Thank You for Calling the Ed Tech Help Line

Source: Pixabay What is a Personal Learning Network (PLN)?  PLNs are networks, whether online or in person, that allows you to connect with others in your field to learn, discuss, and gain more knowledge to become better in your field.  Thanks to the Internet, PLNs have gone online and allows you to connect with others all around the world. I recently created my own PLN via Twitter ( @dyleeGoBlue ) and it has so far been an amazing and eye opening experience.  I've heard from others how beneficial PLNs have been for them, but I was skeptical and never felt the need to join in and on top of that, I was never really a fan of Twitter.  From a personal standpoint, I didn't feel the need to read short blurbs from my friends or celebrities about what's going on in their lives.  However, with a more professional focus, Twitter has been an amazing tool to connect with other teachers and other professionals around the world who have similar passions, interests, an...

How do we know if the technology we have in our rooms is making a difference?  Thankfully, more and more research is coming out on the effectiveness of technology on students.  I had the opportunity to peruse through several sites to learn more about the ed-tech trends that are occurring in and out of the classrooms today.  It has helped me get a better sense of my students and how I can change or modify my curriculum to help better prepare them for what lays ahead. One site that caught my interest was  Project Tomorrow Speak Up .  Their website had a report focused on  coding in classrooms .  One of their main takeaways was that a majority of kids identified creativity as an important skill to be prepared for the future and that coding was a way to help students develop creative skills. I knew my students always loved it when we had the opportunity to code, but I could never pinpoint why.  I just assumed they usually liked it because most of th...

Active Learning Video Source: Youtube ...The epitome of a passive learning classroom: a knowledgable educator up front near a podium, sitting in an uncomfortable position for what feels like hours, and waves of information coming at the student through the professor's lecture. The humor of this clip from "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" is that it is relatable to a majority of us.  We've sat in a classroom like that before, waiting for an excuse to exit.   Instead of just sitting there, imagine if students were engaged, took ownership of their own learning, and were self-motivated to produce tangible learning outcomes, not simply because they had to, but because they wanted to.  The active learning approach targets those exact outcomes.  An active learning approach is student-centered and the teacher is a facilitator for their learning.  There is an emphasis on student choice and self-reflection.  Ed-tech tools can play a large role in providing ad...

Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants At the age of 80, my father has a smartphone, but rarely thinks to go on the World Wide Web.  It scares him because every touch on the screen could lead him to somewhere he didn't want to go to.  The Internet is a foreign land to him.  One wrong turn could lead to the wrong part of the city or even worse, he could get lost.   On the other side of the spectrum, I have friends who are a few years younger than me, who post 15-20 instagram stories a day, has over 1000+ posts, 500+ people that they are following, and has 500+ followers as well.  I joke that their smartphone is like their 3rd arm, because they are able to take so many photos, videos, have the time to post them with cute stickers, etc...and it's a part of their everyday lives.   These were my first thoughts as I read up about Marc Prensky's idea of "digital natives" and "digital immigrants" back in 2001.  According to Marc Presnky, stude...

Check out my video on Pecha Kuchas and Ignite Sessions.  I am looking forward to trying this in some of my classes moving forward! Resources used in my presentation: Pechakucha.com Ignite Talks Website Pecha Kucha: Get to the PowerPoint in 20 Slides Then Sit the Hell Down Richard Edwards Blog on Pecha Kucha in the classroom Lauramfoley.com

Technology Integration Matrix (TIM) TIM was created by the Florida Center for Instructional Technology at the University of South Florida.    Source: https://fcit.usf.edu/matrix/tim-descriptors TIM provides a 5 by 5 matrix that describes the 5 levels of technology integration, starting with entry level integration up to a transformation level of integration, which emphasizes a high level of higher order level activities that could not be done without technology. The matrix also describes the 5 different types of learning environments that technology could be incorporated in.   Each cell provides a unique descriptor based on the different learning environments crossed with the varying levels of tech integration by the educator.   When the time comes to evaluate a lesson or a unit, the matrix provides an easy visual representation of where an educator may feel their lesson or unit falls.   It also allows the educator to take a look at w...

About Me via needpix.com   Welcome to my educational blog! Similar to calling the help desk, I hope my entries will help serve your tech and educational needs. Before we dig into educational matters, I'd love to introduce myself. Education: I graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. in History.  I completed my M.Ed at DePaul University in Special Education.  Since then, I have been teaching at the same Chicago Public School (CPS) for eleven years on the north side of the city.   Professional: For the first six years in teaching, I was a special education resource teacher for 6th through 8th graders.  Although I didn't have a homeroom per se, I loved the fact that I had a small caseload of students who I got to know very well and had the opportunity to journey with them through their middle school years.  During that time, I had the opportunity to help our school acquire new technology to implement as tools in the...