Education Podcasts: A List of My Favorites

Up until a few months ago, I hated listening to podcasts.  I found it so hard to focus on what they were saying while I was distracted doing other things.  However, I started listening to them on my commute to and from school and I can’t get enough!  I don’t even like to listen to the radio now.  If I’m driving or walking, I’ve got a podcast going.

Podcasts are wonderful tools for professional learning.  Like most online media, they break down the barriers of time and space to allow for learning at your leisure.  However, unlike most online media, they also remove the barrier of visual learning.  You don’t need to watch a video with this online professional learning, as long as you’ve got speakers or a pair of headphones, you’re set.  In fact, with most smartphones these days, podcast apps are built right in so all you have to do is stream and go.

 

Podcasts are great ways to learn “on-the-go,” as there are literally thousands to choose from.  A few weeks ago, I put out a call on social media asking for your favorite podcasts.  After listening to ALL of them, I finally decided on a few of my favorites that I’d love to share with you!

The Google Teacher Tribe Podcast

Hosts:  Matt Miller & Kasey Bell (Twitter: @jmattmiller & @shakeuplearning)

Category: Educational Technology

The Google Teacher Tribe podcast gives you all the tips and tricks for using G Suite for Education in your classroom and school.  On each episode, they share the newest releases and updates from Google, dive deep into a specific aspect of the G Suite, and share tips from listeners.  They’ve built an amazing online community called the Google Teacher Tribe, which you can follow on social media using #GTTribe.

My favorite episode so far is 41: The Google Infused Classroom which features special guest Holly Clark, who I got to meet in person at the EdTechTeam conference in Louisville!

Shifting Our Schools Podcast

Host:  Jeff Utecht (Twitter: @jutecht)

Category: Educational Technology

The SOS podcast, as it’s better known, is part of the Eduro Learning podcast network and is all about educational technology and innovation in the classroom.  Jeff and his guests chat about everything from 1:1 models, project-based learning, administrators in a tech-rich environment, and teaching your students how to be You-Tubers.

My favorite episode so far is 42: Highly Structured, Loosely Organized.  Jeff talks about how he uses a “highly structured, loosely organized” approach to using educational technology and what that looks like in a sixth-grade classroom.  He gives practical tips for using devices in the classroom while keeping engagement high and pedagogy intact.

Truth for Teachers Podcast

Host: Angela Watson (Twitter: @Angela_Watson)

Category:  Teacher Self-Care and General Education

On the Truth for Teachers podcast, Angela and her guests talk about general truth for educators.  Angela is a teacher self-help guru and she often shares ideas about making your teacher week more productive and fulfilling.  Angela is the queen at talking about the teacher guilt we all experience as teachers and gives suggestions to combat that guilt.

My favorite episode is 122: Your #1 job when you don’t feel motivated.  In this episode, she discusses how the most important thing to do when you’re lacking motivation is to find motivation.  Everything else on your to-do list can wait.

Cult of Pedagogy Podcast

Host: Jennifer Gonzalez (Twitter: @cultofpedagogy)

Category: General Education

The Cult of Pedagogy podcast seems to have a strong following within my own PLN and for good reason.  Jennifer talks about everything from instructional strategies to classroom management to professional development and everything in between.  She offers a variety of podcasts at different lengths as well so you can find just perfect one for your drive, no matter how far.

My favorite episode is 92: Frickin’ Packets where she talks about the dangers of worksheets in the classroom.  I’ll be completely honest and say that it took me almost a week before I listened to it when it came out because I was afraid I’d hear things I didn’t want to hear.  😓  We all use worksheets, whether we like to admit it or not.  But this episode is fantastic and starts with the audio of a frustrated student in a classroom, an authentic voice expressing a very real problem.  It’s definitely worth a listen!

Transformative Principal

Host: Jethro Jones (Twitter: @jethrojones)

Category: School Leadership

The Transformative Principal podcast is, of course, geared towards school leadership like principals and superintendents.  Jethro Jones is a school principal in Fairbanks, Alaska and he interviews others about their leadership styles and invites his guests to shares ideas and tips for becoming a transformative school leader.  Every episode is very conversational between Jethro and his guests.

There are so many wonderful episodes, but one of my favorites is The Principled Principal with Jeff Zoul and Anthony McConnell, where Jethro and his guests discuss setting up a school climate and culture conducive to collaboration and learning.

These are just a few of the podcasts I’ve been listening to non-stop for the last few weeks.  Do you have a favorite?  Drop a link or title in the comments below… I’d love to learn from you and to give it a listen!

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Using Google Forms To Assess

Earlier this week, I posted about my love for Google Apps for Education (GAFE, for short) and I shared how I utilize Google Sheets to collect and analyze data.  You can go back and read all about that here, but today I’m going to talk to you about another of my favorites: Google Forms.

Whether you feel comfortable with Google Docs and Sheets or not, you can use Google Forms to create a super simple assessment that will export data into Google Sheets.  Newsflash:  It’s not that complicated.

I use Google Forms to create exit tickets, surveys, and short assessments for my students.  They are very quick, easy to use, and, because they export directly into a spreadsheet, they give me lots of tangible data to analyze for next steps.

Here are just a few of the ways to use Google forms in the classroom:

1.  Exit tickets – Sometimes I’ll ask students to share 1 or 2 things they learned during today’s lesson using a generic form like this one.  Other times, the questions are more lesson-specific, like this exit slip for third grade math.  You can even turn on the “quiz” feature and Google will grade them for you! (Hello, extra free time!)

2.  Surveys – You can use Google Forms to administer informal reading inventories and pre-assessments to determine student interest or level of prior knowledge.  For instance, last school year, my class participated in the #GratitudeExperiment and they had to fill out a pre- and post-survey.  Totally did them on Google Forms to save time and money!  You can check out the pre-survey here.

3.  Student conferences – As you walk around the room and conference with students during reading, writing, or math workshop, record your conversations and notes in Google Forms.  You can email this directly to the student so they will have it or print for your own notes.  It will be super easy to go back and look at previous conference notes and organize that data for parent teacher conferences!  Here’s an example of an independent reading conference you might use in your classroom.

4.  Rubrics – You can create rubrics in Forms and use them to streamline the grading process.  I haven’t actually done this one yet, but I can’t wait to try it out this school year.  Have you used it before?  Let me know what you did!

My absolute favorite part of Google forms has to be the data you get from it!  To start, it provides you with a spreadsheet you can export, like this one I got from my #GratitudeExperiment survey.  From here, you can organize and analyze as needed.  Check out my last blog post about using Google Sheets to manage classroom data.

And as if it Forms wasn’t amazing enough, it also summarizes the data for you, giving you beautiful little charts like this one so you can see results at a glance! If this isn’t Google’s way of saying, “I love you, teachers,” I don’t know what is.

Have you used Google Forms in the classroom before?  There are a million ways to use it and I can’t wait to learn more from you!  Head on over to forms.google.com and be creative – then share what you’ve done!

GAFE for Classroom Data

Am I alone in saying that Google has been a God-send for teachers?  With the rise of the Google empire, we’ve been able to connect, collaborate, engage, and organize like never before.  For those of you that are familiar with Google Apps for Education (GAFE, for short), you know that they can be used to simplify a teacher’s life tremendously.  I use them pretty much exclusively for my classroom needs, including for lesson planning, data collection, data analysis, and collaborating.

This post is designed to give the Google beginner some tips and tricks for using Google in the classroom.  While there are a million ways to use Google with students, I also love utilizing it for my own personal organization and efficiency.  Today, I’m going to explain to you how to use GAFE to collect, analyze, and share student data.

Let’s face it, no one became a teacher because they like to look at data.  Or maybe they LOVED to grade papers as a kid, but quickly realized that the follow-up work as a teacher made it almost unbearable.  The reality is that our jobs are highly tied to data now and rightfully so.  Collection and analysis of data makes it easy for us to track where students are and make plans to accelerate their learning or intervene as necessary.

I personally love using the GAFE suite to collect and analyze data.  I originally started a data sheet on Microsoft Excel but quickly moved it to Google Sheets after realizing that I did not have to be tied to one device in order to access it.  I can pull up my data on my laptop,  a school desktop, a colleague’s computer, or any iPad.  (I will say that I’ve tried to access the GAFE suite on my Kindle Fire and it’s a little more complicated.  I’m not sure about other Android devices.)  I also love that I can share my spreadsheet with anyone. This is especially helpful when we are looking at classroom data in our professional learning community and is great to modify and share with parents.

1.  Collect student data.

I collect student data in a couple of ways.  First, I use it to keep track of the universal screener data we collect in the fall, winter, and spring of every year.  For example, we assess students using the Developmental Spelling Assessment, the Developmental Reading Assessment, and the Test of Word Reading Efficiency three times a year.  This data is all compiled in one Google Sheet.

Additionally, my data sheet has essentially taken the place of my grade book and I use it to keep track of weekly formative assessment data. My data sheet is set up very much like a standard grade book, with the name of the student going down the left side and the assessments going across the top.  The biggest difference is that each of the assessments are grouped by standard so that I can easily track progression within the standard.

2.  Analyze student data.

Once the data is collected, this sheet becomes my life.  It’s very simple to format the data so that it tells a story about each student, as well as your teaching.  Below are a few ways I format my data sheet to help tell the story of our classroom:

• Color coding – I use red for novice, yellow for apprentice, green for proficient, and blue or purple for distinguished.  This is my favorite part of the data analysis because I can easily see who is performing at grade level and who needs interventions after every assessment.  You can easily do this by selecting the data, choose Format at the top, and then select Conditional Formatting.  From there, you can set the formatting for each cell based on a simple “If.. Then” statement.
• Class averages – I can look at a glance to see how to entire class performed on the assessment.  This gives me a clue into my effectiveness of teaching.  When I have a bad week, the data shows.  You can calculate averages by selecting a row or column of data, then clicking the Functions (pointy E) button and selecting “SUM.
• Standard average – This is my way to evaluating student progress toward the standard.  While we don’t use standards based grading (yet), this is a great way for me to plan small groups and intervention.

3.  Share with others.

In the top right corner of every GAFE product, there is a “Share” button.  Use this button to share with your professionally learning community, administrators, and others.  For example, I keep all of our grade level data in one Google sheet and it is shared with my team mates, our instructional coach, the school interventionist, and our administrators.  If anyone has a question about a student’s progress, all they have to do is look at the data sheet that has been shared with them.  No need to call and ask.

We also have a Google sheet with the entire school’s universal screening data and every teacher in the building has access to it.  I love this because it creates a very transparent culture.  It also creates a sense of collaboration even though we might not be able to have common planning times.

It is also possible to utilize this data to share with parents.  Of course, be careful and don’t EVER share the entire document with them.  But you can highlight their student’s score, paste them in a word document or another Google sheet and share them that way.  Since scores automatically average once you’ve set the Sheet up, you can easily transfer the data to weekly or monthly progress reports.

So, that’s just one way that I utilize Google Apps for Education in my own classroom.  How are you using it to make your data management more manageable?  I’d love to hear!