Innovative Schools Teacher Preparation

Lately Laurie Friedrich and I have been spending time thinking about preparing teachers to thrive in innovative schools. We spent a significant amount of time laying out the outline of a path that will lead us there. Our mission is to prepare educators who are effective and confident facilitating learning in innovative settings.

This goal emerged from our interaction with school leaders who have indicated to us a challenge in finding and retaining educators who can be effective teaching in innovative settings. We think that it it because traditional teacher education programs are not providing the skills and dispositions needed in innovative learning settings. The group we are proposing will lead to a program that will support innovative schools by providing teachers who can facilitate learning in a variety of settings using inquiry, creativity, critical thinking, and collaboration. Our objective is to have a program to supplement traditional teacher education with the skills and dispositions that will create educators who can be consistently successful in innovative schools.

Being a full citizen in the 21st century requires life-long learning that fosters design thinking and innovation. This life-long learning is shaped during the school years. Innovative schools show how to grow this next generation of thinkers and creators, and lead the way for more traditional school systems. Our program aims to grow the educators that will be the backbone of transformation. These schools need the teachers who will make sure such schools are successful and can try new ideas. Our plan is to help these schools by preparing interested classroom and prospective teachers who can step in ready to teach in innovative ways.

Four things we already know about PD (but need a reminder)

I just finished a week with a fantastic group of educators. Laurie Friedrich, Alison Preston and I ran our fourth iPads in the Classroom workshop. The name of the workshop is inadequate since we had users with all kinds of devices including windows machines, Macs, Chromebooks, smartphones and of course iPads.

The intensive one-week tech workshop is always fun although at the end of each we all experienced the sense of reaching capacity. It also reminds of what we know and often conveniently forget about effective professional development (PD):

1. We need significant time away from the everyday tasks to make significant changes. If you are tinkering with existing structures short workshops can be fine, but if you want a departure from normal you need to take time.

2. We need to work in teams. Shared cognition when learning something new is empowering, supportive and extends the boundaries of what can be accomplished. Even after facilitating numerous PD events (30 presentations and two classes last year) Laurie and I are still learning new things every time.

3. We all need time to practice. Showing isn't enough, everyone must participate in doing and experimenting during the PD. Showing and then sending teachers back is just not enough especially with new technologies that without support can become frustrating and with support are almost trivial.

4. We all need follow-up. That is our next step, making sure teachers have opportunities to discuss and extend what they already know.

The Top Ten most watched videos on the Tech EDGE Channel

A quick look at our most popular videos for 2014 shows that the topics of Apps for English learners is consistently at the top of the list and we will try and add additional ideas that address this topic. The second topic that received attention was App Smashing both in our regular show and from our Tech EDGE conference.

I hope we will have even more success reaching teachers and answering the specific needs of our viewers.

Tech Edge - Episode 38, English Language Learners

Tech Edge, iPads In The Classroom - Episode 133, Apps for English Language Learners

Tech Edge, iPads In The Classroom - Episode 110, App Smashing

Tech Edge, iPads In The Classroom - Trailer

Tech Edge, iPads In The Classroom - Episode 49, Top Free 

Apps for a One iPad Classroom Part 1

Tech Edge, iPads In The Classroom - Episode 111, Apps for Elementary Classrooms

Tech Edge, iPads In The Classroom - Episode 94, Real Time Collaboration

Tech Edge Conference 10: App Smashing 101

Tech Edge, iPads In The Classroom - Episode 115, Apps for Creativity

Tech Edge, iPads In The Classroom - Episode 125, Note Taking Apps Part 2

I'm No Bo: On Striving, Humility, and Democracy

By now Bo Pelini and his rants are public knowledge. The thing that struck me the most about his complaints was the idea that he did not know the expectations every year. I just happen to work for the same institution. I get paid much less and interview a lot less. I am not sure how I would fair under public scrutiny but I do know something about being judged annually by "higher ups".

I often do not agree with my "higher ups" but I do know that we have a shared goal of improving the lives of Nebraskans starting with our students and expanding beyond it. So while we may not agree on the how we can agree on the what and judge our efforts based on outcomes. The bottom line is that every year I need to strive to be better. After reflecting on what I need to improve I make a plan to pay attention and improve a few aspects of my work, be it teaching, research, or service. I do not need someone to tell me that I am not perfect (though many are happy to point it out) I know what I do well and what I do not.

In the last three semesters I have worked hard on building a classroom community through integrating democratic practices. The idea was to present a learning environment that would model a possible educational model that is different from the one my pre-service teachers see enacted in schools. Every semester I have been just a bit better about building a classroom community allowing students to participate in decision making including classroom rules, grading and participation.

Am I there? NO. My students are still struggling to see how these practices can be translated into classroom practice BUT I can say without any doubt that I am a better teacher than I ever was. I can say that my students know more of what they need to teach reading and writing in the 21st century. The community we built in the classroom was built on shared goals, shared responsibility and an understanding that we are in this together. So if I had to have a goodbye speech to my students it would be about their potential to change the world not how the world is against them (or me).

Telling Stories

This week we held our annual iPads in the Classroom workshop. Laurie and I used last year's work as a foundation but added many new components. Most importantly like many other iPad academies around the nation we kept things open and let our learners guide much of the work. It is very interesting to start the week by asking everyone to set their own goals. In interesting ways we got a lot of "what do you want us to do" during the first two days. Then everyone settled into the routine and expectations and did an outstanding job learning and extending.

You can take a peek at the work we all did here.

The week of working with teachers has reinforced the ideas that have been guiding my work in the last year. Mobile devices are the perfect tool to enhance identity and literacy through shared story telling. We envision families recording oral histories, creating in vivo memories, and composing personally relevant texts. Using the affordance of the digital device itself and specific apps within it can create rich personal tapestries with fairly low user knowledge.

We now have a chance to try it out in Nebraska and perhaps within the year in a parallel project in China. I am excited!

iPads in Chinese Classrooms

We just finished with our second professional development with educators in China. This time it was an elementary school that would like to be part of our long term project. The plan was for 20-25 teachers that have been identified as leaders. Over 40 showed up. Every event like this is fraught with difficulty: bandwidth, technology on both sides but more than everything it is the physical and cultural distance. It is hard to get a read on a large crowd through distance and it is almost impossible to get the personal commitment that would drive change.

I started with a very short theoretical foundation. We then used Socrative as a demonstration of a way to engage participants.  Jason Wilmot proceeded to discuss the Flipped Classroom and Krista Barnhouse showed a few apps she uses in her classroom. It then turned into a mini app shootout. Overall it was a successful if stressful session with Ji at the helm producing the event, Dandi translating and Qizhen as a backup/ backchannel discussant. It is a fairly big team but it probably is the only way we can manage that.

This is an evaluation of the effort through our back channels (edited version so I take full responsibility):

         "There were a total of 43 teachers and two principals joined our conference physically. There were three teachers joined our conference online. According to the responses, teachers who participated in online felt more engaged than those who joined physically. This is because those teachers all had a one-on-one technology person sitting next to them solving the technical issues, such as installation and registration. All teachers love our apps introduction but some of them suggested to get rid of theory section because they all know the theories. Moreover, teachers asked us to bring real-time classroom instructions rather than only introduction. 

I talked with a couple teachers yesterday and they said they need the conference but they all indicated that Chinese teachers will never integrate technology into classroom unless principals force them to do so. A teacher stated that there is only five who want to learn among 100 teachers in similar trainings in China, meaning those teachers did not get engaged. The lack of quality of motivation, will hinder them to learn."

I do not share the morbid evaluation. At the heart of it, it seems that teachers in China are like teachers everywhere. They want to change but know it is hard and are afraid that it might not work. Change if any will be slow and will depend on our ability to deliver tailored information and on-going support. It is true with the schools we work with at LPS, it is true with pre-service teachers, and it si true when we work with Chinese educators. Heck based on a faculty meeting last friday, it is also true with our teacher education faculty.

Our Chinese experiment will continue!

My Chinese iPad Adventure

Ji Guo is a new graduate student in our program. With his help I have been able to expand our work on professional development in technology integration to China.

The first foray was adopting our YouTube videos so they can be accessible in China's YouKu. We went even further and developed a separate series of video PD on iPads designed specifically for the Chinese market.

This monday we tried something new. An online presentation for Chinese teachers who are interested in integrating iPads into their classrooms. It took us a full day to prepare and make sure the technology and content were all up to par. We had a great crowd of about 50-60 computers linked (we estimate 100 viewers) through Adobe Connect. This was a great experiment in producing a cross cultural professional development. I think that the team including Ji and Qizhen is very aware of the cultural differences and we all took special care to make the content relevant and helpful as well as culturally sensitive. The viewers were attentive, interactive and fun to work with!

As a reality check I would like to talk about 3 unexpected outcomes that can serve as a guide to working with China.
1. Less than 48 hrs after we made our powerpoint available someone was using it as their ow selling PD.
2. Our book on the Universal Learning Model is available in China in digital format illegally
3. Someone has charged $50 for the password to our presentation (that we served for free).

I find the experience educational and amusing. In some ways it is flattering.

I take a few things from it- We can have a real impact in China- there is obviously a thirst for innovation. The added value in the market cannot be a product it has to be the service- us. Finally that there is considerable monetary value to our and if anyone is profiting it might as well be us.

Here's to continuing my Chinese adventures...

Teacher Change and Technology Integration

Too many ideas are running through my head this morning I will try however to stay coherent.

This week we had a visiting group of teacher educators from India. The always energetic Del Harnisch  invited and hosted the group. I met with the four teacher educators to share the work we have done on technology integration and used a new set of results that you can view here. One of the major questions that followed was the one I get the most. How do you help change the way practicing teachers (who work with our preservice teachers)? 

The answer is incredibly unsatisfying: multiple exposures, with small groups at a time, and with attention to differentiated needs. For example we have been working with one Elementary school on iPad integration. As we planned our sessions we asked to work with 1-2 grade levels at a time making sure that the staff to teacher ration was low. This ensures that even the most frustrated member of the group gets the attention they need. We all preach differentiated instruction to students attentive to their needs but forget the same principles when we work with adults. The results of multiple visits and individual attention are undeniable. Just yesterday one of the teachers told me that the iPad provided a breakthrough with an autistic student. The student refuses to engage in school. Being a thoughtful educator she kept looking for ideas, after our training she used Educreations to create a math lesson. The student watched the lesson and then recorded his own understanding to demonstrate mastery. It is a small step, or is it? One student and one teacher found a meaningful way to use technology, this for me is the only way to move forward, until the critical mass of teachers using technology will simply overwhelm the tendency to replicate past practices.

Little Priest Tribal College

Monday and Tuesday Laurie and I traveled to Little Priest College to teach a class on iPad integration to  preservice educators in the Indigenous Roots program. The story was the same seven teachers were at different levels of comfort with technology but at the end of the three days they all created educational materials for use in their classroom. I cannot wait to see what they use next. 

I know we want a revolution but, change will most likely happen after multiple exposures with small groups with attention to differentiated needs.

Benefits of Gaming

This week I have been thinking of the befits of gaming. It started as Jason initiated a conversation about MinecraftEDU. This was combined with an interest from Ji one of my graduate students. Minecraft is a veteran game that still engages millions around the world. The EDU version allows educators to create a self contained and "safe" environment for students to explore.

As it happened I also presented at NETA fall conference this Thursday and happened to see the tail end of Jason Schmidt's presentation on MinecraftEDU. We had lukewarm coffee right after my presentation and chatted about opportunities to not just do but also research. I am excited.

As Ji and I brainstormed the benefits of using Minecraft we came up with four areas that we think would matter greatly to our students growing up in the 21st century.

1. Collaboration- to be successful students must learn to work together toward common goals, coordinate and learn to create a code of conduct. We also expect distributed practice and cognition. These are key skills and Jason suggested that he has already seen it at work.
2. Problem solving- since mine craft is a Lego like world with it's own rules any task requires some creative problem solving to reach goals (both ones you set for yourself and one set from the outside).
3. Engagement- we expect that incorporating Minecraft will improve attitudes toward school and engagement in school activities.
4. Creativity- The open ended nature of the world and the tasks can naturally lead to creative thinking and solutions.
5. Language- we expect that students will develop a community of practice that will distinguish itself using specific jargon and develop efficient ways to communicate.

By Megx see here

6. Democracy and control- Minecraft rests most of the control in the hands of students teaching them about decision making and creating opportunities for learning social skills and tolerance.

Our biggest challenge:
How do we measure impact?

We are currently collecting literature on these issues BUT we are thinking of designing individual and group tasks using Lego and
Keva Planks. More to come...
Comments and ideas welcome!

Games and learning- evidence

I am attaching empirical results about the impact of games on learning. This is where empirical evidence trumps "common sense" it is not motivation. Instead it is combining traditional and game based instruction, group work and multiple sessions. A good preview to Jim Gee's visit to UNL on Aug 20th and his talk on Gaming in Education.

A meta-analysis of the cognitive and motivational effects of serious games.

By Wouters, Pieter; van Nimwegen, Christof; van Oostendorp, Herre; van der Spek, Erik D.

Journal of Educational Psychology, Vol 105(2), May 2013, 249-265.

Abstract

It is assumed that serious games influences learning in 2 ways, by changing cognitive processes and by affecting motivation. However, until now research has shown little evidence for these assumptions. We used meta-analytic techniques to investigate whether serious games are more effective in terms of learning and more motivating than conventional instruction methods (learning: k = 77, N 5,547; motivation: k = 31, N 2,216). Consistent with our hypotheses, serious games were found to be more effective in terms of learning (d= 0.29, p < .01) and retention (d = 0.36, p < .01), but they were not more motivating (d = 0.26, p > .05) than conventional instruction methods. Additional moderator analyses on the learning effects revealed that learners in serious games learned more, relative to those taught with conventional instruction methods, when the game was supplemented with other instruction methods, when multiple training sessions were involved, and when players worked in groups. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved)

iPads in the classroom workshop

I have just finished an intense week working with educators on iPad integration into the classroom at UNL. We had participants from across the k-16 spectrum and with very different levels of experience. From first time users who unboxed their first iPads the morning of the workshop to a teacher that has already implemented iPads in her classroom effectively.

The approach was developmental and each of our learner-participants (students just sounds wrong) set their own personal goal. They all made it. Outcomes included creating iBooks on grammar, a blog on apps for teachers in the school, books that taught basic words in native languages and many many more. As everyone presented on Friday I could not stop smiling and thinking about this amazing group of learners and their willingness to step with us outside their comfort and embrace twitter, apps, and a new role for the teacher. We aimed straight for the creation and critical thinking (Blooms taxonomy) knowing that the rest was something we could all do.
One of our participants reflected on her blog: "My mind is reeling with ideas now. It is an exciting time for me as I feel we are on the cutting edge rather than just catching up with a movement."
Another:
I also like the idea of a flipped classroom.  It was nice that Jason was honest about the startup time and possible frustrations that we may run into while trying to implement this process.

The biggest lesson was mine. Yes, all teachers can learn to CREATE in a short amount of time and all of them created video, screen casts, and other media products. Yes, iPads seem to make sense for everyone in education in different ways although it is by no way a magic bullet. And, Yes, it was very stressful but also lots of fun. Looking forward to next year and using some of this year's participants as coaches. 
Now I am ready for a break...

Back at the Reading Center- iPads and pre service teachers

 I come back to Reading Center every summer with anticipation. It is a great place to try out new ideas and examine change in teachers and students over short periods of time. During the last few years integrating technology especially tablets (well really iPads) has been a focal point. Two years ago we experimented with iPads for instructors, coaches, and teachers working with struggling readers. The following summer we purchased a classroom set and integrated technology into every aspect of the course.

This summer technology, when it is useful, is ubiquitous- which ultimately is our goal. During the first day about a third of my students showed up with their own tablets. By mid course it was over a half. As students saw that tablet use is encouraged, almost required, they brought devices they already had. The rest are still using our class set.

I am not a big fan of a random BYOD. It creates more problems than solutions. As a program we moved into defining a requirement that will create enough uniformity allowing faculty and students to find a common path. At the same time I am finding that students are eager to bring their devices and use them to support instruction.

I love hearing comments like: "this is much better when I use my phone" or this works better without using the iPads. It means that teachers (and future teachers) are developing the capacity to use technology and make professional judgements about utility and cost benefit.

The impact can be seen through comment by one of our teachers last week:

Alan lights up whenever I pull out the iPad and always wants to know where I found a certain app, or how I created a game. Alan even goes home and adds the free apps to his iPad at home. I have liked using just the basic Safari browser for Google Images. Alan has a hard time picturing words he's never heard of, so we look up pictures of him. This week I used iCardSort, Safari, Dragon Dictation, iDictionary, and Track and Change. (Names were changed)

Change now is multi level. Teachers are coming with more willingness and more access to devices. They see the connection to devices already in the schools, and finally we can add to their knowledge and flexible implementation of technology integration.

iPads Pre-service teachers and Technology Integration

We are now summarizing our first (funded) year of Tech EDGE- Educating in Digital and Global Environments. The premise for Tech EDGE was to create a new generation of teachers for the 21st century by combining professional development for Teacher Education faculty, cooperating teachers and preservice teachers while providing access to devices in our case iPads.

While we have a lot of data about different aspects of the projects I would like to start by sharing the results of a Technology Pedagogical Content Knowledge instrument that Angie Wassenmiller created two years ago. The results for the preservice teachers stunned me- so much that I had to check it multiple times. The chart shows the difference between the cohort graduating in 2011 and the cohort graduating in 2013. The average difference is an effect size of more than 2 standard deviations (presented as the error bars). This is a huge difference far outstripping what we initially expected.

I do not claim that the project is the sole reason for this change, in effect I believe that the project accelerated many processes that were already operating and gave substance and direction to the efforts of many individual teachers, teacher educators and preservice teachers. Part of the success was our ability to move all elements of our program including practicum. Another part was the integration of iPads. iPads were most visible in our Reading Center where all preservice teachers were able to use them intensively. I would argue that the devices do matter- and they make integration much more effective and impactful.

A Quick Note On Declaring Disruption

Last week we had a Technology conference on campus. The keynote speaker was talking about MOOCS (Massive Open Online Courses). I don't mind the discussion of change or the relevance of thinking through options. What I do mind is the declaration of disruption. I believe that we should not declare a disruption before it actually happened. It could very well be that in 10 or 20 years we will look back and be able to point to the MOOC as a disruptive practice. But right now I would argue that it is too soon.
In a way the declaring disruption is analogous in my mind to the media declaring William and Kate's wedding the "Wedding of the Century" just as the century began. Really? are you predicting no other celebrity wedding for almost a 100 years? Of course not. The same goes for disruption. Don't call it until there is some evidence. The point is- change is important, evolve, innovate, try new things- but please call it disruption only after you gain perspective.
Do, don't just PR.

Grading, Creativity, and Teacher Education- Making Room fo Complexity

I caught the middle piece of a radio lab broadcast on choice. In it Gladwell (of Outliers and Blink) discusses the impact of explaining choice on the decision making process. In the battle between system 1 (quick snap judgements as in Blink) and system 2 (deliberate thinking), the latter seems to try and counter bias system 1- with the results being less than satisfactory (I borrowed the system 1 and 2 from Kahneman). In this he quotes Tim Wilson's work from VGA.

I started thinking about this effect as I was grading my students work on a rubric. I just finished grading and it dawned on me that my very specific rubrics, valued by my students, seem to encourage students to back away from ambiguity and complexity. In simple terms it means that when the rubric is specific it is economically beneficial for students to respond with simple lessons than complex ones, to choose one or two objectives than a complex integrated lesson. Going back to Gladwell (not fully Wilson's et al. point) forcing students to explain in detail may push them to make simplistic choices and shy away from complexity.

As  nation our testing system seems to be having exactly the same effect. Measuring creativity a popular subject recently may have the same exact effect. By clarifying what we mean by creativity we may be losing sight of the big picture...

Adding to my challenge is the fact that I do not control the milieu for the assignments. It is a negotiation between our students and their cooperating teachers. It is not always clear who sets the tone for the lesson- so I cannot penalize students for having simple lessons because it is not always up to them. The question is how do we make room for complexity- reward it in this context.

I suggest simply rewarding complexity (I know it when I see it) and demanding that simple lessons (like simple dishes on cooking challenge shows) are perfect. This note just like myself is a work in progress: We need more poetry! (A quote from a recent presentation by Sarah Thomas)

Yo Yo

The last two weeks have felt like the perpetual motion of a YoYo. After presenting at the state conference - a high note, we came back to earth with our students midterm reviews. Laurie and I co-teach a reading/language arts methods courses. This semester following our passion for technology integration and its rising importance in schools we decided to be playful and layer in a variety of technologies and ideas. Our students were somewhat unhappy, and a few were so disconcerted that they wrote a quite lengthy review that was frankly a bit hard to read.

So Laurie and I sat down to process why the reaction to our efforts was so negative. We came up with four main reasons that overlap to a degree.

1. We assumed that students who grew up in the 21st century would have an innate understanding of why technology integration is important. It turned out they don't- quite possibly because while they grew up with the internet and a multitude of devices they were never an integral part of their school experience. Laurie and I were so immersed in this topic we forgot other aren't.

2. Our students are making their first steps as pre-service teachers. When we integrated a large number of technologies they became overwhelmed and lost the single most important aspect which is the link to teaching. Practicing teachers we work with see the relevance almost immediately in our Tech EDGE Conference.  Our students are simply not quite there developmentally.

3. This generation of students is used to the chaos of internet resources and the vast number of media available. In college classes, however, they want us to help them organize the information and sort out what is important. That said I think it is a set of skills we need to help them develop- something that should probably start long before junior year of college. 

4. Beginning professionals want straight answers and procedures. We attempt to give complex responses in an effort to teach them to think in an organized way- while dealing with ambiguity. This tension is at the heart of teacher preparation and Laurie and I may have crossed the boundary for this group of students.

Laurie and I have regrouped and refocused the work we do. Since we have just under half a semester to go we hope to be able and present a more balanced picture that will allow them to learn and use technology integration skills that are appropriate developmentally. The same can probably be applied to anyone scaling up technology integration with teachers. We must recognize where teachers are developmentally and support them in the steps that they need to make next.

Should We Use Digital Technology in Elementary Education?

Last week I happened to be talking about technology to a teacher when someone (not a k12 educator) intervened and said in complete confidence: "I do not know of any benefit of using technology in the classroom."

I will admit that at times I have my doubts about technology integration. There are technologies I find useless for most users (e.g. smartboards) and others I find incredibly powerful (iPads). What struck me, however, was the complete confidence- of someone who is not a classroom teacher.

I am pretty sure that when the piano was introduced, someone stood up and said that he does not see any benefit of using this new technology over older instruments. Probably stating that such technology brings disorganization and laziness to peoples way of thinking about music...

So here are my top eight reasons to integrate technology in the classroom:

1. This is what students will encounter in the world. Students who will not be exposed to technology in school will be at a great disadvantage especially if they grow up in families that cannot fill up this void- i.e. students at-risk.
2. Differetiation: The ability to tailor instruction to student needs.
3. To teach students to find and sort through information for quality and validity- as we shifted into the knowledge economy finding information is no longer the challenge. Instead it is the ability to filter relevant information.
4. Become careful consumers of media, services, and products.
5. Become global citizens communicating with people from different locations and cultures
6. Be able to answer questions about facts and basic knowledge quickly so we can move to problem solving and real world applications.
7. The ability to represent the world and learning through multiple media products.
8. Teaching students about digital social spaces.

The way I see it, technology is here part of our daily lives. Our role in universities is to explore its impact and design evidence based ways of using it in positive ways.

Dragons and the Curse of the 99₵ App

As I sift through hundreds of apps for our iPad in the classroom podcast I am occasionally surprised by quality apps. In our TechEDGE conference yesterday Rob McEntarffer from Lincoln Public Schools showed me DragonBox. In this brilliant app (see geek Dad review) students learn algebra in a way that "sneaks up" on them. It teaches them algebra principles through a true game environment (bringing Gee's vision to life) . Such brilliant apps are rare because they are brilliant. But in effect most of the educational apps have limited learning value. Most have limited content and focus on drill in ways that leave the educator in me cringing and hoping for more.

The problem though may be that the app store set the income margin too low. Right now an app for 5.99 is expensive and gives purchasers pause. The dominant modes are free and 99 cent apps. I just wonder if developers can create and maintain quality educational apps at these prices. I have gone through more than a thousand educational apps in the last year and I can answer with a "not yet". There are some great apps but most fail even my basic criteria to be useful.

I believe that mobile devices with an emphasis on tablets are going to be dominant in education in the next decade maybe even longer. Apps are an important part of this ecosystem but to be useful we need a bigger pool of great apps that serve students need to learn.

The lesson from the print news industry is that new pricing models connected with technology seem to create changes that are irreversible. Some companies are trying to buck this trend by creating educational subscriptions e.g. Footsteps 2 Brilliance and BrainPop.
This is an interesting direction that I hope can be successful but here I want to identify here other possible solutions.

As we discuss flipping classroom I would like to suggest flipping the curriculum and professional development equation. That is, providing the materials for free (or for a nominal sum say 99¢) and charging for backend services such as professional development and data services. This is a concept I have written about before and I think can potentially be viable. The Dynamic Indicators of Basics Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) seem to have successfully followed this model providing the assessment for free but charging for training, data services and optional assessment materials. While it is a not-for-profit organization it still proves the concept.

An effort like this may benefit from a partnership with a university combining the entrepreneurship of start-ups and the educational know-how of university faculty. This combination can make excellent products for the educational market that mesh gaming concepts and excellent content that lead kids to learn.

Finally, states and districts can choose to partner with universities and invest in creating digital materials to replace the commercial curricula altogether. Such efforts would require upfront costs but may actually reduce the dependence on commercial products and save districts significant amounts of money that can then be invested in professional development and emerging learning technologies.

Current and Future Teachers Reflecting on iPad Use

We have used iPads in the Reading Center all summer. I decided to include unedited comments of some of my students who agreed to share the comments.

         Using the iPad during class helped me become more comfortable with technology. I have never used technology in the school setting before. It also helped me know what was available as far as apps and how wonderful they can be in assisting with learning. I won't have an iPad available for use next year, but I am seriously considering buying one. I think it is a wonderful way to enhance classroom learning and get kids ready for the future. I particularly liked the iCard Sort and eBook Magic apps for what I do now. I can see how Show Me would be a great way to present lessons as well.

        The iPads were a huge help during this session. Not only did it give variety, but it helped motivate my student to learn.  I don't think he writing would have come as far if we hadn't been able to publish his work.  He was so proud that it was a book that he wanted to keep writing.  He even decided to write a chapter book and as a second grader, that's big.  I was able to use the iPad for things we could have done on paper, but worked better using technology.  Sam was more engaged when we used the iPad than when we worked with a pencil and paper.  I would definitely keep using the iPads for this class.

          I would use them to record important lessons in case kids are gone or if I'm gone.  You always have to review and if you can give the iPad to a child or a group of children and have them review or learn what they didn't before, that can save you time.  Then, you can go back and talk with them about what they heard and saw.  I would use the internet to show kids how we could research topics.  I would use the eBook Magic app to publish their work and encourage more writing.  I would also use the iPad for revisions.  The kids could type up what they have and correct it, saving paper, while still having the drafts available.  I didn't have a ton of apps on my iPad, but I would also ask my colleagues what apps they have found helpful and use them as much as is educational in my class. 

The iPads used during my teaching was such a great experience! It has allowed me to learn how to apply it in a classroom setting and how to select appropriate Apps for my students. This was one of the highlights for me during this summer session. I wasn't familiar with the iPad prior to this class, even though I had it in another class. Now I am going to purchase one because I realize that this is going to be a necessity for me in my instruction  for my classroom. 

           If iPads and other technologies are available at my school, I will come back to the learning center to ask for help if I do not understand how to use it. I find that this is something I desire to learn and apply to my teaching strategy. Students can be learning the same thing on different levels with iPads. I find that I am able to gain access to resources and students need this as we are entering into one of the most exciting times in education with technology. I am excited to see how technology is going to change the learning experience for classrooms. It want to participate in this process. I will use the iPad for assessments, work stations, connecting community and classroom,  grading, homework, creating lessons and anything that will cause my students to learn. 

           The iPads were such a great thing to get to use. I had never used one in any other class and so it was a learning experience for me as well. It helped with all of my lessons because he would get tired of writing a story and so we would create one in puppet pals or in ebook magic. He was still having to come up with the ideas, it was just more interactive this way. Also brain breaks were so easy to do with an iPad because the games were right there and they were educational.

          If iPads and other technologies are available at your school, how do you anticipate using them?
I really like the educreations app. I would use that to create my lesson plans and if students weren't sure on what they learned, they could go back and watch/listen to it again. It's also a great way to make the class interactive. Having that in the palm of  your hand and can look up anything at any time is beneficial overall. Students can create documents and share them, students can check in/out, and it's just a really great resource to have.

          The iPad has been extremely useful in the tutoring session and allowed e to really explore the possibilities and have practical applications for them.

If there is iPad use in the school I will be in I will be extremely excited because it allows me to teach students and give them a more immersive experience. Allowing them to have more connectivity and having more feedback right away to help me as a teacher design my lessons to help my students more.

          I think the ipads helped me learn more about using technology in the educational field. With the way society is today, by the time I become a teacher, every school could possibly have ipads and technology like Ipads. So, having the training with ipads is really beneficial as I will have a boost ahead of someone who does not have the training. I anticipate using ipads by using them as a motivator and literacy stations. Using an activity that is fun yet educational at the same time, makes learning fun for students. 

Couldn't haver said it better myself...