Wanna Hangout? Google Hangouts for Education

I am always looking for ways to create opportunities for my students to experience an audience outside of our classroom. I want them to know that their work will reach a global reader via our blog, Padlets and Google Apps for Education.  The development of our global audience started when I joined Twitter. My students loved reading the comments from other students, educators and famous authors. These connections gave us valuable feedback and we enjoyed building relationships with new digital learners and adding them to our PLN (Personal Learning Networks).

We enjoyed connecting through our writing, but we wanted more. Who were these people, really? What did they look like? What was their classroom and school like? So many questions. My class is a group who likes to talk, a lot! I am amazed by the conversations they have during book clubs, conferences, pair shares and strategy groups during Reader's and Writer's Workshop. They want to talk to their new friends in their global PLN. Honestly, so did I. I decided to look for opportunities to connect with our buddy classes via Google Hangout.
Two years ago my students had a Google Hangout with Adam from Google about 1:1 Chromebooks.

Merton was one of 3 districts in the country that implemented the first round of available Chromebooks. My students shared with Adam what they liked about the Chromebooks, and what concerns they had. Adam shared some troubleshooting suggestions and gave them a "sneak-peak" into what was coming next for some of the tools, like Google Presentation. My students left that Hangout inspired and knew that they were part of the future of Chromebooks for Education.

Our first Hangout this year was with Steve Pratt's 6th Grade class. We connected for Digital Learning Day via our blogs. We both did comic web site review blog posts and had our students comment on each other's posts. We decided to have our students meet via Hangout. I set up a Padlet for Mr. Pratt's class so they could prepare some questions ahead of time so we would be prepared for our Hangout. On the day of the Hangout, my students were so excited. I projected the Hangout and we dialed Mr. Pratt. When his face appeared on the screen, my students screamed and jumped out of their seats. Mr. Pratt and I gave the students a few minutes to chat and just enjoy the new experience. Next, they started asking each other questions about their classroom, school, and learning opportunities. Finally, it was time to say good bye. We ended our Hangout and my class and I reflected on the experience.

Our next Hangout was for World Read Aloud Day on March 5th. Jill Barnes and I connected a few years ago on Twitter and our students have been blogging together. We are always looking for exciting, innovative ways to connect our readers/writers. We decided Google Hangout would be the perfect way to have our students read aloud to their PLN's on this important day. It was a wonderful collaboration. We finally "met" each other digitally, and celebrated the right to read and share our stories.

Our most recent Hangout was for our Passion Projects. I was introducing Passion Projects for the first time this year, so I decided to contact my friend and expert, Paul Solarz. Paul and his students have been working on Passion Projects all year, so I knew they could give my students some advice to get started and help them form their own essential questions. Paul's students were so helpful. I requested that Paul's students post advice to our Padlet so we had some direction before our Hangout. We wanted to make sure our time with Paul's students was valuable and we asked important questions that would help us with the next steps of our project. This Hangout was different than the others because it was a project think tank session. One class shared their knowledge and excitement about a topic while the other group took notes and asked questions. The collaboration and communication between the students was so energizing, and they just met! This motivated my students to dive in and get started on their projects. I know that I could not have created this experience myself. This was the result of Paul, his extraordinary learners, and Google Hangout.

If I Build It, Will They Read?

This year I added Reader's Workshop to my Language Arts Curriculum. My students and I already loved Writer's Workshop and were excited to follow the workshop model in Reading as well. I knew that if I wanted Reader's Workshop to be successful in my classroom, I needed to create a supportive environment that not only taught reading strategies, but fostered a love of reading. I thought about our experience with Writer's Workshop and how we worked together to become a personal learning network of thoughtful, passionate writers. I realized I needed to apply those same ideas and values to Reader's Workshop.

We started by looking at ourselves as readers.  What do we like to read?  Where do we read?  How do we select the books we read?  Next, we completed our MAPs and F&P testing so we would have more information to help us select “just right” books. I gave each student a book bin which they filled with fiction and nonfiction books of their choice.  We used our right books as we moved through our mini lessons and learning targets.  Conferences were more productive because students were reading books at their level.  They were proud of their understanding and could contribute more to book club and pair share conversations.  They wrote beautiful jots supported by textual evidence.

My students and I love to share our knowledge with others, especially our Kindergarten buddies.  We had just learned about text features in nonfiction, so we decided to use our favorite books in our bins to introduce these features to our buddies.  Each student used their Post Its to identify the features and prepare their individual mini lessons.  When we met with our buddies, each 6th grader shared their book and skillfully explained the features and their purpose in a language that their younger buddy could understand.  I was so proud of my readers.  Not only were they demonstrating the understanding of text structure, they were all workshop teachers that day.  

Then it happened.  I noticed that the conversations in class were about the books they were reading, and not just during Reader’s Workshop.  They would come into class in the morning and while I took attendance they would talk about what they read the night before.  I had students taking their books out to recess so they could read a few extra pages since they felt they didn’t read enough during our workshop time before lunch.  I started to panic.  I looked at my unorganized classroom library and worried that I did not have enough books to keep up with my ravished readers.  I made a desperate plea to my classroom parents for donations of lonely books from their homes.  Our PTO generously donated some funds so we could order new books too.  I asked students what they were reading and ordered only the books they suggested.  The books came right before spring break. A few of the books came out of the box and went immediately into backpacks headed to warm destinations.

Once we got our books, my students and I worked together to make our library beautiful.  Each student took a few books and used their Chromebooks to identify the genre and reading level.  We organized our books in bins by genre.  We were so proud when it was completed because it was a class effort.

 
We have a digital classroom library on BIblioNasium.  Each student has a digital bookshelf to keep track of the books they have read.  They can recommend books to classmates and search for new books so they always have a book waiting on their shelf.  
My hope is we can continue our reading momentum into the summer.  I will keep our BiblioNasium accounts active and encourage my students to update their bookshelves. They can recommend books to classmates for summer reading.  I will also keep our class blog live and encourage students to blog about the books they are reading as one of the independent blogging ideas.  We have written to authors in our blogs, like Ralph Fletcher and Peter and Paul Reynolds, and they have generously commented on our posts.  My students know that our blogs have an authentic, global audience, so they want to continue to blog over the summer.  This will be a great place to continue their excitement and passion about books with their classmates and global community during the summer months.  

Google Forms for Conferring in Writer's Workshop

If someone asked me what my favorite part of Writer’s Workshop is, I would tell them it is conferring with my students. I love talking to my students about their writing. We laugh and cry together as their stories unfold. My writers deserve this uninterrupted time to be heard.  It is my job to supply honest feedback and help them develop their craft. How’s It Going? A Practical Guide to Conferring with Student Writers by Carl Anderson is my favorite resource on conferring.  It is filled with Post It notes and has a permanent place on my desk.

Did I mention I love talking to my students about their writing? This can be a problem when you have 23 students and conferences in workshop should average about 2-7 minutes.  I am always looking for ways to improve the conferring process without sacrificing the quality of the time spent with an individual writer or group of writers.  One idea that greatly improved the environment of our workshop was the implementation of Student PLNs.  Writers now turn to someone in their own Personal Learning Network for feedback while I am conferring with other students.  

I found that Student PLNs helped students continue to move forward with their writing while they waited, but it did not help me shorten my conferences.  I realized my conferences were taking extra time because I spent at least 5 minutes finding out what the piece was about and what skill they wanted to focus on.  I thought if I knew this ahead of time, our time together could be spent developing their craft. We are fortunate to have 1:1 Chromebooks, so I turned to Google Forms.  My students and I already use Google Forms for surveys, flipped lessons, scripts, and submitting links for Web 2.0 projects.  I created a Pre-Conference Interview Form based on the Student Checklists in the Units of Study.

My students completed the form using their Chromebook, Student Checklist and their drafts.  The following day I was able to start conferring with my updated conferring toolkit which included my student responses from the Pre-Conference Interview Form.  This additional information proved to be not only a timesaver, but an additional connection with my students.  I would start the conference with something they shared in the form, and they would smile wide, knowing they had already been heard and the conference had just begun.  

Passion for Padlet

In honor of Valentine’s Day, I want to tell you about a Web 2.0 tool my students and I absolutely love.  It is called Padlet.  To explain what it is in simple terms, I will use a quote from Padlet’s home page, “We give you a blank wall. You put anything you want on it, anywhere. Simple, yet powerful.”  Padlet has given my class a place to post our ideas digitally for a variety of purposes for all subject areas.  

I first started using Padlet as an exit slip.  I would have my students post their thoughts at the end of the lesson or for homework so I could assess understanding, encourage collaboration, and allow students to access other resources for more information to respond to my question.  We were having such success and my students wanted a new question daily.  I decided to post inquiry questions as a way to pretest for understanding before science labs or mini-lessons in Reader’s and Writer’s Workshop.  We are also a 4C’s (collaboration, communication, creativity and critical thinking) centered classroom, so I encouraged students to come up with their own content-related questions to post to a Padlet for our class to answer.  They would submit them via a Google Form. We also used our Padlets to collaborate with our buddy classrooms in our district and across the country. We asked for advice about poetry writing from Mrs. Barnes 7th Graders in Virginia and they posted their ideas on a Padlet for us.  Recently, my class jigsawed online nonfiction resources and explored the text structure of the websites.  They recorded their findings on Padlet. 

Padlet is a great professional development presentation tool for educators.  I use it to get to know my workshop participants, check for understanding, and encourage feedback.  It also gives educators attending my workshop a chance to try one of the tools I use with my students, and feel the power of this collaborative learning opportunity.  It always opens up a great discussion, and I love the buzz I hear between educators discussing the possibilities for their own professional world.

There are many features in Padlet that make it unique and exciting.  The program is very easy to use since you only have to set up a few options in order for a Padlet to be ready to use.  These are: portrait, wallpaper, title, description and privacy settings.  Padlet gives you many options for the portraits and wallpaper, but I usually use my own photo for the portrait to remind my students that the question is coming from me.  I have done this as a way to remind them that classroom rules for digital citizenship apply 24/7 and our connection with our global community comes with great responsibility.  I am happy to say that they have taken this learning opportunity very seriously and have not abused the freedom.  Here are a few more examples of Padlets my students and I have created over the last two years.   

How do you use Padlet with your students? Share your ideas and lessons.

Student PLNs

If you are reading this blog, it means you are probably part of my PLN (Personal Learning Network), and for that I thank you.  As educators we should all have people to learn from on a regular basis.  We need a network of like-minded professionals to challenge our thinking and heighten our professional experience.  These can be co-workers and colleagues in our buildings, but I am sure you are reading this via Twitter, which means you are plugged into a broader global community of learners and know the potential of connecting digitally.  Since personal learning networks can include anyone who you trust to support your learning and make you better, shouldn’t we encourage our students to develop their own personal learning networks so they can experience the same benefits?
  I decided to apply this idea to Writer’s Workshop last year.  We were doing daily conferring and pair shares, but students really wanted to meet with me every day.  I explained to them I was only one perspective.  I introduced PLNs and told them about mine, locally and globally. I shared the importance of trust with PLNs.  I gave an example of how I would create a new workshop or blog and I would ask Mrs. Heizman and Mrs. Kasprowicz to critique it.  They are dear friends, but I also have great respect for them as professionals.  Mrs. Kasprowicz is a 5th/6th grade teacher, but also a published author.  Mrs. Heizman is our experienced Technology Administrator.  They are also extremely honest and will tell me what they think.  That is an essential part of the learning process if I expect to learn and grow.  

To help my students decide who was already part of their learning network, we answered the following questions:

Who helps us learn?
Who really knows us?
Who makes us laugh?
Who pushes us?
Who are our cheerleaders?
Who will be honest?
Who listens to us?
Who do we connect with locally and globally?

They went to work creating their PLN on Google Drawing.  I was happy to see they included me, a few classmates, parents, previous teachers, our current buddy classes, and Mrs. Barnes' class, our blogging buddies from Virginia.  Over the next few weeks in Writer’s Workshop, instead of asking writers to find a partner, I encouraged them to find someone from their PLN for feedback until I was able to confer with them.  They loved the term “professional” and took the responsibility seriously.

I found success with 5th Grade student PLNs, but I wondered if this same idea could be applied to younger students.  I consulted another member of my PLN, Ms. Losik, a 1st grade teacher at Merton Primary School.  Our students had done a few collaborative activities already and were comfortable working with each other. I felt my students were confident with their knowledge of PLNs and they were ready to teach their first grade buddies what a PLN is, and help them create their own so they could start using their network in 1st grade for Writer’s Workshop.  Ms. Losik prepared her students for our visit by talking to her students about their own learning experiences and brainstorming together who helps them at home and school. 

When we finally brought our students together for our PLN pair share/teach activity, the excitement was explosive. They were so proud to share the important, special people in their lives who help them learn. First the 5th graders explained what a PLN is, and shared their Google Drawings of their own PLNs.  Next, 5th Graders assisted their 1st grade buddies to brainstorm their PLN members by asking similar key questions we used to develop our own PLNs.  They wrote the names of the people and drew pictures on a graphic organizer similar to our Google Drawings.  After about 15 minutes, each 5th/1st grade pair presented their PLN.  It was interesting to note that even though these students were different ages, they both valued teachers, classmates and parents in their PLN.

This year my students continue to grow their PLN. They are excited that our blogs have reached new classrooms this year and we have made connections with famous children’s authors. Each TCRWP unit of study has a new element of excitement because the audience is no longer limited to our classroom, but reaches an unlimited global community and Personal Learning Network of their choice.  

  

Validation

Whenever you start a new Language Arts initiative with your students, you are always hopeful.  You want THIS program to make the difference.  The materials are purchased, the teachers are trained, the parents are informed.  Then the real work begins. Implementing real change in your own classroom. In order to do this successfully, means looking at literacy differently and creating a writing environment that looks and feels different than what has been done in the past.  Exciting! Year one of Writer’s Workshop was an absolute whirlwind in my 5th Grade classroom at Merton Intermediate School. It was new to everyone, so we learned together.

That was part of the fun.  My class and I loved conferring best.  We simply loved talking and sharing about writing.  It brought us all closer together as writers. We also had a class blog so we could continue our writing and discussions outside of the classroom. Blogging extended our audience to a global community and provided authentic learning opportunities. We loop 5/6th grade, so I was thrilled knowing we could continue what we started the following year.

I attended Teacher’s College Reading & Writing Project in August 2013 and kicked off the new Units of Study this year.  We started with Personal Narratives.  It was exciting to start our unit with experienced writers who were familiar with workshop. We spoke a common language and were living our lives as writers.  I didn’t realize just how much until 6th Grade volunteered to present “Writer’s Workshop: Year Two” at a school board meeting in November.  I started gathering artifacts and recruiting my writers to present at the meeting.  I made some amazing discoveries.

First, I asked my students, “ How are we living life differently as writers this year?”  Over the next two days students posted their responses on a Padlet.

It was exciting to see responses like:

• “Last year I learned a lot of things that I needed to apply to my writing.  Now that I know all of those skills, it is a lot easier for me to add them to my writing without even having to think about it.”
• “We are more aware of our surroundings so we can make the moments we have lived into small moment stories.”
• “I think I have grown as a writer by being unique and brave.”
• “We are writing blogs which don’t just help me, but inspire others too.  I reach many readers.”

Next, I went back to find a similar activity I did with my students a year earlier.  We were working on building stamina as writers since this was our first exposure to workshop.  My students were not exactly “enjoying” the amount of time we spent writing each day.  We discussed stamina and why it was important to build stamina in all areas of our lives. I had them each contribute to the question, “Why is Stamina Important in Writer’s Workshop?” on a shared Google Doc the same way I did with the Padlet activity.  Some of the responses were:

• “We can build stamina by putting effort into your work.”
• “We can build stamina with practice, practice, practice.”
• “We can build stamina by practicing and writing stories.”
• “We can build stamina by writing a lot at home or anywhere you go!”
  

For both of these activities, I posted the question on our class web site and asked my students to share their thoughts.  What a difference a year and the correct writing model can make.  What I noticed the most was the first year responses were all about the work, effort and practice. The second year responses were about the writer, blogger, inspiration, audience, life, and stories.  YES!!

We proudly presented our findings to our school board and ended the presentation with a potpourri voices share. Thanks TCRWP for your amazing resources and instruction this summer.  Most of all, thank you to my Merton 6th Grade writers/bloggers for your dedication and trust in me.  I am so proud of you!  Merton Community School Board Presentation: 11/23/2013

Finding a Balance

A week ago I got a phone call from our dear friends asking us to join them for the Packer-Detroit game in Green Bay the following week.  My mind immediately went to mush.  All I could think about was all my professional responsibilities coming up the next few weeks, such as my new PBL project, my Digital Writer’s Workshop class, an out of state professional development engagement, and 6th grade camp, just to name a few.  I looked at my husband and I knew that we both needed a break, and a chance to do something other than work on a Sunday for a change.  I said, “Yes!  We can’t wait!”

The following week was insane, filled with work, a sick baby, our son’s sports commitments, and planning for the trip to Green Bay.  My excitement about the game was overshadowed by the guilt of taking the Sunday off of work.  Why did I feel this way?  As teachers we fill our plates so full and never feel “done”.  I have a hard time disconnecting because my passion for what I do consumes me.  I realized this week that this is not a healthy way to be, and I need to get better at finding a balance.  

In Writer’s Workshop, I remind my writers how important it is to “live differently because you are a writer.  Notice small moments and capture them in entries.”  If I sit in front of my computer and never leave my house, how am I modeling this behavior as a writer?  How will I have anything to share? 

If I would have said no to the game, I would have missed the following small moments today:

• The ride to and from Lambeau Field filled with stories and laughter
• Our friend Ken winning a Jordy Nelson Jersey in a tailgating raffle
•  Eating the best steak sandwich ever on a pretzel roll, and devouring two bowls of seafood chowder that would challenge any restaurant on Bourbon Street 
•  Finding disgusting standing water by a dumpster and taking a picture of it to share with my students tomorrow (they know I am grossed out by putrid standing water)
•  I was almost not allowed in the Packer game because my beautiful purse was too big to pass security (my sweet husband emptied it out and smuggled it in)
• Watching an amazing Packer win in sunny 65 degree weather
• Spending an entire day with my husband, kid-free, talking about everything, BUT education

As I type this on my phone in the car on the ride home, I realize I made the right choice. Granted, I'm sneaking a little work in, but I'm excited to share, reflect, and celebrate how I lived life differently today, and found a balance. I can't wait to share these exciting experiences with my class tomorrow, and discover what small moments they lived this weekend too.

Celebrating the Win

Rogers and Nelson?

A Purse Worth Fighting For

Lambeau Field

Standing Water