Life Long Learners Don't Take the Summer Off

Today I started my 8 week summer work schedule. I rolled into school around 7:45am today to pick up 4 GPS units and a couple of laptops before heading over to the playground to see four eager students awaiting the start of camp. It seems like I just left school for the year as the students and staff celebrated the last day of school only a week ago, but in the blink of an eye the classroom shifted to a more relaxed setting and the students came in with all the enthusiasm in the world to enter a new learning environment ready to absorb as much as possible. I couldn't be happier!

I myself will admit that I may have bit off more then I can chew this summer, but with a baby on the way having a little extra cash flow is a good idea, and besides the thing I miss most about not having my own classroom anymore is in getting to know the students better. So here I am primed and ready for four hours with four students each morning designing and creating animations, cartoons and comics for the week as well as getting outdoors to stretch the legs using GPS units to play games closely related to geocaching. (In the afternoon this summer I will be helping the IT staff move everything over to our new servers in preparation for our district Wide Area Network. In the late afternoon and evenings I will be tutoring adults with iPads, laptops and other types of technology needs.)

Of course, as things would have it, I walked into the lab with the students shortly after a quick outdoor geocaching warm-up activity and the Internet was down due to switching servers and problems early on. Time to punt! I had the students login locally to our network iMacs in our computer lab and we used the programs Comic Life, Photobooth, and Hyperstudio 5 to create comics, cartoons and animated stories. The four boys were fantastic and loved the programs. These creative minds not only explored the programs on their own, but quickly became collaborators with one another's stories and animations adding an extra voice over or sound effect for each other.

At the end of morning we watched all four stories and gave feedback to one another. This is the step that I often see skipped in lessons in elementary school, especially when using a lot of technology or teaching within the lab. I understand why this happens, time or an overwhelming feeling to finish the project make it nearly impossible to get everything in, but after seeing what I saw today, and have seen many times over, the observation, critical evaluation and reflection sessions are some of the best teachable moments out there. Plus, this gives students a chance to learn while doing. Too often we evaluate when it's too late to make changes. Do students really learn this way? Not really in my eyes. They see this as a grade given by the teacher, but not as something to improve on since they were not given the chance to fail at something and respond with a solution to the problem.

These mini evaluation sessions, both self-reflection and peer reflection, yields some of the best quality of work in my observations over my 11 years as an elementary educator. This is the basis and quality evidence shown in many case studies for student portfolios and student-led conferences. I know that I will once again push to have more chances for students to share, collaborate and reflect on one another's work. I will also surely push for ePortfolios this year and look for teachers to pilot some of these projects.

Enrichment Day at VES

For one afternoon students at Village Elementary School (grades K - 2) chose special mini-courses that interested them outside of the regular curriculum. We were encouraged by our Horizon's teacher (pc for Gifted and Talented these days) to teach something out of the box and something that the students wouldn't normally expect you to do. The male PE teacher, a good friend of mine since high school, and I have a love for good food and cooking. Certainly something the students wouldn't expect from the two of us. Nor do most of the staff for that matter, so we chose to teach a course on French cooking. Using the Disney movie Ratatouille, and the cookbook by Thomas Keller inspired by the movie, we created a French cheese fondue for the students. Armed with plastic knives and skewers, the students watched part of the movie, and created one of the best cheese fondues I have ever tasted before. It's truly great to see students outside of the regular environment of school. We setup our fondue stations in the teacher's lounge, and the students were very excited to learn a new skill.

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

eNewsletter June

The summer edition of the eNewsletter for teachers is out. In this month's issue, I focus on backing up your files. This is especially essential for educators in Maine as they must turn in their MLTI laptop to be reimaged by their IT department this summer. There are tips and tricks for backing up your files locally to your school's server or your own pen/external hard drive, as well as backing up your files to the cloud. There are many more tips for backing up things like bookmarks in Safari and Firefox, your iMovie files, iWeb domain file, and even your Sticky notes on the Tech Tip of the Week web site as well.

New Blog/Resource

The iDevices, or "Game Changers", as they have been called has inspired me to create a web page dedicated to implementing these devices into the classroom to enhance lessons and instruction in our schools. The district that I work in has seen these changes first hand with a few pilot programs this year using the iPads. Next year's budget will increase these pilots as we plan to purchase another 15 tablets. As these mobile devices take over our world, and we all know the kids will learn on them faster than we can catch up, it is important to develop a PLN of professions with tried and true practices for these devices and apps. For this reason, I have started a blog/resource page called iDevices in Our Schools. I'm hoping that this resource will grow as my own PLN helps to contribute ideas, resources, videos, and reflections on how they are using these types of technologies within their own classrooms. Any input would be great!

eNewsletter May

The latest edition of the eNewsletter is out. In the May edition of the eNewsletter I have included some great new links and resources for project based learning with multimedia and creating exciting new lessons to get your students excited, inspired and motivated down this home stretch of the school year. I have also included some great articles on technology integration that you can use your classroom. Please do not hesitate to ask for help too. Cheers!

Enrichment Day

Each year, our Horizon's teacher (our new PC term for Gifted and Talented), organizes a fun filled afternoon of mini-enrichment courses for the kids in our elementary schools to choose from. Teachers, middle school and high school students, and community members come into our school and offer their expertise and lead a group of elementary students for an hour and a half in their interest areas. This year we had courses that ranged from cooking dog biscuits for your favorite four legged friend, to playing the drums and guitar, to hiking techniques and science experiments at home. There were gardeners, fly fish tiers, golfers, and scrap bookers too. The students got to pick their top 5 choices and were divided into their respective groups for the afternoon.

I can't say enough about events like this one. To see children in a different setting other than in class is truly a special occasion and one that should be shared by all teaching staff all over the world. As a technology integrator, I miss the opportunities that I had had as a classroom teacher to connect with students on a one-to-one level and discuss their social lives as well as just their educational career within the confines of the classroom walls. I miss heading out to the ballpark to watch a student clobber a fastball into the outfield, or play their favorite concerto at their piano recital. A day like enrichment day, although it's only an hour and a half long, offers a quick insight into the true character of each and every child.

There were 20 kids that came out to learn about a golf swing with myself and our school custodian that moonlights at a local golf and ski sports shop. We taught them the basic grip and mechanics of the golf swing, and even let them use the back playground as a driving range. The students then divided up into groups and played a short 9-hole course that I had set up around the back field and even kept score on score cards that were designed in the computer lab. (We had to tie math into the event some how!)

All of the students loved the activity. Some were disappointed, and even frustrated at times, over their lack of confidence and ability to strike the ball with mastery, but that is the actual point of the day. Students that excel in the classroom didn't always master the activity for enrichment day and learned a hard lesson that sometimes extra practice is required to master a skill. Other students, and in my class in particular, that do not always excel in the classroom realized they could succeed in something new and unrelated to typical school activities and found a new love for a hobby that they hadn't tried before.

Learning can come from any where and every where! As educators we need to realize this and strive to think outside of the box and teach from all different angles in order to reach each and every child. I sure learned a lot from the enrichment day and I didn't even get a chance to attend a course. I can only imagine what the rest of the group learned in their choices.

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

iPads, iPhones and iPod Touches as AT in the Classroom

This is my first published article in Tech&Learning Magazine.

iPads, iPhones and iPod Touches as AT in the Classroom