Diary of a Digital Learning Coach

While Thanksgiving break was beyond needed and appreciated, did anyone else come back to school with more than just turkey leftovers weighing you down?  I'm not talking about the extra pounds we added from all that pumpkin pie, I'm talking about my overfull email inbox. Yep, it's that time of year when my inbox tends to get pretty scary.  That's why I am linking up with my friends, Monica and Kelly over at CHS to share some top tips for email management. Check out their post, "No Good Ever Comes From Clicking Reply All" over at Teacher Tech Tools in 2.   Want to learn what my favorite email feature is right now?  Check out the comments on their blog and while you are there, leave one of your favorite tips too!

Did you know?  The Pic Collage app has some settings that you can enable to eliminate web searches and social features?   Simply find Pic Collage in your Settings App Disable social features and web searches And voila! Your learners will not see as much of the extra "noise" in the app! Why is this important?  Well, we want our learners to get used to searching for images that are copyright free and age appropriate.  Our librarians are AWESOME resources in how to use some of our great library databases including Image Quest for this.  Also, but eliminating the social features, we ensure that learners can focus only on their content and creativity. Have questions?  Just let me know!  

I know we are all in "turkey mode", counting the days until we wear our comfy pants and watch football, but truthfully I am just as excited for the weeks after break.   In district? Contact me with questions on how to attend! Not only is my team offering a DLC PLN Launch Party event to kick start professional learning networks within our district (see image on the left), but the HOUR OF CODE is coming!! You might remember my passion for the Hour of Code from last year when I posted about it here and here . This year, my awesome team has built up some awesome resources to support our educators and learners as we once again celebrate the week of December 4-10th. All educators Pre-K-12 are invited to sign up for Hour of Code and check out the resources below! Sign up for the Hour of Code K-12 Resources for educators curated by the Coppell DLCs K-2 Choice board for learners 3-5th grade Choice Board for Learners Are you in CISD?  All of these resou...

The following information is from CISD Director of Instructional Technology, Nancy Garvey. Recently, the Digital Learning Coaches reviewed the instructional relevance of enabling the Airdrop feature on shared iPads and determined that the feature continues to be valid in an educational setting. AirDrop allows Macbooks and iOS devices to share files wirelessly via bluetooth. Listed below are some ways that you may consider using Airdrop in your classroom: Airdropping a website from one iPad to another, which is great if they want to bookmark to read later Quickly collect digital assignments (Notability notes, products created with other iOS apps) Share learner in-progress work on a projector/presentation station Educators can send documents, assignment details, presentations to learners Return feedback in the form of notes to learners Facilitate guided or small group instruction and share information between educators and learners Send an image or crea...

There's some articles out there that talk about the October wall for educators.  Inevitably we come down off the highs of the new school year, the excitement of building new relationships and the general fast pace of the new school year.   We get tired, we feel like the battles are more uphill, we wonder if we are truly seen or if what we are doing is even the "right" thing. We don't get this way because we are bad educators.  We get this way because we are GREAT educators. When things get hard, its not because we are less.  Maybe its because the things we are doing are important. Kid President says, "It's ok to be sad...it reminds you what you care about."  What if we subbed the words stressed, overwhelmed, tired, etc. in for sad?  What if we knew that "the wall" means we care deeply and we focused a little energy on building a network of support to help each other over the wall? Last week, instead of celebrating the work we h...

I'm working on a post for later this week that is a combo of reflection and ideas for us as we move into the holiday time of year.  It's not quite done yet, but I figured that while you are anxiously waiting, you might still want to learn something today.  Thank GOODNESS for awesome teammates! Let's link up with my fellow DLC, Megan Kozar , to learn about some awesome time savers in Google Crome! Chrome Shortcuts by Megan at the Lightbulb Lab Do you share our love of Google Chrome?  Tell me what features you can't live without in the comments!

If you have been following my Twitter feed lately, you've seen me use #gratitude a lot. It is because my team has challenged ourselves to spend 21 days of gratitude. I'm finding it is helping me see my world using a lens of positivity and growth. Speaking of gratitude, we’ve now entered November, and what better time for our learners to celebrate our gratitude than the month of Thanksgiving? "Attitude of Gratitude" Wall in Stephanie Shannon's 2nd grade space at RJL My teammate, Sam Neal , has created a FlipGrid just for that purpose. We are inviting you all to share your own gratitude and to use this is a reflection space for your learners! There are 21 Days of Gratitude sentence stems on the FlipGrid if anyone would like to use that as inspiration or to help the learners express what they’re grateful for. Feel free to use this resource or ignore it completely! A neat feature you might also explore with your learners is the ability to resp...