An Hour with 2 Techie Teachers: Webinar Event

Tuesday, October 6, 2015 - 4:00pm

Join us for our first ever webinar event as we share the importance of encouraging your students to create in the classroom on a daily basis. We'll share easy, no-prep activities that will have your students creatively sharing authentic work in all subject areas. Learn how to maximize the best of what your students’ iPads have to offer. We’ll also highlight our use of digital interactive notebooks using Book Creator. This is one concept guaranteed to positively change the workflow of your classroom! 

We will be live and ready to answer your questions about organization and management, favorites apps and programs, and more!

This event is through the Indiana Office of eLearning.  You don't have to be from Indiana to learn from this webinar!  You can register for the webinar here.  

Interactive Study Guides with Book Creator

Looking for a way to help your students effectively and efficiently study for an upcoming assessment?  If you aren't using digital interactive notebooks, then it isn't too late to provide students with purposeful study materials they can personalize.

We recently completed our Ancient Greece unit, and I wanted to provide students with the key details we covered in class as well as extra online resources for them to check out.  Students worked on these study guides in class with a partner and had full access to them the week of the final assessment.

Looking for the "how to" behind creating these guides?  I used the same process that we use for our interactive notebooks.  Check out that step-by-step guide here.

Why use Book Creator? Simply put, Book Creator provides both teacher and student with a variety of tools to personalize learning while using a user-friendly format that even the littlest of learners can tackle.  Hands-down, this is our favorite paid app loaded on our student devices.  We find new uses every week!

Here are a few samples pages (screenshots) from our Ancient Greece study guides.  Note that I was able to mix media by adding video, images, text, links, and more.  You can even link out to digital flashcards or games that you may have created using resources such as Quizlet or Socrative.

The Cover Page is clear and easy for students to distinguish from other books.
Add a personal message that gives the students a purpose using video.

Interactive features give students a more authentic learning experience. 

Students can add in their own text or photos that enhance their learning.
This student added a photo that named the 12 gods of Mt. Olympus,
and they used the notes section to roughly answer the "Think About It" section. 

The final page is reserved for extra resources for students to go above and beyond in their study.
Including links to information websites as well as interactive features such as Kahoot!, gives students a broader range of study materials to choose from. It also allows parents a great resource to help their students go deeper into the material. 

Happy studying!

Study Guide Medium Credits: 
KG Fonts (dafont.com)
clipart.mrdonn.org (clip art)
nsms6thgradesocialstudies.weebly.com (map)

Lose the Worksheets with these Easy Digital Quick Checks

"I love standing in line for the copy machine on Monday morning," said NO teacher ever.

There is something about a paperless classroom that is utterly freeing.  When I made the jump this year to middle school life, I made it a priority goal to minimize the number of copies I make for my classroom.  Aside from projects I've printed to hang on my classroom walls, I've made exactly zero copies for my sixth graders.  Ahhhh....

After coming off of a stint in primary where paper skills are still extremely valuable and necessary (cutting, gluing, coloring, and other fine motor skills as well as station materials), I find myself not spending my Sunday afternoons hugging the copy machine and subsequently visiting with the laminator.  I don't miss it yet, but I am sure someday I will.  Until then, Brittany keeps me grounded by recounting her many hours spent cutting out lamination!

Even at the primary level, there are still many ways to reduce the amount of "papers" that travel home with your students each day. Let's face it...most of those quickly find their ultimate home in the trash can after a quick glance from a parent.  I know because I am one of those parent-type creatures.

You still need to quickly assess your students' understanding of a lesson or a concept.  Let me throw out a few suggestions to get your creative juices flowing.  Have more ideas?  Share them in the comments below!

5 of the Easiest 5 Minute Quick Checks that Save Trees and Encourage Creativity

1) The..."Quick! Act it out and show me what you know" video.

After a rousing discussion of the four main types of government used in Ancient Greece (what ISN'T fun about that?), I asked students in groups to create a quick 30 second video in which they act out a chosen form of government.  What ensued was hilariously fun, and it provided us with AMAZING review material!  We showed the videos and students had to guess which form of government was being demonstrated.  Did I mention fun?  

2) The Digital Exit Ticket 

Within our LMS, Canvas, students can comment on discussion questions that I post for them.  Take the exit ticket a step further and let this be a student-driven learning opportunity. Allow students to submit exit ticket discussion proposals and select one!  If you don't have an LMS, you can use polls in Kahoot, Socrative, etc. to get a similar effect.  This is a great way to gauge who has it and who doesn't.  You can also allow older students to "backchannel" your lesson and discuss with each other using resources like Today's Meet.  

3) The Twitter-esque Post

For word lovers like me, Twitter with its 140 character limit can be agonizing.  However, it does force you to be concise!  Have students compose Twitter-esque narratives that demonstrate their understanding of the concept.  Students can post these wherever convenient for you to check.  Take it a step further and create a classroom Twitter account and a jazzy hashtag to follow.  Our school has SM blocked, but there are ways around this.  You can select well-written Twitter responses and make them live and breathe out there for the world to notice for your students! #dontforgetthehashtag

4) Graphic Organizers with Style 

When I need a quick check that students always love, I go to PicCollage.  Whether I want them to compare/contrast two characters in a story or discuss the pros/cons of tyranny in Ancient Greece, PicCollage is always a top contender.  Kid-friendly and fun, it also allows the addition of relevant content such as video and photos that add more authenticity to their responses.  Bonus...I can do this on the fly if I see we just aren't "getting it." This allows me to assess quickly and adjust our learning. What can you PicCollage this week?

5) Sketchnoting or Doodling...pick your poison

This is another easy idea that is suitable for any age or stage.  I have always been a major doodler...the proof is on my church bulletin each week!  First graders can sketch or doodle while their teacher reads a story which encourages visualization, text connections, and other comprehension must haves.  Teachers can direct the flow of sketching/doodling or allow students free range.  Older students can also sketchnote/doodle their way through a content rich video or discussion.  The key here is proper management so students understand the purpose of this activity.  Doodles/sketches should be relevant and enhance their learning.  Showing them some great examples that are out there on YouTube can be very helpful, and/or model good technique yourself. There are many great apps for this skill. Idea Sketch, IdeaStorm, Inkflow are just a few of the free ones out there.  Not sure you want to go all the way with sketchnoting?  Try any whiteboard app (DoodleBuddy for primary, EduCreations for intermedate+) and allow your students to doodle 'til their hearts' content. Oh, and do let them share!

What are YOUR favorite quick checks?

Twitter Chat Ahead

If you haven't discovered the incredible world of professional development via Twitter, we invite you to join us as we moderate the Indiana Office of eLearning #INeLearn chat on Thursday (September 3) night from 9:00-10:00pm. Though the chat is geared toward our elementary learners, there will be relevance for all.  Topics will include creation centered integration as well as balancing a blended learning environment.

Use the hashtag #INeLearn to follow along, and be sure to follow us @kindergartenVF and @MrsCoppleSES.

We hope you'll join us!

Check out the INeLearn blog here...

Poetry, Music, and Fun... Oh My!

Show of hands...  How many of you use music or songs to build skills?  I know I use songs regularly, even if they are not actual songs, to teach my little learners skills.

It is no secret that I am pretty much obsessed with EVERYTHING my good friend Deedee Wills creates for the classroom.  I am pretty sure I own all of her products, and trust me when I say, they are worth the investment!  

I have used Deedee's poetry packs for four years.  We use them in whole group as well as during literacy station time.  In a word, they ROCK!

When I found out Deedee was creating a product that would put her poems to music, I was THRILLED!  Knowing how much we sing these poems, and the fact that I wouldn't have to do my best Broadway renditions anymore, I snatched those packs up as fast as I could!

There are endless ways you could use the music to enhance your poetry instruction.  In a whole group setting, you could, of course, burn the files to a CD.  To do that, it does take some technical skill, but this video explains the process beautifully!

Courtesy BestLaoSong's YouTube channel

I do not prefer to use the CD in my classroom; instead, I play them directly from iTunes on either my computer or iPad.  

I also use the music file to supplement my literacy work stations.  Each week, my students visit the poetry station.  While at this station, students have always read the poem, completed the word work activity that accompanies it, and read the poem again.  This is all great, but I was so excited to use the music to really beef up this station!

Here is how I do it:

Our school district uses an LMS called Canvas.  Canvas is used in all grade levels in our district, so naturally, I have chosen to use this with my students.  If your school does not have an adopted LMS, I would recommend using Showbie to push files out to your students.  Showbie is free to use, and pretty easy!

In Canvas, my students download the file to their iPads.  After the file is downloaded, students can listen to the poetry songs right on their device!  I love taking it a step further and having students create a ChatterPix of them reciting or singing the poem of the week!  

Make sure to check out this fantastic resource ASAP!  It's a must-have, for sure!

Building Fluency in the iPad Classroom

There are fewer tasks more important and less daunting than building fluency in young readers. Once a student has mastered the fine art of decoding and word attack skills, they are ready to move toward developing the fluency and stamina needed to tackle higher level reading comprehension.

It’s no secret that the key to becoming a more fluent reader is practice, practice, practice.  When I moved to first grade after teaching four years of third grade, I was suddenly finding myself at a loss for meaningful fluency activities.  I had felt for years that the activities I had completed with students were beneficial for my understanding of student growth, but had failed to provide the learner with activities that both enhanced their understanding of their learning while being engaging. 

I need to preface the following with this statement.  “Techy” that I am, I don’t believe in using tech for the sake of using tech.  Rather, I believe that we should always evaluate our practices for the BEST possible way to enrich our students’ learning.  I started to investigate and play with a few fluency activities that utilized our 1:1 student iPads. The following tips, tricks, activities, and thoughts will hopefully help YOU implement a successful, tech-fueled fluency program in your classroom! Enjoy. :)

The Power of the Camera

Students LOVE to hear and see themselves do just about anything, and teachers love to make assessment and grading as efficient as possible.  When you harness the power of the camera on the iPad, you can combine both of those desires into something pretty great!  Ask a student to read aloud to a teacher or classroom assistant and you will receive a mix of results.  Some students clam up and get nervous while others give an empathetic performance simply to “get it done.”  When you introduce the camera as their audience, things begin to change.  Students see a fluency reading as a chance to have power over their own assessment, and teachers are able to listen (and listen again if necessary) to their students’ reading whenever and wherever convenient.  The ability to listen, listen, and listen again to a fluency recording can hold tremendous advantage for both student and teacher.  Teaching students to listen for inaccuracies, automaticity, and prosody helps them become reflective and ultimately more fluent readers.  

Activity Suggestions  

Cold, Warm, Hot Reads:  Students record themselves on Monday reading a passage they have never seen, heard, or read before.  We suggest including the reading passage as well as recording chart within a digital interactive notebook using Book Creator (view a detailed post here http://2techieteachers.blogspot.com/2015/04/digital-interactive-notebooks-spruce-up.html) or perhaps a digital fluency notebook.  Students can then read the passage and record an audio clip right in their digital notebook.  Students can also simply record their audio or video and send it to you however they share files in your situation (GoogleDrive, LMS, etc.)  They should repeat a reading mid-week (warm read), and a final read on Friday (hot read).  Students should analyze their growth alongside the teacher. 

Trio Readings:  Students form trios to read a shared passage be it a song, poem, fresh read, etc.  Two students read the passage together while the third member records.  Students should listen to their recording and share advice on how to improve their fluency (automacity, prosody, and accuracy).  The trio will then shift jobs and read/record again.  I witnessed students having meaningful conversations with one another about their reading when participating in trio readings.  Just having the ability to HEAR themselves read is invaluable.

Short Reads/Excerpts:  In this activity, provide students with short fluency phrases or excerpts.  Basically any fluency passage/poem/song under 30 seconds will do.  Using apps like ChatterKids, students add audio clips to fun images of their choosing.  For example, during Dr. Seuss week we read one particular book that was full of tongue twisters (great for fluency practice).  Students chose a tongue twister from the book, selected an image from KidRex (safe search site for kids) of the main character, and recorded an audio clip of the passage.  ChatterKids allows the user to draw a “mouth” over the image which will move to the rhythm of the recorded audio clip.  Kids adore ChatterKids and will flip for any fluency activity that utilizes it! This is a FREE app that can be quite powerful for a variety of activities in the classroom.  Check it out! 

For Struggling Readers:  Something that became quite amazing for students engaged in intervention exercises was the ability to individualize and tailor activities that target their weaknesses.  On Mondays, I would call students to my round table and work through our list of first grade sight words and common phrases.  Those phrases and words they struggled with went into a separate pile.  Together, the student and I created a personalized video reading and discussing their struggle-point words and phrases.  For the rest of the week, the students listened and whispered through the video first thing during intervention block.  On Friday, we would recheck for growth in word/phrase fluency.  I found this activity particularly powerful for ESL students who struggle with proper phrasing. 

It’s my hope that you have gleaned an idea or two that will help guide your fluency instruction in your iPad classroom.  I encourage you to utilize the resources and materials you already have and make them work for your students.  I always find that once my mind has been opened to a new avenue, the possibilities become seemingly endless.  

Happy Reading!

-Tiffany

Not "Just" a Teacher: An Open Letter to Digital Leaders

Dear Teacher,

We see you. 

You're the one with one iPad to your name, but wanting so much more. You've spent your summer paying out of pocket to attend edtech conferences around the country just dreaming about the activities you want your students to experience. You don't just want more. You NEED more. 

Your passion and desire do not escape us. 

You are not "just" a teacher. You have the power to change your classroom. Your hallway. Your school. Your district. 

You may not have the title or every resource, but you can do this. You can be the spark of change, and you can do it from the bleachers. 

There will be persecution. Those that call you a showboat or loner. But you know differently. You know that the motivations behind doing what you do is for the right purpose. 

The kids. 

There will be failures. Those will make the successes sweeter. 

There will be tears. Those will motivate you to dust yourself off and try again. 

There will be late nights and short weekends. The hard work pays off. What's worth it isn't always easy. 

There will be frustration. And moments of feeling under-appreciated. You are oftentimes. 

But in the midst of all that, there will also be laughter, smiles, light bulbs, and JOY. 

So you keep doing what you do. We applaud you and encourage you to carry the torch of change.

You are NOT "just" a teacher. You are a mentor. A facilitator. An empowerer. A behind-the-scenes, doer and implementer of change. 

Your students are lucky. Immeasurably and incredibly blessed by the example you set. 

Now get out there and do what you do because YOU are a digital leader AND a teacher. 

-2TechieTeachers