Using Google Apps in a Paperless English Classroom

Due to the fact that our school only opened this year and that the Ultranet was not yet released, we had to come up with a solution for a whole school email/network/website/online storage solution. We are a one:one tablet school so it is important to be able to deliver curriculum flexibly and digitally so we were looking for something that had complexity of features, but ease of use. It was decided that we would use google apps, as the fact that we could set up an education site free of charge was a bonus. It has allowed us to do a myriad of things, very easily and very intuitively. Staff have had no training, but all have managed to contribute to managing and developing our learning space.

TERM ONE:
In the first Term our student's tablets were delayed, as was our building, so we faced technological problems we were not expecting. Not only could we not deliver our lessons digitally, but we also did not have a printer so we could not print them out either! The result was a hybrid start to the year, with a back-to-basics approach in terms of collaborative work in the classroom without much of a technological influence. The upside was that we were able to build relationships and trust before we really set up our online spaces. By the end of Term 1 we had set up a Shelfari book group, a Bookcrossing community so that students could donate books to populate our bare shelves and through google sites I set up an English site with an online, self-paced module based around our theme of Identity and Belonging, that allowed students to choose tasks they were interested in.

TERM TWO:
Student e-portfolios were set up through Google Sites - one for each student to manage, populate and share themselves. The settings allow students to share their portfolios with individual people or groups, using group email addresses. They share them with staff only - making them a private space for them to record their work and reflect on their efforts. We use this for goal setting, reflection and as an online workbook. Term Two saw them studying Fahrenheit 451 under the theme of Future Worlds. During this term we introduced google docs and had students work on shared documents where they collaborated and created resources for their classmates about themes in the text. They were able to simultaneously edit the documents, share them with the rest of the class and then refer back to them when they began to consolidate their knowledge. At this point students also started posting work up on their portfolio pages so that this became like an online workbook that we, as teachers, could scroll through whenever we wanted to check on a student's progress.

TERM THREE:
I feel that it was not until term three that we really hit our stride in terms of working with technology in the classroom. Google apps has given us ways of totally avoiding paper in our classroom - collaborative spaces were all online. This term the focus was on media study. As a faculty we divided up what we would focus on in terms of curriculum development.
Self-paced worksheets were designed to expose the students to persuasive language techniques and the features of persuasive writing. Students were able to work on these at home or at school and then posted them on their eportfolio.
We started a reflective blog that students completed at the end of every lesson - the last 10 minutes of every 75min period was spent with the class posting their completed work online and blogging about their work that lesson. We put up some prompts to help students think about the important things from the lesson and how they felt they were going with the content.
An online 'help desk' forum was set up where students could post questions about the work they were undertaking at home or at school and could help each other. This was done through google groups and allowed an email to be sent to teachers every time a student posted a question - within an hour usually the student had a response to their question, often from a student. This is something we will continue to develop.
We used google moderator to get students to submit ideas about which persuasive language technique was the most effective and why, and then students were able to vote on each other's responses until we had a top 5 persuasive language techniques.
Students were able to share work through a google groups page and were able to critique their classmate's work and get ideas about how to improve their own writing.
Students used a google forms to mark sample essays using the rubric that teachers would be using to mark their final assessment piece. Using a google form meant that we could see an graphed overview of responses and talk with the class about why certain pieces had been marked a certain way. This led to rich discussion about the pieces we were marking and also the assessment rubric itself.
We created tutorial videos for students about how to annotate an article and how to write a language analysis. These were uploaded to google videos and were there as a resource for students, allowing them to watch and re-watch tutorials as they saw fit. These reinforced the in-class learning.
I was able to record, using free screen capture software, debut the in-class examples of annotation so that students who missed the class did not miss the practical instruction. This was posted online for students straight after class and allowed them to go back over important information. The annotated article was also attached to the web page so that students were able to download it as an example of a detailed annotation.
TERM FOUR:
We are only just approaching Term 4, but I already feel that we are taking the next step. Term 4 covers Macbeth and students have split in to pairs and are creating a digital representation of a scene of their choice to present to the class. The scene could be an animation, vodcast, podcast, photostory, narrated comic book etc. It needs to be digital because it will be uploaded as a resource for classmates. Students will then present to the class, a discussion of their scene including how it fits in to the play, themes and characters advanced in the scene etc. The students will be presenting and teaching each other the entire play. They will also be peer assessing via a google form which allows them all to engage in the entire process. Coupled with the in-class presentations will be online discussion forums with pertinent theme and character based questions for the students to discuss and debate, recorded teacher discussion podcasts about particular scenes to complement the student presentations and some moderator voting opportunities where students vote on who is to blame for the outcome of the play.

I feel like the sky is the limit at the moment for our digital learning environment. Anything I could do in a classroom sans technology, I am able to do in my google apps learning environment. I feel like although we have come a long way in a short space of time, we have only just scratched the surface of what is possible. The next challenge for us is to work out what place the ultranet has in our online learning environment. Unfortunately at the moment google apps is much more intuitive, functional and accessible than the ultranet and this means we really have to think hard about how to make it work for us.

Growing Up

At some point I grew up and became a responsible adult and I’m not quite sure when that happened. Anyone got any ideas? I have a job with a lot of responsibility and sometimes that makes me feel like I have a bit of a split personality. When I was earlier in my teaching career, the me in school and the me out of school were very different. Now that I am a bit more comfortable in myself, what you see is what you get in terms of me in the classroom and me outside of work, however the professional me, the one that deals with managing adults and delivering professional development and making leadership decisions is another beast entirely. By beast I don’t mean that that side of me is in any way horrible or beastly (others may disagree!) but rather that I think that that responsible, professional adult me is not the way I see myself. I think sometimes about the job I do and about the discussions I have with people about the wellbeing of their children and curriculum planning and the state of education and I feel almost like that person talking, the responsible Caitlin, is some other person, one who can now mix intellectually and socially with adults of all ages, one who is grown up and seen by others as a leader and as someone to go to for advice. I guess I still feel in some ways like that 24 year old who started teaching and was only 12 years older than the year 7s she was suddenly responsible for and only 7 years older than her senior students. I guess I still feel like the silly, impulsive, immature, fun-loving teenager that I sometimes still behave like.
I occasionally ask other people if they ever truly feel like they are grown up and responsible and ready to “be an adult” and usually they agree with my belief that you never really feel like you are getting older, or even that you will ever be as responsible and grown up as you see all of the other ‘grown ups’ acting, but that you just ‘get on with it’ and deal with what life throws at you in the best way you know how. I think that when you are young you think you know everything and that you are so mature and when you get older you realise how little you knew when you were younger and yet, at heart, you still feel like you are that person. Despite my feelings that inside there is still a large part of me that is silly and happy and free, there is inevitably a bigger part of me that is responsible and clever and passionate about what I believe in and what I do for a living and what and who I love. I guess that is the way it will always be.