Author: naoumd

Educational Blog Post #3

Google and all its helpful tools

Google Apps/ Docs 

Category: Workflow and Scheduling/ Collaboration and Co-Creation

Uses: Meeting organization, scheduling, sharing, collaborative learning spaces, sharing outcomes.

As a teacher or a student a Google Account will be one of the most useful tools you could possibly have. Creating a Google account is free, quick, easy, and has nothing but benefits as a learner and a educator. One of the great things about Google Apps and Doc is that as long as you are connected to the internet your work will be saved automatically so you will no longer lose your work that you worked so hard on.

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Google Apps is a group of web-based messaging and collaboration applications that Google has developed. Googles Apps is a service provided from google rather than a software that needs to be downloaded and install to the devices. Accessing these application is simple all you have to do is use a web browser on a computer that’s connected to the Internet. This allows anyone with access to the internet to use this tool. Using Google Apps in the classroom will allow the teachers and students to connect through sharing docs, spreadsheets, presentations, and creating online forms to capture and share information. Google Groups is a part of Google Apps. Google Groups is a way of simplifying emails and containing specific grouping. Google Classroom is another group app that teacher and students can both access this allow teachers to post homework, test, quizzes, grades and much more in the “classroom” so the students can access this information from anywhere. Google Forms is a quick easy way for teachers to make online test and quizzes for students to take. Google Forms will grade the test or quiz right away and give the students immediate feedback.

Google Docs one of the Google Apps that is very useful in the classroom. Google Docs is a word processor included in all Google accounts. Google Docs is a web-based software office suite offered by Google within its Google Drive service. This service also includes Google Sheets and Google Slides, a spreadsheet and presentation program respectively. Google Docs makes it easy to share work and work together in groups to complete a task. By using Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides students will be able to share their work with other students and peer review/edit each others work. Students can also share their work with their teacher in order for her/him to add notes or edit the students work. Students can also share their work with a group and create group projects that all the the students can work on from anywhere when logged in to their Google account. Check the link below to see Google Docs being used in the classroom. Google Docs, Slides, and Sheets is a awesome tool for group work in the classroom. Lastly, teachers can use Google Docs, Slides, and Sheets to share work amongst each other and collaborate different ideas, provide feedback to one another,  and share differnt teaching strategies.

Google Docs is a Google App but Google Apps is much more than just Google Docs.

Google Docs being used in the classroom:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzWTgt8TKRw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_GzOdgDxMs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wx_-StjDelU

 

The link below will lead you to a sample lesson plan that uses Google Docs.

5th Grade:

https://www.education.com/lesson-plan/e-etiquette-and-digital-dialogue/

2nd Grade:

https://www.education.com/lesson-plan/dissecting-stories-analyzing-story-elements/

Educational Blog Post #2

How to get fired from using technology?

It is not as hard as you would think….

It is 2019 and technology is a huge part of our lives. 10-20 years ago no one would have thought that they could lose their job from posting on social media but today it is becoming a common occurrence. Every case is very different from the next and not all cases I would agree with are necessary for the teachers to lose their jobs.

5 ways you can get fired for using technology are….

  1. Posting pictures- something as simple as posting a picture of you drinking alcohol can cause you to lose your job (check case #3 below). Some things you do on your own time should not be photographed and posted to social media, if these things land in to the wrong hands you could end up losing your job.
  2. Posting racial comments-  being considered racist is absolutely unacceptable in all work places. Workers should keep their racial thoughts and comments to themselves and not on their social media. Anything posted that can be considered every slightly racist cant result in the loss of your job. (check post #2)
  3. Bad Mouthing People- talking badly about your boss, job, or friends on social media can result in loss of your job. Keep your negative comments and trash talk off of your social media pages.
  4. Sharing Confidential information- information about yourself or others that is confidential is not to be posted on social media or talked about. If you are found guilty of this your job could be on the line.
  5. Posting while at work- most jobs have a policy that states that you are not allowed to use social media during work hours. If you are caught posting on social media during these hours you could be at risk of losing your job.

Case #1

https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/colorado-teacher-placed-on-leave-over-demeaning-tweet-aimed-at-covington-st

Friday January 25th, 2019

The headline reads “Colorado teacher places on leave over demeaning tweet aimed at Covington student.”

Michelle Grissom a history teacher and union rep in the Douglas County School District was placed on leave after a social media post that was linked to her caused furor. Michelle Grissom incorrectly identified a student depicted in a viral video of the January 18 encounter of Catholic students with a counter-protester at the March for Life in Washington D.C. Her posts on twitter misidentified a student as a member of “Hitler Youth.” Grissom posted on her twitter which was now deleted “His name is Jay Jackson,”  “His twitter account is closed to non followers so we won’t interfere with his training #HitlerYouth.” The student who she identified in the video was not even in Washington at the time of the video.

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John Jackson the father of the wrongly identified student Jay Jackson began tweeting in his sons defense that this was not a video of his son. He claimed that because of Michelle’s tweet her son was bullied and harassed.

 

 

In this case twitter was the cause of this teacher being put on leave. Was it a honest mistake incorrectly identifying this student? I would say mostly like it was not intentional but she made the choice to put the students name on social media in a negative manner and now she is paying the consequences of her actions. My advice is to think before you tweet. What are your thoughts on this case? Should she lose her job completely? or return to work?

 

Case #2

https://www.nola.com/northshore/index.ssf/2018/09/slidell_high_teacher_fired_ove.html

September 11th, 2018

This head line reads “Slidell teacher no longer employed after posting Nike ad Facebook comments”.

Valerie Scogin who taught math at Slidell High School for 10 years lost her job due to a comment she posted on her facebook regarding the famous Colin Kaepernick ad that Nike released in 2018. Valerie posted a racially inflammatory  comment on the comment stream of a Slidell High graduates facebook post regarding the Nike ad.  Her comments read  “They don’t have to live in that country. They could go back. But it was their own people selling them into slavery to begin with and tearing (treating) them even worse in those countries of origin.” “Want not to be stereotyped, tell people of that color to quit acting like animals and perpetuating the stereotype. Many are average people; the few ruin it.”

 

In this case this teacher made the mindful decision to post about her views of this ad  on someones facebook feed. Her comments she made were very racist and insulting. The question remains, should you be able to lose a job over you social media posts?

 

 

Case #3

https://www.ajc.com/news/local/ruling-goes-against-barrow-teacher-who-lost-job-over-facebook-posting/yhQhGPbZiYkH5HYjb34byJ/

October 11th, 2011

Head line: “Ruling goes agains Barrow teacher who lost job over Facebook posting”

Ashely Payne was suing the Apalachee School District and trying to get her job back at Aplalchee High School after resigning in 2009. She was pressured to resign from her job as a teacher after  someone claiming to be a parent of a student in the school sent an email complaining about “pictures of Payne smiling while holding alcoholic drinks during a trip to Europe” that were on her facebook. It also said that Payne had  written on her facebook wall the  “she was headed to a game of “Crazy Bitch Bingo” at a Midtown restaurant.”

This teacher was using social media the way any other person would. She was posting pictures about her fun time she was having in Europe involving alcohol. In the moment she was doing noting wrong, all she was doing was sharing photos with family are friends. This back fired to the point were she lost her job. Was is a harsh repercussion? Or was it necessary? What do you think?

 

What is FERPA?

FERPA stands for the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974. FERPA is a United States federal law that governs the access of educational information and records to public entities such as potential employers, publicly funded educational institutions, and foreign governments.

Educational Blog Post #1

https://www.kqed.org/mindshift/52648/coaching-teachers-to-become-powerful-users-of-classroom-tech

 

Coaching Teachers to Become Powerful Users of Classroom Tech

Classrooms across the United States have been consistently increasing their use of technology. Teachers do not always have the proper training in these technological tools in order to properly use them in their classrooms. The dynamic learning project also known as DLP is a new program that is working to make the classroom based coaching a better way to help teachers use new tools. DLP has partnered with google, digital promise, and edTechTeam that also worked with coaches in 50 schools across the U.S and coached the teachers in the schools. Many teachers agreed with setting up an individualized development plan for each different teacher. The percentage of DLP compared to non-DLP show a large amount of progress when it comes to the development of skills in technology, improving teaching approaches, and selection and use of tech to teach specific content.

Image result for technology

 

The new program called Dynamic Learning Project is helping to coach teachers in using and integrating new tools in the classroom. This sounds like a win win for everyone. DLP seems to me like a very useful way to teach and monitor teachers use of technology in the classroom. Have an individualized development plan for each different teacher allows the teachers to work to the need of their own classroom and students. DLP is coaching teachers to become a better teacher when it comes to different technology. It is common for teacher to not incorporate new technology in to their lessons because they do not know how to. Many teachers who have teaching for 10 plus years did not even have had some of the technology that we have now when they went through school. Just like any other new thing that comes in to school’s teachers get coached and have a seminar on how to use it properly for their specific classrooms and how it works. Why would technology be any different?

Here you can see how DLP teachers showed improvements in technology skills, use of technology to teach content area and use of technology to improve pedagogy.