Save the Date - Road to Relevance Tech Camp

 Road to Relevance Tech Camp May 30, 31 and June 1

Save the dates for this year's Road to Relevance Tech Camp.  The tentative dates are May 30, 31 and June 1.  If we would have make-up days at the end of the year, these dates will be adjusted to fall after the last day for staff.  

Google Hangout and Google Meet

Last year some of you may have used Google Hangout for videoconferencing.  I just wanted to let you know that we still have Google Hangout, but for videoconferencing the tool that will now be open to you is Google Meet. Click here for an intro to Google Meet.  Click here to see how to get started with this easy videoconferencing tool.

Flipgrid

Here's a free tool called Flipgrid.  Flipgrid is a video discussion platform.  It's a great tool to engage all learners in discussion.  It has some fun features that can be teacher controlled such as adding stickers to your image.  It also allows for tagging.  With the setup of a teacher account, you can have your students join with a code.  Have some fun with a discussion activity by giving Flipgrid a try.  Click here to go to Flipgrid.

PBS Science Resources

 PBS has numerous free resources for education.  Check out the links I have embedded to see some of what's available.  Wild Kratts from PBS provides a number of science related materials on numerous topics for K-12.  Ready Jet Go is a K-3 site and covers topic in Earth science and Astronomy.  Animal Adaptations is another K-12 resource.   Earth Science K-2 includes video, lesson plans and interactive activities.

ISTE Standards for Educators - Updated

I am sharing the new ISTE Educator Standards.  These are the standards are the roadmap to aid every educator in empowering students.  Below you will see the 7 standards.  If you click here you will also see the ISTE site that lists each standard and the indicators for each that more specifically share what it looks like or what you should be able to do to meet that standard.  

1. Learner-Educators continually improve their practice by learning from and with others and exploring proven and promising practices that leverage technology to improve student learning. 
2. Leader-Educators seek out opportunities for leadership to support student empowerment and success and to improve teaching and learning. 
3. Citizen-Educators inspire students to positively contribute to and responsibly participate in the digital world. 
4. Collaborator-Educators dedicate time to collaborate with both colleagues and students to improve practice, discover and share resources and ideas, and solve problems. 
5. Designer-Educators design authentic, learner-driven activities and environments that recognize and accommodate learner variability. 
6. Facilitator-Educators facilitate learning with technology to support student achievement of the ISTE Standards for Students. 
7. Analyst-Educators understand and use data to drive their instruction and support students in achieving their learning goals. Educators:

Online Professional Development Opportunity
EDUC 469: Teaching ESL Methods and Assessment (click this title)

I am very excited to bring this graduate course opportunity to our educators at CVSD.  This online course, which will run during the Spring 2018 semester,  called EDUC 469: Teaching ESL Methods and Assessment is to learn and integrate curricular, instructional, and assessment theories and practices into the elementary/secondary classroom setting to promote language and literacy development.  I know many of you work with the EL population and that it can be worrisome and somewhat stressful when you can't communicate with a student who has little or no English language.  I have worked with Karin Sparrow of Penn State Harrisburg, who has taken an EL course and tweaked it so that it is applicable to the classroom teacher who just wants to grow their knowledge and skill in working with EL students.  The great plus of this course is that what you will learn will benefit all of your students.  The benefit for you the educator is that this course can be a once and done, but if you find you have a continued interest in obtaining and ESL add-on certification you can apply these credits toward that certification.  

Please consider taking this course.  If you are interested, contact Karin Sparrow, her information is on the attachment, but let me know too so that I can keep track of how much interest we have. My plan is to give our faculty here first opportunity at the course, but will open it to other local schools also.

Classes begin Jan. 8 and end on May 4, 2018. 

Graduate tuition is $857 per credit x 3 credits =  $2571
Fees = $159
Books = approx. $75 (maybe less)
Application fee = $65

Total = $2870
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ReCap

Recap is a tool that was previously shared, but there have been some new features to the tool that make it worth sharing again. It's a perfect tool to use with any device that has a microphone and video capability. It's a free tool that allows you to set up your class.  Students just need a code to join your Recap.  Here is a quick getting started video, click here.  Click here to join Recap. Recap also allows users to do #breakoutchats now.  The steps to do a chat are as follows:
How to run a #breakoutchat with Recap

1. Create a new Queue: you’ll want to name the Queue using the topic of that week’s Twitter chat.
2. Add the question: to kick off the breakout chat, add the question the group was discussing on Twitter to the Queue. If you want to maintain it as the focus question for the chat, you’ll want to pin it to the top of the Queue.
3. Share the Queue: invite your fellow chat-participants into the Queue using the Open Queue Link and the Join Pin. It just takes a quick copy-and-paste into a tweet, and your #breakoutchat is up and running!
4. Collect supporting questions: request that participants post any follow-up questions they have to the Queue.
5. Support the chat with resources: anyone can share resources in the Queue chat, with hyperlinks. As the moderator, you can create a Journey to inject some additional resources and information to focus the dialogue or shift it in new directions.
6. Augment the chat with video: use video response questions when you want to add a personal touch to the chat, or for questions where you want to avoid the misunderstandings that text-only chats can produce.

Some additional new features of Recap are shown below.  Go to Recap and see how easy it is to use.  Something I love about Recap is that all students within a class are engaged and participating.  For EL students it's a tool that provides speaking practice.