September 10, 2019

We're all coaches, in some way shape or form!
Whether we are coaching our students, our own children, or the teacher across the hall, we all wear the coaching hat (or shorts, LOL!) at one time or another. I think that's why Diana's Benner's post on the TCEA blog struck home with me. I hope you have a chance to read it here this week. It's a great list of reminders that when we're in coach-mode to listen, to build relationships, to share successes, and to realize that we don't have to have all the answers. I know I need to be reminded of that sometimes in the classroom, in the workroom, and in my own dining room! We all need coaching some days!

Building Classroom Culture 
The graphic below is a great extension of Benner's post above. Sometimes it's the little things that make the biggest difference. 

Updated image for "10 Ways To Create an Amazing Classroom Culture" from #InnovateInsidetheBox cc @KatieNovakUDL #InnovatorsMindset https://t.co/ABmjOqE5JH pic.twitter.com/khNHQ3suIS

— George Couros (@gcouros) September 6, 2019

Digital Learning Spotlight: Flipgrid News
I'm a huge Flipgrid fan. I love its potential for formative assessment. I love its potential for giving our ELL's practice speaking into the computer. And I love its potential for use in station rotation models. Flipgrid is continually upping its game. If you are new to Flipgrid or looking for new ways to leverage this amazing tool, check out the Flipgrid blog. 

ELL Spotlight: Cloze Passages
I had the opportunity to do a little exploring in Texas Gateway this week and was reminded of the power of the Cloze passage for formative assessment, especially when it comes to reinforcing vocabulary for our English Language Learners. (If you haven't explored Texas Gateway, it's an amazing free resource for Core and CTE instruction.) Below is a screenshot of a traditional Cloze passage. Imagine the power of this passage for our ELL's if each of the vocabulary words at the bottom of the passage was accompanied by a picture: teacher-generated or student-selected. Mediating the language with visuals improves content comprehension.

Gmail Contact Groups, Changes to Flipgrid, Cleaning up your Chrome bookmarks bar, Digital Breakouts, Digital Whiteboard options, Twitter

Contacts and Email Groups in New Gmail

Looking for your email contacts in the new Gmail? Click on your "waffle" (thanks @AESBulldogs 1st graders for the vocab upgrade!) and scroll down to contacts. It is a blue circle with a person icon.

Need to set up a new email group? Open your contacts, click on the names you want to include, and click on the icon with multiple heads to name your group.

Changes to Flipgrid

Flipgrid changed its security this summer, and now your students will need to log in with their @banderaisd2.net credentials to access your grids. 

On the teacher end, you will need to click on the editing pencil next to your grid and enable students in our domain to log in. 

Accessing your grid as a student is a simple as 1-2-3.

Want to use this image with your students? Click HERE.

Clean up Your Chrome Bookmarks Bar

Thanks, Mrs. Rardin, @AESBulldogs, for sharing these easy-to-follow directions from A Turn to Learn for creating more space in your bookmarks bar and for organizing your bookmarks. 

Digital Breakouts

Learning games are having a moment, and digital breakouts are an amazing way to harness the power of technology and learning in the classroom. Thank you, Ms. Allison @BanderaMiddle, for sharing this repository of games from BreakoutEDU that can be searched by subject and grade level. From Orwell and Poe to WWII and Reconstruction, there are games to explore.

Digital Whiteboards

Looking for a way to include more instruction and/or collaboration in your Google Classroom? Consider a digital whiteboard. Just as its name implies, a digital whiteboard is a creative space that can be utilized like the whiteboard on the wall in your classroom...except this whiteboard is accessible 24/7. Last fall, TCEA's @mguhlin offered some tips for using digital whiteboards in the classroom, as well as a selection of whiteboard tools. Check out his post here.

If you have a student at AEP, on homebound, or need to conference with a student long distance, I like WebWhiteboard because you can collaborate on the board through a shared URL, the tool doesn't require a sign-in, and clearing the board and starting fresh is fast and easy. I like the SketchPad app for the same reasons but also because if you link the app to your Google account the drawings save automatically to your Google Drive. Either app pairs wonderfully with a screencasting app to model problem-solving steps to students; the screencasts can be shared in Google Classroom to reinforce learning.

Twitter

Bandera ISD has been telling our district's story on Twitter the last couple of weeks. If you are new to Twitter, no worries. Your administrators, curriculum leads, and and I will be there to help you in the weeks ahead. Haven't set up an account yet? Check out the sidebar of this post to see the latest tweets from @BanderaISD.

Changes to Flipgrid; Canvas & Google Drive integration; Educational hashtag database; Emojis

Changes to Flipgrid

Near the end of last school year as part of their transition to new system security, Flipgrid required passcodes to enter grids. Starting August 1, when you create a new grid, you can allow students to access by student id or by email. You only have to edit your grid once; the changes will apply to all the topics in your grid. 

When you log in, click on the pencil to edit your grid: 

Then, make your selection for accessing the grid. If you select email, you will enter banderaisd2.net for the domain.

Canvas and Google Drive Integration

If you are teaching dual credit courses and using Canvas, our very own Mrs. Barnet discovered this summer that you can link your Canvas and Google Drive accounts to simplify managing content. "You can download all kinds of apps on Canvas, including Google. You can still store your stuff on your Google Drive, and link it to your Canvas. It still populates in your Files, but it is located in your Google files instead of your Canvas files." Awesome news for those juggling DC and AP students in the same class!

Twitter: On-going Professional Development

Social media has really blown the doors off on-going professional development in the last several years. Many of us belong to professional groups on Facebook and follow educators in our field on Twitter to get on-going PD on-demand and at our own pace. If you are looking to dip your toe into the Twitter PD pool or looking for some new PD, Kasey Bell of Shake Up Learning maintains an educational hashtag database that is searchable by topic, grade level, subject, and more. Need help getting started? Just email me.

Emojis

Sometimes using an emoji is the just-right way to communicate an idea. EmojiCopy provides a copy/paste interface to access our favorite emojis on a computer.

The emojis can be added to Google Slides/Docs to provide students choices for commenting on text, responding to literature, reflecting on learning, and more.

Texas Gateway, Google Meet, and Flipgrid

Find Targeted Interactive Lessons for Specific TEKS

Skill level: beginner           Use: Curriculum resource

Texas Gateway is another resource to add to your teacher toolbox. Interactive lessons are continually being added to support grade level TEKS. As we prepare for STAAR testing and re-testing, Texas Gateway may be useful for finding a targeted lesson on a particular TEK. To get a feel for what's available, here is a lesson on summarizing informational/expository Text (English 6 Reading), an 8th grade science lesson on organizing data in scientific investigations, and an Algebra I lesson on solving quadratic equations with concrete models. The Texas Gateway site is definitely a work in progress. Lessons are not available for every TEK for every course, but as the site continues to grow, it is definitely worth perusing.

Google Meet

Skill level: beginner              Use: virtual meetings

Collaborating with a colleague on another campus just got a whole lot easier with Google Meet. Think Facetime or Skype with a screensharing capacity.  I found Meet to be much smoother and easier to navigate than Google Hangouts. Click HERE for instructions on how to get started.

If you're thinking, "Well, that's cool, but I don't need it," here are a few ways this tool may come in handy:

• Run into a problem with your Google-ness? We can use Meet to screenshare and work out the problem right away.
• Want to grow in your Google-ness outside of our regular tech integration meetings on campuses? Let's Meet when you have the time without having to leave your classroom or office, and you set the topic/time.
• Want your students to collaborate with students on another campus? Set up a whole class Meet so the students can see each other as they collaborate. Share stories, performances, activities. Screenshare on a collaborative Google Doc or Slide and see students on two campuses learn from each other.

  Encourage Your Students' Voices With Flipgrid

Skill Level: Intermediate          Use: Student collaboration & documentation of learning

Flipgrid is not a new tool in our district. Several of the BHS teachers have been using it in a variety of ways in their classrooms, and they're loving it! As the year winds down and you're looking for new ways to keep your students engaged in learning, you may want to try Flipgrid.
Flipgrid is a "video discussion community for your classroom....You add the topics, your students respond with short videos....Grids can be opened or locked." Flipgrid works on desktop, Chromebook, IOS, and Android devices.

Check out Amy Roediger's post on how her students used Flipgrid for a science experiment. Here's a 50 second explanation of FlipGrid.