Changes that are coming in learning

Learning won’t be categorized or defined by time and place.  I am a #k12online teacher http://www.edudemic.com/2013/08/12-changes-coming-to-the-future-of-learning/ #edtech #miched

@Edudemic 

What leadership should look like #SAVMP

A good leader is collaborative and raises all the people on their team to a higher level. They are not competitive. I think good leaders rise to the top through hard work, ethnics, and supporting others. They do not rise by stepping on others. Maybe it's the nature of our business but our best leaders are teachers to adults and children alike. 
My philosophy of education is that education is a tool to create happy healthy adults as they define it. We have all types of learners going to all types of places - not everyone goes to college. We as educators have to create learning environments that allow for as many students as possible to be successful. 
Most of my work has been done with special populations. Whether it has been special education, home bound, or home schooled, I have worked to those learners that seem to fit into our system the least to create success for them. I find it very rewarding. 

P.S. I have looked at others posts. 
@DCulberhouse coins this sense of collaboration as regifting. I love that! http://dculberh.wordpress.com/2013/08/09/the-regifting-of-leadership/
@RachelWaters posts her mission on her door. What a stage setter. And it included the statement about having fun! pic.twitter.com/8JR8uBpJFv
Such good input!

Summer school Debrief

So the first ever session of virtual summer school comes to a close. 

 5th Monday ~ Teachers are asked to report if they have any students that have completed summer school. 

7th Wednesday ~ letter says is the deadline to submit tests Wednesday. The letter stated "classes must be up-to-date" and "only one comprehensive test" could be submitted on the last day

8th Thursday ~ Tresa was saying it was the last day

9th Friday ~ students are locked out at 10:30 am 

                 ~ teachers are locked out at 5 pm

10th Saturday ~ Tresa needed to print out the grade book for records 

12th Monday ~ teachers need to report failures 

Reflection on how this went. It's the nature of man of these students to let assessments go to the last minute. I did have three very active students that were submitting multiple tests on the last day. NuI submitted seven science tests and I did refuse to grade six of them. He still passed. His mother sent me a message 6:37 pm on the 8th asking if they could submit another test. 

Another student send me a message on the 8th asking for more points on a question. I did not review the test due to the tight timeline. 

For next year, now matter where we put this deadline, students will dump too many tests and asked for more time. Giving them more time only teaches to ignore deadlines and encourage their behavior. However I do think the deadline should be moved up. The grading window for the teachers was too tight. I would suggest that summer school runs all July. And all tests are due July 30th. This will give the teachers more time. It will allow us to report to the districts in a more timely manor also. It will also allow for the staff to focus on enrollment during August. 

The true problem is the rate of the student completing lessons. The students are going through a whole unit of lessons in 24hours. At the pace they are moving through material there is no way the lessons are being done with integrity or fidelity. Soooo I have vented on that which is all well and good but the critical point comes with SO WHAT TO YOU DO to solve the problem. 

I think the learning plans should have deadlines for each tests. If a student's pacing gets off pace, they are subject to removed from summer school. 

Buses and Burgers

Mike Flanagan is suggesting consolidation of district services to the ISD. http://bit.ly/13F8YSJ

Here's my two cents:
I have worked in two districts before. District A has 14,000 students, a great tax base, and well educated parents that value education. District A offers a great range of programs providing the students with a rich educational experiences. District B has 1,400 - no I did not drop a zero. It's an urban district that allows school of choice across country lines so they get many Detroit students. The families come from lower incomes and most of the parents are not college graduates. District B offers few programs due to the  numbers in the population. The range of special education programs, sports, clubs, and enrichment activities is limited due to low resources and low number of students.

District B could really use the consolidation Flanagan is suggesting. They could offer more programs and rich the students' educational experience. District A is doing this fine on their own, but they would benefit from a county cooperation also. They could mentor and lead in the programs. They could also gain diversity they lack. In many cases, we already have districts sharing services with each other or the ISD.

Local districts are a critical dimension of our community and should be protected. But they should leverage the resources of the larger community. It's a global economy; education could at least get to the county level.

Hangout=Skype - not so much

Sooooo we are switching form giving the students desktop PC's to Google Chromebooks. In initial discussions we were told that Hangout can do everything Skype can. It can and more but there's a catch. 

Let's talk about the "it can and more" first. Hangout allows chat and video conferencing. You can wear a pirate hat have moves with your head. You can share your screen.  If you use the "On Air" option, the session is recored to your YouTube account. These are all great features for us. 

"But there's a catch" Google Hangouts are limited to ten people. We have 40 on our caseload so you would hope more than ten show.  But the bigger problem is the integration with Google+. One of the reported advantages of Skype was the ease of use. It's simple for a teacher and one student to use. My families have used it. In order to use HangOut, you must have a Google+ account. Which are students will but the parents may not like their children in a social media.  It also makes it more complicated to start. We have Abode Connect still. We may use that. I personally am debating between using Connect or HangOut to record tutorials. 

Chromebooks summer work

Giving your students Chromebooks? Before the handing out of hardware there's work to be done. 

In May, we did the testing. Teacher took Chromebooks home and played with them. We met with Google to talk about setup. 

Switching to Chromebooks is a bigger switch then you would think. It's more than just handing out a new piece of hardware. You are changing operating systems and moving to the Google platform. Changing operating systems means you need to double check your software. In our case we will be switching most of it. We were using Open Office that will switch to Google Drive. We were using Skype that will switch to Hangout ( there's a catch here ( see other post)). Then you are switching your browser.  Our default installed browser was IE. It will now be Chrome ( duh!).

Our critical pieces are web based. One is the LMS Connexus. The other is Adobe Connect for webinars. These both are capable with Chrome. With Connect, it's compatible for attending webinars but not hosting and sharing your screen. This may be fixed in future releases. 

Many public Wifi do not play nice with Chrome. The default IP for login is 192.168.1.1. Chrome does not always pop up the page to login as guest. If you have the IP, you can login as guest. 

Shock wave is not supported on the ChromeOS. We have spelling tests that will say the word on command. When you load the test, all the sound files go off at once and will not repeat. Not sure how we are going to solve this. I think the parents may need to say the word to the student. 

Then there is the Google ID. We have spend the summer going through the security settings. The administration is easy, web base, and centralized - but it is something you need to do. There are advantages of pushing out apps, black listing sites, and setting home pages. 

Going to the Google ID adds all the Google services such as Blogger, Drive, and Sites. 

Setting up 2013-2014

This year's blog will have two focuses. I will maintain the first focus of the experience and lessons. The second focus will be our implementation of Chromebooks.  

I look forward to this year as a refining of practices. Virtual learning in the K-5 is a new "fad". It's "hot" now with for-profits sucking all the air out of the learning environment. Virtual Learning will not go away. But it will find a natural balance in it's place among placement options. We are not growing at the same pace as the for-profits, but we are a high quality program. When that natural balancing happens, we will rise up to the top. 

Implementing the Chromebooks is more than you think. Currently the biggest impact is not the device, it's the ID. We are moving to the Google platform. This means the students have Google ID's from school to login into the Chromebooks from.  

This year will be a great chance to refine our practices and engaged in the Google platform.