Extend Student Learning With Digital Discussion Forums

Image via Pixabay

As learning with mobile technology becomes more commonplace in our k-12 learning spaces, digital discussion forums are expanding opportunities for our students to share and communicate. There are several benefits for using this platform in place of, or in addition to, a traditional classroom discussion:

• gives all students a voice, even those intimidated or unmotivated by a traditional classroom discussion
• discussions are not limited by time or length---set up properly, they encourage students to continue conversations beyond the walls of the classroom 
• encourages critical thinking skills- fosters the organization of thoughts around a topic before responding  
• delivers content from another perspective
• students gain experience using a professional communication practice
• students practice writing short, meaningful posts

In addition to the traditional question/answer prompted discussion, there are several additional ways to use this tool:

• at the start of a unit or concept, use a discussion forum to assess pre-existing knowledge and misconceptions
• have students summarize points of a reading
• share opinions on a topic
• use as an exit ticket or formative assessment tool
• collaborative research- students each post 1-2 applicable links to share with class
• pose a discussion with an outside mentor or expert

Some best practices to consider when designing a discussion forum:

• plan your forum to last at least one week to allow for flexibility in both reading and responding
• include multi-media to increase engagement (video, powerpoints, links, images, audio, etc.)
• model how to cite sources and give credit
• teach students expectations of a quality response--this is not social media, but an academic forum (proper grammar, academic conversation, on-task posts and comments)
• be involved--the teacher should comment and model proper digital citizenship
• avoid public praise or corrrection

*There are many platforms today that allow for these digital discussion forums. In our district, we use Schoology. Google Classroom and Edmodo are additional options for a k-12 classroom.

Have you used a digital discussion forum with your class? Share your thoughts and questions in the comments below.

Today's Students Learn Differently

"No matter how we feel about it, social media has fundamentally changed how we learn."   read more here

                                                                                                                  -Dylan Rodgers

Here at South Side Area School District, we are just entering our second month with the Schoology LMS. We continue to learn more each day about how to use a platform such as Schoology to help us build a collaborative culture for our students, staff and community. More than just a digital workspace, Schoology allows us to share with one another inside and outside of our immediate classroom walls.

Recently, I have begun to explore the interactive media albums feature available in Schoology. This feature can be a powerful way to share with and connect our learners and stakeholders. Below are some obvious as well as some unique ways to incorporate this feature into your classrooms:

image via Pixabay

• Create a virtual field trip for parents and students who were unable to attend the outing by sharing photos and video from the event. Schoology is a password protected environment making it a safe place to share. 
• PE teachers can take advantage of this feature to share photos of correctly modeled exercises and training drills. 
• Instructors can create a virtual art gallery to showcase projects and artwork created in school. 
• This is a easy way for students or teachers to create vocabulary flashcards. 
• Host a virtual Show and Tell for items that are too big or not practical to bring to school. 

Schoology's media albums are a safe and easy way to share. It also allows users to comment and provide feedback for each other making it collaborative as well. Please share your ideas for this tool in the comments section below.

Teaching With Photos

It's no secret that today's tech-savvy kids love to take photos.

Photo via Pixabay

 Many of our learners have easy access to cameras.  As teachers, we have an amazing opportunity to capitalize on this passion by providing classroom opportunities for our students that allow them to document their learning via photos.

"Documenting is more than staying organized or writing down what will be or was taught. Documenting is part of the learning process."

                                                                                       -Silvia Rosenthal Tolisano


Help kids to capture authentic learning experiences by using photos and some of these easy-to-implement ideas for the classroom:

• Use a collage making tool such as Pic Collage  to document steps in a science experiment or math problem. Or have students create a scrapbook of a famous biographical figure with this same tool.
• Photo essays make an enticing alternative to the traditional essay. Thinglink is a fun tool to accomplish this. 
• Employ Blabberize or Chatterpix Kids to encourage your students to create book summaries from the perspective of their favorite character. These tools can make any photo speak!
• Engage your students in your content with a photo scavenger hunt using Google Photos.
• Our students love memes. Urge learners to make their own.  Suggest one of the many meme creation tools available, such as Imgflip for students to create memes about book characters or science lab procedures.
• Instead of having students write vocabulary definitions and sentences, change it up and ask them to represent their vocabulary through photos instead. 

Are you concerned about how to collect and give feedback on these types of assignments?

A platform such as Schoology or Google Classroom make collecting, checking and providing feedback a snap.

Do you have a great idea for using photos in the classroom? Please share your ideas in the comments below.

Do You Want Your Students To Take A More Active Role In Their Own Learning?

Blended learning is an instructional approach that allows students to have greater control over their learning. It is instruction that is at least partly delivered digitally and allows for some student choice over time, place, path or space of their learning. Chou and Chou (2011) describe this as "maximizing the best advantages of face-to-face and online education" (p. 464). Blended learning has been a part of higher ed. learning opportunities for some time now, but it is steadily working it's way into our K-12 learning spaces as well. Some people question whether this style of instruction is beneficial or even necessary at these levels. I recently came across this befitting video that shares a student's perspective.





 
The Voice of the Active Learner by Blackboard and JESS3 from JESS3 on Vimeo.

Our district will soon be using the learning management system,  Schoology, to help facilitate this blended learning approach. Schoology, or any LMS,  gives students, teachers and parents a one-stop, online space to curate, organize and negotiate digital resources.

Below are a few advantages to using an LMS to simplify a blended learning environment:

• It can save valuable time for the teacher  Teachers are able to create and upload handouts/activities that can be easily attached to assignments, questions and topics, instead of copying, collating and stapling worksheets and packets. It is also a great place to curate applicable multimedia by adding links, images and videos that further reinforce or enhance the topic being learned. Additionally, all assignments assigned digitally can be automatically graded and sent to the grade book.

• Collaboration and feedback are built in Immediate feedback is vital for student engagement and motivation. Online discussions and group work allow students to easily receive feedback from others besides just their teacher. Peers become valuable resources for one another and feedback is immediate. This environment can be especially powerful for students who are too shy to share verbally in class or for students who cannot attend class for health reasons.

• Easy way to involve and educate parents Parents and caregivers may join their child's classes in order to receive updates, stay informed about their child's learning, join discussion threads, view grades, etc. 

• Students can work at their own pace and the teacher is freed up to work with small groups or students who need additional assistance  Teachers set up learning modules that can be differentiated according to need and ability. Please note that the teacher's role is more important than ever in this model-- the focus moves away from whole group learning and moves towards using data to provide more individualized support for students.

Mrs. Fulciniti, one of our high school English teachers, has been piloting Schoology in her classroom during the last several weeks. She shares...

"Using this [tool] for the first few assignments has honestly changed the on-task behavior in my classes. I thought that maybe my first block was a little tired, but both of my classes were actively working, asking on-task questions, and getting “it” done. "

Giving students permission and opportunities to control their own learning increases engagement and motivation. The goal is to encourage our students to move from passive recipients of knowledge to  active seekers of learning. As educators, we can do this by shifting our own focus from being knowledge providers to becoming learning facilitators. Blended learning is one tool to move us further down this path.

What are your thoughts on blended learning? Please share in the comments below. Stay tuned for future posts where I plan to share some best practices for using blended learning in your classroom.

Leveraging Technology To Improve Student Learning

Our district is rounding the bend on our fourth year with 1:1 student and teacher technology devices. The staff and students have become quite comfortable using many new digital tools and resources to enhance student learning. We are now in an ideal place to take our learning activities and lesson design to a whole new level . Not only is this evolution timely, but also indispensable if we are to continue to prepare our students to thrive in today's fast paced, technology-rich world.

The SAMR model is a framework created by Dr. Ruben Puentedura to help educators think about how to use technology purposefully in the classroom.  Dr. Puentedora currently explores new directions in mobile computing, digital storytelling, learning analytics, and educational gaming,  His is one of several frameworks available to teachers to help them think about technology use as a way to improve and transform classroom learning outcomes. His model provides a common language for educators to use for the design of meaningful instruction with technology. This is a model that I will be sharing with my colleagues over the next few weeks as we move into the end of the school year. Understanding this model will allow staff members to make informed decisions about the tools that they will choose to use with their students in upcoming lesson designs. This framework will also encourage thoughtful decisions for purchasing and requesting additional digital tools and resources as we move forward into a new school year. Dr. Puentedura talks briefly about the impact SAMR can have on student achievement in the video below.



This brief video explains how the SAMR framework is used by educators to transform their lesson design.

I am looking forward to sharing this model with our staff over the next few weeks. Do you use the SAMR model when designing your instruction? Do you use another framework for thinking about technology? Please share your thoughts and experiences in the comments below. Thank you for reading!

Elevate Your Teaching With QR Codes

I'm sure you have seen a QR code. They are everywhere. A QR code is a scannable bar-code that takes you to a specific digital location.

Scan this code to find lots of resources curated by Kathy Schrock for using QR codes in the classroom

QR codes make it easy transform your classroom content with supporting digital content. Anyone with a QR scanner can access a QR code.With QR codes, there is no need for students to type in long web addresses or to search the web for content. The QR code will take them directly to where they need to go. QR codes also make it easy for teachers to deliver supporting or differentiated content to students. There are many free QR readers available for both mobile and web-based devices. In our elementary building, the student devices have all been equipped with the free Qrafter app.There are also many tools available for generating a QR code. My favorite QR generating tool is the free web-based QR Code Generator. It takes seconds to create a code. These codes can be printed out or embedded into digital space such as a website, fusion page or blog. Ideas for using QR codes in your classroom are limitless. Here are a few ideas to get you started:

• work exemplars can be provided for students as a qr code on their assignments
• students can design a 21st century resume and link it to an online portfolio
• rubrics can be attached to assignments via qr codes
• instructions for learning centers can be posted in the classroom and scanned as necessary by students
• audio recordings can be attached to artwork to provide context and explanation
• student created book reviews can be attached to the inside of book covers
• student created videos can be attached to written assignments
• differentiated scaffolds can be easily delivered to students using qr codes
• extension activities can be attached to assignments
• QR scavenger hunts are fun in any content area
• maps can become interactive by linking them to additional supporting material
• QR codes are a great way to share student digital work with others
• labs become interactive when QR codes containing links to important facts and content are  attached to models, equipment and artifacts

Do you use QR codes already? Please share your ideas with us in the comments below.

Support For Digital Photos

Recently, I have had several requests for assistance concerning photos taken on our school iPads:

• "How can we share photos? Our iPads don't have airdrop. The files get stuck in my outbox when I attempt to send them to someone."
• "Photos take up so much storage space on my iPad. How can I manage my storage space?"
• "How can I easily transfer photos from my iPad to my PC?"

There are many viable options available, but I am going to share one that works well for me. Enter Google Photos, a relatively new cloud-based storage vault for your photos. This app will back up and sync photos and videos on all devices where it has been installed. It works multi-platform (android, web and ios).

image via Google Play

A great feature of this app is the unlimited, free storage if you agree to a compressed file size. Paid options are also available.

image via Sean Captain from www.tomsguide.com

Once you install the app on all of your devices and select the quality of your uploads and the app will begin to do its work. Photos, images and videos are by default set to private unless otherwise noted by you. These images are automatically sorted and organized which makes them easy to search, share and even edit. Linked here is Google Photos support to get you started. Please contact me if you need some help.

How do you manage and share your digital photos? Please share with us in the comments below.