Teaching and Learning Updates

Please take a few minutes to fill out this technology feedback form so we can continue to improve our services.

One question that has come up a few times over the past year has centered on the conflict between screen time balance and our efforts to save on our printing budgets. I (Casey) would like to offer some perspective and rationale to offer alternatives to the binary of printing vs. screen time. Though this is a tad longer than I’d like, I want to give a picture of how we can look at intentionality and balance rather than simply ‘this’ or ‘that.’

When I taught physics, at one point I was trained in a collaborative approach that utilized problems designed to get students talking about physics. I collected these problems into a packet, which I printed out for all 150 of my students; 20ish pages per unit, 7-8 units….that’s a lot of paper. I was conflicted, in that I believed in the problems but felt I could save paper, so one year I moved them all online. I found, however, that it took away from the collaborative nature of the problems, and that sometimes students were more distracted with screens out (believe it or not). That led me to realize I could keep the packet online for reference but print out class sets of sharable problems, resulting in my students still having paper copies during class, access to the packet outside of class, and I was now printing less than ⅕ the copies. Instructionally, I found that collaboration increased and distractions decreased; it was a 'win' for printing efficiency, instruction, and screen time.

The point of this story is that I don’t want people to think “should I print this, or not?” but instead, “how could I potentially reduce printing costs by using half sheets, having students share, using whiteboards instead, not printing in color (cost 5x as much)...” I fully realize that printing will always have a place in schools, and yet I want us to acknowledge that each person making small changes can have a large effect on those printing costs. In this way we can try to be intentional about printing AND the digital wellbeing of our students. This doesn’t have to be an either/or question.

Finally, I want to share some tangible results of our printing reconfiguration. We are currently paying thousands of dollars less per month than we did on our previous contract (the exact amount is tough to pin down as overages don't get compiled until later, but preliminary numbers look good). As our enrollment declines and budget cuts loom for the foreseeable future, we’re going to have to make some decisions like removing printers that are not used by many so that we can keep as many staff members working with kids as possible. I don't love it, but finding $35k here and $15k there can help move us toward a sustainable budget so we can focus on what's important, our kids.

Thank you for your thoughtful engagement during Curriculum Day on February 21st.

Elementary

Elementary teachers had a great session of curriculum exploration on February 21st. The curriculum guides will continue to be available. One piece of feedback we gathered from your exit reflections is that people wanted clarification around the shifting of curriculum resources that have happened in the last couple of years. Here is a summary of the current curriculum materials for each subject area.

Secondary

Secondary staff had a great afternoon continuing to dig into Disciplinary Literacy using AVID Strategies. MyAVID is always available to you to provide resources as you work to apply this new learning in your classrooms (If you need access, contact Heidi Oanes). Your literacy coaches are also available to model, co-teach, or support your planning when you give these strategies a try with your students. Remember to give yourself permission to try something new even if it is not perfect. The more we practice (as teachers and students) the better we will get at utilizing these strategies and creating common language for us and our scholars.

On February 21st LiveMore ScreenLess shared some research regarding digital wellbeing, and we had a number of requests for that research as well as for a Digital Wellbeing parent handout for the kindergarten open houses. Below are links to those documents

Kindergarten Open House Handout

Research Resources from LiveMore ScreenLess

For those of you involved in MCA testing this spring, you can complete your yearly training requirements any time now. Here are the directions for completing training. Those grade levels who are not taking the test, can take the opportunity to encourage the grade levels who are! This is an opportunity for our district to collectively celebrate all the awesome learning that has happened this year. Here is a link to our internal warehouse of MCA testing resources and the resource most of interest at this time is the Ready to Test Teacher Checklist. Your building School Assessment Coordinators and Principals will provide more school-specific information.

The Technology Committee meets approximately once per month; here are the Key Takeaways that are compiled after each meeting.

The Mental Health Committee meetings once per month, here are the meeting minutes for each month.

At our February 21st Elementary PD, Asset-based thinking was our focus. Each of our students brings strengths into our classroom. As educators, it is our job to spot these strengths and capitalize on those strengths for high academic achievement. Sometimes strengths don’t look like strengths as students may be overusing them in our classrooms. For example, a student whose strength is perseverance may be overusing that strength and it actually begins to look like stubbornness. The goal is to bring those strengths back into optimal use and leverage them to help each and every one of our students achieve. The district equity committee will also be focusing on asset-based thinking and how what we think about and say to students matters! Stay tuned!

Our website is now being translated! See this video for how it works. Our next step is to refine those translations to ensure everyone in our community has access to information about our schools.

Long story short, we are being required by cybersecurity insurance to implement 2 step verification, but it's important to note that this is really a best practice that we should do anyway. Once you sign in to Google using two-step verification on a computer you shouldn't have to do so again on that machine, so it won't likely affect your daily work life. It will affect you, however, when signing into Google on a new device.

What is two-step verification? (sometimes called two factor or multi-factor authentication)

1. Whenever you sign in to your school Google account, you'll enter your password as usual.
2. You'll be asked for something else; a code will be sent to your phone via text, voice call, mobile app, or other methods.

How do I sign up?

While you don't have to yet, you can opt-in by going to google.com/landing/2step/ and following the instructions. We created some extra steps and explanations here if you want more of a guide. We will be forcing sign-up later this spring.

Can I avoid this?

Nope. Everyone will need to be enrolled by May 15.

What if I don't want to use my personal device as the 2nd step?

You can use your school iPad, get a phone call on your school phone, use printed-out codes, or use the Authenticator app that does not use data (it just stores codes on your phone). We're happy to work with you to find a method you are comfortable with; just know that you will want to have easy access to your chosen method in case you need to sign in to Google and you are not at school. See this guide for alternate options for your 2nd step.

What if I have problems?

We're here to help! Fill out a service request if you need anything at all.

In an effort to aid people hired into the district we have compiled an annotated list of software and other technology here. This may be useful for any staff member as a one-stop shop for basic information on our systems.