The digital portfolio team provided professional development to the whole staff on October 30th, 2019. Grade level expectations were reviewed during the presentation, and grade levels had the opportunity to review and update their digital portfolio planning sheet from the spring of 2019.
Mindy Townsend, our technology specialist, spent the entire first quarter teaching students in grades 1-5 Google Basics skills. They completed scavenger hunts to demonstrate their understanding. Because of these lessons, teachers are able to focus on teaching and learning in class without having to teach direct lessons on how to load things to Google Drive/Sites.
Each quarter, MTAC members sit down with their PLTs to discuss progress toward digital portfolios. MTAC members fill out a shared Google Doc reflecting on how progress is going and how the MTAC team can assist with that progress. Professional development and support is designed around the needs of the staff based on these quarterly check-ins. 3rd and 4th quarter check-ins did not occur due to COVID-19 and remote learning from mid-March through the end of the school year.
The digital portfolio team developed a Scope and Sequence document for the entire school to outline expectations for digital portfolios and technology skills at every grade level.
Our MTAC team is now a sub-committee of the school improvement team. As a team, we added an indicator to the SIP and developed actions needed to mark the indicator complete. The focus for the MTAC team going forward will be to accomplish the goals outlined in the SIP in addition to regular MTAC responsibilities.
Our first professional development session was on December 11, 2019 with Mary Clay Vick (DLC). She introduced the staff to the TPACK and SAMR models. We continued that same session (beginning with slide 35) on January 22, 2020 with Mary Clay Vick.
We continued our professional learning with a half-day training for all certified staff on January 29th, 2020. Both Mary Clay Vick and Laura Barnes (DLCs) presented on the SAMR and DSAP models. Staff learned about Pear Deck, Flip Grid, digital math manipulatives, Flipgrid, Google Forms, and Google Drive basics.
On February 5, 2020 staff had the opportunity to share out some of the technology tools they have been implementing in their classrooms since our training. Staff members worked collaboratively on a shared Google Slides presentation. Each grade level shared out at our staff meeting.
Power Half Hour sessions are offered to staff every Wednesday after school from 4:10-4:40pm. Two concurrent sessions are offered each week. One session is on Google Basics, led by our technology specialist, Mindy Townsend. The other session is offered on more advanced technology tools including Screencastify, Educreations, Makey Makey, and Osmo, led by our SLMC, Laura Nowak.
With COVID-19 changing our end of year plans, we did not get to redistribute technology in the way that we wanted to at the end of the school year. We have reallocated resources for the 2020-2021 school year to best meet the needs of our students and staff during the pandemic. We will reevaluate our technology resources when we return to campus for in-person instruction.