Innovation Projects -- Spring 2016

The end of the school year is quickly approaching, but we took one more leap at Innovation Projects this spring.  The last time we did these projects, I was extremely frustrated by Microsoft's Teacher Notebook, as I tried to force it to do something it wasn't created to do.

This time around, I used OneNote Class Notebook and was much happier. Everything was much better organized and I could check work more efficiently and with much less hassle.  If you are in a OneDrive school, I highly suggest this tool for your Genius Hour projects.  I'd be happy to walk through the specifics with you. I also introduced my sixth graders to Sway (a newer piece of the Office Suite) and you'll see some Sway presentations in action below.

As it is, I wanted to get right to the student projects -- the true highlight reel. Here are the best of the best.  Enjoy!

Learn how to cook an over easy egg from this sixth grader.

Here is a Sway presentation about American Sign Language.




Two fifth grade girls teamed up to create this video about the Civil War.

This sixth grade girl created a quiz about dogs on Emaze.  I never heard of Emaze before these projects, but I really like what I've seen from this tool! 

This fifth grade girl taught her class about sign language on her video. 

Here is a 6th grade boy who wanted to hack an iPhone charger.  

This fifth grader taught us how to make a birdhouse. 

I had never heard of EOS life hacks before this sixth grader suggested it for her project. 

Click the link to see a Google slide show about how computers work created by a fifth grade boy.

It was a great year working with these innovators, and I thoroughly enjoyed watching them grow, learn, and create this year.  I'm so glad I started Genius Hour projects in my elementary computer classes and look forward to keeping this tradition alive in future years!

Does Innovation ACTUALLY Work?

First, let me start this post with this.... "Hi, Mom!"  Yes, I have a proud mother who reads each of these posts. So, let's hope she enjoys this one.

I recently finished reading this article by Will Richardson, and I happily agreed with (just about) every word of it.  In the article, Mr. Richardson argues that innovation in school can't stop at the shiny tech tools and toys we tote around our schools.  No matter how we dress up our curriculum and make it look innovative, it's not really.

We all know that when an authority dictates what we learn and when we learn it, school gets really boring really quickly.  We know it because we lived it.  Real learning -- deep learning -- comes from exploring a topic that we have a true passion about.  As educators, our job is to foster that passion, to fan its flames, and teach our students how to learn rather than what to learn. And that is when we become innovative teachers in innovative schools.

Yet, as I nodded my head up and down, a gnawing thought continued to work on me.

How do we know this innovative thing is actually working? 

Let's say you've been reading about maker space or Genius Hour or some new-fangled 21st century way of teaching and you really want to bring it to your school.  You put together a great presentation about what this will look like and how it will be a great asset to your school and sit your principal down to talk pitch your idea.  What if... your principal says, "That sounds great, but how do we know it will increase student learning?"

What do you say?  How do we prove it's a good thing?

Gut feelings, bright and cheery faces, and snazzy TED-like talks aside, how do we know this thing we're doing is making a difference in our students' lives -- today and in the future?

And, yes, there are a lot of question marks toward the end of this post because I'm really asking these questions. I'd love to hear what sort of data you are putting together to show that your innovative philosophy of teaching is truly making a difference in the lives of your students.  Please share.

Thanks!

#OETC16: A Review

Innovation.

If I had to summarize the 2016 Ohio Ed Tech Convention in one word, that would be the word. It's not like every speaker and presenter said "innovation" or even thought about it as they created their sessions. But, innovation was always lurking under the surface of everything that happened.

It all started for me before I ever left my house in Kentucky.  I was introduced to Parking Panda, a site that allows you to prepay for parking, giving you a guaranteed space when you arrive on the scene.  This was huge to me after being forced to park at a meter for the last day of the conference last year.  ("I'll be at your session next hour, as soon as I go feed the meter!" Yup! That made me look cool at a nerd convention.)

Innovation came out loud and clear as I listened to Jaime Chanter talk about her future club and how she helps four different schools learn about coding, robotics, and maker spaces in before school clubs in Lakewood School District.  Innovation was the key element to  Mrs. Thoma and Mrs. Frederick talk about using Genius Hour and coding in their 4th/5th combined class every Wednesday.

It was Jaime Casap telling educators to find ways to innovate how to educate so (school) learning becomes relevant for this generation of learners.  It was Hadi Partovi explaining how he created code.org in an attempt to bring computer science to every school in America and raise the percentage of women and minorities involved in computer sciences.

Innovation was the theme of a group of teachers from Forest Hills School District that have incorporated blended learning in their high school instruction.  Each one found different ways to blend their learning, but they all have worked hard to find what works for them and their classes.

Innovation was woven through all the sessions, even those that were not so inspiring.  After all, every tech tool discussed either didn't exist five years ago, or have been significantly updated in those five years.

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I was struck by a pair of pictures that Jaime Casap put on the screen. On one side was a class of students sitting in rows, using iPads.  On the other side was a black and white picture of a class sitting in rows listening to the teacher lecture.  He pointed out that there isn't much difference between the two pictures.  And, he's right.

What if I came into your room at a random time and took a picture at a random moment?  Would that picture look any different than a picture taken 100 years ago?  Sure, your kids may have iPads in their hands, but do those iPads radically change how instruction happens? Or, does the technology help you teach in all new ways?
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I walked away from OETC this year with a bit less knowledge than I would have liked but a whole lot more drive.  Seeing as the 21st century is old enough for a driver's license in Ohio, I think it's time my school implements the 4Cs of 21st century learning.  I'm so happy that I attended the convention with a colleague who feels like I do.  We need to make a concerted to help our colleagues use technology in new ways in our school.

I think I have renewed Innovation Project for myself.

Book Review: How We Got to Now

Title: How We Got to Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World
Author: Steven Johnson (Twitter)
Review:

"Innovations usually begin life with an attempt to solve a specific problem, but once they get into circulation, they end up triggering other changes that would have been extremely difficult to predict."

What do you think is the most world-shaping innovation ever?  If you're like me, you probably thought of something like the Internet or mobile technology.  But, we'd be thinking too narrowly.  Maybe one day those things will make the cut.

In this book, Johnson looks at innovations that have totally recreated the way we live.  Here are some interesting tidbits that I enjoyed.

• The creation of the printing press led to a huge need for reading glasses.
• Air conditioning changed presidential elections. 
• You can't read this blog post without glass, but the amount of ways glass plays into bringing this post to your eyes will boggle your brain.
• Inventing the light bulb was only one small part of actually lighting up a city. 

What does this have to do with education?  I still have hopes of one day leading my own Innovation Class, and this book may well be required reading for that class. Innovation doesn't necessarily happen in a vacuum. One person's great idea can lead someone else to another great idea.  I learned how glass artisans in Venice were forced to relocate to a nearby island which caused an explosion of glass innovation.  

...by concentrating the glassmakers on a single island the size of a small city neighborhood, they triggered a surge of creativity, giving birth to an environment that possessed what economists call 'information spillover.'

"Information spillover" sounds exactly like what I would love to see out of the innovators in my school.  By reading this book, my hopes would be that my students would see that what they create goes beyond their personal bubbles but have the potential to change the way people all around see world!

What's Next?

If you spend any time with a preschooler, you know that questions abound.  Those little ones are inquisitive machines! As reported by Warren Berger in A More Beautiful Question, a child will ask about 40,000 questions between ages two and five. But, what's more staggering is that by middle school, those same kids will stop asking questions altogether.



I am convinced that the education system is a major player in this crazy decline of inquiry.  After all, we have a body of information to pass along to these kids, and we don't have time for them to dawdle with their own personal quest for learning.

One of my college professors used to us that she would ask her girls every day after school, "What questions did you ask?"  The answer usually came back, "Mom, the teacher asks the questions, not us."  Is this how things continue to be in education?

I was talking to a 5th grade girl yesterday, and she told me about something they heard on the radio on the way to school.  "Children love to learn more than adults."  Her 2nd grade sister piped up, "I love to learn!"  Sadly, my 5th grade friend didn't share that sentiment.  I quickly followed that up with, "No, you love to learn.  You just don't love to learn the things we're teaching."  After a moment of thought she agreed and told me she would love to learn about drawing.

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You probably heard that my Innovation Classes have been cancelled for 2015-16 due to lack of students.  (If not, you can read about it here.) I realized this past week that I've been going at this Innovation/Genius Hour stuff from the wrong direction. Sure, it would be nice to kick off a brand new high school class full of bright inquisitive minds, and I'll still attempt to do that in 2016-17.  However, I realized I have a golden opportunity to catch them while they're young.

As mentioned above, school culture is very much a top-down flow of questions and answers. "I ask the questions, and you give me the answers I want to hear."  You can't just change that culture with a snappy course description that might not even be read.  You can try to change that culture by talking to the students, but that didn't work for me either.  However, I am in a unique position to make some of those changes beneath the radar.

I spent yesterday rewriting my overall elementary computer plans for the year. Grades 4-6 will have two or three month-long Genius Hour projects sprinkled into the year.  This will give them a taste of what will come in middle school. So when my 6th graders get their course descriptions in the spring, I'll be there to pounce on the Innovation Class for them.

My not-very-well-cloaked goal is to hook them young, to re-energize their slowly dying inquisitive mindset, and to slowly change the school culture from the elementary up.

We're not done yet!

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Incredibly astute readers are probably asking some more questions:

• You said you were going to hook them young. Why start the Genius Hour in 4th grade? Why not start in kindergarten or preschool? 
• You are teaching middle school and high school courses. I saw that you're teaching Media Production. Why can't you sneak some Genius Hour into those?
• What on earth does Genius Hour look like in a specials class?

Thanks for asking.  Let's take them one by one. 

• Upper elementary is my comfort zone.From my research of Genius Hour in primary grades, the younger you go, the more structure you need in the projects. I'm going to need to get used to Genius Hour with upper elementary before I get into it with the little ones. If I don't have my sanity, I have nothing at all.
• I'm co-teaching the Media Production classes, and I'm not the lead teacher.  We're still in the process of taking general ideas and writing the course details right now.  I'd like to create some student-choice video projects in there, but nothing has been decided yet. 
• These projects will be more like Genius Nuggets rather than Genius Hour.  The intended schedule is below. The goal is to whet the appetite and help students see that their passions matter.

• PreWeek - The week before we actually start, I will give a 5-10 minute talk about the project and send an email to parents about the project.

• Week 1 - Project selections and begin research.

• Weeks 2 and 3 - Research, building, creating, and updates with me.

• Week 4 - Presentations to class.

I'm looking forward to seeing good things come next year, even if they weren't exactly what I originally intended.  

what3words

Interesting and innovative.  If nothing else, those two words can describe what3words.

If you are reading this, you probably live in an industrialized country with an established addressing system.  Maybe you have street names and a patterned number system along those streets.  Or, if not, you have a system that is culturally recognizable, which is just as good.

What if you don't live in such a society?  Would it be necessary to have a quick and easy address system so you know where you live and where other things are located?

What if someone came up with a completely new way to label locations all over the globe?  Would it be something we could use and adapt to?  Maybe...maybe not.  My jury is still out.  However, I'm intrigued enough to bring it to your attention and create an assignment for my upper elementary students.  (And, I'm still trying to figure out how to turn it into a puzzle cache on geocaching.com.)

3 words to address the world from what3words on Vimeo.

Let's try it out.  Go to what3words>Explore Map and enter this phrase..."verbs.debuts.pounding." You just landed on top of my office. Hope you like the place. It's your turn.  Find your classroom/office/hideout and post the three word phrase in the comments section.

I love the innovation and want to promote the out of the box thinking, so I created an assignment for my 5th and 6th graders to explore the site a bit.  Catch it here.  

I'd love to know what you think of what3words and how it can be used in education and around the world. 

Innovation Projects, May 2013

It's the last week of school, and my 7th graders are presenting their Innovation Projects (formerly called 20% Time Projects) for the fourth quarter.  Back in January when I came up with this idea, I was very excited for something I thought was pretty original.  It turns out that Genius Hour has taken the educational world by storm when I wasn't looking.  Even though my grand idea isn't so novel after all, it's great to be part of something new and exciting in education.  I feel strongly that if we give students to learn what they are interested in learning they will get a lot more out of it than they ever thought possible.  I've been blessed to be given the freedom to explore this angle with my Tools for Tech class this year.

This quarter, my students were given the opportunity to build upon their third quarter project or start something totally new.  About half chose to dive into something new.  We had some new GarageBand songs, a slew of websites, a logo hijacker, lots of wallpapers, and a Lego gun/saw.  In every case, I have no doubt learning took place, but I'm fairly certain I should have pushed them a bit harder to create (aka innovate) something new rather than mash up what already exists. Look at the examples below and let me know what you think....oh, and try a few recipes.  I highly recommend the brownies on Kent's page.

• American Sign Language (ASL)
• Everything Random
• Food, Fun, Friends
• The Plagemans
• All About Evan
• Games, Games, and Guess What? Games.
• Maxx and His Saw/Gun
• The World of Desserts and the world of desserts
• T4Tinnovation
• Wallpapers
• Minecraft Pocket Edition
• All About Evan (A different one) 
• Sports Fails 
• mattst4tappreveiw

Over the summer, I'm going to read up on Genius Hour and connect with some other Genius Hour teachers to try to hone in the happy medium of giving students a chance to pursue what they want to learn while making sure it's a learning experience worthy of one-fifth of our class time.  As always, I'm open to suggestions.

Click here to see the students' original instructions. 

eTech 13 - Overview #oetc13

I had the privilege of spending two days this week attending the Ohio Educational Technology Conference in Columbus, OH. For two days, I was totally immersed in educational nerdom, both live and on Twitter, and loved it!  Over the course of the next few days, I'll debrief myself via Blogger and hopefully share some great insights with you as well.  For now, I have some quick hits before I go prep myself for classes today.

• Innovate or become an afterthought. Like it or not, technology is changing the way education is being done. Schools, administrators, and teachers need to learn how to innovate with the times to stay on top of the technology.  The way we did school is obsolete.  How can use technology to be relevant?
• You have to meet students where they are to reach them. I'm slowly starting to see that I can reach students better through gaming than I can through text. I'll get into this more later, but teachers have students building Mine Craft games, I am piloting a word game to teach Tier 2 Vocabulary, and I'm going to look into a game building software for my middle schoolers. No longer can I expect them to meet me in my world and my vocabulary; I at least need to appear to meet them half way.
• Sometimes the best way to learn is to connect to others. I'm happy to say that I walked away from this conference having started conversations with other educators, and I hope that this networking will lead to learning on both sides of the email or tweets.  I even got a bit geeked out when I got to sit next to one of my favorite presenters and tweeters.  It's about connecting with each other and sharing what works and doesn't work.
• Be very very careful what you post online. I'll get more into this later, but I saw first hand how dangerous it is to be online. In this age when nothing is private, we have to be careful to protect our privacy... and to teach our students to do the same.
• I really like sushi.  I've never had sushi before, but one of our school's vendors sprung for a huge sushi dinner for a few of his clients.  I. could. not. stop. eating. sushi.  Wow! 

That's it for now.  I have to prep for my classes.  Maybe I'll write more later today.