Group Work as a Teacher

I've been working with a group of teachers to instruct them in the use of MacBook computers with ActivInspire and the Promethean Activboards. It's been a great experience made even better with the book Building a Professional Learning Community at Work^TM: A Guide to the First Year by Parry Graham and William M Ferriter.

How I Learned About the Book

I've been communicating with Bill Ferriter through Twitter for at least a couple of years. Over time he has shared a wealth of information and conversation (albeit 140 characters at a time). I've looked at PDF worksheet files that he has shared and found a lot of value in them. I decided to pick up his book for summer reading. It has been a great value to me.




The Book's Focus
I really appreciated the way the book was written. It is not an easy book to read cover to cover in a short period of time. There is a lot to digest and think about. I split reading it over June and July. I read about half of the book over the course of three or four days each time.


I specifically liked that each chapter of the book starts with a scenario from a fictitious school. It put me in the frame of mind to reflect on my situation. The scenario is followed by research, ideas, and suggestions. The chapters wrap up with worksheets, surveys, and check lists.

Wrapping Up the Summer Sessions

The last session this summer was part show and tell and partially practice in hooking up the projector, speakers, board, and computer. I wanted to make sure that the group stayed focused and felt their time was well spent as we worked. Initially, I was going to have the teachers break into groups with the six boards, but due to floor polishing I couldn't.


While thinking about my approach, I decided to page through the book. The idea I found came from a chapter on Negotiating Personalities and Conflict. This chapter ends with two reproducibles called the Team Agenda Template and Team Roles to Consider. I didn't use the exact worksheet or roles, but it was perfect for my needs. It really calls to mind working with students on group projects and making sure they have clear roles to play in their learning. It shouldn't be any different with adult learners.

My Version

These are the modified topics I used.

Topic 1: Each person will connect the laptop to the projector, board and speakers. What worked well for each person? What did not work? Was it one individual, several, or everyone?


Topic 2: Each person will open a flipchart they found on Promethean Planet or a flipchart they created themselves. Others in the room will act as students. What worked well for each person? What do individuals need to learn to move forward?


Topic 3: The group will focus on student outcomes for the lesson. What student weaknesses would this lesson support? What ideas were brainstormed as a result of viewing this lesson? Do you think this lesson could help younger or older students in the building (with or without modification)?


Topic 4: As a group reflect on a lesson or lessons Ann could provide to move the learning forward.


If a lesson wasn't prepared in advance, I had bookmarked a website called Faith First as a tinyurl (www.tinyurl.com/sms-faithgames). The teachers enjoyed testing it out. Another teacher shared a website her college son was using. Everyone really got into talking about the possibilities of the websites in class - both the strengths and potential downsides. They discussed the importance of trying things outside of class hours to make sure they knew what to expect.


I intended to also use the short survey of the value of the meeting, but forgot to use it.

A Hearty Recommendation

I've been leading the teachers to become more comfortable with sharing in online spaces though the use of a private Ning. The teachers helped me by posting the results of the topics, reflections, and discussions on the ning. As a result, I created several screencasts to help everyone remember how to find a flipchart on Promethean Planet, the difference between Mac folders, opening and saving a flipchart from Promethean Planet, and the difference between save and save as. We are becoming a learning community. The book has given me a wealth of ideas as a teacher leader to help others expand their comfort and knowledge.


It is a resource for an administrator helping a district, a principal helping a school, or a teacher leader helping fellow teachers. It brings up both the benefits and real work involved in becoming a professional learning community.

A Busy Summer and the New Year Ahead

I was just looking at my last post date. I realized a whole month has passed. What a busy summer it's been. I'd like to briefly share some highlights.

A School Email Account

I was able to sign up for a Diigo educator's account this week. In order to (easily) get one, a school email id is required. Over the summer, I was assigned a stmichaelscranford.org email address. I won't use it for much besides signing up for education accounts to use in class. Diigo was something I wanted to start using with the students. I have a Delicious account with links for school that I've been using for at least three years now. I originally thought I would teach the students to use Delicious to save bookmarks, but it was too involved with email addresses. 

The benefits of a Diigo educator account can be found on the link. I am most happy to be able to create accounts without the need for email addresses for each student AND student accounts are kept private from other users, ads are education only, and we can bookmark and annotate webpages in groups.

Promethean Board Training

I have had eight hours of training with the teachers to use the Activboards. There will be six in the school this year. Previously only the computer lab had a board. The training went exceedingly well. 


I found a great training resource online for Windows. I updated the Creative Commons licensed flipcharts for the Mac operating system. I put many links for ActivInspire on this Google Site. The specific Mac training flipcharts are on this page.


We have only worked on the first five training flipcharts. It gives the teachers enough material to feel comfortable with the board. We learned how to navigate the Download and My Flipchart folders on the dock. The teachers signed up for Promethean Planet accounts and learned how to open old .flp and new .flipchart files and save them. This led to an interesting discussion about File Save vs. File Save As. 


As part of the training, I was requested to create some screencasts. As a result, I decided to get a one year subscription to Jing Pro. 

Jing Pro

I have used Jing's free version. It works well. The downside is that the files are saved in Flash format. With the pro version, I can save the files (without ads) to the MPEG-4 .m4v
format. This is so useful. I was able to create three little screencasts and stitch them into a longer movie in iMovie. Feel free to use these screencasts:


Finding a Flipchart on Promethean Planet
Mac Folders
Playing Back a Vimeo Video in a Larger Size
Opening, Reviewing, and Saving a Flipchart

K12 Online Conference 2010

I submitted a proposal to the K12 Online Conference for 2010. The topic is Free Learning and Inspiration Online. It is based on the session I led at New Teachers Camp (ntcamp) in July. Hopefully it will be accepted.

Global Education Conference 2010

I am on the Educator Advisory Core Group for the new for 2010 Global Education Conference. It is scheduled for November 15-19 and will run around the clock. It is intended to get more educators comfortable with global collaborations. I will be writing more as a I learn about the conference. There is currently a call for proposals for sessions to run in Elluminate. If you've been participating in global online projects, consider offering a session. The timing for the sessions is 20 to 60 minutes including discussion/ Q&A time among the participants. There is an intent to get mentor partnerships established to help new teachers gain a comfort with global collaborations.

EdCamp NYC

I am a co-organizer for EdCamp NYC. It will be on Saturday, December 4th at The School at Columbia University in New York City. I've spent the summer working on the website for the group. If you are in the NY, NJ, PA, CT area, consider stopping by the website to request your free ticket to the event. It promises to be outstanding based on my experience with EdCamp Philly and ntcamp. Keep you eye out for more information as I get closer to December fourth.

Back in the Saddle Again

After a restful summer, I'm looking forward to the new school year ahead. Old projects and new projects with the students are at the top of my mind right now!


Photo Credits:
Ann Oro.

The Interactive Whiteboard Revolution Book and Website

I am in the process of reading The Interactive Whiteboard Revolution by Chris Betcher and Mal Lee. As I've been reading, I'm recording my thoughts in a Google Doc. One of the chapters speaks to e-Teaching and three common phases teachers go through when adopting the use of an Interactive Whiteboard (IWB) in the classroom. I've saved all of my flip charts from the last two years and decided to find out how this has mapped to my use. I thought I'd share what I found out on my blog.

For Those Without an Interactive Whiteboard
It's worth mentioning that Promethean allows anyone to download their personal edition of the ActivInspire software. I believe you have to sign up for a free account at Promethean Planet. You can run the software on a computer using a projector or large monitor. The students can work the files with the compute mouse. It's good practice for the day and Interactive Whiteboard finally shows up in your school.

Phase One: Doing Old Things in Old Ways
The book suggests that most people start out by using the IWB in the same manner that they might a chalkboard. It surprised me to see how true this was in my case. I learned how to use the board on my own time and in my own way. I took tutorials at the Promethean Planet web site.

When I look back at September 2008, I mostly created text box titles (in advance) and had students walk up to the board and write with the pen. As I looked through the files, the first two months look like PowerPoint presentations with fill in the blanks for the students. I had very limited use of the tools. The pointer, pencil, eraser, and colors were my top tools. The lessons were not interactive, but I used what I knew would work seamlessly with the students. As it was the first board in the school, everyone just wanted to touch the pen and the board. It made my lessons marginally more interactive since I do not have a blackboard or whiteboard that I can easily access with my students. This was the first time they could actually write down an answer for me in front of the whole class.

Phase Two: Doing Old Things, But in New Ways
I needed to see an IWB in action to get a better idea of what I could be aiming for in the classroom. In December 2008, I went to a conference at a local university and went to a session with Promethean representatives. I was the only one who showed up, so they dropped what they planned (ActivExpressions) and gave me some pointers. They showed me around Promethean Planet and how to use the paint bucket on text. This was a breakthrough idea for me. I have the students in second grade work on monsterproject.wikispaces.com that I run with Anna Baralt (@abaralt). I used the idea the next class to have the students find adjectives. It was something I could have done with Word and a highlighter tool, but it was a new way for my students and I.

We have a set of 32 ActiVotes that came with the board. It took me a long time to figure out how to register the ActiVotes. I received help via Promethean Planet and the conference. My first flip chart with the voting devices was January 2009. It was still an old thing in a new way. I wanted to talk with the third grade students about our state bird, the Eastern Goldfinch. It was a new lesson, but I wanted to try the ActiVotes. I couldn't yet figure out how to assign student names, but I created a number of lessons that gave the students in all grade levels various topics containing multiple choice questions and answers. It was a good way to talk and interact as a group. I had been using SurveyMonkey for this purpose, but this was more immediate and we didn't have to leave the discussion area in my room, go to the computer to fill out the form, and return to the discussion area. At this point, I didn't feel comfortable enough with my output to submit the lesson to Promethean Planet.

By the end of January of my first year with the board, I started trying out some ActivStudio gadgets. My eighth grade had created some movies. I used a spinner to select the order in which we would play the movies. It enabled me to test another feature of the software with the students. They enjoyed the spinner as an alternate method to select movies. I wasn't too happy with the spinner and tend to use the Interactive Fruit Machine.

I continued to build in new ways. I teach the third grade how to read a web page. We start with a book. I could have held up the book, or used a document camera (but I may not have known how to use the one we won yet). So, I scanned pages from a library book, put the images into the flip chart, and incorporated the voting devices into it. Even though I resized the image, the version on the board was readable. I used the pen to circle the location of the answers on the page after the vote. This lesson was from January 31, 2009. I can't upload an image because of copyright.

We were having an out of uniform day to raise funds for solar cookers.
In another attempt to explore using the board in new ways, I found a video to engage the students in learning about Darfur. Again, the students used the ActiVotes to register their knowledge of solar cookers, where Darfur is located, and the content of the movie. I started saving the flip chart pages as images, brought them into PowerPoint, and uploaded the file to Slideshare. You can see them here. Since the class was on Saint Patrick's day, there are a number of images on the flip chart pages for the holiday. This lesson was from March 17, 2009.

I can see how I would find a new thing and use it a lot. The following week, I was trying out Discovery Streaming. Every year, I work on the book “Make Way for Ducklings”. I had found a Google Lit Trip about the book to use with Google Earth the year before. In this example, I embedded video and votes. This is from a week after the Darfur set.

I continued to use the ActiVotes quite a bit, but I started using them to have students evaluate choices instead of simply selecting a correct answer. I had them use the board for matching and evaluating pieces of information with the pen. There is still a good bit of use of the pen to write on the board. In this fourth grade Internet Safety lesson, I tried to reach a little more with the depth of the questions for the students. This is from April 24, 2009.

As I closed out the school year with the board, I was ready to spend the summer learning more on my own time. I had all my flip charts saved so they could be reused and modified the following year. I really never use exactly the same lesson year after year. With the flip chart, I can review the content, modify the ideas, and take them to a new level the following year. It is a time saver. Additionally, we used the board set up for Skype calls with other classes.

Phase Three: Doing New Things in New Ways
In the book, the third phase talks about teachers doing new things in new ways. I’m not entirely here, but I feel I’m starting to do things that I wouldn’t have been able to do with PowerPoint, a projector, and Skype. I’m working more with have students evaluate information. I am starting to share resources on Promethean Planet. I uploaded a duplicate by mistake, but I'm learning. The resources are on the United States site.

I have a hard time finding charts I really like for computer class. In November 2009, I found a symmetry lesson on Promethean Planet that I used with Kindergarten. This flip chart helped me to understand hidden objects and draggable objects. I had a hard time using ActivStudio to create hidden and draggable objects. I think it was around this time that I finally decided I had to learn ActivInspire because there were nice ActivTip movies that clearly described what I wanted to do.

I now have three flip charts shared on Promethean Planet. The first is State Research: Learning to Use Keywords in a Search Engine. It has had 14 downloads in eleven days (between the two files I uploaded). The second is Computer Terminology. It has had a whopping 46 downloads in nine days. The last is Digital Citizenship. It has had 14 downloads in nine day. The flip charts use draggable items, have locked items, have ActiVote opportunities, and page notes. They charts give third to fifth grade students the opportunity to evaluate information. I look forward to learning more with the ActivTips. The more I learn, the more I can create and share.

The Interactive Whiteboard Revolution
I've been conversing with Chris Betcher, one of the authors. He mentioned that there are teachers discussing the book at his Interactive Whiteboard Revolution ning. It is also mapped to http://iwbrevolution.com. I've been a member of the ning since before I had a board. I plan on spending more time there. I'm still reading the book, but I thought this would make a good general blog post.

State Research: Learning to Use Keywords in a Search Engine

In third grade, the students complete a state research fact sheet. Usually, I take the students directly to a web page to work on the research. This year, I began laying the groundwork for successful search strategies.

My Resource on Promethean Planet
I've uploaded a set of flipchart pages to Promethean Planet. I was worried that teachers who do not have an ActivBoard would be excluded from using the resource. There are two ways you can use this file on your computer - even without a board.

First, you can download a personal edition of ActivInspire. Go to the Promethean Planet web site. Sign up for a free Promethean Planet account by clicking Register. Go to the download page.

Second, you can dowload the free flipchart viewer. I am not sure if this is just for old ActivPrimary and ActivStudio files or the old flipcharts and the new ActivInspire charts.

Once you have an account, you can download my resource file.

Working Through Search Engine Concepts
First, I introduced the students to the facts that they would be finding on the worksheet. We used the state of New Jersey as the example. Some students already knew the state capital. Most know the state bird after our work earlier in the year.

Next, I asked them how a third grade student could learn the details about their state such as the land area or three largest cities. The students knew they could look in a book or go to the Internet. Page two of the flipchart allows the students to drag those hidden images from behind a U.S. flag.

With that information in mind, students took turns dragging six search engine names from behind an image of a computer. The list includes Google, Bing, Ask Kids, Yahoo Kids, Fact Monster, and Kids Click! As each image was dragged from behind the computer, I had the students who have used that web site stand up. Getting students moving during a lesson is always helpful. It's an easy way to build some movement into a lesson.

Part of the lesson is learning about key words. Before starting to get this idea across, I wanted the students to focus on how they use a search engine. I have noticed over the years that some students tend to type in questions or long sentences. The fourth slide shows the question: What is the population of Iowa? We used the ActiVotes to find out how many students type a whole sentences, short words, or sometimes both.

With that information in mind, we begin discussing key words that could be used to find the information on a search engine. I kept reminding the students of the individual items they needed to find and the state name. For example, "Remember we are looking for the population, land area, three largest cities, governor, and state flower of New Jersey." Once we had many keywords listed, I pointed out that they would have to complete the search nine times to find out all the details. If their teacher gave them two states, it would take about 18 searches.

On flipchart page six, I asked the student if they thought the words state research would be helpful keywords. They used the ActiVotes to agree or disagree.

We looked at some top results for the key words. We found that there are several web sites that would allow us to type in a state name and locate many facts.

But I Don't Have ActiVotes...
I think the ActiVotes are a great way to involve the students in a lesson. If you do not have them, there are a number of ways you can have the students respond. You could give them a red, yellow, and blue index card to represent A, B, and C. You could use dry erase boards. There are a number of options electronically including PollEverywhere with a web link.

Resources I've Located
The students are going to have a choice of six web sites to complete the research. I think the Fact Monster web page will be the quickest for my students, based on what their teacher wants the students to learn. As I was setting up the ActivInspire flipchart lesson, I came across a few other sites that looked interesting. These include Stately Knowledge, State Facts for Students via the US Census Bureau, Enchanted Learning's State Page, and 50 States.

First Grade Reptiles Lesson

First Grade Reptiles

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I used to feel uneasy when I had to have a larger than usual class in K-3. With my new tools, I look forward to these times. It gives me an opportunity to learn how to integrate the Activboard, Activotes, and Discovery Streaming into the school day. I hope that someday I have more Activboards in the school and want practical, first-hand knowledge of what can be done.

Book Fair Schedule Change
I had the entire first grade in the computer lab today. They will be going to the book fair tomorrow. Usually half of the first grade is in my lab while the other half goes to the library. The next day, the students switch and I have the half who went to the library.

What To Do?
I started by browsing Promethean Planet. I was specifically looking for a lesson designed for K-2 with Activotes. I downloaded a few lessons, but the one that caught my eye was called Discover Reptiles by Nicole Glover of Kentucky. It got my attention because I was certain that I could find a complementary video on Discovery Streaming. Reptiles are fascinating creatures. I headed over to Discovery Streaming and was not disappointed.

Discovery Streaming Reptile Choices
There were a tremendous number of choices. As you can see from the image on the right, there were 44 video clips just in the K-2 grade range. I previewed about five.

The first video that fit my need was Animal Groups: Beginning Classification (copyright 2000). I liked it because it talked about all the vocabulary in the Activstudio flip chart: turtles, lizards, crocodiles, snakes, vertebrates, scales, cold-blooded. It was a one minute 54 second clip.

The second video I chose was The Jeff Corwin Experience: Wild Animals in the City (copyright 2005). In one segment in New York, they show how a snake was left behind in an apartment and had to be collected by the animal control department. It was a ten minute clip, but we only watched the first few minutes.

Running the Class
When the students arrived, they sat in a horseshoe around the Activboard. I reviewed the Activote and explained that everyone would have at least two turns working on the board. We would write, erase, or move things on the board. I modified the original flip chart. Several slides were changed from "reveal" type items to Activote questions.

This was the second time they used the Activotes, so I made the first few questions very easy. I focused on having the students click A, B, C, D, or E to identify the snake, crocodile, turtle, lizard, and iguana. Next, the students slide vocabulary to where they thought it belonged in different sentences. They must have worked on the concept of reptiles. They were aware of the concept that reptiles are cold-blooded animals. Afterward, students erased a block to reveal the actual answer.

Next, we watched the first video and filled in the blanks about different animals on the board. Other students clicked to reveal the answer and compare it to what was written by the previous student. Before moving on to the Jeff Corwin video, I needed to review some vocabulary: rural, urban, and suburban. Those words all came up in the clip. We used the Activote to determine if the students felt we were from a farming (rural) or big city (urban) area. I talked about the word suburb and how it applied to our area. I asked who had traveled to New York and Miami.

Finally, nearing the end of our 42 minutes together, we watched the snake being bagged in the New York apartment.

Looking Forward to Opportunities
I am looking forward to more opportunities to gather the students around the Activboard and use the Activotes and Discovery Streaming. It is a great combination of products. My hope is that I will eventually have more classrooms with boards and I will have a personal understanding of what can be accomplished with students. I know the children had a fun learning experience.

Activboard Quick Activity

During Terra Nova test days, the morning is dedicated to administering the test and the afternoon has abbreviated rotations of specials. Since I teach computer class, I am in the afternoon rotation with thirty minute class periods.

What To Do - Grade 4-8
I really didn't want the students to have an open choice of program and I really want to give them a break after tests all morning. I decided to turn to my Activboard and Activotes. I want the students engaged. I was looking for a fun project and decided to go to the Lesson section on Promethean Planet.

I found an illusions flip chart called Tricks of the Eye by Lisa Dubemar. It has an interesting set of optical illusions. Some I had seen, some are new to me. She had a nice opening exercise with pennies, cups, and partners, but I skipped to the illusions and added some more of my own from the NIEHS Kid Page. NIEHS stands for the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.

How Did It Go?
I had 4th, 6th, and 8th grade students. They were all engaged in the examples, voting for their choice, and seeing how they compared with the students sitting nearby. The half hour few by. I arranged the room in a horseshoe of chairs around the Activboard.

This could really be accomplished with a PowerPoint or Keynote set of slides containing the images. Students could have white paper and pens to hold up their answers or could answer via SurveyMonkey or Poll Everywhere.

Potential Updates to the Questions
Instead of having an A and B choice, the students seemed to want and A, B, Both, or I Can't Tell set of options. I just told them to press C if they saw both images, or D if they couldn't see either.

Overall I was really happy with this little filler lesson and so were the students. Not a complaint was heard in the room.

Here are the slides I used with the students. The images are from the NIEHS Kids Page. As always, I struggle with using images. I believe these are fine to post under Fair Use guidelines. If the owner feels they need to be removed, please let me know and I will happily do so.

Actiboard/ Activote Illusions Slides

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Image Citation:
"optical illusion - pulsing vortex." ClintJCL's photostream. 2006 Oct 20. 2009 Mar 3.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/clintjcl/274762242/