Notes from a concurrent session at TASA Midwinter 2014.Effective Digital Leadership: Moving Our Schools Forward
Don Jacobs, Principal
Anita Scott Elementary School
Royse City ISD
Twitter: @Don_Jacobs
Websites:
Personal: www.thedigitalprincipal.com
Campus: scottstaff.blogspot.com
All presentation resources, including slides, are posted at
http://www.thedigitalprincipal.com/2014/01/27/effective-digital-leadership/
Don referenced Eric Sheninger's new book, Digital Leadership: Changing Paradigms for Changing Times, as inspiration for his presentation.
Communications
scottstaff.blogspot.com - Blog which Don uses to
communicate with his staff. Emails get deleted or misplaced. Can also be
accessed from anywhere that you have internet access, not just when you are
connected to your school/district network.
Blog also sets admins up in order to be able to do
flipped learning with their staff. Post video or article you want staff to go
over prior to a meeting, then have them discuss during your faculty meeting.
Saves time in the meeting and lets meeting time be more productive.
http://weprincipal.blogspot.com - Melinda Miller,
Principal in Missouri who uses flipped learning with her staff. She is in her
second year of this. She talks about mistakes she's made and what she's learned
from them! Don showed a video Melinda created for the start of the school year.
What was cool about this video is Melinda talked about the tools she used to
create the video so her teachers would know how she did it!
Public Relations
In Royce City ISD, every campus has a Twitter account
and shares reminders with parents and students via Twitter.
Remind 101 - Free texting service for teachers to text
students without sharing phone numbers. Must have an education email account to
set up an account. Don uses it to text his staff on important topics that can't
wait for everyone to check their email.
Branding
Other people are talking about our schools and teachers
and students. Schools and districts need to be part of that conversation. We
need to be using social media to tell people about the positive things that are going on in our
classrooms and schools!
Professional Growth
Don uses Twitter for a professional learning network. He
is constantly in conversation with people about what is going on in his job,
growing with them and learning from them. He can't imagine doing his job
without his Twitter PLN. Don is trying fresh ideas on his campus because of
connections he's made with Angela Myers on Twitter.
Follow hashtags on Twitter like #txed, #txlege,
#digilead, #txidea, #txeduchat
edweb.net
- Professional social network for the education community - watch their webinars and webcasts
live or in recording.
Edcamps - unconferences where there aren't traditional keynote
speakers or vendors. Educators come together to learn about topics they want to
on a given day. Agenda is created the day of the conference. Royse City is
hosting EdCamp Awesome in Feburary 2014.
Student Learning
Todd Nesloney, 5th Grade Teacher, Waller ISD - PBL and Flipped
Classroom - www.toddnesloney.com.
Was invited to White House as part of White House Champions of Change initiative. Gave his
incoming 4th graders the 4th grade Math STAAR w/out the multiple choice
answers, and they bombed it. Used flipped learning to focus on their areas of
need and had a 97% pass rate on the 6th grade STAAR.
Productivity
Don uses Google Drive to collaboratively create documents with
his colleagues. Ex: Creating elementary student handbook. Don't have to worry
about emailing copies back and forth.
Don also uses Evernote to keep his notes in the cloud and access
them from his phone, tablet, laptop, or computer. Evernote searches the text in
images which is helpful when you can't remember everything on a business card.
Also uses Evernote to type notes during teacher observations. He can record
audio of what's going on in the classroom and take pictures of student work,
classroom layout, etc.
Dropbox also keeps Don organized. He hasn't carried a flash drive
in three years!
Digital Leadership
There are new tools born almost every day, and you can't keep up
with all of them! Pick one or two tools and get comfortable using them.
Administrators are trying to lead into innovation and make sure schools are
educating kids to think and create and work outside the box. If admins want teachers and students to be like this, then administrators need to model
it in front of them. Teachers will respond to modeling.
It is a difficult challenge and it is not comfortable. But after
a while it becomes easier.
www.thedigitalprincipal.com - Don's personal blog.
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