High Impact Teacher of the Year

It is my privilege to be named the TCEA (Texas Computer Education Association) High Impact 2018 Teacher of the year.  Because the uses and types of computer applications are rapidly changing in our world, I continually strive to improve my Computer Science and Information Technology curriculum and instructional methods.

I first learned about TCEA at the ISTE 2017 Conference in San Antonio, Texas.  As I mingled and listened to other teachers talk about the sessions they attended, there was a recurring theme that TCEA sessions were some of the best.  After returning home from ISTE, I received an invitation to join TCEA at a discounted rate, so I gladly joined.

As my days grew busy getting ready for the opening of a new school year, I made it priority to read newsletters that focus on topics that will helpful for the improvement of my curriculum.  I found TCEA news to be a good investment of my reading and professional development time.

When I saw the TCEA description of a high impact teacher, I knew that I fit that description.  Our Admissions Director, Sally Drea, and I gathered evidence, wrote a description of my program and projects and submitted an application.  The nomination is as follows:

Lynn Koresh works to solve real-world problems and make worldwide connections through technology. Lynn incorporates cutting-edge lessons into her daily teaching.  Notable projects include an interdisciplinary 3-D car project, global collaborations, augmented reality, and video game design. Additionally, she manages selection and implementation of school software.

Presentations

• Global Ed. Conference, “Little ol' Me Sharing Global Collaboration Experiences”
• ISTE Poster Sessions
• WEMTA, “Be a Game Star”
• Games & Learning Conference, Panel Discussion

Digital Citizenship/Collaborative Projects

• JDO Foundation
• Level Up Village, Global Inventors & Global Game Designers
• Flat Connections, Building Bridges & Digiteen Project Manager
• Partners:  UK, Poland, Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, Bahrain, Mexico, Ghana, India, Nicaragua, Palestine  

Lynn’s pioneering endeavors resulted in receiving the National Innovations in Catholic Education 2015 - 2016 NICE Award in the category “Recognition for an Innovative Project Facilitated by Technology.”  Her programming sets the pace for her peers and our students.

I am very pleased to receive the recogin as a High Impact Teacher.

Making Assignments Authentic

The ability for students to share their ideas and work with people outside of school gives authenticity to school assignments.  At this time, we would like students to share information about books they have read with other people.

Check out some blogs's that my students made.  These blogs are written about books they read in their literature groups.

Blake

This is a link to a Class in Purley School, UK

Global Partnerships

Global Partnerships

This year the staff at Edgewood Campus School has been flattening our walls to learn with other students around the world. ISTE Standards (International Society for Technology Education) describe the skills and knowledge students need to learn effectively and live productively in an increasingly global and digital society, “Students will develop cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with learners of other cultures.”

We have many students involved in global education.  This year we have partnered with JDO foundation, Level Up Village, and Flat Connections in order to provide a variety of international experiences for our students.

New this is year is a partnership with JDO Foundation.  The JDO Foundation’s mission is “to provide an enriched educational experience for classrooms (PK-8) by providing state of the art technologies, and the professional training to the educators managing these technologies.”  ECS students in Grades 3, 4, & 6 have been partnered with schools in Berkshire, England.  Communications via Google Hangouts, Google Classroom, e-mail, and shared websites have been used to introduce the students to their partners school and teacher.  During November fourth grade students are explaining our celebration of Thanksgiving and learning about Guy Fawkes Night in England.  Third grade students have planned to read books and discuss them.   

Flat Connections provides unique approaches to online global collaboration.  We ‘flatten’ the disconnected classroom to become a global learning environment of the future.  Grade two students are currently participating in K-2 Building Bridges to Tomorrow Project.  This project  is a global collaborative project that joins together students at the lower elementary levels.  They will collaborate with The Wilderness School in Auckland, New Zealand.  We have met each other’s classes via Skype meetings.  We discovered that their school is close to an active volcano and they were excited to learn that our school is next to Vilas Zoo.  We have learned they like to eat a lot of the same snack foods that we eat.  We learned about handball, and they are excited to learn about playing in snow because it doesn’t snow where they live.  

Students in Grade 5 participated in Level Up Village Video Game Design class. In this class students learned the building blocks of coding using the MIT’s Scratch platform.  Together with their partners in India, the students created animations and video games while learning sequencing skills and to how to communicate in a video letter.

Students in Grade 7 at Edgewood campus school are participating in a Flat Connections, Digitween project.  In this project students work in global teams to develop a researched-based wiki and then create action projects around important digital citizenship issues which are designed by classroom groups.  This year we have met students from Nevada, Bahrain, Thailand, and Virginia.  EDGEWOOD CAMPUS SCHOOL students are currently creating skits and iMovies about digital privacy, online etiquette and respect, digital literacy, and how we use the internet to learn.

3D Printing

New for me this year was teaching 3D printing.  Naively I thought it would be an easy tool to add to the tools I use in the classroom.  What I learned is that using a 3D printer is very time consuming.  The maintenance required to keep the plate level and the print nozzles calibrating was very time consuming.

Was it worth the time?  YES.  My students used TinkerCad to design the 3D prints.  Teaching students grade 4 and older to use Tinkercad was easy.  Opportunities to teach the engineering design cycle were endless.  My students were really excited to get their first 3D print, but mostly surprised that the object printed was not the size they expected.  This provided many opportunities for re-design that helped students to understand iteration process.

Click here to read the story about my class that ran on Mindshift.  The story talks about how I blend game design and entrepreneurship using Gamestar Mechanic.

Computer Science for Girls

During this past year,  eleven girls from my school were interested in creating an app for competition.  Five girls entered the Technovation Challenge and six girls entered the ProjectCS Girls competition.  There were a total of three teams.  The Technovation Challenge required that the girls create a working app and a business plan.  Project CS girls required a prototype and report.  Each of the teams stepped up to the challenge and submitted an entry to the competition.

While reflecting on the successes of these projects, all the girls commented that they really enjoyed working as part of team.  They actually enjoyed giving up their lunch time, study halls, and "Friday Fun Time" to work on "another assignment."

I believe strongest reason that the girls enjoyed these projects was because they were working in a "girls only" environment.  They never had to defer to ideas from boys and didn't need to do any posturing.  Each girl used her strengths to contribute to the team effort.  They were comfortable with themselves and their contributions.  As the teamwork progressed, it turned out that some girls had a natural aptitude for coding, while others found writing or art to be their strength.  They all realized the importance of the contributions of each member of the team.

Teaching Computer Science is fun.

As part of an online class to learn how to implement Scratch in our classrooms I developed the following.  This project would be a great way to combine Computer Science Concepts with another discipline.  I really enjoyed animating this story, and I am sure the students would have fun doing a similar project.

Click the green flag to see the animation.
Scratch Project