BYOD: Making it Mobile 2015

These are notes I took at the BYOD 2015 conference. They may (or may not) make sense!

Explain, reflect, and demonstrate learning through creation (Fiona Grant)

• Google educator group
  
• Google plus GEG NZ
  
• Comments positive, specific, helpful, thoughtful, ask a question
  
• GEG NZ events once a month- hangouts.
  
• Use in school community to share readings with teachers
  
• Want more face to face events
  
• Hangouts (different from hangouts on air - broadcast live on YouTube)
  
• Hangouts similar to Skype. Can use in classroom to connect with other schools
  
• Schools can use hangouts on air to broadcast events. Need conversation with management. Can use a Page rather than profile. Needs to be under school domain.
  

The Student Perspective (Felicity Timings)

• Research to evaluate success of BYOD
  
• Every student surveyed
  
• Year 7 - new toy, novelty, social media, home use monitored
  
• BYOD preferred - isolated, anxiety
  
• Students off task more so than teachers think
  
• Device use during breaks
  
• Do they behave differently when they got their devices
  
• Kids felt they needed help with managing their devices
  
• Identified learning advantages and disadvantages
  
• Mix of handwriting and typing
  
• Printing issues
  
• iPads vs laptops - iPads seen as more of a toy distraction, laptops more work focussed
  
• iPads - camera is too accessible, google docs not great, I messaging, snapchat
  
• Facebook - groups for school problem
  
• Year 7 banned use of devices in break time
  
• Staff PLD -inconsistent use and skill levels
  
• Digital citizenship - skill levels low,taught specifically, turnitin
  
• Distraction more awareness, user protocol, PB4L
  
• Printing - student hand in work online or by hand, hoping for cloud based
  
• Home behaviour - newsletter column
  
• Handwriting - both available
  
• High multi-tasking children - harder to focus, more distraction, much worse social and emotional development
  
• Important to practice face to face interaction.
  

Making learning visible and engaging in a digital learning environment (Matt Goodwin and Karen Belt)

• Making learning visible and engaging in a digital learning environment
  
• Learn create share
  
• Accessible to all, visible to all, feedback from all over the world, blogging challenge, high engagement and motivation
  
• Visible planning through Google sites
  
• Visible learning through student blogs
  
• Visible learning to teacher dashboard
  
• Visible learning to whanau via Parent portal
  
• Hapara
  
• Enables students to start work straight away - they know where to look for what they should be doing
  
• Plan online, create templates via drive, share using sites, review via teacher dashboard
  
• Padlet - vocabulary task
  
• Explain everything - (year) - first few weeks establishing routines, kaka of care
  
• Create lessons on iPad and upload to hapara
  
• Personalise projects - work for guided reading
  
• Use record function in Explain Everything
  
• Share learning 3-4 times per week via blog
  
• Blog from y1 - 8
  
• Oral language emphasis
  
• Some choice in learning
  
• Use of icons to communicate to non readers
  
• Model all activities first
  
• First page highly scaffolded later pages more independent
  
• Use QR codes to direct students to curated content - follow up with oral discussion. Gave choice
  

Learn, create, share for teachers (Dorothy Burt)

• Learning is active and social
  
• Sharing includes reflection
  
• Sharing implies that you have finished something
  
• Finishing - hugely important for people who haven't experienced success
  
• Ready to share =finished. More than just the teacher sees it
  
• Children learning laterally from each other
  
• Children capture learning process, have it in accessible location, outside boundaries of classroom
  
• Do something once - not learned. Put it somewhere you can find it again. Rewind own thinking
  
• Anything we want our young people to learn, we need to be modelling.
  
• Key competencies - we need to model these. Life-long learners, active, connected
  
• Teachers have different ways of capturing learning. Sylvia duckworth
  
• What do you do to capture professional learning.
  
• Sharing - how do you share?
  
• VLN -
  
• What percentage of teachers give back?
  
• How to capture PLD in schools. Is it digital?
  
• Teaching as inquiry - part of it creating and sharing
  
• Make learning process rewindable
  
• Manaiakalani google+ community
  
• @teachinquire
  

Site tour of Hobsonville Point Primary School

In the last session I took the opportunity to do a tour of HPPS. It's open plan design is very different to the classroom that I will be taking over in just over a week.

But as Mark Osbourne said in a session I attended last year, it is not about the furniture, it is about the pedagogy. And there were plenty of examples that can be incorporated into any classroom.

Visible Planning

 Student voice

Making learning visible

Posted with Blogsy

The Power of Self Assessment

It is one thing having someone tell you how well you have performed in a task. It is quite another to review your own performance. The power of self-assessment was really brought home to me tonight.

One of my sons is learning to play the trumpet and, after an initial burst of enthusiasm, is finding it hard going. Tonight I decided to video him while he practised. Because he can't hear himself when he plays, he finds it hard to work out what he needs to practice. When he saw the results played back, he instantly became aware of the areas he needed to work on.

Children can be pretty astute assessors of their own work when given the opportunity. We adults just need to make sure they have the tools available to make it happen.

I was browsing Twitter the other day and came across this tweet from Bron Stuckey:

This is a true sign from a school library in Aus - backlash to #Minecraft. #Minecraft LA http://t.co/9On0J6yZ9S Reality bites! #Minecraft LA
— Bron Stuckey (@BronSt) March 20, 2015

Seeing that sign made me think about the still prevalent attitude that playing computer games is anti-social. So many people ignore the sense of community that forms when children (or adults) share a passionate interest in gaming.

Real friendships have blossomed over a shared passion for games like Minecraft. I have seen the power of connections made through games in my students, especially those who aren't part of the "cool" group. It often allows these children to be "experts" who are sought out by others. This can be pretty powerful for kids who are a bit on the outer.

As a teacher, I have used my (rather meagre) game knowledge to make connections with my students. Being able to converse with a student about Minecraft directly led to that child feeling confident and eager to include the game in their writing. For a very reluctant writer, that was pretty huge.

Of course not all libraries discourage games. Auckland Libraries run several gamer focussed activities. And who knows, maybe the kids will pick up a book or two while they are there