Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Tech New Year's Resolutions

As an elementary educator in the 21st century, it is becoming more and more important to embed technology into lesson plans, activities, units, and every day tasks for both myself and my students. Technology is constantly evolving, and if I ignore it even for a little bit, I may be left behind. It can certainly be overwhelming, but I vow to keep my head above water and be the life preserver for anyone feeling like they cannot keep up. Whether this be students (not likely) or staff members that need a little help in moving forward and to not just feel comfortable treading water any more.

Taking a leap of faith can be overwhelming, so taking a few smaller steps can be very rewarding. This year I have made a list of some things that we can all do to help incorporate more technology into our own environment and into our classrooms. Everybody loves lists so I created my top ten ideas for increased technology use in education, but do not feel like you have to check off each item in the new year. These are merely suggestions for enhancing your classroom lessons and student motivation. Try one step at a time, and in no particular order.

1. Subscribe to an educators blog and vow to read it at least once per week. I have built into my schedule now a time to read my subscription blogs and time to write a blog as well. Here are a couple of great blogs to read for education. (www.speedofcreativity.org, www.ilearntechnology.com, and www.freetech4teachers.com)

2. Download Skype and connect with another classroom somewhere on Earth. I highly recommend joining Skype in the Classroom to help in making connections with other classrooms.

3. Create a Twitter or Facebook account and start your professional learning network (PLN) and start collaborating with educators around the world.

4. Attend a free webinar and learn something new for free and from the comfort of your own home.

5. Investigate a new handheld device and find a few ways to use them in the classroom. Allow your students to become the investigators and evaluators for the apps too!

6. Start a blog, wiki, threaded discussion or a web page that is interactive with your students. You'd be surprised how much students will participate in classroom discussions away from the regular classroom.

7. Publish a video, podcast or photo set to an Internet site to share. Don't forget to comment on somebody else's published work while you are there too!

8. Enroll in an online class, or start your own online class with your students.

9. Design a unit with project based learning with multimedia for your classroom. This sounds like a lot, and I won't lie, it is a big step. It is truly worth it though if the time to plan and setup is used effectively. In the first year, don't be afraid to have students come up with the project, help in planning and creating a rubric for a finished product. It's your first year, take baby steps, and then as a whole class (students included) tweak the steps along the way.

10. Read a book about technology in education. Better yet, download an ebook to your favorite mobile device and incorporate two ideas from the book into your classroom. Don't forget to reflect on this with your peers, PLN, or on your web page or blog!

Monday, December 6, 2010

Tech Tip of the Week

In an effort to help bridge the gaps in teacher's understanding and basic skills, I have started an initiative this year that allows for a quick reference to a new skill each week. I create, or borrow, a video tutorial that explains a quick tech tip (no longer then two and a half minutes) and I broadcast it through the school television system in the morning just before the students arrive. This gives teachers a quick tip that they can use immediately, and allows them to continue what they are doing in their own classroom to prep for the rest of the day while listening in.

I first created a webpage using iWeb to create a tech tip of the week online repository. I used the blog template to encourage subscribers as well. Here I add one tip per week from YouTube, or TeacherTube, that either I have submitted or that I have found from another educator that is relevant to something the teachers asked for help with. I also added my email address to the site, so that teachers could email me with suggestions for future tips. Of course, on YouTube and TeacherTube, there is also a place for comments so that educators can chime in and leave feedback for the tip or for future tips.

I then attach my laptop to our CTV box via our DVD/VCR player using the camera 1 input. I have a VGA adapter that allows video out from my MacBook Pro either through the digital adapter or s-video, and a "Y" cable that connects to my headphone jack to send the audio from my laptop to the DVD/VCR player. This way I do not use up all of our DVDs in the school, and yet I can still play them through the CTV system. To check out my tech. tips of the week, just visit; http://www.yorkschools.org/~elawson/teachers/techtip

Universal Design for Learning and Book Builder


For a master's project, I chose to research and evaluate the CAST UDL Book Builder online tool. Book Builder was developed with support from the Massachusetts Department of Special Education, NEC Foundation of America, The John W. Alden Trust, and The Pinkerton Foundation. (http://bookbuilder.cast.org/) This online resource and tool allows users to read books from public libraries, or model books created by other users to the website. These books are very helpful to younger readers, and also readers with visual and/or other reading learning disabilities. Each book comes with a text-to-speech tool, translator for other languages (usually Spanish only) and helpful cartoon coaches that can help a struggling reader, or a first time user to the site to navigate through the digital audio books. I found these coaches to be very helpful upon my first visit, as I wasn’t sure which buttons to hit in order to try everything out. They remind me of the little cartoon drawings in the Map Champs books for kids that help guide third graders through their exploration of the Earth through maps.(http://www.nystromnet.com/index.cfm?fa=Products.product&CATEGORY_ID=3&CHILD_ID=381&PRODUCT_ID=637)
The website is very user friendly, and the data base for searching content online is easy to follow and to use. Within the database you can search by date published, title, author, illustrator, genre, content area, school group, grade level, average rating, and by key words. Each book can also be rated and there is an area to leave a comment to the database and to the creators of the book. This makes it very easy to browse through the database to find a book that is just right for your student(s).
Along with libraries and model books, you can sign up for a free account to create your very own book. This is a great way to get all of your students to create digital books, and to also offer assistive technologies to students that may need the text-to-speech or translation features for stronger comprehension. “Assistive technology has historically been considered part of service delivery for children with special needs. However, the emphasis of universal design for learning in the creation of accessible and effective curriculum- based instruction can support the educational needs of ail learners.” (Gavigan, 2009)
This resource is an excellent way for students with learning disabilities to better understand the text that everyone is reading in class. The website can be accessed from a computer or a mobile device such as Apple’s (http://www.apple.com) iPad or iPod touch as it does not require Flash (http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/otherversions/) in order to read the ebooks.
This tool may have started with an intended audience, targeting ELL students or students with physical or reading learning disabilities, but this tool could be used for all students. Introducing this tool to students before a project could yield some interesting presentations that could last a lifetime. Imagine proposing a project based learning with multimedia project within your classroom with an open ended way to present. Some groups may want to construct a physical product or representation, others may want to embed more technology into it and create slideshows, or multimedia stacks, and others may want to create a visual representation that can be used in years to come that would benefit all students no matter their skill level or abilities. Book Builder could definitely transform a product into a wonderful teaching tool for the future, and best of all, the students would create it themselves. “When educators plan and support instruction using universal design for learning, there is the expectation that a wide range of learning styles and abilities be served in the classroom.” (Gavigan, 2009)
Book Builder is truly a web 2.0 tool as students can read, but also create and publish their work to this resource. These books can then be read and shared with students all over the world. Comments and edits can be made to build skills in communication and writing with voice or to an intended audience as well. Universal Design for Learning, or UDL, offers students many different routes to take in order to find their best learning style, and to experiment with different formats of learning and presenting to find greater success. An open ended project expands upon this idea and offers students a chance to think outside the box and perform in their most comfortable setting, and with ideas and programs they are more familiar with or more interested in.
Book Builder could be used by teachers too. It is often difficult to teach all of our children with the same text book any more, due to learning disabilities of various types. Modifications and adjustments for each individual student can be a daunting task, however, when done correctly, the students will benefit and succeed at a much higher rate, and the resource can be used in future years to come. Teachers could certainly reword texts and/or create more student friendly versions to apply to all of their learners in class, and help to individualize the content to meet each student’s need. King-Sears states, “Taking a UDL approach to textbook usage, these weakly designed features are redesigned before instruction is delivered, so that key facts are targeted and relationships among them are determined.” (2009) A text book could be reworked to drive home key points to students in a manner of different ways using Book Builder to help students with learning disabilities.
The technology should not be the only focus, however. In the terms of reworking text books to meet the individual needs of students, Book Builder is just the tool and not the means by which teachers create resources for all learners. “Equitable use of instructional materials can be achieved via technology, such as digital texts for students with LD. However, when the instructional material is a textbook that is not well designed in terms of how its content is organized, depicted, and sequenced, pedagogical features that increase the content's accessibility for many learners become the focus.” (King-Sears, 2009) A teacher must be skilled in UDL design and implementation in order to create these resources for each individual child. Book Builder allows a skilled professional to not only model, but to also create books to individualize instruction and promote UDL within their classroom.
In conclusion, I found that CAST UDL Book Builder was an extremely valuable tool that is easy to understand and navigate, not only for teachers, but for students as well. I could see using this for ELL, physical and learning disabled children in reading, and for creating presentations in project based learning with multimedia projects for all students. This resource offers many valuable tips on teaching with UDL and offers model books and lessons for teachers. I will certainly bookmark this site and share it with my colleagues for projects in the future.
Resources
Gavigan, K. & Kurtts, S. (2009).. AT, UD, and Thee: Using assistive technology and Universal Design for Learning in 21st century media centers. Library Media Connection, 27(4), 54-56. Retrieved June 21, 2010 from Academic Search Premier
King-Sears, M. (2009).  Universal design for learning: technology and pedagogy.. Learning Disability Quarterly, 32(4), 199-201. Retrieved June 21, 2010 from Academic Search Premier
Massachusetts Department of Elementary & Secondary Education, NEC Foundation of America, The John W. Alden Trust, and The Pinkerton Foundation (2006). CAST UDL Book Builder. Retrieved from http:bookbuilder.cast.org/ on December 1, 2010.