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Weekly Blend with Marcia 01

2/15/2021

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The Weekly Blend with Marcia Kish is a resource for Educators, Instructional Coaches, and Administrators, who would like to learn more about implementing Blended Learning into the Virtual, Hybrid, and Social Distance classrooms. Each week, Marcia Kish will share a coaching video, new tech tools, tips and tricks, lessons learned, what to try next, and her favorite coaching items. Join us each week to learn more about deploying and implementing Blended Learning strategies into the classroom. 
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Weekly Coaching Video 

This week on the Weekly Blend with Marcia Kish, Hailey Reinhardt is the guest teacher that showcases her Social Distance and Virtual Blended Learning fourth grade math classroom. Hailey showcases how to organize, sanitize, and motivate students to complete their work within this new type of learning environment.   

Resources from the video: 
Suggested Tech Tools 
seesaw.me
freckle.com
prodigygame.com
edpuzzle.com
Schoology.com
Link to the Checklist 
Grab a copy of Hailey's Checklist 
Data Meeting Tracker 
Google Draw Templates
Amazon Items 
Timers
Hand Sanitizer Bottles
Bins for Paper
Spinner 
Picture frames for direction cards 
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​Hailey Reinhardt
​@Ms_Reinhardt

FREE Snappy Class App for Google Classroom

During the March Shutdowns, my mother was quarantined with my four nieces and nephews while my brother was serving overseas in Afghanistan.  At that time, she was helping the kids with their online assignments in Google Classroom.  I jumped in to help my Mom with generating a daily checklist for the kids.   I started each day by going through all Google Classrooms and writing down the daily assignments, Zoom links, and quiz links for all subject areas.  I was blown away by the amount of time it took me, a Blended Learning Coach, to construct a daily checklist for a Freshman, Seventh, Fourth, and Third Grader.  
After seven weeks of generating the checklist, my husband realized that there had to be an easier way for students to view what is do each day quickly.  Last week, we released SNAPPYCLASS  to the App Store.  SnappyClass is a free iOS and Google Play app that will showcase the daily assignments, an overview of each assignment, and acknowledgment if it was submitted or returned to the students.  

​This quick and easy to use App, is a new daily checklist for the students that are currently using Google Classroom.  Please pass this App link along to the teachers, students, and parents.  I only wish I had the App in March while helping my nieces and nephews with the Google Classroom assignments.
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Tips and Tricks 

Across the board, almost all of the educators I am currently working with are asking for more ways to increase student engagement within the virtual and hybrid classroom setting. Below, I will showcase three of my top favorite ways to engage students during class. Hopefully, with these couple of tips and tricks, you will see more screens on during your lesson. 
Individual Breakout Rooms or Choose Your Room
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If you have not updated Zoom, take time to restart your computer or go to zoom.us to update the new features. 

The New updates allow participants to pick their breakout room. The pick your room feature is fantastic for the Blended Learning Classrooms. Follow the attached document steps to help you manage and set up the Breakout Rooms for your classroom. 

Click here for FREE Zoom Breakout Room PDF
Choose Your Own Breakout Rooms is a game-changer for the hybrid, social distance, or virtual classrooms. Students can choose who they want to work with and have a place to ask questions, get tech support, and work with the teacher. 

How to Increase Student Engagement 

The most common struggle I hear among all of the teachers I am currently working with is student engagement. For the last couple of weeks, I have asked the teams to switch their mindset from being worried about student engagement and think about the lack of involvement as part of student ownership. Why are educators worried about engaging students? Shouldn't we provide ways for students to have voice, choice, and ownership in "their" learning? 
I used the following analogy this week. Think of a cheerleader at a football game. The cheerleader is trying to engage the fans to cheer, clap, and yell to encourage the team to move the ball down the field. Now think of the student section at that same football game. The student section starts the cheers, chants and encourages others around them to motivate the football team. The cheerleader is the teacher! The student section is the students in the classroom. Both are important parts of the crowd supporting the team. 
When teachers stop and think about the amount of time, they spend trying to get the students engaged with the lesson vs. how much easier it would be to allow them to voice, choose, and ownership in the learning planning, the lesson becomes a big eye-opener. ​
How do we move to Student Ownership?  
  • Choice in the way students learn.  Start with implementing different learning modalities into the lessons 
  • Collaboration projects for the students 
  • Choice in showcasing the understanding of the content through ChoiceBoards 
  • Set up Data Meeting with the students 
  • Checklist with choice activities 
  • Choice in who they want to work with in the classroom or in Zoom Breakout Rooms 

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FREE GOOGLE DRAW TEMPLATES 

Try one of our Google Draw Templates to increase student ownership.  Allow students time to collaborate with the activities in a small group while the teachers is pulling small groups to reteach the content standards. 
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Coaching Lessons Learned 

This week while working with a team of Middle School teachers from Texas, I set aside time during our coaching session to have the teachers individually plan. I put about 20 minutes on the clock for them to work on their lesson plan. I made myself virtually available during that time, so if they wanted to ask questions or show me their lesson, the teachers could do so. While the first group was working, I did not have one teacher ask for help. When the time for planning was complete, I wondered if anyone had any questions. Crickets. Yikes, I wanted the teachers to asked for individual help, and I wanted teachers to showcase what they created. I knew it was not their fault, but instead, it was how I set up the work time. 
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STOP, ASK and LISTEN 

After the first group of teachers attended the virtual coaching session, I thought about what worked and what did not work while planning with the teachers. I realized that I did not give them enough time to plan, that the teachers did not ask any questions, and I rushed the coaching session. During the Administrator reflection session, I asked what they thought went well and what I could do better. I listened. I did not respond but instead Stopped and Listened to what they were saying. They had the same concerns. The administrative team wanted the teachers to have more time to plan. 

I adjusted my coaching session for the next group. I set up the first part of the meeting the same way as the first group. However, when it came time to plan a lesson, I switched it up for the teachers. I add more time for individual planning, and I put the teachers into Individual Breakout Rooms in Zoom. Even though most of the teachers were in the same physical classroom, I put them in Individual Breakout Rooms to ask me targeted planning questions. It worked! During the 35 minutes of planning, I met with six different teachers, and I gave them individual help and guidance on their lesson plans. My time was used more effectively, and the teachers felt more successful. 

By stopping, asking, and listening to my reflections and the administrative team's reflections, we made the adjustments needed to ensure that everyone had time to ask questions. ​

Who we are working with this week

CyFair ISD - Coaching sessions on hybrid learning for coaches and instructional support team
Judson ISD - Middle School training for the Math, Science, ELAR, and Social Studies Team 
Dean MS at CyFair ISD - Exploring data driven mini-lessons for the Middle School Classroom 

Spring, Summer, and Fall Workshops

We are currently booking for Spring, Summer, and Fall workshops, coaching sessions, and Keynote Presentations.   Please click on this link to download a copy of our top session topics.  

Blended Learning Workshop Information 
  • All of the workshops can be either onsite or virtual
  • You can set up a combination of workshop options for your staff.  Below is an example of a six-hour choice workshop day for the staff
    • 8:00-10:00 Introduction to Blended Learning 
    • 10:00-12:00 Creating Data-Driven Classroom Environments 
    • 12:30-2:30 The Power of Student Ownership
  • Workshops can be delivered in any hour combination 
    • One Hour workshop - will be fast-paced but will provide an in-depth overview of the concepts 
    • Two-Hour workshop - will allow for time to create, collaborate, as well as an in-depth overview of the concepts
    • Three-Hour workshop - will allow for time to share, create, collaborate, process time, as well as an in-depth overview of the concepts 
    • Six-Hour workshop - will allow for time to design lessons, build sample projects, as well as an extreme in-depth overview of the concepts
  • Number of Participants 
    • Virtual workshops can hold up to 100 participants
    • Onsite workshops can hold up to 45 participants in a session 

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    AuthorS

    Marcia Kish - Blended and Personalized Learning coach that designed the Three Phases of Blended Learning

    Jeff Kish - Coding Expert that showcases how to implement coding into the classroom. 

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  • Field Guide
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