by Krissy.Venosdale | Jun 25, 2013 | Reflect
What if the things we do in schools slowly chip away at a student’s passion? What if the limits we place on their ideas, imaginations, and thoughts that fall outside the box begin to make them tone themselves down, hold back, and try to fit the mold we set up. Our kids come to our schools craving to learn, play, and experience the joy of discovery. Year by year, day by day, what happens? Less play. Fewer discoveries. The learning? It just sort of slows down. The momentum gets lost. The passions fade and suddenly nothing is about learning anymore. What if learning was a blank slate and we just started from scratch and built something wonderful? Willing to let go of our preconceived notions, our comfort zones, and just openly collaborate to make schools something awesome. The kind of awesome that learning really is. What if?
by Krissy.Venosdale | Jun 23, 2013 | Reflect
All the technology in the world won’t make you a better educator. It’s more than a device or a tool. Sure, the technology allows you to connect more and to collaborate easily. To share a project with a classroom on the other side of the world, to learn from an educator in another state or country, or to read someone’s thoughts that provoke your own thoughts? That’s what it’s all about. I’m here at ISTE to learn from the best. To improve the way I integrate tools, to gather new techniques, to rethink what 21st century learning is really about.
Then? I bump into someone I’ve followed on Twitter and have been so inspired by, and I realize something. It’s so much bigger than technology. These connections are not just virtual. They are real and powerful and I am changed because of every single person I follow. For that? I’m grateful in a way I can’t even describe. But the next time someone asks me what the most valuable thing about teaching with technology is, my answer won’t be about tools, apps, or devices. It will be ‘connections.’
by Krissy.Venosdale | Jun 19, 2013 | Reflect
Looking for a GREAT presentation app for your iPad? Check out Haiku Deck. It’s a great way to create a quick presentation using the IPad! I’m already loving how easy it is to use. I love that you can import a pic or snap one right around you, and add it right to your slides. It speaks to the visual learner inside me.
Here are a few ideas of using Haiku Deck in education…
1.) Open House Presentation or Meet the Teacher.
2.) Develop a school tour, or even town tour, to share with classes that you Skype with.
3.) Students develop a digital portfolio by snapping photos of projects they have done throughout the year and adding text to reflect.
4.) Take the Ipad on a field trip and pass around for each student to create a slide throughout the day.
5.) Photograph classroom and make a classroom tour. Better yet, have the kids create it and take ownership.
6.) Create a Haiku Deck to start off a project. Include some cropped photos to build interest and mix in some essential questions. Share the Haiku Deck from your website so parents can see, too.
7.) Encourage students to create one about a school staff after interviewing them.
8.) Develop one Haiku Deck every week by having teams of students work on it, and share the story of your school year.
9.) Encourage kids to summarize a book in a Haiku deck. Book reviews could be linked on a school library blog to encourage others to read the book, too.
10.) Take a geometry scavenger hunt around the school with cameras. Create a Haiku Deck to display the findings.
I guess I should have added, make Haikus. 🙂 The simple nature of the app allows kids (and teachers!) to get started with it right away. Best of all, you don’t need an app or special program to view.
Created with Haiku Deck, the free presentation app for iPad
by Krissy.Venosdale | Jun 15, 2013 | Reflect
What’s your story? Your school’s story? Are you telling it? If you aren’t, someone else probably is. Someone who doesn’t live it and breathe it the way you do. At the end of the day? Our story is all we have. It’s the only link we have to tomorrow, and it’s today’s only link to yesterday. It’s a tiny piece of the impact we all hope to leave. When you look around in a school, you are surrounded by so many little miracles each and every day. Inspiring moments. Triumphant experiences. You don’t even have to look hard to see them. You just have to keep your eyes, and your heart, wide open. They are there. Just waiting to be celebrated. Just waiting for the story to be told.
by Krissy.Venosdale | Jun 14, 2013 | Reflect
We’ve made learning into a game. Hoops to jump through. Levels to pass. Things to know. We’ve set it up so kids play the game to earn points. Even worse, we sort and resort those points and assume it all means something. We give kids awards for getting 100%, even when that 100% doesn’t actually mean they learned anything if it’s something they already knew. We over-emphasize grades, and under-emphasize real problem solving. We talk about changing education. A lot. But, ‘what’s always been done’ can be so comfortable. That game? It’s what we know. It’s what we all grew up playing.
But learning? It’s not a game. Learning is life. All the points in the world mean nothing if you don’t have the experience in struggle or the practice in collaborating with others. It’s time to break out of the game. Change things. Stop getting bogged down in the details that don’t really change HOW we teach. Start rewriting the design of daily learning experiences. The way we present material. The way we need to allow kids the time to uncover material. Rethinking the questions we ask and the problems we are presenting to kids. It’s time to throw a glitch in to the system. A spark. A way for our kids to break out of the game and get into real learning. Life.
