Teaching with Technology

Using educational technology to enhance the learning environment and increase student engagement!

Offering Students CHOICE: CREATE in the Classroom Series

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Happy Sunday, my friends! I’ve been a bit MIA lately for a few reasons: first, I’ve been spending every spare minute writing my second book, CREATE, which will be published by DBC soon! More on that later 😀 Second, in addition to teacher-hood, I’m also a pretty busy MOMMA! My daughters, ages 7 and almost 9, are involved in ALL of the things, ranging from piano lessons to ballet/tap/jazz multiple nights a week, as well as basketball and soccer practices and games. It is CRAY-CRAY every day in the Petty household, especially since my husband (a finance manager for a car dealership) works super unpredictable hours. We often find ourselves eating late suppers at our favorite Mexican restaurant so we can all be together for one meal each day! I know you know exactly what I’m talking about – we’re all busy people! To help welcome CREATE into the world, I’m starting a new series to debut each component of the title/acronym … you know I’m a sucker for a good acronym! Welcome to the first installment – offering CHOICE in the classroom!

 

Through intentional tech integration, teachers can offer their students more CHOICE when it comes to how they plan to demonstrate their learning. Are you a fan of essays? Go for it. Would you prefer to create a visual representation of what you’ve learned using a sketchnote, mind map or something similar? Be my guest. Do you want to try your hand at creating a game to demonstrate what you’ve learned? How about a tweet? Do it! Students take more ownership and pride in a project in which their choice is taken into account. If you think about it, we all take more ownership and pride in work when we have had an option on how we share information.

How do you provide students with CHOICE in your classroom? Every unit HyperDoc in our American Government class includes an extension page that students can complete to earn Bonus XP and review for their unit assessment at the same time. I always include a choice board aka Show What You Know BINGO which includes many options for students to create demonstrations of what they’ve learned. Students appreciate the opportunity to choose what they create to demonstrate what they’ve learned. Sometimes providing choice isn’t an option because of course standards, learning targets, etc. But, when we can provide choice, doing so can increase student engagement and quality of work!

How do you encourage choice in your classroom?

Thanks for reading 🙂

Tips for Using Google Classroom – Tip #5

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Happy Thursday! We’re in the middle of Homecoming Week in my district – today was “decades day” and I was a bit stumped as to what to wear. I settled on my Declaration of Independence shirt that I bought over the summer when we were in Philadelphia for ISTE and am representing the ’70s … the 1770s that is! Yes, I’m a nerd 😀 Even though we’re a third of the way through October, we’re still technically in 1st quarter, which means we’re still technically in back-to-school mode, right? Therefore, finishing my back-to-school with Google Classroom series today is just fine! Don’t judge – this semester has been super hectic!

What’s the final tip for using Google Classroom?

DRUMROLL, PLEASE …

Archiving Classes!

Yes, archiving your classes is tip #5. While there are many different perspectives on the best way to create sections in Google Classroom, such as creating a new section in Classroom each quarter, for each unit, etc., I have anxiety about actually deleting a class or deleting content from the Classroom stream when I’m finished with the course or the unit. Therefore – I archive my classes at the end of each course.

Archiving class sections has three main benefits for me:

  1. Pacing: I really REALLY appreciate the ability to look back at previous years to be sure I’m making adequate progress. Sometimes, particularly in my dual credit classes, I find myself getting bogged down in my favorite topics, including the US Constitution, Greek Mythology, the Colonial Period, and the Protestant Reformation. It’s nice to be able to glance at the previous year’s section of each course to make sure I’m plugging away as I should!
  2. Reusing Posts: Have you used this feature? In Classroom, when you’re creating an assignment for a class, you can select “reuse post” to, for lack of a better phrase, “reuse” an old post from a previous, ARCHIVED class section. Can’t do that if you delete your class section!
  3. Accessing Student Assignments: Accessing student assignments is, in my opinion, much easier to do in an archived section of Classroom than searching around my Google Drive, digging through dozens of folders in an attempt to locate a file.

Do you archive your classes? What other tips can you share about using Google Classroom?

Thanks for reading 🙂

 

 

Using Google Classroom – Tip #4

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Happy Saturday, all! I took a mental health day yesterday and it was fantastic! I think teachers are all too often shamed (directly or indirectly) for taking a day off – and that SHOULD NOT HAPPEN! Yes, yesterday was my high school Homecoming parade(this is my 15th year out of high school!) and Grandparent’s Day at my daughters’ school. Since my mom is still teaching (this is year 30 something!) at their school, that only leaves my dad to do double-grandparent duty. Which means, Momma is coming to Grandparent’s Day! Fortunately, my daughters’ school recognizes that not everyone has grandparents that are able to come, so they make all visiting adults feel welcome 🙂 Even though we’re nearing the end of September, I still feel like it’s “back to school” time, so I’m sharing another one of my favorite tips for using Google Classroom!

It’s no secret that I’m a HUGE fan of Google Classroom. We use it as a landing page in all of my classes. All of the assignments, materials, and resources that my students need to access for my classes can be found in Google Classroom. It’s all RIGHT THERE! My students appreciate the fact that they don’t have to search all over the place to find objectives, HyperDocs, ELFs, extension opportunities, task lists when their teacher takes a personal day, etc. Google Classroom, which celebrated its fifth birthday last week, is a great fixture in our classroom.

Now, on to the tip!

DRUMROLL, PLEASE …

The fourth tip for using Google Classroom is …

MOBILE APPS!

Yes, that’s right! Download the mobile app to your phone to make your life easier on the go! Are you sitting in the doctor’s office waiting for an appointment? Whip out your phone, open your Classroom app and get caught up on evaluating student work and providing feedback.

Did you take a personal day and forget to share a task list with one of your classes? No? Does that only happen to me?! Simply open your Google Classroom app and share needed info with your students!

Google is always making updates not only to Classroom, but also to the mobile apps in order to allow seamless usage between the app and the website. It’s FABULOUS.

The Classroom app (on my iPhone and iPad) has saved my tail many times over the last few years. How do you use the Google Classroom mobile app?

Thanks for reading 🙂

Tips for Using Google Classroom – Tip #3

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Happy Friday, all! If you’re getting back into the classroom this week – welcome back! If you’ve been in session for the last three weeks like me, how’s it going?! In case you missed it, I shared an image earlier this week (or was it late last week??!) with some tips for using the Share to Classroom extension. Be sure to check it out here if you haven’t!

I started the Top Tips for Using Google Classroom series late this past summer and am excited to share with you the next installment – Tip #3!

A bit of a backstory – in addition to teaching high school Social Studies during the day, I also teach Educational Technology online for pre-service teachers. I’m a busy gal 🙂 The college uses a learning management system that is, lets put it this way, is not my favorite, and I’ve been allowed to use Google Classroom instead. PRAISE THE LORD! Since I teach multiple sections of the same course, I use a lovely trick when assigning work, posting announcements, sharing materials, and asking questions: select multiple classes!

When you create a post, simply click on the dropdown triangle next to the name of your class, and select all of the classes with which you’d like to share the post. Easy – peasy! This prevents me from forgetting to assign a specific resource or assignment with my classes and helps ensure that the assignments are the same name across all classes.  Also – it’s a huge timesaver!

Keep sharing your favorite Google Classroom tips in the comments!

Thanks for reading 🙂

Gather Evidence of Learning with Google Forms

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Happy Thursday! Today was the last day of the week with students for me – we’re in PD tomorrow and then off on Monday for the Labor Day holiday in the US. My school year is off to a GREAT start and I hope you’re enjoying an awesome transition back to school. I’ve revamped a few things in my flipped classroom this year to help me be more present individually with my students in their learning. I. AM. LOVING this new checkpoint system that I’ve implemented. Here’s how we’re using Google Forms to gather evidence of student learning in my “in-class” flip. Get ready for an E.L.F!

First thing – I’m a sucker for a good acronym. If you read my last post on increasing collaboration in my classroom with the B.O.A.R.D. strategy, you know what I’m talking about! As I was revamping my plans for my Government classes this summer, I wanted to focus on improving two things: collaboration among my students and increasing individual discussion and feedback on learning with my students. Enter the E.L.F.

I know you’re curious by now and are ready to learn what E.L.F. stands for, right?

E.L.F. stands for “Evidence of Learning Form!” My students said the acronym should actually be “EOLF” and my response was, “oh yes, we always say we live in the USOA, don’t we?” My point was made 🙂

After two to three videos, my students complete an ELF that I share with them using Google Classroom. (The locked form option in Classroom is still super glitchy, so I don’t use it just yet). If my students get a 100% on the E.L.F. they can either move on with their videos or start an extension activity on their HyperDoc. If they get less than 100% on their E.L.F., I go to them with their results pulled up on my iPad, and we talk about what they missed. If they’re still not quite clear on what they missed, I have them re-watch the video with the specific content, then I chat with them again. Most of the time, they’ve cleared up their misconception and are ready to move on. Sometimes, I open up a drawing app on my iPad to sketch out an example or explanation. This has been FANTASTIC!

What goes on an E.L.F., you ask? Two to three questions that ask students to apply what they’ve learned – no spitting out definitions that they copy and paste from Google here!

If you come into my Government classroom, here’s what you’ll see:
–> students working asynchronously about 1/3-1/2 of the class period
–> students working on extension activities
–> students checking the XP leaderboard on Classroom
–> students creating products such as games, presentations, conversations, etc., that demonstrate learning
–> me bouncing around from student to student, answering questions, clarifying misconceptions, explaining concepts in multiple ways, while sitting on the floor, a stool, or perched on a table
–> frequent formative assessment through E.L.F. activities and whole-class review games
–> a Keurig that is almost always running because I’m a coffee-holic

The E.L.F. and B.O.A.R.D strategies are exactly what I needed to add in my classroom this year! I feel like my students are focusing on learning content, collaborating with their peers, creating, and thinking critically. I’m loving it!

Enjoy the rest of your week!

Thanks for reading 🙂