The Innovative Educator

I found this blog entry on the web and I think it will be helpful to teachers as well as anyone else interested in virtual learning.   Like it or not, we are now living in a "connected" world.  The challenge that faces school districts is to use the power of connection to enhance student learning. 

It is claimed that anyone born before 1982 are considered "technology immigrants".  In other words, their formative years were spent without the widespread use of the social technology that we have now.  People born after 1982 are considered "technology natives and their formative years were spent during the explosion of technological advancement that has defined the last 30 years.  The "natives" (especially those who came of age in the last 10 years) are used to using the internet as a source for information and connection to other people.  They are used to instantaneous communication with their friends and family.  I think back to when I was an undergraduate and I had to wait until after 9:00PM to call home because that was when the long distance rates dropped to an acceptable level.  We were fortunate to have phones in our dorm rooms, but that was something that was just put it before I started.  Imagine a freshman in college today waiting to connect with friends and family until after 9:00PM when the long distance rates dropped.  Better yet, think of the parents of freshman who ask their children to give a simple text message once a day just to be re-assured that everything is okay.  How would those parents feel about waiting until 9:00PM once a week to check in on their kids?  It is all very interesting.  I hope this article helps you contextualize the possibilities of social media to help enhance student instruction.


The Innovative Educator: Want to connect your students this school year? He...: .

Two Interesting Videos

I want o share these two great videos that begin to explain where learning (and education) has the potential to go if we allow it to happen.  The second video was created by students so I see it as a very meaningful plea to make sure change happens.  All of us must come to an understanding that providing a quality education means that changes must be made to a system that is over 100 years old.  To think that we can prepare students to thrive into the 21st Century in a system designed in the 19th Century is pure folly.  The role (and importance) of teachers will become more pronounced as we move toward a more individualized, collaborative method of assisting students in their learning.  I hope you enjoy the videos.

The New School Year is Underway!

I am happy to report that Penn-Trafford has had a great start to the school year.  I have spent time in each building throughout the past two days and it has been fun to watch the students "get back into the groove".  Today I asked a second grade student at Harrison Park what he was going to learn this year.  He looked at me very excitedly and said "We are going to learn cursive!".  He was pumped up to think about learning such a "big person" thing like cursive.  I asked some kindergarten students at Sunrise if they were going to have fun this year and they yelled "YEA!".  Imagine the enthusiasm...it does a person good to hang out with kids.  At the high school I was standing in the hall with Mr. Inglese when a student went by with her cell phone to her ear.  I don't think she was talking but she told us she was just checking Mr. Inglese to make sure he was following the new BYOD rules.

On Tuesday the entire teaching staff met at the high school.  Part of their day was listening to me talk about the upcoming year.  The presentation can be found here.  You may not get a lot out of the presentation since I use slides to remind me of what to say but you are welcomed to look at the presentation none the less.  We were fortunate this year to be able to purchase t-shirts for the staff with Penn-Trafford's instructional core values on them.  Each school had a different color t-shirt but they all said the same thing.  This was a symbolic way to show that all schools can have their own identity but are still part of a bigger whole.  The t-shirts were paid for through generous donations.  The largest donation came from the P-T Community Education Foundation. These generous donations allowed me to get the t-shirts for the staff without using any tax-payer funds.  I took a picture of the staff as I started my speech on Tuesday.  The excitement of the teachers to start the new year was infectious.  I know their enthusiasm was a big part of why the new year has started so well. 

"Math and More" at McCullough Elementary School

The Final installment in my blog series about Penn-Trafford's pilot programs focuses on another program aimed at customizing education for students.  The "Math and More" program will have grades 3, 4 and 5 working collaboratively to provide different learning experiences for students.  The room that has been designated as a resource room for this project will have various hands-on activities aimed at providing a customizable experience for students.  I am excited to watch the teachers work together to build this program into something fantastic!  Here is a short "blurb" about the project written by Mr. Marasti the principal at the school.

Students at McCullough Elementary will experience the new Math and More Lab, a lab devoted to engaging students in hands on mathematics.   The students will have the opportunity to immerse themselves in essential skills, such as critical thinking and problem solving.  You will find students working independently and within collaborative groups.  This room will provide opportunities for the students to go beyond the traditional classroom .  Technology will be integrated with the use of smartboards, ipads, and the mobile computer lab. Grades 3-5 will be able to explore the M & M Lab while working with the interactive centers for Math & More.

Mass Customized Learning at Sunrise Estates Elementary

Today I will once again turn over blogging duties to someone else.  Mrs. Karin Coiner is the principal at Sunrise Estates Elementary School and she will introduce to you an exciting initiative that a few teachers in her school are undertaking.  I love to see that different teachers across the district are putting their own spin on customized learning to fit their strengths and the needs of their students.  Customized learning cannot be a "one size fits all" approach, or it could not be called customizable!!  Enjoy.

Enter a Customized Classroom as an Observer

We believe education is shifting its focus towards mass customization and we are moving with it.  Individualized choices and educational decisions are impacting how we change our instructional practices and approach to student learning.  Last year, we piloted an alternative way to learn math in our fourth grade, which we will continue this year.  In addition, more grade levels will be implementing a similar plan.  Before you read this classroom experience, reflect back on how math was taught to you.  Now journey with us as we embark on providing alternative classroom experiences for our youngest learners. 

Sample of a Fourth grade math class:

All of the students have previously taken a math topic pre-test and the students have received their individual results.  Students are responsible for analyzing their own pre-test results to guide their learning needs and determine their individual areas of weakness.  This is in addition to the analysis done by the teachers.  These results impact how they plan each day of math time. 

Here is a “picture” of what it would be like as an observer looking in on our non-traditional and individualized approach to learning math. 

First, an observer notices that all the students in the class had received a Topic outline with the intended timeline of requirements.   For the first ten minutes of class, students organize their customized learning utilizing a planner page.  When the planning is finished, the students move to the location of the learning environment that best meets their needs. 

Upon entering one learning environment, an observer notices small group instruction with one teacher.  The students in this room receive their instruction in a more traditional approach.  Students are seen interacting more frequently and receive one-on-one assistance from the teacher as needed.  The students in this room state they are moving at a pace that best meets their needs. 

Upon entering another learning environment, an observer notices several things.  Students in this room prefer and are capable of independently using technology to learn their math skills and content.  The students move at their own pace through the topic requirements provided by the teacher.  You notice some students periodically gathering with the teacher to receive specific instruction when learning gaps are found.  Other students are working on individual projects that are tailored to meet their learning needs.  In addition, some students are working on checkpoints in order to determine if they have mastered a skill and can move on. 

Upon entering the final learning environment, called the Learning Lab, an observer notices a ‘centers’ based room filled with activity.  Students are freely interacting in order to complete a variety of tasks.  Some students are seen:

o   Using math manipulatives

o   Working at a computer center to research information, view informative videos, playing interactive math games, and produce instructional tools to share with their peers

o   Practicing their math facts through a variety of methods

o   Completing differentiated activities focused on the Topic they are learning

You have just observed a non-traditional classroom that uses a customized approach to meet the individual learning needs of each student. 

The Penn-Trafford Virtual Academy

Today our guest blogger is Mr. Capoccioni, one of the assistant principals at the high school.  Mr. Cap is helping lead the Penn-Trafford Virtual Academy.  This initiative allows teachers to stretch their instruction beyond the classroom walls.  In a "blended" instructional environment students will receive more opportunities for meaningful engagement and interaction with the subject.  I am proud of the hard work that the teachers involved in this project have undertaken thus far. This initiative also supports the vision of the school board to move our students into the 21st Century.

In 2000, forty-five thousand students were learning in an online environment; in 2007, 1 million students were learning in an online environment, and in 2009 27% of high school students were learning in an online environment.  If these statistics continue, Ambient Insight projects 10.5 million students will have taken an online course by 2014 (Christensen).   Based on these startling statistics, Penn-Trafford teachers began experimenting with the blended learning approach to instruction.  They believed that for our students to become 21^st century learners a technology component had to be integrated into the instruction.   

Blended learning occurs when a student learns in a supervised brick-and-mortar building and through an online delivery, with some element of control over time, place, path and/or pace.  Blended learning is the effective combination of different modes of delivery, models of teaching, and styles of learning.  Classes are student centered with customized instruction in which students become active and interactive learners.  To assess the learning, the instructor must create integrated formative and summative assessments. 

            Because of the success and interest by the teachers, the Penn-Trafford Virtual Academy was created. The Penn-Trafford Virtual Academy is an all-inclusive technology system based upon the Blackboard Learn platform.  This allows users to interact with Blended Schools seamlessly from a single login.  The main goal of the PTSD Virtual Academy is to create a customized learning environment that all students can successful learn by utilizing web 2.0 tools. 

This summer 19 teachers in grades 3-12 were in-serviced on how to instruct through the blended learning model.  They are excited to begin utilize blended learning this school year.   To begin his school year over 1000 students will be enrolled into the PTSD Virtual Academy. 

"The Pod" or Customized Learning

Today our guest blogger will be Mr. Swartz the principal from Harrison Park.  He will explain how Harrison Park is reaching for the goal of a customizable learning experience for students.  This pilot program will allow the school district to learn how to scale a customizable (or individualized) learning experience for our students.  This project pulls the curtain back on where I believe education is going over the next five years.  Please take the time to read the attached PowerPoint and watch the video at the end of the PowerPoint.

 

Technology is transforming nearly every sector of our lives. Music, books, retailing, communication, news, photography, medicine, architecture, ect. have changed drastically, have become more efficient, and we all expect those changes, improvements, and progress will continue. Education cannot sit in this customized world as an island, embracing the Industrial Age, and expect to survive (Schwahn, 2011). This statement is one that is leading a trend of mass customized learning at Harrison Park Elementary. We recognize and value the importance of teaching all learners at their individual ability level while teaching to their individual learning style. During the 2012-2013 school year, we will pilot a comprehensive math program that meets these expectations.  Our customized math learning will focus on the following key concepts:

·        Constant (learning)- Learners are grouped according to each individual’s instructional level not their age.

·        Variable (time) - Progression can occur at any point during the course of the year. 

·        Personalized delivery- Learning takes place through goal setting, choice, demonstration of outcomes, and mastery of skills.

·        Balance in learning- System will efficiently and effectively utilize technology, interactive groups, and facilitator-guided and independent learning.

·        Assessments- Learners will be required to be proficient or better on standards, not earn letter grades to pass.

·        Opportunities- Various learning opportunities allow for the learners to demonstrate outcomes that are relevant for their future in the world of 2020 and beyond.  

Additionally, attached is a PowerPoint presentation about the pilot program.  As you walk through the classrooms at Harrison Park, you will see many examples of customized learning as well as a place for our children to be inspired!

21st Century Learning at PTHS

Today I turn over my blog to a guest blogger.  Mr. Scott Inglese, the high school principal, will discuss one initiative that is targeting significant change at the high school.  I have been watching the development of this team that he discusses with great interest.  The work they are doing has the potential to shift the culture of instruction toward a more individualized format.  Mr. Inglese and the teachers have been doing a great job transferring ideas into action.  Enjoy the blog entry from Mr. Inglese.

As the high school moves toward 21^st Century Learning, students and staff will undergo significant changes in the coming years.  This year we will implement a new BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) policy where student may use their own device anytime, anywhere as long as they use them responsibly and appropriately.  We have come to realize that in, 2012, these devices can be a valuable instructional tool for teachers.  We now have a new wireless network that will permit students to access WIFI throughout the school.  Student devices enable teachers to “blend” their classes to combine traditional and virtual methods of instruction inside and outside the confines of the classroom.  Instead of fighting with students using Facebook and Twitter in class we will embrace it as an instructional tool for students and teachers to collaborate with one another.  Students will be able to learn anytime, anywhere.

A 21^st Century Learning pilot group of teachers are implementing some new practices that challenge some of the traditional teaching and learning that most of us grew up with.  These teachers will shift from individual practitioners to collaborative and project based teaching.  Teacher-centered, lecture-based classrooms will give way to more student-centered, interactive learning. Teachers are moving students out of rows and into groups where they will do more collaboration and application of concepts. 

Additionally, these teachers are reexamining some of their homework practices to make sure homework is meaningful and relevant, so students don’t perceive it as busywork.  Instead of students doing homework for “points,” they do it for the value of learning.  They are also exploring an option for students to retest to encourage mastery of concepts before they plow forward.

This is an exciting time for the high school.  I look forward to the new school year to see how these changes develop.

PLN Training

The next installment in the blog series will discuss the Pennsylvania Literacy (PLN) training that is being incorporated into the school district.  PLN is a literacy and writing strategy that all teachers can embed into every curricular area in the school district.  The training comes from the University of Pennsylvania.  As I mentioned in yesterday’s blog, literacy is a gatekeeper skill for our students.  I view it as a moral obligation to assure that all of our students are given every possible opportunity to excel at Reading.  The school district spends a lot of time, effort and programs to make sure our students have a great start in the elementary school for their literacy training.  PLN serves as the next step in this process.  The strategies used in PLN are geared toward the middle school and high school students.  The school district has trained about 25 teachers this summer and there are plans to train another 20 in October.  Teachers who have been through the training have told me that it was the best training they have ever had.  I have had teachers share with me their plans on how they will incorporate the strategies they learned at PLN training into their classrooms in this upcoming school year.  The ultimate goal of all of our pilot programs is to help teachers provide the best educational experiences for or students.  PLN is a great example of teachers being able to take practical strategies from training and incorporate them immediately into their classroom to help their practice.  The administration will study how well the PLN strategies are being embedded into the classroom to determine whether to expand the training to more teachers. 

Student Learning Assistants

Today I will discuss Student Learning Assistants (SLA's).  SLA's were created for two reasons.  First, the school district needed to "clean up" the different roles and responsibilities of non-teachers in the system.  In the past the school district has various job titles for a host of people doing work within our school.  There were long-term subs, Burst teachers, Risk teachers and tutors.  SLA's will undertake many of the responsibilities and duties of these different titles and place them under one job description. Since SLA's will not be tied to a specific program it will give the principals more felxibility to schedule the SLA's.  SLA's are not teachers (although they are all certified); rather they were created to help students in their learning.  This is where the second reason for their creation comes into play.  SLA's are there to help students learn; thus their name.  By not being ties to a specific program, the SLA's will be able to step in where needed in the schools to help students.  The majority of SLA's are in the elementary schools.  The school district is committed to make sure all of our students (especially the ones in the primary grades) get all of the help possible to make sure they can read.  Reading is a gatekeeper skill that will impact the student's learning for the rest of their lives.  The elementary principals will make sure that the SLA's concentrate a lot of their time in the early grades helping in basic reading.  There are also a few SLA's in the middle schools and high school where they will help students in all areas of the curriculum.  I look forward to reviewing achievement data of students (a nd schools) to judge the effectiveness of the SLA's.

Using a Kindle in the Classroom

Today I will discuss the school district’s initiative to utilize Kindle’s in one of our English dual enrollment courses. The school district has purchased 75 Kindle’s for students to use in a classroom. The original purpose for researching the Kindle in an educational setting (in Penn-Trafford’s case) was the potential money savings.  The course in which the Kindle’s will be used is a dual enrollment course that requires the students to read 25 novels throughout the course of the year.  In the past, the school district would buy the novels for every student.  After a few years of use, the school district would have to purchase the novels again because the books would simply get worn out.  The district can avoid the repurchasing of the books through the purchase of the Kindles.  The 25 novels that are required reading are a free download onto the Kindle.  In other words, the school district gets 25 novels placed on the e-reader for all 75 Kindles at no cost to the school district.  Additionally, the cost of the Kindle's was less than the cost of purchasing all of the novels for the students.  

The money savings aspect (of course) is a good thing.  However we will also keep our eye on whether or not students will benefit instructionally from using an e-reader. There is a shift underway in reading habits of Americans.  E-readers (such as the Kindle) are becoming much more popular with readers, especially younger readers.  I have even read a few books on a Kindle app. on some of my devices.  I am a little old fashioned in that I still like the look and feel of a book, but I have decided that some of the books that I read professionally work well on an e-reader.  I also like the fact that I can keep track of my highlights (and publish them) through my Amazon account when I use the Kindle.  We will monitor how the students use the Kindle and how they will enhance instruction in the classroom.  This pilot program will be interesting to follow.

Reflecting on Classroom Practice

The next pilot program that I want to discuss is something that two principals are doing to help them help teachers with more detailed, effective feedback on their teaching.  The 2012-2013 school year is the first year in which the Penn-Trafford School District is using a new teacher evaluation model. The model was developed a by a committee of teachers and administrators. This model (approved by PDE this Spring) is based on the work of Charlotte Danielson.  Coincidentally, all school districts in the State will be required to use a Danielson-based evaluation system starting next year; so we are ahead of the curve by starting this year.  The evaluation system itself is very thorough and offers 22 different components on which a principal can offer feedback to a teacher regarding their classroom practice.  

The pilot program will explore whether a program called “iobservation” can assist the principals and teachers in this new evaluation process.  Iobservation will allow principals to use their IPads to do formal and informal observations of teachers.  By having the new evaluation tool on their IPads, we hope that feedback to teachers will be immediate and thorough. By placing the evaluation tool in an electronic format, the feedback can be almost instantaneous as the principal can send their comments to the teacher’s iobservation account as they are observing the class.

The most exciting aspect of iobservation for me is the fact that there are videos that correspond to each component of the Danielson model. This offers one more professional training opportunity for our staff. These short “teaching tutorials” can be electronically attached to comments that the principals make to help the teachers as they reflect on their lesson.  For example, if a principal is observing a lesson and the teacher is engaging the students in a class discussion, the principal can make comments concerning the lesson and also attach a video on class discussion to give the teacher more ideas (or reinforce what the teachers are already doing) on the topic of “classroom discussion”.  In evaluating this pilot program, we are looking for two things: first, does iobservation increase the efficiency of using our new evaluation tool, and second, does it assist the teachers in reflecting on their classroom practice.  We have two principals that are going to use this tool with some of their teachers this year and I look forward to evaluating the system to determine whether it something that will benefit the entire school district.

10 Blogs in 10 Days

Over the course of the past three weeks I have traveled quite a bit with my family.  We have spent a lot of time on the road driving.  A thought occurred to me as we were finishing our latest road trip yesterday.  As you are driving down the road you spend the vast majority of your time looking forward through the windshield (if you don’t you will certainly get into an accident).  A driver spends very little time looking in the rear-view mirror.  Although it is important to check the rear-view mirror from time to time, the most vital part of driving is looking forward through the windshield.  In other words you respect what is behind you (in the past) but you place your concentration and mental energy on what is coming in the future.  I hope this blog is a place where readers can sit beside me and view the wonderful opportunities the future holds for the school district. We respect what has happened in the past (and learn from it) but we do not use all of our energy viewing the past.  With that in mind, over the next 10 days I will blog about the “pilot programs” that the school district will be undertaking in the upcoming school year.  I have discussed these programs in a previous post, and will give you an update about the programs.  These programs revolve around providing the best instruction for our children in their classroom.  We call them pilot programs because we will spend time evaluating them on a small scale to determine whether or not they will be able to scale to the entire district.  We will learn what programs will help the district achieve our goals.

The Middle School Social Studies teachers are de-emphasizing the textbook this year.  In lieu of purchasing textbooks, this group of teachers will now use an IPad cart in each of their rooms to help provide great instruction.  The teachers were trained two weeks ago on how to incorporate the IPad into their instruction.  The training was phenomenal!  The teachers who participated in the training told me that it will change the way in which they instruct.  I sat in on some of the training and was amazed at how interactive the classroom can become with the use of the IPads.  Of course, the importance of the new technology (in this case the IPads) is how they will enhance the instruction in the classroom.  Based on conversations I had with the teachers at the training, I look forward to observing how they build lessons that engage students in their own learning by using the resources that are made available through the IPads.  The most innovative aspect that the teachers learned in the training was the use of QR codes in education.  I will discuss their use more after the teachers get a chance to use them in the classroom.