Category: Classroom management

Dear Otto is an occasional column where I answer questions I get from readers about teaching tech. If you have a question, please complete the form below and I’ll answer it here. For your privacy, I use only first names.

Here’s a great question I got from Linda:

We all have that student who just doesn’t get what we’re saying. We want to blame him/her–may even start that direction–but then, many of us, we pause to listen. What’s s/he saying–something about not understanding the problem? What’s s/he mean? What if we [fill in the blank with something outside the box]?

Here’s a 12-year old who happily and successfully sees the world as no one else does. And the world is a better place because he does. His message:

Stop learning and start thinking.

Solve problems your own way.

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Common Core notes:

New technologies have broadened and expanded the role that speaking and listening play in acquiring and sharing knowledge and have tightened their link to other forms of communication. Digital texts confront students with the potential for continually updated content and dynamically changing combinations of words, graphics, images, hyperlinks, and embedded video and audio.

The underlying theme can’t be ignored by teachers any longer: A 21^st Century learner requires technologic proficiency. Proof enough is that Common Core summative assessments will be completed online—only possible if students use technology as comfortably as paper and pencil to demonstrate knowledge.

But how do you do that if you aren’t a ‘techie’, a ‘geek’, if you barely use a Smartphone much less the myriad of online tools. I have ten strategies that will make your teaching life easier, bump up your effectiveness with students, and save time complying with Common Core standards. Try these ten tech uses. Watch what a difference they make:

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It used to be simple to post grades. Add up test scores and see what the student earned. Very defensible. Everyone understood.

It’s not that way anymore. Here are the factors I consider when I’m posting grades:

• Does s/he remember skills from prior lessons as they complete current lessons?
• Does s/he show evidence of learning by using tech class knowledge in classroom or home?
• Does s/he participate in class discussions?
• Does s/he complete daily goals (a project, visit a website, watch a tutorial, etc.)?
• Does s/he save to their network folder?

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When I was editing the 8th grade tech curriculum, I got wowed by ‘infographics’–a visual approach to communicating information. Yes, I have known for a long time about ‘infographics’, but haven’t really paused to considered their strength. This dove-tailed nicely when I started getting questions from readers like, “What is a ‘flipped classroom’?”

Here–take a look at this one from Cool Infographics (and click the link–they have some great visual stuff over there):

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Dear Otto is an occasional column where I answer questions I get from readers about teaching tech. If you have a question, please complete the form below and I’ll answer it here. For your privacy, I use only first names.

Here’s a great question I got from Charlie:

Jacqui, I’m curious about one aspect of blogging with students as a computer lab teacher. That aspect is efficiently managing so many students blogs. I teach grades 2 and 3 which adds up to over 600 students in 25 classes. When you only see each class once per week, blogging could easily be the basis of the entire year’s curriculum. We are a GAFE district but Blogger is blocked. For that reason and ease of management I decided upon Kidblog. So, I am curious how you manage the different classes and numbers of students as a lab teacher. Do you for example have the “all posts must be approved before going live” turned on? What is your username/password convention? Do you use the invitation method of registering student accounts or bulk upload? BTW, do you have a reference that you utilize/like in terms of the teaching progression for teaching blogging?

As you read the 100+ pages of Common Core’s ELA and Math standards, you realized that technology is woven throughout as one of the tools students use to prepare for college and career. It is mentioned at least a dozen times (I’ve truncated the bullet list for convenience, but the gist is the same)–

• Expect students to demonstrate sufficient command of keyboarding to type a minimum of one page [two by fifth grade, three by sixth] in a single sitting
• Expect students to evaluate different media (e.g., print or digital …)
• Expect students to gather relevant information from print and digital sources
• Expect students to integrate and evaluate information presented in diverse media and formats
• Expect students to interpret information presented visually, orally, or quantitatively (e.g., … interactive elements on Web pages)
• Expect students to make strategic use of digital media
• Expect students to use glossaries or dictionaries, both print and digital …
• Expect students to use information from illustrations and words in print or digital text
• Expect students to use a variety of media in communicating ideas
• Expect students to use technology and digital media strategically and capably
• Expect students to use text features and search tools (e.g., key words, sidebars, hyperlinks) to locate information

Use of technology differentiates for student learning styles by providing an alternative method of achieving conceptual understanding, procedural skill and fluency, and applying this knowledge to authentic circumstances.

New technologies have broadened and expanded the role that speaking and listening play in acquiring and sharing knowledge and have tightened their link to other forms of communication. Digital texts confront students with the potential for continually updated content and dynamically changing combinations of words, graphics, images, hyperlinks, and embedded video and audio.

The first bullet point–Expect students to demonstrate sufficient command of keyboarding to type a minimum of one page [two by fifth grade, three by sixth] in a single sitting–has garnered a lot of attention from not just tech specialists, but all educators because it quantifies keyboarding skill, something not done in the ISTE national standards or many of the disparate state standards.

Last week, Washington Post writer Lindsey Layton wrote a front page article (of the Sunday Education section) on this topic and asked several teachers about their experiences with keyboarding in the classroom. I was thrilled to be included in that list and wanted to share the article with you. I know you’ll enjoy it:

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As a working technology teacher, I get hundreds of questions from parents about their home computers, how to do stuff, how to solve problems. Each week, I’ll share one of those with you. They’re always brief and always focused. Enjoy!

Q: How do I check to see where my kids/students have been online without making them think I don’t trust them?

A: If they’ve been online without you (because you considered them mature enough for this action), by all means check up on them. This is not a sign of distrust any more than guiding them through any other new skill is. This is you showing them the correct way to use the internet. You’re not spying on your children; you’re making sure everything is OK, kind of like checking in on them while they sleep.

Go to what’s called ‘history’. ‘History‘ is where a list of all the websites whoever logged in under a particular user name went. Here’s how you do it:

• Hold Control key (Ctrl) and push H. That brings up a sidebar with the sites they’ve visited.
• Select the time frame you’re interested in

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I wrote about the demise of handwriting 2.5 years ago. Seems even truer now than then. One problem for both sides is that Common Core is ‘silent’ on it, according to the Alliance for Excellence in Education. That’s like the Fat Lady warming up, but not sure when she’ll be performing. Where Common Core has a lot to say about many tools required to deliver the education that will lead to college and career for students, it doesn’t mention ‘cursive’ at all. Though Common Core allows for a nominal amount of personalizing–meaning add-ons–only eleven states (as of publication) have amended their education requirements to mandate cursive be included in the curriculum. Not a ringing endorsement. Headlines such as these proliferate in the news:

Technology may script an end to the art of cursive writing

Is cursive’s day in classroom done?

No longer swearing by cursive writing

Studies show one in three children struggle with handwriting. I’d guess more, seeing it first hand as a teacher. Sound bad? Consider another study that one in five parents say they last penned a letter more than a year ago.

Let’s look at the facts. Students handwrite badly, and don’t use it much when they grow up (think about yourself. How often do you write a long hand letter?). Really, why is handwriting important in this day of keyboards, PDAs, smart phones, spellcheck, word processing? I start students on MS Word in second grade, about the same time their teacher is beginning cursive. Teach kids the rudiments and turn them over to the tech teacher for keyboarding.

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