Beginning a 1:1 iPad Program

It takes good planning and organization to make an iPad 1:1 program successful. That’s what The Westside School in Seattle did for more than a year before rolling out its new program in its middle school. Even then, school leaders worked to integrate the devices into the curriculum slowly over two months. An outline of the phase-in is available from the Edutopia blog for 08/15/12. The phase-in included time without using technology, but instead helping students discover why technology is important in our world; sessions during which students and parents/guardians learned about proper use of the iPads and signed AUPs; classroom lessons that did not make use of technology during which time there were tech classes to learn about the use of iPads; the handing out and gradual integration of iPads for classroom use; allowing students to take the devices home; sponsoring events in support of the program, and finally, allowing students to use the devices as needed for learning.

Yoga for Student Stress & Anxiety

How about inserting Yoga into your school curriculum? Researchers from Boston’s Brigham and Woman’s Hospital studied high school juniors and seniors who were given yoga class or regular PE classes for a period of ten weeks. Psychological testing showed that the students taking the yoga classes did better in mental health. “Mood problems, anxiety and negative emotions stayed the same or improved among yoga students, but grew worse among those taking regular PE.”  Although not a research study, Celeste Bunting, Head of Lower School at Worcester Prep in Maryland, offers yoga classes to preschool students, because she believes that the sessions help with the mind/body connection, coordination, and focus. Those interested in offering yoga in their schools should look for routines that are appropriate for the targeted age group since the moves introduced must be safe for the students involved. Lead researcher in the Boston study, Jessica Noggle, Ph. D., says, “Yoga may serve a preventive role in adolescent mental health.” —And perhaps it may help students of all ages.

Math with Virtual Nerd

Students working with Pearson Common Core Math programs Grades 6-12 now have free access to homework help with the Virtual Nerd. This means that Virtual Nerd’s interactive videos and on-demand quick refreshers are available to students whenever they need them. For those schools who don’t use Pearson’s Common Core Math, Virtual Nerd videos for Grades 6, 7, and 8 may be accessed free at myMATH Universe.

Math Games from Mangahigh

Mangahigh offers free math games for Kindergarten through Grade 12 students. To use the games with your students, you’ll need to register your school, but that only takes a couple of minutes. Games are related to the core standards and “are designed to dynamically adapt in difficulty to the ability of the student . . . “ Games are downloaded to school computers, which usually takes three to four minutes. To use the games, school computers must have Adobe Flash Player 10 installed. You can take a look at short versions of some of the games before registering.

Ignite! Teaching...

If you haven’t seen the video of Will Richardson giving his five-minute presentation on igniting change, you’ve missed a thought-provoking experience. Richardson races through twenty slides that suggest we educators be subversive, stand up and scream, cheer for the uncommon core, flip the power structure, give open network tests, don’t teach the curriculum or insist that students do their own work, . . .  It’s a powerful ISTE presentation, but it’s much more. Give it five minutes of your time, and you’ll remember it.

Have Students Draw the News

Children, 12 and under, can participate in the New York Times Kids Draw the News. The program focuses mostly on assignments related to New York area news.  Children submit digital or scanned drawings that depict current events or mail drawings to The Times. Topics such as taxes on sugary drinks, canal cleanup, a tightrope walk across Niagara Falls, and the stealing of manhole covers are given for artistic assignments. To find current assignments, go to: City Room, Kids Draw the News. 

If your school is not in the New York City region, you may want to create your own news challenges based on current events in your town, your state, or the world. These, of course, wouldn’t be submitted to The Times, but some are sure to be published in local papers. Even if you don’t want to send the drawings to the media, your students can learn a great deal about a topic as they decide how to best capture it in a picture.

The 21st Century Teacher

My guess is that, except for the technology ingredient (unless we consider the printing press, the pencil, the pen, film projectors, tape recorders, chalk), there were 21^st Century teachers in all of the centuries in the past. As I read Josh Stumpenhorst’s What is a 21^st Century Teacher?, in the SmartBlog on Education, I thought back to the projects and ideas that were evolving in schools in the 1960s and 1970s. Project-based learning and connected teachers are certainly nothing new. It seems to me that the phrase “21^st Century Teachers” is just another name for good teachers who make use of their creativity and of the tools they have to give the best to their students.  They teach in a way that students learn how to learn, and they know how to encourage students to explore the excitement of learning on their own, with others and with them. I agree with Stumpenhorst that teachers today need to be “connected educators”, “masters of technology”, “reflective practitioners”, and advocates for good teaching and the teaching profession. I also agree that we aren’t there yet in many of our classrooms, technology-wise and teaching-wise. Master teachers will, as they have always done, lead the way for others.

PLP—Powerful Learning Practice

If you’re like me, you are confused about all the acronyms that relate to improved teaching. I had to look up PLP to find out that it stood for Powerful Learning Practice, which sounds good to me. It’s all about professional development, called the Connected Learner Experience. On the PLP site, you can download a brochure about what PLP has to offer and sign up for the free 13-page Twitter Handbook for Teachers. There’s a PLP convention scheduled for Philadelphia on September 28, 2012 that is designed to inspire, provide collaboration, and help accelerate the shift to positive change in teaching.

Tech&Learning Videos

Tech&Learning hosts a section that features videos about 1:1 computing using iPads and apps, digital-rich classrooms, learning spaces, social media, Facebook as a teaching device, BYOD, 3D projectors, Evernote, Vernier science tools, and much more. You can search for the videos you’d like to watch.  Most are less than 10 minutes in length and many are only a few minutes long. You’ll find them useful in learning what works for other educators and also to view product demos.

Are You Teaching Over Your Head?

Can’t find the app you want for your teaching? No problem, create your own. That’s what the Director of Technology for the Mogadore Local Schools (Ohio), Anthony Luscre, tells the teachers in his district and those he works with at conferences. He challenges teachers saying, “If you’re not teaching over your head, you’re not doing an effective job.” In his sessions, he shows teachers how to create what he terms “pseudo apps”, which are “sketches” of the information a teacher would need to build an app. Because not all teachers want to code their own apps, Luscre recommends coding tools from Websites like Apps Geyser.  For those who want to jump in and get started with app creation, he helps them to go from functional flowcharts (spreadsheets) to actual coding. Educators, including Luscre, realize that app coding isn’t simple and requires months to master. Those who take it on, say the work is worth it. Luscre doesn’t expect all teachers to code, but he believes they will benefit from the critical thinking it takes to understand how apps are created.