Celebrate Digital Learning Day on February 6

Digital learning happens every day in classrooms throughout the Tuscaloosa City Schools.  However, February 6 has been designated as Digital Learning Day 2014, a nationwide day to recognize digital learning activities taking place in our school, and we want to share with our community and the world all of the great ways that teachers and students are leveraging technology for learning.

Please take a moment to complete the form below if you would like coverage of digital learning activities happening in your classroom or school on February 6.

My Remote Classroom

I’ve always been fond of 37signals’ products like Basecamp but also their always-fantastic writing. Their newest full-length book Remote is no exception, and has inspired some big changes in how I incorporate technology into my classroom.

My class is now paperless, a fact that has been incredibly well-received. Despite the enthusiasm, however, systemic obstacles remain for reliably sharing, communicating, and (eventually) collaborating on classroom projects. Given this, I decided to go back to the old school moment we all had when someone’s cursor first appeared in one of our Google Documents, which very few of my students had experienced before.

It might seem strange that I began this piece by talking about 37signals’ Remote, as the full suite of tools that would allow for the most effective remote work are not possible in our current system (not to mention I can never assume that my students have reliable Internet access at home.) By having multiple Drive-related tabs open on my own laptop, however, I can see which students need help but aren’t raising their hands, check whether students who are talking have been working on the project or need further direction, and even do effective classroom management all by typing in students’ documents as they write them.

If this sounds simple, it is. That’s why it works. A student gets out of his seat to show another student something on his document that has now distracted four others? I quickly fire off a message asking him to return to his seat, and it happens. No power struggle, no classroom theatrics, and no hurt feelings. A student is more worried about formatting than the work itself, even though I continue to tell them that doesn’t matter? I go into their document and say that how the bullets look isn’t the problem; it’s what’s written next to them.

Teachers will recognize these as more “macro” answers than ones linked to things like teaching ACT Writing best practices, but that sort of fine-tuned writing instruction definitely occurs all the time in my pseudo-remote classroom. Rather than interrupt the entire classroom, however, those students who want specific help simply raise their hand, I give them a thumbs up, and go into their document to discuss whether they are on the right track.

If 37signals are correct that the modern office has become an interruption factory that will give way to more remote workers, and if we are attempting to prepare students for 21st century college and career readiness, then doesn’t it make sense to start trying right now?

Christopher Watson teaches 8th grade language arts at Eastwood Middle School.  Connect with him on Twitter, where he goes by @schoolpivot, or check out his blog.

TCS Tweet-In

Last night a group of TCS teachers met at the central office for a face-to-face discussion of Twitter and participation in the evening's scheduled #edchat, a discussion that takes place via Twitter twice every Tuesday and brings together educators from all over.

It seemed appropriate that the night's chat topic was the popularity of Edcamps, grassroots professional development gatherings that offer an alternative to traditional professional development.  Both allow participants to re-think how their professional learning can and should look.

The best part of the evening was the conversation among participants as the chat wound down.  Moving forward from a nuts-and-bolts how-to of Twitter, we dug into the why.  And, more broadly, we discussed what it takes for PD experiences to be truly meaningful for educators.  Some of the best nuggets of the night are these:

• We are learners first.  We have to serve as models in that capacity for our kids.
• Everyone brings to the table different experiences with tech and with teaching.  In our conversations and our professional learning, we must value the perspectives that all participants have to offer.
• We can be catalysts for powerful, positive change in our schools.  It's never been easier to share what we know.

Considering the evening's festivities were in celebration of Connected Educator Month, I think those take-aways are evidence of time well-spent.

Laren Hammonds is an 8th grade English teacher at Rock Quarry Middle School.  She's @_clayr_ on Twitter and blogs about her classroom experiences at Game to Learn. 

I've Got a Cart Full of Chromebooks, Part 3: Sharing & Collaborating with Google Drive

At this year's parent open house, lots of moms and dads asked me questions about supplies and notebook setup: Does my son need a 3-ring binder?  How many inches?  What tab labels should my daughter write on her dividers?

The truth is, once we're fully running with our Google accounts and have daily access to our Chromebooks, there might not be enough paper floating around in our classrooms to warrant much fuss about these issues.  Instead, we can set up digital notebooks in Google Drive for organizing all (or almost all) of the work students do each day.

Why Google Drive?
Let's check out the SAMR model for the bigger picture of what we want to do with tech in our classrooms.

If we are to take advantage of what a digital transformation has to offer, then we must move beyond doing traditional work in a digital format.  Additionally, we must offer a more substantial rationale for our tech choices than "It's more fun/engaging for the kids."  The key word is transformation: What learning experiences can we offer our students that we could never pull off without the tech?

I am not suggesting here that everything we do must hit the Redefinition level.  However, we should strive to keep the image above in mind and push ourselves to develop lessons that leverage technology to arm our students with the critical thinking and collaboration skills that members of an active, thoughtful citizenry need.

For that reason, Google Drive is the workhorse of my classroom.  It allows my students to collaborate with one another asynchronously and in real-time, and it gives them a space for working efficiently with collaborators throughout the world, as well.  Drive makes for easy and constant revision and iteration, and I can provide more timely, more human feedback via text and voice comments.  Apps that hook into Drive offer opportunities for multimedia projects, remixes, and mash-ups, and housing their products in a digital space makes the jump to publication much more manageable.

But what about Edmodo?
When I decided to make the switch to housing most of my students' work in Drive, one of the biggest questions I wanted to answer for myself was "What does this offer that Edmodo doesn't?"  The kids know Edmodo and tend to be proficient in using it.  Widespread use throughout our school and system has made parents comfortable with it, as well.  However, Edmodo doesn't offer much to support student collaboration, nor does it play well with other tools.  So while I do use Edmodo still for quick notifications and occasional posting of resources, Drive tends to meet our current needs in ways that Edmodo does not.

How do you set it up?
For our general purposes, I start my students out with two folders:

• a personal class folder they can edit, in which they create their assignments (in our class, we call it their writer's notebook) - each student shares this with me so that we can communicate about their work throughout the year
• a  view-only folder in which I'll place documents they need for their work - students have access to this folder but cannot make changes to documents in it

Step 1 is to make that view-only folder, which I create myself, naming it "[Class Name] Handouts" or some other informative label.  Then I share it with students using the Can View setting.  Students will be able to view all documents I place in this folder but will not be able to change or move them, making it an easy place to deliver electronic handouts.  

See the video below created by the ed tech facilitator for Norfolk Public Schools to guide you through this process with both teacher and student views.  The video also demonstrates how students can make a copy of a document if they do need to place it in their own folder and edit it (i.e.lab reports, templates, etc).

Step 2 requires the students to create the class folders that will house their work for the year.  They make these, naming them using criteria I specify, then they share it with me at my email address, giving me Can Edit rights.  Once they've completed this step, I'll have access to every document they place in the folder.  I can drop in digitally as they work and offer feedback or assess a class's progress without lugging around stacks of notebooks.

Here's a video walk-through of Step 2 from the student perspective.  Please note that, for consistency's sake, you may want to develop folder naming protocol at the school-, grade-, or team-level.

For those who are a little more comfortable with Google tools, there are ways to automate folder setup using Google templates and scripts.  If you're interested in learning more, check out the instructions here.  

Once your folders are up and running, you've got a powerful system for managing student work and a space in which students can collaborate with others both within your building and beyond.  What ideas do you have for using shared folders in Google Drive?  Please share your thoughts in the comments below. 

Check out the first two posts in this series:
Part 1: I've Got a Cart Full of Chromebooks. Now What?
Part 2: HP Pavilion 14 Tour

Laren Hammonds is an 8th grade English teacher at Rock Quarry Middle School.  She's @_clayr_ on Twitter and blogs about her classroom experiences at Game to Learn. 

Work Orders and You

When you come across a computer problem and you need some help, what’s the first thing you do? No, I mean after you swear at it and sigh in disgust. Right, you put in a work order! That’s the signal flare in the sky that tells us you need us to come and take a look at something that isn’t working.

It’s really more than that, though.

Work orders are the way that you can communicate with us about problems that you’re having. When you put in a work order, the more you can tell us, the faster we can get it fixed. I’ve had some experience in elementary schools being referred to as “the computer doctor,” and that’s actually a really good way to look at it.

When you go to the doctor and they ask you what’s wrong, you don’t just say “It hurts.” You tell them what hurts, when it started, what aggravates it, what you’ve done on your own to try to alleviate the pain, any history you may have… all manner of things, right? So sticking with the medical metaphor, let me give you an example.

“I can’t log in.”

Okay, to what? What error message are you getting? Are you on a desktop, laptop, tablet, phone, Chromebook? Novell? iNow? Groupwise? Those are all important details that could help us get you back up and running much faster if we had them.

“I can’t log in to Groupwise. It’s prompting me for a password, but I’ve never had to enter one at school before. None of the passwords I know will work.”

Just from those three sentences, I know that you’re logged in “Computer Only” and that nothing’s going to work quite right for you. That little bit of extra info was all I needed to diagnose exactly what your problem is, and I can immediately respond in the work order and tell you how to fix it, which, for the record, is to log out, click on the “Log in to Novell Network” link, and log back in.

Don’t be afraid to put too much in there. There’s no character limit, and everything helps. Something that you might not think matters might be the exact thing we need to diagnose the problem and get you fixed. Like they used to say on those GI Joe PSAs that ran when I was a kid, “Knowing is half the battle!”

Erik Hammonds is a computer tech for the Tuscaloosa City Schools.

Choosing Concept and Caring Over Device and Requirements

People who have heard me speak recently concerning our own school district technology initiatives may remember an analogy and model I have used. I have employed this model to illustrate the target at which we need to aim, in our district and as educators in general. The model consists of a "Golden Circle," three concentric circles. The inner-most circle contains the word "Why," the second "How," and the outer circle "What." In aiming at the center of the target, we must clearly define the "Why" we are engaging in this thing we call education.

I borrowed the model from a TEDx Puget Sound talk by Simon Sinek. If you would like to view the whole talk, I have posted it below:

A key portion of Mr. Sinek's talk hinges on Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s I Have a Dream speech. It is interesting that I find myself writing this post on the 50th anniversary of that historic moment. Sinek powerfully points out, "People do not buy what you do. They buy why you do it." Dr. King, he says, gave the, "I have a Dream" speech not the "I have a Plan" speech.

Why do you go to work every day?

As a leader in our district, I want to challenge others to define why we do what we do. Our technology initiatives should then follow those values. If we can agree, we are all invested in helping students fulfill their purpose and the dreams they have.

New technology devices and services are coming. I challenge you to choose caring for your students and equipping them with skills to meet world prepared. The journey you take with your students will involve technology. What matters is why, how, and what the people do, not the device.

Chris Jenks is the instructional technology coordinator for the Tuscaloosa City Schools.  Follow him on Twitter, where he goes by @chrisjenks.

I've Got a Cart Full of Chromebooks, Part 2: HP Pavilion 14 Tour

The machines issued in the TCS English and math 8-12 classes for the 2013-2014 school year are HP Pavilion 14 Chromebooks, most notable for their 14-inch screens.

Check out the short video below from SlashGear for a little tour of the Chromebook you'll be working with, which includes information on the available ports, battery life, and other features.

So what does this mean for our daily classroom use?

First up, the USB 2.0 ports allow you to access files for upload and use in web apps (think photos needed for presentations and photo-editing apps or Microsoft Office documents you might want to access via Google Drive).  You can also use these ports for peripherals like USB headsets or mice.

The HDMI port is handy for video output and will allow you to display your work on a separate monitor, TV screen, or through some projectors.  Most of our classroom projectors use VGA instead, though, so these aren't likely to work with them.  The good news is that everything students and teachers might create and want to project will be stored in the cloud and easily accessible from any computer with an internet connection, so swapping out machines attached to a projector in class probably won't be necessary.

The 4-5 hour battery life means that on days of heavy use you may want to plan for a quick mid-day charge to keep your devices going until the last bell.  Your mileage may vary when it comes to battery life, so gauge your usage in the first few days and weeks, and establish a plan that works best for you.

You'll also note that there's no option to hook up a Chromebook to a printer.  There are work-arounds, but the best advice I've heard is this: "Don't print.  Create, publish, share."  The how of that will come in blog post form soon.

Do you have practical tips about the Chromebooks or observations to share? Post them in the comments below!

This post is Part 2 of an ongoing series intended to orient teachers to their new devices as part of the Tuscaloosa City Schools 1:1 digital conversion.  You might also be interested in Part 1:

I've Got a Cart Full of Chromebooks, Now What? (classroom setup basics)


Laren Hammonds is an 8th grade English teacher at Rock Quarry Middle School.  She's @_clayr_ on Twitter and blogs about her classroom experiences at Game to Learn.

Learning Isn't Optional or Why I Love Twitter

Our system hosted our two-day best practices with technology conference this week. #TCStech Days were a place for brand new teachers, new to our system teachers, and seasoned teachers to collaborate and play with new tools. The focus of #TCStech Days is to enhance learning, not just use shiny and snazzy technology. We had three time slots of concurrent sessions in the morning and then two open work sessions in the afternoon. Here is the Google spreadsheet of our schedule.

On the first day of #TCStech Days, this inspiring tweet showed up in my feed.

T&l tip for aspiring outstanding teachers: teaching is an art & lasts a life time; enjoy the profession! #ukedchat pic.twitter.com/cRK1M5ydFc
— theharrispeeps  (@theharrispeeps) August 6, 2013

That quote resonated in my mind. "Never stop learning, because life never stops teaching." What does it mean to never stop learning? To me, "never stop learning" means never stop asking for help, sharing successes, sharing failures, asking opinions, researching, brainstorming, or connecting with other educators. In a word, "never stop learning" means collaboration.

Collaboration is the heart and soul of a connected educator. Collaboration is why I love Twitter. Twitter is almost instantaneous professional development, tailored to your exact needs and in real time. Many educators have said they learn more from Twitter than any conference they have attended. Not only does Twitter provide PD, but Twitter is also a continuous, ongoing dialogue with other educators. Our system was looking at implementing Chromebooks, so I asked the Twitterverse who would know about Chromebooks. @web20classroom connected me with @kylepace, who then agreed to a Google Hangout with @chrisjenks and I to discuss Chromebooks. Chris and I were looking at learning management systems for our district, so I tweeted out this Google document and asked for feedback. Eight colleagues - some I know and some I do not - collaborated on the Google document. Through one tweet, I was able to connect with three other educators I have never met to answer my questions. Thank you @clonghb @mosspike and @davidtedu!

If I need a question answered, I tweet it. If I'm looking for a resource, I tweet it. If I have an awesome anything to share, I tweet it. If I need feedback, I tweet it. I tweet lots of things. I tweet because it is my main way to collaborate outside of whatever walls I may find myself in on a given day. I tweet because I don't know everything. I tweet because I need to perfect this craft of teaching with other people who have the same mindset I do - to never stop learning.

It may be the fact that I was raised by a Nationally Board Certified Library Media Specialist and twice Teacher of the Year, but I truly believe that as an educator, regardless of age or experience, we must collaborate or we will go extinct. My mother taught me that you can always learn something from someone, even if it is how not to do something. Twitter provides a place to share what we learn - the good, the bad, and the ugly.

The first part of collaboration is to share. If you are on Twitter, don't just browse or retweet. Join the conversation! Look at this Google spreadsheet of twitter chats you can join any day of the week. The second part of collaboration is to put to action what you have learned, to try something new or different regardless of the success it may yield. As teachers, we must continually learn so that we can provide the best process for our students to learn. A teacher cannot use the same lesson plan every year. Besides, that information needs to be refreshed and updated in times such as these. As teachers, we can never stop learning because that's what we expect from our students, right? So model it for them. Show them how to learn. Provide an environment for them to love learning. If we don't teach them how to do that, who will?

Melinda Sears is the Title I Instructional Technology Coordinator for the Tuscaloosa City Schools.  Check out her website or connect with her via Twitter.  

I've Got a Cart of Chromebooks in My Classroom. Now What?

If you're a TCS math or English teacher in grades 8-12, you're likely coming back to school this year with a cart full of Chromebooks to use with your students.  Check out the tips below for a bit of guidance on getting started and managing them for student use.  Please note that this is not a post about transforming your instruction but rather a bit of practical advice for getting acquainted with your new devices.  Future posts will discuss possibilities for classroom use and share specific ways TCS students and teachers are harnessing the power of Chromebooks and web tools to make meaningful shifts in learning.

First up, what's a Chromebook?  It's not exactly a laptop.  It's clearly not a tablet or desktop.  Check out the video below for a brief overview.

So here's the gist:  Google Chrome is a web browser, not unlike Firefox or Internet Explorer.  A Chromebook uses the Chrome operating system.  This means that everything you do on the Chromebook is web-based.  You start out with a basic suite of tools like Gmail, Google Drive, Google Calendar, and other resources, and you can easily add other apps from the Chrome Web Store based on your needs and the needs of your students.  Because everything is web-based, the work your students do is not tied to the device they work on or to the school network.  It's stored in the cloud, so the kids can access their stuff from a variety of devices - at home, at school, anywhere - by simply logging in to their Google accounts.

Number and assign your Chromebooks.  When you begin distributing the Chromebooks among your students, you'll want to make sure that there's some level of accountability in the event of any issues or damage.  Some prefer to attach small labels; however, I find that fidgety fingers tend to make short work of these.  Grab a sharpie, and write small numbers (1-30) in an inconspicuous spot on the outside of the Chromebooks.  I recommend not writing the numbers on the inside of the devices because you don't want to have to open every Chromebook up each time you need to place it back in your cart.  Speaking of the cart, once your machines are numbered, place corresponding numbers in each space in your cart to provide a designated space for each Chromebook's storage and charging.  The final step, once you've got your rosters for the year, is to assign each student to a Chromebook.  This will be the device they will use for each work session, so if you ever have questions or concerns about one, you know who to talk to.  Keep your Chromebook assignment lists stored or posted somewhere for easy access throughout the year, and make sure that you distribute the devices to the students yourself at least the first several times they are in use to ensure that students get in the habit of getting the same assigned machine.

Secure your cart key.  This is a very small piece of advice based on personal experience.  If your cart has a keyed lock (and odds are it does), make sure that you pull the key out of the lock if you're moving the cart from room to room.  Narrow doorways can be deadly for keys left in the cart locks; I've got two key fragments in my classroom to prove it.  On a related note, when your cart is locked, keep the key somewhere secure.  Though it may be handy to hang the key on the cart via a lanyard, this practice pretty much eliminates the effectiveness of locking the thing up.

Get your students logged in.  Logging in to a Chromebook requires a Google account.  If necessary, both teachers and students can log in using an existing Gmail address and password.  However, current TCS students also have Google accounts through our system's Google Apps for Education.  All they need to do is log in here, reset their passwords, and they're ready to start using Google Apps and the web.  I suggest assigning one time (for example, all English 9 classes) for taking care of the initial login process to make this first step more efficient and to avoid overlap.  Folks at the CO will be distributing student login info soon.

Assign student helpers.  Pick a student or two per class to assist you in collecting and plugging back in the Chromebooks once they're returned.  Having a few extra hands to facilitate the shuffle, along with beginning the process a minute or two before class ends, will help to reduce moments of frenzy between classes and ensure that the next class starts with a clean slate.

So that's it for now.  One of the best things about Chromebooks is that setup is a breeze.  What tips or questions do you have about getting Chromebooks student-ready?  Please share your thoughts in the comments below.

Upcoming posts will recommend great apps to use, share instructional practices, and help to answer a very big question: what happens to these things when the network goes down?  Stay tuned!


Laren Hammonds is an 8th grade English teacher at Rock Quarry Middle School.  She's @_clayr_ on Twitter and blogs about her classroom experiences at Game to Learn.