Monday, October 28, 2013
Parent Academy Website
We have launched a new website at Mid-Prairie - Parent Academy. Our goal with this site is to provide parents with resources to support them as they work with their children in our digital world.
This site currently focuses on the Middle School 1:1 Pilot program with Chromebooks. We will attempt to reflect the changing technology status of Mid-Prairie schools. That is a fancy way of saying - stay tuned as Mid-Prairie's technology use continues to evolve.
As we build the site there will be more tabs across the top of the home page linking to topics of importance. Currently there are only 2 tabs as illustrated in this image. The schedule will keep you up to date on upcoming Middle School Parent Academy events. All parents are invited - although some will focus more on chromebooks and the 7th graders. That will be noted in the schedule. The second tab links to an online powerpoint presentation including videos presented by our Washington County Investigator, Chad Ellis. Chad, a Mid-Prairie grad, has met with 6-8 graders for the past few years speaking on the same subject. This was his first opportunity to also meet with parents. A FAQ of the question and answer time will be coming soon to this page.
We welcome parent and staff requests for information as we add to this page. We hope to include short video tutorials as well as pertinent websites.
Contact me at bswantz@mphawks.org with suggestions or concerns.
Friday, October 11, 2013
ITEC: Des Moines, October 13-15
It is time for ITEC again!
It's a great technology conference in Des Moines. One that I have been attending for a lot of years. I especially like it because the workshop presenters vary from tech people to classroom teachers and mixtures of both. I have learned so much over the years!
Frank and I decided it would be a good idea for us to present this year! So, our presentation, Instructional Coaching in a Digital Age, will be on Tuesday morning.
Our goal is to describe our position a bit and then talk about the projects that we have been involved in and share some of our resources.
This is a link to our presentation. We are thrilled to show off what is happening at Mid-Prairie. There are lots of great things!!
Frank and I decided it would be a good idea for us to present this year! So, our presentation, Instructional Coaching in a Digital Age, will be on Tuesday morning.
Our goal is to describe our position a bit and then talk about the projects that we have been involved in and share some of our resources.
This is a link to our presentation. We are thrilled to show off what is happening at Mid-Prairie. There are lots of great things!!
Sunday, September 29, 2013
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Monday, September 9, 2013
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Look what Pinterest can do
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| image from ddatch54 flickr |
Click here to see a great video created all from Pinterest pins! A fun way to put it to work!
Thanks to Lori's Latest Links for sharing!!
This is also a great blog to follow. Lori has wonderful links to a wide variety of sources.
Digital Citizenship for the adults in the room!
Richard Byrne had an excellent post on how not to plagiarize another's online blog work!
Check out the information here and make sure you are not guilty!
This would be a great teaching example for digital citizenship with students!
An honest look at ourselves
I just read a very interesting post by Scott Mcleod about a workshop that didn't go as planned.
His ending words were...
Name the problem. Own it. Apologize. Try to fix it, both for them and for next time.That’s all I know to do, along with an overall insistence on high-quality work and continual improvement. But, as always, I’ll take any and all suggestions. What do you do when your workshop isn’t awesome?
Read the rest of his post here
This got me thinking...As an educational leader we often are expected to know what needs to happen. Teachers see us as outsiders who have left the classroom and now have all the answers. If they believe that is our task, then their ears begin to close and the defenses and the excuses begin.
I attended two conferences this summer.
One was hosted in our district and I was on the planning committee, the other was out of state and I was a pretty green participant.
Both were focused on a different type of teaching, one that provided more opportunities for student involvement and achievement.
There was a marked difference in the two conferences.
The one we hosted had imported experts to show us what we needed to do differently. These experts were successful in their teaching styles. They were dynamic and they were knowledgable. The conference was well received. Staff members responded favorably and the grad homework that I checked showed they 'got' it! But, it was a pretty one sided dialogue. The experts knew and we
learned. I am not sure what the lasting change will be.
The second felt like we were all invited to the same table. There were some who had been sitting at the table longer and so they were sharing what had worked and what hadn't. But, we were all there at table - ok it wasn't a table, but you get what I am saying!
The undercurrent of that conference was RELATIONSHIPS! We need to change the way we have been delivering content, not because it was bad, not because we were failing, but because we were missing out on the opportunity of creating relationships with our students with that teaching style.
I think in these two examples lies some of the failure of Professional Learning.
I've been teaching for 25 years. I know in my gut what my students need. I know that some of it works and some of it doesn't. So, when someone starts to tell me about change - I need to see the big picture and I need to be invited to the conversation. I need to be applauded for what I have been doing and listened to when I have concerns about how this really looks in my classroom.
PL is successful when the person in front...names the problem...owns it...apologizes if necessary and we all work together to try to fix it.
I know that isn't what Scott was talking about - but for me it is the real problem. Teachers are tired of being told what they are doing is wrong or being made to feel are just too lazy or busy or tired to change. They already know it! They feel it.
Instead, I think many want a relationship with their peers and their leaders and they want to create a different future for their students - TOGETHER.
Now...I don't know exactly how that works.
BUt this great post by Edna Sackson gives some concrete ideas.
One that I think is really important is home grown PD. We did that a few years back. It was one of the scariest experiences for the presenters and one of the most successful for our whole district! Seek out those in our own midst that are getting it and have them share.
So thanks to Scott Mcleod for starting my thoughts and for being honest.
What do the rest of you think?
His ending words were...
Name the problem. Own it. Apologize. Try to fix it, both for them and for next time.That’s all I know to do, along with an overall insistence on high-quality work and continual improvement. But, as always, I’ll take any and all suggestions. What do you do when your workshop isn’t awesome?
Read the rest of his post here
This got me thinking...As an educational leader we often are expected to know what needs to happen. Teachers see us as outsiders who have left the classroom and now have all the answers. If they believe that is our task, then their ears begin to close and the defenses and the excuses begin.
I attended two conferences this summer.
One was hosted in our district and I was on the planning committee, the other was out of state and I was a pretty green participant.
Both were focused on a different type of teaching, one that provided more opportunities for student involvement and achievement.
There was a marked difference in the two conferences.
The one we hosted had imported experts to show us what we needed to do differently. These experts were successful in their teaching styles. They were dynamic and they were knowledgable. The conference was well received. Staff members responded favorably and the grad homework that I checked showed they 'got' it! But, it was a pretty one sided dialogue. The experts knew and we
learned. I am not sure what the lasting change will be.
The second felt like we were all invited to the same table. There were some who had been sitting at the table longer and so they were sharing what had worked and what hadn't. But, we were all there at table - ok it wasn't a table, but you get what I am saying!
The undercurrent of that conference was RELATIONSHIPS! We need to change the way we have been delivering content, not because it was bad, not because we were failing, but because we were missing out on the opportunity of creating relationships with our students with that teaching style.
I think in these two examples lies some of the failure of Professional Learning.
PL is successful when the person in front...names the problem...owns it...apologizes if necessary and we all work together to try to fix it.
I know that isn't what Scott was talking about - but for me it is the real problem. Teachers are tired of being told what they are doing is wrong or being made to feel are just too lazy or busy or tired to change. They already know it! They feel it.
Instead, I think many want a relationship with their peers and their leaders and they want to create a different future for their students - TOGETHER.
Now...I don't know exactly how that works.
BUt this great post by Edna Sackson gives some concrete ideas.
One that I think is really important is home grown PD. We did that a few years back. It was one of the scariest experiences for the presenters and one of the most successful for our whole district! Seek out those in our own midst that are getting it and have them share.
So thanks to Scott Mcleod for starting my thoughts and for being honest.
What do the rest of you think?
Friday, July 19, 2013
One Stop Shop
What is the best way to share info with our staff?
How do we curate our content?
I want to sit with this over the summer
But if anyone has ideas - I would love to hear them!!!
a challenge...
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| image from iClipArt for schools |
I was catching up on my Techno-reading today and found this quote in Tech & Learning
BLOG QUOTE OF THE DAY
Seek out at least one educator in your district who is not a connected learner. Be a mentor, and listen. Try to discover their perspective, and share yours. If every one of the 20,000 conneted educators at ISTE does this, we will significantly expand our pockets of educational innovation - Nancy White
| http://www.techlearning.com/default.aspx?tabid=67&entryid=6205 |
What a great place to start!!! Mentoring at its best!!
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