#TellingOurStory, Google Calendar, Blended Learning Spotlight

#TellingOurStory

What a difference six months makes! In August we were talking about setting up social media accounts for our campuses, our organizations, and ourselves. And today if you search Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook, you can see the awesome things that are going on in BISD. 

To help out the people who are managing the campus accounts, please tag that campus if you are posting about something awesome in your classroom or for your organization. (example @BanderaMiddle or @HCEBulldogs). That way your post will show up in their feed and they can share it. 

Last week I heard an administrator share that she was so excited to find that you can search hashtags to connect with others. (ie #1stgrade #middleschoolscience #blendedlearning). Another way to locate people to follow is to simply do a Google search. (ie. top people to follow for social studies teachers, or top people to follow for math teachers.) You'll get a big list. Select one or two to follow. Pretty soon your virtual PLC will become an amazing resource. Last week when we got the email from Remind about their service changes, the first thing I did was email Richard Byrne from FreeTechnologyForTeachers. He responded within two hours, and I had information from an expert in the educational technology field. How amazing is that?

Google Calendar

Did you know that you can hide Google calendars that you subscribe to? Whether you are on a computer or a mobile device, you can check or uncheck calendars to make them visible or hide them. For example, if you subscribe to BISD's calendar or your campus calendar, you may only want to see those events some of the time. Simply uncheck the calendar in the Calendars list. You're still subscribed. You just don't have to look at the events all the time. Ahhh. Relief from calendar overload! 

Want to subscribe to someone's calendar? Click HERE for a cheat sheet or HERE for Google's support page that includes instructions for IOS, Android, and computer.

Blended Learning Spotlight

Chromebooks should be in the classrooms of the teachers awarded Digital Classrooms, and this week the teachers are participating in two days of professional development. Tuesday they'll be visiting Engaged Classrooms in Alamo Heights ISD, and Wednesday they'll be collaborating to harness the power of technology to allow more time for student-teacher interaction and to impact instruction and differentiation. Next month they'll be visiting Robertson Elementary in Round Rock ISD. That school, a recipient of a Raise Your Hand Texas grant, is in its third year of implementing blended learning. 

Many of the Digital Classroom teachers are participating or will participate later this spring in the UTeach Blended Learning series, a 30-hour professional development opportunity that allows participants to explore blended learning models and to create activities to implement blended learning in their classrooms. This spring ask the Digital Classroom teachers about what they're doing/seeing/learning.

 It's an exciting time to be teaching and learning in BISD. 

Digital Learning Spotlight, Canned Responses in Gmail, Limiting Comments in Social Media

Digital Learning Spotlight

Congratulations! You have almost survived the first six weeks. And that is a major accomplishment in itself. As teachers, we most clearly remember the end of the year, and that first six weeks is always a shocker no matter how many years we've been teaching. But give yourselves a double high five because you not only have been molding young minds and hearts, you've been harnessing your Googleness to impact student learning. There is so much going on out there. Here are just a few highlights.

Teachers are providing their students access to 24/7/365 learning with Math Flipped Lessons 

and Spelling and Sight Words. 

They're welcoming their families to their websites with grade level pictures.

They're providing students (and parents!) pages of study materials and...

... study tips to help students succeed in class.

They're co-teaching in Google Classrooms to encourage school-wide discussion of books, and...

...they're providing support for students who are absent or students who need to experience the learning again by recording videos and posting them in Google Classroom.

If this much awesomeness is going on in the first six weeks, I am excited to see how you will be impacting your students through digital learning in May. You are amazing!

Canned Responses in Gmail

If you need to send the same email content over and over again, the Canned Response option in Gmail is a true time-saver. The video below will give you an overview of what Canned Responses does. The screenshots show the old Gmail. If you are using the new Gmail, you will go to your settings and click ADVANCED instead of LABS, and you will click on the three dots next to the trashcan in your COMPOSE window instead of the arrow.  Pair a canned response with a Gmail Contact Group and the time saving grows exponentially. 

Need help creating groups? 

Old Google Contacts

• Click on the app launcher a.k.a. the nine boxes or the waffle
• Scroll down and click on the blue circle for Contacts
• In the left column, click on New Group
• Name the group
• The group will appear in the column under My Contacts
• Click on the 
• In the box that populates, type your email contacts.
• Next time you need to email the group, just start typing the group name into the TO: line

New Google Contacts

Limiting Comments On Social Media

If you find a need to limit comments on a social media account, here are some tips from Tiffany Pierce at AES.

Description:For a Facebook personal account, find instructions here.

For administrators of a Facebook Page, find instructions here. 

On Twitter: After you tweet, click on your post to open it and click on the small arrow in the top right corner. Choose "Turn off Commenting" or "Mute this conversation."

BISD on Social Media, Hour of Code, Google Slides and Apps

Calling All Tweechers

Looking for BISD-related feeds on social media? 

Facebook

Hill Country Elementary 

Alkek Elementary  

Bandera Middle School 

Bandera ISD

Twitter

@hcebulldogs

@aesbulldogs

@BanderaMiddle

@BanderaHigh

@BanderaISD

Want to share your Twitter handle with others in BISD? Click here.

Want to find others in BISD on Twitter? Click here. (Must be logged into @banderaisd2.net Google to access file.)

Remind

Hill Country Elementary: Text @c76kb to 81010

Alkek Elementary:  Text @22a7bf to 81010 
Bandera Middle School: Text @2hg927 to 81010

Instagram

Hill Country Elementary 

Trending Hashtags

For Student Centered Posts: #bluegrit #bulldogtenacity #WeAreBandera

For Teacher Centered Posts: #iteachbluegrit #bisdtweechers #bhstweechers 

Hour of Code 

We still have just under two weeks to go in the first six weeks, but it's already time to start thinking about celebrating Hour of Code the first week of December. 

Hour of Code can be celebrated in classes elementary through high school and in many subject areas. Susan Reeves at ESC-20 has put together a planning guide for campuses; however, the resources within the guide can help an individual teacher celebrate Hour of Code in a single classroom. Over the years @BanderaMiddle we have celebrated Hour of Code through English classes and science classes and technology classes and special programs. Need some ideas for integrating Hour of Code into your content area? Contact sgroff.

What? You Can Create an App in Google Slides?

Kasey Bell of Shake Up Learning hit a home run this month when she hosted a guest post by Micah Shippee showing how students (and teachers) can create "apps" using Google Slides. Check out the post here. I am super excited to see how teachers use this concept in the classroom. Here are a few ideas to get your students started:

Social Studies: an app for a time period (people, places, events, significance in history, etc.)

Science: a scientific method app with icons for question, hypothesis, etc.)

ELAR: an app for literature analysis or for student-generated grammar rules, or for different types of writing

Like the idea but need help implementing? I would love to co-plan and co-teach with you!

For teachers, wouldn't it be awesome to create an app with links to your Google Classroom, your email, your website, your campus library, etc.

Goo.gl, Google Drawings, Social Media, Privacy

Goo.gl is being retired

If you have been using the URL shortener goo.gl, you will need to find an alternative, as Google is retiring that tool. 

See Brenham ISD's post or Free Technology for Teachers post for several good alternatives.

Insert Diagrams Into Drawings

Looking for a quick and easy way for your students to take notes, show understanding, or process learning? Consider using Google Drawings.

Last week during one of the BHS PLC meetings, I learned that diagrams can be inserted into Google Drawings. Just open the drawing tool, click Insert, and select Diagram. There are a variety of diagrams including grids, hierarchies, timelines, processes, relationships, and cycles. The Drawings can be shared just like any other G-Suite document or they can be downloaded as a .pdf or .jpg.

If you have teens or teach teens...

With social media in the news this week, now is a great time to review privacy settings on devices with your students or children. The topic became personal this weekend when I received a Snap from my teenage niece. Her location was tagged. Needless to say, this aunt's alarm bells sounded. It was a great reminder that we need to help our kids navigate privacy settings on their devices and apps.

What's a parent/teacher to do? Common Sense Media, a national nonprofit that aims to provide trustworthy information to help families navigate 21st century tools, offers some great suggestions for adjusting location and other settings.  This link addresses the safety of teens using location apps, and this link offers suggestions for privacy settings for computers and smartphones. My top two suggestions to my niece? Turn off geotagging on photos and restrict location settings on apps.

Turn off geotagging of photos on devices

Restrict location settings on apps