WPP Final

Wicked Problem Project: Final

How To Use Apple Configurator

The Problem:
Having to deploy over 500 iPads was not only a big challenge for me as a new Technology Coordinator within my school, but it was also a bit overwhelming. The purpose of these iPads are to assist students with special needs with communication, comprehension, creativity and much more. I was very excited to begin but ran into a problem along the way. A major concern amongst my colleagues and I was how would we manage all these iPads in an efficient way? After a meeting with Apple, we learned about an application called Apple Configurator. This applications allowed you to successfully manage multiple iOS devices all at once. Since an iPad was designed to be used as a personal device, it only works best when not completely managed. We decided to give teachers a little bit more of control and train a handful of them on how to use this application. These teachers would then be considered "iPad Managers" and would responsible updating, synchronizing and charging all iPads on a daily basis.

The Solution:

The solution to my problem was the training that I conducted which entailed a 30 minute video tutorial, hands-on practice and a PDF guide of how to use Apple Configurator. These tools were very effective because they allowed multiple opportunities for learning and understanding. The video showed a clear demonstration on how to use the application and its multiple features. This way, teachers would apply what they learn during the hands-on practice. A video tutorial also allowed me to pause and take time to clarify questions and concerns some people had. The video is also on the schools website where it is easily accessible and can be reviewed by teachers at their own convenience. The PDF file can be used as a guide during hands-on practice or to assist teachers anytime after the training.

How does technology represent pedagogy?:My choice of technology for this assignment was to create a video tutorial through Camtasia. This connected with the pedagogy because it will give the teachers a visual on exactly how to work the configurator. They will know what to expect before having to perform hands-on practice and this will follow the stages of observational learning. Most of these teachers do not have Mac knowledge so by viewing a video, they will be able to watch and imitate what they observe.

How does technology represent content?:The video tutorial effectively represents the content being taught because it is helpful in demonstrating exactly what is expected. It also leaves time for teachers to take notes, ask questions and embrace what is being taught. This also gave me a chance to pause and address certain misconceptions that arose. The teachers can use this tool to practice from. It is broken down into different sections of features of the Apple Configurator and this will help to better facilitate learning.


How does pedagogy represent content?:

Observational learning is demonstrated when learning how to use Apple Configurator. The teachers will be using my video tutorial and step-by-step guide in order to properly deploy iPads for their students and classrooms. I think by providing the teachers with both a document and a video tutorial, it will accommodate different learning styles and paces.

Results:

Teachers are currently successfully deploying 90 of the 500 iPads on a daily basis within my school district. I will be conducting my next training fairly soon and will take what I have learned from feedback to adjust my teaching methods for a more successful tutorial.

  

WPP: Part D - Findings & Implications

If there is anything I learned in my first four years of studying Education it's that nothing goes as planned when you're a teacher. Although the project got implemented as planned, there were a few things that I wish were different. I had to delay my training session due to the fact that we had a purchasing issue with Apple. Also, I was only able to train six people since not all of our schools have finished wiring for a wireless network yet. In a way, this was okay because I am able to take what I learned from this training and apply it to my next one. 

After watching the video tutorial and performing hands-on practice with Apple Configurator, I had my trainee's complete a survey. The survey was not a "test" however, I add questions to it that they needed to answer reflecting information from the training. Almost everyone got everything correct, I was really happy because this means that they really focused and understood what was going on. The iPad Managers are also now checking in and checking out iPads on daily basis and have yet to have a problem. So I am assuming things are going quite well!

As I was looking over feedback from my surveys, I noticed that a lot of people mentioned that they wish I had moved a bit slower. Since this was my first time conducting a training like this, I was unaware of my pacing. I also sometimes forgot how little computer knowledge some of these teachers had. I need to remind myself that just because I know it and think it's easy, doesn't mean it's easy for someone else. I really need to "dumb" things down a bit more for the next training and move a little slower.


A lesson that I learned during this project is always prepare a day before! During my training, I realized I did not have the appropriate adapter to hook my computer up to the SmartBoard to share my video tutorial with everyone. Since I had a Mac, I had to use DropBox to move my tutorial to a Windows machine. For some reason, DropBox was taking forever to upload and download my video. This was probably because it is a very big file. It ended up cutting time into my training session and it was a little embarrassing. I will now prepare in advanced for next time.


The next time I conduct this training, I don't intend to change much. I thought it went really well and everyone I trained got a lot out of it. The video was a great way to demonstrate the use of Apple Configurator to multiple people at a time while giving them a visual of what they will need to be doing for thir hands-on practice. I will still keep giving them PDF guides because most of them still continue to refer to that when they need to add applications and update softare. However, next time I do plan to move at a slower pace, take into consideration more that a lot of these people don't even use computers on a daily basis. I will also explain more about the structure of the training and the intended goals of the training this way faculty will know what to expect. I think it'd be more helpful if i had an additional member from my department to help me perform the hands-on practice this way I can spend more time with each person. I also had requests for pens at the next training, this goes back to being prepared. I will try to be more prepared when initiating my next training.

Below, you can see some pictures of my survey results from this training.

Professional Learning Plan

Here is my professional learning plan. Hope you enjoy!

Group Leadership Project - Final

My group is Group 4 which included Tracy, Suzanne, Charlene and myself. I honestly could not have asked for a better group. These ladies were always so easy to reach out to and were always open to  collaborating. What we present to you, is a video tutorial on how to use Google Hang Out. We used many different video productions and editing tools such as Camtasia, iMovie and Screenomatic. I know we had talked about using Jing in the beginning but it just did not offer us the time and effects that we wanted to use within our tutorials. After creating our three tutorials, we then easily posted them to YouTube. In the first tutorial, Suzanne used Screenomatic to create it and used iMovie to edit and upload it to YouTube. iMovie provided great ways to edit and input transitions while also allowing easy access to export anything to YouTube. Tutorial 2 & 3 were created in Camtasia by Charlene. Suzanne was supposed to edit it but we ran into compatibility issues so Charlene ended up taking on some editing. Luckily, group work was divided up very well so we did not worry about this too much. Camtasia is just a great way to capture anything on your screen. This was exceptionally useful when recording how to create a google account and using google hang out. You can view Tutorial 1, which talks about what Google Hang Out is and the benefits that come with Google+. You can also watch Tutorial 2, where we discuss how to create a Google Account and Tutorial 3, where you can learn how to create a Hang Out and upload it to Youtube.

I learned a lot through the final production of this project. Google Hang Out was something that I always knew about but never was familiar with. Now I can honestly say that I am extremely comfortable with Google Hang Out and would love to encourage teachers to use it within their classrooms. It's such a great tool and has so many resources that could be very effective to both teachers and students. I have also been slowly becoming a fan of Google+. I am a who Apple/Mac advocate so I try to stick to what I favor but Google has made many things so easy and so "education-friendly." I have been enjoying every second I get to explore what they have to offer. In addition to this, I also learned a lot about group work. Due to hurricane Sandy, I was unable to access a computer for five days. It has been true chaos here on Long Island and I am just so grateful that I have a group that is so understanding. I am also grateful that we broke up our work like we did because when it came time to meet our deadlines, even though I do not have power, I didn't need to worry much because I had already contributed my part. We collaborated and emailed each other all the time to keep posted and this taught me how important communication is within distant-learning. I really enjoyed working with these girls and I think we made the perfect group.

If I could do something differently within our group it honestly probably would've been prevent hurricane Sandy. It just ruined my opportunity to see the final production before we submitted it and I was bummed that I didn't get to give much input. Although I contributed my part, I still wanted to be there to give my opinion on some things. I also wish I was able to help Suzanne more because I have a Mac and this could've prevented the compatibility issue. However, hurricane Sandy really ruined this for us. I think it would have also been more helpful if we really spent more time on discussing what recording and editing tools we wanted to use than experimenting with different ones. Regardless, I think we created a great tutorial and I think it is going to be useful to many people. I am very lucky to have worked with such a wonderful group! :)

WPP - Part C: Implementation

Implementation has been the best part of this project so far. I was really excited to conduct my training to see how it would go. To hear more about my implementation, listen to my podcast. Since only one school has been ready due to WiFi installations, I was only able to conduct my training for six people. However, since I am going to be holding a lot more of these in the future, this was definitely a good first time experience. Just to refresh, my wicked problem is training teachers, directors and other faculty how to use an application called Apple Configurator. In order to effectively do this, I decided to create a video tutorial and a PDF guide that they can refer too. Below, you can see some pictures taken from the PDF and the video tutorial that I created.

Cover of PDF Guide

Video Tutorial

Configuring Profiles & Groups within PDF Guide

Mobile Learning

Unfortunately, I do not have my own classroom yet so I was unable to try any new tools. However, as an Educational Systems Coordinator, I am incorporating iPads into my curriculum and am really excited to see how those turn out. In the schools I work in, I would say we are more tech savvy then some other schools. We have Smart Boards, Smart Tables, computers in every classroom and now iPads. However, if I had my own classroom, I would be interested in seeing different ways that I could use cellphones. WhenI was in school, cellphones were known as a distraction, a toy and something that always got confiscated. I want to use it as a tool, a resource and something that students could benefit from. I think if we used the tools that they're interested in, it would help motivate them to learn.

I believe that mobile technology can be great for all sorts of things. Devices like cellphones would be great for taking polls, commenting on topics through social media and collaborating. Other mobile technologies such as iPads and tablets give students and opportunity to learn in different ways through applications and software that can accommodate any type of student learning style. In my classroom, I would really like to use cellphones during an activity where students could text each other a conversation in Spanish. I think it would be cool to learn the short-cuts of Spanish text messages as we have them in the U.S. I think this would give students an insight of how people in Spain their age communicate. I also mentioned this in a blog on Classroom 2.0, you can read my response below:

Blog Response:

I would definitely love to use cellphones in my classroom some day. I think they would be an awesome asset to a foreign language classroom. Like we have abbreviations in English while texting, I think it would be cool to have students text each other using abbreviations in the Spanish language. Then they could share their conversations with the class and have other students make out what they are trying to say. I think this would be a cute and fun classroom activity. Not only would it permit students to practice the language but they would learn a little more about the culture by understanding the words and abbreviations that they use. Has anyone else used a cellphone in a foreign language classroom? I would love hear the feedback!



Some challenges that I can see occurring when integrating mobile technology into the classroom is financial issues. Mobile technology is not necessarily cheap and may not be accessible to all students. Another issue is actually integrating these devices appropriately. I think it would be important for me to plan these lessons ahead of time to see how well they would actually work. Some times teachers don't use technology effectively and that is because they don't know how to properly use the technology. This is something I hope not to run into.

Below is the poll of questions I would've gave to my students if I had my own classroom regarding technology.

Part B - Storyboard & Script

Below is a link to both our Storyboard and Script on our Google Hangout tutorial. Tracy and I worked together to create both the storyboard and the script of this project. Although Tracy and I worked on this portion of the project, we gave Charlene and Suzanne access to both documents so that we could get their input of some area of question and on the final product. Since Tracy and I created the storyboard and script, Charlene and Suzanne will record and edit the tutorial. In the brainstorming part of this assignment, we had trouble deciding how to distribute the work amongst all of us but we thought this would be best. I believe Tracy and I also may do a live recording as well demonstrating how to start a live Hangout. Overall, our group work is going really well. We communicate daily and create our own hangouts when needed to spend more time on the details of this project. We're eager to see how our final product turns out. We are all learning a lot about Google Hangout and are excited to be learning new things.


Click here to access our storyboard!

Click here to access our script!