Know Your Why!

The All Powerful and Almost Magical Chrome Browser

The Chrome Browser is a power tool to enhance your learning experience and save you time while online. Understanding how Chrome can help teachers and students be more efficient with their time online is an essential skill.

Getting Started with Chrome

Open Chrome and make sure you are signed into Chrome on the device you are using. Click here if you need help signing into Chrome. When you sign in to Chrome, you can save and sync things like your history, bookmarks, and passwords, so you can get to them on any device.

Chrome Browser Essentials

Chrome Learning Activity 1: Review the Chrome Essentials Document and learn more about the following aspects of Chrome:

Making Chrome the Default Browser
Setting Homepage
Setting Startup Pages
Incognito Window
Bookmarks
Omnibox
Tabs
Shortcut Keys

Chrome Learning Activity 2: Explore the Chrome Store Web Store and find an Extension or App that could be used to support teaching and learning.

Click here to share an Extension or App.
Click here to view responses.

Learn more about Chrome Browser

Communication Resources for the Modern Leaner

When I review a new EdTech tool or resource I want to know how it can support and build essentials skills before I think about content. I always start with how a tool can support one or more of the 4Cs of collaboration, communication, critical thinking, and creativity.
There are many incredible tools to support communication. ISTE has a set of standards to connected to essential communication skills for students.

Communication - Students use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively, including at a distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others. Students will:

Interact, collaborate, and publish with peers, experts, or others employing a variety of digital environments and media.
Communicate information and ideas effectively to multiple audiences using a variety of media and formats.
Develop cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with learners of other cultures.
Contribute to project teams to produce original works or solve problems.

ISTE National Education Technology Standards

With the help of my incredible PLN, I've compiled a list of tools that can support communication for students and teachers in classrooms.

Communication Resources to Support the 4Cs and Student Growth

What other tools can you recommend to build communication skills with students and staff?

How can we build bridges to better support learning?

What is the Best #EdTech Tool?

I recently responded to this question in one of my collaborative networks I. I think many of us have answered this question many times.

Hello All,

I was charged with the task of creating technology rich PD sessions for content area teachers. Could you share the best tech tools for Science, Social Studies, Math and Literacy for middle and high school students?

Thanks!

Here is the essence of my response:

Wow, big question with so many answers. We've been down this path from a few different directions with varying degrees of sucess.
I want to share some advice before sharing the tools.

1. The tools can be great and can be a catalyst for change, but they can also be a dead end if the a tool is no longer available for some reason. It is important to have a few choices to accomplish a task. I usually give my students a couple of options to see what works best for them. A list of tools to meet a certain set of skills helps steer us clear of the idea that there is only one way to get something done.

2. Start with the skills first. "What do you want students to be able to do with the content?" is an essential question we always ask when supporting staff. It is important to have a model or plan for why you uses the tools, not just what the tools are for.

Here are a few ways that we've successfully modeled our training and integration of technology to enhance instruction.

3. Try to find as many tools as possible that are not for a single subject, instead focus on tools that can be used across multiple subjects. Students are much more comfortable and effective learners with a handful of tools they can effectively use across classrooms. This will reduce the stress on both teachers and students to learn the tools.

4. Finally, it is important to consider the culture and teaching 1st. There is a big difference between a traditional teacher-centric culture and a student-centered 1 to 1 environment.

Here are a few of our main tool collections for staff:

If you have a specific need for a skill or concept, I can probably narrow down this list quite a bit. Just let me know in the comments below.

How would your respond to this question?

Using Collaborative Networks to be Heard

It is all about engagement! Can you hear me now?

I have a tendency to sound like a broken record more often than I should. I can ramble on when I am passionate or worked up about something. I've been rambling for years about how Twitter and EdCamp have done more to impact my teaching and learning than anything else I might point to. I've encouraged anyone who will listen to attend an EdCamp or engage in Twitter. If you are looking to grow as an educator, I firmly believe that you need to find an EdCamp near you ASAP. While you are waiting for EdCamp, learn a little more about social networks to engage in a Personal Learning Network.

Collaborative networks can be used to communicate and collaborate. These networks are great resources to build critical thinking skills and inspire creative thinking.

Connected educators use Social Networks to:
1. Get the word out about school events and resources.
2. Share resources and classroom conversations.
3. Engage in Personal Learning Networks to improve teaching and learning.

Collaborative digital tools can be powerful resources to amplify student voices, teacher voices, and a school voice.

Learn more about how to get started, manage, and engage in Social Networks to support teaching and learning with this interactive set of tutorials:

Connected Educator Interactive

Please share your ideas, resource, and tips in the comment section below.

It's Not About the Shiny New Tools

Many teachers still love the shiny new tool and get excited when we show them a new resource, but over the years we've discovered that this did not move teachers forward in their teaching very often. We also struggled when a tool caught on and then either disappeared or we lost district support for. We got a bit tired of hearing, "Why should we use this if it is gone in a year?"

For district required Tech Tools (Gradebooks, LMS, etc.) we create online tutorials and offer periodic face to face help sessions, but we don't teach the tools. We instead facilitate the use of the tools to support teaching and learning skills.

When we plan Instructional Technology PD we try focus on specific teacher and student skills rather than the tools, with these two foundations:

We model our PD around learner-centered activities, with this infographic as our foundation: The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Teachers Who Use Technology. We ask teachers to approach PD and planning with 1 or more of these in mind. We design any pd offerings with 1 or more of these in mind.
Our second primary goal is to support a shift to learner-centered classrooms where teachers use the 4Cs. We believe that EdTech tools can help a teacher use their course content to help students develop skills connected to Collaboration, Communication, Critical Thinking, and Creativity. Here is one of our resources sites connected to this idea: Recharge Learning

Despite our goal to focus on skills, sometimes you still need to have tools in place to help teachers shift to the skills. In the big picture, the two resources that have given us the most leverage to shift our learning: