3 Simple Shifts after ITEM 2015

Every session I attended at the 2015 ITEM Conference had countless great ideas, but the three breakout sessions that stood out the most for me were: Macgyver Librarianship, How to Amplify Student Voice, and Coding in the Elementary School.

Jennifer Lagarde’s (@librarygirl) MacGyver Librarianship breakout session was filled with a nonstop stream of ideas for improving the library. Much of the time was focused on simple inexpensive ways you can redecorate on a dime. However, the biggest take away for me was the fact that very few of the ideas that she shared were hers. Most of them came from her involvement with the professional learning network on Twitter titled #macgyverlibrarianship. Paricipating in that community is a simple shift I can implement right away.

With the simple and powerful message of Friday’s subtle shifts keynote resonating in my head, I followed Dr. Brad Gustafson (@gustafsonbrad) to an interactive discussion he facilitated  about ways to Amplify Student Voice in your school. The session had over 12 different ideas including: augmented reality, blended learning, makerspaces, Youtube, student led PD, and so many more. But one idea struck me as something I could easily implement on Monday, the Principals Podcast Crew. I teach a media production class and I think that offering their video editing services to create a podcast from the principal about what is going on in the school would increase communication and creativity in our school.

One of the last sessions of the conference I attended was all about coding in the elementary classroom. The list of free tools for introducing young students to coding and computational thinking was inspiring, because so much of the time that our elementary students spend in the computer lab is devoted to playing educational games or using test prep software. The coding curriculum we discussed, can be easily implemented and will also have a greater impact on student success.

Participating in #macgyverlibrarianship chats, implementing the Principal’s Podcast Crew, and trying out coding in the elementary school are three subtle shifts I can implement right away in our school. I am looking forward to the dramatic changes that result.

Flipping over the Tonka Institute

I attended the annual Tonka Institute professional development workshop this June. I signed up for several sessions related to the Flipped Classroom; it has something that I've wanted to do for a while and some teachers have been talking to me about getting started.

Cambridge Isanti Innovation and Coach, Kristin Daniels (@kadaniels), led a session on planning for flipping the classroom and another on the tools that you need to get started. I walked away very motivated.

Most workshops leave me overwhelmed; new ideas, no time to integrate into curriculum or the training plan, but Kristin's sessions were different for two reasons.

• Flip one lesson, flip one unit, flip one chapter - Nobody should expect to change their instruction overnight. The one lesson, one unit, one chapter mantra resonated with me
• The longer you wait the harder it gets - Trying new things is hard to do, but the longer you wait the harder it gets. This video highlights the idea well:

The turning point for me to get started was when Kristin did an experiment with Origami paper. Each of the workshop participants were instructed to grab two sheets of Origami paper. Then we watched a video on how to fold a frog. We were not allowed to pause the video. A few students sitting in the front row completed the task without error. But most of us failed.

We then watched the video a second time but we were allowed to pause the video and back up as needed. Using that method everyone was successful. It was a powerful exercise. Instructional videos allow students to learn at their own rate. What's more if we assign these skill based lesson outside of class and allow students to develop mastery outside of class we can use the classroom for more authentic and meaningful learning.

For more information from the session click here to check out the workshop resources.

Repurposing Old Pentium 4 PCs with Vector Linux 7 Lite Edition

One of the major projects that my SWAT team students took on in the 2nd Trimester was to load Vector Linux Lite on all of our old PCs that could only handle XP.

I wish I had on hand some of the images and video of this process. It was quite an experience. First we took apart computers, cleaned up all the parts, and put them back together. We learned about careful handling of motherboards, how delicate the pins are on a CPU, and we also learned the names of all the major parts of a computer.

It was a real mess and tons of fun. After the machines were back online we started to test out different operating systems. We tried Ubuntu, Puppy, Vector Standard, and Vector Lite. After some trial and error we settled in on Vector Lite.

We have since deployed 6 systems into the classroom and have had 0 tech support calls. That is if no news is good news.