INNOVATION TECHNOLOGY EDUCATION

Topics: STEM

In part one of this series, we reflected on the inadequacy of the professional learning model that we see most of the time in education. Teachers receive one day of learning and then are sent on their way. Instead of getting a chance to really work on the model with time to implement and then reflect on the learning, teachers are thrown right back into their classrooms.

Here are the top three issues that were discussed in part one:

1. Professional learning has to be more timely—teachers can’t wait to learn something they need to learn.
2. Professional learning should include opportunities for the teacher to practice and use the strategies, just like we have students do in the classroom.
3. Professional learning should be relevant to the learner. If the teacher believes something doesn’t really apply to them, the leader of the professional learning should work to make it relevant to the audience.

First, we are going to think about how we can make professional learning more timely for staff. It’s true that bringing in a speaker for an entire staff development day is very efficient and can be very impactful, but if your district is like mine, we have these spread out throughout the school year. Teachers often comment that certain times of the year aren’t convenient to be learning something new. I respect their opinion—to an extent, there is never adequate time to practice and implement new things. I think what they mean is that this strategy would have been better earlier in the year or during a period with less going on. There is probably no perfect time for all teachers, so what do we do?

If we take the “I do, we do, you do” instruction model from Explicit Instruction that we discussed in part one, we can think about it in terms of making learning timely for teachers. We can ask ourselves how the “I do” portion can be more timely, and then do the same with the “we do” and then the “you do” portions of this model.

Here are some tips to help you achieve timeliness for your teachers:

I do: This part of the learning is when the teacher gains the knowledge. While full-day workshops are often great for this, they can lack the timeliness that is needed for our teachers. For example, when a teacher would like more information on a topic—like classroom management or an instructional strategy—they have to wait until a local training is available, which can take a while.

One solution is to use online resources for teachers to learn new information. This can be effective in that these can cover just about any topic, are usually professionally made, and are able to meet the needs of teachers in a timely way.

Another opportunity for being more timely is to create on-demand video resources yourself for teachers. I often use this strategy in our district if there is something simple that can be demonstrated over a screencast video. Teachers can watch it when they have time and revisit as needed.

We do: Teachers need the chance to practice and implement the strategies that they have learned. When they return to the classroom, they usually jump right into the next school day and put the new materials to the side. How can we help to prevent this?

First, we can help them to plan and process the information they have learned. When I travel to a conference with others, I sometimes schedule time at the end of the day for us to discuss our next steps and plans. This helps put a timeline to the learning so we don’t put it to the side.

Another model that is very impactful is professional coaching. Some schools have instructional coach positions who do this full time. This is really an ideal way to do “we do” practice in the classroom. The coach can model, co-teach, or just provide feedback to the teacher.

You do: Depending on the topic, the steps above might not be necessary. There are times when the professional learning is something that a teacher can easily implement quickly into the classroom. Even so, it’s good to have a plan or timeline for the “you do” portion of the teacher trying the strategy. This can come from a principal creating a deadline for implementation or from the teacher’s individual plan for how they are going to use it. Essentially, some kind of accountability can be created to ensure that the learning isn’t pushed to the side and not used by the teacher.

Hopefully these tips can help us think differently about how we make professional learning a timely experience for our teachers. Did you miss the first part of our Professional Learning That Works series? Be sure to check it out here.

While you wait for part three, be sure to check out Boxlight’s training and professional development opportunities.>>

You’ve probably heard of STEM—you may even teach STEM in your classroom. The key to students’ success is not only to learn science, technology, engineering, and math, but also to understand how those disciplines apply to the world around them. Students need to develop the critical skills that will prepare them for beyond the classroom, enabling them to be tomorrow’s engineers and innovators.

To help you further your STEM efforts in the classroom, our new and improved STEM guide is now available! We’ve updated the stats, included new articles, refreshed our top ten lists, and added two new lists featuring robotics and coding as well as space. Plus, we dive into the many ways you can bring STEM learning into the classroom, how to engage students in STEM subjects to ensure they’re prepared for careers in these fields, and take a look at the STEM products that are changing the way we teach and students learn.

Here’s a taste of what you’ll find in our new and improved STEM guide:

• Articles: From branching out STEM concepts and creating STEM-focused lessons to why it’s critical to involve girls in STEM, our articles provide valuable insight into STEM learning.
• Top 10 lists: Looking for the best STEM events, tech products, apps, and resources for teaching about space? We’ve got you covered! We’ve also included a list of available funding to help you bring STEM into your classroom even if you’re on a tight budget.
• Infographic: We need a STEM workforce, and our STEM by the Numbers infographic shows just how important STEM learning is for today’s students.
• Robotics: Interested in incorporating robotics in your lessons? Check out our top three considerations for bringing this popular activity to your classroom.
• And more!

STEM occupations have grown 79% since 1990, so it’s imperative that we make STEM a priority for all students. Download our valuable Big Guide to STEM Volume 2 today to discover the many ways to incorporate STEM learning in the classroom!

Many of us probably remember wonderful days in our elementary classroom listening to stories read by our teacher. These stories, whether they were picture books in kindergarten or chapter books in fifth grade, were a major part of my upbringing in elementary school and one of my favorite times of the school day. I distinctly remember in fourth grade listening to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and being sorely disappointed when we watched the movie and the details had changed. I had such a vivid picture in my head of the characters and setting. Our entire class had the collective language of the story that we could talk about and discuss.

Sadly, some teachers see classroom read alouds as a waste of instructional time. And just like everything else in the classroom, if done poorly, these sessions can be very ineffective. So, while it is true that it can be a waste of instructional time, when done well, it is not a waste at all.

More often than not, I feel that classroom read alouds are well worth the investment of time. Everyone loves to be read to—even adults. Look at the popularity of audiobooks and sites like audible.com. These demonstrate that people of all ages love to listen to stories.

So, what makes a good read aloud effective instructional practice? And why should we encourage teachers to read books aloud to students? Here are some of my thoughts:

• Reading fluency is more than just reading quickly: Good readers are able to use timing, tone, inflection, and pausing to make the written word easy to listen to. Students do not come by these skills naturally—they have to learn and practice them. Teachers can model this so that when students read, they can transfer the ability to read with emotion and effect, both orally and when reading silently. In essence, hearing good reading helps students to become better readers themselves.
• Comprehension questions can be embedded: As teachers read the story to the students, they can seamlessly work in comprehension skills. Things like making predictions and drawing inferences can be modeled for all of the students. It’s a great way for the teacher to show students how stories have clues that can help lead us to understand a theme or draw a conclusion.
• Students are exposed to books they might not normally read: Read aloud books are typically rich in some way, shape, or form. They might be full of historical references, rich imagery, or silly humor. Often times, this will ignite an interest in an author or series that the student had never experienced before.
• It gives students a break: This might not be the best reason to do it, but it does serve a purpose. Read alouds fit in well before or after recess and in the spots in the schedule that don’t allow for long periods of instruction. It gives students a way to relax and passively listen for a few minutes in a typically work-filled day.
• It creates a shared love of literature: Most teachers read books aloud that they really love. To spend that much time with a book requires some commitment, so teachers are usually all-in with their selection. By reading something hilarious like the Junie B. Jones series or something emotional like Where the Red Fern Grows, teachers can share their love of the story with their students. The last two pages of To Kill a Mockingbird get me every time, but I loved reading them to my students every year.
• Teachers can model a growth mindset: Even teachers make mistakes. As I read the books aloud to my high school students, I would make mistakes from time to time. This allowed me to model that I wasn’t perfect—mistakes are signs of growth, and we can roll through anything that might come up.

There are other good reasons to read books and stories aloud to students in the classroom. Pure enjoyment should be reason enough to kick back and read a great book, but it is also a great practice educationally for a number of reasons. Hopefully, our students have wonderful memories of being read to just as I did when I was a student.

Want to connect with fellow educators to discuss topics like this, find engaging lesson plans, and share your ideas? Consider joining MimioConnect™, our interactive teaching community.

As we inch closer to 2020, we can look back at the significant strides and innovations in educational technology and the ways EdTech has redefined traditional education in the first two decades of the 21st century. Technology has become an integral part of the everyday learning process, with students, teachers, parents, and administrators all using important devices and software each day to increase efficiency and improve learning outcomes.

After so much growth in the EdTech industry and the creation of a surplus of EdTech products, it’s hard to imagine how much room the industry still has to grow. Yet new educational technology solutions are being discovered every day to help educators and students improve the learning process and achieve success. These emerging trends are the EdTech solutions of the future and will have a bold impact on the industry in the next decade.

Here are five emerging EdTech trends you should watch for this year:

1. Alternate Realities: Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, and Mixed Reality

The first educational stride in the alternate reality trend came with the affordability and accessibility of Google Cardboard, which allowed students to convert their personal devices into virtual reality (VR) simulators. This enables students to visually experience valuable learning opportunities—such as observing a surgery or exploring a historic monument—as if they are actually there. Augmented reality (AR) is currently a hot topic in the EdTech space, with many innovative resources popping up on the market for students and teachers to take advantage of all of its possibilities. AR is technology that digitally places interactive elements in the real world, simulating objects that are right in front of students, typically through the camera of a smartphone or other handheld personal device. Finally, mixed reality (MR) has begun to make its debut in the classroom, enabling students to experience a virtual environment that is superimposed on the physical environment. MR shows great potential for the educational technology market, with predicted global growth of 90% until 2021.

2. On-Demand Education and Independent Learning

Students—particularly those in high school—have begun taking greater ownership of their education, becoming more independent as learners. In the classroom, this has resulted in an increase in blended learning models, allowing students to complete online work in their own time. Additionally, teachers have had to rethink their lesson plans in order to engage Generation Z students, who rank video lessons as their preferred learning tool over learning apps and printed books. Greater student autonomy has also led to an increasing population of students who choose to attend online or blended learning schools, along with a greater social acceptance of these alternative learning paths.

3. Digital Security and Student Data Privacy

Student safety is always going to be a top priority in schools, and many new EdTech solutions have emerged to support schools’ missions to keep students safe. From fingerprint and facial recognition software to digital student safety monitoring services, schools are striving for ultimate digital security to protect students and faculty both in and out of the classroom.

Student data privacy is also a top concern for schools, especially amid countless cybersecurity breaches and ransomware attacks on schools within the first half of 2019. Districts and administrators are searching for new ways to protect sensitive student data from being breached in a hack—especially their personally identifiable information such as name, address, and birth date. An ever-growing collection of resources to support student data privacy have also emerged, such as the Education Privacy Resource Center, FERPA|Sherpa.

4. Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the use of computer programming to imitate human thought and decision-making by analyzing data, solving and anticipating problems, and learning and adapting to different tasks through another computing process known as machine learning. Other than being a complicated concept to grasp, AI has critical uses in the education space, including personalizing learning for every student, analyzing and interpreting student data, and improving teacher efficiency. Machine learning—an aspect of AI that is also seen in learning analytics—also has an important place in the future of EdTech, particularly in its ability to decrease teacher time spent doing administrative tasks, predict future student outcomes, and develop personalized learning plans for students.

5. Robotics and Programming

Science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) subjects are the foundation of the future careers of today’s K-12 students. With careers in STEM fields on the rise faster than the average growth for non-STEM jobs in the US, students will have to step up to higher-level technical careers in order to feed the growing market. With this in mind, it’s important that students are learning the STEM skills necessary today to be successful in college and future careers, including fundamental coding and programming skills and their functional connection with robotics. Many innovative products and software have been designed to aid teachers in supporting students’ programming and robotics journeys, such as the Mimio MyBot educational robotics system, which offers a digital programming interface along with physical robotics and engineering elements.

These topics are just a few of the big trends that will become the EdTech solutions of the future, changing the educational technology space for years to come. What trends do you expect to emerge and have a significant impact on EdTech in the future? Let us know in the comments below, and be sure to subscribe to our Educator blog to receive the latest news and trends!

En la Universidad Hispanoamericana utilizan nuestra herramienta en línea, English Discoveries, para que los estudiantes avancen y aprendan el idioma inglés.

Esta herramienta es una solución integral para el aprendizaje del idioma inglés basada en tecnología, que atiende las necesidades pedagógicas, administrativas y tecnológicas de las instituciones académicas y ministerios de educación. Al ofrecer distintos modelos de implementación, tanto de aprendizaje mixto como de aprendizaje a distancia, esta solución “llave en mano” incorpora enfoques pedagógicos y metodologías de aprendizaje probas en el campo, en combinación con tecnologías de aprendizaje interactivas de punta, lo que crea un ambiente ideal para el éxito del estudiante.

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Five-year-old T enjoys programming Cubetto and watching the effect of his actions. He especially enjoys using Cubetto on one of the beautiful World Maps (playmats). Ru (age 2) is very young so mostly likes trying to get puzzle bits in the holes in any random order or position, pressing the button and frequently turning the robot over to watch the wheels move in responseto the pressing of the button.

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