The One Where I Notice Teachers are Miracle Workers

Every year it seems expectations increase as does the amount of content teachers have to cover. Like most teachers, I've shuffled things around to make it work. However, try as I might, there are some things that there never seems to be time for anymore.

Out of the things that I've had to push aside... the one I miss the most is talking with my students and getting to know them more personally. While I still know each one fairly well, it is not the same as it used to be.

With inspiration from +Sue Gorman  (@sjgorman on twitter), I decided to make a simple Google form each day so I could get an idea of how my students were feeling each morning. I've been doing this for about a month and the results I've gotten back each day have made me realize something about teachers.

We are miracle workers.

I'm not necessarily using that as hyperbole either. The very last graphic below shows a sampling of some of my students' responses in one day. Notice the roller coaster of emotions: "I'm tired because my parents let me play on the XBox until 11pm", "I'm angry because my brother beat me up on the way to school again", "I'm happy because we are taking a math benchmark test today", "I'm nervous because we are going on a field trip and the bus has no seat belts", "I'm excited because I'm seeing grandma this weekend", "I'm very sad because our dog is sick and at the vet. They might have to put him down"

Those are a sample of some very real responses I received on one of the days I've been doing this. The fact that teachers are able to get anything done with the wide range of emotions is, in my humble opinion, AMAZING! If you are a classroom teacher, pat yourself on the back for the miracles you work each and every day with the wonderful, beautiful, emotional children you have been assigned. Below is a step-by-step for how to get started making a simple Google Form to do the same thing. It literally takes about 2 minutes.

Go into Google Drive. your screen should look something like this:

Click on the red CREATE button and then select FORM from the list:

I usually title the form with the date, followed by a quick saying. For example, "April 30, 2014 - How Do You Feel This Morning?" and then I choose a random theme each day. Click OK after you have done this.

The main screen should appear and look something like this. On this particular form, I titled it "Monday, April 28, 2014"

If your screen shows choices similar to these at the top, I always select the top two choices. If you don't, you won't know which student is saying each comment (which sort of defeats the purpose).

I type in the question. In this case "How do you feel today?" In the help text, I usually add something like "Please answer with as much or as little as you want to say. No one will see your response except for me. I read every response each morning.". Make sure for QUESTION TYPE to change it to PARAGRAPH TEXT and check the box the reads REQUIRED QUESTION.

After you click DONE, your screen should look like this. Once here, click on SEND FORM.

Where it says "Send form via eMail" type in the eMail addresses for your class (I already have them in a group, so I just type the word 'class' in the box and all of their eMail addresses show up). Click DONE after that.

As students start to submit their answers, this is how they start to shape up on the RESPONSES spreadsheet that is automatically generated.

Back in Google Drive, the form shows up in my list of files along with an auto-generated spreadsheet that houses their responses.

If you click RESPONSES at the top and then select SUMMARY OF RESPONSES 

You will get a screen like this that will show you what your students are feeling like on that day. 

The One Where We Switch to Front Row

Front Row Math

My 4th graders have been using the newly revamped Khan Academy website on our iPads since Mid-November. Things have been going great and I have seen a fantastic, better than average, increase in MAP Math scores from August to January.

I read a Tweet recently that mentioned an App called Front Row (or Front Row Ed Math). It is very similar to Khan in many ways but has some thing unique to it that I really like. Both Khan and Front Row are FREE and both give teachers access to "More Data About Their Students Than They Could Ever Use."

I have already written in length about the Khan Academy and it very positive effects in our classroom. Test scores have improved for all of my student (some dramatically). We are now using Front Row as a "Change of Pace" from Khan. Here are some of the "Data" highlights... To the left there are clickable areas like "Insights" (my favorite), Groups, Matrix, Common Core Standards, Class Roster, Report Card, and Printables (My 2nd Favorite). Clicking on the "Insights" tab brings up the screen below. Clicking on the arrows on the right will drop down each section revealing your students "Most ahead" and "Most behind" as well as who is improving the most and the least. The last section reads "What's the Most Important Standard I need to teach next? 

Clicking on that will bring up this screen and you can see what standards students are missing the most.

Clicking on the standard itself will show you examples of the types of questions they are missing.

My other favorite feature is the printables section.....

I've only used the "Individualized Practice". If you click on GENERATE PDF it will generate an individualized worksheet for EACH STUDENT based on their appropriate level of success in that area. Don't worry, it also generates a mini answer key for each child's worksheet. Pretty Slick! 

I don't know if Front Row Ed will ever replace Khan in my class, but ALL students like it right now as a great change of pace!

What do you think? Have you used Khan Academy? Do you use Front Row? If you have tried both, which do you prefer?

The One Where I Storybird on iPads!

I recently discovered that a website I used with my class several years ago has, at some point, rewritten their code to be compatible on iPads! This has been great news for my 1:1 iPad students! Storybird is a site where students write stories and collaborate with artists from around the world. Here is how it works...

As a teacher, I created a free account and was given a passcode for my students to sign up (no eMail needed). The passcode attached each student to my account and allows me access to their stories if needed.

When a student clicks on the CREATE button, they see a screen similar to this one. Each picture is from a different artist and they can scroll through hundreds of artists who have donated their artwork to be used on the site, royalty-free. So, from the pictures below - say a student really likes the "Haunted House" picture. They select it and then....

This screen will come up. On this screen, students get to see ALL of the artwork by this one artist. From here, they select the portfolio of art they want to use for their story. In this case, I selected the Haunted House portfolio but I could choose any thumbnail at the bottom to select a different portfolio of art from this person.

Next, students see their "Desktop" which has their empty Storybird in front of them and all of artwork tossed about on the left and right of there book. Controls are at the bottom for navigation and adding pages. Pictures are switched out simply by drag and drop. 

Hit the Plus sign in the bottom right to add pages. One simple font is used for all Storybirds. 

Another page is added.

This student clicked SAVE in the bottom left corner. As a teacher, this screen shows me my students and their Storybirds. I can share, favorite, comment on, or delete their Storybirds.

When I click on one of their Storybirds, it will enlarge on the screen along with this control panel that allows me to to see some basic data about their 'Bird as well as assign it a grade (viewed only by the student) and notes about their story.

One of the more intriguing features of Storybird is that their books can be purchased as a PDF, a softcover book, a hardcover, or a premium format book. Costs vary depending on how many pages are used. The site also offers fundraising for classrooms or schools. 

Storybird has been a great experience for all of my students. It helps both their writing AND reading skills. We have integrated it into our writing curriculum. I also have several highly motivated students that have been creating their own Storybirds at home.

We have all used it on our iPads using both Safari and Chrome as browsers to access the site www.Storybird.com

Please contact me if you have any questions or need help getting started

The One Where I List What iPads Changed For Me

Last September I started using 1:1 iPads my classroom. Over the past few months I've had my share of successes and failures. To say this has been the largest growth of my teaching career would be a tremendous understatement. These are the Top Five ways "Our iPad Classroom" has changed my teaching:

1) Students as teachers! No teacher knows everything. Even me. As much as I like to pretend sometimes that I know the answer to everything, I simply don't. Using 1:1 iPads, I've had many students come up to me with App usage questions. As much as I am able to help them, just as often, I have no idea how to do what they are asking. 

This is where my students have grown into technology leaders. I will usually ask, "Who knows how to (for example) add text to a picture in edit mode in iMovie?". Usually 5-10 hands will go up and I direct the student to seek the answer with one of them. Students LOVE feeling helpful/useful/knowledgeable and "knowing more than the teacher does" is a BIG confidence booster for them! It is a win-win-win situation!

2) Creating Creative Creations! While my students still handle an occasional worksheet (usually digital), my class has definitely moved more towards CREATING products to show their knowledge of curriculum. Geometry in the Real World iMovies, Explain Everything Story Summaries, and Tellagami Vocabulary Videos are just a few examples of my students using multiple levels of intelligence to showcase their knowledge across the curriculum. Once these projects are created, that leads me to the next classroom transformation....

3) Breaking Down Classroom Walls! These projects are great and would be fine just sitting on their iPads. However - students almost always do better and put in more effort if they know more people are going to see the work than just their teacher and maybe their parent(s). Let's face it - the same goes for most adults. A lot of us will put in extra effort if we know a large audience will be seeing our work rather than just 1-2 people. YouTube, eMail, and Google Drive have allowed us to take these wonderful creations and easily share them with parents, grandparents, relatives, friends, and other educators. 

I have a student who is pretty good at Math. She created an iMovie to showcase her knowledge of geometry. She also created music to accompany it using Garageband. Her music was AMAZING and her video has been seen and commented on by her mom, aunt, grandma, classroom teacher (me), music teacher, as well as several other teachers from across America. Talk about enthusiastic! I share this with my class as an example of what can happen when you create something "Worthy of the Web".

4) 95% Paperless! Paper is at a premium and I'm proud to say that we have figured out ways to go almost completely paperless in our class. Google Drive, Notability, etc. have allowed my students to take tests, complete daily work, and display their knowledge of content all without using a single sheet of paper. 

5) From Teacher-Centered to Student-Centered! This is a move that I have been hesitant to make for a long time. It always felt to me like a student-centered classroom involved me giving up classroom control. The iPads have allowed my to act as more of a coach, letting the students work on their projects while moving around and guiding them when necessary. It also allows kiddos the ability to work ahead and move beyond grade level - truly differentiating their learning. Giving more Project-Based assignments allows each student the opportunity to work at the level they are at. With the integration of technology into these projects, it allows some students to shine who otherwise may not have had many chances in a traditional classroom.

So - Where do I go from here? There are several Apps I've had for awhile that I've never used with the students. The top of the list? Explain Everything. There is also a fairly new App called Stick Around (#StickAroundApp) created by Tech Guru Tony Vincent @tonyvincent (http://tinyurl.com/m57wh2n) that looks very promising to use with my students to assess what they know about certain content. 

I plan to use the same philosophy I had in the first semester: Slow and steady wins the race!

The One Where We Showcase our iPads

Yesterday I invited parents to our class for an overview of the iPads (which includes our district philosophy regarding them) as well as a question and answer session. During this time, the students were out of the room at specials.

When they returned, students shared with parents some of the amazing work they have been creating in class. Their projects, which included a Skitch/Tellegami/iMovie App Smash involving Reading Vocabulary and a "Geometry in the Real World Scavenger Hunt" which involved Skitch, Photo Booth, iMovie and (for some) Garageband, were simply incredible and (as my colleague Brent Catlett noticed) the kids were SO excited to play their creations for them - most of them turned their heads to watch their parent's reactions to what they had made. Very inspirational!

After the sharing, I gave an assignment to each parent/student team. The assignment was given to them much the same way I now communicate many assignments with the class - as a shared doc in Google Drive. Basically - the families were asked to use Tellagami and iMovie to create a child/parent interview. Children used Tellagami to ask their parents a set of 4 questions (for example, "What is a special memory you have of elementary school?"). Children then recorded their parents in iMovie sharing the answers. They then spliced together the Q&A from each source to make one movie. It really gave the parents a nice understanding of what the children are capable of and how they are continuing to become technology leaders in our school.

One of the questions a parent had that we spent some time talking about was "Digital Citizenship". While it is a topic that I have covered off and on throughout this whole experience - it is definitely something that we will delve deeper into as the year progresses. We heard several parents voice their concerns with their kids at home when they play games online (Like Minecraft and Clash of Clans) with people they don't know and accept them as 'friends' in the game. This worries them. As a parent of three boys myself (ages 4, 9, and 11) it concerns me as well. As we enter the 3rd quarter I will be developing more lessons with the students on what it means to be a good Digital Citizen.

All in all it was a great day. The highlight for me was watching the students lead their parents (and grandparents) in the planned activity. Hosting this also gave me a good idea of the concerns and comfort level of parents of child in a 1:1 iPad classroom.

 

The One Where We App Smash Our Reading Vocab with Tellagami

My 1:1 iPad Tech Specialist, Brent Catlett, recently introduced our class to a "New-to-Us" App called Tellagami. Tellagami allows students to make an avatar and place it in front of a premade digital background OR any picture of your own. Once the picture is placed and your avatar is made the avatar stands in front of the picture and can speak (in your own voice or in several digital voices) about whatever you want to. One nice feature is that the app only allows you to record for 30 seconds so if challenges students to be thoughtful and precise in their creation.

After we had our discovery time with the app, our class was asked to think of ways we could use it within our curriculum. One great suggestion given was to use it to demonstration knowledge of reading vocabulary. We tried it out this week for the first time and below and a few of the results.

Here is the process each student had to go through:

1) Look up the definition of each word.
2) Find a picture (or take one of yourself) the "shows" the meaning of the word.
3) Put each picture in the app Skitch and write the name of the vocab word that matches the picture.
4) For each word, put the picture you chose in Tellagami, create an avatar for yourself and then yourself A) saying the word, B) defining the word, C) Using the word in a sentence and, D) describing the word in the picture behind the avatar.
5) Export each Tellagami video file into iPad camera roll.
6) Open up iMovie and create a single video file with all 8 Tellagami videos. Bookend the Tellagami clips with a video of the student introducing the project.
7) Upload the video to our classroom YouTube account.

Whew! As with anything practice makes perfect. For their first time doing this, I was amazed at what they came up with! We also also working on being original (which may include being funny) in their work. In the first example below - I loved how the student used that comical picture of the owls in the house to illustrate what the word overwhelm means. It was definitely memorable and that is one of our main goals in doing this - making memorable experiences that they can recall from later.

For all of my students, this experience will be something they remember much better than if we, say, just talked about the words and definitions at the board or had them do a worksheet about the vocabulary words for the week.

The One Where I Truly Differentiate Math Instruction

Updated on 3/11/2014 - Check notes at the bottom
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Have you seen the newly revamped Khan Academy website? Most of us know of The Khan Academy as "That place with all those Math Videos". While it still has those easily accessible - the site has completely re-imagined the way in which math can be taught.

When you go to www.khanacademy.org you sign up and then add your students (or own children). Each student then logs in and takes an 8 question math test. Some of the questions are very difficult and some are relatively easy. If one is too hard for them, they click a button that reads "I haven't learned this yet." and then it asks them an easier question.

Once the test is finished, it "levels" the student at where they are in general math knowledge. From that point, students work at their own pace through thousands of lessons. In each lesson, it will ask them a series of questions about a certain topic. If they are confused about the topic, they have the option of watching a Khan video during the lesson to help them with the concept. The site has a depth and breadth unlike any Math site I've seen. As I told my own sons when I signed them up "It is a marathon, not a sprint".

One of the reasons I like the site is that it "scores" the students equally. Meaning my lowest students that are taking Khan lessons on concepts like 2 digit addition are scored the same as my gifted students that are studying concepts like dividing with decimals and scientific notation. Each student can earn the same amount of points for correctly answering questions. About a week in, I discovered a way to sort the students by number of points they have earned (they earn skills points each time they get a question correct). When I sorted the list, the top 5 names were of the five best math students in my class. No surprise there. However, the 6th name was of my student who struggles the most in Math! When I read the list of the top 6 names aloud - #6 almost jumped out of his seat. I'm pretty sure his name has rarely ever been associated with the top math students in his class - but today it was! The excitement all over his face was truly priceless!!!

Another reason I like the site is that it works on multiple platforms, not just on a PC-based web browser. It works 100% on the iPads, iPods, Laptops, etc. Having 1:1 iPads in my class helps with this because each student has complete access to Leveled Math Content whenever they need it. There is NO downtime in my classroom!

I also enjoy the site because of the amount of data it gives me on each student. For any given student in my class, I can see:

• Skills they have mastered
• Skills they are struggling with
• How much time they have spent on the site during school hours
• How much time they have spent on the site at home
• Each individual question they answered in each lesson
• How many seconds they spent on each question
• How many attempts they gave on each question
• If they used any built in hints for the lesson
• If they watched the Khan Video to help them in the lesson
• and SO MUCH MORE!

I also use Khan at home as a parent of two school-aged boys. When they want to play their video games, I ask them to do 5 lessons on Khan first. We have repurposed our laptop (which has been rarely used in the last couple of years) and have it set up at a table in the dining room with Khan Academy ready to go!

Finally - I have seen my student use Khan for the last few weeks and it is amazing to watch how it differentiates for EACH student in the class. It is truly amazing and - if I haven't mentioned before - it is completely FREE! I would be glad to help anyone get started with their class or own children.
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Updated 3/11/2014

Does Khan work? I think so, I had (nearly) all of my students improve significantly on their Winter MAP Math test. The two student I have had using Khan the longest (and had already had extremely high scores in the fall) earned scores of 251 and 258! Not bad for 4th graders.

If Khan isn't working or if you want a change of pace, try the App Front Row Ed Math or IXL Math.