Curriculum Corner
Updates from Vicky McCann, ADW Director for Curriculum
What tools are we using?
Dear ADW School Leaders and Educators,
Last Wednesday, 500 educators joined in during the 1st ever Virtual Collaboration Day. Common themes that we discussed included video conferencing, assessment, and read alouds. Our next event will be this Friday, April 3. We are excited to bring you a wide variety of session topics with details being added to our Collaboration Day site.
Keep communicating on a regular basis with the students and parents on homework assignments or other learning activities relating to the teachers’ areas of responsibility.
If you have ideas to share or need assistance with these strategies, please contact Vicky McCann, mccannv@adw.org, or Shannon Norris, norriss@adw.org.
Xfinity WiFi Free For Everyone
Including All Students
Video Conferencing Ideas
A: Teachers are routinely using technology to reach their students. We encourage parents/guardians to be included on all communications regarding upcoming interactions, as well as, being invited to sit with their children during these group instructional sessions (NOT required). One-on-one interactions without the presence of a parent and/or another Virtus-cleared adult, is not allowed. Communications should be related to academic- or school-related business only, and through school-based (school-approved) online learning platforms. It is also important that we are respecting the privacy of our students when sharing videos or pictures (do not display names, consider their attire, etc.). Communications with students should never take place via text messaging or through social media platforms.
This statement can also be found here; 2018-2023 ADW, CSO Educational Technology Plan
Screencastify
Seesaw
ClassDojo
Assessment Ideas
Written Assignments: short essays, research papers
- Students submit written work electronically.
- Can assign students to small groups to provide peer feedback and build community.
- Students can solve problems on paper, scan or take a picture of the solution, and upload it to a platform.
Online Discussion: Asynchronous discussion activities
- Instructor can initiate class discussions with set of questions.
- Ask open-ended questions.
- Opportunity for community building through student feedback.
- FlipGrid, Seesaw, Class Dojo
Presentations:
- Students create presentations (i.e. slide deck or poster) to present to teacher and classmates online and receive instructor and peer feedback.
- Google Classroom, FlipGrid
Choice Boards
See more and samples here.
EdPuzzle
Virtual Manipulatives
Nearpod
FlipGrid
Formative
Formative Assessment Distance Learning Tools
Mentimeter: Allows for the creation of interactive presentations (which you can use for quizzes), and integrates with Google Classroom.
Pear Deck: Create custom questions in Google Slides and provide student-paced activities easily. More on ways to promote remote learning with Pear Deck here.
Poll Everywhere: Run live interactive presentations; similar features to Mentimeter. There is a free account that supports up to 25 participants.
Quizizz: Self-paced quizzes for students to review. You can use teacher-created quizzes if you don’t want to create your own. 100% free.
Quizlet: Quizlet Live is very similar to Kahoot and allows classrooms to run collaborative games. They have a plus plan that removes ads and ads some additional functionalities.
Socrative: Create multiple choice, true/false and short answer quizzes as a quiz, game, or exit ticket. Free plan supports up to 50 students.
Virtual Read Alouds
Publishers Adapt Policies To Help Educators
As educators move to remote learning, many are worrying and wondering about reading books aloud online and possibly violating copyright laws. In response, many children's publishers have temporarily altered policies.
Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins Children's Books, Macmillan, Little, Brown Young Readers, Penguin Random House, Scholastic, Chronicle Kids, Candlewick, Lee and Low, HMH, Abrams, Holiday House, Disney Publishing, Crabtree Publishing, Lerner, and Peachtree have put out guidelines for use during the coronavirus pandemic that has shut down schools across the country.
Scholastic
We are particularly sensitive to the needs of children to continue their learning and to reap the many benefits that literature brings them, especially during these challenging times. Scholastic fully supports providing a wide range of online learning activities for kids during this time of school closures.
We have been moved by the numerous requests we’ve received from teachers across the country who are trying to address these needs by posting readings of books online for students to access. We want to support these efforts and have given permission for our books to be read online, with select guidelines in regard to platform, notice, and duration of availability.
Please visit www.Scholastic.com/Read-Aloud-Permissions to learn more.
Supporting Students with Disabilities Virtually
Vicky McCann
Archdiocese of Washington Catholic Schools
Email: mccannv@adw.org
Website: http://adwlearn.weebly.com
Location: Archdiocese of Washington Pastoral Center, Eastern Avenue Northeast, Chillum, MD, USA
Phone: 301-853-4548
Twitter: @adwcurriculum