Blackboard sponsored this session presented by
Rob Leo, CNYRIC/OCM BOCES
Jed Friedrichsen, blendedschools.net
Pam Willingham, Volusia County Schools
Katie Gallagher, M. S., Solutions Engineer, Blackboard K-12
Blendedschools.net
They have 160 school districts participating in their non-profit online learning and professional development for teachers and students. The focus is to learn how to use online learning for instruction, but also for reaching learners who do not go to school.
Blackboard 9.1 provides an excellent opportunity to provide professional developmoent and online learning for educators.
Channging in Teaching and Learning upgrading to 9.1
Online courses and blended learning using Bb will change from a web 1.0 environment to a web 2.0 environment. With version 9.1, teachers will be creating authentic activites for students to participant and collaborate with blogs, wikis and chats. This will empower teachers to engage students to learn and take more of an active role in learning.
Impact of Professional Development
Model Schools Program out of New York uses Bb 9.1 to provide professional development for teachers. Also, using Bb9.1 the standards align with the teacher standards can be doen with the professional development course rollouts.
Student Learning
Schools are using Bb9.1 to seeing a way to expand on student engagement to have them delve into the learning. The standards alignment is the key component to the Bb9.1. This would tie into making the link to the assessment. Curriculum mapping can also be done in Bb9.1.
"I don't believe there's a district in the nation that would tell you standards doesn't play a role in the work that they do. In the age of acocuntability, our state assessment system is driven by state standards. Therefore, we do not have to be granular about what our standards are and how those standards translate into instruction."
Dr. Lissa Pijanowski, Asst. Sup. For Academics and Acocuntability, Forsyth County, Georgia
