#diffimooc Launches next week: Differenting instruction in a MOOC

Do you know that Juneau has some very cool education technology innovation happening? You can join them without moving to Juneau!! - Gastineau Channel from top of Juneau tramway, Alaska (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Update: it is #diffimooc with an "i" after the double "f"! I mistyped and apologize for my mistake. Please note this. A note from Vicki Davis: last week, I saw a professor that I follow, Lee Graham @ak_leeg tweet about #diffimooc. I was curious and started digging. A mooc? A different mooc? It certainly looked different. But there were educators in this mooc. It is a mooc on differentiating instruction and last week was sort of a "pre" week. 

As I dug deeper, I found some very progressive exciting professors. People that you could dm on twitter who would talk back. I offered a guest post and it was written in a day. These are the kind of renegades who GET social media who could pull this off. I've found that in this new landscape, sometimes the most progressive people - the innovators - can be from small places like Juneau, Alaska (or Camilla, Georgia, for that matter.)  

These professors are doing something very cool and I hope some of you will find it fits with your schedule and join in. Meanwhile, we all benefit from #diffimooc hashtag and can see what they are doing. Tweet on, professors and ROCK that MOOC!! There are other moocs cropping up as well and if you'll share them in the comments, others can find one that fits. But not only one that fits, you need to realize that MOOCS (Massive Open Online Courses) are still evolving as best practices are being worked out. IT is exciting to be part of that innovation. 

Differentiating instruction is so important and one of the most popular spotlights I give is Technology Driven Differentiated Instruction which inspired Chapter 7 (p 158) called "Choices" in my book Flattening Classrooms, Engaging Minds. Get inspired to differentiate and reach EVERY Child. Every child matters. Every classroom matters. You matter!!!

Here's their guest post:

Next week will be the official start of the Differentiating Instruction through Technology #diffimooc offered by the University of Alaska Southeast. This class is designed to help pre-service, in-service, formal or informal teachers in gaining strategies to differentiate student instruction through the environment, through process and through product. We’ll be exploring ways to collect, aggregate, and manage student information, models for differentiating the classroom process such as the flipped classroom and problem based learning, and giving students a choice of products to demonstrate their content knowledge through technology.

Our dream for the Differentiating Instruction through Technology #diffimooc is pretty simple. Each of us believe, even though we teach three separate disciplines (technology, math and science) that the role of any good teacher is to make him or herself obsolete. We also believe that our greatest success will be to see our students achieve more than we have in terms of knowledge and skills! We have built the #diffimooc intentionally to encourage self-regulated (but supported) learning in authentic social environments, to tap into prior knowledge and intrinsic motivation, and to encourage achievement at all levels. Whether our participants are at novice or expert level, we designed the class so that all might benefit from this open network of learners.

We know how quickly technology is moving, and we know that inservice teachers are not served well by traditional professional development. We want to inspire a sea change in our students – to help participants to seek out and find their own mentors, their own resources, and their own professional development geared to their individual needs. Offering this class as an entirely open experience is new to all of us, but we are really excited about exploring this new frontier in online teaching and learning.

The experience is frightening for some of the participants in our class (and we have to admit we were a bit nervous about it as well)! Working in a fully online community in which we both give and take knowledge can be scary! We are so impressed and inspired by the fearlessness of our group. Regardless of the anxiety they feel about operating in an open environment, they are rising to the challenge! Some sent their first tweets yesterday! They have established their first blogs and shared their first videos! It is great to see them becoming citizens of the digital world!

We hope by the end of the #diffimooc we will have created a framework for ongoing professional development which will outlast the class, and will serve our teachers well in a fast-moving technological world! Our students are both NetGeners and Baby Boomers. But then so are we who are teaching the class! We hope for a seamless interplay of teaching and learning without regard for formal “roles”. We’re off to a great start as we investigate, during this week, the attitudes we will need for success in our MOOC. Next week, we’ll move into the technology we can use to differentiate instruction for students, and we’ll try to practice what we preach as the class goes on!

We no longer have to get together face to face to assemble en masse. #diffmooc is one example of this. - Phila. Teachers on Capitol Steps, Wash., D.C., 5/13/11 (LOC) (Photo credit: The Library of Congress)

In this class, participants will explore means for managing differentiation in their individual classrooms. Participants are college through kindergarten teachers. We even have some library scientists in the mix! During the first week, participants are setting goals for what they’d like to achieve through the mooc. Assignments include collaborative creation of a wiki to archive and demonstrate managing differentiation in the classroom, collaboration to improve an existing lesson to integrate differentiating the learning process, and creation of rubrics and other tools to assess differentiated products. Of course technology to assist in each of these tasks will be explored throughout the class. It is our hope that teachers will leave the class with “take-aways” that will be immediately applicable in their professional environments.

Thanks to all who have joined us in this adventure, and we hope others will join us as well. You can find us on twitter at #diffimooc on Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday at 6:00PM AKST, or you might sign up for the class (or just peruse our materials and interactions) at http://diffimooc.weebly.com/. We’re pleased to be teachers and learners along with you!

Lee Graham, Associate Professor of Ed Tech and STEM Coordinator
@ak_leeg
Email: mgraham4@uas.alaska.edu

Virgil Fredenberg, Professor of Math Education
@virgil.fredenber
Email: virgil.fredenberg@uas.alaska.edu

Chip McMillan, Professor of Science Education
@chipmcmillan
Email: cmcmillan@uas.alaska.edu

University of Alaska Southeast

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Take the hassle out of tough tasks: Make shortcuts to your action steps

A good filing system includes not only the files you need but the action steps, all in one place. Earlier this week, I talked about recording checklists and action steps in Evernote.

But what happens when you go to a folder and don't remember where you put those action steps? I create shortcuts to the evernote notecards for that action step.

Wherever you put your checklist, you should link to it so it is bundled with the files that will be used. Here's how. But know this, checklists will save you time, mistakes, and I've found they curb my natural desire to procrastinate hard tasks because I know that it is all in one place.

Step 1: Copy the Note Link

If you can get a shortcut to anything, websites, google docs, one note. This process will work in other apps, if you just replace the step 1 with however you copy from that resource. I'm an evernote fangirl, so we're using Evernote.

a. Go into Evernote and open the card that you want to link to.
b. Click on Note
c. Click on Copy Note Link as shown in the graphic.
The link is now on your clipboard. Immediately do the next step. If you copy anything else. it will write over this link.

Click Note --> Copy Note Link 

Step 2: Create a Shortcut in the appropriate folder (PC Instructions)

a. Go to the folder where you want your shortcut
b. Right Click and select New and click shortcut with the left click button

Right click in the folder --> New --> Shortcut

c. Click in the "Type the location of the item" box and press the Ctrl key on your keyboard and the letter "V" at the same time. Click Next.

Press the Ctrl key on your keyboard and the V key simultaneously to paste in the link.

d. Type a name that will make it clear what this routine is. Click Finish.

Add a descriptive name

e.You now have a nice shortcut to an evernote notecard for the routine.

It is now in the folder. You could begin the instructions with a
special character to put  it at the front of the folder like a period.

Remember that you can use this for wherever you have the routines. The reason that I like using evernote instead of lots of tiny documents is that within evernote or any notetaking app, you can search and have routines. If you look back at the original card, the tags I use will prompt me for what happens in January and I can lay my hands on it, for example, if I need information or instructions.

This is an example of something I do once a year. It took me 2 hours today. I'll be interested next year how much time it takes me when I don't have to dig deep and remember what I did last year.

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Make Google Reader your Powerhouse sharing system

Productivity and simplicity, these are two things the modern knowledge worker craves. Google Reader is my "secret weapon" of productivity and I'd like to show you how I get the most out of this program.

What is Google reader?

1- Make a list of the places where you want to share

Begin with the end in mind by knowing where you want to share. Facebook? Your blog? Twitter? Pinterest? I have a list of my places where I share every day including: my blog here, my tumblr blog, Facebook fanpage, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, LinkedIn.

2- Enable Share It

a) Go to your Google Reader Settings (shown in screenshot)

b) Click on Send To

c) Enable the services that you want to share to.

Blogger, Delicious, Digg, Facebook, FriendFeed, Instapaper, Myspace, Orkut, Ping.fm, Posterous, Reddit, Stumbleupon, Tumblr, Twitter are all available. Just make sure you add Google reader on your pop up blocker's list of approved sites.

d) Add information to add other sites.

I use Diigo and need it to be integrated into Google Reader. I found some older directions from the "Jeff is a geek" blog and they work.

Under name, I put Diigo.

e) Another option is to enable ifttt.com

If this then that is a website that helps you automate things. You can set up many different "triggers" from Google reader that are very simple. For example, some of the most popular recipes as shown in the chart, make use of the star in Google Reader by sending things that are starred to Buffer or Evernote or Instapaper or Delicious or Pocket.

You could also use with any other trigger on ifttt.com including Diigo.  You could also schedule a tweet by tagging mathchat and it could tweet the title and add #mathchat on the end. I'm looking to set that up on my Ifttt.com tweak when I do my next PLN maintenance time. (I schedule at least 2-3 hours once a quarter to prune my google reader and tweak all my social media settings.)

I choose to use tags to do this, although admittedly, I"ve realized I'm not entirely happy with that. So, something tagged tumblr sends to tumblr. The problem is that when it goes to tumblr - the words and tags are there, but I don't necessarily want the tag to say "tumblr." I haven't decided what to do about that, but overall, it is very useful.

For example, I"m finishing up Collaborative Writing in the Cloud and as I've found things relating to the book, everything I tag wiki_book goes automatically to my notebook on the topic in evernote so it is all there when I head to research.

f) Find a great RSS app for your Tablet Device 

If you have an ipad or tablet, find a device that allows you to share easily like Mr. Reader to use as your RSS reader (I wrote a snippet at "Mr. Reader is my favorite RSS app" but I am curious if some of you want to know more about it. Let me know, I do requests. ;-)

I found Mr. Reader because I had a list of required places it had to share. At the time, it was the only one that shared to Diigo. It shares to everything and I read my Mr. Reader at least two hours a week as I share and write blog posts.

In Conclusion

Google Reader is so powerful because it can power great apps like Flipboard (see 15 Fantastic Ways to Use Flipboard).

It is one of the keys behind my own ability to share and find things. It is an essential tool for researchers and I teach all of my ninth graders and tenth graders how to build their PLN in Google Reader by scraping news, blogs, and more using RSS. RSS is a powerful and essential tool with a name that intimidates smart people from even trying.

I'm very concerned that Google got rid of iGoogle and they may get rid of Google Reader. THIS IS AN INCREDIBLY HELPFUL APP. I USE IT ALL THE TIME. If you don't use it, we'll all lose it. So, please, if you use the product, share with others, so we can keep it. It is a valuable research tool. I also think that Google is missing the boat because they are looking at volume not WHO those people are. If the Maven's as Malcom Gladwell discusses in Outliers: The Story of Success  the mavens, the people who share with everyone and influence a lot of people. If those people, the mavens, are using your product, and you get rid of it, you'll be alienating the wrong people. (Yet, again. iGoogle was a mistake, in my opinion.)

Educators who care, share.

Remember your noble calling, teacher.

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Don't let exhaustion choke the love of teaching from your heart

Last night, I literally got in the bed at 4:30 pm. Monday I worked 13 hours at the school... at school and then 4 hours of gate duty because someone forgot to show up... then I watched my son's game. So, yesterday, when I got home at 4:30, I knew I was going... as I call to my family...'over the top.' When I've been around people for so long and been so intense that I'm, quite literally shutting down from exhaustion.

It is in those moments, no matter how good my day, that I wonder how I can do this job. It is in those moments that self doubt arises like a WWF Schwarzenneger-like wraith to choke this career out of my heart. But I won't let it.

I looked at the picture of passion on my iphone (below) and I held it in my hand as I closed my eyes for a few moments. I was bone tired and felt it all the way to my heart. I clung to the very special picture as I slept as I held onto my win today. (Sadly, it was also the phone that awoke me, when someone sent me a text message. Lesson learned, never sleep with your cell phone.)

Let me tell you what happened and how you can cope when you're 'over the top'


Talking about the Habitudes
I'm working through the "Name it" stage of the Classroom Habitudes. This year I''ve set a goal to work on the habitudes in class for 15 minutes twice a week. In a jam packed curriculum like mine, it is a sacrifice, but I'm making it work, snatching time here and there. Last week Angela Maiers was at my school and did the one of the best inservice training courses I've ever absorbed. Many of us teachers at Westwood were deeply impacted and re-upped our commitment to everything we want to be as teachers.

In this phase, you talk about the 7 Habitudes (see Classroom Habitudes version 2 by Angela Maiers). You talk about what it is, what it looks like - the people or what you see someone do, what it sounds like (this example below didn't quite do that one correctly - specifically it is focusing on the kinds of things we SAY when we are exhibiting passion - things like "Wow!" or "I think it is so cool that..." or "I'm so excited to learn that..." "I want to learn more about..." these are just a few of the things that sound like passion.)

Then, we talk about what it feels like. Of interest to me were the conversations about how the different traits feel, for example, the kids talked about how perseverance feels like doubt and struggle but afterwards, people often recognize it as perseverance because when you're in the midst of doing something great that you often don't get praised for what you're doing.

It is important to me that my students KNOW that I only want to hear what they really think. I don't want them to "suck up" but be brutally honest about whatever we're discussing. I praise the "courage" to ask hard questions and ask them what they are "curious" about. Plus, I have great students.

When your students choke you up
But yesterday, I had to stop class for a few moments - maybe 30 seconds. But I was overcome. The kids in the teams had their papers so I had no idea what they said. A young man was talking about passion and said:

"Well, we were talking about what passion looks like, and we decided, well, we decided that it looks like 'Miss' Vicki."

My eyes teared over. It was an involuntary response.

I was so taken aback. I think all of us teachers who are in this because we love kids hope that our lives will be lessons. We want to live what we want kids to be. We want to be more.

I tell my students... I'm not here to teach you, I'm here to COMPLETELY BLOW YOUR MIND. We don't settle for "just teaching" we teach each other. We are curious. We are passionate. We do more and be more than we've ever been. My only expectation is that we are expected to be world class in everything we do. That simple. I don't care if we're in the tiny town of Camilla, we are world class. It is what we do. It is who we are.

But yesterday, my mind was blown and my heart was moved. I really didn't deserve that because I don't encourage people to say anything about me. I don't really want it at all. But the complete innocence of it and the way he said it as a fact, I'm sitting here crying as I type this on my ipad at 6:13 am listening to Sara Groves.

Angela told me these were million dollar conversations, but I didn't expect to be the one who the "money" so to speak.

Savor the wins, you'll need it sooner than you think
I've encouraged the kids to keep 2 folders: an "at a girl" or "at a boy" folder and a "goals" folder somewhere in their desk in their room. All I could choke out was:

"Oh my goodness. (they could see my tears) It is my dream for you to see my passion, not only about the subject but about YOU and helping you find the things you do well. I don't know what to say, but that, that is the kind of thing that will go in my 'at a girl' folder and I'll treasure forever. Thank you for that."

I Can't Fight this Feeling

Those of you who don't teach won't understand this feeling I described in the opening paragraphs.  Usually it is a feeling for Fridays and end of the semester, but it is real and it is normal for teachers to get this way. We are in a high stress high burnout job and must hold onto encouragement and go to bed at 4:30 when we are self-aware enough to realize that we're about to push ourselves to far.

Every teacher and every classroom counts: YOU MATTER SO MUCH!

So, as I end my thoughts for today and head to the kitchen to cook my family breakfast, I just want to tell you teachers that YOU MATTER. You matter very much. You are important. Every one of your classrooms counts... whether you are public, private, or homeschooling - you have a tough job and you're my heroes. It is an honor to serve among you and wear the badge of honor of being a teacher.

It is my prayer today that you will:

• Hold onto the moments that you'll need to reflect upon when you're exhausted
• That you'll be self-aware enough to get some rest and reset when you feel yourself 'going over the top'
• That you'll know that being tired is a normal feeling for teachers (we've had lots of conversations about this on my Facebook Fanpage, so I know that many teachers feel this way) but that when you're tired, KNOW IT and REST.
• That you'll know how important YOU are and that your classroom is very important.
• That you'll go into today giving your best.
• Finally, that you'll consider the habitudes or at least some discussion about the "to be" list you want students to be before you get too deep into the to do list of your classroom. We want students "to be" so many things, but I was struck how I needed to formally say, "we want to be...curious, adaptable, passionate, self-aware, etc.

Remember your noble calling teacher. You rock.

Written by Vicki Davis, author - Flattening Classrooms, Engaging Minds - Posted with Blogsy from my iPad

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Family Treasures

Words are wimps

I'm supposed to turn in the words for my son's annual ad today. I've been writing at 5 am. It is just one page. One page to summarize how I feel and what I want him to carry with him.

But one page can't capture it. It won't. It can't. I have to pick the words that will inspire him and hope that 18 years has been enough time to tell him how much I love him and all the things that he needs to know to make it in this world.

So, how can I leave a tiny piece of me on this page, so that when I'm gone, he can look at it and say ... "yeah, that's my Mom... that is what she would say to me if she were here right now." How can capture a bit of immortality -- or at least a fleeting bit, as long as he's alive, because in the end, he's the only one who will really read or care what I said.

Tidal Waves of Change

I was completely clueless about what this means and still am. It is kind of like playing in the surf at the beach, I think I'm ok until the next big wave comes and smacks me in the face, stinging my eyes and causing my nose to run. I get to do this two years in a row - two tsunamis back to back, my daughter graduates next year.

So much of who I am is wrapped up in my desire to love my children with abandon and to make them independent people who don't need me anymore. In this case, success means change. Success means letting go. My youngest will be starting middle school next year... I'm more thankful for him than ever because I've still got a lot of being a Mom left in these bones.

Being a Mom has been the greatest joy of my life as a close second to being a wife of a great man. I had no idea how much I'd love these three little squirming, wet creatures who came into my life.

Tough Times Give you the Chance to Treasure

Sunday we were laughing about all of the times we had been in or to the hospital with our three. LAUGHING. We laughed about how my youngest inhaled a sunflower seed and had to be at Eggleston and how I held him all night as he screamed because he couldn't eat. We laughed about how my oldest woke up from wisdom tooth surgery with a violent temper and my daughter came out of having her tonsils removed sobbing. We laughed about those things that almost sent me over the edge and we told jokes and we remembered those times with fondness. Why? Because it is our story together.

Families make memories together. Sometimes the tough times are an opportunity to show just how much you love someone. Without those times, they might be oblivious as to what they mean to us...let me demonstrate.

The Family Heirlooms

Yesterday I heard this story that fits from Dr. Charles Lowery who told a story about a little girl who was told not to do gymastics in the den because the family heirlooms were on the shelves and tables. The rug was thick, so one day when Mom was in the back of the house, she couldn't resist and started doing her back handsprings. She was fine for a while but started really getting into it and kicked a vase off the shelf. When she did, it cracked into shards and she fell on top of the vase, cracking it further but gashing her leg open.

Her Mom heard the noise and came running. The little girl was so afraid because she knew she had broken a precious family keepsake. But when her Mom came in and saw the blood, she didn't even see or say anything about the vase. All she could do was look at the little girls leg to see if she was ok. And then the little girl realized something that changed her life. She was the family treasure.

See the treasure in your students

As you teach these precious children, remember that everyone one of them is the family treasure. And if they are not..make them yours. Every child deserves to be loved. These children in your classroom are your heirlooms. They are treasures. They are gifts.

As we struggle through life, teaching, and everything else, let's keep clearly in focus who the treasures in our lives are.

Notice, I didn't say what our treasures are... I said WHO.

 

Written by Vicki Davis, author - Flattening Classrooms, Engaging Minds - Posted with Blogsy from my iPad

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Reddit: A cool source for your PLN

I like to use the Reddit forums to turn up cool things on productivity, education, teaching, and also to follow my favorite technology shows on Twit.tv. (Forums follow this format - reddit a forward slash and r another slash and the forum like this one http://www.reddit.com/r/productivity/ ) But Reddit can be clunky, so I found a great app called Alien Blue that lets you easily drill down, comment, and vote up or down the things that you like and find and subscribe to different channels.

I've grabbed some screenshots to show you how this looks. While I don't check reddit every day, I get on the forums at least once a week. Breaking tech news often breaks there before it "breaks" in mainstream media and I've found it an increasingly influential place where people "in the know" hash things out and vet stories before they are ready for prime time. If you want to be part of this process, I recommend you join reddit. I'm coolcatteacher over there too if you want to connect.

(If you want to know how I annotated these photos, I took screenshots on my ipad by pressing the power and home button at the same time, which sent it to my photo gallery. Then, I took it into Skitch (which also lets me send all of these annotated photos to Evernote.) You'll also see why I TYPE so much (my handwriting isn't so great.))

Note that you can also create your own communities on reddit. I'm not sure how that would look with students but am sure those students would have to be over 13.

Also note that there is a bit of "noise" on reddit so you'll find JUNK and BUNK and a little bit of FUNK but the cool stuff I find is very very cool and leading edge (shall I say it gets me CRUNK? OK, it rhymes but I don't get hip hop ;-)

Also remember that even if you don't add anything yourself that you should always vote up or down because that is what you do when you share and are part of a community. If you're a spammer - trolls get called out pretty often, so beware hyping yourself.

Join me on reddit. Let me know your experience, I'm curious how other educators like the site.

 

 

Written by Vicki Davis, author - Flattening Classrooms, Engaging Minds - Posted with Blogsy from my iPad

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Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 01/13/2013

• Double Robotics - Wheels for your iPad

  The virtual presence ishere. This set of wheels, stand, and extending arm turns your ipad into a virtual you. So, for $2K you can have a presence at a location and facetime into the classroom. The price is $1999 but there are applications for this.  "Double is the simplest, most elegant way to be somewhere else in the world without flying there. The minimalist design and intuitive touchscreen controls allow you to freely move around without inconveniencing others. You can stay at eye level, whether sitting or standing, by adjusting your height remotely, which makes conversations fluid and real. Retractable kickstands will automatically deploy to conserve power when you are not moving around. Efficient motors and lightweight design give Double the ability to last all day without recharging the battery."

  tags: news ipad edu_news

• Using RSS to Keep Up with Scholarly Research: LaGuardia Community College Library Media Resources Center

  RSS is still here. I like this RSS guide written for students at LaGuardia College. Students should know how to build an RSS reader and subscribe to things like Google news search and google scholar to build a research tool that will pull information to you on the topics of interest.

  tags: news rss. education wiki_book communication

• Three Ways to Create a Digital Classroom Library for Your Students | Angela Maiers, Speaker, Educator, Writer

  This article is perfect for librarians wanting to utilize free books and help students "check them out" (if you can even use that term.) Here are three methods, the only thing I would add is that you can create a library with Evernote instead of springpad as well. Pass this one on. "three methods for creating and sharing a digital classroom library with your students. In all three cases, I’m going to assume that you have a source of free eBooks (Amazon’s Free Popular Classics, Google’s Play Store Top Free Books, or Project Gutenberg) and an app to read those books (Amazon’s Kindle app, Google’s Play Books app, Aldiko for Android, or iBooks for iOS)."

  tags: news librarian media specialist wiki_book evernote

• 44 Smart Ways to Use Smartphones in Classroom | Classroom Aid

  Cell phones can be used in very powerful ways in the classroom. Our fifth grade teachers have moved ahead with BYOD because they are promoting the habitude of curiosity from our workshop this week with Angela Maiers. They have a one strike policy - if you're caught off task, you may not bring the device back to school. They are loving it and enjoying it. This is a great article to share about some ways to use smart phones in the classroom.

  tags: byod news mlearning

• WATCH: Three burglars caught on tape while robbing a house in Raleigh - UPI.com

  Home automation systems are being installed by many (like me) who use things like wemos and motion detectors to customize the system. In this video, a person captured robbers on their home automation system ip camera and have caught two of the robbers already. 

  tags: news automation

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

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