Waffle Bytes

From the REMC/RITS PLAYDATE team: The New Teacher Playdate is approaching! Can you think of someone who is new to education and might benefit from professional development that centers on technology in the classroom? On January 29 Lenawee ISD is hosting an opportunity to collaborate with other new Michigan educators, to not only learn about using technology in the classroom, but explore it. The link to the Smore for more information and registration is below.  If you have any questions, please email or call. Thank you! New Teacher Academy Flyer Topics include: Managing Technology in the Classroom Integrating Technology into the content areas The use of REMC projects 21things4students MiTechKids Classroom Makers MITECS - Age Band Articulation Computer Science Standards Grants - how to find them and apply for them The 2019-20 P.L.A.Y.D.A.T.E. schedule is now available! In addition to the traditional Playdates, there are a few theme foc

Did you know you can reuse your posts in Google Classroom?  And you can use them from any course that you teach?  To reuse a post, when you are in the stream click on the double arrow at the right side of the textbox where you can add a new post - When you click on it you get a pop-up which gives you a few options from where to select a previous post  - 1 - you can select a post from within the course. 2 - you can back up to a list of all of your courses to select to grab it from another course - When you click on a different course from this list, it will display the posts in that course -

The Google Classroom calendar has the flexibility of being stand-alone within Classroom, or view-able with your other calendars within Google Calendar.  Which you (and your students) want to use depends on how you want to use it.  One of the big differences is that the only way you can add items to the calendar built into Google Classroom is by adding them as an assignment, etc within the classroom; whereas the calendar as viewed within Google Calendar is editable - just like your other Google Calendars.  To view your calendar within Classroom, click on the 3 horizontal bars on the upper left side Select Calendar - This will bring up a calendar that is built into the Classroom, which will display the assignments for the course (or all classes) - To view the Classroom calendar within Google Calendar, look for the classroom name right within your calendars list - 

Settings can be found multiple places in Google Classroom.  One of the places that is overlooked - but controls the number of email notifications you get from your classrooms - is in the sidebar.  Notifications and your profile settings can be changed here. Click on the 3 stacked lines on the left side - you can do this when in a classroom, or on the general classroom page. Scroll all the way to the bottom to select Settings - This is one place you can change your profile settings - note that this is your profile for your G Suite account NOT just for Classroom- Below that is where you can set your notification settings to decide how much and what types of email notifications you want for your classrooms - At the bottom of the list of notifications is a drop down list where you can choose which courses to get notifications for, and which ones you want "silent" -

Wanted : Michigan K-12 educators working in a classroom setting to participate in the #GoOpen Michigan/Collabrify opportunity. Learn about #GoOpen Michigan and Collabrify, then create instructional resources. Title : #GoOpen with OER Roadmaps Audience : K-12 Teachers and Staff that work in the classroom setting Content Areas : ALL When: October 19, 9am-2pm Where:  Ingham ISD - 2630 W Howell Rd, Mason, MI 48854 This training will be conducted by Elliot Soloway of the University of Michigan, and Gina Loveless of the Michigan Department of Education (and former REMC Director!).  There is a $200 stipend available for completion of the training, plus completion of two prerequisite EduPaths courses, Copyright in the Classroom and Introduction to Open Educational Resources (OER) .  Please read through  the flyer  for complete details and  share with all of your educational staff and colleagues . This is a time sensitive opportunity so please encourage your co

If you are going to Google Classroom and want to get a list of work needing your attention, this is very easy to do - as a teacher or as someone enrolled in a course.  This can be especially useful when you have multiple courses to manage. (It is probably worth a few minutes to demonstrate this to your students so they know about it as well.) To get to the To-Dos, click on the 3 horizontal lines (some people call this the hamburger or pancakes...) - Click on To-do under teaching to see the assignments you have given - This window will display all your assignments, along with their status (how many turned in, how many were assigned, how many have been graded) - If you want to select to see this just for one class, look over on the left upper corner where it says All classes - Clicking that will display a dropdown of all your classes, so you can choose which one to view - As a student, looking down a bit further in the left sidebar (seen by clicking those 3 horizon

Here is a brief overview of the Classroom Settings. Go to the gear on the right side Class Details - you can modify the details of your class (that were set when it was created) General Settings Class code Stream - students ability to post & comment on stream Classwork on stream - decide how (and if) classwork notifications show on the stream Show deleted items -  Guardian Summaries -  Grade Calculations Overall grade calculation ( Learn more ) Show overall grade to students Grade categories

There are several options available with the class code that you may find useful.  (If you prefer, you can watch the video .) This can be especially useful if you want to update or disable your class code.  Options for your class code, including how to reset and disable it: Click on the gear in the upper right corner of your class Scroll down to general section, the class code listed here.  Click on the arrow on the right side: You will have 4 options in this menu. Display Copy Reset  Disable Display will enlarge the class code so it is more easily seen Copy will put the code on the clipboard so you can paste it into email or into a doc, ect Reset will change the class code (sometimes you want to do this if similar characters make up the current code - like "l", "1") Disable will disable the code completely ( you can re-enable it if needed in the same location)

Email from DroneBlocks: We are excited to announce that  DroneBlocks  and  Drobots  are partnering to develop a unique STEAM-based competition for middle school students:  The   Synchronized Dancing Drone Competition!   Participating teams from across the country will submit their final performances in a virtual manner to be reviewed and graded by competition judges. The top four winning teams will be invited to display their Dancing Drone Performance during halftime of the high school  2019 BELL Vertical Robotics Competition  on  December 7th . Competition criteria include... Participation for current middle school students Evidence of demonstrating the "A" in STEAM Combining Drones + Programming with DroneBlocks + Music + Creativity Final projects shared through a virtual presentation Top-rated Final Four Teams will be invited to perform in front of hundreds of participants during the High School 2019 Vertical Robotics Competition, Sponsored By BELL, at the U

A new school year brings new opportunities to dig into the content and tools in MeL's eResources. We know it can be a lot of work to roll out a new library resource to students, parents, teachers and school administrators. To help, a range of support resources are available from each of MeL's eResource providers. This month, we're reviewing EBSCO’s knowledge base, EBSCO Connect. With a collection of lesson plans, tutorials, student guides and more, you are sure to find what you need. The best part? They’re free! Here are the Top 5 student and teacher support resources available in EBSCO Connect:   Lesson Plans Are you supporting teachers in your community with library material connections to curriculum? Look for dozens of lesson plans for a variety of subjects. To support students and teachers in high school check out the information literacy lesson plan  Spotting Fake News and Images on the Web . Scavenger Hunts Explore features, discover research top

P eople L earning and A sking wh Y Interacting with Minecraft: Education Edition for the first time can be overwhelming. Surround yourself with other educators, self-identify your comfort level, and then attend break-out sessions that meet your needs! Learn with and from others and by the end of the day, you'll be teaching others! Come join us and learn more about how Minecraft: Education Edition can positively impact student demonstrations of learning and you'll leave ready to integrate it into your classroom the next day! There are two dates/locations available, see the Promotional Flyer for those details at  https://www.smore.com/kmepv . There are 2 locations: December 11, Kalamazoo RESA December 13, Genesee ISD