TECHNOLOGY NEWSLETTER WINTER 2015
In This Issue: Apps to Explore
Articles of Interest
Classroom Initiatives
Faculty Workshops
Making and Tinkering
Spotted in the Schoolhouse
TED Talks of Interest
As a popular television show claims, “successful restaurants
don’t open, they launch.” Likewise, the revamped
Nightingale technology department launched in September
2014 with a brand new “open door” policy. More than just a
physical change, the technology department ushered in a
new mission of transparency, openness, and communication. The team hit the ground running with newly defined roles,
a full slate of workshops, and one-on-one conferences.
Looking ahead, we are moving toward an expanded role in
classrooms, faculty dialogues, and professional development
opportunities. This seasonal newsletter provides an
opportunity for us to shine a spotlight on some of the great
technology work being done both in the schoolhouse and
around the world, and will feature articles of interest,
technology news, and classroom spotlights. We’re very
excited about this new way to communicate with you, and we hope you are as well. Enjoy!
Faculty Workshops
The following workshops were offered to Nightingale faculty members this fall:
NovemberGetting Started with MacBooks Screencasting Collaboration in the Cloud
DecemberBlended Learning Collaboration in the Cloud MacBook Airs
Social Media and Your Daughter
The Ten Commandments of Instagram Common sense tips for digital citizenship on Instagram
Tech Tidbits
Quick and Helpful Hints Goo.gl Goo.gl provides a free widget similar to Bitly or TinyUrl that allows you to take your long, cumbersome html link and shorten it. The more manageable size won’t break in e-mails and can be more easily copied. Just go to Goo.gl and insert a link!
TECHNOLOGY NEWSLETTER Getting Connected | Staying in Touch | Looking Ahead
Tech@Nightingale: Opening Doors
Issue I, Volume I Winter 2015
Technology Newsletter 1
TED Talks of Interest
What’s Next in 3D Printing?
Just like his beloved grandfather, Avi Reichental is a maker of things. The difference is that he can use 3D printers to make almost anything out of almost any material. Reichental tours us through the possibilities of 3D printing, from printed candy to custom-made sneakers and everything in between.
Life Lessons Through Tinkering
Gever Tulley uses engaging photos and footage to demonstrate the valuable lessons kids learn at his Tinkering School. When given tools, materials, and guidance, these young imaginations run wild and creative problem-solving takes over to build unique boats, bridges, and even a roller coaster!
Technology isn’t
static, and neither is the environment
at Nightingale. For the first time
ever this past
September, faculty
were offered Apple
computers as an
alternative to their
traditional PC
laptops. Sixty
faculty members selected the Mac and excitement is high, with
positive feedback on the change from many quarters. As the
year progresses, we are taking advantage of the ability to create
a seamless handoff environment between the Apple computers
and our existing iPads, and training has been ongoing.
To better support our faculty 1:1 computing initiative and
steadily growing student use, our entire network is undergoing a massive upgrade that will see network speed and capacity
increase by 1000%. This work is set to be completed in
December 2014.
Continuing workshops
will support faculty in their Macbook
development, as we
work towards a
seamless handoff
environment which will enhance the
educational experience.
TED
TED
Adapting and Changing
Issue I, Volume I Winter 2015
Technology Newsletter 2
Link and ThinkArticles of Interest
Science Fair Set to Change the World Students from around the world saving the world, one project at a time.
Blended Learning Around the Country What blended, flipped, and distance learning look like around the country, and some unique ways educators are utilizing technology to support education.
Robotics Projects Encourage Girls to Engage in STEM Tinker Squads, physics in action, incorporating blended learning, and so much more are packed into this all-girls school in PA.
The Women Who Shaped the Computer AgeFrom Ada Lovelace to Silicon Valley, female “computers” are critical to the development of the tech world as we currently know it.
!!
In this issue, we’d like to highlight some of the fantastic technology
integration work which
takes place in the Lower
School. In Class III, the
girls learn foundational
iPad skills under the guidance of Ms. Winthrop and Ms. Galassi, and begin
cross-disciplinary work,
which prepares them for Middle and Upper
School. A major project
each of the girls maintains throughout the year is her own
personal blog, which she continues in Class IV. The blogs are
pieces of rich educational content that serve multiple
purposes, allowing the teachers to touch on technology
integration, iPad skills, creativity, collaboration, and digital
citizenship, along with academic content like reading and
writing. They also open new avenues for cross-disciplinary
work. For example, the PE department can keep track of the
girls’ weekend physical activity through their blog entries.
Over time, the blogs become repositories of the girls’ work
(they capture images of their work and record themselves
explaining why they’ve chosen to archive that piece) and
reflections on what they have learned, serving as a digital
portfolio of their time in Class III. In the Musings section,
students are encouraged to share observations on any topic
and to respond to their classmates, learning digital
citizenship in the process: everything they say and do online
is representative of their self, and they are taught to always
have that in mind when interacting. !!!!!!!!
Class III Digital Classroom
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Technology Newsletter 3
Apps to Explore
Check out the apps below, which you may find useful for yourself or for using together with your daughter.
FlipboardA news aggregate where you can discover, collect and share all the news you care about. Personalize your news feed on your mobile device! Available at the App Store, Google Play, Windows Store, and Blackberry World.
ColAR MixPrint, color, and see drawings in hand-animated 3D worlds. Fact-filled narration accompanies many of the pre-made coloring sheets. Available at the App Store and Google Play.
Post It Plus Take snapshots of your scattered sticky notes and organize them into digital, easy to use files.
!!!
Necessity is the Mother of all Invention…
!!!!!!!…While fearlessness is the mother of reinvention! Under the
guidance of Ms. Blandford, Class X students in Foundations
of Computer Science are learning both of these principles as
they work on inventions of their own design. Students were
challenged to identify an everyday problem, work to find a
solution, and then conceptualize and design that solution.
Using TinkerCad, they’ve pulled together their cross-
curricular knowledge of engineering, math, science, and art,
thrown in some straightforward ingenuity, and worked
through the design process from inception to fabrication to
field testing. Fabrication is happening via our MakerBot 3D
printer, an integral tool in our nascent “maker” program.
The designs created by the girls are wonderfully varied and
address a host of daily problems from smudged nails to
creating personal levitation, and have allowed the girls to
tap into a sense of creativity and playfulness while
reinforcing the serious academic STEAM underpinnings of
the course. Making is a fantastic opportunity to introduce or
continue interdisciplinary problem solving, allow plenty of
space for self directed learning, and make room for
creativity, risk taking, and learning from failure. !
!!!
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Technology Newsletter 4
Spotted in the Schoolhouse
Things to See in Our Halls ✦ Ms. Guggenheimer and Ms.
Epstein using ExplainEverything and Google Drive in their lessons on Ancient China.
✦ Ms. Hart using ExplainEverything with Class V, as the students learn to write and sing musical notes.
✦ Mr. Donnelly using Moodle for AP review distance-learning sessions.
✦ Mr. Meikle using iMovie with Class III to film commercials for their woodworking clock projects.
✦ Ms. Birch’s Class VII students using Notability to explore music concepts in more depth.
✦ Ms. Qualman and Ms. Anderson’s Class IV girls using their iPads to create interactive multimedia blogs.
✦ Class X using TinkerCad and the Makerbot to design their own solutions to everyday problems.
✦ Ms. Kernell’s music students using an app to accurately tune their guitars in class.
!!!
!
Class III girls have been
learning the basics of
robotics by working with
LEGO WeDo. Once the
girls learned the basics,
they were challenged to create a robot that
would follow simple
programming: begin,
complete an action, play
a sound, repeat, and
end. Many of the designs went through three or more iterations
before coming to completion, and the monkey and puppy
shown here are just two examples of what the girls created. The collaborative groups drew knowledge from many sources,
including their previous building experience and the gear
structures and building schematics in their LEGO books. Most
often, however, their learning came through experimentation
and trials. Once they moved on to programming, the girls were
hard pressed to stop at
the basic commands and
most groups met and
exceeded the
requirements, creating
multistep programs
which had their creations
moving, rotating, and
playing a variety of
sounds. To cap off the
project, they each
presented their creation
to the class.
Class III will continue with their robotics studies throughout the year. Next up? Kinetic architecture and robotics!
!!!!
Problem Solving Through Creativity
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Technology Newsletter 5
NightingaleTech At-A-Glance
✦ Our current daily device average is over 1,300 devices in use in the schoolhouse. By the end of December, we’ll have upgraded our network capacity and speed by 1000% to support this usage.
✦ The LMS pilot program is well underway and surveys have gone out to all users. Many thanks to all teachers and staff involved in the planning of this project!
✦ Some faculty members are beginning to explore distance and blended learning opportunities, which will allow us to extend learning even further beyond the blue doors.
✦ We are currently piloting Chromebooks in some classrooms. A Chromebook is a Google-based cloud computer that has a small footprint and huge collaborative ability.
✦ Our maker program is beginning to take shape—look for exciting news about this project in the upcoming months!
!!!!
Spotlight on: Blended Learning Some students might resist the idea of “Saturday school,” but not
those in Ms. Vivion’s Environmental Science class. Comprised of
girls from Classes X, XI, and XII, the class works in a blended
learning environment, which means that face-to-face classroom
time is reduced and some of that classwork is delivered digitally.
Every two weeks, the class drops one period and moves to the
cloud for instruction,
resources, materials,
and opportunities for
interaction. Projects
designed within the
cloud are ongoing and
allow multiple entry
points for student
collaboration,
participation and
research, and also
permit students to work in timeframes that take every girl into
account. With online learning, each student is free to work and
contribute at her own pace. Feedback can become deeper, as
online spaces for feedback such as forums and blogs not only
encourage more discourse among students, but also allow
students to plan out thoughtful written responses to topics that
might be raised as questions in class. Ms. Vivion and the
Environmental Science class utilize the Finalsite blog creator to
contribute responses to articles, and girls are asked to write and
respond to their classmates’ blogs. Screencasting is used to
deliver content, and additional content such as videos and
companion articles are housed on the class Finalsite page. The
girls are also expected to check the calendar regularly for their
assignments and deadlines, and to use WikiSpaces to turn in
projects.
Above: Ms. Vivion presents her work to the Academic Affairs committee.
!!!!!!!!
Issue I, Volume I Winter 2015
Technology Newsletter 6