Full Circle

The end of the school year for teachers is always crazy.  My students and I have enjoyed the journey with iPads, but my only regret is that I didn't keep better records of our learning curve and progress.

But since I cannot go back in time, I can only provide a reflection of our journey together...

Let me start by saying that it was a magnificent ride full of ups and downs.  Mostly ups.  My students constantly amazed me with their ability to rise to the occasion. Whatever I put in front of them, they were willing to try.  And if it didn't work, they were just as relieved as I was to shift gears.  But their projects.  Wow.  Let me preface this with the fact that I work at a Title I school with a high EL population.  But my students (most of them anyway) put their best efforts in learning how to use a variety of technology tools.

Let's start with the iPads.  What the students didn't know was taught to them by their peers.  What I didn't know was taught to me by my students.  Split the key-board?  Didn't know it could happen.  Luckily I had several students who knew how to fix that.

But the apps…there were so many that my students used throughout the semester:  Edmodo, MyBigCampus, HaikuLMS, whole GAFE suite, HaikuDeck, Popplet, PuppetPals, Educreations, Mematic, QR Scan, Quizlet…along with web-based tools:  bitty.com & Kaywa QR maker.  Keep in mind that I only have these students for one semester…so I packed a lot of technology in our short time together.  To top it off, we were still trying to keep in line with our pacing.  We didn't make it, but we made a good effort to get as far as we could.  Truth be told, I've always been more about depth than breadth anyway.  No harm, no foul.