In today’s world, the topic of using technology in the classroom can be intimidating. In this monthly column, join one teacher on a quest to discover the best way to meet the needs of her digital-age learners…moving beyond the technology tools to focusing on supporting each student’s learning.

p: infoxchange_australia via photopin cc

As we approach the end to another academic school year, many people (not in the educational field) keep asking me if I'm counting down the days or looking forward to having a couple of months off. I'm sure other educators hear similar questions and I have to say that those questions frustrate me a bit. I feel like they imply that I can't wait to get out of the classroom and away from my students, putting us in the stereotypical school situation...which we are not.

I don't know about you, but I enjoy being with my students. We have fun in our classroom together where we all learn together every single day. It's bittersweet for all of us when they pass on to the next grade because our tight-knit learning community is breaking up as they move forward to the next step in their learning journey. I'm proud of them and I know that they are more than ready for the next grade, but I also know that I will miss them.

Teaching is a constant journey that causes us to reflect throughout the year on what went well and what we want to change for the next group of learners headed our way. With that in mind, I am always searching for new resources, tools and insight on what will reach my individual learners best wherever they are in their learning journey. My summer fills up fast with conferences, un-conferences, and workshops.

I know that funding is tight (or nonexistent) in many of our systems. That leaves us with the responsibility to either pay out of pocket to attend conferences and professional learning events or go without. But are those our only options? In today’s digital world, is it possible to continue our professional growth without shelling out our hard earned dollars?

The answer is a resounding “YES!” I thought I would share a few ideas on how you can harness the power of today’s technology resources to help you get the professional learning for which you are searching all for the low, low price of…FREE!

Let’s Discuss!

No matter what your interest or certification, there is now a host of learning communities in which you can engage in conversations. In addition to blogs written in formats such as IRA’s Engage, just about any professional organization has an online community where you can register a user name and begin posting ideas, questions, strategies, or tools.

These discussion boards, such as this one from Thinkfinity, become asynchronous conversations where practicing classroom teachers can all share their experience to benefit everyone within the learning community. What I love about these message boards is that I am getting relevant information from teachers who have actually used these tools, strategies, and lessons plans with actual students.

Tweet Away!

Another way to connect and grow professionally is through Twitter. I know that many people have written Twitter off as a waste of time. After all, who wants to know what celebrity is having trouble deciding which latte to get this morning?

However, Twitter is as useful as you make it. If you want to professionally grow in a certain area, look for other educators who are experts in that area. Twitter is all about the connections and relationships you build with other tweeters. Don’t expect to sign on and post a question and immediately get an answer. Other educators need to ”know you.” Send a tweet introducing yourself and join in the conversations. If you are unsure of where to begin, take a look at this list of educators.

Also, many people are not aware that there are real-time tweet chats on just about every subject that would interest an educator. These are informal learning times where a topic has been selected and educators chime in with their resources, lessons, ideas, and strategies within that particular hour. Here is a list of educational Twitter chats to get you started. Tweet chats are fast paced. You wouldn’t believe how fast an hour long chat will fly by or how many practical ideas and resources you will gain.

Also, most conferences now have Twitter hashtags, like #IRA2013, where you can follow all of the ideas, insights, and resources shared by the presenters and attendees.

Getting a Little More Formal

Do you enjoy learning in a more formal manner? Just like with blogs and discussion boards, most organizations offer webinars of live or recorded sessions. One of my favorites is Classroom 2.0 Live. They have at least one live webinar a week complete with audio, chat, desktop sharing, and sometimes even video. These webinars are led by today’s leading educators and you can learn from them, ask questions, and get a multitude of ideas all from the comfort of your home or local coffee house.

The great thing is they archive all of their other webinars and you can gain access to for free. Want to learn about LiveBinders, educational apps, or blogging? They have a webinar for that. Want to learn from your favorite authors? They have webinars for that, as well. One great perk is that after you view one of their webinars, recorded or real-time, you get a link to print out a certificate for professional development hours.

Taking the Time You Need

During the summer, I do thoroughly enjoy having some time where I don't have to set my alarm clock and I can meet friends for lunch. Also, I do (like many of you) cram a lot of professional learning into those two months off because I'll have more flexibility to read and participate in professional learning throughout the summer months.

My husband once laughed and told someone that real teachers don't get time off. They work just as hard, if not harder, during the summer as they do during the school year. The only difference is that we aren't in classroom with our students. We're out there learning to become the best teacher we can be for our next group of students.

So this summer, as I strive to learn as much as possible from all of you, I hope that we can connect and learn together. Because learning together (like in many of our classrooms) is what is going to impact our students most. Providing them with as many opportunities to create, collaborate and work together in authentic learning activities while supporting their work with relevant tools is really what it's all about.

Julie D. Ramsay is a Nationally Board Certified educator and the author of “CAN WE SKIP LUNCH AND KEEP WRITING?”: COLLABORATING IN CLASS & ONLINE, GRADES 3-8 (Stenhouse, 2011). She travels the country to speak, present, and facilitate workshops in applying technology to support authentic learning. Read her blog at juliedramsay.blogspot.com.



In Other Words: Harnessing the Educational Power of Twitter

TILE-SIG Feature: Making the Professional Development Shift

In today’s world, the topic of using technology in the classroom can be intimidating. In this monthly column, join one teacher on a quest to discover the best way to meet the needs of her digital-age learners…moving beyond the technology tools to focusing on supporting each student’s learning.

For many of us, this is the last big push before the end of the school year. Not only do many of us face the dreaded days spent administering standardized test to our students, but we are also trying to impart those last lessons that we hope that our students will take with them for a lifetime.

We have spent a fantastic year where the students have been a community of readers, writers, debaters, publishers, communicators, creators, scientists, artists, historians, and mathematicians. Recently, my students have begun asking me, “Will you keep up all of our online work?” I reassure them that I have no intention of taking down any of their fantastic work.

Their question caused me to pause and think upon my own experiences; when my book was released, it was the tangible quality of holding it in my hand that validated all of the hard work that had gone into it. For our students, of any age, it is powerful to write a piece for others to read, discuss and contemplate. Even in our digital world, students still need that tangible quality of a final project that they can hold and share with someone else that will validate their work.

My students use a wide variety of digital tools for publishing their work for a much wider audience. They love all of the different publishing tools that they use (and are constantly finding new ones), but they still crave creating their own hardcover book. They are always creating little paper version with paper folded in half and stapled together. So how do we provide students with publishing options that will meet their digital aesthetic while providing them with the physical copy of the book?

One tool that we stumbled upon several years ago is StoryJumper. On StoryJumper, the students have the ability to create digital picture books. The creators of this tool did a fantastic job of creating the shadowing and animation of an actual book. One student commented, “Wow, it’s just like a real book.” It is a book; it is just digital. Every year when my new group of eager writers sees a StoryJumper book, they are immediately drawn to it.

Teachers can easily set up an entire class so that each student can create their own book. There is not only a large collection of clipart and backgrounds to choose from, but also a user can create and upload their own illustrations, graphics, or photos, making their book unique and personal. My students love that their book is different from every other book ever published because they can easily customize it to what they envision.

The StoryJumper templates guide students into creating a front cover, title page, dedication page, and each page for their story. Because it is digital, students from different locations can easily collaborate and publish. Once a book is complete, the students can share it through email or they can purchase their hardcopy version to keep and share with others.

The options for this tool are only limited by your writers’ imaginations. My students have created family and regional cookbooks, anthologies of fables and poetry, short stories, expository pieces on habitats, family histories, how-to books, and informational books of their favorite topics. One student even created a joke book.

My learners love the fact that their StoryJumper books are both digital and hardcopies. They can share the digital version with all of their global peers and family members who live a great distance from them. Then they can also have purchase a copy to carry with them to share with all of those important people in their lives.

It still surprises me that with all of the other digital tools that they use, my students thoroughly enjoy—and seek out new opportunities—to publish a hardcover, hardcopy version of one of their pieces of writing.

Sometimes our students enjoy having that tangible book in their hands as evidence of their hard work. They like taking it to share with others. My authors love taking their books to read to younger students and we keep a library of their books for them to be read by everyone in the class. They are shared with anyone who will take time to listen and look at their books. Their books always receive a lot of attention at our Young Authors' Conference because they look so professional, and my students are so proud of and enthusiastic about what they've created. After all, they created it so that others would read it.

So next time your students begin to publish, remember that sometimes students want to have that tangible book in their hands to share with others. It's a way for them to receive validation for all of the hard work that they've done now, and in the future.

Julie D. Ramsay is a Nationally Board Certified educator and the author of “CAN WE SKIP LUNCH AND KEEP WRITING?”: COLLABORATING IN CLASS & ONLINE, GRADES 3-8 (Stenhouse, 2011). She travels the country to speak, present, and facilitate workshops in applying technology to support authentic learning. Read her blog at juliedramsay.blogspot.com.



We’re Crazy About Publishing: The Top Ten Tools We Love

Teaching Tips: A Peek Inside—Digital Tools that Empower

In today’s world, the topic of using technology in the classroom can be intimidating. In this monthly column, join one teacher on a quest to discover the best way to meet the needs of her digital-age learners…moving beyond the technology tools to focusing on supporting each student’s learning.

When you begin a writing project with your students, do they jump up and cheer? Or do they roll their eyes, sigh, and grumble? Ever wonder how some teachers inspire young authors to blossom while others fight off the weeds that choke their students’ desire to write? That is where our story begins…

There once was a teacher who felt like she dragged her students through writing projects and activities. They loved class, they loved learning, but they hated writing. She tried throwing in some technology projects, to pique their interest, but the students still resisted writing. Just like Christmas presents weeks later, the exciting newness of the technology lost its sparkle.

In addition to the weight of her students’ disinterest in writing, she faced an even bigger challenge. This teacher was feeling the dragon known as standardized testing breathing its hot, stinky breathe down her neck. She felt the pressure to get her students to perform for the standardized writing assessment. She loved her students and wanted what was best for them. She knew that giving them the gift of writing would open up new worlds and give each of them a voice. What could she do?

Her district promised her help from a writing fairy in the form of a consultant. With the direction of the consultant, hired for all of the English Language Arts teachers in the district, she began breaking down writing lessons into a pattern that her students could emulate. Even after following everything that she had learned, her students’ test scores were not improving. In her heart, she knew this was not teaching her students how to become writers. She recognized that they were much more capable, and she knew they deserved more than these pseudo-writing lessons.

“Enough!” she declared. “I will start from scratch and have my students help me find the secret recipe.”

Together they traversed through many paths searching for the way to making writing meaningful for the students. Although the dragon of standardized testing was still there, they continued on their quest focusing on what would help student learn and embrace the life of a writer in today’s digital world. There were many bumps along the road that taught them that learning from mistakes and challenges were just as important as finding the right path.

p: Enokson via photopin cc

In their pursuit, armed with optimism, they re-evaluated all of their old writing practices and perspectives. They tested, tried, challenged and reformed a new way of writing that created a community of voracious writers, writers armed with keyboards, digital tools, apps and tablets. These students were overwhelmed with joy when it was time to write in all of their classes. They had found the secret to sharing their voice in the world and exploring who they were as learners. In fact, they loved writing so much, they looked for new times to fit in writing projects by even begging their teacher, “Can we skip lunch and keep writing?”

These young writers and their teacher knew that they had found a way of writing that could not remain a secret. They knew they had a duty to share it with the world; it was their obligation to bring their secret to as many other people as possible so that many more learners could find their voices and impact their own learning and the learning of those around them.

Would you like to know the secret recipe for getting your students to love writing so much that they beg, “Can we skip lunch and keep writing?” The secret is yours for the taking.

Join me in San Antonio at IRA’s 58th Annual Convention on Sunday, April 21, from 3PM–4PM in Grand Hyatt, Lone Star Ballroom C. Come and hear about our journey, listen to our success stories, learn new teaching strategies, tools, and practices, and go home with the “secret” to getting your students to beg to keep writing.

Are you a fan of Plugged In? Come see Julie D. Ramsay present a session on collaborating in class and online at IRA’s 58th Annual Convention, April 19-22, 2013, in San Antonio, Texas.

Julie D. Ramsay is a Nationally Board Certified educator and the author of “CAN WE SKIP LUNCH AND KEEP WRITING?”: COLLABORATING IN CLASS & ONLINE, GRADES 3-8 (Stenhouse, 2011). She travels the country to speak, present, and facilitate workshops in applying technology to support authentic learning. Read her blog at juliedramsay.blogspot.com.



We’re Crazy About Publishing: The Top Ten Tools We Love

Teaching Tips: A Peek Inside—Digital Tools that Empower