It’s incredible to think about all that EdTech has done for learning. From hardware like interactive whiteboards, iPads, Chromebooks, and more to software like mobile apps, iMovie, Google Apps, and more, EdTech has really enchanced learning for students and teachers.

As mentioned, I’ve had the pleasure and privilege of sharing Google Expeditions with THE Karly Moura at MDUSD’s 3rd Annual STEM & EdTech Symposium. This was our second year sharing Google Expeditions to educators all over the SF Bay Area. Google Expeditions is truly a wonderful platform to take students on virtual fields. If you have not explored Google Expeditions, I highly encourage you to invest some time to try it out. You'll want to have at least two devices - one for the guide and one for the explorer. It's definitely worth your time.

One exciting addition to Google Expeditions is their new AR platform that you can experience by signing up for their Pioneer Program. I had the pleasure of being selected for their Pioneer Program. I partnered with Valerie Sabbag - fifth grade teacher at Fairmeadow Elementary School in the Palo Alto Unified School District - to bring Google Expeditions to her school. It was exciting to see the second grade through fifth grade students at Fairmeadow experience AR. Students learned more about the solar system, explored California Earth Science, and also got up close and personal with dinosaurs. The tweets below were from the Google Expeditions AR experience at Fairmeadow on October 20, 2017. Sign up for the Google Expedition Pioneer Program here.

EdTech, specifically AR/VR in EDU takes another amazing step with the Merge Cube! Merge Cube is "the world's first, holographic object you can hold in the palm of your hand." It is truly an amazing product that enhances the learning process for learners of all ages. The Merge Cube craze has definitely grown in educators!

Since buying those first 43 Merge Cubes, I've picked up a few more, joined the ARVRinEDU Voxer Group, gave a cube to each of the teacher leaders in PAUSD's Elementary STEAM Inquiry Group, showed the cube to the science coaches of the South Bay Science Collaborative and gave each of them their own cube, and begun writing up ways teachers can use the cubes with their students and their grade level's curricular topics and the Next Generation Science Standards. I'm excited to continue exploring the use of the Merge Cube, especially the chance to write my own apps! 

What, in your work, are you proud of?

Last Friday, PAUSD’s Chief Academic Officer of Elementary Education asked the TOSA Team to reflect on our work so far this school year. What was I proud of? This being my third year in the role as a Math & STEAM Coach, what was I proud of? The transition to our new math curriculum sure makes the list. Co-facilitating the STEAM Inquiry Group with my colleague, Leslie Faust, is a definite thing. Supporting teachers and students in their math, STEAM, & inquiry based instruction definitely stands out.

How did I answer the question of what I was proud of? I am proud of partnering with teachers who have been “harder” to reach the past two and a half years.

There are many teachers who I have had the pleasure & privilege of partnering with and have made many connections with. And there are those who I have never worked with or have invited me to do a demo lesson once in the past two and a half years mainly because their principal made it an expectation. Those are the teachers, who I am working with this year, that I am proud of - of continuing my effort to partnering with them. Some of them have forever had their doors closed to TOSAs and coaching. Maybe it’s because they’ve had previous bad experiences with TOSAs. Maybe it’s because of a perception that they’re being judged. No matter the reason, they have always resisted any support. This year some of those resistors have opened up to my support. I’ve had the opportunities to co-plan with them, analyze student data, share resources, model lessons for them, and asked for their feedback. I am reminded of one of Simon Sinek’s quotes.

One of my favorite days of the school year is Halloween. It’s definitely not because of the candy, sugar high, distractions, and class parties (although the party could be a highlight depending on the food and activities at the party). Halloween brings connections, students to students, students to teachers, students to parents during the Halloween Parade. Halloween brings creativity with the costumes - home made ones and the ones that are purchased in stores. I would argue that costumes purchased in stores also includes some creativity by the company and designer who created them and the consumer, deciding which one to purchase.

Today I had the pleasure of attending a Halloween Parade in my district and got the chance to see the creative costumes, connections, and celebrations of the spooky, festive day.

It has indeed been such a pleasure and privilege serving as the Math & STEAM Coach / TOSA for PAUSD's Elementary Education Department. What an honor it is to work with so many teachers, their students, and administrators to influence and impact the learning and discovery of students.

I recently wrote a Year 2 reflection and it was incredible to reflect on my second year in this role. This post is meant to accompany that earlier post with the following image I recently completed. Inspired by Ryan O'Donnell (@creativetech) last year with my Year-End Reflection after year 1, I just completed my process of tallying, calculating, and summing my second year. Again, this in no way reflect every aspect of my 2016-2017 year but it does give a glimpse into my work as a Math & STEAM Coach / TOSA and offers a nice overview of my work. Just like last year, I was surprised by the numbers.

There are many highlights to my second year as a Math & STEAM Coach. Here are just a few:

• Just like the first bullet in my Year 1 reflection, connecting with Ben (@cogswell_ben), THE Karly Moura (@karlymoura), and Kelly (@kmartintahoe) and continuing our collaborative effort to support other TOSAs and coaches through #tosachat, @toaschat, tosachat.org. Celebrating our First Anniversary!
• Organizing @tosachat's book study of Trevor MacKenzie's book Dive into Inquiry, using Flipgrid as the platform for the conversation.
• Working with amazing educators to support other educators with their GAFE / GSuite Edu questions through @gsuiteeduhelp.
• Working with a fantastic group of elementary TOSAs: Amanda (@AmandaGantley) Amy (@amy_doss), Heather (@HSCleland), Hilary (@hmark321), Leslie (@lfaustedu), Mangla (@manglaozaduv), and Nikole (@nikole_manou).
• ​Working with grade level teams across the district on deepening our understanding of the Common Core State Standards in Mathematics through a standards mapping exercise.
• Seeing continued influence and impact as I had the opportunity to work with the same schools I did during my first year. Continuing to have that regular anticipated support on the TOSA schedule greatly helped with the work, relationships, and outcomes.
• Designing and facilitating two district-wide professional learning sessions on the Next Generation Science Standards.
• Facilitating PAUSD's elementary math pilot group, presenting the progress to the School Board throughout the school year, and successfully completing the pilot year with a very smooth adoption of the recommended curriculum from the pilot group.
• Facilitating the STEAM Inquiry Group with my colleague, Leslie Faust, PAUSD's Literacy & STEAM Elementary Coach.
• Partnering with Dr. Jeong Choe of PAUSD's Advanced Authentic Research Department to bring Creativity Carts to every elementary school in the district.
• Designing a successful elementary STEAM-themed summer school program, truly bringing the A in STEAM by including instruction in visual arts and music. The addition of mindfulness lessons by a Spectra Art teacher was also an incredible experience for the students and teachers. [Tweets]
• Jennifer Williams quoting me on her blog post and creating an amazing graphic of my passion and calling.
• Attending the CA STEAM Symposium with my colleague, Mangla Oza, where we gained a lot of great information and ideas to share with our district.
• Finally getting to meet Kelly Martin in person at the CA STEAM Symposium.
• More #TOSAchat Tiki TOSA Meetups - one during the CA STEAM Symposium in Anaheim and another during the runDisney Star Wars Half Marathon weekend.
• Writing 5 BreakoutEDU games (and counting) after learning about the game from Heather Cleland the year before and playing my first game with Jody Green (@peerlessgreen) at the #TOSAchat Tiki TOSA meetup during the 2015 runDisney Star Wars Half Marathon weekend.
• Attending EdCampCoCo and having the pleasure of listening to Dave Burgess's keynote on Transformative Passion.
• Organizing EdCampSV with a fantastic team of educators. [Blog post]
• Co-presenting with Karly Moura at MDUSD's 2nd Annual STEM & EdTech Symposium on Google Expeditions.
• Continuing to work with amazing STEM/STEAM educators on the South Bay Science Collaborative, facilitating NGSS workshops.
• Helping to build new websites for the South Bay Collaborative, PAUSD NGSS Resources, PAUSD STEAM Lending Library, PAUSD Elementary Math, and more.
• Being a part of The Teacher Advisory Council at The Computer History Museum.
• Being an ambassador for ClassDojo, Flipgrid, Khan Academy, Schoology, and a Swivl pioneer.
• Completing the Apple Teacher modules.
• Having the pleasure of designing a Design Thinking workshop for EdTechTeacher for its summer institute in Menlo Park and then receiving the support from the EdTechTeacher team and George Garcia (@edtechchamp) with a change in my summer schedule.
• And finally, JOY!

​It has truly been another incredible year collaborating with teachers in PAUSD and beyond, connecting with coaches and TOSAs from all over the globe, partnering with administrators, and ultimately continuing to impact students.

It's the end of my second year as a Math & STEAM Coach and it has absolutely been an amazing journey so far. Throughout my time I've always said, written, and tweeted that it's a pleasure and privilege to be in a position of support to so many teachers who work with and inspire children. After 10+ years teaching first, second, and fifth grade, it has indeed been a pleasure and privilege. I, along with all the TOSAs and Coaches out there, get to work with countless teachers, curious students, and administrators at the school level and district level. The position of a coach is one that involves focus, humility, perseverance, constant growth, and lots of reflection and refinement.

At the beginning of this second year as a Math & STEAM Coach, I identified three goals for the year.
-Make systematic changes and support in math content knowledge and instructional practices in teachers through PLCs, Learning Walks, and Lab Days.
-Complete the Maker Mobile proposal and get ready for its launch after securing funding from the district's fundraising organization.
-Facilitate workshops on NGSS and begin the 3-year rollout of the Next Gen FOSS modules.

How was my year in relations to those three goals?
1) I focused a lot on a systematic method of engaging grade level teams in a standards mapping exercise to identify, understand, analyze, and map the Common Core State Standards in Mathematics. Each experience was a powerful, collaborative, and collective revelation of CCSS-M. The grade level teams were able to identify a progression of each standard and domain to address throughout the school year. Teachers gained a better understanding of the concepts that are important to assess and the building blocks of those concepts. Some teachers even shared, "I didn't know that that's what the standards said," "We've been teaching things that are no longer required in our grade level," and "I don't think my study of the standards was as complete as what we just did." This standards mapping exercise is definitely something I want to continue bringing to grade level teams across the district.

2) For the second goal, the Maker Mobile didn't come to fruition. However, the point of the project was to bring the Maker Movement to schools across the district, with a big emphasis on mobility. This goal was accomplished, not by the Maker Mobile, but through a partnership with the district's Advanced Authentic Research Department (AAR). The AAR Department brings a powerful experience of an authentic research experience for students at the two high schools in the district. As my colleague, Leslie Faust, and I shared our goal of bringing the Maker Movement to the elementary schools in the district, Dr. Jeong Choe of AAR jumped on board with our project of establishing the "Creativity Project" for elementary students to engage in creating, exploring, and making. The Creativity Project brought Maker Carts (a K-2 cart and a. 3-5 cart) to three elementary schools for our phase one of deployment that began during the winter trimester. Four more schools received carts a couple months later. Three more schools received their carts through a grant I wrote through the district's fundraising organization. Dr. Jeong Choe and her team decided to complete the project by funding the remaining elementary schools. It was truly incredible to partner with the AAR Department to bring a modified version of my second goal to the schools.

3) NGSS and the workshops my colleague, Leslie Faust, and I facilitated were indeed successful. We carefully planned the theme of studying the Science and Engineering Practices (SEP) with the teacher leaders at our STEAM Inquiry Group meetings. The teacher leaders were able to then take the learning back to their school sites to share with their staffs. The TOSA Team also planned and successfully facilitated two district-wide NGSS workshops, one in August called NGSS 101 focusing in SEP 1 and the other in February called NGSS 102 focusing on the Disciplinary Core Ideas (DCI) and the Crosscutting Concepts (CCC). I was also a part of the South Bay Science Collaborative where we delivered three workshops during the school year on Science Notebooks, Design Thinking, Design Challenges, and Breakout EDU. It was an incredible year continuing to be immersed in the Next Generation Science Standards and STEM/STEAM Education. Having the chance to attend the California STEAM Symposium in October in Anaheim was indeed a fantastic way to immerse myself. [And of course, I got to meet Kelly Martin, a fellow co-creator of #TOSAchat, for the first time.]

It has definitely been a tremendous journey serving as the Math & STEAM Coach for the Elementary Education Department for my second year. Successes, challenges, courageous conversations, shortcomings, careful planning, missteps, #eduwins, errors, and everything the year brought are all reasons to celebrate. Celebrate what has been the journey - every part of the journey.

"Ethnic diversity adds richness to a society." Gary Locke

I had the pleasure of seeing a buddy activity between a Kindergarten class and a 5th grade class today at one of the schools I support. The buddies collaboratively worked on drawing the flags of countries around the world, especially the ones of their ancestor's origins. On the other side of the maps, the fifth graders were creating puzzle piece drawings of the US map. In just that short time of seeing the pieces on the floor of the 5th grade classroom, I saw the powerful symbolism in that project. The United States is truly a diverse country with numerous cultures and ethniticities. What an incredible powerful activity from five, six, ten, and eleven year old students!

What a timely topic for last night's #TOSAchat for this school year. It seems like there's always so much to do no matter what time of the year it is, however the topic of Organization for last night's #TOSAchat was quite amazing. Kelly Martin, one of the creators of #TOSAchat, came up with fantastic questions for the chat that really sparked great conversation, tips, reminders, and resources for how to stay organized. Some of the takeaways from the chat are creating lists in order to manage the number of tasks on our plates, Kyle Anderson's method of organizing his Google Drive, Kelly Nunes' use of Boomerang for scheduling emails through Gmail, the send & archive button in Gmail, Tom Covington's method of only dedicating email time to two times a day, and Shea Smith's 5D method to evaluate time-sucks. I definitely want to create a graphic for his 5D method.

Here is the link to the Participate Learning transcript of last night's #TOSAchat. There are so many wonderful gems in there, including the following two tweets.

Sandy Otto's tweet: "A3: I want to be better at not thinking I can multi-task. More often, I need to focus just on the task at hand & see it through."

Bethany Thompson's tweet: "A4: Also, try to do just one thing. If you need to concentrate to finish something lock everyone out and get it done."

Fortuitously, today I had a conversation with colleagues at Fairmeadow Elementary School about to do lists and how to attack our lists. Liz Pounders, the school's PE teacher shared the following quote with us. She mentioned she had shared the quote with a group of other teachers in a professional development class and that it applies to the conversation we had over lunch. The quote was definitely something that inspired me to make the following graphic for her.

Recently two teachers who I've had the pleasure of working with for many years told me they've been asked to submit proposals for sessions at a professional development conference in the summer. They asked me what topics I thought they could write for their session proposals. Having had the pleasure and opportunities of working with them as colleagues, supporting them in my role as an instructional coach, and knowing them as friends, I felt honored they asked me for my opinion/suggestion/idea. It was definitely easy for me to point out the amazing things they've been doing in their classrooms that I am confident others would love to hear and learn from their experience and expertise. We were able to identify lessons, units, projects, and philosophies like coding and robotics, fostering a culture of student voice and student choice - giving students digital options to showcase their learning, MysterySkype and MysteryHangout, BreakoutEDU, and integrated units. An example of the amazing integrated units they've designed for their students was creating a life size teepee during their study of Native Americans in their Social Studies block, measurement and data in their Math Workshop, and nonfiction study in their Readers and Writers Workshops.

In my experience of brainstorming topics for PD conferences, I often second guess my ideas because I feel comfortable with those topics as a result of having done those lessons/units/projects/had those philosophies for a long time that I feel they are "old news." "Why would anyone go to that session? Hasn't everyone done that already?" And I always find the reality is the topics are worthwhile, are beneficial, are new to others, even though I've been practicing them for some time. Knowing their ideas would be beneficial to others AND knowing how they may be feeling, I suggested to submit 1 Comfort and 1 Push. Submit a session topic that you're comfortable with, confident in, and KNOW it will be helpful to others no matter how you may feel about it. And submit 1 topic that's a Push for you. A topic that you've been wanting to explore, to learn, and to implement - the Push. We all have those Push ideas and sometimes we don't push ourselves to try them because of the tasks on our plates, a lack of time, and many other reasons. Suggesting they identify a Push idea for them to submit creates that importance of time and investment into learning the topic so they can present it at the conference. A goal with a due date is set. Learning that Push idea becomes a priority.

Of course I am not suggesting this to be the way to push yourself to learn something new, to take on your Push ideas. It's just a suggestion I shared with those two teachers in our conversation that, given the circumstances, may help them to identify those Push topics they've been wanting to try.
However, the notion is still there (which is why I'm writing this blog post). What are your Push topics? What are the things you've been wanting to learn that you may not have had the time for? Identify those Push ideas and set a goal to learn them - maybe to share that idea at a conference like in the conversation I had with my colleagues. Identify those Push ideas.

I have long been talking about the amazing benefits of BreakoutEDU games. It is wonderful for students, teachers, professional development, and more.

As I've mentioned in previous posts, I've had the pleasure of playing and facilitating games with so many wonderful teachers and coaches.

• One of the first experiences was Jody Green's original Disney themed game she led for a TikiTOSA gathering during the runDisney Star Wars Half Marathon weekend on January 16, 2016. Ann Kozma's tweet captured the excitement we all had, meeting each other face to face after a lot of tweets and connections on #TOSAchat, an evening chatting and getting to know each other, and playing the BreakoutEDU game.
• Another wonderful BreakoutEDU experience was playing a game led by Lindsey Blass and Amanda Haughes at the first #ConnectedTL Meet Up, Tweet Up gathering, in Campbell.
• Of course, I always have to mention Valerie Sabbag's fifth grade class' integrated project involving BreakoutEDU - learning math through the study of measurement, area, volume, and angles as they build their own boxes, and writing their own games tied to their Reader's and Writer Workshops.
• Partnering with Sabba Quidwai during one of EdTechTeacher's summer workshop on design thinking during the summer of 2016, I got to facilitate a game in a professional development setting with teachers from all over the state and beyond.

Throughout this process of playing Breakout games and facilitating games, I really enjoyed writing my own games. It was definitely one of those things I spent my 20% time focusing on. To date, I've completed four games, with many games I've started brainstorming clues for the various locks. My first game, a TV Show themed game, was a fun first try and writing a game. I definitely learned how to make the game better after playing it at another TikiTOSA meet up in Southern California (during the runDisney Disneyland Half Marathon weekend - September 2016) where the group broke out in just seven minutes. The second game I wrote was a Math themed game geared towards fifth graders. Valerie Sabbag's fifth graders helped beta test the game on the last day before winter break. The third game I wrote was a Disney themed game (inspired by Jody Green's game).

The most recent game I completed started with a tweet by Kristi Van over winter break asking if there was an existing BreakoutEDU game focused on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. for third graders. Over winter break, Kristi, Valerie, and I collaboratively wrote the MLK BreakoutEDU game. With the experience of writing my previous games, I was able to write clues that were appropriate for third graders to solve. It was definitely a collaborative approach with Valerie's idea, as I always find it most difficult to write clues for the directional lock.

This week I had the pleasure of facilitating the game to four third grade classes in PAUSD - Kristi Van's, John Brubaker's, Helena Holmes', and Penelope Sanders-Jones' classes. It was wonderful to see the third graders work together, use their research skills, collaborate, and exercise a lot of persistence to open the box! After each game I asked for feedback from the kids and got some creative and thoughtful suggestions to improve the game and also for future games. In all four classes, the students shared how much they enjoyed the game and thanked me for sharing it with them. To me, I was the lucky one - to have four colleagues that are open to me trying a BreakoutEDU game with their students.

This most recent BreakoutEDU game I wrote focused on MLK is linked here. Please share your thoughts, feedback, and suggestions so I can continue to make it and my future games better. Please do keep in mind that this game is geared for third graders (with one labeled clue that is adapted for advanced players).

Today, the last workday of 2016, was a day full of closing up projects, celebrations, and preparing for 2017. Even though it was a half day of work, it sure felt like a full day's work. Of the projects I brought to a close or at least a stopping point before winter break, they included preparing print shop orders of student booklets for round two of PAUSD's Elementary Math Adoption Pilot process and preparing participant packets for February's PD Day focused on the Next Generation Science Standards. I also spent some time continuing my work designing the 2017 Elementary Summer School program and working on a special STEAM project with PAUSD's AAR program.

In the midst of all the work closing out the year of 2016, I had the pleasure of experiencing a coding party and a BreakoutEDU game. Kristi Van's third graders had a special time building obstacle courses and coding Sphero robots to go through the courses (or more like destroying the courses).

In the afternoon I had the pleasure of watching Valerie Sabbag's fifth grade class beta test my BreakoutEDU game. It was the one I wrote about a month ago and just posted on the previous blog post. What a wonderful experience because the students really worked hard at solving the puzzles and also showed me ways I can improve my game. There was one "color it on the hundreds chart" puzzle for the direction lock that I left the answers on the sheet. As the game started and a student pointed that out I quickly took the paper and cut the answers off so the group of students could still work on solving the puzzles. I felt embarrassed that I missed that mistake but the class was super understanding and encouraging as they said it was fun to be the beta testers of my game. Needless to say, it was such an amazing way to end the last workday of 2016.

"Curriculums come and go. Standards are here to stay."

This was the phrase that prompted my work with grade level teams on examining the CCSS-Math standards. Elementary school teachers in the Palo Alto Unified School District are in the middle of a pilot year to select new math curriculum that scheduled to be implemented during the 2017-2018 school year. PAUSD has been using Everyday Math for eight years with a lot of conflicting opinions of the curriculum between the staff and parents. There are many schools that have used it with fidelity while some schools have moved onto using other math curricula to meet the needs of their students and align with the Common Core State Standards, including EngageNY. No matter what curriculum teachers use, quality pedagogy that focuses on the success of all students, aligned to the Common Core State Standards and the 8 Mathematical Practices is the key.

I share the belief (and fact) of many that there is no perfect curriculum. My view is that any curriculum acts more like a GPS navigator. Throughout the school year, teachers make professional and purposeful decisions to use supplemental materials to meet the needs of their students. As a result, the progression of lessons in any curriculum is paused or altered. These professional and purposeful decisions is the science of teaching and no curriculum can replace the science of teaching. Instead, the curriculum as a GPS navigator to guide the teacher back on a predetermined path when necessary decisions to change the path are made. Like any road trip, the driver (the teacher) can make purposeful decisions to alter the suggested path (of the curriculum guide).

The biggest part of this analogy is the focus on the destination - meeting the grade level standards. An effective curriculum is designed to bring all students to meet CCSS at the end of the school year. Focusing on the destination of CCSS is the key aspect of the standards mapping activity.

Working with grade level teams, I've lead teachers to read and better understand the CCSS Math standards for their grade levels. It's been a powerful exercise, evidenced by teachers commenting that they "didn't know that was the actual language in the standards," that they didn't have to "teach concepts they've taught before" which saves them time to focus more on the concepts that have been problematic for their students, and that they see how to address "standards at each trimester of the school year." The exercise provided teachers the chance to identify which concepts/standards was important to address at each trimester in order to build understanding that leads to practice and mastery by the end of the school year. Of course, each of the above standards cards is meant to be mastered by the end of the school year, AND having an understanding of the progression of concepts throughout the school year helps gain a bigger picture of the professional and purposeful instructional decisions.

Having a deeper understanding of the Common Core State Standards is definitely an important piece of instruction.
- to know the destination of the school year,
- to know what's important to address at each point of the year and how concepts build,
- to be able to teach to those standards no matter which math curriculum is used (or selected in PAUSD),
- to see curriculum maps as guides to meeting CCSS and professional instructional decisions are far more important,
- to be able to see how "concepts build from grade to grade."

It's definitely important to remember that We don't teach curriculum; we teach students. Be mindful of the standards - the end destination, however, remember we teach students.

Of course we all know how kids say the best things (funniest, silliest, ...). I saw the following image from a 4th grade class at Fairmeadow Elementary today. What a simple and profound piece of advice for other students and adults. No matter what you do, who you are, be a good one.

I've always enjoyed the STEAM, Designing Thinking activity of building paper bridges. I've had the pleasure of sharing this activity with many classes throughout PAUSD from Kindergarten students to teacher workshops. The experiences were always the same - excitement with the hands-on activity, frustration with the paper bridge falling, determination to keep trying, celebration with more and more pennies/nickels being set on the bridge, and requests to keep going.

This activity is quite simple. The challenge is to create a bridge with a single sheet of 8.5 x 11 piece of paper across a 10 inch gap. Paperclips are available but may not be used to attach to the boxes or containers that form the gap.

Recently, I had the chance to share it with Jenna Segall's fifth graders at Palo Verde Elementary School. It was great to see the fifth graders brainstorm ways to construct a strong paper bridge, keep working on their bridges, celebrate their success, and recognize the strength of triangles. This activity definitely helps learners of all ages understand the iterative process of design thinking. One attempt that I haven't seen to that point was tearing the piece of paper in half and trying to make it a longer piece of paper with the paperclips. Such a simple step and yet no one had tried it before when I did the activity with so many people.

Jenna will soon lead this activity with the summer school staff members as our second design thinking professional development activity.

It's been truly an incredible experience and true pleasure partnering with so many teachers throughout the Palo Alto Unified School District in math and STEAM throughout the school year. I've had the privilege and pleasure of working with Valerie Sabbag, a fifth grade teacher at Fairmeadow, throughout the year on Number Talks, the use of Spheros, and co-planning STEAM integration.

BreakoutEDU is one of those STEAM integration projects we got to work on. Throughout the year, her fifth grade students worked together to solve BreakoutEDU games and puzzles that involved math, social studies, critical thinking, teamwork, and problem solving. BreakoutEDU is definitely an activity that surpasses any curricula and content area. It addresses multiple areas, and, more important, the lifeskills that are essential to educating young children. Character education is a critical part of life.

This week, Valerie's fifth grade students had the pleasure of working on their own BreakoutEDU games AND boxes. Valerie really had a wonderful vision of having students build their own boxes. This process addressed many mathematical concepts that she was going to teach and in doing it with this project, it was definitely an engaging and hands-on project. Measurement, surface area, volume. Students got the chance to use a hacksaw, hand sanders, and wood glue to construct their boxes. Students worked in small groups to plan this boxes, check and double check their measurements, and put their box together.

While one group worked on building the boxes with Valerie and a wonderful volunteer, the other groups worked collaboratively on writing their own BreakoutEDU games. This was also part of Valerie's integrated approach to teaching. In her Writer's and Reader's Workshop, her class was studying fantasy stories. This became the basis for the BreakoutEDU games. Groups of students created games centered around the themes of Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, and more.

The fifth grade students got to beta test their games with their third grade buddy class, Krisiti Van's class. This was an important step because it helped them observe how effective their clues were for their puzzles. The fifth grade students had opportunities to revise their games before sharing it with their parents at Fairmeadow's Learning Celebration / Open House.

Check out the pictures below of this incredible project that spanned a few weeks.
Also, check out #breakoutedu for tips and stories. A #breakoutedu Twitter chat also takes place. Be on the lookout for days and times of the chat. Here's an archive of the first chat by EdTechAri.

Families in the Fairmeadow Elementary School community enjoyed a wonderful, hands-on evening at Family Game Night on Wednesday, February 24, 2016. It was such an amazing evening with a full house of students, parents, grandparents, ... in Fairmeadow's Multipurpose Room. As a Math & STEAM Coach, I had the pleasure of sharing in that event, capturing the activities with pictures and videos, and celebrating with the entire school community in its exploration of math games.

Some highlights:
-There were over 10 stations of various math games they students enjoyed.
- Parents had the opportunity to play with their children.
- Various math games were available, from a variety of cultures and countries.
- And, of course, this was a wonderful experience that continued to foster positive home-school connections around mathematics.

It's always such an amazing process of hearing the mathematical thinking of students during Math Talks - Number Talks and Dot Talks. As a Math & STEAM TOSA, I've had the pleasure of joining many classes throughout PAUSD and listening to the academic discourse from students from Kindergarten to Fifth grade.

On Tuesday, February 16th, I had the pleasure of hearing a second grader from Susan Hoff's class at Fairmeadow Elementary School share his mathematical thinking. I had just introduced a new Problem of the Month packet and got to listen this his strategy of solving 19 x 3. Enjoy the video I captured. You'll notice he effectively shares his mathematical thinking and math strategies. Through the Number Talks, MARS Tasks, and Problem of the Month packets Mrs. Hoff and I have used with her class it's clear they have really been exercising Math Practices 1 & 3.

It's been such a pleasure and privilege working with so many teachers throughout Palo Alto Unified School District. The teachers have inspired me, shared challenges that we work on together, and given me the honor of partnering with them on math and STEAM projects.

This week, I had the pleasure of working with Mindy Dodsworth, 4th grade teacher at Fairmeadow Elementary School, on introducing Google Docs to her students. We began our time with a discussion about digital citizenship and norms we expect for our online interactions and behaviors. It was great to hear the students generate their ideas for what they consider to be ways to stay safe and productive online. The following are a few ideas from our discussion.
-Stay focused on the work.
-Stay safe.
-Take a break
-Stay calm (reload the page).
-Be respectful to others (don't hack others' accounts).
-Keep private information private (don't share passwords).
It was great to hear the students share the point of taking a break. We had a discussion about the importance of that, screen time, the effects on our eyes from staring at a screen for an extended period of time, and ideas for taking a break.

As we continued, we talked about the importance of keeping our Google Drive organized. We discussed how similar to any place used for storage, like cubbies in the early elementary years, lockers in middle and high schools, and the bedrooms, keeping their files and folders organized in Google Drive is important for peace of mind and workflow. [Of course there's the search field within Drive, but personalizing a structure of organization is important.]

As our lesson continued, I showed the students how to share their "4th grade" folder with their teacher so Mrs. Dodsworth can comment on their Google Doc. We talked about how this helps in the editing and revision process of their work. It was great to immediately demonstrate this as Mrs. Dodsworth and I commented as they wrote about their current study of the California Missions. It was great to support these fourth graders use EdTech while keeping digital citizenship in mind. It was great to support a colleague implement the use of Google Doc into her classroom.

I have had such a pleasure partnering with so many professionals through the Palo Alto Unified School District and districts all around the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond. In this first year as a Math & STEAM Coach / TOSA (teacher on special assignment, it's been extra special because I have the opportunity to go into many more teachers' classrooms, partner with them, collaborate on lessons and projects, and learn and grow together. Two educators I've had the incredible pleasure of partnering with are Kristi Van and Valerie Sabbag, both from Fairmeadow Elementary School in the Palo Alto Unified School District.

This week, the first week back from winter break, has been an incredible experience with STEAM and robotics. On Tuesday, January 5th, I had the pleasure of partnering with Kristi Van, a third grade teacher at Fairmeadow Elementary School as her students had a free exploration of Spheros. The students had a wonderful time with the Spheros and they quickly caught onto the user interface of the iPad app to control their Spheros. Blog post about this experience.

The fun with the Spheros continued it the afternoon with Valerie Sabbag's fifth grade class. I had the chance to touch base with Valerie during lunch about her plans for her students with the Spheros. She told me they've explored maneuvering the Spheros the day before and she developed a few courses for her students to take their Spheros on. These 4 to 5 courses became the students' "Driver's Ed" class as well. An example of one of the courses was to drive the Sphero down a straight line of blue tape, stop on an "x," and then drive it back to where it started. Another course involved maneuvering the Sphero around the classroom and under stools without hitting the legs of the stools (if you did, you had to start over). One other course was to circle around the three round picnic tables outside the classroom without bumping into the legs.

It was super fun to see the students' excitement after they passed their "driving test" and I asked them for their names to print on their Sphero Driver's License. As I printed the students' licenses on card stock and cut each one out, Valerie Sabbag gave her students the opportunity to design obstacle courses with any material in the classroom. The students definitely showed a lot of creativity as they used math manipulatives, pencil boxes, white boards, stools and benches, and supplies from their science explorations to construct their obstacle courses. Not only was this activity fun, hands-on, and creative, the students exercised a lot of academic skills and lifeskills. Valerie and I were able to hear the students talk about the angle their Sphero had to rotate to make a particular turn. Students calculated the distances of their obstacle courses. Students worked collaboratively, communicated their ideas, and showed flexibility as they revised their obstacle courses after some test runs.

Here are two more videos of some of the creative obstacle courses Valerie Sabbag's fifth grader made. The one on the right is definitely an example of how the students persevered to achieve their goal of dropping their Sphero into the tub of water.

As you can see in that last video, the students landed their Sphero in the tub of water. It was super fun. A fun connection was Valerie's comment, "This is how we use textbooks" which was a reference to Matt Miller's book, Ditch That Textbook. Of course I had to tweet it to Matt right away.

As you can see, it was such an incredible time for those fifth graders. I feel so honored to have the chance to partner with such amazing professionals. I can't believe that I get to have these experiences of being able to support Valerie Sabbag with the Spheros, STEM, and robotics! This week, the first week back from winter break, has indeed been an incredible experience.

Word Cloud of student responses to using the Spheros.

Click "Read More" to view one last video of fifth grade students in Valerie Sabbag's class explore making their Sphero jump, dance, ... in the tub of water.