EdTech Loop Episode 103 - Cut Through the Clutter

Episode 103 of the EdTech Loop podcast has Danelle braking out the oversized scissors to help you cut through the digital clutter.

1. Cut Through the Email Clutter: Gmail
   1. Increase productivity by sorting (star before folder names)
      1. *Action Required - green tagged
      2. *Waiting for Response - yellow tagged
   2. Settings
      1. Show “send and archive” button in reply
      2. Smart Compose (predictive writing suggestions appear as you compose an email)
      3. Smart reply (three suggestions for replies)
   3. Templates - “save draft as template”

1. Cut Through the Grading Clutter: Streamline grading process
   1. Catlin Tucker high school English teacher and a featured speaker for MACUL 2020 - video:LIVE at Fall CUE 2019: She talks about the struggles with grading. “It’s time to rethink our workflow.  The teacher is doing the lion share of the work in the classroom. We know that the person doing the work is the person who is doing the learning.  Why would we rob our students of the opportunity to learn. We have to reimagine our workflow so that our students are doing the work in the classroom.”  Her example of a student led workflow:
      1. Student completes assignment.
      2. Student corrects mechanics using Grammarly before it’s “done.”
      3. Teacher gives students an exemplar and a rubric.
      4. Student is asked to look at what they did, compare it to the exemplar, assess their own skills using the rubric.
      5. Student reflects in a learning log.

In this scenario, the students are doing the heavy cognitive lifting.  They are doing the learning. Instead of asking “How can I”....reframe the question as “How can the students…”  She shares some pretty awesome key shifts in the YouTube video - Teach students to track, monitor, and reflect on their progress, provide timely actionable feedback in class AS students work, make time to grade student projects with the students sitting next to you, partner with students and prioritize their agency

1. 1. Research to support student directed learning - it’s all throughout the ISTE Standards for Educators and Students.

 

1. Cut Through the Distraction Clutter: New Year, New You, Digital Wellness - https://istedigcitpln.wixsite.com/home/digital-wellness (go here during pod), based off Manoush Zomoradi’s book: Bored and Brilliant:How Spacing Out Can Unlock Your Most Productive and Creative Self builds on that experiment to demonstrate how to rethink our gadget use to live better and smarter in this new digital ecosystem. Zomorodi explains the connection between boredom and original thinking, exploring how we can harness boredom’s hidden benefits to become our most productive and creative selves without totally abandoning our gadgets in the process. Grounding the book in the neuroscience and cognitive psychology of “mind wandering,” she illuminates what our brains do when we’re doing nothing at all. Also a TED talk 
   1. 5 days - Keep phone in pocket, photo free day, delete that app, take a “fauxcation”, one small observation, dream house (creativity exercise)
   2. Data Savvy Project: https://istedigcitpln.wixsite.com/home/data-savvy-series
   3. FYI-Manoush is coming to MACUL 2020 and has two awesome podcasts, also started The Privacy Paradox (take back your digital data): 
      1. IRL - “Online Life is Real Life.  Privacy breaches, closed platforms, hacking, fake news, or cyber bullying, we the people have the power to change the course of the Internet, keeping it ethical, safe, wierd, and wonderful for everyone.” 
      2. Note to Self - “Is your phone watching you? Can texting make you smarter? Note to Self explores these and other essential quandaries facing anyone trying to preserve their humanity in the digital age.”

 

 

• Cut Through The Edtech Noise

 

1. 1. Use your experts - everyone has a site online that will “help your students flourish” and will be the “gamechanger”.  Use your experts and ask their advice! They have studied this stuff, they know the research, and if they don’t, it’s their job to do the digging for you….
      1. EdTech Coach
      2. Tech Dept
      3. REMC/ISD

Another Useful Link: https://www.ted.com/talks/yves_morieux_as_work_gets_more_complex_6_rules_to_simplify?language=en#t-4333

Tech tool of the Week:

New Year, New You, Digital Wellness - https://istedigcitpln.wixsite.com/home/digital-wellness

 

https://medium.com/@whenifeellike/what-ive-learnt-as-a-17-year-old-who-deleted-all-social-media-d282274d4edd

Transcripts will be coming.