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Growing a Community of Readers through Seesaw

Professional Development Online Learning Module

Sakinah Hunafa

FRIT 7739: Practicum in Instructional Technology

Georgia Southern University

Dr. Wofford

Fall 2021
 Online Staff Development Module Outline
Overarching goal: Educators will be able to successfully integrate the technolgy tool:
Seesaw to increase reading comprehension and accuracy for students.

Part 1: Identification of Learning Problem: Dr. Dickey and I discussed what could be a potential
need for professional development for the staff at Lilburn Elementary. She stressed to me that the
school places a large emphasis on the importance of reading for success. Lilburn Elementary is
all about growing a community of readers. The principal, Dr. Merisme is an impressive
proponent of that goal. She participates in reading to the students, encouraging and aiding in
reading programs, working to increase the language and reading comprehension of the large
ESOL population at the school and more. Dr. Dickey also informed me to the plethora of
resources available to teachers to achieve this goal. Interestingly, she also pointed out to me that
teachers do not use some of those resources or just one resource. It became apparent to me that
by providing a professional development workshop that helped staff to use a reading tool for
integration into their curriculum, I could help them achieve the goal. It also helped me to narrow
down one topic versus a potential wide variety of topics.

Part 2:  Learner Analysis

1. Introduction: The professional staff development was geared to the staff at Lilburn
Elementary school. This did not only include grade level teachers but support staff and
ESOL. I actually had a response from one of the assistant principals and one of the
LSTC’s as well. The teachers there are hardworking and all are fully certified.

2. Entry Skills and Prior Knowledge: All of the respondents to the needs assessment had
experience with at least one of the tools that I was offering as the potential choice for the
workshop. A good deal of the teachers had used at least two of the tools. None of the staff
members had used all of the tools as Dr. Dickey had explained to me. Therefore, the staff
had some knowledge of some of the tools, but in varying degrees and no experience with
others. A few members expressed interest in Amplify Reading, a program which Dr.
Dickey will shortly begin to give professional development lessons on as well as lessons
with students.

3. Attitudes Toward Content & Academic Motivation: The staff members were
generally interested in this topic as evidenced by the quick response for the
professional development workshop. I was also very impressed to have received 24
responses in the span of one afternoon and 31 responses before 2 days had passed.
This affirmed to me that Lilburn Elementary staff is both motivated and excited to
learn and grow professionally to benefit themselves and their students.

4. Group Characteristics(including social characteristics and relevant cultural 

information): The group consists of a variety of staff members from different backgrounds.
Upon receipt of the responses of the needs assessment, I learned that very quickly.
There are some staff members of Hispanic Heritage, African, Caucasian American, African
American and Asian American. The respondents varied from support staff to ESOL teachers,
admin, technology specialists and classroom teachers.
My respondents spanned each grade level as well beginning at Kindergarten and ending with 5th
grade. This was excellent to see a diverse response and required me to provide differentiated
activities for the respondents to meet all needs.

Instructional Goals:

Task 1: Introduction to Seesaw

Objective: Participants will receive an overview of Seesaw as a learning tool for classroom use
and will reflect on knowledge gained.

Task 2: Teacher Account Set Up

Objective: Participants will create their own teacher account through Seesaw.

Task 3: Class Creation

Objective: Participants will add their class to Seesaw manually with code invitation or though a

Google Classroom imported roster.

Task 4: Create and Assign Activities

Objective: Participants will be able to create a reading comprehension activity to assign students

as well as use the activity library to assign pre-made reading comprehension activities connected

to the curriculum standards.

Task 5: Explore the Student Profile On Seesaw Platform

Objective: Participants will be able to navigate a student profile to gain perspective on the

student point of view involving Seesaw and show a way students can use Seesaw on that end.
Task 6: Ideas for Improvement of Reading Comprehension in Students

Objective: Participants will be able to explain at least two ways to use the Seesaw learning tool

to improve reading comprehension in students.

Task 7: Evaluate the module

Objective: Participants will evaluate the module to give feedback on usefulness of the course

and give any comments or suggestions for improvement.

Professional Development Outline:

Task 1: Introduction to Seesaw

1. Participants will view the instructional goals for the professional development workshop.

2. Participants will view a video introducing Seesaw outlining some it’s key benefits.

3. Participants will complete a Padlet post noting their thoughts on Seesaw as an

instructional tool after viewing the video.

Task 2: Teacher Account Setup

1. Participants will view my instructional screencast video on creating a teacher account.

2. Participants will set up their own teacher account.

3. Participants will take and submit a screenshot of a page in their teacher account to show

task completion on Padlet.

Task 3: Class Creation

1. Participants will view a video explaining how to set up your class on Seesaw.

2. Participants will login to Seesaw and set up their class for use on Seesaw.
 3. Participants will take and submit a screenshot of the class page to show the completed

task on Padlet.

Task 4: Create and assign activities

1. Participants will view the video on creating and assigning activities in Seesaw.

2. Participants will login to Seesaw and create their own reading comprehension activity to

assign to students as well as choose a pre-created reading comprehension activity to

assign to students.

3. Participants will take and submit a screenshot of the class page to show the completed

task on Padlet.

Task 5: Navigating the student profile

1. Participants will view my instructional screencast video on navigating the student profile.

2. Participants will take notes to anticipate anything students may have questions about.

3. Participants will create a video, drawing or note in the student profile that addresses the

notes made in the second step. Participants will provide test login information if they

choose to create a video otherwise, they will take a screenshot and submit it to Padlet to

show completion of the task.

Task 6: Improve reading comprehension in students

1. Participants will view my instructional screencast video on four ways to use Seesaw to

improve reading comprehension in students.

2. Participants will use Padlet to post at least two ways to improve reading comprehension

in students.
Task 7: Identify and Suggest a Useful Resource for Assistance using Seesaw in Classrooms

1. Participants will visit the resource page of the module and explore the resources listed

there.

2. Participants will identify one resource they found useful for future assistance using

Seesaw to build reading comprehension in the classroom. They will also come up with

one resource that other participants may find useful to assist them further.

3. Participants will post to Padlet with this information using a method of their choice such

as video, audio or note.

Task 8: Complete Evaluation Survey (Included to ensure completion of evaluation, not a

part of instructional sequence regarding overall goal.)

1. Participants will give anonymous feedback on the professional development module.

2. Participants will take and submit a screenshot of the submission page to show completion

of survey.

Pre-Assessment: A Google Forms Needs Survey was created by me after collaboration at

Lilburn Elementary with Dr. Dickey. It was then sent to certified staff by Dr. Dickey, field
supervisor. 31 staff members including admin and a Local School Technology Coordinator
completed the survey. (Appendix A)

Formative Evaluation or Post Assessment: A Google forms Post Professional Learning

Survey was created by me after collaboration with Dr. Dickey. It was embedded into the module
as one of the tasks to complete at the end of the module.
 Content Sequencing and Instructional Strategies

Instructional Sequence

Sequence Description Objective

1 Develop a basic understanding of what Seesaw is. 1

2 Setup a teacher account on Seesaw 2

3 Create a class in Seesaw 3

4 Create and assign reading comprehension activities in Seesaw. 4

5 Navigate the student profile to gain perspective 5

6 Improve Reading Comprehension in Students 6

7 Identify and Suggest Useful Resource for Assistance using Seesaw in Classrooms 7
to build reading comprehension.

This sequence represents concepts set up in a world-related order style. By doing this, I keep
motivation high and achieve a better level of involvement. Respondents are completing activities
that prepare them for the next step.

Data Analysis:

My Seesaw Professional Development workshop was created as an asynchronous and self-paced

module to accommodate to the difficulty establishing a common time frame to give the
workshop live. I added a chat box option for all participants in which they could send me a direct
message through What’s App or Telegram if they had any questions. I also made sure to
comment on participant submissions to the group Padlet to give them feedback. The data I
received was mixed.

There was 32 respondents to the initial needs assessment which gave respondents the option of
four different technology tools: Read Theory, Seesaw, Readworks and Reading Eggs. I received
7 votes for Readworks, 8 votes for Seesaw, 8 votes for Read Theory and 9 votes for Reading
Eggs. I further reviewed the data in response to a Question 4, which asked respondents to
choose any of the reading tools they had currently used or used previously. I learned that 21 out
of the 32 respondents had used Readworks either in the past or currently, 5 out of 32 respondents
had used Read Theory, 18 out of 32 respondents had used Reading Eggs and 17 out of 32
respondents had used Seesaw.
 Readworks was eliminated as a tool both due to the fact that it received only 7 votes and almost
all of the respondents had used it either previously or currently. I eliminated Reading Eggs as 18
out of the 32 had used it previously or currently and my previous review of it found it to be more
geared to the youngest students. This left me with Read Theory and Seesaw. I saw that Read
Theory only had 5 out of 32 respondents use it and 8 votes for completion. However, Read
Theory was very limited in use for the goal with the exception of assessment. This left me with
Seesaw as the winner with 8 votes and 17 out of 32 respondents with some experience.
It also spanned grade levels, had multiple resources for teachers and parents, can be utilized for
lessons as well as assessment and more. I could also see the benefit for it for a school that was so
diverse with many ESOL students. Finally, this decision was also made with thorough discussion
with Dr. Dickey about school goals and data confirming the most common grade levels and
positions of the respondents.

Then, I created the Seesaw Professional Development Workshop and Dr. Dickey reviewed it
and gave me helpful feedback. I sent Dr. Dickey the workshop and she emailed it to all certified
staff at the school, this including administration, local school technology coordinators, support
staff and teachers.
I kept a close eye on the workshop each day and the Padlet to ensure a quick response to any
questions and/or posts made by participants. A few people personally spoke to me about how
they were impressed by the set up of the workshop. I had 8 participants in the Seesaw
Professional Workshop. 5 participants completed the workshop in full. 1 of the remaining 3
participants only completed the evaluation survey, but did not post anything to Padlet, the second
remaining participant completed and posted 3 of the 7 activities for the workshop, but did not
finish, the third remaining participant only completed the evaluation survey and posted that
response to Padlet.

Respondent Feedback:

Of the eight participants, seven participants responded to the evaluation survey. Overall, the
feedback was positive. Respondents were asked about the navigational ease of the module. All of
the six respondents confirmed that they were able to navigate the module with ease with the
instructions provided. I was pleased to see that as I worked hard to provide clear instructions for
all tasks.
Respondents were also asked about their comfortability level with using Seesaw in the classroom
after the completion of the module on a scale of one to five. Out of the seven respondents, three
respondents were comfortable on the highest level at five, three of the respondents were
comfortable on the next highest level at four and one respondent was comfortable at the median
level of three.

Respondents were further questioned about the most useful aspect of the Seesaw module. All
seven of the respondents replied that they found the instructional videos and screencasts to be the
most helpful.

Respondents were also asked about the likelihood of incorporating Seesaw into the classroom or
increasing their use of it following completion of the workshop. I received seven responses. The
graph is showing a skewed number somehow.
However, four respondents replied that they were likely to do so. Three of the respondents
replied that they were somewhat likely to do so. None of the respondents replied that they were
not all likely to do so.

Finally, I asked respondents if they had any comments or suggestions for improvement of the
module. Three respondents replied with positive feedback in either thanks or complimentary
statements. One respondent mentioned a love for using Seesaw and a plan to increase her use of
the tool. Two respondents gave some feedback that provided some constructive criticism and
positive affirmation. One of them mentioned having some difficulty with locating a student code
to complete one of the tasks at first. The second respondent gave an organizational suggestion
regarding the group Padlet page and one comment on confusion regarding an instruction for one
of the tasks. One more respondent replied that the workshop was useful in learning about
Seesaw.

Reflection:

I believe that the lack of participation was in part due to the time of year. My workshop was
sent to everyone towards the end of October. That time frame was right before Halloween and
towards the end of a semester, a busy time for educators.
 This created some issues for me as it was exceedingly difficult to ensure participants began and
completed the professional development. I believe that for future professional developments, I
would need to give the workshop earlier in the semester to allow educators time to work on it
without the added stress of holidays, testing and mid to end of the semester challenges.

Another aspect that I would like to reflect on is that all of the respondents found the
instructional videos and screencasts to be most helpful. I spent some time working on
infographics to provide additional ideas for the use of the Seesaw technology tool. However,
with that feedback in mind, I plan to include more instructional videos and screencasts in the
future as they were deemed to be most helpful. I would like to be as helpful as possible in order
to ensure successful integration of Seesaw in the classroom to support student learning.

Additionally, one of my respondents left a very helpful comment regarding organization of the
group Padlet for ease of understanding. She suggested I create columns for each task to make it
easier to manage posts. I thought this was a great observation and idea and immediately made the
change. As a learner in the instructional technology field, I am ready and willing to take
feedback for improvement. The same respondent mentioned an instruction given on the Padlet
page was not reiterated on the module page, so she experienced some confusion for that
particular task. I reviewed what she was discussing and found that to be accurate and fixed the
issue immediately. I was thankful she pointed out the problem and allowed me to fix it for other
participants.

Another respondent mentioned having some problems with locating the student code needed to
complete task 5 regarding navigating the student profile on Seesaw. I plan to review my
instructional screencast videos to ensure that I have clearly outlined my instructions for this task.
I hope to make it as easy as possible for my participants.

I also noticed that three of the respondents felt only somewhat likely to incorporate Seesaw
into the classroom more frequently or as a new tool. Since the goal is to ensure integration of this
amazing technology tool, I will explore ways to further inspire the use of Seesaw. Perhaps I need
to give some further examples of the benefits involved. The module could also benefit from a
deeper look into Seesaw. I believe I could achieve that if the workshop were worked in as
professional development that could be completed over the course of a few weeks with more
collaboration and encouragement from administration.

Overall, I could see that my participants felt as though the workshop was beneficial to them as a
professional development to aid them in the integration of Seesaw as a technology tool to
improve reading comprehension. However, there were some aspects that I plan to improve on to
make the module easier to navigate and more informative to share with other educators in the
future.