21st Century Skills Resources

I spent some time for my graduate course exploring the site “Partnership for 21^st Century Skills”.  This site is from “a national organization that advocates for 21st century readiness for every student”.   This site had been shared with me before but I had not really taken the time to explore everything it has to offer.  Now that I have, I'm glad I did.

The site has a plethora of tools and resources available for educators on 21^st century skills.    They have everything from defining what these skills are to why are these skills important.  This would be a great place for educators who are just beginning to explore this avenue to begin their journey.   As I continue my professional development of teachers, I will share many of the articles and resources that this site provides.  There are even definitions for those who are still looking for clarification.

This site also provides a toolkit for school and districts that is “A Guide to Aligning the Common Core State Standards with the Framework for 21st Century Skills”.    It’s always key to have your administration on board with new movements and what a wonderful resource and support for them as they try to role out this initiative in their schools.  The alignment of the common core and 21st century skills is really key when moving forward.  We want these skills to be taught and implemented within are curriculum and not in isolation.  Understanding the alignment will help educators move forward in this udnerstanding.

Another feature that the site had was an area called “what employers say”.  I was surprised to see this despite its importance.  I think that this would also be an eye opener for educators.  Our role is to prepare our students for the future, so what better way to show what is important than hearing from employers about why these skills are so important.

The P21 website has its own blog where new topics are discussed by a variety of knowledgeable bloggers.  I think this is important for multiple contributors to share their viewpoints on such a huge topic.  This is beneficial for those wanting one place to continue to develop their understanding and to gain new ideas.  I have already added this blog to my Feedly subscription list.

In addition to this site, I would also encourage to others to check out the 21^st Century Fluency Project.  Both have their many useful resources but this particular sites takes it a step further and offers a new feature called the unit planner.  This planner is free and allows you to share and search 21^st century units that meet the standards, fluencies, and provide the essential question.

"Doing Projects" and "Projects-Based Learning"....What's the Difference?

While exploring through twitter, I came across a blog called TeachBytes where a post had been made by ADITI RAO.  The post contained a chart that was created by Amy Mayer of FriEdTechnology and showed the differences between projects and projects-based learning.

After viewing this amazing chart, I immediately shared it with my staff.  I have been working hard to help my teachers understand that there is a big difference.  It changes the dynamics of a classroom when done correctly.  

Glogs for Engagement

About four years ago, while attending the WEMTA (Wisconsin Educational Media and Technology Association) Conference, I was introduced to Glogster EDU. Since then I have been using blogs in my teaching.
If you aren't familiar with Glogs or Glogster, let me tell you a bit about it first. Glogs are interactive posters. When making a Glog you can add text, pictures, video, and graphics. What makes it interactive is that you can link any of these items to outside sites.
I have used Glogs a lot for curation purposes for my students. I would create a Glog when beginning to read a new story where background knowledge is needed, while studying a specific topic, or learning about certain holidays. This was a fun, exciting way for students to explore information and engage in activities I had found that were appropriate for them. For some of the exploration activities, we would complete KWL charts as a way to show what we had learned. (Normally I use KWHL charts but the how piece was already completed for them)
Just this week I finished working with fourth graders who were created their own Glogs. Their goal was to research a specific storm or severe weather event. They answered questions using the Big 3 Research Model. The questions addressed defining the storm or event itself and how it's formed, where it could happen, and what could you do to prepare or survive it. Once their research was competed, they then had to share their information on the Glog. We went over the rubric and what the expectations were. The purpose of it was to share their information with others, and remembering to make it look like a "reputable" source. They were given copyright/royalty free websites (morgueFile, Creative Commons, Pixabay, and Icon Bug) where they could gather images and graphics to use on their Glogs.
I always love watching the students begin the creation process of their Glogs. They are so engaged and excited.
I found Glogster EDU to be one of my favorite Web 2.0 Tools. Over the years it has never lost interest or appeal for me. Even when they made it a fee paid service in order to create students under your account, I find it worth the money, as so my teachers. They are always changing, making things more user friendly, and adding different graphics, and walls to keep if it fresh and new. I know this is a tool that I will continue to use for years to come.

Why should our students blog?

When blogging first became a popular trend, I think there was a lot a of hesitancy, and still is, about allowing our students to make their opinions, statements, and comments public on the web.  Anyone could see them so why would we want to do that?  Now, for some, that mind shift has happened and blogging is an important part of the classrooms where students are making real world contributions.  they are making their opinions heard, and are being taught how to be appropriate digital citizens wiht their interactions and collaborations.
I think the tough piece can be making that first step.  That first step does not always have to be a leap of faith in allowing your students to post to the world.  You can begin with your classroom.  Blogs have the ability to be private for certain people.  So to begin there, you classroom could begin a blog for discussions in a curricula area.
Before we begin with the how, we should talk about the why.  Blogging is completely different from the normal essay or paper writing.  Students are given their own voice about a topic and can share who they are.  With this different way of writing you begin to get the students writing and thus engaging in a conversation about a topic or shared idea.  With all this interaction and discussion, you as a teacher can begin to get to know your students better.  You can learn a lot about them.  It also changes the role of a teacher.  Once a proper blogging community is established, students begin to take a larger role in their discussion and learning.  I think all of these are very strong reasons to get your students blogging.
Personally, I have seen blogs used to create and share ideas on books that have been read in different reading groups, to share discussion questions to begin conversations for deeper level analyzing and thinking.    Videos, podcasts, pictures, and other media can be shared on blogs.  There's also the purpose of getting feedback or gathering information.
As your students begin to become better digital citizens, you can begin to explore other blogs created and shared.  I read an article not to long ago where a teacher shared a story.  In his classroom the students had been blogging about a book they had read.  Their blog was shared out with the world.  One day they logged on and saw they had a comment from the author himself.  He shared how he was intrigued by the analyzing and conversation they were having about his book.  What a reward!
Like all shifts, beginning to blog with your class can be a bit scary because it is new, but again, just remember, the distance is nothing, its the first step that is difficult.

Blended Learning Initiative

Yesterday morning, about 30 teachers, administrators, and innovators from my district met to discuss an initiative regarding Blended Learning. This is something are district really needed to begin looking at as we move forward with our technology plan and technology integration.  We first began by discussing our goals:

• To create a shared vision about how to best leverage technology as a tool to enhance student achievement

• To promote the Blended Classroom concept as a process to advance the use of technology in all classrooms in the SDJ

• Define what technology skills every teacher needs to make the blended classroom a reality

• Identify how graduates from SDJ will look different as a result of this effort.

As a group we read and discussed the article from the March issue of Education Leadership called the The Basics of Blended Instruction. This article was written by Caitlin R. Tucker. She has some wonderful tips that she shares from her experiences in implementing blended learning. Her first tip is one that I usually share when teaching my graduate course on Web 2.0. This tip is that you must "Think big, but start small". When you are just beginning to move forward with blended learning, you must keep your end goal in mind but just begin with one initiative.  
As a group we talked about some more of the big ideas that we pulled form this article and as our discussions began in a smaller group breakouts:
Big Ideas:

• Think Big, Start Small, & Share
• Building staff capacity
• Accessibility & Equity
• Reallocation of financial resources
• Establish criteria for quality
• Positive Result
• Support system
• Students produce/construct quality
• Purpose-enhance guaranteed and viable curriculum

When looking at this initiative and writing the technology plan, we decided to begin moving forward with the implementation of Edmodo K-8 and Moodle 6-12 and using these tools as the platform to begin our blended learning journey. As a result of these decisions, I am excited to be one that will be training our teachers on the Edmodo and its uses. It is a tool I used when I was a 3rd grade teacher and constantly promote in my graduate course.

Moving Forward with ePubs

After a long and eventful day at school, I am now attending a video conference on ePubs in the Classroom. The presenter is Keith Schroeder, a LMS in upper Wisconsin. This is an area that I have been wanting to explore more but really have not had the opportunity. Well here we go. Keith has provided so many resources for the variety of ways to create ePubs. I had originally thought that I would create my first ePub in iAuthor. Keith suggested that I begin with Pages instead. His reasoning was the ability for my students to access and download it easier, as opposed to having to upload from iAuthor where anyone has access.
After watching his presentation, I am thinking WOW this is pretty easy, why have I not started this earlier. I am going to begin my ePub adventure by creating a new format with our Early Janesville unit. The booklet that we currently use is boring, drab, black & white, and leaves very little in the way of interest for the kids.  So I am taking it upon myself to bring this unti into the 21st Century!  Looking forward to sharing it when it is completed.

The Voice of the Active Learner

You Have to Start Somewhere

Welcome to my brand new blog.  I must say that I am an avid follower of many blogs but was always very hesitant to start my own.  Now, as part of my Master's program, I am required to start one.  There's an old proverb that says "The distance is nothing, it's the first step that is difficult".  So here I go making the first step.
I want to start off this blog by sharing some exciting news/  I co-taught with one of my third grade teachers on a project called "I Dream".  this project was created and posted by the website called United Classrooms or UClass.    The project stated "As people around the world celebrate the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his dream this month, we want to know what your dream of a better world is".

For the project, we began by reading allowed the story Martin's Big Words.  Students then brainstormed different words that they felt described Dr. King's life and his impact.  They used these words and then created a word cloud image of Dr. King in Tagxedo.
The last steps were uploading this word cloud images to VoiceThread, and then they recorded a voice over of what their dream for a better world was.  The project was posted by the students in our UClass project folder and shared with classrooms around the world.
A panel chose ours as the winner of the lower elementary unit and stated, "Your students' projects were examples of creativity and thoughtfulness".  What a wonderful achievement for them!!




We are featured on the United Classroom's homepage http://uclass.org/, as well as on their blog which can be found at http://blog.uclass.org/2013/02/12/announcing-the-i-have-a-dream-project-winners/