Educational Technology

The Bedford County Public Schools Instructional Technology Coaches created a Mini Vodcast and set of resources on Differentiation. Today's blog is a quick summary of those resources and the vodcast. A future blog and mini vodcast will focus on Tiering. Check out the (Mini) #Vodcast on Differentiation (Part 1) on YouTube: https://bit.ly/36crHkR Differentiation is basically tailoring instruction to meet each student’s individual needs regardless of their abilities, strengths, and weaknesses. At the core of Differentiated Instruction is the modification of four elements Content (what students learn),  Process (how do students make sense of the information and ideas),  Product (how they show what they’ve learned) and Learning environment/Affect (the climate or tone in the classroom). This modification is based on an assessment of student differences in readiness, interest, and learning profile. Pros & Cons of Differentiated Instruction Pros Research shows differentiated instr...

Every time  I've thought about  improving my craft as an educator, learner, and leader, I find myself worrying that I am "reinventing the wheel". Why do we say "reinvent the wheel"? According to dictionary.com, it's defined as slang  "To go laboriously and unnecessarily through elementary stages in some process or enterprise; waste time on tediously obvious fundamentals"  The inspiration for this metaphor lies in the fact that the wheel must be the archetype of human ingenuity which allows it to underlie much if not all of modern technology.  As I delve further into this saying, I have found that it's good to "reinvent the wheel" depending on the reasoning, purpose, and mindset of the learner.  Maybe we should first consider the  learning mindset . When it comes to learning, by re-inventing, we learn how solutions map to problems ( backward design, backward mapping ) and get a deeper understanding of how those solutions work ( See...

 Did you know that you can make Google Docs interactive with Google Drawing? And, why would a teacher want to do that? Good reasons to embed Google Drawings inside Google Docs include creating editable drag-and-drop activities for elementary students, generating editable maps for Social Studies, or even producing the dreaded Technology Enhanced Question (TEI).   I like this activity because (as a teacher) you can quickly and clearly see if the student completed the "drawing" correctly without having to click anywhere. Just scroll down the doc and assess.  So... Here's how you do it.  Create a Google Doc and add a title and all the needed directions for your activity.  "Insert" Google Drawing  Pick "+ New" Create the drawing in a way that you want the students to manipulate in order to assess mastery When you are done, click Save.  Now, you can continue with your assignment with other directions as well as add more drawings for students to manipula...

What is adult learning? Adult learning is a situation where adults are learning , pursuing an education , and/ or acquiring a skill . Children and adults are very different when it comes to how they learn, so different techniques must be used in order to make learning effective for adults . Popular ways adults tend to learn.  Find experiences to help facilitate learning. Adult learners benefit from finding ways to get hands-on learning. Finding projects and other experiential opportunities can help them get a better grasp of their learning and be more excited about how it will translate to real life . Setting goals. Adult learners who have a specific career goal in mind will have a better experience as they pursue their degree program. Adult learners need these goals because their learning is more in their own hands than younger learners. Explain why . Knowing why they want to pursue education will help adult learners feel confident about their learning process. Und...

Every year, March Madness is upon us. Basketball fans everywhere rejoice as every copier in America is struggling to print millions of copies of the NCAA Bracket. Although I appreciate the enthusiasm fans bring to the tournament season, I am not a big basketball fan. Therefore, I started a Technology Final Four bracket a few years ago that coincides with March Madness. I saw a similar bracket in a post a few years ago and I would love to give kudos to the technology person. But, for the life of me, I cannot remember who it is. If you know, write the person's name under the comment section below so I can give that person the credit they deserve!  Here's how it works: I send out a Google sheet with the bracket of technology apps and websites I believe would be of interest to teachers. This year, some of my teammates used Google extensions for "teams". Each App is hyperlinked to the website of that product. The teacher decides which product is better and moves that n...

Ever wonder how Google folders are organized? 🙄 💻 Here is a quick tip about organizing your drive. If you don't already know, when you organize your folders you can organize them by special symbols, then numbers, then letters. Many people know this already. Therefore, they name their most important folders 001, 002, and so forth. What you might not know is that emojis actually come before all of these. They act as symbols and come before numbers. So, if you wanted to name (or rename) a folder with an emoji you can! It's really easy.  Go to getemoji.com and find the emoji you really want.  Highlight it and copy it. Go back to your drive and find the folder that you'd like to be renamed. Create a folder to be named or Double click the folder so it can be renamed. Paste in that emoji at the beginning of the folder name. N ow th at emoji will bump that folder up to the number one spot in front of all the numbers. 🤯 From here you can defini...