Staff Meeting Fixer Upper

Not all of the ideas posted here are for staff meetings, but so many of our friends have given us great ideas for motivating staff, conducting interviews and rewarding faculty members that we could not leave them out. Enjoy and share!

We depend on our PLN for ideas, updates to programs & apps, answers to difficult questions, etc. For this presentation, we used Twitter and Google+ to reach out to educators from around the world asking how they shake up their staff meetings. Ideas from this group are denoted with an asterisk.

No staff meeting is ever complete without food! Here are a few of our favorite ideas:

• Nuts About Nearpod (or your campus name, mascot or anything else) - Nuts or Nutter Butter Cookies
• "Nacho" Your Ordinary Staff Meeting - Nacho bar or Nacho-Flavored Doritos
• *Sparkling grape juice while we "toast" our achievements
  
• *Cookies with Your Coach
  
• *You make our school Pop! Popcorn bar for a snack option

• *Smooth"ies - We served smoothies to staff in the morning during teacher appreciation week so they would have a smooth start to the week.

How About a Breakfast Meeting?

• Rise and Shine - donuts, pastries, bagels, etc.
• Taco Tuesday - breakfast tacos
• "Breakfast Club" meetings
• *Wows and Waffles
• *Pancakes and Praise - Admin made pancakes and gave compliments to staff as we served each staff members pancakes

*Chocolate covered strawberries (because everyone loves to be spoiled!)!

Build your own PLN on Twitter. Whether you're a lurker or a heavy-duty Tweeter, you will discover some of the best PD ever!

Twitter Chats occur when a group of people tweets about a specific topic using the same hashtag (#). By using the same hashtag, participants can all follow along and respond to questions posted by a moderator. The chats are at a specific time and usually repeat weekly. Click here to find a Twitter Chat that interests you.

Hold regular Twitter Chats where teachers can share their thoughts and ideas for implementing the skills in their classroom that were taught in the PD session(s).

Read more: How to Participate in a Tweet Chat by Janet Fouts

Using Twitter for Professional Development
How to Use Twitter Chats to Expand Your PLN

The Twitter Question of @ and .

The PLN Matures. The Progression of the 21st Century Personal Learning Network

*Everyone has to tweet highlights of the meeting before they can leave.

*Create a hashtag for teachers to post learning to, reflect, exit ticket, etc.

Nearpod is an excellent tool for administrators to use to lead their meetings and model what they expect to see in their classrooms! Nearpod can make your meetings more engaging and interactive and several of the activities can be used to gather staff input.

6 Reasons to Lead Your Faculty Meeting with Nearpod by Monica Burns (@ClassTechTips)

Using Nearpod Beyond the Classroom - Nearpod Educator Series

*Our principal uses Nearpod for faculty meetings. He loves to be able to get Teacher feedback on certain items so that teachers have a voice.

Both of these online games include databases of quizzes that can be used in faculty meetings. Search for STAAR Test security questions or bloodborne pathogens for an engaging way to cover required material.

Kahoot

Quizizz

Gimkit is similar to Kahoot! and Quizizz. What excites us about Gimkit is that it was created by high school students from California. Questions can be imported from Quizlet or you can create your own games.

Tech Tool Smackdown - Spend the last few minutes of each faculty meeting having teachers share a favorite or new app or website. Make sure you have a moderator who can keep everyone on task and be the timekeeper.

Appy Hour - Meet at the local Sonic during their Happy Hour and share new and favorite apps.

Designate one faculty meeting each month for Cutting Edge Technology. Different staff members present a technology lesson from a training (face-to-face or online) or conference they have attended. The meeting does not include any other information...only technology!

*Hold staff meetings in different rooms each week so everyone can see the great things going on in each classroom

Use Remind (remind.com) to send documents, voice messages and/or text messages with new ideas, websites, etc. to staff.
5 Ways Administrators are Using Remind

Are you looking for a great team-building activity? Then BreakoutEDU might be the answer!

Escape Game Rooms are the latest craze across the country. BreakoutEDU is the educational answer to this fun, engaging and creative activity. Participants are given work together to solve clues and puzzles in order to attain codes that will open locks that are hidden throughout the room or locked in the BreakoutEDU box. Once a

BreakoutEDU game is launched, the team works collaboratively to beat the clock, solve all the puzzles and unlock all the locks.

Kits can be purchased for schools from the BreakoutEDU site or you can build your own. Click here for pricing.

Introducing Breakout EDU is a short video that will show you the basics of BreakoutEDU.

Follow on Twitter - @breakoutEDU

Have you thought about bringing an expert to your faculty meeting by using Skype, Google Hangout, Zoom or any of the easy to use video conferencing tools that are currently available?

Skype

Google Hangout

Zoom

A backchannel is a digital conversation that runs concurrently during a meeting. lecture, presentation, etc.

Poll Everywhere has been used for a few years, but the ability to have your answers make a Word Cloud is a feature that many educators have not used.

• Create Word Clouds in Poll Everywhere

*Poll Everywhere Chrome Extension

Other Backchanneling Tools:

Padlet

Chatzy

Mentimeter

Google Groups

The Post-It App allows you to take a big picture of the Post-It Notes you have assembled in a training. You can digitize the information, send it to an Excel spreadsheet, create a PDF or PowerPoint or take a photo of it.

Post-It App Activity
Write your name and job title on a Post-It Note.

*One of the newest features from Google is the Q&A option in Google Slides.

1. When you are in the Present mode, select Presenter View.
2. Make certain you are under the Audience Tools tab (the default tab) and press Start New.
3. A link has automatically been generated at the top of your live presentation. Audience members open the link and as questions are asked, they will be sent to your Audience Tools window. You will receive a message when a question appears.
4. Audience members also can vote on the questions that are asked.
   

Padlet is a virtual wall/bulletin board that allows students to create a sticky note to express their thoughts on a common topic. Padlet allows us to post text, links, images, and a wide variety of files including video.

Note: Padlet recently began charging $99 a year for unlimited Walls. The free account allows new users to have up to 3 walls. If you already have Walls in your account, you may add 3 more Walls for free.

New from Padlet:

Padlet has added new formats:

• Shelf - Posts can be sorted into a series of labeled columns

• Canvas - Move posts around free-form style

• Collaborate and assess with Reactions. Grade, star, upvote, or like posts - a simple way to give quantitative feedback. Read more about Reactions here.

• You can now highlight text in your posts.
  

• Categorize posts with Colors. Customize your posts one of five colors. Learn more about Colors here.

• Seamlessly link your pages to an LMS. Learn more here.

• Video Recording on a Padlet

• Snap feature - allows you to take photos and selfies from within Padlet and post them on your pages

• iPhone and iPad app users: Padlet just launched a new, experimental feature called Catscan. You can take a picture of a wall with post-it notes and Catscan will create a Padlet with those notes on it.

Examples:

Elementary and Middle School YouTube Channels

100 Picture Books

Padlet of Hyperdocs

Hyperdoc Links

Hyperdoc Links from Matt Miller, Ditch That Textbook

Flipgrid Ideas

Flipgrid is a video response tool that is used to create discussions between all students within your classroom. Teachers post a topic or question via text or video and the students respond to the prompt. Why not try using Flipgrid in your staff meetings to gather input from all attendees? Outside of meetings, Flipgrid can be used to reflect on an article or chapter from your book study, give every employee a chance to share new ideas or have faculty members introduce themselves to each other, students and/or parents.

FANTASTIC NEWS!!! Flipgrid has been purchased by Microsoft and it is now free for all educators!

Inspiration: End of Year Faculty Meeting Reflection Using @Flipgrid

Google Slides is an easy way to collect information from your students in a collaborative format. Once you have created the presentation, give the students access to the slides. The scribe for the group will go to the slide that matches their group number. The group discusses the question you have posed and the scribe fills out the slide for their group. This can also be used with individual students.

1. Open Google Drive (drive.google.com).
   
2. Click New, select Google Slides and choose Blank presentation.
   
3. Create your title page just like you would create a title page in PowerPoint.
   
4. Click Slide and select New Slide.
   
5. In the Click to Add Title textbox, type in Group 1 (or Table 1 or the group name).
   
6. Click Slide and select Duplicate Slide.
   
7. Change the number 1 to 2.
   
8. Continue duplicating slides and changing the group numbers until you have all that you need.
   
9. Click the blue Share button in the top right corner of the window.
   
10. Give your slideshow a title.
    
11. Click Save.
    
12. Click Get Shareable Link in the top right corner of the popup box.
    
13. Under Link Sharing, make certain that you change the drop-down menu to Anyone with link can edit.
    
14. Click Copy Link.
    
15. Click Done.
    

Here is a link to download the Google Slides Table Share. You will have to click Make a Copy to use the presentation.

Hint: The link to the Google Slides presentation is very long. It is advisable to use a URL shortener or make the link a QR Code so that your students can easily access the presentation.

Kasey Bell (Shake Up Learning) has created a free Google Slides Cheat Sheet that can be very helpful when you are working with Google Slides.

Plickers
Google Forms - Directions from Free Tech for Teachers
Tricider
Polltogo
Socrative
*The Answer Garden
*Tozzl

Reflections from an Elementary School Principal - Jessica Johnson shares how she uses technology to replace some faculty meetings and the impact these digital blogs, tweets and emails have had on her campus.

*Try a Flipped Faculty Meeting! A recorded video message can be sent before the meeting to cover any announcements so that the meeting can be more about collaboration, learning or problem-solving. (I did that with interviews to set a tone and give a big picture before meeting candidates. Worked great!)
*Flipping faculty meetings by using an online channel to discuss things or share ideas (Instagram, Twitter, SnapChat) was always a winner.
*Flip it with a twist! Give grade levels/teams a topic, article, etc. ahead of time. Have them create a 1-2 minute video teaching others the important pieces of their topic and post the video to YouTube (or other video sites). During staff meetings, show the videos to all staff. Afterward, everyone has the videos to refer back to.

*Flip It and Kahoot It - Send out info to be read ahead of the face to face meeting (saves time). Then, play a Kahoot asking questions about the important info in the items to be read.
*Using a blog post to spark ideas and allow conversations before the meetings was also a winner.

Examples:

Prelude to the Faculty Meeting

Flipped Faculty Meeting

Anne Beck from the University of Oklahoma has launched Tweet and Eat for the Department of Ed faculty members. What a great idea for a quick training at lunch.

"Join us this Wednesday for our first Tweet and Eat Twitter session! We will be meeting for lunch for the next few weeks to discuss Twitter and how to expand your Professional Learning Network!"

*Jump on the EdCamp bandwagon and have have a faculty meeting or PD where teachers go to sessions that pertain to them. This could be done in conjunction with other school(s) in the district.

Edcamps: Remixing Professional Development

A Faculty Meeting: Edcamp Style

*EdPuzzle could be used to share visual strategies/skills.
*Use videos to emphasize a critical point.
*Class Flow is great for interactive polls responses and collecting data from staff.
*Organize the distribution documents in an Office365 site or iTunesU account.
*Try Eduphoria for PD and faculty meeting scheduling, take surveys and attendance.
*Ignite Sessions by faculty members are great ways to share successful practices.
*Use Nearpod to present the information. You can include interactive activities for staff members to complete. You could also have attendees sketchnote or create mindmaps using the Drawing feature of Nearpod. 6 Reasons to Lead Your Next Faculty Meeting with Nearpod

*Host a Hackathon during a meeting.
*Digital scavenger hunts are fun ways to introduce staff members to everything in the building.
*Shared Notes in Google Docs allow your staff members to have access to the notes at any time and anyone can add to the notes.
*We always play games that kids would play at camps during the summer. That is a great ice breaker and fun moments.
*Have staff members create "badges" to reflect on the info they received/mastered during the meeting (5 mins on Canva (IOS App, Chrome App or website) or Google Drawings.
*Create a Flippity quiz or Flipquiz over topics like what was discussed at the meeting or happened on campus since the last meeting.
*Ask attendees to create a video or graphic as an Exit ticket Activity. Adobe Spark is a great option (also available as an IOS app).
*Create a Collaborative Google Slide where attendees have to post something they learn/talked about during the meeting.
*Create Exit Tickets in Google forms or Twitter.
*Attendees can create team sketchnotes using Ziteboard. Click here to access a list of sketchnoting apps for teachers and students.
*Use Google Forms, sheets and autocrat to create afun "Madlibs" - staff edition.
*Quizlet Live team quiz is a new feature on Quizlet and could easily be used in a staff meeting.
*Create a LiveBinder for a campus notebook - meeting notes, schedules, fire drill info, dismissal charts, duty schedules, or relative websites could be kept and accessed during meetings and easily referenced throughout the year.
*Use Google Keep for sharing lists with different teams or individuals on your campus.
*Post a question in Voxer prior to the meeting to get staff thinking about the topic(s) of the meeting. You could also do this on Twitter. Then allow staff to respond before the meeting or after as a way to reflect on or share knowledge gained or thoughts.
*Create QR codes to hide answers around the room or building that have video or website clues to training material or meeting information.
*Use Google Classroom as the portal for all staff mtg agendas and landing space for everything that staff needs throughout the year. They could also use the stream to post questions or facilitate discussions.
*Create a Symbaloo webmix of important websites, PD sites, etc.

Shana Ellason of Ft. Worth ISD created this webmix of sites that includes tools that can be used to engage your staff members during meetings or professional development.

Here are some other examples of how schools use Symbaloo for their staff:

• SHS Staff Tools
  
• Texas Assessment Program
  
• Staff Desktop

*Celebrate accomplishments more frequently.
*Have teachers lead certain topics.

*Have a teacher (on a rotating basis) briefly share a recent student media product or tech integration lesson, and then have someone (librarian, computer teacher, other staff) write a quick post on a blogger site to share it out to the wider world. Call it a "Learning Showcase" website. Examples: showcase.casady.org and showcase.yukonps.com .

*Poster Gallery Walk - Post questions/topics on posters around the room and have teacher groups collaborate and post ideas on the posters. Tech it up and use Google Slides assigned to groups.

*Prizes for teachers who arrive on time

*Google Keep is a great tool for creating digital "Post-Its" that can be categorized, color-coded, archived and are 100% mobile.

*Recognize birthdays

*Our district puts on its own conference each year called You Matter...full of choice & awesomeness! The presenters are our own teachers, administrators & para-professionals!
Click here for info. #youmattercsisd

*Color-coded agendas

+Music/Videos - Consider creating a YouTube Playlist for your campus. Teachers add their favorite appropriate and energizing music or videos to the list and then you have something to play all year long.

*Don't meet to schedule future meetings!

*Teacher Share Fair - Celebrate what your staff members are doing in their classrooms!

*icebreaker at every meeting!

*Competition

*Prizes/Door Prizes Drawings

*Coloring pages - Relieves stress!

*Goosechase - This online scavenger hunt allows you to create various activities or tasks to complete. Teachers take pictures to document task completion. Friendly competition. Collaborative. Can be completed at one meeting or over time.

*Do you have attendance problems at your faculty meetings? Reward the department or grade level with the highest average attendance with lunch.

*Guest speakers

*Favorite door prize or reward - Jeans Pass

*Have themes for your PD sessions and make certain the administrators participate!

*Begin every meeting with "Good News"! It helps staff to focus FIRST on what's going right both personally and professionally!

*yo da best - celebrate staff accomplishments - shout outs staff to staff & admin to staff. They get a "duty" pass if they are recognized.

*We start every meeting with positive recognitions from either admin, coworkers, or students and draw for gift cards from those who received the positive recognition.

*Our principal always starts the meetings with funny things that have happened on campus since the last meeting. She keeps a quote book and the staff loves it!

*Use Skype for an Interview with prospective teachers. Make sure that they are in their room and ask them to give you a tour of their room.

*Escape Room Teambuilder activity

*Have staff members share a short 5-minute snippet on how they utilize tech in the classroom.

*Teacher examples - Have teachers share their ideas and include students feedback or input.

*Team Building Activities - We have each grade level design a team building activity to use during our staff meetings.

*Lunch and Learn Bite-sized PD - Offer small, bite-sized PD for Ts during lunch time, oh, feed them too!

*We provide bagels each staff meeting and have drawings at the conclusion of meetings.

Principal Helpline: How Can We Have Better Faculty Meetings?

Principals Share "Best Meetings of the Year"

Best 25+ Faculty meetings ideas on Pinterest | Principal ideas ...

Great staff meetings: Pointers from the principals who lead them (Education World)

Fun Activities for Principals to Begin a Staff Meeting for Elementary Teachers

How to Have Successful and Productive Team Meetings

Ten Ideas to Liven Up School Staff Meetings

10 Ways to Switch Up Staff Meetings

Many thanks to the following for helping us out by sharing your wonderful ideas!

Dr. Roland Rios (@drrios) - Ft. Sam Houston ISD

Dr. Kari Murphy (@karimurphy) - Deer Park ISD

Jennifer Williams (@JenWilliamsEDU) - Participate, Florida

Dr. LaShera McElhaney (@drsheramac) - Southwestern Assembly of God University

Chris Pombanyo (@FamousinFirst) - Seminole County Public Schools, Florida

Lisa Ham (@lisadham) - Highland Park ISD

Cori Coburn-Shiflett (@coburncori) - Georgetown ISD

Amber Teamann (@8Amber8) - Wylie ISD

Dwight Goodwin (@scout2i) - Denton ISD

Knikole Taylor (@knikole) - Lancaster ISD

Joe Marquez (@JoeMarquez70) - K-12 Educational Strategist, California

Donna Stanley (@ESC7Donna) - ESC 7

John Bimmerle (@J_Bimmerle) - Sulphur Springs ISD

April Riley (@April_Riley) - Aledo ISD

Heather Kilgore (@TechyKilgore) - Commerce ISD

Cari Sturch (@TigerCurriculum) - Commerce ISD

Natalie Arnold (@Pi4MrsArnold) - Northwest ISD

Lee Hattaway (@l_hattaway) - Wylie ISD

Charles Cooper (@Thrasymachus) - ESC 11

Courtney Kofeldt (@CourtneyKofeldt) - PA Leadership Charter School, Pennsylvania

Dianne Leoni (@LeoniDianne) - Hillsborough Township Board of Education, New Jersey

Meagan Frazier (@mzfrazier0428) - St. Marks School, Dallas

Eryn Pluim (@MrsPluim) - Gloucester County Public Schools, Virginia

KC Testerman (@kctesterman) - PA Leadership Charter School, Pennsylvania
David Dyer (@cdaverun13 ) - AISK, Kingston, Jamaica
Monica Burns (@ClassTechTips) - Consultant, New York

Amy Roediger (@AmyRoediger) - Mentor Exempted Village Public Schools, Ohio

Jeannine Freeman (@TechTimeWithJ9) - Hays Consolidated ISD

Jaime Donally (@JaimeDonally) - Consultant

Rodney Turner (@techyturner) - Consultant, Phoenix, Arizona
Todd Nesloney (@TechNinjaTodd) - Navasota ISD

Shana Ellason (@sellason) - Ft. Worth ISD

Wesley Fryer (@wfryer) - Casady School, Oklahoma City

Lisa Langston (@PrincipalLang) - Ft. Bend ISD

Kara Noah (@NoahsArkTech) - Irving ISD

Besides the great educators listed above, you might want to consider following these tech-savvy friends of ours:

@gcouros

@KellyClifford9

@dmantz7

@Don_Jacobs

@kworthy11

@tonyvincent

@ShellTerrell

@sherylabshire

@TeachersApps

@mimg1225

@eduk8r_Jared

@DriskillElita

@PrincipalJ

@GustafsonBrad

@awelcome

@justintarte

@gerrybrooksprin

@aaron_hogan

@ShakeUpLearning

@edtechchic

@DrHitzelberger

@robinryan_gcisd

@ToddWhitaker

@DrJoeYoung

@E_Sheninger

@Curriculumdiva

@jkwilsiii

@dianedfrost

@CSE_Chameleons

@4OClockFaculty

@dmrische

@CubanTeachrinTX

@AdamJinkens

@pinkpatterson

@jackson_carrie

@DrRDubKellerISD ‏

Janet Corder & Joan Gore
www.j2training.org
j2training@yahoo.com
Follow us on Twitter:
@corderj
@joangore

Begin your PL or meeting with fun music! It shows your attendees that you are engaging and fun and it is a great way to make certain that your audio is working.

The Anatomy of a Great Professional Development Music Playlist from Education Elements

Streambeats.com - Copyright-free music

Classroom-Safe Playlists - Middle school teacher, Josie Bensko (@maniacsinthemid), creates and shares classroom-safe playlists on Spotify.