Moodle on my Noodle

Yep, that title just happened. 

But seriously folks...I signed up to be trained on all things Moodle, so once a month, five other teachers and myself sit in the administration building and participate in the completely-online training course and work through training modules to learn the tools and best practices for our district's online learning interface. For those who don't know, Moodle works almost exactly like any Blackboard course (very similar to BlendedSchools as well). It has many different tools to incorporate into online courses, such as blogs, discussion boards, quizlets, virtual flash cards, voice threads, the list goes on for what seems like forever! I have used some of this stuff in my regular classes almost as a supplement or complement to the everyday lesson content. (Kind of like how Edmodo works.) But now, my district is leaning toward including more online courses for cyberschool students. So these courses need to be organized down to the tiniest detail, so building my class is pretty challenging. I basically have to map out the entire year, which is pretty difficult for ELA, as it is not as simplistically linear as a math or science course. Instead, there's a lot of jumping around to different topics. 

So I guess my problem lies in this gigantic organization process. Because I'm so used to planning for about a month at a time, I tend to find this quite daunting. As in...I basically get stymied and end up staring at the screen for about an hour. And I'm assuming this is a pretty common problem when teaching English. 

Currently, I share a college writing Moodle site with two other teachers and the students really appreciate having a portal to go to when looking for resources. Plus, bonus, we save so many trees this way! Let me share a picture of our current section for a rhetorical analysis essay: 

(Note that one section at the top is "unavailable," so teachers can control what students can see and work on.) Anyway, front-loading all of this can be tedious (that's one word I used during the last training...there are other words I used, too, as I awkwardly meandered my way through uploading a self-created voice thread...). However, look how neat it is displayed this way! You basically then have your lesson plans for the entirety of your teaching of the course. Now, all of the copyright to this page goes to my colleague, but this is what I strive for as I work toward creating an online course for Language Arts 8. I'm up for it, and I have to be honest, being enrolled in New Media at Pitt this semester has helped immensely. I'm so intertwined in all things new media that the technology is literally flowing from my brain and fingertips. It's invigorating and comforting, that's for sure. 

AND look what I found!!! Moodle is on Twitter! They post issues, troubleshooting, examples of cool stuff from Moodle users...ah, how I love social media... nice way to tie everything together! 

Wikis for Everyone!

I'm challenged daily by the curriculum of Argument and Debate class. Not only do I not understand the content, but I really, really don't enjoy it. It's very content-heavy, like learning the rules of student congress, legislative procedures, debate rules and regulations...not really my cup o' tea, and it seems pretty social studies-related vs. being under the language arts umbrella.

But I digress. I have to teach it, so I might as well find a way to make it interesting and meaningful...for the kids AND for me!

Enter technology. (And my wonderful professor, Tim, and his wiki inspiration!!!)

I decided to have them work collaboratively to research some (real, existing, United States) bills and resolutions so that we could debate them in class. Instead of just assigning the unoriginal individual powerpoint, I had them choose one of six groups for bills that they voted on last week and they're going to have a period-long presentation on the topic, including time for cross-examination by their peers. In order to best help this project come to life, I created a wiki (much like the one we do in our Pitt online class!) and within the wiki, created groups that they can collaborate within. Here's what it looks like:

(there are two more blue boxes below these three for the remaining groups)

So far, only the following headaches ensued:

• taking time in class to invite students via their school emails, to which many forgot the log-in procedures
• waiting for them to create accounts
• waiting for them to change their usernames to something appropriate and based on their name (ya know, so the other members actually know who they're chatting with on the wiki......

And I expected more issues, honestly, since none of them raised their hands when I asked who had worked on a wiki before. But in checking on their progress today (one day into the project), I noticed they're actually utilizing the collaboration possibilities! Color me impressed :) Check it out!

One major aspect that the love so far is that there is a field trip for four of the students tomorrow, but they'll be on the bus on their smartphones joining in on the wiki during class, anyway, so as not to leave their group "hangin'." (Their decision...not mine!) 

I'm excited to see the finished products. Our online Pitt class already taught US that this is a highly effective format for collaboration, discussion, and sharing of content, but I'm glad that these students (9th graders) are getting this experience in group work with a twist on technology. 

We're Not in Y2K Anymore

I think the most important thing I learned last night while chaperoning the homecoming dance was that if I ever have a daughter, she is not getting new shoes for any dance. Those girls marched in past the ticket table with their corsages, glittery clutches, and dates in tow, teetering on brand new four-inch strappy, sparkling platform stilettos (seriously, most of them were nearly identical save a few color differences here or there), making their way toward an unclaimed, poorly-camouflaged cafeteria table littered with paper plates full of pretzels and cheese puffs. No sooner did their tiny bags clunk onto the tables did their shoes fly off and their iPhones come out, and they were scuttling (now barefooted) into the gym to hit the dance floor. 

All while I stood there in my heels, wishing I wasn't a grown up so I could fling my shoes into a corner, too. 

And then I got to thinking (lots of time to kill while standing around watching high schoolers chug Mountain Dew and try to dance to all those 80s songs that made me feel like I was at a wedding...), how would I do things differently if I was back in high school? Or better yet, if time travel wasn't an option, how would my friends and I be handling the onslaught of technology? Because students just did not have cell phones back then. (Except for my friend Kelly, whose dad let her use it during musical season so she could call for a ride home. Man, were we jealous.) So we had to have actual film cameras at dances and the only people who got to see the pictures were our friends at the lunch table about a week after the dance IF we took them to be developed immediately. I mean, there are thousands of pictures out there that my peers took during, say, just ONE dance I went to as a senior that I will never, ever see. And meanwhile, last night, of the 800+ in attendance, probably about two thirds of those students saw at least 100 pictures on facebook or twitter that same night. (I'm ballpark-ing, but I think that sounds close, right?) 

I mean, let that sink in. Just in visuals alone, imagine the brain capacity that is being used up on a daily basis in comparison to when I was in high school a mere 13, 14, 15 years ago. No wonder they can't pay attention in class or respect their elders! Their brains are at max capacity! I mean, this isn't groundbreaking; this is the proclaimed age of information where we are constantly overwhelmed with content in a multitude of media. 

I don't feel negatively about it; I enjoy new technologies, and I embrace them in my classroom as much as humanly and fiscally possible, but it does baffle me from time to time. Like I just sit back and watch it all happen and sometimes can't believe my eyes. For instance, I just got an email on my iPhone from a student asking me to read over her college essay. I glanced at it in between commercials of the Steelers game; I didn't have to send myself into a small panic Monday morning amidst my other 10,000 tasks to print it and glance at it; instead, I brought it up on my phone and wrote back immediately with some quick changes and a note of admiration. Now she can go about her evening with a little less worry and some confidence that she will get her essay turned in on time. (A bit bold of a predicted result, maybe...but overall I'm sure she's pleased nonetheless!)

Tomorrow in the computer lab while students are reading articles with which they will respond in a rhetorical analysis essay, class will move along merrily as they will effortlesslly log onto the online classroom and download their .pdf files with ease, killing no trees in the process. And no one will blink or miss a beat. I loved being in high school, I did; but I love 2013, too. 

Old Habits

Sometimes I love my online gradebook, other times I am highly annoyed.

For instance, I love the fact that I don't have to figure out grades manually. In fact, I have never existed as a teacher in a world where I had to do that. So I'm not even sure how that was done. But it sounds awful.

I also think it's great that students can stay updated on their own rather than whining to the teacher (as we often did as students back in the day) to tell them what their grades are. Not only are teachers not bothered but now students (and families) can take ownership. For example, I have a not-so-100%-engaged senior who recently asked me why he had a zero for an assignment. I had just assumed he hadn't turned it in when I updated the gradebook, but he said he was absent (truth) the day I collected it and handed it to me right then. Now, this could have gone unnoticed and harming his overall average had he not had access to the gradebook. I was impressed by his diligence and I now feel compelled to not dismiss him as the slightly apathetic student I sometimes see. (Technology: allowing us to see our students in different, dare I say more accurate, lights. Very cool.)

One thing I do NOT completely enjoy, however, is having to stay completely current for the good of the public. Like when I would get emails from parents wondering why their child's score was blank for something... AS I WAS TYPING IN GRADES. Now some might call that coincidence, but not when it happens more than thrice. It's like, "Hey, moms, dads, students, take a peek into my world of hurrying to update sometimes a bunch at a time because I haven't done it in awhile eek!" It's a stressor for sure, but ultimately it keeps me on my toes. As I have learned a lot so far in life, the annoying stuff usually creates the greatest of lessons.

Ok: and raise your hands out there in teacher world if you also still use the old school "pencil and blank spreadsheet" gradebook before typing online. I can't help it...something about a piece of paper and a mechanical pencil is just so comforting to me, as I can have a product to hold in my hand and glance over. My five classes (along with seating charts and lesson plans) are all tucked away neatly onto a clipboard and perused often during the course of the day. In fact, as a traveling teacher, it's kind of been my security blanket this year, as I truly can't conduct a class without it.

Which leads me to a question...will our society ever fully ditch the paper-in-hand product when it comes to education? (or anything, for that matter) I know I am having a HECK of a time transitioning from my thick, delightfully-scented library book obsession to the Kindle Fire that I received last January as a birthday gift. I've seriously read like four things on it so far. And it's not that it isn't awesome, because it is, but something about that old habit of holding weight in my hand as an English nerd I just can't abandon. And then really, will we all ever truly abandon it? When will text books disappear and iPads be used solely in literature classes? I mean truly this has started already, hasn't it? More importantly, should we abandon it? Is it so wrong to have physical stuff in hand versus the online version? 

(...this could easily delve into a discussion of cyber school vs. traditional brick-and-mortar school...but I'll save that for a later posting...)

Bottom line: for now, in 2013, I think I'll hang onto my mechanical pencil and paper copy of The Great Gatsby from undergrad, but the grading calculator can stay in the desk drawers.