Waffle Bytes

I've always enjoyed the movie "Apollo 13." There are so many good messages in it - about hope in a seemingly hopeless situation, about courage in the face of danger (and possibly even death), about creative problem solving for problems that are not "contingencies we remotely looked at." This scene is where we are right now with education - We have been asked to "invent a way to put a square peg in a round hole - quickly." And now we are in the room (or this course) looking at what is available to make that happen.  We have the resources, we have the tools...we now need to make it happen.  We are going to be innovative, creative, and make this work.  We are going to fail and have inelegant, imperfect solutions, but we will get solutions.  And we will continue to refine them until the emergency is over. One of my concerns is - and this is something often seen with students working on a problem - if we spend time on a solution that we think is goi...

My very first blog post ever was about 10 years ago (May 20, 2010).  It was titled  Textbooks: the Curriculum Security Blanket . I've been thinking about this post the last 24 hours as I prepare to help educators in local districts across 3 counties in my state rethink how they teach. This is such a high-anxiety time - our routines have been disrupted, our health (or our loved one's health) is at risk, daily life is DIFFERENT. We don't know how long this "disruption" is going to last, and we don't know how we will come out changed on the other side. On top of all that,  educators are now having to contemplate how to be "teachers" with our students at home.  And we are falling back to our "security blankets" for in the classroom.  We are trying to bring the comfortable into this new situation, and it concerns me for our success. Why?  I'm talking to educators that want to know what tool to use, and what content to get - they are fo...

Learn about REMC's Virtual Courses, and below that find several face-to-face professional learning opportunities - REMC’s Virtual Courses Summer is the perfect time to take advantage of REMC’s free Virtual Courses. These courses are specifically tailored for educators, by educators.  The classes provide a convenient way for education professionals to learn and collaborate while reducing the time and expense of traveling to a seminar or workshop. All REMC courses are open to all Michigan school personnel. No registration or SCECHs fees. Seven courses are offered in June and begin on Monday, June 3.  Deadline for registration is Friday, May 31.  Each course is open for three weeks and consists of two (2) one-hour webinars and four (4) to eight (8) hours of resource review, assessment developments and written reflection.  SCECHs are available, ranging from 6 - 10, depending on the course. Enhancing Instruction for All Learners Increasing Efficiency and Productiv...

There are several upcoming professional learning opportunities that are low-cost/free for educators from #REMC12E districts! #CISD Inspire Workshop: Online and Blended Learning Join us as we explore what opportunities exist for school districts, questions you should be asking during implementation, and legislative impacts concerning pupil accounting/FTE.  Jill Slaught from the Pupil Accounting team will be joining us with her expertise.    This workshop will be   8:30-noon on June 1, 2017 at Calhoun ISD; for more information refer to this flyer . #REMC12E Breakout EDU Workshop We are holding a BreakoutEDU Workshop - experience a Breakout game, then develop one of your own! The first 18 to sign up will leave with their own Breakout EDU kit - complete with box, set of locks, hint cards and more, a $125 value! When : 8:30-2:30, June 20, 2017 Where : Calhoun ISD Cost : $25 (includes lunch) Limited to the first 18 people from #REMC12E - a Breakout EDU...

From Discovery Education: Save The Date Spring VirtCon 2016 April 16 | 9:00 AM - 4:00 PM (ET) Join us for Spring VirtCon, Discovery Education's bi-annual virtual professional development conference. Hear from your peers around the country as they share creative ways they are using Discovery Education to personalize learning and embed digital media into their instructional practice.  Register today to reserve your spot . Why register for VirtCon:   Free, live streamed sessions Thought provoking discussions Keynotes from educators Opportunities to build your network Certificate of participation ...

Looks like a very cool experience - with many renowned speakers! Announcing the Hack the Classroom Digital Event! Date: January 30, 2016 at 8:00a.m. PST Location: Online- Register at aka.ms/hacktheclassroom Actions: •   Register yourself for the event •   Share this announcement with other educators •   Send your own tweet. Example tweet: Join me & Microsoft_EDU for the #HackTheClassroom digital event on 1/30! Sign up here: http://aka.ms/hacktheclassroom Resources: Hack The Classroom Website Questions? Email us We are so excited to announce a new, free live digital event for educators around the world! The “hacking” spirit has captured the hearts of educators around the world- more and more, teachers are taking it upon themselves to transform the way they teach, and the way their students learn. Initiatives like Hour of Code and the Maker Movement have been groundbreaking, wh...

You might consider this if you are a mentor teacher, online teacher, or want to educate yourself on Section 21f. Details from MVU: Exploring key trends in online and blended learning The 10 th MVU Online Learning Symposium on November 17 will explore key trends in online and blended learning and examine real-world orientation and support strategies for online learners. Keynote Speaker The keynote speaker will be John Watson, founder of Evergreen Education Group of Durango, Colorado. Watson and Evergreen help schools choose and implement the right online and blended learning strat egies that help schools meet education goals. Micourses.org Showcase Through an inaugural statewide catalog showcase, participants can network with representatives from local and intermediate school districts that collectively offer more than 2,000 online course titles in the statewide c...

Michigan Educators - you have the opportunities to participate in FREE professional development to learn about and implement blended learning in your classroom!  The course runs approximate 15 weeks, starting  August 11  and closing  November 24, 2014 . You can expect to spend about 4-5 hours per week on the course.  There is an option to receive 62 SCHECHs (available for $10) if desired  Details are found on the REMC Blended Learning Project page at  http://www.remc.org/projects/ blendedlearning/ .  Registration is found at  http://www.solutionwhere.com/ remcam/cw/main.asp  . You will select the face to face location that works best in your schedule, and  BLiC has graduated over 600 educators across the state of Michigan over the past two years. If you have any questions please feel free to email  blic@remc.org

This morning while getting around, I was watching Twitter for my usual morning food for thought.  During it I started following a twitter chat (the #coffeecue happening at #ISTE2014) about redesigning the learning environment.  The chat started about the redesigning off the physical classroom - I confess not as much interest to me, but still interesting to follow.  Then it took a turn with the following tweet - and it got me thinking, hard.  And after reflecting on it I've come to the following thoughts/beliefs - many teachers reconstruct/mirror their physical space into the online arena we talk about tearing down the walls of our classroom....and then turn around and build walls in our online environments I think we have a big misperception of an LMS - that it needs to be the be-all and end-all to where our students' learning takes place online.  And it shouldn't  Instead of thinking of an LMS as the structure, we need to think of it as the gatew...

A common issue on many Moodle courses is the plethora of items that end up on the "home" page of the course.  When a person starts building a course, they don't have much so begin with a habit of adding every item on the main page.  Over time, this becomes a monstrous beast, that takes a LONG time to load and eons to scroll through.  There are several methods that can be used to eliminate the "scroll of death" - some take more work than others.  This week I'll show one way to help students focus in on the current topic, and away from an endless stream of content. Viewing a Course by One Section  First - a caveat - you need to be putting content into topical areas for this to work.  If you have everything in the top content box...this won't help. This takes only one step.  Go into your Course Settings, and under the course format change the Course Layout to "Show one section per page:" When in non-editing mode or viewing the course as a studen...

Occasionally it happens...a student leaves a class, and then comes back in.  Or, even worse, the WRONG student is removed from a course.  With Moodle 2.5, did you know you have the ability to attempt a grade restore when reinstating the student into the course? When in the Enroll Users window, there is an understated area called Enrollment options: Clicking on this, reveals some additional choices available to you: With these choices, you can: opt to try to recover the user's old grades if possible (depends on your database & backup system) have them start from the current date OR the course start date If you have a course that has finite duration, you can set the enrollment duration Another awesome feature when you need it!

One of the newer features within Moodle is the availability of completion status.  As an instructor, you can turn this on (as long as it has been enabled at the server level) and then use it to help students "track" which items they have completed within your course. Advantages of this feature:  There are several advantages: If you do not use the gradebook, it gives an alternative way for students to track their progress It is flexible by activity so you can set completion "standards" such as a grade or action, or even set it so students can mark it themselves It can be used in conjunction with contingencies, so activities can be dependent on each other (students have to complete one activity to see or do another) Disadvantages of the feature:  There are a couple drawbacks to using this feature as well: While a default can be set within your course, if you set parameters for completion it has to be set on each activity It has to be enabled at the server lev...

"How do I start using Moodle?" If you are new to Moodle, it can be easy to become overwhelmed.  This is because Moodle can be used in so many ways that the new user feels lost!  Here are some quick-start suggestions for ways you can quickly begin using it: share handouts on your course so students can access them anytime (no more running to the copier to get additional copies as they can print it out themselves!) - File Resource post links to online resources (no more running around helping students when they type in the URLs incorrectly) - Website Resource create a weekly poll of one question that can test for general knowledge or gather data -  Choice Activity have a student Q&A forum where students can answer each others' questions - Forum Activity By starting out implementing just one aspect of Moodle, you can gain the familiarity and confidence you need while beginning to move your students into a blended environment. ...