OIT Goes Global for Spring '24 eCoach Day

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 By Kerri Lambert, Teacher Specialist, AACPS Office of Instructional Technology

Going Global, Spring 2024 eCoach Day

On March 7th, OIT went global with our semi annual eCoach Day. During this day of virtual
professional development, eCoaches, Brightspace Campus Champions, media specialists, and other guests took time to “Explore the possible: Connecting Classrooms to the World” through 33 unique sessions offered by vendors, AACPS teacher specialists, and AACPS classroom teachers. 

Session topics were varied, covering everything from Generative AI, Google Earth, Talkies in Wixie, to coding with robots and other applications. With the global connections theme, many sessions focused on how students can connect and interact with the world beyond the classroom walls. Discovery Ed took teachers on virtual field trips, Lumio by Smart demonstrated how to integrate global perspectives across content areas, and our own Samantha Wilkinson and Tracey Brown showcased Google Arts & Culture and Google Earth, tools that allow teachers and students to explore culturally diverse places, themes, and ideas by immersing them in different environments. 

Another focus of the day was on students’ expressing their knowledge creatively using applications
such as Adobe Express, Wixie, WeVideo, and Minecraft. Storytelling was a common theme in these sessions, as podcasting, movie making, and world building were discussed as avenues for assessment. Do you find those concepts a bit intimidating? Then give talkies in Wixie a try; these are animated characters that students give voice to. Even coding can be used for students to showcase what they’ve learned, as demonstrated by OIT specialist Koral McKenna in her session “Student Expression with Coding.” Not only are all of these projects fun and engaging for students, but they directly align to Maryland’s 6th digital learning standard, Creative Communicator. 

With testing season approaching, we would have been remiss if we didn’t cover innovative ways to
leverage technology for students to review curricular concepts. Our LMS specialists, Darren Thompson and Morgan Thompson, shared examples of ways Brightspaces’ Creator+ can be used to engage students in authentic and dynamic assessments. Standards aligned test prep materials can be found in Nearpod, and Wixie is a perfect tool for assessing our youngest learners in PreK and Kindergarten. Looking to provide students with more interactive ways to connect with text? I showed how to take AACPS curricular materials and put them into Lumio or Nearpod to create engaging lessons that give teachers more insight on student mastery.

As well received as these sessions were, nothing compares to the #aacpsawesome sessions led by our
eCoaches, Brightspace Champions and teachers from around the district. Minds were blown by “Every Child Reading, Every Day”; a session focused on how two third grade teachers from Lothian Elementary, Jennifer Simmons and Patricia Periera,  are using the Reading Progress tool in MS Teams to improve their students’ reading fluency. Another session that received rave reviews from attendees was Gigabytes and Giggles, led by eCoach and Mayo first grade teacher April Crovo. In a quick 30 minutes, she covered tried and true tips for integrating technology into the primary classroom. With the ELL population rapidly increasing in AACPS, two of our own ELD teachers and Tech4Learning Innovative Educators, William Bulmahn and Elizabeth McMullen, shared their top 10 reasons why Wixie is perfect for working with students who are learning English as a second language. Finally, a Brightspace Roundtable discussion provided participants with the opportunity to hear from AACPS teachers at all levels who are routinely using Brightspace with their students to facilitate learning. 

The feedback we received from the day was overwhelmingly positive, with attendees calling it “a day filled with knowledge,” and “a great variety of sessions” that were filled with “so many practical, easy to implement ideas that they can’t wait to share with staff!” Sorry you weren’t able to attend the day? Well, you’re in luck! Every session was recorded and made available, along with any shared resources, on the session catalogue that you can access here. Happy learning!


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