Actively Learn also has a very robust Help Center to answer your questions on the fly!

​Don’t forget about the EdTech Office Hours for teachers! We are available 7am-4pm Monday-Friday to help with your Actively Learn and other digital tool questions. Find the link for Office Hours and other EdTech resources here!

​School libraries are often considered the hub or heart of the school community. Frequently, their goal centers around the ability to provide the essential resources that empower students to become lifelong learners, with an avid love of reading.

​When you picture a school library typically it is the stillness and quiet of books and print resources that first come to mind, but in 2020 the school library is so much more.  Today’s library continues to embrace and promote reading at its core, but also promotes creativity, communication, collaboration, and innovation through a multitude of ever adapting activities including programming and Computer Science, STEM and Makerspace, Book Clubs, and Geek Squads.  Technology integration is a part of the fabric in the libraries of today.  In March of 2019 the demand for access to digital resources changed.    As we have long anticipated, technology has found it’s space as an essential resource in education next to paper, pencil and textbooks.  It is not the only tool but it is an essential tool in the 21st century.

This blog post is by Tracy Peronard, a math teacher at Dakota Ridge High School. She has had a fascinating career track and shares some amazing insights into how Book Creator can be used for creative instruction and to set examples for students when using Jeffco Digital Tools. 

Tracy has been teaching in Jeffco for nine years, eight of which have been at Dakota Ridge. She is from Atlanta, GA. and has a BS in Management from Georgia Tech. Tracy also completed a post-baccalaureate program at Georgia State University in Secondary Mathematics Education and is working to finish her Masters in Mathematics in the fall. Tracy and her husband moved to Littleton, CO. in 1998 where she was a stay at home mom for the first few years. In 2001, she went to work for the Lakewood Police Department as an Investigative Technician. She then left the LPD in 2010 and returned to the classroom. Her son graduated from Dakota Ridge in 2011 and her daughter graduated from Lakewood High School in 2014. She likes to run, play soccer, and go to the gym.

Tracy currently teaches trigonometry and Integrated Math 3. The Math 3 class is comprised entirely of juniors who are working on a math Capstone Project to fulfill the new graduation requirement. Tracy uses technology almost everyday in her math classroom. Thank you Tracy for sharing your expertise with us!

WeVideo is one of the core digital tools for staff and students in Jeffco this year. As a result, students and staff have access to a wide range of opportunities to engage in deeper learning activities that personalize and authenticate learning through film and multimedia. Getting started with WeVideo is fairly straight forward and there are plenty of resources such as the WeVideo MMTS to help you get started. (Click on the image below to open the MMTS and start exploring.) However, getting started with using film creation and WeVideo for authentic tasks can be a little more challenging. Here we hope to provide a few ideas and inspirations to help you get started. 

Capturing and creating videos as part of instruction can seem daunting at first however, it's doesn't need to be a complicated process. One approach is to begin with photo stories. Challenging students to capture or collect photos that tell a specific story and compiling those photos together with a narrative or background music allows us to practice compiling stories and using video editing tools. Photo stories can be about academic content such as a historical time period, scientific or mathematical processes, or about how to maintain a healthy lifestyle. They can also be about personal things such as our daily journey to school or our family history. Everyone has different perspectives so our photo stories can be shared to deepen the learning and understandings.

One of the biggest challenges to using technology in classrooms is to ensure it is not a distraction from the larger goals of learning and content mastery. A great way to begin addressing these challenges is to empower students to lead their own learning. As students gain foundational understandings of content, they can be challenged with application of the content and creating products to share their learning and additional understandings. For example in mathematics, we often ask students to memorize key facts and processes but seldom challenge them with application and sharing of the learning. We can empower students to lead their learning by asking them to look for examples in their lives where they can apply the content they're learning and capture those applications to tell their stories. With this challenge, students gain deeper understandings of why content is needed and ways in which it fits into their worlds. Students can then share their creative stories of content application with each other, another class, or students at another school, which leads to deeper learning of the content. 

One of the essential skills across many content areas involves the ability to effectively conduct research and compile our findings so we can form argumentative or persuasive claims. As humans, we regularly find ourselves in situations where multiple views are represented and the need to understand and respond respectfully to others is a foundational aspect of any democracy. As students conduct research and capture evidence that supports their claims, they can put together short films with photos or video clips to support their stance. When sharing with each other, students have access to practice listening and summarizing skills that lead can lead to civic and global engagement or the continued development of communication skills necessary to succeed in settings beyond the classroom. 

Teachers are experts at creating links between outcomes and learning which drives us all to the continuous search for new ideas and strategies. Here are a few tips to consider as you begin to design learning opportunities involving film and multimedia: 

1. ​Keep it short. No one likes to watch lengthy films unless they are coming from Hollywood or experienced film makers. The most difficult films to make are often the shortest ones because getting content that tells a great story into small time frames is challenging. Limit the films to minutes at most to keep them interesting, anything over a few minutes is far too long and students won't want to watch them. A great place to start is 60 seconds or less and work up from there. 
2. Don't forget the planning. Great films aren't just put together on a whim, they often involve months if not years of planning and revising. Setting goals and involving planning processes such as outlining, drafting, storyboarding, and deadlines, are essential to creating films that will captivate an audience. Editing and revising are also essential components that need not be forgotten. It's critically important that students understand how planning and revising are components of all processes we engage in. 
3. Group work is easier.  It's rare to see people doing great things alone, there are often multiple people involved. Providing students opportunities to work in groups when creating films will make outcomes more attainable and lead to better products. Group work also provides opportunities to develop collaboration skills. Working with others is essential to success in any environment and students need practice. Getting captures worthy of being involved in a final film product takes time and work and it's much easier to have multiple people capturing different things. This provides options for choice and the more we have to choose from the better the final product will be. Lastly, sometimes there is a need for a camera person, a director, or an editor, and working in groups makes all of these roles easier to fill as students learn to collaborate together. 
4. Portions of the work needs to extend beyond the classroom. Capturing for film should always be done outside of a classroom. Students see their classrooms everyday so capturing them is certainly no novelty. Classroom time can be used for planning, revising, and compiling however, much of film work will take place beyond the wall or outside the school. This can be a replacement for homework but shouldn't be called homework. The term "homework" has many negative connotations so terms such as capturing or filming can be used instead. Students often love to use their phones (or their parents phones) outside of school and the purpose of capturing for films makes the use of their phones interesting and purposeful, as well as, authentic. Rather than spending time scrolling through social media feeds or messaging with friends, students can find joy and purpose in figuring out ways they want to tell their stories. 
5. Celebrate the successes and challenges. There will be many successes but there will also be many challenges and celebrating both will help students want to continue honing their film skills. When students realize they didn't get the capture they wanted or something is missing, they will face opportunities to reflect and create new practices so they avoid those situations in the future. Call it building resilience, learning from our mistakes, or something else, these opportunities are priceless moments for growth and they need to be celebrated. The first film products might be a little rough around the edges but what are the areas of growth and the new learning that comes from those final products? Students will excel if we allow them time and space to reflect on their work and identify what they will do differently in the future. 
6. Don't forget about the laws. With film and multimedia come a wide range of copyright laws and it's important to know what is permissible and what is forbidden. There are plenty of royalty free options for music and images and helping students understand where to find them is useful. A great resource to help you with finding them is your DTL (Digital Teacher Librarian), they have expertise that is invaluable in these areas. We have some increased rights for using multimedia when it comes to education however, as students become more engaged in capturing and sharing their learning, it will be vital for them to understand where the lines are drawn in regards to copyrights. It's also important for them to understand so they can protect their own work as they grow into more experienced film makers. Ultimately, it's a great lesson in citizenship and ethics that will help them throughout their entire lives.
7. Look for ways to authentically challenge your students. There are a variety of options for students to begin engaging in authentic challenges when it comes to film. The Denver Film Festival has created opportunities for high school students to be a part of the festival each year by attending the festival for a day and being involved in a film competition if they so choose. You can register a group of students to attend this year's festival for free by visiting this link. At the festival, students have opportunities to engage with professionals in the industry to learn tips and tricks, as well as, possible careers in film. If you would like more information about the Denver Film Festival opportunities, contact Nick Steinmetz (nick.steinmetz@jeffco.k12.co.us). Digital Promise also has a great FilmMAKER Challenge and 360 Degree Filmmakers Challenge for students. Check out some of the student film products on the Digital Promise Student Film page or share them with your students to provide inspiring looks at how other students around the world are sharing their learning through film. 

Back in July, Teach Thought published a short piece on 6 Powerful Strategies for Deeper Learning in Your Classroom by Dr. Monica Martinez who is one of the leading experts on deeper learning. These 6 strategies are a great way to get students engaged in learning that involves their passions and interests. Film creation can be used in a variety of ways to implement and achieve all 6 strategies. As students are challenged to create films demonstrating their knowledge and understandings, they are provided additional opportunities to share their learning. Not every film needs to be publicly shared, there might be some short films that are simple reflections allowing us to go back and revisit some of the learnings we gained. Think of them more as selfie videos that are for the purpose of journaling or compiling a personal narrative. Ultimately, remembering the last strategy of "Making Technology the Servant, Not the Master" will help us leverage the power of film in more ways. As we use technology to capture and tell stories rather than consume them, we will be the masters of the digital tools we use and the time in front of a screen will have far greater purpose and outcomes. 

Looking for more ideas on how to use film in your instruction? The WeVideo blog is a great place to find ideas and examples. 

Pear Deck is an online tool that provides formative assessment in real time.  It's web-based so it works on any device.  Teachers are able to check for understanding in their classroom through a variety of question types.  When teachers use Pear Deck they are able to adapt instruction based on student understanding and students can receive feedback in real time.

Pear Deck is an Add-on that works with Google Slides so it is easy to use! We have automatically added it for  you in Google Slides! To utilize Pear Deck, you can create a new Google Slides presentation or add Pear Deck to an existing presentation.  Once you've opened the Pear Deck Add-on, you can create your own questions or use the Template Library.

Pear Deck Math Templates

Here are some great ways to start using Pear Deck in your classroom:​

• ​Add a questions to existing Google Slides through  "Ask Students a Question" 
• Use a Beginning of Lesson template to get a discussion started in the classroom.
• Take a pulse of the classroom using the draggable slide
• Use the Newsela Daily Deck for a ready to teach activity 
• Use vocabulary lists and play Flashcard Factory

Pear Deck is designed so that all students are engaged in the learning.  Students answer questions in real time and teachers are able to give quick, immediate feedback to the students.  Teachers can see who is answering and able to project student responses that are anonymous.  Through the teacher dashboard, teachers can see each student's responses.  Teachers can even add a question on the fly to help alleviate misconceptions or get additional information from the class. At the end of the session, teachers are able to publish student takeaways.  These takeaways are sent to the students and the teachers.   

After creating your slides or adding your questions, it's time to present.  Make sure to use the green present with Pear Deck Button. When you Present with Pear Deck, your students will join your class with a code and your lesson can get underway.  Pear Deck is a great tool to get students and staff engaged in their learning.  Being a Google Add-on allows anyone to create a Pear Deck slide presentation.  Contact your Ed Tech Specialist or your Digital Teach Librarian to get started using Pear Deck.

​To aid in the transition with 1:1 devices as a new pilot program at Pomona High School, I was apart of a cohort lead by EdTech Specialist Nick Steinmetz. Nick challenged the members of the group to take risks and learn with their students. We were charged with Transforming the Task in our classroom in new ways that were not available before the chromebooks were assigned to our students. I decided to transform the unit on graphing parabolas. My goal was to leave the unit with students being able to answer the question: “How can graphing parabolas help me make decisions?”

My love of STEM came about a couple of years ago. I was in my 11th year teaching,  and it was the first time in my career that I was actually considering leaving the profession. I was unhappy, and my passion was gone; how could my students learn if I wasn’t passionate?

​Everything changed during a school technology committee meeting when I was tasked with figuring out why teachers were not using our 3D printer. There was just one problem…I had no idea how to use a 3D printer. My school was, and is, a STEM school, but we were still in the very beginning stages of trying to figure out what that meant.

I started little by little. First, I taught myself how to use the printer; then how to print something. Finally, I tried creating my own model to print. Everyday I was a little bit happier. It was fun, and I started including students in my learning process. We learned how to fail together and succeed together. It was a long and slow process, and I had a lot of help from Jacquie Adkins, a Jeffco TOSA who specializes in science. We found a program called Maker’s Empire that made creating and printing 3D models easy for first graders to use!  Students’ behavior improved because they were engaged and motivated to design and print their own models.

I figured if changing the student task through 3D printing was working so well, maybe I should try adding other STEM-related tasks to my students’ learning experience. Through code.org, I learned coding and then taught my students how to code. The more I learned, the more I integrated it into my classroom.  As a result, my students’ were more engaged and their behavior continued to improve. Students learned that failure is a part of the learning process and started using it to fix their mistakes. I also noticed that they were much more willing to take risks because they knew that our classroom was a safe place, whether their answers were right or wrong.

STEM is changing the landscape of our teaching in a good way. It allows us to are create an environment where students can learn and fail forward without fear of receiving bad grades. It gives choice to students and encourages them to learn real-world skills that they will be able to transfer to jobs they will have in the future. Teachers can weave STEM into every content area and grade level. It's is not just a subject, it is how I teach and how my students learn.  As educators, we need to take a risk to transform the task and continue to better adapt our teaching. STEM changed how I taught and I became a better teacher because of that.