BPSTechnology Webinar - Episode 4: Teacher Panel - Tech & Inclusion
Good. Evening and welcome to the tech and inclusion, teacher panel. If. You're interested, and following along with our presentation. Tonight we, have a link to our slides, at bit ly. /. Tech. Inclusion, 1 9 so. That's bid Li slash tech, inclusion 1 9. My. Name is VN guitarist, and I'm a digital learning specialist, at bps technology. I'll be one of your moderators, tonight also. Joining me are Nicholas, Gonzalez also. Digital learning specialist, in bps technology, will, be manning tonight's chat, so please follow along will, help you answer any questions that you have the. Main reason, why we're here today is because we are being joined by three teacher panelists. Who, be sharing some of their stories of using technology, for inclusion in their classrooms, and workplace first. We have Mary O'Brien a, second grade teacher at the Henderson inclusion. Next. We have Scott woods, an occupational. Therapists, and assistive, technology specialist, on the bps, assistive. Technology, team. Finally. We, have John Hines an, instructional. Coach and teacher at, the Mary Lyon k-8. So. Tonight's agenda will, be covering, various things I'll, be going over some of these briefly we're. Gonna be talking about how teachers or designers, are connecting, that to some standards, as. Well as the types of technology, that there are when it comes to thinking about inclusion. Will. Also be connecting. With our guiding, question, for. The evening and then. Finally, we'll be hearing from some teachers all three, of their stories and some resources they'll be sharing with all of you. So. When I say teachers, or designers, what, does that mean well. There are some standards, given. Out by esteem, International. Society for, technology and education, and these, are the standards, for educators, the, one that has stood out to me the most is, Stan and number five designer. So. What does this mean it means an educators, design authentic. Learner. Driven activities, and environments then. Recognize and accommodate, learner, variability. Now. This is a really, really powerful phrase, to think about because. Teachers. As designers, really means that you are constantly, constructing. And creating, new learning experiences, with students, not just for them but with them, if. You're interested in learning more about the, ISTE standards we. Have linked, to them at the bottom there, aren't just stands for educators, there are also standards, for students, administrators. And coaches, as, well as computer science educators, and, it's. Also important, to note this standard, is heavily influenced, by. Educational. Philosophy, known as Universal. Design for Learning you. Will be hearing from the teachers tonight and how connected, their work is to Universal, Design for Learning. So. I mentioned there are certain categories of, Technology, so. What does this mean well. First we have instructional, technology, this is very much connected to the work that Nick and I do on, PBS, technology. This is thinking about tools for learning and, communication. So, you might be familiar with tools like Khan Academy Google. Classroom, there's a very much about pedagogy. And supporting, teachers, and students, with that learning. Next. We have assistive, technology, Scott's, going to be connecting, to some of that tonight and that's, thinking about tools.
That Increase, or maintain the, functional, capabilities of. A person with a disability now. Oftentimes we are seeing those lines blur between instructional. And assistive technology and, Universal. Design for Learning is a big part, of that because. We all recognize that we have variability. And how we learn context. Matters rains. Matter so, thinking, about these tools sometimes. Tools, are designed the one might be for many that's. Tools that book share and read and write. We. Certainly have other types of technologies, well relating to productivity, and information. Technology, and those are the ones that we pretty much interact, with every day like. Google, and Microsoft, tools. And the, final one is medical, technology, we won't be covering that because as teachers we, don't really have much influence with that but. We look forward to hearing the stories the teachers will share with us tonight about, the use of these various, tools. So, one of the big guiding, questions, that we have for tonight is, how. Do, you use technology, to. Design more inclusive. Learning experiences. For your students, and we're, gonna have all three teachers share these stories with us. Hi. I'm Mary I teach second grade at the Henderson inclusion, school. Boston. Public Schools recently, has. Been working, on a curriculum, called focus, on grade two and we've. Been fortunate at our school to use it for the last two years there's. A lot of opportunities. For the children to. Explore. All types of tools for research learning, and communication. Through this curriculum we're, very fortunate that we've been provided, with materials, that help the children, expand, their thinking and, in. This particular unit, unit, 2 which I'm gonna be talking about this evening it's, called the forces, of wind and water the. Children explored. Water. Resources. Around the world but, they also focused, on the. Dangers, and the results. Of wind, and water as. A final product the children were asked to design barrier. Walls that. Could, prevent, erosion, specifically. On the, north end of Thompson Island right here in Boston Harbor. Through. The studio time the children were allotted, opportunities. To create barrier. Walls such, as the Kapler structure, which, is very elaborate, it's in the top left. Hand corner the, children. Designed, ramps. On this particular structure, so that the water would flow in.
Either Direction if you looked at both sides of it you would see that it was very similar, then. The children, were. Asked to take their thinking a little bit further and they. Designed, barrier, walls using a variety of found materials, and. Asked. To explain exactly, what, their thinking was using the vocabulary in. The, language, of the curriculum. Students. Were allowed to access this, in many many different ways some. Students, used, wiki. Sticks as a tool. To. Help them identify the. Things. Like waves and, mountains, and barriers. And, water. In general and just learning about like riverbanks and everything to, help them with their thinking but, then the students, got together teams, of students work together to, build their final products, through. These final products, they were able to use, vocabulary from, the entire curriculum, and talk. About the different ways that they thought that they were to be able to save, the. North end of thompson island and prevent it from further erosion as time, moves forward we. Took photographs of, each groups products, and then, we turn them into, thing. Links, thing. Links are when, you take a photograph and then the children put a link on the, photograph, and they, used. Word. Banks, they use their writing journals, and some of them verbally spoke, about what they wanted to describe. About their, final. Product we. Took all of those results and then we turned it into a padlet, so, the students were able to share that with others. And talk explicitly about. Their research that, they had done throughout the unit here's. Some, examples of three of the thing links that the students, made, each. One of those little tabs the little plus sign is. Something that can be clicked on and, it, will give more detail, about what, the students, thought would, be good barriers. Or ways to prevent the erosion on Thompson Island as. You can see this we uploaded everything onto a padlet, and the students have been able to share those with their parents, their friends their colleagues at school and the early literacy department, we. Could take a look at one of them now this, wall. Barrier. Really showed a lot of ingenuity on the part of the children they, had some great ideas they thought of creating fans, which. They didn't end up making, in the end that would blow the, wind in the water in two different directions, they, had sprays. They had tools available to. Rescue. Animals, that might be in, danger during a terrible storm they, had senses, for security, they had drones that, were supporting, the research, they. Had. These little, red. And. Yellow. Things. That jut out in front of the barrier that would actually, be buried. Deeper, into, the ground or into the sand or into. The, surface. At Thompson Island to, help prevent, the area from serious, flooding and continued. Erosion over time. I am Scott from the assistive technology department, I'm also an occupational, therapist, and my. Role on the team is, to, conduct. Evaluations, and. Consultations. Throughout the district, and to. Provide training, to. Students, and to staff. Members on, different. Types of tools that could be beneficial to students, with. Disabilities and. As. Rhiannon, had mentioned. Earlier. You. Do plays. A very important, role in what, I do and, I. Suppose. One could, consider. That UDL would put somebody like me out of a job but in fact I feel, like, the. More that people know about UDL, the, more awareness we have that people have different ways of learning and so. Tools. Like, assistive. Technology, tools that we use with many students, are becoming. More and more mainstream and, we're finding that were. More, similar in ways than we are different and that everyone, has a different way of learning, the. Past couple of years we've had a lot of discussion, within. Our team and I believe it's part of a larger discussion about, how we. Are kind of moving away from. This. Separate. Expert. Type of model where, one. Expert, goes into a building and, and has, all the answers, surrounding. That one particular. Area. And so. There's a lot of, reliance. On that, person, was considered, the expert to make decisions, about things and. These. Decisions, are, the type. Of decisions, that will affect the, student on a regular, basis.
While. Receiving instruction in the classroom and, for, testing so it's important to to. Get those right and also. To understand, that they're. In a constant, state of evolution so with. The expert type of model, there. Is a, greater. Focus, of. Time. Spent. One-to-one, with students. Training. Them getting, to know what their strengths, and weakness, and. Trying. Out different tools. Weatherby devices, or a piece, of software, there's, also a, fair. Amount of training with individual, teachers or. Small. Groups, of teachers like maybe a sixth grade team or seventh, grade team but it doesn't, usually, move, past that, kind of small. Ecosphere. Of. Learning. And. I. Believe, that the expert, model will. Always, have some place in. Assistive. Technology, or in technology, in general because there, will always be cases where, specialized, supports, are needed or, complex, needs need to be addressed and. Having. Somebody with a bit more. Experience. In this area is, helpful. Despite, the fact that we are I think inevitably. Moving, in the direction of. The. Other type, of model which is a capacity, building model, and, in, the capacity, building model, it's. A collaborative, approach. Which. Is usually. Conducted. Not, really, with one. Person as a leader, necessarily. Although. 80, specialist, can play a role in its, in kind of facilitating, these just. As a introduction. But. School-based. Consideration. For the tools is. What. We're looking at the capacity building model, so, the specialist could provide the guidance, for. Particular, eighty decisions. But. The focus, really is on, training. Teams, training. Staff. Members, to. Kind, of pay it forward in a way that they. Are owning. Some of the tools and and, strategies. That can be useful for for. Some or many of their students. And. The. Focus really is on getting, it at a school level department, wide level in it in a district wide level so. Training, is a very important part of that, because. It expands the reach of assistive, technology as well, as instructional, technology, and, concepts. Of the UDL which I find are very. Very. Much in line with, the. Inclusion model of, teaching. Just. A couple examples here, for, the expert model. I'm. Using a real example of a fourth-grade student with a learning disability in, a regular education classroom and he. Would get pulled out for resource room help, his. Team was concerned about him not being able to access reading, so. They, requested, an 80 consultation. To, assess. The. Points. Of difficulty. Or barriers to learning, and. There. Was a combination of interviews, and observations, and testing that we did and finally.
Decided On some tools they would use and the teacher then, sat. With me and analyzed the data about. What was most useful and, we, created a Bookshare, account and, trained the, students, on how to use reading right for Google so. We, reached this, student, as well as a few others that the teacher then worked. Was after, and. Then, the capacity building model, is, more. Focused. On training, such. As a training, that we just did a few months ago on the, tool called the COS, writing protocol, which. Is intended, to guide decision-making about writing accommodations that students might need so. The, participants. Discussed. Ways that they could after. They learned how to use the tool how they could use it in, their school which is what were a strategic, approach rather. Than just the operational. Skills needed, and then, they would go. In and and. Do testing, with the students and on. A wider scale and be able to see, where. Their access points were in the best accommodations. For them so. What. We saw was a big, increase in capacity that, the knowledge that we had as 80 specialists was passed along to the next the. Next, sort. Of point, of contact, and they. Had direct contact with the schools and so they could make better, decisions, because they. Know the students in the environment, that they're working. Hi, my name is John Heinz I am an instructional coach the Mary Lyon school. Before. Being an instructional coach I was a seventh, grade ela, and geography. Teacher, only, a couple of different ways that I use Google, classroom. So. We were reading a book called, a long walk to water in seventh grade and one, of the activities. Happen, through the book is to read an informational, text about. Sudan. Civil war and when. I was doing this activity I wanted to make sure all. Students, had access. An. Entry, point into the material, so I wanted all students were the grade level text but I wanted to scaffold it in different ways the. First way the, first document. Is that some students who receive is a the, original copy and, the expectations, they would read it and use the comment section in Google classroom to make notes about the key information main. Idea. Then. For, some students i chunked, it that was the first level, scaffold, I provided, and.
In, The trunk section. For. Each section they would make, notes annotations. About the main idea or key facts that they learned about Sudan. Civil War for. Students who needed a different level of support scaffold, in. Each chunk section, I would highlight. Important. Details and based on those important, details they, would try to summarize, the main idea identify. The really most really, important, key facts, based. On the reading, for. Students who needed even more support. And. This is what Google classroom, is great you can differentiate. In more and I, you, know in the same chunk text but. There. Was multiple, choice options for students to, match up. The. Main ideas with each appropriate, section and then. All students, final, presentation, for the second final product this activity, was -. It. Was a choice for divider for them and they. Have. Options and how they wanted, to show their understanding of the text this. Whole assignment self, is a different way to differentiate, and, give students options and how they want to show. What. How they made sense of the material. So. Let me push you and show you now Google. Classroom how many screaming classroom so, I. Creative assignments, here, and. I. Would. Assign. In, the first reading to certain a monster and so I click on all students and then, I would click the students I wanted this, assignment. To, go ders. I. Would. Title it. Time. Trip Sudan Civil War and I would go to this little icon here which is Google Drive and. Upload, the assignments. So. It adds the first reading that had no scaffolds. And if. To make sure you click on make. A copy for each students, there's, also a choice for that all students would be receiving. So. It makes sure I want to link. That as well too and. Don't. Forget to make a copy for each student because, if you dolt and you try to go back and won't allow you to do it so I would assign this to six students and then. So only six the only these six students would see this assignment so so. Make sure the other students you see the assignment, I would click on create, assignment again. And I would assign it to these five. Students, make. Sure you title the assignments click. On the Google Drive icon and. I. The live. Reading that is the first has um the, first the, first one that's chunked. Added. Make. Sure everyone gets a copy. And. Then I would also add the. Choice board. Make. Sure to hit make a copy of reach students and. Then. Assign, it. This for each one of those four different. Readings that are a scaffold. In different ways and. So. When students open up the assignments, they're only going to open up one but. Depending, on which group you're in the reading is going to look different. So. School classroom, is a great way to. Differentiate. Assignments. Because you're gonna sign specific. Assignments, and specific. Text. In a scaffold, in different ways to, very specific, students based on their learning needs, so. It's a great way to use it with students but it's also a great. Place. We can it's a great tool. For you. Can usually colleagues, as well with the mary lyon school we. Have a, Google. Classroom that all staff members are part of and, we. Post. Important. Information. School-wide. PD, slides. Incident. Reports. Staff. Memos, on, them, on the left-hand side and topics, we have a class we have a section for each team so the three to five comment, planet I'm team, the six to eight ela common planning time team. The. Specialist common planning time team etc so. I would definitely recommend using, Google classroom with your students but also at a school to, kind of have one place where you kind of store all your important, documents. And. We'll kind of make it easy for teachers and, staff to find things they need great. John thank you so much for sharing how you use Google classroom, it's. A really, popular. Tool, in the. Boston Public Schools, but. Every. Party really varies, in terms of their expertise, and, comfort. With the tool so. What would you recommend for. Somebody who's like I'm really curious about glue classroom, I want to get started wouldn't, you say I mean it's I think it's as simple as just kind of testing, it out in like, you.
Know True you. Learn a lot the more you do with the the more you learn about how the different ways you can differentiate it and you'd be try different things and, you, know when I first started using this I kind of was posting, assignments just. To all kids and then. As. You get familiar with the features. You. Realize you do so much more you can you know send certain assignment, certain kids. It's. Not just documents you can link you know that, same assignment, that I posted. You could send videos you can attach certain videos or other. Other. Documents, to it so. You're. Better able to support different students, and the. Different learning needs. Absolutely. So one of the pieces that you are shown. Was, how you use Google Docs so, sometimes I find that people might be simply. Substituting. Like The Hobbit PDF, version and then you put things up or they're subpoenaed scanned but, you actually took. The time to. Create something Google Docs it can be small, and adaptable, so, what was that process like I, mean, you know, there's a lot of websites and links out there that have some great resources and then I think, once you just take the time to you. Know cut, it paste it and kind of manipulate, the document, a couple different ways you really feel like you can you. Can do a lot of cool things that can be you. Know you the students needs because, students have a variety of learning challenges, and you. Want to make sure they have access to to. Rigorous and challenging materials. But, I think Google Docs and class. Show allows, you to make. Sure all kids have you. Know are exposed, to those texts but you can have. Really helps you just provide, different. Levels of scaffolding, and support so all kids can. Engage. And challenge of material. Do. You use the comments, feature in, Google Docs or read and write by any chance to provide that just-in-time feedback, with kids yeah so even that's, a reading right it's a great tool you. Know if you're able to cut and paste, you. Know create a, kind. Of paste of reading and printed documents. Google. Will read and write can read actually read the doctor read the the, text for the students for so some students who might have more challenging, with childhood. Decoding, and stuff and. The. Comment section is a great way to give feedback. To. Students on their writing and Google. Classroom now has a good new feature where you can almost. Up. Load, a. Set, of comments kind. Of so on sis when you give you students report card comments, the, a drop-down menu that you could hit now, Google classroom as a feature where. You. Can when you're given feedback to students if you want to pre-populated, with like. A list of possible, comments to provide students, you, can kind of do that and that way it's, a lot of ways you kind of given students a lot of the same type of feedback so, you can kind of make the process a little more efficient, but, then also if you want to make a really personalized, comment with students you, can you could do that as well okay that's. Great to know, and so that's. On the student side I mean I already can think of so many really, fun and interesting ways I mean this is this, is a powerful use of technology, Google classroom, and Google Docs the Google suite of tools because, you can really, not. Just differentiate. Instruction but, you can also personalize it, the kids you gave him a choice for and there's all these different things they can do it's not just Google tools yeah. Yeah. Absolutely and, then you there's. So many websites out there that they do somebody good things I feel like sometimes. I give you overwhelming, but the thing I like about classroom, I feel like it kind of almost brings it all together and, every year they make new changes.
To It to improve it and I, can only imagine where, they're gonna go next with it. Yeah. I really, I'm pass improve, it even if you just used it five months ago they've added some new features and so you think oh wait did I miss this so. It's, really exciting. When I first started using I actually found my students as resources, they're, like oh if you click on that you can you. Know they'll. Make a copy for everyone or they. Just like little things the kids are really computer savvy so they can actually be a support, and resource out there for you as well what. These three I want, to talk about the collaboration piece, with your colleague so how, did you get, them to buy in to using Google classroom to share resources, second. Question is how can you model, by. Collaborating, in this space how they can use at distance. Yes. Is a great question so you know being a classroom teacher who used it we weren't using classroom, as a whole staff there's. So much information we share we sharing, so many emails and there's there's, so many PD, slides and the so many document size sometimes, I think teachers are overwhelmed, because things, are in all different places we kind of wanted to make the place where. Teachers could go to, fight everything they needed so, people needed to find the, Rolling agenda for your CPT meeting, it was there if you wanted to find a. PD. Slide from the previous year that you wanted to go back and look good, it's, in one place if. You need to fill out an incident report on the students you can look at Google Forms, to, classroom, so it's just kind of easily accessible. Because. You know teachers have a lot of responsibilities. They kind of going in, all different directions we want to kind of find, one place where we kind of can store all the. Important information, the. Teachers need. That's. Great and, you feel like by doing this you're sort of modeling for them how they can use it absolutely. They interacted. With as a student, almost like this student physic as a team they, are better, prepared than, usual, with their own students. That's. A really powerful way, to really. Share people share with people how, they, can use this tool because sometimes if you just say oh this is a great tool they're like okay but if you they're engaging in that process that really does arm increase the buy-in absalom.
Well. Thank you so much. And. If. Anyone, else has any questions please leave them in the chat Thank, You Marion Scott one, of the questions I want to ask is, well. Any. Questions that Nick and myself get, option is how, people. Can get started, with using different tools and different technologies, so. Wouldn't be your advice to your teacher who comes to you in the building saying, you know I have this one student I'm struggling, to support them they would kind of advise when you give them in regards to technology years, I think. Sometimes, we take for granted how, much the, students. Actually know already about technology. Nowadays. It's normal for students, to grow up in an environment where technology, is just a part of their everyday existence and. So I think there. Can really be short. Periods of time that are set aside for exploration. Within. Certain parameters you, know like here go into the. Google classroom and. And. Then, play. Around with chatting, with people on the page or, sharing. Ideas, on a document. And. Then the teacher can go around and observe and and quite, possibly learn, I learned something new all the time from students that I work with I think. That technology through Google classroom has been a big incentive for. Some. Students, to with just reading. With. Guided reading in my in my classroom, the children like, look forward, to seeing if I can supplement. What they've read no matter what their reading level is somehow, through Google classroom, and they're. Looking for information through, a padlet, or activities, that they can do to extend the. Guided. Reading lesson, or the book that they're reading so, that's really exciting and I think it's really engaging the kids in learning more today, they actually wanted to tweet to the author that, we were reading about so I let them do it during, their lunch time and it was pretty cool and they're really excited, about it so I guess for teachers who are afraid just take that risk and. See. What happens the kids like Scott, said kids, know way more than we do for the most part, yeah. That's great so, I want to highlight, a couple of things that I heard from each of you so Mary what you're talking about is really collaborative, project-based. Learning, so you're connecting, all these different pieces where, there's, multiple means you know you've had the kids using some tool, set of physical and some better more digital, so. How did you negotiate. Between. That. Well. Having, them get comfortable with the project-based learning first, of all was the most important thing but before they could even do that they, had to build the language in the vocabulary through, the curriculum and that was done through a lot of media through a lot of text different, access, access points, for everybody and as. They got more comfortable talking about what they were building or what they were designing, then. They became more confident, in being able to make the final products, that they were interested, in so, I think just exposure giving, them reap opportunities, during a research center. Vocabulary. Opportunities. Rich, rich. You. Know text text in the classroom, I think to. Go along with what we're doing plays a huge role and then, giving them that further opportunity, to see, their product digitally. And what, they can expand upon. By pointing out and recognizing. And even, in some ways. Clarifying. What they learned from their peers while they were doing it as well which I thought was something that I found interesting when the kids were giving their feedback for. Their products, yeah. That's a really really good. Snapshot. To share thank, you so, Scott with your so you were talking, about the, expert, versus capacity, building do, you find that. You. Prefer. One of the other and has. There been any, kind of pushback. About one or the other in terms of, how you. Choose. Your approach. Well. I do enjoy the. Problem-solving. And the. Satisfaction. Of, providing, some tools and training for, one student or two students, so. It's a satisfying experience but. But. I realized especially from. Taking. Some graduate. Classes that we're. Really missing, the mark on a national, level. Reaching. All the students that we should be reaching, particularly.
When It comes to students with high incidence disabilities. Like learning disabilities, that, there there's, a tremendous. Space. There for us to be filling, with, tools. And it's not necessarily, high technology, tools be looking at how we can expand, on everyone's, knowledge, and use of these, tools so that it becomes a more something. Within the. Grasp of. Most. If not all students, and teachers so. Any, final thoughts wouldn't you want to need people right if you were to say I. Want, you to try. Out something new whom, do you want to share. People, just. Go for it. You. Know right now I'm trying to figure out I'm taking that stem classes at, Lesley and figuring. Out a love learning, around scratch and makey makey and, and, you. Know the kids definitely know, more about that than I do but, I do need to stay ahead of them on those. Things because they're seven and they're. Not always doing what they're supposed to be doing so, I do, I, just, you know take the risk, we're. Never too old to learn and we can learn from the kids as well I think. That's good advice just, take a chance with it a very simple, request. Is, to. Go into a, Google, document and, look, for that little, purple puzzle piece, that. Is the read and write for Google it is a very. Powerful tool. Bar that has been, purchased, by our school district for the entire district. To use including students, and teachers so get. In there and play around those tools and you might surprise yourself there could be some goodies. In there for you they could make your life easier, as a teacher, we. Want to also share some resources with. Everyone, who's been watching tonight's, webinar so. You noticed. That there are a, few tools that we'll discuss tonight, we, have on, here. Six. Featured. Tools there. Was shared tonight we, have padlet. And thinkning. They, were both shared by Mary, O'Brien with. Her second-grade students, we, have Bookshare, and read and wide shared, by Scott Richards and, read and write is also something that John Hines shared as well as Google, Docs and Google classroom. Now, all six of these tools are free and available for everyone in the Boston Public Schools, to use if, you're curious about how to access them, he actually have a link at the very bottom of this very last slide, bitly, slash, tech, inclusion, one nine links, and, this has how. You can access these tools as. Well as some of the fabulous resources. That, John. Scott. And Mary shared with us tonight so once again I want to thank all three of our presenters for, joining us and sharing the expertise, you have any questions, please need them in the chat you, can also reach out to them thank, you and we'll see you next time. You.
2019-03-03 20:48
