Happy Labor Day!

Most schools in North Carolina have only had one week of school, so it has been so nice to immediately have this long weekend. Hopefully, you have taken some time today to think about all of the work and labor that goes into making things run as smoothly as they do. Especially in schools, we always have opinions on how things are not working all that well, but there are people who are working harder than we even realize, without whom, things would just fall apart!

If you're like me, just because we have a day off does not mean that I'm taking a day off of thinking and planning! There is always more to be done, especially at the beginning of a new year that we want to make better than last year.

I haven't worked too hard today: I've just done some general things that will enable me to use technology more efficiently this year.

• I typed in all of my students into classes at www.learnzillion.com Learnzillion has common core-aligned videos that you can assign to your students. There is also guided practice, slide notes, and other resources for the teacher or for the students to practice further. The setup is the hardest part because each student has to be typed in individually. You then get a code for each one that they have to enter. You can print out a page of the codes and give each student their own slip... we'll see if it is that easy!
• I created an Edmodo group for the sixth grade math teachers at my school. On there, we can create folders of resources that we can each access and edit. The reason we're doing it this way is because Google docs currently don't work that well on our computers, and emailing everything gets messy. We thought about livebinder and other sources, but we all use Edmodo so regularly that this sounded easy! 

I'm sure I'll do more planning later... it's been hard to think too far ahead when we've had to spend a lot of daily time and energy planning for how we can use our tablets and working out the kinks that we currently have. I've only had about two days of instruction, and that was on divisibility rules- not even in our curriculum! When we get back tomorrow, I intend to have all of my students create Edmodo and Learnzillion accounts, review divisibility, and then get ready for GCF by assigning a couple of videos for homework as preview.

OK! My labor is done!

I'll leave you with the other work that I did today...

Working hard on the water of Smith Mountain Lake, VA!

Edmodo

If I have one technology friend, it is Edmodo. Together, we can do anything!

But honestly, it is a very useful and user-friendly tool. If you're familiar with Facebook, it is likely that you could pick up the logistics of Edmodo very quickly.

What is Edmodo? It is a website where teachers can create classes (called "groups") that their students join. Once this is done, teachers can share posts, create polls, assign quizzes (multiple choice, T/F, short answer, fill in the blank, matching) and more. Posts can be sent immediately, or scheduled to be sent at another time (i.e. the next morning before school starts).

Everything that you post or create in Edmodo gets saved in your library so that it can be reused again. Sync it with your Google docs so that all of those gems can be accessed quickly; you can even give your students access to particular folders, if you'd like.

As you can see, I have shared some ixl.com practice as well as Learnzillion.com videos on Edmodo

To create a class, you simply "create a group." Once you have given the group a name, grade, and subject area, it will give you an access code. Students who are already on Edmodo simply have to click "join a group" and enter that code to be put in that class. Students who are not on Edmodo can use that code to create an account and join their first class. (Another option is to send the join link to everyone in an email.) Then you can start sharing! Each student is given a parent code so that parents can keep up with their assignments and grades on Edmodo. As a teacher, you can create small groups, limit students' abilities to comment, change their passwords, and more.

I have not used Edmodo extensively yet, but I intend to use it daily this year. Schools where students do not have tablets/laptops with them throughout the day can still use Edmodo for homework assignments and a sharing center during trips to the computer lab. 

For a PLE, I plan to post the day's agenda and activities in a post in Edmodo. When the activities are student-driven, they will have the freedom to go about it at their own pace, taking more time with a particular activity or assignment if they need to. Students who are grasping the information a bit more quickly can move ahead to the next assignment or assessment. Students who finish early can then peer-tutor group members that may need some assistance, or practice the topic on ixl.com, khanacademy.org, or similar sites.