Tools I use in Digital Immersion 9

I've been having some discussions with some of my colleagues about the tools I use to teach Digital Immersion (DI). So, I thought I'd create a list of sites/apps I use and how I employ them. By the way, not much has changed since 2007ish in terms of what I have been using (with some exceptions), but the sites have become more solid and refined.

Collection/Reading

Primarily, I use Google Reader as my hand-in box. Each student has their own Blog (either Tumblr, Blogger and WordPress) where they complete and hand in most of their assignments. These assignments are completed as a traditional Blog post, an embedded video/presentation/picture etc..., a link or a combination of some or all of these.

At the beginning of the semester I got all the kids to either create a new Blog (the best option) or send me a link to a previously made Blog which they will only use for school. I then created a folder (DI Blogs) and subscribed to each student. Then I renamed them all, sorted alphabetically and whammo...an RSS enabled, time stamped hand-in box!

Google Reader also allows me to follow some professional Blogs and my mom (shes paying me with hugs to shoot her mad props).





Communication and Professional Development


Twitter is my primary tool for communication with my students (it has become my way of sharing videos, shape of the day) and my colleagues. For my students, we use a hashtag to link all our posts #rsidedi, this allows us to all be on the same page when we share things.

I use Hootsuite as my Twitter dashboard for a couple of reasons:
1) its a Vancouver company
2) I like how its web-based and it doesn't matter what machine I am on
3) great iOS apps.

Hootsuite also lets me do a better job of following my Personal Learning Network (PLN). I made the following presentation last year about why Twitter and PLNs are  so important for teachers.
Building a personal learning network

View more presentations from jbsd43

I have started using Google+ over the last little while and it has started to become a staple on my screen. I especially like the ability to move people into different circles. I am trying to figure out how to use it as a teaching tool...but I'm not there 100% yet. Next year for sure!

Collaboration/Productivity


To collaborate with colleagues or students, I tend to gravitate towards Google Docs and WikiSpaces. Google Docs because the sharing function allows us all to edit at the same time. While this can be chaos (just try it with a group of Grade 9s and see) ... it also allows for really cool things like shared notes, collaborative projects and student created forms). When I look at the Digital Backpacks for 2011/2012, almost all of the students have chosen it as a worthwhile companion.

WikiSpaces has been a dream for education becuase of their genorous policies for k-12 students and staff. I can create ad-free pages where students can record lab results, which can include pictures and embedded videos. One of the best teaching/accountability tools is the history tab, which you allows to see who did what and when. Amazing when you have one kid crying and saying they did everything, then finding they did very little.








Assessment and Record Keeping


As I said earlier, I use my Google Reader for much of my written summative assessment. It's also great for the formative piece (making sure kids are up to date, quick little check your understanding snap-shots, etc....). For my formal testing I use Classmarker. It is an on-line test taking engine that allows your to create, edit and distribute tests very effectively. While the paid version is superior, the free mode suffices for us.

For recording marks, I use Engrade.ca (servers are in Canada so no FoIPA issues), the on-line gradebook which allows students to check their marks any time they want. It has done 2 things for me:
1) It has made me a better marker because of the accountability of students having real-time access to their marks
2) it has made me take a closer look at what I do mark. My understanding of summative and formative assessment has grown because of Engrade.

Final Thoughts

I have used many more apps than these over this past year. Prezi, Popplet, YouTube Trends, PHeT, etc.... not to mention everything I use on my iPad. But the ones listed are my mainstay... they just keep getting better and better.

Have any rock solid education apps? Please share!

My Scale of the Solar System Project

First off...I stole this project from Norm Stelfox! No claim of originality here ... just some modifications!

Step 1: Teach the basics of scale and ratios. This is the worst part because with the new mathematics curriculum, the grade 9's have a heck of a time with ratios. I start with this:



Step 2: Talk about Astronomical units (AU). Since the distance from the Earth to the Sun is 1AU, its an easy starting point. You can say "if the Earth is 1AU away from the sun which equals 149,597,870 km  then how far away is Neptune if it is 30.06AU? They will struggle with this for a bit but will eventually see how the ratio works.


Step 3: Use Google Maps (or Google Earth) to make a personal map of the solar system (this is their practice).
The school becomes the Sun and their house becomes the Earth. Every kid will have a different scale and every project will be unique to them! If they live close to the school, Neptune won't be that far away ...but if they live far away... the distances will be exaggerated to epic proportions!

Here is my simple Sun and Earth map to give the kids an idea where to start (as you see...I live at the Seniors Center)


View Solar System Map in a larger map

Now I don't share their maps because they have personal information (like where they live)

Step 4: The tester!
Now get them to repeat the process in another city with 2 great monuments (Paris, Rome, Istanbul, New York, etc...)

Here is I.M. Pei's Pyramid at the Louvre as the Sun and the Arc de Triomphe in Paris.


View France solar system model in a larger map

This is a fun little way to show scale and gives the kids an idea of distances in the solar system in a more manageable way. I always end with:

What I have learned part 10: Mentorship leads to innovation

In my 10 years of teaching, I have had some amazing mentors. One in particular stands out: Norm Stelfox. Now, I don't know if I agreed with everything Norm told me... but one thing stuck with me more than anything else: "Never sit on your laurels".

When I started, I was an old-school teacher. I marked every assignment as a summative assessment (I had over 70 marks in my grade book for each kid and I was told "thats OK but try to do better"), I sat at the front of the class and wrote notes on the overhead, I assigned loads of homework (sometimes as a punishment), etc...

What changed for me was seeing Norm run Science Olympics in his class. Each kid was engaged, they were learning more than the kids in mine and there was no classroom management issues. I was blown away. I wanted to do this for the kids on my class so bad! Norm graciously mentored me and it was my Age of Enlightenment. 

After that, I started to embrace other ideas...one bit at a time. assessment for learning, proper use of summative and formative assessment, technology in the classroom, project based learning, personalized learning, etc...

My classes became joyful and at the same time, I became a better teacher. I still have the commitment to never be happy with past successes... to always propel myself forward.

Everywhere I looked around, I saw the same thing happening. The only difference was the pace of the innovation. And that was ok... think of it as a parade...some are at the front, some are in the middle and some are pulling up there rear. If we keep the parade moving, we will all get to the end together!

This has happened at my school as we introduced technology. When anyone starts teaching with technology, the first thing they use is PowerPoint. Its a great starting tool. Eventually they all end up using blogs. wiki's, podcasting, google stories and the 1000s of other tools out there. Its the natural progression of the parade.

My message is simple: Don't be afraid to innovate. Do it at your own pace. Be bold with your projects and share them with your colleagues (especially the new ones =D). 

What I have learned part 9: Teaching is more than standing in front of a class... be a school teacher

Classroom Teacher vs. School Teacher

A classroom teacher teaches his or her class...that's it. They might do amazing things in that class but they don't involve themselves in the greater community.

A school teacher does everything a classroom teacher does and makes his or her school an amazing place to attend everyday. These are the people that volunteer hours upon hours of their own time. They measure grad caps and gowns, chaperone dances, organize school trips, coach multiple sport teams, go to games and events, start clubs, dress up like an elf for the community Christmas dinner, etc... the list is endless. These are the teachers that make a school go from good to great. They pillars of the community, always relied upon to do that one extra thing. People like Carlo Muro, Bryan Gee, Jen Nelson and so many others, who walk our hallways and stop and talk to every kid they know. They ask about the basketball game on the weekend and make sure the student is getting help for their maths even though they are PE teachers. They are the teachers you remember, the ones who changed your life.

Yesterday, the CBC did a TV spot which included a picture of me in front of a class with a list of things teacher's aren't doing during this strike action (Click here for the article/video). The piece went on to talk about how the employer wants a 15% clawback on wages for work not done. To tell the truth I thought it was rather funny... because they never tell the other side of the story My question is this... despite knowing that the threat of a clawback from the employer is rhetoric, isn't it kind of dangerous putting a monetary amount what teachers do other than teaching? How does that inspire the new teachers or even the more "experienced" (don't say old) to become School Teachers?

Beyond the mess we are in right now, my advice is this: Get involved in your school. Becoming part of a staff and a building will reward you in so many different ways.  you will get everything you put in 1000 times back.

And CBC... why couldn't you use this picture?

Dear Uncle Harry... and to all the others battling cancer

This post is personal and its about connections. Sometimes in this job, things connect in such an such profound way that you really need to share them. Let me explain:

My Uncle Harry

Over the past month my grade 9 Digital Immersion Class has been studying cellular reproduction, mutations of DNA and inevitably cancer. As we learned about all the science behind the disease, stories about loved ones with cancer started to be shared in our little class.

September is also the month that we celebrate the life of Terry Fox and the lives of all those that we love who have been stricken with this disease. It is an especially profound time for those of us who live in Terry's home town of Port Coquitlam.

So, as a class we decided to honour Terry, our grandparents, dads, sisters, cousins and in my case, my Uncle Harry. We ran the run and raised over $5000 as a school for Cancer research. During this process we decided as a class to document both Terry's life and the lives of their loved ones.

Below are some of the videos, I hope you enjoy and are inspired by the stories told by these 13 and 14 year olds. As a personal note, please donate to Cancer research and our prayers are with all of you (keep fighting Uncle Harry!).

Bryan and I running for the cure

What I have learned Part 8: If you don't love what you are doing.... do something else

I love this little clip. Every time I watch it I go back and examined my own teaching practices. Sometimes I catch myself falling into the some of these patterns. It's easy to stand in front of a class and yap, hand out worksheets and "teach the same thing 25 times". It reminds me of Dr. Seuss' "Oh, The Places You'll Go". Especially the following quote:

You won’t lag behind, because you’ll have the speed. You’ll pass the whole gang and you’ll soon take the lead. Wherever you fly, you’ll be best of the best. Wherever you go, you will top all the rest.
Except when you don’t.
Because, sometimes, you won’t.
I’m sorry to say so but, sadly, it’s true that Bang-ups and Hang-ups can happen to you.
You can get all hung up in a prickle-ly perch. And your gang will fly on. You’ll be left in a Lurch.
You’ll come down from the Lurch with an unpleasant bump. And the chances are, then, that you’ll be in a Slump.
And when you’re in a Slump, you’re not in for much fun. Un-slumping yourself is not easily done.
You will come to a place where the streets are not marked. Some windows are lighted. But mostly they’re darked. A place you could sprain both your elbow and chin! Do you dare to stay out? Do you dare to go in? How much can you lose? How much can you win?
And if you go in, should you turn left or right…or right-and-three-quarters? Or, maybe, not quite? Or go around back and sneak in from behind? Simple it’s not, I’m afraid you will find, for a mind-maker-upper to make up his mind.
You can get so confused that you’ll start in to race down long wiggled roads at a break-necking pace and grind on for miles across weirdish wild space, headed, I fear, toward a most useless place.
The Waiting Place…for people just waiting.
Waiting for a train to go or a bus to come, or a plane to go or the mail to come, or the rain to go or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow or waiting around for a Yes or No or waiting for their hair to grow. Everyone is just waiting.
Waiting for the fish to bite or waiting for wind to fly a kite or waiting around for Friday night or waiting, perhaps, for their Uncle Jake or a pot to boil, or a Better Break or a string of pearls, or a pair of pants or a wig with curls, or Another Chance. Everyone is just waiting.
No! That’s not for you!
Somehow you’ll escape all that waiting and staying. You’ll find the bright places where Boom Bands are playing. With banner flip-flapping, once more you’ll ride high! Ready for anything under the sky. Ready because you’re that kind of a guy!

Like the poem says,  I'm just not content with doing things that don't excite me any more. I want to try new things. This is one of the reasons I started the Digital Immersion Program at Riverside. I didn't want to be a "teacher" in the traditional sense. I wanted to be the "lead learner" among a group of inquisitive people. It's like Dufour's community of learners but with students as the primary inquiry group.

During this process, admin, parents, students and other teachers were are all very supportive and eager to join in. I think it helped revitalize some of them as well. The support is there... but you need to try/ask/beg to do what you love to do.

Passion, perseverance and planning will go a long way :)

Ten things I have learned Part 7: No surprises

Jim Nelson taught me one of the greatest lessons for a teacher: People don't like being surprised. He would give examples of how simple problems had been blown out of proportion because one party hadn't talked to another. In fact, I think he actually wrote a song about it :)

My beef with  teachers, parents and kids is: in today's social world, what excuse is there for not finding someway to communicate with each other? We can use Twitter, Engrade, email, BBM, text, phone and god forbid face to face :) Set up a distribution list with parent emails... have your students create a class newsletter of upcoming events in your class (When tests are, showcases of student work, etc...), give our your twitter handle at meet the creature night :)

No one likes to know on the last day of classes that their son or daughter is failing. Kids are often to ashamed (or in my case, too delusional) to tell mom and dad about poor performance. If you want to stop all 90% of your issues with parents... just communicate better.