Pam Hubler
  • Home
    • About Me
  • Blog
  • Wakelet Collections
  • Hire Me

Planning For A Year Like No Other!

8/23/2020

2 Comments

 
Picture

Planning for the 20-21 School Year

One thing we all have in common right now is that we have NO IDEA how to plan for this year.  While chatting with some educator friends last week, we decided it's a no-checklist kind of year.  Don't get me wrong, we'll have tons on our to-do list, but there isn't a checklist to follow to make back to school easy because no one has done it before!
​So here's my attempt at making this year less painful...
​
As a coach, I'm trying my hardest to gather things that will help my teachers through an interesting mix of face-to-face and virual learning. They were just getting the hang of the virtual part, then we had to throw in the face-to-face part. That's out of our control, so we are going to try to make the best of it! My first thought was to help them create a workflow to their day so they aren't "live" all day, but they can include their virtual students during the most important times. Below are some guiding questions I found from NIET that might help with the planning process. In our school, we'll also be setting up a clickable schedule where teachers and students can click on the link they need at the right time to join a live meeting with their class. To start with, we'll be setting up a morning, mid-day, and afternoon time that's required. The rest of the live times (since you can't always plan the best teachable moments) will be linked in Google Classroom for easy acces. I'll be posting more after we officially start school to try it out. 

Guiding Questions for Planning Virtual Lessons

✅​ Helpful Resources:

Google has been sharing a ton of resources to help educators make the best of our current situation and new trends that have surfaced to meet the needs of our students.  Here are a few that can be shared with families since they will be in this with us.  I'm thinking these would be great to share in your first newsletter or virtual introduction for the year. 
Google Junior Training Series
Tech Tool Kit for Families/Guardians
Family Engagement Best Practices
If you are a GSuite district, there are tons of tools you can use to help make your instruction easy to navigate whether or not you are face-to-face, virtual, or a mix of both. Here are the tools & Extentions I have found really useful since last March when all this started. 
​

📅​ Google Calendar

Google Calendar can be a life saver for you when you are working in a digital enviroment.  Using calendar events with a Google Meet link can make it much easier to keep track of time. I have notifications settings for anywhere from 15 to 5 minutes before an event to make sure I stay on schedule.  Here are a few posts and resources that might help you if this sounds like something that will help your workflow (including a link to my post on surviving remote learning). 
Google Tips for Coaches: Shake Up Learning
Google Calendar Help
Screenshot from one of my posts
Screenshot from my post "5 Rules for Surviving Remote Learning"

🎥​ Google Meet

There's a few different ways to use Google Meet. Right now, the safest way to use it with students is to either go to meet.google.com and create a nicknamed meet from there, or use the Google Meet link in Google Classroom (which also serves as a nicknamed meet where students can't join without the teacher). Below I've linked Eric Curts Google Meet series so you can choose what you need to know. 
Google Meet & Google Classroom
Google Meet : Eric Curts
Google Meet Tips for Educators

🖼️ Google Slides 

Google Slides is one of my favorite Google tools! It's not just about making presentations pretty, but making them effective and engaging.
Some of the ways you can use Google Slides to help you teach right now can include:
  • Lesson Plan "Hub" -Slidesmania Templates FREE & amazing! 
  • Hyperdocs -Hyperdocs.co  
  • Student Portfolios -Google Slides Template Gallery
  • Student Blogs - #ditchbook style
  • Self-Paced Formative Assessment -How to Create a Quiz in Google Slides
  • Chose your own adventure - Choice Stories, Choose Your Own Adventure
I could go on, but that might give you some ideas on how to use Google Slides differently than you may have used it before. Each one is linked to a resource that can help you get started! 
​​

👩‍💻​ Google Classroom

I won't even try to create my own resources for Google Classroom tutorials when I have access to Kasey Bell's resources! Check out all that she has to offer here.  Also, she has an amazing Google Classroom Master class (that I've taken myself) that includes EVERYTHING you would need to know, and then some.    If you are new to Google Classroom, do yourself a favor and take this course (which is on sale right now, because she's awesome like that)! 
Here's the link to the course if the free resources linked above isn't enough for you. 

Another thing I'd recommend is to listen to her latest Podcast on "How to Create Google Classroom Blended Learning Lessons" (part 3 of a great back-to-school series).


🖱️Extensions

Some of my favorite extensions to use with the apps mentions above are linked below.  
  • Google Meet Grid View
  • Google Meet Attendance
  • Mote: Voice notes & feedback
  • Screencastify
  • Add to Google Classroom
  • Add to Wakelet
  • Classwork Zoom for Google Classroom  *Paid service, free extension
  • Extensity *MUST have to keep your computer from running too slow with lots of active extensions. You can turn them on and off easily as you need them! ​

🔗​ Wakelet, Edpuzzle, SeeSaw, and Flipgrid

These aren't Google tools, but they are sites we will be using a lot this year! As I've mentioned before, I use Wakelet for my #PottyPD and our school newsletter. We also started using it as a "hub" for lesson plans. Here's a post on some of the many ways you can use Wakelet. 

Flipgrid is an amazing tool to keep your kids engaged and seeing each other even if they aren't in the school building with you. One of my favorite app smashing ideas is to start your Wakelet off with a Flipgrid short (embeded in Wakelet alread) to add your personality into your Wakelet collections. Want to know more about Flipgrid? You can check out the tons of resources already created for educators here.

SeeSaw! I haven't used SeeSaw myself much, but I know our K-2 teachers LOVE it! We bought a subscription for our teachers to use this year and they are super excited! I'll be able to share more on how we use it soon.  In the meantime, check out their resources for educators here.   
​

💡​It's about the instruction & pedagogy, not just the tool!

As with any technology integration, you have to think about the purpose before you pick the tool.  Here's a Toolkit from Shake Up Learning that will help you plan engaging lessons regardless of the tools you choose to support "Dynamic Learning" in your classroom. Just make sure to not overwhelm yourself and keep self-care on your calendar.  I'd also love to hear what you are doing to try to keep yourself same this year.  Tag me on Twitter or comment below with you thoughts! ~Pam 
2 Comments
Kathleen Garnett
8/27/2020 07:26:10 am

Hi Pam!
Hope you have a great year!!

Reply
Pam link
8/27/2020 09:33:41 pm

Thanks Kathleen! I wish you were still there with us! :)

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Picture

    Author

    I'm an Innovative Learning Coordinator in Berkeley County South Carolina and a Google Certified Trainer.  
    I have 25 years of experience teaching K-8 special ed., General Ed., and instructional & technology coaching. 
    ​Since I enjoy technology more than some, I started this blog for educators who love it too. Thanks for visiting! 

    Archives

    August 2022
    July 2022
    July 2021
    May 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    October 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    August 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    September 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    November 2017
    October 2017
    August 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    February 2017
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    September 2015
    August 2015
    March 2015
    January 2015
    November 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014

    Short Cuts

    All
    Apps
    Back To School
    Bitmojis
    Blended Learning
    Blogging Buddies
    Blogs
    Books
    Choice Board
    Chrome
    Close Reading
    Coaching
    Conferences
    COVID-19
    Edcamp
    Edmodo
    Edtechteam
    #educoach
    End Of The Year
    E-Text
    FETC
    Google
    Google Calendar
    Google Certified Trainer
    Google Classroom
    Google Docs
    Google Drawings
    #GoogleET
    Google Forms
    Google Keep
    Google Sheets
    Google Slides
    GSuite
    #GSuiteEDU
    #GSuiteUDL
    HyperDocs
    ISTE
    Lesson Planning
    My One Word
    NotAtISTE
    Personalized Learning
    PLC's
    PledgeCents
    PLN
    Podcasts
    #PottyPD
    Productivity
    Professional Development
    Remote Learning
    Sketchnoting
    Slides
    Social Media
    Summer
    Twitter
    UDL
    Videos
    Wakelet
    Websites

    RSS Feed

    Tweets by @specialtechie
Proudly powered by Weebly
Pam Hubler ~ Instructional Coach, Daniel Island School, Berkeley County School District ~ @specialtechie
  • Home
    • About Me
  • Blog
  • Wakelet Collections
  • Hire Me