Book Studies in Brightspace
By Melissa Connelly, Behavior Specialist & Brightspace Campus Champion at Belle Grove Elementary, and Stacy Langhirt, 1st grade teacher and former eCoach, Severna Park Elementary
Books clubs about technology, really? Yes! It was an awesome experience.
When asked to facilitate a class during the summer of 2021, feeling a little burned out on technology we asked if we could try something new. Guess what the answer was a resounding, YES. That is how a five week technology book study came to be using our new LMS, Brightspace.
Facilitating a book study about tools and technology that we have available to us everyday and that our students are familiar with just made so much sense. We were able to share a wonderful text, Eric Curts' Control Alt Achieve: Rebooting your Classroom with Creative Google Projects, that was rich with ideas on using Google Workspace for Education in the classroom and we had conversations centered around those ideas that helped all of us to grow as educators.
We participated in two synchronous sessions using Google Meet where we were able to break down the information in the text and ask each other real time questions. The rest of the book study was self-paced, and was facilitated through discussion and shared documents in Brightspace.This allowed members to read at their own pace and participate in the discussion as they finished up a section and were ready to dive into the dialogue. It was really a very calm and relaxing way to look at technology and how to use it everyday.
The feedback we received about the book study was positive and 100% of the people who participated said they would participate in this type of class again. Participants also shared that they were able to walk away with tools in their toolbox that they could use the very next day with their classes.
Books clubs about technology, really? Yes! It was an awesome experience.
When asked to facilitate a class during the summer of 2021, feeling a little burned out on technology we asked if we could try something new. Guess what the answer was a resounding, YES. That is how a five week technology book study came to be using our new LMS, Brightspace.
We participated in two synchronous sessions using Google Meet where we were able to break down the information in the text and ask each other real time questions. The rest of the book study was self-paced, and was facilitated through discussion and shared documents in Brightspace.This allowed members to read at their own pace and participate in the discussion as they finished up a section and were ready to dive into the dialogue. It was really a very calm and relaxing way to look at technology and how to use it everyday.
Interested in participating in an online book study? Sign up for The Chromebook Infused Classroom book study that starts October 18th! More information here!
