After the success with our school’s “Waffles_Bot” [via SchoolAI] (you can read about that here), my school’s Instructional Supervisor came to me wondering if AI could assist teachers in a different realm. On a bi-weekly basis there is an interdisciplinary…
March “Tech”ness 2024!
If you haven’t seen my previous post, which talks about how educators have adapted college basketball brackets into fun competitions for children’s literature or technology tools, then make sure you check that out. I have been offering a technology bracket…
Tech-Powered Inspiration: Crafting an AI Bot for Genius Hour Topic Selection
In the Beginning…: The Genesis of an Idea In the ever-evolving landscape of education, finding ways to engage and empower students is a constant challenge. In the pursuit of fostering creativity and self-directed learning, my building administrators brought the concept…
Unleashing Creativity: A Breakout EDU Adventure on International Dot Day
At my elementary school, each year we have a theme. This year’s theme is MINDSET and the way it was kicked off in September at our first whole school meeting was with my building administrators reading a story to students.…
Designing to Play: Collaborative Unit with my Librarian – Creating a 3D Monopoly Game Piece
I recently collaborated with my school’s librarian, Rachel Morling, to develop a 3D design unit where the students created a playable game piece for Monopoly, by Hasbro. She approached me to create an end of year activity for fourth graders…
Elevate Your Phone Protection with Wood Burl Cases from Carved
In a world filled with smartphones, standing out from the crowd has never been more important. And what better way to do that than with a phone case that not only offers top-notch protection but also adds a touch of…
Breakout EDU Contest…
Breakout EDU releases a daily Lock of the Day which is a single lock challenge. Sometimes they put a call out to crowd source, from the community, lock ideas. Their most recent was before Valentine’s Day and my lock submission…
Sharing Inspiration…
In a previous district, when my responsibility was to assist teachers with integrating iPads, I would share out a “Free Friday ‘App’etizer”, or in other words, an app of the week with the why/how it could be used in the…
Breakout EDU, Challenges, Education, Google, HyperDoc, Nearpod, Professional Development, Projects/Activities
Mystery Unit Culminating Celebration…
I was approached by one of my fourth grader teachers. She was looking for an activity for her students to celebrate the end of their Mystery Unit in ELA. The students learned vocabulary like: mystery, crime, culprit, evidence, etc. They started to write…
Updating My School’s Breakout EDU Sign-out…
Back in 2017, while in another school district, I was asked to help create a digital way to sign-out a Breakout EDU kit(s). I wrote about that and unfortunately, when I left that district to come to my current district,…
Add-ons, Badging, Challenges, Coding, Education, Forms, Google, Google Apps Script, Projects/Activities, Star Wars
Washington’s Code Day 2022
In my district, we have a school which is just fifth grade. Each year, during Computer Science Education Week, they celebrate an entire day devoted to coding called Code Day. I was asked to be a guest speaker since I’m…
Helping My Admin Breakout!
One day my principal asked me for some help. She was part of a district wide administrators’ book study (The 15 Invaluable Laws of Growth by John C. Maxwell). Her group was responsible for leading a review of chapter 4,…
Increasing My Own Coding Abilities…
Part of my role at the elementary school I work, is to support coding in K-4th grades. To better my professional development and enhance my skills, I participated in a virtual course which had several Scratch Challenges. Each day a…
How I Package Osmo For My School…
I recently became an Osmo Ambassador. As part of the program, we have monthly learning opportunities where any ambassador can share how they are using Osmo in their schools, districts, or personal/professional careers. I shared about how I have package…
Osmo + iPads = Hands-on Engagement
An Osmo from Tangible Play is an amazing educational tool used to enhance the interactivity of an iPad. It takes the power of the iPad’s camera and combines it with the interactivity of various manipulatives to create an engaging learning…
March “Tech”ness 2022!
March Madness Brackets are all the rage every spring, so much so, education has adapted & differentiated it for various means. Ever see a bracket for favorite children’s literature? How about educational technology? Maybe you’ve seen Kyle Niemis’s annual Ed-Tech…
NJECC Conference
At this year’s NJECC Conference I facilitated a session on green screening using Nearpod. Below is the embedded session. During the session, I share a resource Guide. Here is a link to the guide.
Update On My Last Post…
My last post, ‘Digital Activities for Students‘ had at the end of the post an app-smash using Tynker & Nearpod. Well, I thought it was something worth sharing, so at the last Nearpod: Camp Engage ‘Time to Collaborate’ (Feb. 25th-27th…
Digital Activities for Students…
Recently my district went Hybrid for a week. The teachers had afternoon Google Meet check-ins with students. The intention was not to teach any “new” information; in case any students couldn’t join in. I reached out to my fourth grade…
Massive Improvements…
Back in 2017, I wrote a post called: ‘Dabbling in a Little Scripting out of Necessity…’ At that time, I was helping setup an unconference session board, in a Google Sheet, which had linked Google Docs for collaborative note taking.…
Formatting…
My building’s Instructional Supervisor came to me recently with a challenge. They are using a Google Form to submit necessary information, when the nurse is notified a student needs to quarantine. The information is placed in a Sheet for all…
G-Tech Summit (Summer PD)
This past summer, I had the opportunity to facilitate two sessions at the G-Tech Summit. My sessions were: How You or Your Students Could Be Anywhere Make Google Forms Work For You Both sessions were delivered virtually and I presented…
Guest Speaker @ Constellations Summit (Summer PD)
After earning my Tynker Certified Educator levels 1 & 2 and then finalizing my Tynker Distinguished Educator status, I was asked to join Leandra McGriff, Tynker’s Educator Community Specialist, to co-present at a virtual conference. The session description: Driving The…
International Association of Woodcarvers
Back when the pandemic first hit a group of woodcarvers decided to have virtual meetings. Whether it was weekly, bi-weekly, or now monthly; each meeting has had a presenter share tips, tricks, methods, techniques, etc. I took a turn to…