Molly Sand – Molly Sand

E-Learning Day Excitement

Molly Sand on November 13, 2019

Long story short, my school had an E-Learning Day last week due to a fire in the art department.

For more details click on this link: https://www.sctimes.com/story/news/local/2019/11/05/south-junior-high-fire-tuesday-afternoon-cancels-school-wednesday/4170500002/

I went into this day frustrated by having to do more work than I would if I had the chance to teach in class that day. I was overwhelmed with the idea of learning more new things because this year is full of too many learning experiences. But as the day began, I realized how much I enjoyed the freedom e-learning provided.

I uploaded an e-learning folder with the materials for each of my classes on Schoology.

Materials included:

E-Learning Day Check In (used for attendance)
PDF assignment
Assignment dropbox

I had not used the feature for asking students a question before and found a lot of use for it by creating my check in questions. I plan to use more check in questions to start my reading class because I need a better routine for starting class.

For the check in, I asked my students to write a few sentences about how their day off was going and what their plans were. I provided them with two sentence frames.

My day is going ____________________________.

I am going to ______________________________.

On short notice, this was the perfect way for my students to engage in the class to be counted as present.

The PDFs were of two worksheets from my reading class’ review packet. We were going to do them in class, so I thought this would be a great way to gauge how many students understand how to complete and turn in assignments on Schoology.

Well, I got my answer. Half of my class completed the check in and only ONE student completed and turned in the worksheets. I am not sure if my directions were not clear, but I chose to keep them simple in the hopes of preventing confusion. I guess I was wrong, but am unsure.

By the end of the work day, I decided to develop a discussion for class the following day about E-Learning Days. Our students had not been exposed to this kind of learning yet and I felt they needed to express their thoughts/questions. The reflection lesson went over well and I was able to address many questions and issues that came up when they were working at home. I also provided them with a few minutes to complete the check in and finish their worksheets on paper.

Before future E-Learning Days, I plan to teach my students how to export the PDFs into Notability, go over how to use Notability, and how to submit assignments from Notability into the dropbox on Schoology. Overall, I am not feeling more confident in E-Learning Days and will develop clear and concise directions for the assignments.

Airdrop for Amateurs

Molly Sand on November 6, 2019

Again, I am a few steps behind when it comes to using different pieces of technology in my classroom. This week was one full of exploration. I made the brave decision to embrace the one-to-one technology available and so far it has been a positive decision. They have been working on a video project for a week and a half. It is finally time to wrap up and turn in their final projects. I realized turning in videos could be complicated, so I taught myself how to use Airdrop on my laptop for students to turn in their TV commercial projects.

I was hesitant to use this technology because my students have misused it so many times before. My only experience with Airdrop before this week was for writing up students for airdropping photos during class and disrupting instruction.

After today, I will only use Airdrop for students to submit projects. They were able to airdrop their video from iMovie to my MacBook Air. It only took a few minutes depending on how long the videos were.

Here are some simple directions:

1. Open Finder

2. Click Airdrop on the left side

3. Turn on Bluetooth

4. Select who can Airdrop to your device

Airplay Adventures

Molly Sand on November 1, 2019

It has been an exciting week working with Airplay. I might be late to the party when it comes to using this in my classroom, but better late than never. Airplay has offered a lot of help when it comes to avoiding the technology mishaps I shared earlier this week and allows me to move freely around the classroom.

I am able to change slides, show videos, help students, and more all at the same time. Maybe not entirely the “same time,” but you know what I mean. I can do more than when I had to sit next to my laptop with all of the cords connected hoping the screen would appear.

My only concern is that I do not know how exactly this system works. My students were excited for this technology to be available, especially with them making TV Commercials to present soon. One of them asked how Airplay works and I could not give them a decent answer.

The media specialist set it up for me on the classroom computer and showed me how to connect my laptop to it, but did not explain the details of how it works. I will continue to look into this for my students.

Technology Mishap Today

Molly Sand on October 29, 2019

Today, while instruction my reading class all of the technology gave up. The projector would not display my computer screen. The DocCam would not connect the projector to the computer screen. Finally, I caved and called the media specialist to save the day.

When he came in to fix the equipment, he pressed the two buttons I pressed and they cooperated for him. Let’s just say I was grateful and frustrated. I am embracing the technology available to me, learning how to use it properly, and it still does not work somedays.

Shortly after he left, my computer shutdown and would not turn on right away. I went as far as to lay my laptop down to be displayed by the DocCam since the projector would no longer connect. It was a ridiculous sight. The entire process started over, but this time when I called him back he taught me how to use Airplay. This is a lesson-saver when technology mishaps happen.

It is another new technology feature I have to practice using before understanding it completely, but I am eager to try it out tomorrow and not be trapped in the back where the cords are.

To be continued…

Social Media for Teens

Molly Sand on October 15, 2019

According to the Pew Research Center, “Teens credit social media for helping to build stronger friendships and exposing them to a more diverse world, but they express concern that these sites lead to drama and social pressure.” I will reflect on some questions I thought of while reading this article.

How can social media provide diversity for students?

Interact with people from other cultures
Learn about a world they did not realize was out there
Connect through interests and similarities
Join groups and forums

What issues do we run into when using social media in school?

Appropriate content
Social burdens, such as pressure to post things that will get likes or comments
Posts need to add to social status
Hostile environment
Cyberbullying and other drama filled online interactions

What activities can utilize social media in a classroom?

Learning to be concise and think critically
- Writing short paragraphs for Instagram or Snapchat stories
Presentations
- Using a Snapchat story as a form of PowerPoint slides
- Would have access to using different fonts, colors, filters, etc.
- Able to make a presentation more unique
Pen Pals
- Social media has opened the world up to communicating across cultures
- Pen pals can help students develop written language skills or verbal language skills (depending on which platform used)

Why are students hesitant to write about religious or political beliefs?

There can be a lot of backlash for adults who post their religious and political beliefs on social media. When I have encountered these posts, I notice the enormous amount of comments. The comments display many negative opinions and reactions to the user’s post.

I think this kind of hostile environment would make anyone avoid these kinds of posts. In our society, it is taboo to discuss religion and politics. This has made it more difficult when things need to be brought up. Social media only adds to the tensions because people can hide behind usernames and post/comment anything.

Overall, I found this article to be very useful. The statistics about teens opinions on social media helped clarify and brought to light different questions I have about using social media in my classroom.

One-to-One Technology Pros and Cons

Molly Sand on October 7, 2019

One-to-one “is applied to programs that provide all students in a school, district, or state with their own laptop, netbook, tablet computer, or other mobile-computing device. One-to-one refers to one computer for every student” (The Glossary of Education Reform).

As a teacher in a one-to-one school, I struggle to embrace the technology available. In my school, students are given an iPad to complete schoolwork on. Many students also use these for personal use. This can cause issues with how to appropriately use the iPads.

My students are not yet productive technology users. We stick to a more traditional classroom for my seventh graders. But my eighth graders, they are required to bring the iPads every day to complete notes and assignments. The maturity difference between seventh and eighth grade can be demonstrated by how they use their technology. The seventh graders are personal use focused, whereas the eighth graders are school focused with some personal use. A year makes an extreme difference in how students use their technology at school.

One-to-One is definitely has both positive and negative impacts on schools. Some of the pros and cons of One-to-One in my school are below. There are many more, but I stuck with five for each.

Pros of One-to-One:

Students have access to new technology and the apps used by the school everywhere
Wifi Hotspots are available to check out (may not apply to every school district)
Students are able to develop appropriate skills for using technology
Introducing students to technology they might use in a career
Reducing paper copies

Cons of One-to-One:

Not bringing iPads to class or school
Not charging iPads for school
Using technology for games instead of schoolwork
Access to non-educational sites
Breaking the technology

With access to technology 24/7, my students are expected to follow school policies when using the device and treat the device with care because it is school property after all. I think I would like to incorporate more technology use for in class work with my seventh graders, but I will need to take it step by step.

Edpuzzle for English Language Learners

Molly Sand on October 3, 2019

Hello all,

Today, I will be discussing how to use Edpuzzle and more specifically how to incorporate it into a 7th grade language arts class with students identified as English Language Learners.

According to Sylvester and Greenidge, “A digital story is a multimedia text consisting of still images complemented by a narrated soundtrack to tell a story or present a documentary; sometimes video clips are embedded between images.” Edpuzzle is a format for digital storytelling. Digital stories motivate students to be more engaged throughout listening to and creating a story.

Edpuzzle is a new addition to the more familiar teaching model, Flipped Classroom. The Flipped Classroom Model is where the educator shares predetermined digital resources with students through a platform outside of the classroom, and related content is also taught through the same outside platform asynchronously (Cabi, p. 203).

Cabi discusses four important components needed in a lesson to be considered as a Flipped Classroom lesson. These components include restructuring the learning environment to be more flexible and consider the needs of individuals, not only the whole group. The next component is developing a learner-centered approach and providing students with opportunities and activities to enrich learning. The third component is for educators to track student progress closely and monitor the level of the content. The final component focuses on giving feedback and assessing students’ knowledge (Cabi, p. 203). As you read this post, you will learn about how Edpuzzle aligns with the four major components of the Flipped Classroom Model.

Edpuzzle is available for both educators and students to use for free. Educators and students have access to limited storage on the free plan, but can upgrade to a paid plan for unlimited storage. It can be used to enhance any kind of lesson from science to math and writing to reading. My experience with Edpuzzle, as I have mentioned in previous posts, is limited to using it as a student. I enjoyed majority of my time interacting as a student, but felt as if my time could have been more productive if the instructor allowed certain features to be available to students. I will speak more on those features later on in this post.

According to Leslie Mischel, video lessons have been “incorporated into the flipped classroom, massive open online courses, and other learning sites, such as Lynda.com or Khan Academy, to allow individuals to learn about topics of interest at their own pace.” Edpuzzle gives educators and students access to videos from Khan Academy, YouTube, National Geographic, Ted Talks, Veritasium, Numberphile, and Crash Course. The videos being used in my lesson will be from YouTube. They are audio readings of the novel Number the Stars by Lois Lowry.

I chose to rework these recordings with Edpuzzle because my co-taught language arts class has various learning abilities and language proficiencies. The features allow for differentiation and scaffolding for all of my students. This is important when working with not only English Language Learners (ELL), but also when working with all students.

As you can see in the images below, Edpuzzle provides a simple and inviting appearance for those who may be intimidated by adding a new piece of technology to their classroom.

Edpuzzle offers videos in various content areas to be edited to fit any lesson. Educators can use this tool to add a voiceover to videos from the site or uploaded videos. There is a feature to crop videos and add questions or notes to enhance the comprehension of the concepts in the lesson.

I will be displaying how I will use this form of technology in my co-taught language arts class. I will be enhancing their learning experience by providing stop and check comprehension questions throughout the audiobook reading of Number the Stars.

I decided to focus on adding questions to the audiobook reading because my students are at various levels for reading. Some are comfortable reading long series like Harry Potter, whereas others might struggle to read graphic novels, which contain few sentences per page. By using the quiz tool, I am able to insert open-ended questions, true or false, or multiple-choice. I have developed stop and check comprehension questions for chapter 1, chapter 2, chapter 3, and chapter 4. I will continue to add questions and notes throughout the rest of the novel. With these questions, I can engage and track my students comprehension while they listen to each chapter.

In this video, you will be able to view a screencast of how to insert a question to a specific point of the video (Video Link).

In ISD 742, we utilize Schoology for our classes. It is a platform for engaging with students and other staff, similar to Facebook or Twitter. Edpuzzle is now available on Schoology for posting the content to different classes and creating assignments. For example: As a class, we will listen to the audio reading of chapter one, discuss what happened, and who we have been introduced to in this chapter. Then for the assignment, students will be able to access the video on Schoology to re-listen to the chapter at home and answer the quiz questions when they appear on the video.

I realize my different learning levels and styles in my classroom can impact how my students will complete this type of an assignment. Keeping that in mind, I chose to turn on the ability to skip ahead in the video, as well as closed-captioning. This will cater to differentiated instruction because students can read the captions and listen to the voice reading at the same time. They will not be required to re-listen to the entire chapter, but will have the opportunity to choose which parts they need to re-listen to in order to answer the questions accurately.

In this video, you will see how a student can skip ahead to a question instead of re-listening to an entire section of the reading (Video Link).

Edpuzzle tracks students engagement with the videos and their overall results. One of the reports indicates which students watched the assigned video, how accurately they answer the quiz questions, and whether they watched the video before the due date or not (Mischel, p. 285). With this information, I will be able to provide informed feedback to each student. They will have access to their score sheets and I will conference with them to ensure they understand why they received a certain grade.

To recap, Edpuzzle provides a flexible learning opportunity for all students, differentiates for individual learning needs, effectively tracks student progress, and encourages educators to provide detailed feedback. I believe this kind of technology will enhance my students understanding and engagement while reading a novel.

Work Cited

Cabı, Emine. “The Impact of the Flipped Classroom Model on Students Academic Achievement.” The International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, vol. 19, no. 3, Nov. 2018, doi:10.19173/irrodl.v19i3.3482.

Mischel, Leann J. “Watch and Learn? Using EDpuzzle to Enhance the Use of Online Videos.” Management Teaching Review, vol. 4, no. 3, July 2018, pp. 283–289., doi:10.1177/2379298118773418.

Sylvester, Ruth, and Wendy-Lou Greenidge. “Digital Storytelling: Extending the Potential for Struggling Writers.” The Reading Teacher, vol. 63, no. 4, Jan. 2009, pp. 284–295., doi:10.1598/rt.63.4.3.

Teachnology Reflection 7

Molly Sand on October 1, 2019

After writing my rough draft and reading the peer reviews, I have decided to rework and expand my final paragraph. My final paragraph is as follows:

“Through a professional growth plan, I will further my own education by participating in professional development conferences. I plan to continue researching the best strategies for implementing technology when teaching English Language Learners and record which strategies work best in my classroom. I will reflect on my own teaching and technology use in the classroom. I will look for ways to improve the areas I may be lacking in and find ways to emphasize my classes’ areas of achievement. As a teacher, I am committed to providing my students with the tools to succeed not only in education, but also to achieve in a technological society.”

Some questions were brought to my attention about the specifics on how I intend to achieve my professional growth plan.

My professional growth plan includes

Participating in professional development conferences, like Inspire Academy. At Inspire Academy, I was introduced to Edpuzzle, Storyboard, and other forms of technology to be used in the classroom. While attending this conference, I was able to test out each technology with a specific lesson plan or unit. By being provided this opportunity, I decided to include Edpuzzle in my co-taught language arts class when we read Number the Stars.
This will be the first year implementing Edpuzzle into the Number the Stars unit and I will be tracking how the students engage with the technology. I will provide opportunities for student and educator reflections.
Through self reflections, I am hoping to identify the weaknesses and strengths of using new technologies with my students who are identified as English Language Learners and mainstream.

I will continue to expand and respond to the feedback i have received in order to create a better Teachnology Philosophy Statement.

Edpuzzle Exploration

Molly Sand on September 21, 2019

Over the summer, I participated in a technology training and was introduced to Edpuzzle for educators. As I mentioned before, I had only used Edpuzzle in one online class and did not enjoy the entire experience. There were certain aspects I did appreciate, like the questions added to videos. I did not like the feature of not being able to move freely through the video. The presentation was locked in and this caused for issues with time. I would have to look at how long the presentation was in order to dedicate enough time.

In my classroom, I think I will be setting the audiobook videos to as unlocked because we will listen to the audiobook in class and i want my students to be able to move through the book and answer questions. There will still be the option to re-listen to the chapter and answer questions, but I want to make this lesson available to all learning levels. Some students will not need to re-listen, some might need to re-listen to a specific section, and others might need to listen to the entire chapter in order to answer the questions.

I believe Edpuzzle will provide more differentiation for all my students, both ELL and mainstream. As a teacher of ESL, i have to constantly revise lessons to make them accessible to the various abilities and technology will make this process a lot simpler.

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