Journal Reflection for Amy Matas and Katie Sims Internship

8.22.16- We got together today and typed up our proposal for our internship. We submitted our
proposal and Approval Form to Jae, our principal. Were waiting for the signed copy to send
back to Kelly! *Update, both documents have been submitted to Kelly.

9.6.16- Initial Survey

We had met with Jae Lee yesterday to allow us time at our first professional day staff meeting to
verbally introduce ourselves to the staff and explain the purpose of our internship. Once we had
the approval, we began creating the survey to get the opinions from our staff. We will use the
data from the survey to plan future staff meetings.
We sent the survey out today through email.

9/14/16 Met to discuss survey results. Here are our results.

We realized there was a problem/need for teachers to learn more about GAFE and ways to use
Google Classroom with their students. We created a GoogleSlide to make a tutorial that we
wanted to address at our next staff meeting. Objectives: Understand the latest updates to
Google Apps for Education, & Receive Google Classroom tips to manage distribution of
resources and assignments.

9.21.16- Staff Meeting #1 Google Classroom

Before we began, we set up a Google Classroom for our staff members to log in. We plan on
using this Classroom to post all of the Tech. tools and resources well be sharing during our
internship. Our GoogleSlide was very helpful.
Highlights of our meeting:
-google classroom you can post assignments, announcements, and questions
-you can schedule when you want to post assignments to be live, so students dont have access
to it when you first post it.
-parents can be invited to join your google classroom (but you have to add them)
-creating an announcement
-creating questions (great for quick exit passes)
Our staff was very appreciative of our presentation. We were able to have everyone log in to our
Classroom. Everyone was at ease! SUCCESS!

9.28.26- Prepping for XtraMath

Our staff was informed that their was a school-wide problem with students not knowing their
basic math facts. Students in all grades struggled with their addition, subtraction, multiplication,
and/or division. We were determined to find a tool that students could use at school or home
that would motivate them to practice their addition, subtraction, multiplication and division facts.
We came across XtraMath. Amy had used the program previously so we knew this would be
great solution to our school-wide problem. We sent out a brief survey on our Google Classroom
to see if other teachers had used the program before, to our surprise no one had. Moving
forward, we created a GoogleSlide to teach our staff about XtraMath and shared it at our next
staff meeting.
10.05.16- Staff Meeting #2 Cancelled
Unfortunately, our principal had rather important news to share, which caused our Tech Ten to
be pushed to the next staff meeting.

Later in the day, we sat down with the second grade team to help them set up a Google
Classroom for their students. They received Chromebook carts to use with their students for the
first time. We discussed having the students create rules for using the Chromebooks and how to
make sure they are taking care of properly. We walked them through starting a Google
Classroom, inviting students, and adding links to the classroom.

10.19.16- Staff Meeting #3 XtraMath

We walked staff through the XtraMath program using Amys personal account. We were able to
show and explain how easy and efficient the program was. This is a great tool for teachers and
students. We plan to touch base with staff members at a later date to see how the program is
working in their classrooms. Our Staff Development teacher actually encouraged all grades to
use this tool since the county is forcing a lot of attention on students knowing their basic facts. A
lot of the teachers appeared to be interested. We reminded staff that our Google Slide was
available in the GoogleClassroom. We also sent out the link to our slideshow after the meeting
for teachers to create their accounts. At the end of the meeting two teachers asked us to come
into their classrooms that day to help them get started. We have our next staff meeting on
November 2.

10.24.16- Helping
One of our staff members asked that we help set her class up for XtraMath. We were able to log
all of her students into the program.

10.26.16 Prepping for Hour of Code

We got together after school to plan our next Tech lesson for the November 2nd staff meeting.
We decided to share information about Hour of Code after we came across the hashtag on
Twitter. We logged into the website and realized that it was a great concept to introduce to our
staff. Earlier in the day we met with our principal and staff development teacher to run our ideas
by them. They asked if we would not only introduce it at the next staff meeting, but that we
should also explain that all teachers will be expected to expose their students to one hour of
coding in the computer lab. Hour of Code ties very closely with our seminar class with Dr.
Marcovitz. We were able to use Tony Wagners book, Creating Innovators, to share more
information as it relates to inspiring our youth. We created a GoogleSlide to visually inform our
staff about the value of coding. Most students are not exposed to coding at a young age. This
was a great opportunity to expose our elementary age students.

11.2.16 Staff Meeting #4 Hour of Code and Reflection

Today we began switching our staff to our new email server, Outlook365. We instructed staff
how to access their new email account before we discussed Hour of Code. Once all the staff
was set up, we showed a brief video to introduce Hour of Code. Two staff members have
participated in Hour of Code last year and were very excited about it. Administration decided
that as a school we will be participating. Overall, the staff was excited, especially since it is self-
instructed for the students and reaches all levels.

11.16.16 Staff Meeting #5 Plickers

Today we introduced Plickers to our staff. We created a GoogleSlide to introduce to the staff
how they can implement Plickers in the classroom to assess student understanding. We
explained that it is low tech and easy to set up. Teachers seemed responsive to trying a new
tech. tool. Quite a few teachers even asked us for the site so that they could print the plicker
cards out themselves.

11.28.16 Prepping for Padlet

We want to introduce Padlet at our next staff meeting (hopefully 12/7). Today, we created a
GoogleSlide to post on our GoogleClassroom that briefly explains the purposes and uses of
Padlet. We plan on describing Padlet as a blank wall for students to post ideas on. We added a
video at the end of the Slide for staff to watch on their own time. Its a quick video that models
how to properly use Padlet in the classroom. It seems like everyone is fairly busy this time of
year and if we make things available to them on their own time --theyll be used more. We plan
on creating a survey for our staff members this week to hopefully send out after our next staff
meeting. The survey will allow us to touch base with the teachers to find out what tools they
have been using. We would also like to know what tools they would like to know more about.
We want to have an idea on how we can better utilize their time at meetings.

11.29.16 Hour of Code Reminder

We sent out an email to remind staff to sign up for Hour of Code.
Computers are everywhere, changing every industry on the planet. But fewer than half of all schools
teach computer science. Good news is, were on our way to change this. If you've heard about the
Hour of Code before, you might know it made history. More than 100 million students have tried an
Hour of Code.
With the Hour of Code, computer science has been on homepages of Google, MSN, Yahoo! and
Disney. Over 100 partners have joined together to support this movement. Every Apple Store in the
world has hosted an Hour of Code. President Obama wrote his first line of code as part of the
campaign.
This year, let's make it even bigger. Im asking you to join in for the Hour of Code 2016. Please get
involved with an Hour of Code event during Computer Science Education Week, December 5-11.
Get the word out. Host an event. Ask a local school to sign up. Or try the Hour of Code yourself
everyone can benefit from learning the basics.
Get started at http://hourofcode.com/us

12.7.16 Staff Meeting #6 Padlet

We introduced our Padlet Slide to staff members this morning. We explained that Padlet is a
virtual wall that allows students (or anyone) to express their thoughts on a common topic easily.
It works like an online sheet of paper where people can put any content (e.g. images, videos,
documents, text) anywhere on the page, together with anyone, from any device. We displayed a
sample version that Katie used with her second graders the week after Thanksgiving. Teachers
were amazed the second graders were capable of using it.

12.9.16 Prepping/Creating our Survey

We created a GoogleSlide that reviewed the technology tools and resources weve shared so
far (GAFE, Xtramath, Plickers, Hour of Code, Padlet) and created a Google Form to survey our
staff. We plan to have the staff complete this survey at our next staff meeting. We plan to review
the results before we introduce the next tech tool.

12.14.16 Staff Meeting #6 Review/Survey

We presented our GoogleSlide as a review of tools. Staff took our survey.

1.4.16 Prepping for next staff meeting

After looking at our survey feedback, we realized our staff would benefit from an organized tool
called Symbaloo. We got together and prepped our GoogleSlide for Symbaloo.

1.11.16 Staff Meeting #7 Symbaloo

Today we shared Symbaloo with our staff. This was one of the many tech tools that ALL of our
staff members were eager to learn about. Teachers were excited to have one site where their
students could go to with all the useful links they provide access to. A common problem most
teachers ran into was their students saving sites into their favorites tab --but have too many
favorites caused problems. Teachers were thrilled they could save websites by grade, subject,
quarter, and even weeks. We shared example Symbaloos that our county previously created
that no one knew of. Success!
1.18.17 Staff Meeting #8 Final
Today we wrapped up our Tech. Ten by thanking the staff for their participation in our tech.
Tools. We thanked them for their willingness to try the tools that we introduced to them since
everyone has such busy schedules. To sum up our internship we passed out an exit note card
for any final feedback or requests on how we could support the staff individually. We explained
that technology doesnt always need to be electronic and complex. We let everyone know that
we will be available to help them as an as-needed basis.

4.4.17 Screencast on Cult of Pedagogy

Post by Amy: I created a screencast using screencast-o-matic as a 2-for-1 deal. I shared with
staff about an online magazine, Cult of Pedagogy. By using a screencast, I was able to show
teachers how to subscribe to the magazine and what theyd read about. I chose to use the
program Screencast-o-matic because I wanted to share how easy a screencast can be made. I
sent my screencast to staff through email. I also posted the screencast and GoogleSlide in our
Google Classroom.