My Virtual Reality Thus Far

Everything that I know about virtual schooling is based on my experience in Suttons Bay. There the district entered into a consortium with two other districts that each did their best guess on how many students that they could bring into the consortium. The budget was based on that guess and Suttons Bay was relying on that budget to balance their brick and mortar budget. Not only was there an over estimate of FTEs, but the pupil accounting requirements that are a different standard than that of brick and mortar schools was not fully followed through on and there are some discrepancies with the teacher - student contacts which caused several of the pupil log ins and contacts to not count the students for FTE money purposes. This also created an issue for me, as the district went into deficit and wasn't going to make payroll in a couple of months, they had to make deep cuts. One was me. So I see the back end administration of the issues with virtual schools.  

The kinds of students that I have personal experience with leaving for virtual school from my current district are not typical students and usually are struggling students in some way-usually socially or behaviorally. Some who- in my opinion are in the biggest need of face to face social interaction and need the practice with positive peer relationships. The lack of face to face social practice that can happen if parents' of home schooled and virtual school students do not make a major effort to ensure that their students keep live social interactions.

I am sure that my experiences do not define virtual school students. I am excited to find out more about the virtual school experience. 

Quality of Wikis- #2

Post #2 - Judging the Quality of Wikis and Non-vetted Sites

I do not view wikipedia as a resource for my student's outside of how anyone would view the Reader's Digest as a source. I might read an Wikipedia piece, go to the work sited to find the original article and read from there. I feel it is important to view source articles. I do not use wikipedia's a source but may refer to it as a quick check on something, but prefer to dig further to other articles. I guess the point being that we often have death hoaxes gone wild when someone adds a death date to a Wikipedia- So how reliable is the information posted. So I would think multiple sources should be quoted besides wikipedia. I use youtube as medium for modeling teaching practice for my teachers. I also love how it allows me access to real people working on real concepts. As long as I preview it for content and make sure that it fits my intended purpose- I don't have a problem if teachers are doing the same thing. 

RSS Blog #1

Select THREE ADDITIONAL blogs to add to your RSS reader (and feel free to select more than three if you find others that are of interest to you).

1. http://www.principalj.net/a-principals-tip-for-keeping-focused-on-1-task/
I like this blog as she is a fellow principal that seems rather down to earth. She understands the importance of humor in the daily job of being a principal. 


http://www.principalcenter.com/blog/
I caught this blog as a result of a search. I like that it comes also from a professional organization that links to professional learning books and other resources that allow for administrative perspectives and professional development. 

https://reflectionsonleadershipandlearning.wordpress.com/
I love this blog as this principal is also a doctoral student and it is nice to see someone have the same struggles in balancing family, work and school. 

Adding Twitter....

I added EdWeek Teacher, Us Dept of Education, HuffPostEducation, Education Week, eSchool News and Its learning USA.
I found that I enjoyed the regular paper copies of Education Week, would love to be up to date on all things Department of Education. I enjoy HuffPost, so I am curious on how the education pieces will play out. Of course the IT learning will directly impact concepts in this course-I am very curious on how that will play out.

So far, I have enjoyed using Camastia and keeping up to date on some Twitter posts and following education news that way. The screencast is something that I will continue within my school setting. Other than that- I haven't found a lot of use of the cartoon piece. I do enjoy the blogs of my team mates. I enjoy reading them.

Web 2.0 Tool

 What could you do in your class (or workplace) with a (i.e., any) Web 2.0 tool that would equate to each of the four levels of the SAMR Model?  That is, how could you use a Web 2.0 tool as a Substitute for current lesson, to Augment a lesson, and so on.

I am currently an elementary school principal of a building of PreK-3. I can see how I would like to use these tools as an administrator and how I would like to see teachers use them. 

Level	Definition	Examples from My Work Currently	How I would like to use this in the future
Substitution	Computer technology is used to perform the same task as was done before the use of computers.	A facebook group to work on communicating with teachers and parents on facebook. But it is 'frowned' upon.  Teachers taking attendance, inputting grades still use report cards paper only Email blasts to parents- about  upcoming events. Still put out paper as well	I think there is an level of importance that we have a group that will keep parents in the loop as most are on facebook. I use it with caution as it is a grey area in our tech policy.  I would prefer to only use online digital access for parents. But I realize access is an issue. I also think it will help in accountability with us being able to see if and when parents have access the reports cards...etc. But I can see that making sure there was access will be a continually problem. Perhaps using a google doc that is linked to our districts website.  Of course, this is just the same as with the report cards. Access to technology is still a problem for 50% of my school population.
Augmentation	Computer Technology offers an effective tool to perform common tasks.	Currently in my building students computers to perform simple games and some reading comprehension programs. This year they will take M-STEP (the MEAP replacement and I am scared!) They have been using computer labs to do the NWEA test. In my district, my son uses the clicker/CPI system that the teacher inputs test items and gathers instant data on whether the student answered appropriately or not.	Students take a quiz using a Google Form instead of using pencil and paper. My district just started using google apps for classroom and teachers. I am hoping that some teachers will start to utilize this. I would like my 3rd grade teachers to be able to use this system but we do not have access to the materials that are needed.
Modification	This is the first step over the line between enhancing the traditional goings-on of the classroom and transforming the classroom. Common classroom tasks are being accomplished through the use of computer technology.	My staff has been using shared documents on the network drive and have been trained in google apps, but have not been using its application in the classroom. Currently my school only has one laptop cart. They just ordered google chrome books for the building. HOWEVER, we do not have building wide wireless. It is only on moveable routers. This is source of frustration for not only me but several of my staff.	I would love to see an applied knowledge of my students writing and implementing a student news show. Students would gather a weeks worth of news, write and we would act out a script for a broadcast to our entire school. I could see them to do this using a screencast with maybe a background. It would be awesome to be able to use a greenscreen!
Redefintion	Computer technology allows for new tasks that were previously inconceivable.	None at this time!	I could see using a day in the life of a student video for my perspective as an administrator, so parents could get an idea of what their children go through in a day at our school. I could see teachers use this to create a wax museum of the 1930s. What would that look like for kids, would be that they all take an important character or event, investigate it, act it out and the teachers could record it for the class as a documentary or learning experience.

Wilson, Jalambo, Buzun-Miller, McGuire

First Real Blog Post

Our students have changed radically, it is true. Currently, most of our teachers have meet that standard for adjusting instruction for those students. I believe because the shift of the how we all have grown up. The Presnsky article itself is dated in 2001. This would be when the beginning baby boomers started to retire.  A person born in 1940s would have turned 60. A teacher can retire with 30 years at 47 or 30 years of teaching in the Michigan pension system at any age after 47. (Of course this depends on whatever school pension system they choose) . So it is safe to say, that people of the Baby Boomer generation 1946 to 1965, have or are about to retire. These are people who have not necessarily grown up with changing technology, to understand it, they had to make some conscience choices to be involved in it. In the later generations, such as mine- I am a gen-xer. It is more of a conscience choice to NOT be involved. It has been or is nearly impossible to not be forced or prodded to accept the digital world, thus it is easier to adjust our teaching practices around the existing digital natives. I would say that on some levels the Ellis Island is closing for the digital immigrants. Our current teachers are the digital natives.  

The Prensky article moves to discuss "should digital natives learn the old ways or should their digital immigrants learn the new? " I would jump to say that this digital media is so engrained in our culture that it is a way of life.  Just as the article makes connections to cultural immigration I would say it is the same for technology. I have even noticed on social media- when Facebook began and altered its platforms to meet various needs, people would complain at every change. EVERY change. Now, when there are changes or updates- I read more from my friends not of complaints but - where is this now? How do I do this? It seems there is now an acceptance that technology will be updated. It will change.  This goes along with Prensky's article "Not-so smart (or not-so flexible) immigrants...." theory. 

As I go on to the article I have found that parts of his article itself is outdated because of my above theory. At the time, most teachers were digital immigrants- now- the majority of teachers have at least embraced the new way or grew up at digital natives themselves. 

The McKenzie article presents as lots of articles I read that are either for or against republican/democrats policies. It really was amusing on the levels of presentation in this article. 

As I read through this things that jumped out at me- our students learn with technology- but because of various reasons, one being poverty don't necessarily have access to it. Schools all don't have the same levels of technological resources. So they do need to work and think different to ensure a quality educational programming is meet for all levels of student access. This is particularly true for students in my building. Parents have cell devices to access email and games. But don't have laptops/computers to access other types of technology. 

I have found in my current school our access to technology has determined our teaching ability/learning abilities. It isn't a matter of can or won't. It is what is available. 

Hello, My name is Dannielle McGuire, I am a principal of an elementary school, K-3 in Shelby, Mi. Shelby is on the West side of the state and a wonderful place to be. I have had an interesting last couple of years and managed to keep plodding along in my graduate studies.  I have had a twitter account for quite a long time. So a lot of the things that I have written are retweets, etc.

https://twitter.com/SammyPants2004

I still am confused as to when in, twitter, to retweet or quote tweet and what exactly is the difference?
I do however, really enjoy Jimmy Kimmel's Celebrities reading mean tweets. It is a great way for our students to get an idea that there is someone on the other end of the computer comment. Or a great way for kids to learn to be really mean and they could get on Jimmy Kimmel. Not sure yet. :)

I find online learning fascinating and I am hoping to bring focus to the need for internet resources and programming in the classroom.  I am interested in using the blog forum for classroom purposes. I do really enjoy blogging and reading blogs. I look forward to reading everyone's work!

djmm