Malchow's Tech Bytes (Virtual Learning) Edition~ 4/20 👩🏻‍💻

Ahhhhh..... what a difference a week makes! Although it was still a super busy week with lots of techie things to do, I feel like I was able to breathe a little more easily and found a bit of time to get some of the things on my own to do list done! Sweet Success!!!! 

So with that said, this week brings both my normal Tech Bytes newsletter as well as the newsletter info that I am putting together for my colleagues. 
My building newsletter this week has tips to support using Google Meet for video conferences while my normal newsletter brings you integration ideas for remote learning. 

I hope you can find a resource of two to help you out this week! 

Simply click either of the pictures to go to the Google slidedeck where you will find 

both of this week's slides as well as all previous editions of my Tech Bytes newsletters.

Click the image to access

Click the image to access

Malchow's (Virtual Learning) Tech Bytes

Whew! What a CrAzY MONTH it has been!

 I feel like I need to say that 10 times to get my point across, but my guess is that if you're reading this, I'm likely preaching to the choir! LOL  I've been on overdrive since March 13th when I was at a regularly scheduled Apple Core PD planning day. The day seemed to start normally with a bit of talk about what was going on in the world and that nasty 5 letter word, COVID, but within an hour, normal turned into disbelief as we found out that a school closing was likely imminent. At that point, our team shifted gears and spent the remainder of our day planning for how and when we would train staff in virtual learning. From there, the wheels just kept on spinning. There have been days that I'm not sure if I'm coming or going and the amount of hours I have put in have been extraordinary. My family's spring break ski trip to Colorado was cancelled and I spent the majority of that break planning, prepping and creating for teachers, students and parents. Needless to say, my normally scheduled projects such as my weekly Tech Bytes and monthly EpicPals projects have taken a back seat, not because I wanted them to, but simply because there hasn't been a spare hour in the day to work on them. 

My hope is that things will calm down a little in the next week or two (I keep saying that, but it has to happen, right?!?) and that I will be able to find a better balance of working from home and supporting my middle school & high school sons with their remote learning while also keeping my own sanity knowing that my husband is working on the frontline as a captain for the fire department and riding the rescue squad each shift. The threat of COVID is very real for my family and although we have a plan and will cross each bridge as we get to it, the possible scenarios honestly scare the he** out of me.... 'nuf said.

So, back to that balance.... over the course of the last week, I've revamped my normal Tech Bytes to take on a new objective and that is to support my K-5 teachers with our main technology initiatives (Seesaw and Google Meet). Rather than create two newsletters, I'm going to share pieces of what I am creating for my district teachers with you. I hope there will be things that you will find useful as you also navigate these unchartered waters. 

Please feel free to reach out if you have any questions!

~ Sara

Click Image to access the slide deck

Creating Choice Boards

Remote learning brings with it lots of challenges including how to get content to students in an easy format and on one platform if possible. When I started creating choice boards it was simply to give students choice, but with the new learning landscape that we are all in, they've helped to solve other problems- getting info out that:

• is in an easy to use format 
• provides easy to access links to multiple resources 
• parents can easily help their child with AND...
• located on one platform (Seesaw for our K-5 kiddos)

If you're looking to find a way to conquer any or all of the issues above, you may want to try creating one! It's easier than you may think! The video below will walk you through the basics so you'll be able to confidently create your own that can align with your grade level content.

Want to see a few examples? Click here or here to see two different ones that I created. Feel free to download and use if you'd like. 

Have fun!!

Remote Learning~ Learn to Code Choice Board

Here's another Choice Board that your students may enjoy during your school's remote learning timeframe. You'll find a Dr. Seuss choice board that I created in this post

The top row of this choice board would be appropriate for the primary grades while the remainder of the board will likely be more appropriate for the upper grades and students that have an interest in coding. 

**Please Note: The CS First sites (Create a Google Logo, Animate a Name, Code your Superhero) require students to enter a code to access. To get a code, you need to set up a free account. It's super easy & takes less than 5 minutes (I promise!). Once it's set up, your students will simply  enter your code. There's nothing more you will need to do unless you want to track their progress on the dashboard. I've included a video below to show you how to set up your acct.

Click image to access and download this file

For the links to be live, the board which is saved as a pdf, needs to be uploaded as a file, NOT as a link in Seesaw. You'll need to download the file first (click the image to access the file and download) then, watch the embedded video below for directions on how to make it work in Seesaw.

** Please know that sharing settings for all documents are set to Open by Anyone with the Link. **

If you are being asked to request access, please check with you IT department 

as the message below is what I get when trying trying to give you access.

Remote Learning, Choice Boards and Seesaw

With so many of us moving to remote learning, you many find yourself in the position of needing to offer your students choice in a different format. Choice boards if you've not heard of them are graphic organizers that are comprised of different squares, each with a different activity. Each activity helps students to learn or practice a concept while allowing choice. You can ask your students to complete 1 or several of the activities and they can complete them in an organized fashion or in random order. I guess there's a reason that they're call choice boards! 

Here is a choice board that I created for Read Across America week that may be a useful extra in our new, ever-changing learning landscape. These are great when uploaded to Seesaw.

For the links to be live, the board which is saved as a pdf, needs to be uploaded as a file, NOT as a link. You'll need to download this file first (click the image to access the file) Nexrt, watch the embedded video below for directions on how to make it work in Seesaw.

Click the image to download a copy of this board.