Degrees of Tech Use in Education

I've been working on this thought for awhile, but the missing piece came from a simply stated insight from Terry Heick in this short interview. He said his advice to teachers regarding tech integration would be:

"Think of it as a learning tool, not a teaching tool."

It's my job to help teachers infuse more technology into their instruction and that is too often hindered by a misunderstanding of terms. It is easy for some teachers to say they integrate technology because they use their interactive whiteboards and students play on Study Island in the lab.

But technology use in education has to be seen as a spectrum, not a yes-no question as to whether a computer is on in the classroom.  I'm sure some of the distinctions I make below would not matter in all schools, but here is the image and terminology I will begin using as I teach teachers.



Of course, my goal is to help every teacher to take the next step toward the innovation end of the spectrum. First, I want them to identify where their instruction would fall on the scale most days using this criteria:

• Teacher use - The technology is in the teacher's hands and it is essential for her to do her job. Examples - Lesson in PowerPoint projected in front of the room, lesson plans done in a calendar shared with the principal, grading program
• Student use - Students need to use technology to complete the lesson. Examples - Watch Khan Academy videos at home, find the assignment in Edmodo, read the article in Newsela
• Integration - This is the important distinction for me because I am working toward integration of content objectives and technology skills. Here students can't complete the lesson without learning a new technology skill. Examples of this could look like student use above, but the difference is the teacher designed the learning so most or all students will use a new tool in a new way to learn a new skill. The step in tech skills has to be small enough that it enhances rather than distracts from the learning of the content.
• Innovation - Here the teacher is using the technology to design learning experiences no one else has used before. This is exciting, but difficult work. It stems from a high degree of digital literacy in which the teacher thinks creatively with the technology, expressing herself through the blend of her unique personality and broad range of personal experiences.

Two thoughts:

• Each level is a spectrum as well. There are levels of tech integration and levels of innovation. The idea of what counts as "new" can relate more or less to the teachers and students themselves, the district as a whole or possibly the world.
• I will be thrilled to have all teachers at the Integration stage. Innovation is vital and I believe passionate teachers will automatically move in that direction. We need innovators leading the way, both in the world at large and within our districts. However, students acquiring appropriate tech skills within the context of content are a lessons is exciting.

If this becomes an effective tool in our district I will follow up with some examples.

Digital Storytelling for Middle School with WeVideo

I created a digital story assignment to introduce WeVideo and we tried it out this week.

It confirmed for me that WeVideo is a great tool for the classroom. This assignment results in a digital slideshow, so we were only uploading photos. I'm not sure how well it will work with video, especially long clips, but I hope to try that out soon.

For now, it is my recommended editor when teachers ask me for a resource to create narrated slideshows.

For our assignment, I took 10 pictures of students in various poses. The students had to arrange at least six of these pictures into some short story in WeVideo. They were required to add a title and end clip as well as captions and some panning and zooming.

Here are the resources for the assignment:

• The assignment sheet - This includes directions, requirements and links to the tutorials.
• A shared folder on Google Drive with the pictures - These 10 photos were taken ahead of time.
• Video Tutorial 1 - This shows how to get started in WeVideo. It shows the basics of the interface, how to upload, arrange, add captions and titles and also how to pan and zoom.  Note:  The tutorial refers to uploading the photos because in our class we didn't store photos in Google Drive. You can upload from Drive or you could save those photos above in a different folder.
• Video Tutorial 2 - This tutorial shows how to add music and how to publish and share the final video.

This basic assignment lends itself to a lot of modification for different needs. Here are some suggestions:

• Have the students take their own photos.
• Have another class take the photos.
• Instead of using actors in the photos, students could set up action figures or maybe even objects.
• They could draw the pictures digitally or on paper.
• Require editing of the photos. For example, speech bubbles could be added.
• Narrate the story and have students read the dialogue.

If you use this assignment or you have suggestions for other changes I'd love to hear from you!

A Note to Teachers: Consider the quality of your PLN

This is an article I wrote for my district tech newsletter in hopes of getting more teachers to develop their PLN. It could be of value to others, so I posted it here. If you already have a PLN, I'd love to hear your input on this matter so I can help the teachers I work with to see the importance of growing a PLN.

Maybe you've heard teachers talk about their "PLN". Some will suggest everyone needs one. I'd say we all have one already, though PLNs vary in quality. It's important to recognize this, because in all cases they can help or hinder us in doing our best work.

A PLN is a personal learning network. I hear it most often in reference to social networks like Twitter, where professionals follow and contribute their own thoughts among peers and leaders in their fields.

I say everyone has a PLN because we all have a group of people we learn from. Some will talk about "connected educators", but we are all connected to some degree. Whether it's to authors we've read, speakers we listen to at conferences or the other teachers in our buildings, we have a network that shapes how we see our work.

But not all PLNs are equal. For the sake of our students and the profession, we all should evaluate the quality of our PLN. We can do that by asking three simple questions:

• How does my PLN impacted my professional growth?
• How many teachers am I regularly connecting with?
• How often do we connect? 

When measured in those ways, the advantage of technology becomes obvious. In fact, that's why PLN commonly refers to a large tech enabled social network. The most effective tools for the job are obvious.

Those who regularly stay in contact through large social networks will confirm this. The anytime, anyplace nature a dedicated PLN is a lot like hanging out with teachers at a conference whenever you have a spare minute. It grants immediate access to timely answers, a source of collective wisdom, best practices and a perspective of education on a global scale.

If you already use Twitter, Edmodo or some other network as a PLN, I'd encourage you to share contact information with others in your building or across the district.

If you aren't yet a part of a larger network, I suggest taking the time to get started with Twitter. It only takes seconds to sign up.

This Teacher's Guide to Twitter is a good place to start for basic information. Here are two other good posts to start with if you are looking for other teachers to follow:

• 10 Teachers to Follow on Twitter
• 10 Educators on Twitter You Should Follow (But Probably Don't)

This is a note to the teachers I work with, but feel free to follow if you care to contribute!

Also, I set up a Twitter account for our district's technology tips or other related communication. Right now the only followers are me and Kevin Honeycutt (and he could split at any minute). So if you've got an account, join in and you'll make a very significant contribution to the number of followers. The account is the same as the title of the newsletter: @lv_tech_connect

Quotes and thoughts for teachers and leaders

At some point I started turning the things I say regularly at school and my more popular tweets into the little word posters we see plastered all over the internet and social media.  I compiled most of them here, each with a brief thought. 

Please feel free to share or use them as slides or images for presentations. A link to my blog or my profile on Twitter is appreciated. 

One variation on my "play or make something" routine...

Here are a few that sum up everything I'm learning from all my "teaching like an artist" thinking. 

Share on Twitter.

Artists dream big and do what it takes to make the dream real. They are motivated by letting their ideas spread and they love to share the ideas with others. School needs more of these people!

Too often we forget that technology allows us to connect and to do something big now. I know students don't think of it much. They are bombarded with free entertainment instead. The chance to do something big now is why I'm not big on talking about career planning or getting a high paying job someday. 

Share on Twitter.

Change happens a heart at a time and for school, those hearts will mostly be those of the teachers. Let them see us learning.

This picture that came to mind when I discovered the power of creativity in school. It has received a lot of attention in the years since.

Technology integration doesn't mean there's a computer on in the room or even that a student is engaged in an activity at a computer. 

We don't often grade on the creativity and it's not on the list of learning objectives. That's fine, but that doesn't mean it's not important in all grades and subjects.

This is the key to success I always taught my students. 

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It's no wonder the students get bored with school. We all are wired to learn so we can do. Focus on the doing and design it so learning happens. 

This was my most tweeted thought ever. It would be displayed before a learning activity. I designed it for a session for teachers, but any secondary class might benefit from it. I wrote a lot more about it here. 

The only question that matters when working for success. 

Don't forget it's not about the tools. Let students be amazed with what they can accomplish. 

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Book Review: Learning Stencyl 3.x Game Development - Beginner's Guide

I was given a review copy of Learning Stencyl 3.x Game Development: Beginner’s Guide. Before jumping into the details of my review, I’ll say I found the book to be an enjoyable read. I learned a lot and I can safely say this will be my go-to resource for my students when they are learning to make games with Stencyl.

Right away I was glad to see Joe Dolivo’s name in the list of reviewers for the book’s content. When I started programming with Stencyl almost two years ago, I contacted the Stencyl team to ask about classroom resources. I liked the promise of Stencyl, but I was having difficulty learning to create some simple classroom games. They directed me to Joe as someone who knows the program and knows education. He pointed out a few online resources and also told me this book was in the works. With Jonathan Chung, Stencyl’s creator, writing the forward and Joe Dolivo as part of the writing process, I knew the book’s author was writing with authority.

The book provides a great overview of Stencyl, leaving the reader with an excellent idea of what to expect from this game creation tool. Beyond that, most of the ten chapters are a step by step walk-through of creating a platform game called Monkey Run. Instead of progressing through the menus, tools or other features, it takes us through the stages of game development. Anyone who works through those chapters will have created a playable computer game. What more could a beginning game designer ask for?

Now, as I mentioned above, I had trouble getting started with Stencyl and I didn’t have much luck with the online tutorials. (I wrote about my early experiences and conclusions in this post.) I can say without question Learning Stencyl 3.x Game Development is a vast improvement over those resources. The writing is very clear. I really like how each stage starts with a brief overview of what we’ll accomplish with the game, then it goes right into a step by step explanation of how to actually make it happen using Stencyl’s tools such as actors, behaviors and blocks.

I was very pleased with these explanations, but I think the best sections are the “What just happened?” segments that follow them. As an educator, I know students want to jump right into the doing. They’re not big on reading paragraph after paragraph of the overall concept and plan.

So instead of trying to explain the why and all the terms upfront, the book elaborates on what we did and why after we’ve gone through the steps. It’s a great way to teach. By the time the learner gets to these sections, he or she has become somewhat familiar with the tools and probably already has some questions that the sections will address.

One last positive I’ll mention is I appreciated the care taken to credit the creators of the graphics and audio used in the game. The attention given to copyright and creative commons licenses, both explicitly in the appendix and by example throughout the chapters, will be very helpful as I teach these practices to students.

With all the praise I have offered, I do have to add I haven’t yet worked through any of the actual programming. I read over the first half of the book carefully and skimmed through the later chapters. I hope to return to it, preferably with students, actually going through all the programming in Stencyl as I do. At this time I can only say it all makes sense with the things I have created on my own previously.

I did download the sample code that came with the book and I tried out one of the advanced sections. (The sample code can be downloaded from the publisher's site. It is provided in sections that match each step of the book. This is a nice touch because learners can jump in at any point of the book or development process they need and have just enough of the code prepared for them in advance.)

And definitely worth mentioning, the book refers to Stencyl 3.x, but that hasn’t been released yet. The Stencyl site does say 3.0 is available through a closed beta program to paying customers.  I can only assume the authors expected that version to come out the same time the book did, but for whatever reason it hasn’t. As I mentioned, I didn’t notice anything in the steps that looked different than my initial experience with Stencyl. Also, the code section I tested out in my current version of Stencyl seemed to work fine. If there are features of 3.0 that would be significantly different, they aren’t immediately apparent.

All things considered, I am very happy to have this book for myself and my students. It has answered some questions I had about this very promising game design tool and I think it can help many more young learners to find success in game creation. I’m not currently teaching a game design or programming class, but the next time I have the opportunity, I will use Stencyl and I will provide this book to the students.