Category: 1:1 iPad Classroom

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Bright Idea #2: Goodnotes App

I first heard of the Goodnotes app at SET Connections SPun Special Education Technology Conference (think unconference meets Special Education).  I sat in my first session.  A group of us (ok…three of us) were in one of the classrooms sharing.  A younger educator needed ideas to bring back to her district to share with her staff, so myself and another special education teacher shared what we were using in our classrooms.  We spilled ideas and technology tools we used in our classrooms.  The room was filled with,

“Oh yeah I know that!”

“Oh Yeah! I love that tool!”

“Oh no I didn’t know about that one!”

“OOOOOO that’s a great one!”

…then suddenly… Continue reading “Bright Idea #2: Goodnotes App”

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Week 5 and 6: Steady As We Go

After weeks and weeks of excitement, new tools and waves and waves of awesomeness, things have finally settled and iPad life has been smooth sailing.  


With my students now the captains of their iPads…


they easily navigate between apps, using Goodreader to complete assignment notebooks, worksheets, take notes and write paragraphs. 

New apps that we (I say we because I currently have a dynamo…awesomely tech savvy…she totally speaks geek student teacher)  have introduced to our students have been warmly welcomed and tired with a fantastic energy and without hesitation.  We have tried Baiboard, Socrative, Study Blue and Bitsboard (all of them and all but Bitsboard are also internet based….BONUS for your non-iPad users or if you do not have iPads).  We continue to have great success and celebrate all the awesomeness of what each app offers our students.  All while knowing there are just so many more awesome apps out there!  


My students are still finding their way around Google Talk (I introduced them to it about a week and a half ago).  This app allows them to easily communicate with me if they have any questions while they are working on their homework.  While my students have become expects at using Edmodo as a communication tool, we quickly found that for homework help, Edmodo doesn’t reply fast enough and the multiple posts and long streams of communication can be confusing for them.  We are still in the lets try this out phase of Google Talk… setting our course and hoping we find more treasure…but my students are over the moon they have this tool to use and uber excited at what it can do.  Bonus…can we say independent students advocating for themselves…geee! 

My Goals for NEXT WEEK…

  • Each student has 5 tools (apps) on their iPads they are confident, independent and proficient at using
  • These 5 tools meet and support their educational needs 
  • Of these 5 tools (apps)... 
  • One to two of them improves access to the curriculum and improves output of information
  • One of them allows us (me and my students) to communicate with ease (at home, in my class or away from my class)
  • One to two of them provides interactive and engaging funs that reinforces new and old skills.  


So until next week you can find us sailing the open seas, rocking our iPads and spreading our awesomeness where ever we travel! 

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Week 4: Light Bulbs

Light bulbs were all the rage last week!  

Ah ha moments, glowing eyes of aw and pride, oooo’s and ahhs, and glissening wide smiles…with teeth and everything and oh my goodness look at me filled each period! 

My students continued to just rock technology and totally and completely rock being an iPad 1:1 classroom last week.  They continue to become more and more proficient at using their technology.  Lessons continue to flow and the pace of each lesson increases each day.  Their knowledge of the basics is well ingrained… actually fluid!  At only four weeks into being a 1:1 iPad classroom my student and the possible ways we will use technology have already exceeded my expectations. 

You might want to put some sun glasses on. The glow of all the awesomeness could be blinding…


I find myself able to introduce them to new tools and new components of their technology.  Baiboard has become not just a look what your iPad can do tool but a consistent tool…from sharing word lists during group Reading instruction to facilitating peers working together to sharing math notes and completing them as a class.


I find myself looking for ways to tweek and perfect our usage…looking for ways to be increasingly more efficient at changing paper to text form. The Jetscanner app has been an absolute god sent.  Anything paper need to be turned into a PDF for sharing or use on the iPad.  Take a photo, it changes it to a PDF and done! 
‘CLICK’ for source
 


I find myself looking for that very last way to remove almost all paper from our daily use. We have switched my students from typing their daily events / daily narrative on a PDF type enables document to putting these events on their Google Calendar.  Why not?  I use my Google Calendar everyday to keep my day organized!


I find myself looking for ways to connect us more…. to show my students the power of technology and communication. Last week two of my students went on Edmodo (unprompted by staff or parents) at home seeking help on a problem they were having on their homework.  That night after several replies from me and my student teacher they had the answers to their questions.  In that instant they learned the power technology has to connect. It actually made me teary.  As a direct result of this (it is actually something that has been on my mind for a while) I am exploring apps that would allow me and my students to chat when they need help on homework. This very moment was my most proudest yet!  Technology does powerful good and connects them to resources.  They learned that that night!


I find myself becoming a paper snot!  I even lost the capacity to breath for a half second when I actually had to print something last week.  You mean I actually need to have a paper copy…I need to print?! …Cue Back to the Future 2… What like you thought my geekiness really started and stopped here…


All of this awesomeness is just overwhelming wonderful!!!   I just can’t say enough about what has happened to my classroom, to me, to my teaching and to my students!

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Our Awesomeness #1

We have tried out a few different tools to project the iPad during lessons.  Reflector is a phenomenal desktop app that projects your iPad through the projector.  It allows me to not have to be plugged in.  I can walk around the classroom continuously displaying what I am doing on the iPad (downfall is my classroom’s wifi is not always able to keep up with it so it has only worked half the time).  Another, more reasonable tool to project the iPad is the iPevo camera. It clearly projects the iPad, but does not allow me to move around the classroom.  The above picture is the iPad projected using the iPevo Camera with one of my students navigating the iPad while I instruct.  My favorite way to use the iPad, iPevo and make students part of my teaching.  

 All of the worksheets and templates we use are PDFs 
 uploaded from Dropbox into Goodreader
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Week 3: Juuuust Right

Remember in Goldie Locks and the Three Bears when Goldie Locks (that naughty girl she was, being in someone’s house without asking) sat at the table tasting porridge… this one is tooo hot…this one is tooo cold… this one is just right!  That moment…The moment the porridge finally tasted perfectly warm, was exactly what happened this week!

This week things came together in awesome ways!  So much awesomeness is happening.  I simply can not contain it to a day by day account and feel the the urge to shout all of the awesomeness that happened this week!!!!

 
1)  Students can independently upload documents from Dropbox to Goodreader

2)  Students now complete all worksheets on the iPad (both in class and at home)

3)  All class notes are taken on the iPad

4)  Students know how to independently view documents side by side in Goodreader
     ex. Students can complete their paragraph organizer on the iPad and view it on the same
           screen while typing the paragraph using it

5)  All grading is done at the beginning of each class (a huge change in routine for us)

6)  Grading time is down to 5 minutes

7)  Instant daily feedback of performance has significantly reduced the number of 
     corrections that need to be made to homework

8)  Corrections are now done the day they happen, rather then on a specific day of the week

9)  The overall pace of a class lesson has almost doubled,  
     significantly increasing the amount of instruction given 
     in a week

10) Students are starting to use their iPads to take notes on while looking at 
      videos / resources on the computer

11) We are almost a completely paperless classroom

12) WE… staff…myself and my Teaching Assistants…and my students are crazy 
      giddy happy and proud…WE ARE (almost completely) A PAPERLESS CLASSROOM!!!!

13) Students use all of our basic apps almost completely independently…  
      Goodreader, Dropbox, Google allowing me to begin to slowly introduce new tools

14) New fantasticness is emerging…Fantasticness I tell you! 

15) We use the Socrative app once a week in two classes to record and document 
      student performance in Reading and Social Studies

16) We began using Study Blue to learn measurement abbreviations in Math class

17) Upon learning how to use Study Blue one of my students sat in his desk, stared at 
      me, stared some more and then said…

Student: Wait…this makes note cards.
Me: Yes, it does
Student: I make note cards for Science class
Me: Yes you do
Student: Can I use this to make note cards for Science
Me: You sure can
…and we set up a time after school to make the note cards together. 

 Can you just feel the sparks and connections clicking!!!

18) We discovered the app (during a day it was offered for free…bonus) Jet Scanner and a 
      whole new world of independent awesomeness was opened. No scanner needed 
      when you can take a picture of a worksheet, turn it into a PDF and then upload it 
      to Dropbox, share it with all of your students and they can upload it into Goodreader 
      and type and/or write on it

19) I am in the process of starting Assistive Technology  
      Evaluations for three of my students. I have plenty of 
      data already that these tools need to be a perminent 
      part of their educational days  


Next weeks technology and iPad goals…

  • Introducing, modeling how to use and using Baiboard to students…humongously huge deal…this means working in groups (something that is very challenging for my students and we rarely do)
  • Changing my thinking about how we are teaching measurement to my Math students.  No more memorizing and memorizing and memorizing conversion facts.  I am going to focus on teaching them to use technology as a resource to access facts and information.
  • Teach my students to use the Jet Scanner app, how to upload documents to our Dropbox and make them available to the class
  • Explore and test out ClassDojo behavior management system
  • Continue to our awesmomeness streak into the next week…because seriously..My StUdEnTs RoCk!!!!


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Week #2: Perfecting Student Access

The iPads where in full force this week. This week the expectation was that class work, assignment notebooks and homework would be done on the iPads.  With my students, teaching assistants and the iPads ready, (and state testing almost done) we were ready to put  the iPads to work! 


Monday– my students were still learning to navigate the Goodreader software. We continued to focus on teaching them to organize their materials in it ex. Labeling worksheets and putting them in the right folders. During my language arts lesson I introduced the drawing tool in Goodreader. Teaching my students to realize and identify that they do not always have to type, sometimes using the technology to hand writing is the better and more efficient choice. 

Tuesday–  This day brought me the question…What do I want materials do I want my students to type on the iPad?  Do some of their assignments/work have stay good old paper and pencil?  If my students take notes on the iPad for Math and do their Math homework on the iPad how can they can not have their notes right in front of them while doing their homework (something they often have to be able to do to remember the steps/information).  I had to seriously think about what would and would not be completed on the iPad and again contemplate… Do some of their assignments/work have stay good old paper and pencil?

Wednesday– Hump day proved to bring some solutions. First, I decided that notes and information gathering during class would be the primary support the iPad.  A decision I was just ok with, but not completely satisfied with.  Next,  it was time for me to start thinking out of the box…especially if I didn’t want to settle on just using the iPad to take notes.  

For example…
When completing their Social Studies homework, if a student needed to look at their notes to help recall information they had to close the homework document they were in,  open the notes, find the information they needed, remember the information, close the notes, reopen the homework sheet and typed them in their answer…ugggg This many steps proved to be too challenging for students who were using their notes to help support short term memory weaknesses.  How could I make it so they did not have to close and open documents and so that I didn’t have to cave and have them go back to printing out their notes?   
Solution: using adobe I was able to merge (import) both the notes and the homework documents into one file. This will give my students the ability to move between both with just a swipe and not have to close, open, close, and open. I was able to use this same solution  with our paragraph organizer.  I was able to merge (import) the paragraph organizer with a blank document. 

This way my students could continue to use the organizer to manage and organize their paragraph ideas and only need to swipe between the organizer and the space they typed their paragraph on.  


With a lot of the kinks worked out Thursday and Friday allowed my students to use their iPads throughout the day with fewer hiccups and road blocks.  Class assignments and homework were completed electronically.  Our new grading system (grading on the spot, providing instant feedback on assignments, being paperless) continued to be an efficient grading technique.  Our new grading system continues to save us a lot of time and has taken away a lot of wasted steps we had in place before.  Most importantly, the direct feedback to each student regarding what they did well and need to improve has been highly effective, allowing each student to know instantly what they might need to improve on and even more importantly making them just feel plain old good about themselves and their work when they do well!

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Week 1: Unexpected Crazy Perfection

You know those weeks that you walk into your classroom thinking I have everything planned. 

You’ve checked your ToDo list, your calendar, run through the second ToDo list in your head and think done, done and yes! 

This week was one of those weeks….or so I thought.

This was it. THE WEEK!!! The iPads were going to be handed out. It was finally here. All my prep, hard work, planning was finally going to be unleashed on my class. Little did I realize that my giddy excitement had left me unprepared for one thing…. The one huge gigantic duhhhh thing you fail to remember.   It was ISAT testing (Illinois State Achievement Testing)… Yep!! Happening this week. I had giddily waited for for three weeks.   By the time I finally connected the dots all I could say to myself was uuggggggg what the HECK were you thinking Carrie!!!  Introduce iPads to your students during ISAT week!  (I was even totally prepared for the testing week).  What can I say…I blame my giddy excitement.

MONDAY– It was THE day! It was the day I was going to pass out the iPads and start teaching my students to utilize all their technological goodness. Only I did not prepare for the entire tech team to be out at the ICE Conference for two days. That meant that the iPads were not going to be ready. UGGGGGGGG I thought for sure my students would string me up by my toes and give me a major guilt trip for not having them…. no one even asked! 

TUESDAY– brought us a snowday… wooohooo 

WEDNESDAY– State testing day for our school. An error in ordering had left students on my case load without testing materials, leaving me with a two hour block of time I needed to fill with my students while the rest of the building tested…ugggggg (that word is becoming my mantra) and seriously! I sat at my desk siggghhhing at the situation. Scanning the classroom as if it had answer, my brain tries to process what was happening. Suddenly, my eyes connected with the cart of laptops and iPads. The iPads were ready. They were READY. THEEEEYYYYY WERE REEEADY!!! Before I knew it I was explaining to my students that were we not having testing. After i answered all their questions about why and how and what if I told them that today was the day they were getting their iPads. 

“You mean to take home and use all the time?!!!!!!” 

“Yes!!! To take home and use all the time!!!!” 

 …Instantly this unexpected… this uuuugggggg moment became two hours of uninterrupted instruction on how to use, navigate and interact with the iPad. 

It was unexpected fabulousness! 

Those two hours gave me an opportunity to flow from one iPad lesson to the next. No interruptions. No passing periods, no announcements. I introduced them to Dropbox. Showed them how to load materials from our Dropbox into Goodreader (if you have iPads and do not use this you are seriously missing an incredible tool. It IS my student’s binder). We logged into their Edmodo and Google accounts. We explored and got to know each apps functions and ways. My teaching assistants and I smiled and giggled as we watched our students look at their iPads, realize what they can do, realize the new skills they had and see their eyes widen and their smiles over take their face. It was absolute awesomeness!!! 

As we wrapped up the two hours by asking our students to fill out their assignment notebooks I looked at my class, smiled and waited for it. I watched as a couple of students start to stand to get an assignment notebook sheet. 

 “What ya doing?” I asked waiting for my student to make eye contact with me. 

“Getting my assignment notebooks sheet.” 

“Reallyyyy?!” I said, totally over exaggerating my smile.  I held my smile waiting it to happen 

{Wait for it} 

{Wait for it} 

“My assignment notebook is on my iPad!!!!!” 

“Yep!! No papers!” I smiled!

 {roaring infectious giggle} 

 “THIS IS SOOOOO COOL!!!!” 

THURSDAY AND FRIDAY our tests showed up and testing happened. Now not having my usual instructional time began to once again make me think uggggggg what was I thinking. This is an awful week to roll out the iPads. As our testing sessions ended and our modified schedule played out I began to realize that this week could not have been more perfect to do exactly what I had done. The modified schedule coupled with the general expectation of reduced, if not any homework, because of testing gave me freedom. It gave me the freedom to break in all the apps I wanted my students to use without the pressure of a full on class lesson. It gave me the freedom to give a worksheet for my students to try doing at home on the iPad instead of a packet or complex assignment. It gave me and my students time to connect with the iPad, my new expectations, their new mind set and the freedom to work through all the ins and outs and what ifs. 

It was quite a week! It was totally unexpectedly amazingly unplanned perfection! 

I’m exhausted!!

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Getting Ready…Pre-Week #2

Last week was my last week prior to {insert nail biting paired and gitty excitement geeeee} the big day… The day the students get their iPads.

I wasn’t the only one excited either!  I heard at least once or twice a day, “When are we getting the iPads (insert blank stare at me… Light bulb going off) Oh yeah next week.” Followed by frown and shoulder slump.

We are all incredibly excited and the anticipation was high!!! 

My goals for this week were pretty straight forward… prepare and change.

Prepare… I needed to label each iPad with names and numbers, collect the last of the permission slips/ technology agreements and finalize what apps I wanted on all the iPads.

Change…I realized needed to completely change how I took time to evaluate homework and my mindset about managing it.  You see until last week the homework I assigned was collected at the beginning of the period it was due. The time left was dedicated to instructional time. If I was going to go all in and fully embrace being an iPad classroom, which to me also meant almost completely paperless, I needed to seriously change how I was doing things.

The Change…First, I developed a template. I needed to make a  paper template I could use to record assignments on and that could easily be transferred into the grade book. It needed to be easy enough for the teaching assistants I work with to use and record assignments on for their groups. Second, I needed to change how and when we graded papers. I can’t exactly collect 11 iPads and grade the papers, nor did I want 10 PDFs times 6 periods plus a day being dropped in my Dropbox. So I had to compromise with myself and give up a bit of class time to grade papers. I didn’t, however,  want grading to take more then 5ish minutes of any class period. 


So with these very strong plan in mind, I ran my class as if it was a paperless classroom and prepped my teaching assistants for the changes to come and this mindset.

Here is how things went…
Monday– I payed attention to my habits, reminding myself of what would be paperless and what would not. I took note of places in our classroom routines I would need to leave time for corrections.

Tuesday– I was well aware of the changes I needed to make to my habits. I worked hard to grade papers on the spot. Grading them, collecting them and then…gasp! throwing them away… Paperless yo!  I took mental notes of the routines in our day and the improvements I still needed to make.

Wednesday– By this time my students had become accustomed to having papers graded on the spot. I began to share with them their scores immediately and have them fix errors on the spot (if their was time).  I began to realize that by collecting and grading homework separately, wanting to save precious instructional time I may have been missing priceless re-teaching and reinforcement opportunities. I was also missing chances to share with my students my recognition for their hard work and what they did well on in their work. I also realized that if I was allowing my students to make corrections for better grades (something I have always done, but usually as homework and after the score had been recorded in the grade book) I also needed to record the initial score of the worksheet and the score of the worksheet after correction.  This would ensure I documented my students initial performance on work.  

Thursday– Our usual stack of collected papers was next to nothing. My teaching assistants reported that the template made transferring scores into the grade book simpler then ever. I determined that all of our data collection in relations to my student IEP goals would be done on paper. We would continue to collect it, to ensure we had documentation and record of their performance as it relates to their goals.

Friday–  We were excitedly on our way to a almost paperless classroom. I was happy and proud of the hard changes we made. I was embracing our new mindset and modeling that change can be exciting and well worth it!  I was absolutely giddy with anticipation for the big week ahead!!!

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Getting Ready….Pre-Week #1

Today it began.

I did it.

I shared the letter with my students introducing the 1:1 iPad classroom we were becoming.  Excitement filled the classroom. Question after question came from their mouths and it all became real to me.

Parent Letter

This was really happening.

So as eager students go home to share with their parents the news of this fantastic opportunity I plan and prepare the technology.

My Fancy TO DO List

With a week left to prepare for the big hand out I am…

  • Assigning students to iPads
  • Labeling iPads with students names
  • Making sure all the iPads have the apps I want on them…I am starting with Dropbox, Goodreader, Edmodo, a whiteboard app, Google app and Paperport Notes
  • Making sure each student has the necessary accounts
  • Preparing a file with most used PDFs ready to be shared with each student’s Dropbox

In between preparing the iPads and having excited students eagerly return their technology agreements I am also running though my daily schedule trying to predict and anticipate any glitches I need to prepare for.

                                                                                   

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