Summer Learning - Happened so fast..

Now that the school year has ended and teachers are so excited to be on vacation, it is time to relax and rejuvenate, right? Right! But it is also a fantastic time to focus on your professional learning! I know many teachers who use summer as an opportunity to take classes, read professional books, and work collaboratively with their teammates. Here are a few other ideas for how you can take advantage of summer learning while also working on your tan!

1.) Develop a Professional Learning Network: Using social networking tools like Twitter, Google+, Feedly, and many others, you can connect with teachers around the globe who are doing amazing things. Read about what they are doing, participate in conversations with them, read articles recommended by colleagues, all from your mobile device on your back deck, poolside, or green lawn!  Check out Cybraryman’s list of Twitter Hashtags to follow.

2.)  View some amazing Google Hangouts On Air for free learning opportunities!  Here is a great resource to peruse through.  Connect to a Google + Community like Edudemic.

3.)  Attend a local Edcamp in your area.  Edcamps are usually held on weekends and are free of charge.  Edcamps let you choose the topics being covered and its a great place to network with other professionals.

4.)  Follow some amazing educational blogs.  This is the 2013 best edtech blogs honor roll, as well as some of our favorites:

http://technologytools4teaching.blogspot.com

http://digitaleyesblog.blogspot.com/

http://fluency21.com/blog/

http://comfortably20.blogspot.com/?m=1

http://edublogawards.com/2012awards/best-blog-on-educational-technology-2012/

5.)  Finally get that class website going for free at www.weebly.com!   This site gives you tons of great looking templates to work with. No HTML knowledge is required.  And best of all it is free for educators.

6.)  Find some great YouTube Channels to subscribe to. This is a great way to learn new skills on practically any topic.  Subscribing to a channel gives you instant notifications when a new video has been added.  Check out this #tt4t YouTube channel for a multitude of ed tech video tutorials.  Also click to see some amazing TED lessons for your students using the Flipped Classroom idea.

7.) Think of a place where you can read quietly, soak up the sun, and turn on that mobile device for some unique learning opportunities.

Return in the fall with some great new skills and feel invigorated by the fact that you cared enough to dig a little deeper with your knowledge even on your “time off”!  So if you choose to do any of the above suggestions this summer, congratulations!  You’re a leader, you inspire others with your knowledge, and your students will be better for it!  

Written by Jenny Krzystowczyk in Conjunction with Guest Blogger Dave Zukor

ROAD TRIP

Recently, on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday my Colleagues @techiefeldie &@jennykbps traveled West to York, Nebraska to present on Google Docs at the York Public Schools In-Service Day.  @chericson & @mrbadura & @Coach_Sautter were the gentlemen who felt highly enough of us to invite us & bring us out to present on their amazing Professional Development day.  It was #dukepd12 if you are familiar with Twitter.

On our Road Trip West we came up with this slogan in HONOR of Dr. King - - - Google Docs is like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. empowering people to be free!  

My colleagues and I love Google Docs and are passionate about sharing it with people.  It truly is a game changer and revolutionizes what we are familiar with in Microsoft Word.  The power & potential that is within Google Docs is endless & bringing that to teachers in any city, state, province, or country I would do if I had the chance in a heartbeat!

Here is a link to what we used for our presentations at #dukepd12

Interestingly enough, in my district, we were off / out of school on this PD day in York.  So theoretically we could have stayed home with our families, rested, relaxed, and enjoyed the day off, but because we love to share, collaborate, & connect with teachers & people we jumped at the chance for the ROAD TRIP! 

It's not everyday you find teachers / people willing to do this I think.  I am by no means trying to toot my own horn here so if you are misinterpreting me I am sorry, what I am trying to point out though is teaching is about PASSION.  I love knowing I may have helped someone in the York PD day #dukepd12.

I love working with my colleagues @techiefeldie & @jennykbps and seeing there passion come through them in their work as well.  I love knowing I may have sparked someone to use Google Docs in a new way.  In my dream world we would all be using Google Docs, we would all be using Twitter, and we would be collaborating and flattening the globe with these 2 simple yet complex WEB tools.  Districts could dramatically improve the way they do business if they only used these 2 tools.

In closing, I was humbled & honored to come to York, NE to participate in #dukepd12 and I hope we did well enough that folks got something out of it & our twitter friends from York will still follow us! 
;  )

Training for Professional Development

Training anyone for anything is a tricky and difficult task.  My colleague, Ann Feldmann and I have worked hard the last 1.3 years to incorporate the best possible training we could give teachers.
Some quick background on me, for 6 years I used to work as a principal, and recently before becoming an Instructional Technology Trainer for my district I taught 4th grade for 2 years.  I know as a principal that I always struggled with the idea of how to train my teachers and afford them the time to get better at Professional Development related things.

 I wish I would have come up with this sooner!


I have always been passionate about using technology and now in this new position I hold I am charged with training the teachers of my district.  So, with that being said, some ideas have come about.
We (Ann and I) created Techie Tuesdays.  Teachers from our District can "register" to come to our "conference" / Techie Tuesday if you will through their principal at their building.  The principal / secretary arranges for a sub that day for the teacher and of course the teacher has to produce sub plans that Tuesday they are gone.

Once they are registered they come to our office / classroom for a full day of training on a given topic such as Google Tools, Website creation, Blogging, etc.  They can dress casually and are given a nice lunch break to travel somewhere and have a normal lunch without having to scarf something down in 10 minutes because they need the other 10 minutes to go to the bathroom, check their box, and get ready for the kids coming in from recess, etc.

But most importantly, they are given TIME!  


On a Techie Tuesday we give them the GIFT OF TIME!!
We approach the day with a very laid back atmosphere and we don't throw 15 new things down their throat that they can learn.  It's maybe a couple of things, but we allow them the TIME to dig into it and learn it.  We of course walk around to help them out and we are right there to assist with questions they may have which makes for a very productive, non-threatening environment.

The goal is that when they walk away at the end of the day they feel like they could use the product we are showing (ex. Google Docs) the next day at school with students if they wanted to.
Too often times we hustle teachers through Professional Development Trainings and expect them to implement it and the problem is we have not given them enough TIME to digest it and feel comfortable using it with their students the next day!

We are lucky that our district supports this endeavor and we feel it continues (in year 2 of it) to be successful in the implementation of our offerings and the enrollment of classes.  We think we have hit the nail on the head with this style of Professional Development.