As you may have noticed, I EDU has recently launched a series of webinars. Our first series occurred during the first two weeks of April and I am excited to share 2 more webinars from a variety of presenters for the rest of this month. If you are interested in these webinars, you can pop onto our YouTube Channel or Facebook Page at the time of the event OR sign up via the Google Form below for email updates and calendar invites.

Adobe Spark

Date: 4/20 @ 6:00 PM (PST)

Presenter: Jenn Calderon

Links: YouTube | Facebook

Description: Learn how to create diverse images, a simple webpage story or narrate a quick video. Adobe spark is a versatile platform where students can create powerful projects, with a few clicks of a button.

Self-Care During Distance Learning

Date: 4/22 @ 4:00 PM (PST)

Presenter: Meagan Kelly, Mari Venturino, Rosalinda Jaimes, Jenn Calderon, Melissa King

Links: YouTube | Facebook

Description: It’s amazing to see how educators are taking on distance learning with such passion and creativity for their students. However, distance learning and working from home can take a mental, emotional and physical toll on educators. Join us in this session to hear transparent talks about the ups and downs of distance learning and self-care strategies to stay mentally healthy.

Distance Learning Fun with Flipgrid

Date: 4/27 @ 3:00 PM (PST)

Presenter: Melissa King

Links: YouTube | Facebook

Description: How can we offer assignments that are engaging, rigorous, yet easy to use? Flipgrid! Now teachers and students can even screen record using Flipgrid. See how to create Fliphunts, design reading group challenges, and more!

If you are interested in signing up for any of these webinars, please sign up via the following Google Form:

I EDU has officially launched its webinars! Our first webinar was on Sunday and it covered Google Meet and Zoom. Below, you will find the recorded video of the webinar, as well as the presentation used in the webinar.

In this webinar, we covered the following topics:

• Google Meet Tutorial
• Zoom Tutorial
• Meet vs. Zoom Comparison

We truly tried to keep a non-biased view of both options because there are certainly a lot of benefits to each program! Below you will find the recorded webinar via YouTube but it is also available on Facebook:

Below, you will find the presentation used in this webinar, as well as the ability to make your own copy of the presentation:

(View) (Copy)

Which conferencing program as your site and/or district decided to use? Share in the comments below!

I am excited to announce that the BoostEDU community is growing! 

BoostEDU is now on Facebook and Twitter and is a community where teachers can receive updates on resources and support from teachers all around the world.  Interested in joining this community?  Click on the links below!

In these communities, feel free to share resources to support teachers and post your own lessons for community feedback.  In addition to this, each week I will be posting a question and/or poll to spur conversation and bring more resources to our community.  This week’s question:

I look forward to seeing this community develop and the conversation grow!

Earlier this month, I publicly released my Google Innovator Project: BoostEDU.  BoostEDU is a program that supports teachers in transforming their traditional lessons through an inquiry-based self-assessment and guided lesson design process.  (Interested in learning more?  Watch this video.)  It’s been a lot of work but it has been very exciting to hear feedback from teachers that have started using these tools to support their lesson design.

In this blog post, I wanted to spend some time talking about the two self-assessments that are currently available on BoostEDU: the Basic and In-Depth SAMR Self-Assessments.  In the future, I plan on expanding the self-assessments to include 4 C’s, ISTE Standards, and TPACK but SAMR was an excellent starting point for this project.  Here is some information on the two self-assessments:

The Basic SAMR Self-Assessment

The Basic SAMR Self-Assessment is a short self-assessment that provides educators with the depth of SAMR within their overall classroom.  Here are some key features:

• Short self-assessment that includes 7 questions.
• Focuses on the classroom as a whole, rather than a specific lesson.
• Results are immediately delivered within the screen.

The In-Depth SAMR Self-Assessment

The In-Depth SAMR Self-Assessment is used to analyze the depth of SAMR in specific areas of a lesson.  Here are some key features:

• Focuses on a specific lesson, activity, or project.
• Results are immediately delivered to the user’s email in an editable Google Doc.
• Offers suggestions, tech tools, and next steps for lesson planning.

Are you interested in seeing these self-assessments in action?  Watch the video below!

Ready to try it out for yourself?  Go to www.boostedu.org to start!

Have you used the BoostEDU Self-Assessments?  If so, I would love to hear your thoughts below!

One of my goals for the month of June was to build the first self-assessment form for BoostEDU.  The first self-assessment form will focus on SAMR and, over the next year, I intend to create more self-assessments aligned to 4 C’s, ISTE Standards, and TPACK.  The purpose of these self-assessments is to support teachers in purposefully integrating technology by transforming their current lessons into 21st-century lessons.  Through this survey, educators will receive real-time feedback on their technology integration and will be able to select suggestions and technology tools to improve their lessons.  As we know, each teacher is in a different place when it comes to technology integration.  Through the BoostEDU process, teachers will receive personalized feedback and support on transforming their lessons.

Currently, the SAMR self-assessment is in the final stages of development.  Although I am not going to share this self-assessment until the BoostEDU release date, I am excited to say that it has turned out better than I had imagined.  However, I do need some assistance from anyone that would be willing to help.  Part of the self-assessment consists of suggestions for improvement and technology tools to “boost” teacher lessons.  Even though I have a lot of suggestions and tech tools built into the self-assessment, I would like to receive some input from educators that are outside of my grade level, subject area, site, and district.  With your help, I will be able to create more suggestions and offer more ideas for technology tools that will support teachers.

If you are willing to help, please respond to the survey below:

In addition to this, if you are interested in being a beta tester for BoostEDU, please email me at meagan.kelly@boostedu.org and I will add you to the interest list.

Thank you for your help!

This post is a part of a series of titled “Adventures in Innovation” and focuses on the release of my Google Innovator Project: BoostEDU.

A few months ago, I had the opportunity to attend the Google Innovator Academy in London.  Although I haven’t written much about my innovator project, I have spent quite a bit of time developing my project and outlining my goals for the year.  As a part of the program, I have created a project deck that is continuously being modified, refined, and developed.  In fact, if you were to view this project deck, I am pretty sure that you would think I am the craziest, OCD person you have ever met.  But, it works for me.  I tend to leave my project deck open on my computer and reflect and add to it several times a week.  Some days, I will find myself falling down the rabbit hole and spend hours developing key pieces of my project.  It’s a lot of work – but I love every second of it.  Even though the project is several months out from being released publicly, I want to introduce you to my Google Innovator Project: BoostEDU.

When I applied to the Google Innovator program, I was challenged to discover and find a solution to a problem in education.  The problem that I discovered is one that is not uncommon.  In fact, I believe it is a problem that is plaguing many teachers that work in a site or district with a high volume of technology.

Due to a massive amount of technology, a wide range of teacher ability, and lack of support and resources, many teachers struggle with implementing purposeful educational technology that supports high levels of student learning.

It’s a very common problem.  If you are working in a 1-1 school district, I am sure that you can think of the wide range of teacher ability at your site.  In addition to this, there is constantly new technology being introduced that it can become overwhelming.  To top it all off, there can also be a lack of support, time, and resources for teachers to truly learn how to use technology in their classrooms to support student learning.  So, I decided that my goal was to create a system that supported teachers in integrating technology in their classrooms – no matter their knowledge, ability, or support system.

Introducing…BoostEDU!

BoostEDU is in the (very) early BETA stage.  Essentially, BoostEDU is a program that will support teachers in transforming their traditional lesson into 21st-century lessons.  Although this could change, BoostEDU currently looks like this:

There are four steps to the BoostEDU program:

Step #1: Find a current lesson.

Teachers will find a lesson they have previously taught.  It’s important for teachers to understand that they do not have to start from scratch.  All they need to do is modify a current lesson.

Step #2: Complete a self-assessment of the original lesson.

Teachers will complete a self-assessment of an original lesson to determine their current level of SAMR/ISTE/4 C’s within their lesson.  During the survey, teachers will be able select suggestions and tech tools to “boost” their lesson based upon their response.  These results will be emailed to the teachers in an editable Google Doc.  

Step #3: Complete a guided lesson design process.

Teachers will use an online, interactive form to transform their original lesson based on their results from the self-assessment.  The form will be interactive and offer suggestions for technology integration to assist them in building this boosted lesson.  When the teacher submits the form, they will receive a digital copy of their lesson plan.  

Step #4: Receive community feedback and share.

Teachers will have the opportunity to share their self-assessment results and “boosted” lesson on a Google Plus Community.  After their lesson is complete, they can share the lesson on the BoostEDU website for other teachers to access and use.

Final Product: A transformed, 21st-century lesson.

Through this process, I hope that teachers will find their lessons transformed in a way that uses technology to support higher levels of student learning.

Current & Upcoming Goals

Being the neurotic, OCD person that I am, I have developed monthly goals for the next year.

Current Goals:

• Create a BoostEDU: Survey of Tech Tools to gather tech tools/resources.  (Done!)
• Create MailChimp sign-up form. (Done!)
• Finish and send self-assessment form to a selected group of educators for feedback and modification.  (Soon!)
• Create a slide deck for commenting feedback.

Next Month Goals:

• Build/develop lesson plan creation form.
• Send lesson plan builder to a selected group of educators for feedback.
• Begin marketing “BoostEDU” by getting signups and creating a “teaser trailer”.

Over the last I have spent a lot of time working on the self-assessment and…I’m so excited.  So far, it is working out even better than I imagined and I think that this could be a great resource for teachers.

If you are interested in being a BETA tester for BoostEDU, please email me at meagan.kelly@boostedu.org and I will add you to the interest list.  In addition to this, if you would like to receive updates on BoostEDU, subscribe to the mailing list below.

BoostEDU will be released in Fall 2017.

This post is a part of a series of titled “Adventures in Innovation” and focuses on the release of my Google Innovator Project: BoostEDU.

An Experience of a Lifetime

Last week, I had the privilege of attending the Google Innovator Academy in London.  I can say, without a doubt, that this was one of the most amazing and impactful learning experiences of my professional and personal life.  Every minute was filled with learning experiences to develop our innovation projects.  If I was excited about my innovation project before the academy, I cannot even explain how excited I am to continue working on this project with the guidance that I received while in London.

While I work on my Innovator project over the next year, I know that it will be difficult and challenging at times.  I am dreaming big with this project.  I want to do something that can have a positive and transformative impact on education.  While at the academy, I realized that you should dream big but also understand that there will be times where you fail – and that’s okay.  It’s not failure, it’s opportunity to improve your original idea and make it something even better than you previously imagined.

Before you read this, you may want to consider reading a previous blog post: Adventures in Innovation – My Google Innovator Journey.

Let me share five more takeaways with you from the #LON17 Google Innovator Academy.

Five Takeaways

1.) Understand the problem that you are facing and fall in love with it.

Without a doubt, my favorite part of the Google Innovator Academy was going through the design thinking process to understand my problem and develop solutions.  All of the Innovators came into the academy with ideas on how to fix the problem they had discovered.  However, when we arrived, we were encouraged to let go of all our preconceived ideas and solutions.

Les McBeth encouraged us to create a lot of solutions to our problems, whether they were good solutions or bad solutions.  Each Innovator took a piece of paper, folded it into eighths, and were given 1 minute per each box to draw a solution to their problem.  The first 4-5 boxes
were relatively easy but I started running out solutions at the sixth box.  After we completed all 8 boxes, Les challenged us to find the our “wow” solutions and the ones that could be done now.  This activity was fast-paced and did not allow for us to overanalyze any solution that came to our mind.  From this activity, I was able to narrow in the focus of my solutions and add some ideas that enhanced previous parts of my solution to the problem.

Through the design thinking process, I realized that the I needed to focus on the problem.  The solution is simply the tool to fixing the problem.  I know – that sounds obvious.  It is very difficult to focus on the problem when you have all these ideas of how to solve it.  However, to truly solve the problem, you must understand and fall in love with it.  This way, you are passionate about the problem and want to put in the time and effort into solving it.

2.) Always focus on the users when solving your problem.

Before we arrived at the academy, we were asked to complete several tasks to prepare for the work we would do on our projects.  In one of these activities, I developed questions to ask my users (the teachers) about the problem.  As a reminder, the problem I chose was based upon the idea that teachers are not receiving the support  that they need to properly implement technology into the classroom.  (Read more about it here.)  Although I understood that I needed to focus on the problem, Mark Wagner and Les McBeth helped me to realize that I needed to put my focus on ensuring that any solution I developed would be of interest to the users.  After all, I might think that my solution is the best idea in the world but it doesn’t matter if there isn’t anyone else that is interested in using it.

Due to this session, I have embedded multiple opportunities for teachers to beta test my program and offer feedback into my yearlong plan.  I will need the feedback of educators that I can trust to give me an honest opinion and will be able to see problem areas that I am unable to see.  The feedback of these teachers and educators from dozens of different backgrounds will ensure that I am being true to my users.

3.) 8 Pillars of Google Innovation

During Mark Wagner’s spark session, our cohort was introduced to the 8 Pillars of Google Innovation and it completely changed the way that I look at my innovation project.  The 8 Pillars of Google Innovation is not a complicated idea, in fact, it is a simple list of things to remember when developing a project.  As I go through developing my project over the next year, I want to keep myself focused on these pillars to ensure that I am developing an innovative project that has a profound impact on my users.

The 8 Pillars of Google Innovation will help me to remember to dream big and believe in the impossible – but start small.  Don’t move too fast and do to much at once.  Break it down, step by step.  This is the reason that I have developed monthly goals to pace myself throughout the next year.  The pillars help me to remember to build in processes for receiving feedback from users to continually modify and refine my project for continued innovation.  Also, I should never stop dreaming about my project and get stuck with my current solution.  My solution may evolve based upon my interactions with my users, so I need to remember to never close my mind to new ideas.  I will need to share my program with my users while the program is in development but, especially, once it is ready to be released to the public.  Through this, I will be able to find new solutions to ideas based upon the needs of my users.  Finally, never fear failure.  As I mentioned before, failure is just an opportunity to try again and to develop a better solution than previously imagined.

4.) Eat the Whole Apple

Have you ever eaten a whole apple?  I have (during David Hotler’s spark session) and it actually isn’t that bad.  Simply, start from the bottom of the apple and work your way up towards the top of the apple.  By eating from the bottom of the apple to the top, you don’t even realize that you are eating the core of the apple.  Once you get it out of your mind that you cannot do eat the whole apple, or that you shouldn’t be eating the whole apple, then you can eat the whole apple.  (Side note: You may still want to remove the seeds.  We are pretty sure you’ll be fine but you don’t want to eat to many of them as the Google Home relayed to us during this session.)

Our whole lives we have been shown to eat an apple a certain way.  It has to be eaten from the sides and towards the middle.  The core and stem are left behind and you throw away the excess.  The question is…why?  Why do we eat an apple that way?  Do we have to eat the apple that way?  Are there ways to eat an apple that were previously unimagined?  

Now let’s relate that to education.  Think about yourself as an educator.  Think about the tools that you use in your classroom or school and the way that you teach.  Think about the problems that you face on a daily basis and how you solve them.  How could you use these tools or strategies in a way that was previously unimagined?  Let me give you some examples:

• Traditional – Use Google Forms as a survey.  New Idea: Use Google Forms for assignments.
• Traditional – Use Google Slides for a presentation.  New Idea: Use Google Slides to create an interactive “Choose Your Own Adventure” story.
• Traditional – Use Google Drawings to create a picture.  New Idea: Use Google Drawings as infographic.

As you can see, these are just simple adjustments to already used tools.  Try not to get stuck on how it’s “always” been done by try to think about how it “can” be done in an innovative or new way.

5.) My Lagniappe

Tinashe Blanchet introduced our cohort to the word “lagniappe” and challenged us to find what our own lagniappe.  A lagniappe is “something given as a bonus or extra gift”.  What is your lagniappe?  What is it that you give that is more than you are already giving or are required to give.

For myself, I am a Math & AVID teacher, a Team Technology Leader, and an AVID Coordinator.  There are a lot of responsibilities that go along with the roles.  I take each role and responsibility very seriously and have spent considerable time developing these classes and programs.  However, that is what I am supposed to do.  Although it is what I love to do, it is just the basic requirement of any educator that is in these roles.

So…What is my lagniappe?  What is my “bonus” or “extra gift” to others?  I believe my lagniappe is my blog and the resources that I share with teachers all over the world.  I love writing my blog, sharing resources, and having conversations with other teachers about their students and classrooms.  I haven’t felt any desire in requiring people to pay for my resources.  I simply want to share what I have developed in hopes that other teachers can use it in their classrooms, too.  Am I required to do this?  Not at all.  It’s just that little extra thing that I love doing and giving back to others.

In relation to my innovation project, it has definitely challenged me to dream big and think “What if…?”  Although I have a solution to my problem, I have been challenging myself to think about the “extra” I could be giving or creating to offer greater support to teachers when I publicly launch my project.  It could be something simple, an idea or extension of a previous idea, but I will keep asking myself this question:

How can I give just a little bit more?

Next Steps

The Google Innovator Program is a yearlong program and I have just finished outlining my monthly goals for the next year.  I would like to share this with you soon but I am hesitant to do this until I have been assigned a mentor and we begin going over my innovation project.

Here are a few of my next steps:

• Begin developing the self-assessment form for the BoostEDU program/service.
• Begin building a website for the BoostEDU program/service.

BoostEDU is the current name of my innovation project but it is definitely in development.  I need to do some research to see if it is a name I am able to use or if there are copyrights that will prohibit me from using this name.

Throughout the next year, I will be sharing my journey in a series of blog posts titled “Adventures in Innovation”.  I look forward to sharing more with you in the future!

Hi students,

This video is arriving a bit late since I had a very busy day at the academy.  However, I do have some answers to your questions about the academy and London.  Just an FYI, this post and video were created after Day 2 of the academy and I have so much more to share with you about Day 3.

Question #1: What sites did you see in London?

Although the majority of my time has been spent in the Google Innovator Academy and networking with other educators, I was able to go see a few sites before the academy began.  The easiest way to view the most famous sites of London was by taking one of the “big bus tours” around London.  The tour was only a few hours but I was able to see Big Ben, Tower of London, London Eye, Westminster Abbey, and several other famous sites.  As I mentioned, I wasn’t able to do very much sightseeing since I was attending the academy but it was great to see some of the famous London landmarks.

Question #2: Did you meet any famous people?

No, I did not see any famous people in London.  There were quite a few plays being featured around London that had some famous actors but I did not have the time to see any plays on this trip.  Altho

ugh I didn’t meet any “famous” people, I did get to interact with a lot of educators that I have been following on Twitter.  So, I definitely had some nerdy moments when I was able to meet them in real life.

Question #3: What kind of training/fun activities did you do?

Yes!  We participated in quite a few fun activities, as well as helpful training.  In relation to the fun activities, I participated in several icebreaker/team building games while at the academy.  (AVID – I have some ideas for new games!)  We also had a really interesting activity where we at
e an entire apple.  Yes, you heard me right.  An entire apple.

Besides the activities, there were also many sessions led by the leaders and coaches of the academy.  These sessions helped guide us in our design process for our innovation project.  We also had a lot of time to start developing the ideas for our innovation project through breaking down the problems, creating story boards, and collaborating with others.

I’ll be talking about this a lot more in a future blog post – so keep your eyes out for another post soon.

Question #4: What was your favorite part?

It’s hard to pick just one favorite part of the Google Innovator Academy – so, I am going to give you two.  First, I have really enjoyed the sessions by the leaders and coaches of the academy.  They have sparked many ideas that I will take to the classroom when I return.  These sessions have been inspirational but also meaningful.  Honestly, I could write so much more on this topic but that will be for my next blog post.  Second, I have enjoyed going through the design thinking process to breakdown and refine my project and solution.  If you are in my AVID class, this is very similar to our 20Time projects – just on a much larger scale.  I wish I had gone through this process before our project because it has given me a million ideas.  As I mentioned in my last post, I am very passionate about this problem and finding a solution to support teachers in developing more rigorous and tech-based curriculum.  So, working on my Innovation project over the last two days has been an amazing opportunity.  More importantly, I truly feel like I understand my problem, my users, and the likelihood of implementing my solution.

Question #5: Are the other teacher at the academy working in different project like you are?

Yes, all of the teachers are working on their own projects.  Each teacher had a problem that they discovered in education and a solution to solve this problem.  As we went through the design thinking process, many educators saw these solutions start to change.  For myself, my solution is similar to what it was originally but it is starting to adjust and extend beyond what I had initially planned.  Just like myself, all of the educators are going through the design thinking process and are in the process of developing some amazing projects.  If you are interested in checking out these projects, visit this link: Google Innovator LON17 Cohort.

This post is a part of a series of titled “Adventures in Innovation” and focuses on the release of my Google Innovator Project: BoostEDU.

In March, I was accepted into the Google Innovator Program for the #LON17 cohort.  It was probably one of the most exciting moments of my career – actually, one of the most exciting moments of my life.

Now, I haven’t shared much about this journey yet.  The reason?  Honestly, it all still seems a bit unreal and I didn’t want to jinx it.  Was I really accepted into this amazing program?  Do I really have the opportunity to develop an innovation project to create change in the education?  Am I actually headed to London to meet with my #LON17 cohort?  Like, I said – it still seems a bit unreal.  Which is probably why I haven’t written this blog post until today…as I am sitting on the plane headed to London.

Although it feels unreal, I keep reminding myself that this is real and that I have been given an incredible opportunity.  An opportunity that I do not take lightly.  It is an opportunity for me to bring a vision project to life and to create a positive impact in education.

Let me share my journey with you…

The Journey Thus Far

Last September, I like to joke that I fell down the Twitter Rabbit Hole and I never came back out.  My district, Hesperia Unified School District, hosted an EdTechTeam Google Apps for Education Summit and I was introduced to this crazy, wonderful world of professional development.  It is the moment where my professional and person live was forever changed.  I started joining Twitter chats, collaborating with teachers all over the world, and began writing and sharing ideas on my blog.  I developed relationships with other teachers and had some of the most amazing conversations I have had about education and ways to improve student learning.  It has redefined by my teaching practices by inspiring to be more innovative and create lessons that truly prepare students for the future.

In October, I saw that many educators were becoming Google Certified Educators and Trainers.  I found myself thinking that this would be a great way for me to grow personally and professionally.  It would challenge me to continue to grow and refine my teaching practices, as well as share my ideas with other teachers.  By the end of the month, I had passed all of the Google Educator Exams, the trainer exam, and had submitted my Google Trainer application.

Then I waited…I collaborated with educators…I blogged and shared ideas from my classroom…and I waited.

January is where everything started to move quickly.  Quite frankly, it’s been a whirlwind of amazing opportunities and opportunities that have challenged me to go outside of my comfort zone.  By the end of January, I had been accepted into the Google for Education Trainer program and had presented at my first EdTechTeam Summit.  I began receiving feedback on my blog and hearing from teachers that were using my materials in their classrooms.  More importantly, I was having conversations with these teachers on how to improve my materials for future use.

Right after this, the Google Innovator Program announced that they were accepting applications for the next academy which would take place in London.  There was no hesitation in my desire to apply for this program.  I knew I wanted to apply.  For the last few months, I had been reading on Twitter about the amazing Innovation projects that were being completed all over the world.  I was inspired to do the same – to make an impact and a positive change in education to affect student learning.

Through the encouragement and advice of other educators that I admired, I submitted my application for the Google Innovator program.

Then I waited…I collaborated with educators…I blogged and shared ideas from my classroom…and I waited.

On March 15, I received an email that I had been accepted into the Google Innovator Program and that I was being invited to attend the academy in London.  The email came to me during our weekly Math collaboration meeting and I am sure I confused the entire group when I began freaking out from excitement.  Honestly, I had convinced myself that there was no way that I would be accepted.  (This isn’t one of those false humility things, either.)  I knew I had a good idea for an innovation project and I was very excited about the idea of developing it.  However, there are so many amazing educators in the world that applied for this program.  When I received the email, I was honored.  I felt blessed to have this opportunity to create a positive change in education.  Again, it was and never will be an opportunity that I take lightly.

So, here I am…Sitting on a plane and headed to London to the Google Innovator Academy.  It’s still unbelievable.

My Vision…So Far.

The idea for my vision project is something that I had been thinking about for several months before I applied to the Google Innovator Program.  I had been thinking about my school and our educational technology integration.  I asked myself, “What is our greatest issue with implementing purposeful technology in the classroom?”  My district is very fortunate to have access to technology as a 1:1 Chromebook district.  However, I often wonder if we are implementing technology appropriately and purposefully.  Or, are we simply using technology in the classroom to substitute what we were already doing and/or simply for the sake of saying that we use technology.

Had our technology integration been purposeful to students?  Meaningful?  Productive?  Were we using technology in our classrooms as a way to promote student learning, increase rigor, and prepare them for 21^st century careers?

As I pondered this idea, I realized that the answer was somewhat vague.  The answer was: sometimes.  Sometimes our technology integration was purposeful, meaningful, and productive.  Sometimes it promoted student learning, increased rigor, and preparation for the 21^st century.  Sometimes.  It just depends upon a variety of factors but, mostly, it depends upon the teacher.

So, my question shifted to, “How do we prepare our teachers to implement the purposeful use of technology in the classroom to promote student learning, increased rigor and preparation for the 21^st century?”  This question was harder.  Every teacher is at a different level of tech integration with a very different skill base.

Then it hit me.  Our teachers are not much different from our students.  They all learn differently and they all have different set of skills.  Some teachers will learn quickly, some will take time.  Finally, my question shifted to one that would be the basis for much of my vision project:

If we personalize learning for our students, why are we not creating the same personalized professional development to support our teachers with tech integration?

As I began applying to the program, my solution to the problem began to form.  I wanted to develop a program that personalizes professional development for teachers to reach higher levels of SAMR in their lessons, activities, and projects.  I wanted to create a program that allowed teachers to see that incorporating purposeful technology for students is not difficult.  It’s not impossible.  If anything, it can be fun and exciting.  It can transform and redefine classrooms.

Below, I am sharing my Vision Deck and Vision Video that I submitted in my application for the Google Innovator Program.  Feel free to look through these resources and learn more about my vision project.

In the title above, I titled this “My Vision…So Far”.  This is my vision but it is also one that might change as I attend the academy over the next few days.  It is going to change and evolve.  It may even go in a direction previously unimagined.  That’s okay.  In fact, I welcome it.  I welcome the challenge to develop this idea and take it in any direction that will support teachers and inspire students.

I’m excited.  I’m nervous.  But…I’m ready.

Over the next year, I will be chronicling my Google Innovator journey in a series of posts title “Adventures in Innovation” so that I can be reflective on my project and share my ideas with other educators.  Keep an eye out for more posts coming very soon!

This post is a part of a series of titled “Adventures in Innovation” and focuses on the release of my Google Innovator Project: BoostEDU.

If you are interested in how I am using Google Cast in the classroom, click HERE to visit the EdTech Team blog.  They have a lot of great resources that are worth reading!