Digital Citizenship – Elanco Elementary Instructional Technology

May 2016 Updates

elemtech Communication, Creation, Digital Citizenship, Google Apps, Professional Development, Resources May 19, 2016May 19, 2016 0 Comment

Thanks, Mr. Leister!

As the end of the school year approaches, please take a few minutes to complete the survey and explore some new technology resources:

Digital Learning Tools at ELANCO Elementary – At the end of each school year, teacher input concerning the paid educational programs at ELANCO is very important. Please take a few minutes to complete the Elem Digital Learning Tools Survey to share your opinions on current programs, as well as to offer suggestions for future programs and professional development needs. One of our August in-service days will have sessions based on your suggestions.
New Q&A Feature in Google Slides – A newly released feature in Google Apps for Education provides the option for presenters to allow their audience to submit questions and vote on them during Google Slide presentations.
Quizizz now integrates with Google Classroom – so that you can use the Google Classroom Share button to easily send out Quizizz games to your students.
Subscribe to your School’s Calendar in MS Outlook – Follow these directions to add the your school building’s calendar to your Outlook Calendar.
End of the School Year Backups – It’s approaching the end of the school year and teachers will soon be packing up their classrooms for the summer break. However, teachers should also consider packing up (or backing up) their digital classroom as well. Consider some steps that you could take to cleanup and secure your computer files, browser settings, and Email. Yes, email….Take the ‘Inbox Zero’ Challenge and get to zero emails in your Inbox before leaving for the summer and claim your ELANCO Credly Badge here. Remember that you can claim other Elanco Digital Badges for your many tech skills.
May Edition of Storify at #ElancoSD – A collection of educational resources and social media posts from Elanco teachers and organizations. Check out posts and pictures of the Blue Ball Big Read, our HS spring sport athletes, GSHS Prom 2016, GS chorus concerts, and more. Include the hashtag #ElancoSD in your tweets to see your posts in future editions.
The Elanco Leading Edge Flipboard Magazine – Read what’s new in the world of Teaching and Educational Technology. View on the web, or subscribe via the Flipboard iOS or Android App to read on your mobile device.

April 2016 Elem Tech Updates

elemtech Communication, Digital Citizenship, Google Apps, Professional Development, Resources April 19, 2016May 19, 2016 0 Comment

April 2016 Updates from Mr. Leister

While the students are testing this week and next, perhaps you’ll have some time to explore some new technology resources:

Quizlet Live is a new feature from Quizlet that allows teachers to play an in-class game using existing online flashcard study sets. The game requires students to collaborate in small groups to find the term that matches the definition.
Google Classroom has added a new polling feature! A recent blog post from Google for Educationshows some creative ways teachers are using polling in their classrooms.
Kahoot has added a new ‘Team Mode’ to their online game system to better “nurture collaboration, teamwork, leadership skills and good communication.”
ThingLink is an online tool for teachers to create interactive images by adding ‘hot spot’ buttons to overlay text, images, videos and more. Here’s one example for learning about the U.S. Presidents.
Nearpod is a great classroom presentation tool with the formative assessment tools are built right into the presentation allowing students to respond on their computers with open-ended answers, multiple choice questions, or the use of drawing tools. I have 2 Nearpod Teacher accounts that were paid for by the district for any Elementary Teacher who is interested in having the full version of the program through February 2017. First come, first serve!
April Edition of Storify at #ElancoSD – A collection of educational resources and social media posts from Elanco teachers and organizations. Check out pictures from our guidance department of the Class of 2016 accepting their college admission offers. Include the hashtag #ElancoSD in your tweets to see your posts in future editions.
The Elanco Leading Edge Flipboard Magazine – Read what’s new in the world of Teaching and Educational Technology. View on the web, or subscribe via the Flipboard iOS or Android App to read on your mobile device.
Remember that you can claim your own Elanco Digital Badges for your many tech skills.

Kiddle – A Search Engine for Kids

Tim Leister Digital Citizenship, Google Apps March 9, 2016March 31, 2016Google Search, kiddle 0 Comment

Even the best school district Internet content filters will sometimes allow inappropriate content in the search results for teachers and students. Kiddle is a new customized search that uses the Google search engine, created just for young kids. Using Kiddle will allow students to still utilize the search power of Google without receiving some of the unnecessary information that comes along with their search results.

Below, you’ll read the benefits of using Kiddle with young students as described on the Kiddle About Page.

1) Safe search: sites appearing in Kiddle search results satisfy family friendly requirements, as we filter sites with explicit or deceptive content.
2) Kids-oriented results: the boxes below illustrate how Kiddle returns results for each query (in the order shown):

Safe sites and pages written specifically for kids. Handpicked and checked by Kiddle editors. Typically, results 1-3.
Safe, trusted sites that are not written specifically for kids, but have content written in a simple way, easy for kids to understand. Handpicked and checked by Kiddle editors. Typically, results 4-7.
Safe, famous sites that are written for adults, providing expert content, but are harder for kids to understand. Filtered by Google safe search. Typically, results 8 onwards.

3) Big thumbnails: most Kiddle search results are illustrated with big thumbnails, which makes it easier to scan the results…..
4) Large Arial font in Kiddle search results provides better readability for kids.
5) Privacy: we don’t collect any personally identifiable information, and our logs are deleted every 24 hours. Please read our full privacy statement here.

To make Kiddle easily accessible for students, an icon has been added on the new Elanco student gateway homepages (here’s Blue Ball Elem) with the Google Search icon.

This free resources might be one to share with parents as well. Keep in mind that as with any search engine, there is no 100% guarantee that all search results yielded are child-friendly. Continue to be vigilant about assigning meaningful online work for your students and supervising their activity.

It’s Digital Citizenship Week! And some updates!

elemtech Digital Citizenship, Google Apps, Professional Development, Resources, Updates October 19, 2015October 19, 2015blogging, Digital Citizenship, Edublogs, research, Wired Wednesdays 0 Comment

October 18-24 is Digital Citizenship Week! As educators we need to model strong citizenship, both online and off, and provide our students with the support and knowledge needed to be skillful and safe contributors in digital learning spaces. Check out these resources to support your ongoing digital citizenship and safety talks with students. Great talking points and graphics to share at an upcoming class meeting!

Resources for educators from Common Sense Media, videos, and classroom posters

6 Digital Citizenship Resources from Edutopia

Citizenship in the Digital Age infographic from ISTE

The 7s of Meaningful Learning Start with Citizenship by Shelly Terrell

Our next Wired Wednesday will be held on October 21 at Brecknock Elementary, from 4-5 PM. The topic is Elementary Research! We’ll review key copyright topics, explore the built-in research tools in the Google Apps suite, and check out other elementary-friendly research sites. Please register in My Learning Plan!

Have your students begun blogging and now you’re in need of some ideas to help them take their blogging to the next level? Check out this recent post from Edublogs, 50 Ideas for Student Blogging and Writing Online!

BrainPOP is offering a free webinar on how to get started with My BrainPOP on Wednesday, October 21 at 4 PM. These sessions are archived if you can’t watch live. Click here to learn more!

In case you missed it, Elanco STEM featured in Lancaster Online this week!

Summer Updates 2015!

elemtech Communication, Digital Citizenship, Google Apps, Professional Development, Resources, Updates July 22, 2015August 20, 2015 0 Comment

We are well into July, and it’s less than one month until our opening inservice day! I hope you’re all enjoying a summer filled with relaxation, time with family and friends, and lots of smiles.

Below are some updates from elementary instructional technology. It would be very beneficial for you to take some time over the next few weeks to read through the information listed here. Please don’t hesitate to email me with any questions!

Elementary Instructional Tech Info 2015-16 – This document has many “need to knows” for elementary teachers for the new year, including the digital citizenship pledge and kick off lesson we’re asking all teachers to address in the first week or two of school, info about Qwertytown and other content providers, and resources to support technology integration. (This doc is also a great example of how to incorporate a responsive table of contents into your Google docs!)

August 19 In-service Day – From 8 AM-12 PM on August 19, we will be offering sessions focused on instructional technology and teaching & learning. Many of your colleagues are running these sessions! For those of you new to certain content providers, sessions may be mandatory. Please read the schedule carefully. The tech day wiki and sessions can be found here. Please be patient and check back if a session you’re interested in does not yet have a session description listed.

August 21 – Get Googly!

On August 21, I will be hosting Google-centric training sessions at Brecknock Elementary School for all elementary staff. The sessions will cover a variety of Google Drive/Docs must-knows, Google Classroom info, Google Chrome tips and tricks, and best practices for staying organized and using Google Apps to its fullest potential. Choose the session that best meets your needs, and/or stay for all three! Topics may vary during the sessions based upon the needs of attendees. Register for these sessions in My Learning Plan, found in the District Catalog!

9:00-10:00 AM – Rookies – Google Drive basics, organizing files and folders, sharing and collaborating, the basics of Docs, Slides, Forms. Intro to Google Chrome and its features.

10:00-11:00 AM – Seasoned Players – You’re comfortable and familiar with the basics of Drive and the productivity suite. We’ll look at Research Tools in Docs & Slides and ways to promote collaboration in your classroom, and Forms for formative assessment. Google Classroom basics will be reviewed for use with supporting rotational learning in your classroom.

11:00 AM – 12:00 PM – Veterans – You know the basics that GAFE can offer, but how can you more meaningfully integrate the suite into your work with students? We’ll look at going deeper with Google Chrome using apps and extensions, and the use of Google Calendar to promote home-school communication via your Edublogs site, and advanced options like using Flubaroo to self-grade Google Form assessments and other Drive add-ons.

Wired Wednesdays – This year I’ll be offering digital learning workshops on scheduled Wednesdays from 4-5 PM. Please click here to learn more! Hope to see you there!

Want to stay updated on the latest posts shared on this blog? Enter your email address in the Subscribe to this Blog box to the right and never miss a post! You can also subscribe via RSS in your Outlook inbox. This is the space where I share information about instructional tech throughout the year, and the pages along the top navigation bar will lead you to information about the content providers and other digital resources we use here at Elanco.

Photo Credit: mountainpete via Compfight cc

Spring Happenings

elemtech Communication, Connected Learning, Creation, Digital Citizenship, Resources April 8, 2015April 9, 2015Digital Citizenship, Edublogs, Storybird 0 Comment

April is Poetry Month!

It’s the perfect time to have your students compose and share their creative writing! Storybird is one way to support students’ literary creations. With Storybird, students can build poetry, longform, or chapter book creations. Sets of stunning illustrations will inspire students to include creative details in their writing. I can help you set up your classroom accounts and show you how to manage student projects. Learn more about how Storybird is celebrating Poetry Month! There’s even a #dailylark challenge so your students can participate in the literary fun!

Digital Citizenship Lessons

Digital citizenship lessons in grades 1-6 have begun this spring during computer lab special. It is always exciting for me to spend time with students and learn about the ways they’re using digital technologies to create, communicate, and collaborate in their personal lives. Through these lessons emerge important conversations that focus on safe and appropriate use of technology, respecting the rights of others, and crafting a digital reputation of which we can be proud! Our lesson materials are from Common Sense Media. You can see the full scope of the lessons they offer here. Remember, while it’s nice to offer these lessons in isolation to give students more direct instruction in these topics, it’s up to us as the adults in their lives to model and talk about respectful, empowering online behavior whenever we use technology with our students to support their learning!

Googly Goodness

Many of you were interested in learning more about Google Classroom to use as a platform for sharing digital resources with students during rotational learning classes next year. Click here to access resources where you can learn more about the features of Google Classroom and how it can support your work with students. Please email me to arrange a time when I can meet with you and/or your team to show you what this tool can to!

Looking for a quick start guide for Google Forms? Look no further!

Chromebook tips every teacher should know

Happy Spring! 🙂 I look forward to working with you and your students!

Photo Credit: Ken’s Oven via Compfight cc