3.7 Communication & Collaboration
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Artifact: View the school APP I created iTunes | Google Play | URL
Artifact: My Teacher Website - http://www.ExceedTheStandard.com |
Candidates utilize digital communication and collaboration tools to communicate locally and globally with students, parents, peers, and the larger community. (PSC 3.7/ISTE 3g)
As an educator, it is extremely important to be able to communicate and collaborate with my students, parents, and colleagues by using appropriate digital tools. I pride myself with the types of communication that I use and methods that I developed to not only reach my local community, but the larger community as a whole.
I am recognized as a Remind Connected Educator because of my continued contact with my students and parents. I utilize their platform to connect, or remind, my students about upcoming tests and projects while also sharing special classroom moments with parents. My social studies team discussed our frustration with our students not studying for the upcoming tests as they do not see social studies as the “class they need to study for.” I came up with an idea to send a link to our study guide with answers, in Google Drive, through Remind so parents would also have direct access to it. By sending the link to the study guide with answers, parents simply click a link on their phone, and the study guide appears. Parents, with one click, are now assisting in the method of study and review for the upcoming test, without needing to know or understand the content. We do this now for all upcoming assessments and our students do not necessarily like this, so we call this one a win for the teachers and parents!
I also use my teacher website to communicate and collaborate with my students and parents. I can be reached many different ways:
• My school email account
• My classroom Facebook Page
• The school Facebook Page (I am the admin for this too.)
• Remind.com Account
• Email section from my teacher page
• My educational Instagram Account
• My educational Twitter Account
• The Google Voice Phone Number for my classroom
• Through the Google Apps for Education accounts for students to contact me directly
• By talking to me – I understand this is old school, but perhaps the best part of school
I also created an app for the Madison County Middle School which allows anyone who downloads it to contact the school and learn about the current happenings within the school. Conversely, the app also allows the school to send push notifications to anyone who has the app. We use this feature for picture days, sports scores, parent survey requests, and other important information that needs to be delivered immediately. We can reach all stakeholders, who downloaded the app, immediately. As of 03.01.2016, we currently have 2,086 users (iOS – 1,705 and Android – 380) and over 26,500 page views within the app. I am very proud of my ability to not just utilize digital tools, but create them to reach all stakeholders.
I learned that communication does not take two people, collaboration does. Even though I may not ever hear from certain parents, this does not mean they don’t hear from me. By having them signup with my remind account, I am able to see who is currently receiving messages, and who is not. I learned that this is very revealing and important data to have. The more assistance I can give my student’s parents the more I am helping that student become more successful with their grades and understanding. It takes a village I am told. As to what I would do differently, I would insist that all parents signup for my remind account messages. This is going to happen next year and it will be mentioned in the syllabus as a parent requirement.
The work that went into creating the website and app is never ending. They will continue to grow, as I do, through my progress in my professional career. This work continues to impact student learning but allowing students constant access to learning objectives, study guides, multimedia, and other digital awesomeness. The impact of this work comes to me through student, parent, and administrator approval and positive comments of the work in all of the digital components to support student learning and achievement.
I am recognized as a Remind Connected Educator because of my continued contact with my students and parents. I utilize their platform to connect, or remind, my students about upcoming tests and projects while also sharing special classroom moments with parents. My social studies team discussed our frustration with our students not studying for the upcoming tests as they do not see social studies as the “class they need to study for.” I came up with an idea to send a link to our study guide with answers, in Google Drive, through Remind so parents would also have direct access to it. By sending the link to the study guide with answers, parents simply click a link on their phone, and the study guide appears. Parents, with one click, are now assisting in the method of study and review for the upcoming test, without needing to know or understand the content. We do this now for all upcoming assessments and our students do not necessarily like this, so we call this one a win for the teachers and parents!
I also use my teacher website to communicate and collaborate with my students and parents. I can be reached many different ways:
• My school email account
• My classroom Facebook Page
• The school Facebook Page (I am the admin for this too.)
• Remind.com Account
• Email section from my teacher page
• My educational Instagram Account
• My educational Twitter Account
• The Google Voice Phone Number for my classroom
• Through the Google Apps for Education accounts for students to contact me directly
• By talking to me – I understand this is old school, but perhaps the best part of school
I also created an app for the Madison County Middle School which allows anyone who downloads it to contact the school and learn about the current happenings within the school. Conversely, the app also allows the school to send push notifications to anyone who has the app. We use this feature for picture days, sports scores, parent survey requests, and other important information that needs to be delivered immediately. We can reach all stakeholders, who downloaded the app, immediately. As of 03.01.2016, we currently have 2,086 users (iOS – 1,705 and Android – 380) and over 26,500 page views within the app. I am very proud of my ability to not just utilize digital tools, but create them to reach all stakeholders.
I learned that communication does not take two people, collaboration does. Even though I may not ever hear from certain parents, this does not mean they don’t hear from me. By having them signup with my remind account, I am able to see who is currently receiving messages, and who is not. I learned that this is very revealing and important data to have. The more assistance I can give my student’s parents the more I am helping that student become more successful with their grades and understanding. It takes a village I am told. As to what I would do differently, I would insist that all parents signup for my remind account messages. This is going to happen next year and it will be mentioned in the syllabus as a parent requirement.
The work that went into creating the website and app is never ending. They will continue to grow, as I do, through my progress in my professional career. This work continues to impact student learning but allowing students constant access to learning objectives, study guides, multimedia, and other digital awesomeness. The impact of this work comes to me through student, parent, and administrator approval and positive comments of the work in all of the digital components to support student learning and achievement.