Welcome to the BLU Personalized Learning Forum

Sam J. Brooks, Expert Advisor, Jan 6, 2017 0 0
Many teachers feel threatened when discussing the onset of blended or personalized learning for students. Allowing them to get involved at their own pace is key to success along the way. We are entertaining digital natives in the classroom now and teachers have to be given time to "catch up" with the students. An attitude of "productive failure" is important and teachers must have the opportunity to try new things out, even if they fail at first. The one thing for certain is most students know more about technology than our teachers, but it is OK to learn from our students along the way. A more engaged classroom is the goal! This will give more time for teachers to work with students and differentiate the learning. Teachers who personalize classrooms must have room to try new things, even if they fail sometimes along the way. Read more...

Sherre Vernon, Expert Advisor, Jan 10, 2017 0 0
Teachers, as much as students, benefit from a personalized approach. The key is figuring out why they aren't motivated -- and their reasons do differ. Some, as Sam mentioned, have little or no experience with technology and are intimidated by it; others are successful teachers who don't see the need to fix what's not broken (these teachers often discover that blended learning fits in well with their already personalized approach int he classroom); some fear the impact of difficult-to-regulate screen time; some love to be front-and-center in their classrooms and blended learning shifts that; some don't want to do the data analysis and re-teaching that blended learning often highlights as necessary; I'm sure there are other motivations that aren't coming to mind right now. The point is, each of these motivations for resistance needs a different type of response from school leadership to "de-mystify" what happens in blended learning. Simulated blended learning experiences in the proposed digital platform, if done well, can help with this. There's also a need for capacity building (around data; student accountability; class routines) depending on where the teacher's resistance is coming from. Read more...

Rebekah Kim, Expert Advisor, Jan 19, 2017 0 0
Make the structures, resources and content relevant to what teachers want and need to help make students successful. In today's mad search for high quality CCSS aligned resources, we are in need of game changing approaches to teaching. Unpacking of standards, identifying resources and knowing that it is aligned to student achievement measurements is a priority in education. If we listen, name it and help our teaching staff in this journey, it could lead to better buy in. Read more...

Denis Zaff, Jan 20, 2017 0 0
We come from a slightly different angle as most of our instructors focus on corporate training.The most successful and efficient instructors who use Rukuku.com to deliver blended training programs got there by what we internally call a "snow ball approach". These instructors grow into their roles by:starting a small, simple programthen building on that program by taking many incremental steps Read more...

Sam J. Brooks, Expert Advisor, Jan 5, 2017 0 0
Our district (Putnam County Schools TN) is very lucky to have the Putnam County VITAL program as the lead for all personalized learning in our district. The VITAL program also has the lead for all Professional Learning for teachers and is moving toward PD Credentialing as time moves on. The VITAL program also pushes out trainings that can be both "traditional" and "virtual" in delivery. We feel confident that if teachers can experience the benefits of being in a personalized learning delivery of teacher professional learning, they will understand the student experience and outcomes much better. I hope this helps! Read more...

Kenneth Grover, Expert Advisor, Jan 12, 2017 0 0
As I work with teachers and staff from around the country, we begin by focusing on the core beliefs the group has about student learning how we take those beliefs and meet them through blended learning and personalized learning. Read more...

Barbara Treacy, Jan 19, 2017 0 0
One of the most effective (including cost-effective) ways to on-board new staff, is to provide opportunities for teachers to visit the classrooms of other teachers who have started to transition to blended learning. Through classroom visits, teachers can learn from what other teachers are doing, and the visits can also increase collaboration and dialogue within the school around blended learning. Read more...

Rebekah Kim, Expert Advisor, Jan 30, 2017 0 0
For the last several years, we have created a Blended Learning 101 Orientation for new staff. Since we have over 85 staff members at our school, it is important that we set aside time and resources for new staff to our school to spend time reading, engaging and learning about our blended learning structures before the school year begins. Most recently, we used excerpts from Go BlendEd, Liz Arney, for staff to understand the baseline of structures. As we continue to strive to go deeper with our work by personalizing what is taking place in these BL structures, we have the confidence that all teaching staff have a foundational understanding of what the expected instructional structures of a 1:1 classroom setting entails. Read more...

Bailey Thomson, Expert Advisor, Jan 7, 2017 0 0
At SPARK Schools, we made the deliberate choice not to implement a 1:1 in either our foundation phase (K-3) or intermediate phase (4-7) blended learning models. In the lower grades, we use a lab rotation model and generally keep technology out of the classroom, up to and including smart boards. Our students spend the majority of their time in relationship with their peers and teachers via guided work and collaborative work in the classroom and use Chromebooks in our Learning Lab for about an hour a day. In our intermediate phase, we employ a flex/individual rotation and find that a 1:1 is a poor choice for both capacity utilization of assets, because there are huge swaths of time when students are working together or with a teacher and do not need a device, and that it limits their social-emotional development with peers and with teachers. Read more...

Kenneth Grover, Expert Advisor, Jan 13, 2017 0 0
While 1:1 initiatives provide the necessary tools to personalize the learning environment, computers are still just a tool. We decided to provide computers as needed for students to check them out and we also encourage students bring their own computers (if they have them). Read more...

Donna Henry, Feb 1, 2017 0 0
In Lewisville ISD we implemented a 1:X (TM) program five years ago. While students in grades 4-12 do have district-provided iPADS, the goal with 1:X (TM) is to shift the focus on learning and selecting the right tool for the task. Read more...

Kenneth Grover, Expert Advisor, Jan 14, 2017 0 0
We have found that using multiple positive behavioral approaches the recognize student responsible use of the time, path, pace, and place of their learning has yielded greater student responsibility. Read more...

Kenneth Grover, Expert Advisor, Jan 13, 2017 0 0
Focus on the core belief about student learning and then incorporate multiple instructional practices as needed to support personalized learning. Read more...

Kevin Wenzel, Expert Advisor, Jan 14, 2017 0 0
In a more formal way, we provided our district's teacher evaluation team(s) with a set of blended learning look-fors for each of our instructional practice standards they observe. This allowed for teachers to try innovative practices in blended learning, while still grounding their instruction in existing evaluative frameworks. Read more...

Thomas Arnett, Jan 15, 2017 0 0
From my experience, the key is to focus on best instructional practices and then determine from there which aspects of personalized learning will help in implementing those practices. Read more...

Rebekah Kim, Expert Advisor, Mar 13, 2017 0 0
At our school, we found the best examples based on research, site visits and successful practices happening in our very own classrooms. These examples were synced with our Teacher Instructional Framework (evaluation) to align our observed best practices with the components of the existing framework. The benefits of this showed a direct alignment to practices already happening and how they could be enhanced implementing a blended learning instructional model. This process helped with gaining buy-in. Read more...

Michael Fauteux, Expert Advisor, Mar 17, 2017 0 0
To take a different perspective, one thing to consider when aligning best practices to personalized learning is how some best instructional practices are not necessarily enhanced, or are outright undermined, with well-intentioned blended and personalized learning.For example, if developing student academic discourse is a focus for a teacher or school, one needs to think carefully about whether or not certain blended and personalized approaches help or hinder the practice. Often times the individual pacing and broad choice provided via technology results in rooms of students plugged into head phones not speaking with each other. Carefully planning ways to preserve academic discourse with specific tasks and structures are necessary to guard against this. An additional challenge to depth of learning comes with students moving at their own pace. For any topic, there is often a minimum number of students necessary to produce a rich range of approaches, understandings, and misunderstandings. Teachers draw upon this variety to expertly push thinking and help students add depth to their learning. Students moving at their own pace are often on different topics, potentially limiting access to the different approaches and understandings students see from their peers.In other words, sometimes the best way to align best instructional practices with personalized learning is either to refrain from blending or personalizing them or by thinking carefully how to protect them by balancing what makes them effective with other benefits from personalized initiatives. Read more...

Rebekah Kim, Expert Advisor, Mar 13, 2017 0 0
We use the blended learning block to personalize learning pathways for students by planning instructional groups based on students' strengths and areas of need. The rotations involve teacher-led core instruction, adaptive technology programs, small group instruction led by our ELL bilingual tutors and instructional classroom assistants. This allows core instruction, intervention and enrichment to take place. The data collected from these varying practices is used when looking at student growth and areas of need as we analyze standards-based assessment both formative and summative. Read more...

Bailey Thomson, Expert Advisor, Jan 8, 2017 0 0
At SPARK, we see blended learning and the use of technology as a tool to leverage, not as an ultimate outcome. As such, we measure the effectiveness of our blended learning model by taking a look at student achievement results and satisfaction/engagement surveys from parents, staff, and students. We aren't willing to subject some students to blended learning and leave others aside, so I doubt we will ever be able to make meaningful comparisons between achievement with and without technology. However, that's all well and good, because blended learning is a whole greater than the sum of its parts. Our models are not just about technology implementation, but also include culture-setting, behaviour management, social-emotional development, peer and teacher relationship-building and so much other soft "glue" that makes the whole model effective. Read more...

Clifford Hong, Expert Advisor, Jan 15, 2017 0 0
For me, it starts with selecting the right data points. For example, if your blended program is designed to improve students' reading skills, perhaps you would use iReady, SRI, or NWEA Maps. You would do a diagnostic, then run your blended program, and then run the assessment again, perhaps a month later to see if the data has improved. The tricky part is selecting the right data points, because you need to be able to efficiently collect the data and have it reported in a usable form. Read more...

Rebekah Kim, Expert Advisor, Jan 19, 2017 0 0
Identify the key factors in implementing the program with fidelity and the specific skills/standards the program is marketing itself to support students in. Hold staff accountable in implementing programs with fidelity. This includes administration master scheduling to allow appropriate blocks of content time. Then, align an external pre, mid and post assessment measurements to monitor progress. This will help to determine if the skills being worked on in a program are being generalized and mastered outside of the program. If progress is not being made, then adjusting time or a program change is necessary in personalizing the learning pathway for each child. This can happen using an MTSS structure that looks at a variety of measurements, which includes, formative, benchmark and summative assessments. Of these assessments, it can be technology or non-technology based. I have never been shy to ask program vendors and strategists how they can help us to determine if progress is being made by using our own external data measurements to determine the effectiveness of a program. When we have not seen effectiveness based on external measurements, we have discontinued the program. Read more...

Donna Henry, Feb 1, 2017 0 0
That's a really good question. In Lewisville ISD, we look at the following indicators: course completion, grade distribution, state assessment data, and enrollment demographics. Additionally, we look at parent and student survey data. We also conducted an interesting study this year where we compared a teacher's face-to-face classes and blended classes (see data indicators above). We found that the blended classes out-performed the traditional classes. Read more...

Donna Henry, Feb 1, 2017 0 0
This is such a great question! In Lewisville ISD we collect a lot of data about blended: attendance, completion, grade distribution, demographic, and assessment. But your question is what we are going after now. When I walk our blended classes at the secondary level (students attend class two days a week and learn online three days a week -- at the class vs. program level), I see all of the pieces in your question playing out differently. And how they play out shows up the the rather traditional data we do collect. All to say, we are just now discussing how to conduct research about how students and teachers are spending their time. I'll get back to this question as our discussion deepens. Read more...

Clifford Maxwell, May 9, 2017 1 1
For online work, check out our blended learning MOOC here: https://www.coursera.org/learn/blended-learning. For in-person PD, our colleague Heather Staker is also doing live training (learn more here https://www.readytoblend.com/how_it_works). Additionally, I would look at training from iNACOL, and also look into modules on blended learning from the Relay Graduate School of Education. Read more...

Serge Pelletier, May 10, 2017 1 1
Thanks Clifford! I just registered for your MOOK. Can't wait to start on May 22nd! Read more...

Nikolaus Namba, Expert Advisor, May 30, 2017 2 2
Every once and a while we come across a list that simply cannot be duplicated... Jessica Slusser is a Project Manager at Getting Smart and she created a posting called, 25 Can’t-Miss Education Conferences in 2017 . Some of these opportunities have already passed, but they are great development opportunities to consider next year. However, there are still some conferences that would be more than worthy of going to this summer: National Charter Schools Conference, June 11-14, 2017; Washington, D.C.; ISTE, June 25-28, 2016; San Antonio, TX; Bb World, July 25-27, 2017; New Orleans, LA; PBL World, June 20-22, 2017; Napa Valley, CA; New Tech Network Conference, July 6-10, 2017; Saint Louis, MO; and many more... There are so many great opportunities to learn and build your network of resources: "Adventure is out there!" Read more...

Michael Weinraub, Expert Advisor, Sep 6, 2017 0 0
And now that we're into Fall already, worth having iNACOL on your radar screen. Will be a great roundup of people, sessions, and practitioners. https://www.inacol.org/symposium/See you there?MW Read more...

Kim Carter, Expert Advisor, Aug 30, 2017 0 0
Consider taking a look at How to Personalize Learning: A Practical Guide for Getting Started and Going Deeper by Barbara Bray and Kathleen McClaskey from Corwin. Getting Smart has a great blog post offering a set of "Look fors" and a "Personalized Learning Progression", along with some other resources. Read more...

Sam J. Brooks, Expert Advisor, Oct 11, 2017 1 1
Rachel,We are presently working on a crosswalk from our Tennessee state teacher evaluation model to the expectation in a personalized learning classroom. I will try to remember to share it with you when we are finished. We are using the rubrics created by iNacol and ISTE as a guideline for our rubrics. I hope this helps, but if you need further discussion, feel free to contact me at brookss4@pcsstn.com. I am the Personal Learning Supervisor for the Putnam County School System in Tennessee and a BLU Expert Advisor. Read more...