, or should they code to learn? When coding, learners are developing transferable, life skills. Coding and computational thinking enhance problem solving skills that transfer to all content areas. The Turning Point educators at Victory Place @Coppell embrace this understanding and are using coding to inspire unlimited creative freedom, promote teamwork, elevate computational thinking skills, and develop leaders.
THE PLAYD8
High school learners at Victory Place learners were first exposed to the coding toys available to them through a “coding playd8”. We set up several different coding toys around the room and gave them free exploration “play” time with each toy.
THE ESCAPE ROOM PROJECT
Using the coding toys they experimented with in the PlayD8, the high schoolers designed and implemented escape rooms for the Denton Creek 4th grade learners. Each “room” had its own theme and several puzzles to solve. At least one of each room’s puzzles required a coding challenge for participants. Denton Creek 4th graders collaborated in teams to solve all puzzles in order to collect the clues needed to “escape” from the room.
Scooby-Doo Themed Code-A-Pillar Disco and Ozobot Maze Challenges
How quickly they can pull their escape room designs together. Particularly, because the learners at first are a little unsure about how others will take their ideas and are very protective of their feelings. Once they start to weigh the options of having their idea shot down verses not being ready, they start to realize they need to communicate with each other. Ideas start coming and things get pulled together very quickly.
What did you notice most when you observed the high school learners interacting with the fourth graders?
I think what I observed the most is that they severely underestimate the curiosity, tenacity, and intelligence of the fourth graders. We told them that “these are some smart fourth graders and we need to make this hard”. Getting our learners to challenge them in a real way is probably the most difficult part. I think that speaks to their character a little bit. They want to be nice and be helpful and then they realize it takes a little bit of coaching. It is ok for them to struggle. It is ok for them to fail.
What are the biggest take-away you see for your learners?
The elevation of computational thinking skills. It is severely underestimated how much of your day-to-day life encompasses computational thinking. To be able to take a problem, decompose into its smallest parts, look for patterns in both digital and life problems, and see where it is going haywire. Where can I make a change? What is a change that I can make that will affect several things? Computational thinking is not only good for their academic brain, but it is also good for their social emotional brain.
Designing the Escape Room
DESIGN YOUR OWN PLAYD8
Interested in incorporating coding lessons into your curriculum? Want to set up a Coding PlayD8 with your PLC team or the learners in your class? Comment below or drop us an email. We would be happy to design an experience with you.
Many of us keep track of our to-dos and events with Outlook’s calendar reminders feature. Did you know that you can customize when and how often you receive those reminders and how the organizer receives your response?
Customize Calendar Categories and Reminders
Edit reminders to events created by someone else...
Simply open the event in your calendar and edit the reminder time.
Use the Outlook app on your mobile devices and customize invite responses
Learn More
Revisit one of our previous, most popular posts featuring email overload tips and changing your Reply All settings here.
It’s not too late to connect your classroom with the world. Global Collaboration Week is still going on today and tomorrow. This event provides a one stop shop of opportunities for educators and learners looking to make connections around the globe. Participants from all over can collaborate on projects, make plans for future projects, or simply connect with one another to share information and resources. For links to events happening in Central Daylight Time Zone, click here.
On this planet we are all interdependent and ultimately already connected. Why not parallel that reality in your classrooms. Check out his video from the UN that really sums this up from the learner’s perspective.
Why Global Collaboration:
Authentic & Experiential Learning
Preparing our learners to contribute in an ever increasing globally connected society
Connect with Industry Experts
Newly Possible Virtual Experiences
Cultural Awareness & Empathy
Celebrate differences
Provide different perspectives
Collaboration
Real-world communication skills
Communicating and creating products despite time and space
Connecting
Building your PLN
Share Learning and resources
Find like-minded thought partners
Who's Connected?
Connecting learners with educators
Michael Yakubovsky’s learners are currently working on a project where they interview educators from other campuses to discover needs. Learners are designing solutions through 3-D printing inventions. Keep following to hear more about this as it develops.
Connecting learners across schools and grade levels
Pillar Castro-Zena’s learners connected with Kindergarteners through Flipgrid to get feedback on the toys they created during their design thinking unit. Read more about it here.
Connecting current learners with former learners
Ian Vanderschee hosted a Skype session with over 40 of his learners that have already graduated. He included a Q/A session for his current learners to hear what graduates said about college and preparing for college.
Connecting with other districts
Sr. Mares challenged his learners to create Earth Day children's books with a target audience of Spanish speaking fourth graders in mind. Sr. Mares connected with a fourth grade dual language educator in another city. Her learners read the books, and then met with his learners through Google Hangouts. The high schoolers were able to practice authentic conversations in Spanish and received feedback on their books from the fourth graders. Read more about it here.
Connecting with parents
Suzanne Paylor uses Flipgrid to bring parents into the conversations happening in her classroom.
Connecting through social media
Tracy Henson’s learners kept blogs related to causes that are dear to their hearts. The public blog tracks the learners’ journeys through research to fund raising. Example
We know so many more of you are making global connections, too! Inspire others. Tell you story below.
Hello Differentiation. Meet the individually assign feature in Schoology. At times, learners or groups of learners may need alternate assignments or individualized content. Or, maybe the educator just needs to differentiate learning experiences to accommodate varied learning styles. Did you know that in Schoology, your Discussion Boards, Assignments, Quizzes, and Assessments can be individually assigned to learners or groups of learners? Check out this 1 minute video on how to individually assign.
Besides individually assigning, this feature has the ability to turn your Schoology course into a platform for group collaboration. Want to see how Schoology can help deliver materials to groups of learners? Visit this link for step-by-step instructions.
Interested in exploring this feature more? Contact Monica Champagne and Kelly Skillingberg.
“Grading Groups and Individually Assign.” DoDEA ELearning Portal, Department of Defense Education Agency, 22 Jan. 2015, learn.dodea.edu/.
As educators, we understand the importance of upholding expectations for classroom management. Through the reflection of particularly rough days, we strategize and calculate the changes we will make to ensure things will go better “next time”. Recently, we have been exploring how this process is just as important to the digital aspects of your classroom as it is the analog and wanted to share three of our favorite resources with you.
Last night, we had the privilege of hearing from our district’s secondary teacher of the year, Mel Mollick. Mel, shared some of her tried and true classroom management strategies, specifically focusing on those related to a 1:1 learner to device environment. Click hereto access Mel's slide deck.
