By Carl Hooker, CIO Advisor
A new school year always brings about new ideas and hopeful ambition for teachers. However, it's almost 2015. Gone are the days when we can use the excuse that "we don't do technology". Part of being a teacher in the 21st century is being creative in integrating academics and learning into student's digital lives. With access to content being ubiquitous and instant in student's out-of-school lives, we can either reject their world for our more traditional one, or embrace it.
While some of the ideas that follow may seem a bit trendy, it's never hurts to model ways to interact with all this new media as a covert way of teaching digital literacy and citizenship. The great news is, you don't need every student to have a device to make these happen. Heck, in most cases all you would need is a single smart phone. All you need is an open mind and some student-led creative thinking.
And so, I present the 21 things every 21st century teacher should try in their classroom this year:
1. Post a question of the week on your class blog
One of the best ways to engage student (and family) interaction with your classroom is to have a class blog. While these are becoming more common, I like the trend of having a weekly student "guest author" write up the ideas and learning objectives discussed in class. This is also a good place to discuss appropriate commenting behavior on blogs and websites.
2. Have a class twitter account to post a tweet about the day's learning
Just like a blog only smaller. Nominate a "guest tweeter" and have them summarize the day's learning in 140 characters or less. Then ask parents to follow the account so they can also get a little insight into the happenings of the school day.
3. Make a parody of a hit song
The ultimate form of flattery is imitation. The ultimate form of stardom is when Weird Al makes a parody of your song. Why not take that to a creative level and have students rewrite lyrics to their favorite hit or a popular tune? Sure, this might take more time than it's worth academically, but the collaborative sharing and engaging aspect of producing such a thing can be a positive.
4. Create an infographic as a review
Those clever little graphics are appearing everywhere from Popular Mechanics to Cosmopolitan. Why not make one as a way to help visual learners review and remember information?
5. Go paperless for a week
Depending on your grade level, this might be harder than you think. Even in a 1:1 district we still print or have need to print things from time to time. The idea behind this challenge is see if you can figure out ways to make things more digital. Maybe instead of a newsletter you print and send home, you write a blog or send a MailChimp? Or instead of asking kids to write and peer-edit each other's papers, you ask them to share a Google doc? If your students don't have devices, then challenge yourself to try this personally for a month.
6. Have a "No Tech Day" just for nostalgia's sake
And then have your students blog about the experience.
7. Create your own class hashtag
Tell your students and their parents about the hashtag and have them post ideas, photos, and questions to it. It's a great way to get people from not only your class but also around the world to contribute to your class conversation. You can also use this with your blog posts (#1) or classroom tweets (#2). Bonus points if you use something like Visible Tweets to display your posts in your class.
8. Create a Listly list to encourage democracy in your class
It could be as simple as a list of choices for a project or something as grand as what is one thing you want to learn about this year? Whatever the choice, use Listly to create a crowd-sourced voting list and let your students have some say in their learning!
9. Integrate Selfies into your curriculum
This one might take some outside-the-box thinking, but I'm guessing that there are students in your class that could come up with a creative way to do this. Maybe take a selfie next to a science experiment? Or a selfie with an A+ paper? #SuperStudent
10. Curate a class Pinterest account
Pinterest is a great visible way to curate resources but why not create a class account that has a different board based on projects throughout the year? Add students as collaborators and let them post their projects to the board. You could also have a board on gathering resources and information for a topic which would be a good time to mention what is and what isn't a valid resource.
Carl Hooker is director of innovation & digital learning at Eanes ISD in Texas and blogs at Hooked on Innovation, where this is cross posted.
