In a Classroom Near You...GSuite Comes to 3rd Grade!

MASD has been a GSuite for Education (formerly Google Apps for Education) district for quite a few years now. We started by providing all secondary students with @masdstudent.org accounts, but quickly realized that our upper elementary students could benefit from access to these tools as well. For the past several years, students have been introduced to their Google accounts at the beginning of fourth grade. Our elementary librarians, Sarah George and Nate Chesky, have taken on the responsibility of acquainting the students with their new accounts using a lesson called "We Are Google C.A.T.S." Each letter in the acronym stands for an important aspect of being a Google user that the students need to know before logging in for the first time.

• C = Citizenship - Students review important digital citizenship topics such as keeping their passwords and other personal information private and treating everyone with respect.
• A = Access - Students learn what devices they can use to access their accounts and review the places they might find Internet access, such as school, home, or the public library.
• T = Teamwork - One of the best features of GSuite is the ability to collaborate. Students observe others working together on a collaborative document to see how they will be able to work as a team to accomplish tasks.
• S = Sharing - "With great power comes great responsibility." Before logging into their accounts for the first time, students discuss the importance of only sharing work with people who have a need to access it. Just because they could share documents with former teachers or older siblings doesn't mean it's the right thing to do.

Once they've completed this lesson (including the opportunity to summarize the C, A, T, and S on a collaborative Google Doc with their entire class!), our fourth and fifth graders across the district use their Google accounts to create presentations, share work with classmates and teachers, access Google Classroom, and more. As word has spread, a few teachers of students in younger grades have opted to give their classes access, too. With all of the third graders heading to the same school next year, it made sense for all of them to be ready to login to their Google accounts from the very beginning. Between now and the end of the school year, Sarah and Nate will ensure that all of our third graders are ready to use their @masdstudent.org accounts when they begin fourth grade at the Elmwood Academy in August. The students are excited about this next step in their learning journey and are eager to join the @masdstudent.org team to learn, create, and connect!

Tapping Into Student Interests to Drive Learning

Genius Hour? Passion Projects? 20% Time? It's hard to have a conversation in education these days without someone mentioning at least one of these. But are they just buzz words or is there really something to this buzz?

There are differing stories out there about where the concept came from, but many attribute the idea to Google's practice of giving their employees the ability to spend 20% of their work time on projects they're personally interested in, as long as it contributes to the company's bottom line. (So no, they can't use the time to learn basket weaving, unless they can show how that will help Google as a company). Rumor has it that GMail started out as someone's 20% project. In classrooms, where it might not be feasible for teachers to give students 20% of the time allotted, the concept has been rebranded as "Genius Hour" or "Passion Projects". Whatever you call it, the idea is that students get to spend a portion of time researching and creating on a topic of their own choosing, which still contributes to meeting required standards. Remember the basket weaving example? We're not talking about Jay McTighe's "crayola literacy". Projects need to be tied to standards, but students have the ability to address those standards in ways that are meaningful to them. Watch this video for a short overview.

We have several teachers across the district who are trying various forms of genius hour in their classrooms. They all report that student engagement is at its highest during this time. This is no wonder, since we know the power of choice as a motivator for learning. Some think this is a structure that can only work at elementary, where teachers have their students for longer chunks of time during the day and address all the content areas. But there are many teachers out there who are successfully incorporating the idea into middle and high school classes across the curriculum. Tapping into student interests is a great way to build student empowerment and self-direction at any grade level. If you are interested in exploring how you can leverage your students' passions as a way to motivate them as learners, check the links below to learn more.

Bring JOY to the Classroom with Passion Projects - This site is focused on elementary learners, but has ideas that can be applied across the grade levels.

Welcome to the Genius Hour - Making Genius Hour work at the middle school level.

Passion Projects from Life Lesson Learning - This site includes great examples of high school students' passion projects, including videos of the students themselves sharing their learning. There is also a step-by-step guide for incorporating passion projects at the high school level.

20time.org - This site, built around Dan Pink's three major drivers of motivation: autonomy, mastery, and purpose, provides examples as well as a "how" page. Check out the videos on "the bad idea factory"!

Also, check out the following hashtags on social media: #geniushour, #passionprojects, #20time