Sunday, December 2, 2018

Library News: December 2018

December Calendar: Appreciating the gifts of being part of the Pack! (bit.ly/dec2018challenge) - With the help of some student aides, we took time to dedicate our December calendar to thanking members of the Pack. Feel free to print your own copy and follow along!

Design and Robotics Exploration - Mr. Knopp’s students have helped us further develop our school’s Maker Hub offerings by applying design thinking and experimenting with robots, which were generously donated to West Hills by the OtterCares Foundation last spring. We are excited to continue this collaborative exploration together!

In Remembrance of Stan Lee Display - Upon hearing of Stan Lee’s death, a student deeply inspired by his work created this library display built around the idea shared in Spiderman 3 that “one person can make a difference.” In our library, many students enjoy checking out books from our Graphica section that includes comics, graphic novels, and manga. Curious about their value? Check out some of these articles:


AVID’s College & Career Corner - Next time you’re in the library, make sure to see the expanding College & Career Corner, which was inspired by our AVID team. Thank you to students who added the pennant decor, to teachers and staff who shared where they went to college (students are enjoying this!), to Ms. Carson for preparing the labels and hand-drawing the maps, and to student aides for putting the final map display all together!

Thursday, November 1, 2018

Library News: November 2018

November “Your Vote Counts” Calendar Challenge - Inspired by an AP Government student, who also happens to be one of our library student aides, this month’s calendar shares information and resources related to voting and civic engagement. Feel free to print your own copy and follow along!

AAC Awareness with Wolf Pack Readers - Ms. Tropiano’s students have been busy reading books in their English class, and they are communicating about their books using a mix of communication methods, including writing, talking, and using AAC. What is AAC? AAC stands for augmentative and alternative communication. Check out this video to see one of our students using AAC!

Research Tip: Add Search Context Terms - As students worked on research projects this month, one search tip shared is to experiment with adding context terms when searching Google. For instance, if their topic was media literacy, rather than just search for “media literacy,” they could try searching for “media literacy literature review,” “media literacy statistics,” etc. Click here to see a list of more sample context terms.

Meet a Mythological Monster Virtual Gallery - Inspired by the Halloween season, two WHHS student library aides worked collaboratively during the month of October to create mythological monster art and informational displays for the ends of bookcases. Original wire sculptures of monsters from different world mythologies are accompanied by informational posters. Enjoy a scroll through the virtual gallery!

Monday, October 1, 2018

Library News: October 2018

October “Continue the Conversation” Calendar Challenge - During the last week of September, our school participated in #StartWithHello week. To help keep the momentum going, the library’s calendar challenge for October has conversation starters for each school day of the month. Feel free to print your own copy and follow along. Bonus: Print, make, and play a caring action fortune teller!

Chromebook Quick Guides for Troubleshooting & Shortcuts - Access these links for help troubleshooting common Chromebook issues, which students may often resolve all on their own, as well as a shortcuts guide updated based on suggestions from last month’s shortcuts calendar challenge. You may find these links again in the future on the library’s website under the technology menu.

#WHHSreads - Last month we launched #WHHSreads to promote reading in our community, inviting students and staff to share what they’re currently reading. To contribute to this effort, Ms. Liddell’s 12th grade ERWC English students shared the independently selected nonfiction titles that they are reading. Visit the #WHHSreads link to see their books and submit your own current reads.

Saturday, September 1, 2018

Library News: Week of 9/5/18

September “Shortcuts” Calendar Challenge - With Global Studies teachers helping 9th graders establish good tech skills (thank you to Josh Reyes for collaborating!), we talked with students and staff about some of their most commonly used Chromebook shortcuts to create this month’s calendar challenge for the library. Feel free to print your own copy and follow along or share with students. We will also provide a generic, non-calendar version of these shortcuts soon. If we missed any you think we should add, tell Suzanne in the library.

#WHHSreads - One of our library goals is to encourage reading for pleasure. Inspired by similar efforts at Valhalla and El Cajon Valley, we invite you to share what you’re currently reading. Click here for 2 options to share what you’re reading. Just as our AVID team inspires students with staff sharing about their post-secondary education, we hope this will show students how reading is also part of our lifelong learning journey. In addition to featuring slides on our website, we will have a slideshow running at the library’s front counter. Thank you to Sarita, Tiffany, Corrie, Michelle, and Dan for helping us get started!

Free Online Test Prep Resources - As we are already seeing students printing out tickets for the SAT and some even checking out AP study guides already, we have updated the free online test preparation resources guide for West Hills students: bit.ly/whhstestprep (1-page quick guide). Please feel free to share with students. If you have any questions, talk to Suzanne in the library.

Library Welcome Info For New (and Returning) Staff - We have had a chance to meet many new staff members and are so happy you have joined the Wolf Pack. Here is some basic information about the library program and our services. We look forward to working with you!

9th Grade Library Orientations - Thank you to 9th grade English teachers (Dan, Todd, Casey, and Cathy) for allowing your classes to participate in library orientations. In addition to giving students an opportunity to learn more about library and tech resources on campus, it allowed Suzanne a chance to experiment with Pear Deck. Students have mentioned a few other teachers on campus are already using it. But, if you have not yet tried it, Suzanne wrote a blog post about her first experience that you can check out.

Sunday, August 26, 2018

7 Takeaways From My First Pear Deck Experience

Fellow GUHSD teachers, have you tried out Pear Deck yet? During the rush of our back-to-school days, we received emails from GUHSDtech regarding the addition of two new premium-level tools to our existing toolset: Adobe Spark and Pear Deck.

I've had the chance to use Adobe Spark a lot in the past since the free version allows you to do quite a bit. Pear Deck, however, is a tool that was too limited for me to use without premium access. So, I was quite excited to hear that we now have premium access in our district.

What exactly is Pear Deck?

In terms of its module for Google Slides, Pear Deck simply allows you to make your slide decks interactive. You can intersperse traditional slide content with opportunities for students to engage in answering questions or adding their own personal responses. This creates opportunities for formative assessment and allows you to customize instruction on the fly.

How did I get started with it?

I chose to attend a professional development session about Pear Deck offered by our Digital Learning Coach team to get a sense of the basics, but my best learning happened through experimentation within an actual classroom setting. Although I'm just getting started myself, I'll share what I've learned so far in case it is helpful to other newbies.

For context, my first opportunity to give Pear Deck a try was as part of the 9th grade library orientations that English teachers kindly allow their students to participate in during the first few weeks of school. In the past couple of years, I've paired a Google Slides presentation with a scavenger hunt. This year, when updating the slides, I just went a step further by customizing them with Pear Deck. Here are links to compare the two versions of slides.
The two slide decks look very similar. In fact, I started the Fall 2018 slides by simply creating a copy of the Fall 2017 slides and then inserting Pear Deck slides. Where exactly did I go to customize the Pear Deck slides? This takes me to Takeaway #1.

Takeaway #1: Get to know the various teacher interfaces (browser windows/tabs) of Pear Deck.

When you're first using Pear Deck as a teacher, the most confusing part is probably figuring out the various interfaces that you will need to navigate as a teacher. Below is a summary of these interfaces in my own words.
  • Pear Deck Website - The Pear Deck website has both a student and teacher login. When students log in, they are simply joining a teacher's session. As a teacher, when you log in, you have the ability to access past sessions to review student responses. You can also access other resources such as the Pear Deck Vocabulary tool and help resources. You don't need to have this open to prepare your slides or when presenting them, though.

  • Pear Deck Google Slides Add-On - The main Pear Deck website will link you to opening a new Google Slides presentation with the Pear Deck add-on enabled. But, you really can just open the add-on anytime you want from within Google Slides by going to Add-ons in the main Slides menu (NOTE: I never needed to add the add-on. It was already added automatically for me).

    Once you open the add-on, it will appear on the right side of your Slides window. Simply click on different slide templates from the add-on window to add interactive slides. Then, when you're ready to start a Pear Deck session with students, you similarly just need to have your Google Slides open with the Pear Deck add-on open. From within the Pear Deck add-on, select the "Present with Pear Deck" button and a new browser tab/window will open with a join code.


  • Pear Deck Session Browser Tab/Window - As mentioned above, as soon as you choose the option to "Present with Pear Deck," the Pear Deck session browser tab/window will open with a join code for you to project. As the teacher, you need to be using extended desktop with your classroom projector so that you can drag the code to the projector screen for students. Students follow the instructions of going to joinpd.com and entering the code. Once joining the session, the student view will match the projector view in terms of the slide that they are on. It will differ somewhat, though, because students will be interacting as individuals on their own screens when there are interactive slides. Logistically, as you have the code projected for students to successfully join the session, this is when you can click on the option under the pear to "Open Teacher Dashboard."


  • Teacher Dashboard Window - When you open the Teacher Dashboard, it will be another browser-like window you can locate under Chrome, but it doesn't show up as a regular tab. You should be sure to drag this back to your teacher computer monitor. The Teacher Dashboard is what you use to navigate through your slides and to view and interact with student responses.


Takeaway #2: Plan your first slide with intention.

Since it takes students a varying amount of time to join the session, put some thought into your first slide. The one I had turned out to be a good one by accident. It had an easy to identify design so I could simply instruct students to click through screens until they "got to my name tag." At a quick glance, I could scan students' screens to tell that they were at the right place. Also, while I was waiting for the final students to join, I was able to fill the time by introducing myself verbally. Students still joining didn't miss out on critical content; at the same time, students who were already in the session weren't so distracted by what was on the slide. 

Having said this, I could also imagine experimenting with an interactive slide to begin with so that students could immediately jump into some sort of activity as they joined.

Takeaway #3: Students are not locked into Pear Deck. 

When students join a Pear Deck session, they are kept in lockstep with what slide you're on, but only when they are on the Pear Deck browser tab. Pear Deck does not prevent them from having other tabs open and so you will need to use your regular classroom techniques for ensuring they are where they need to be (i.e., lower your screen to 45 degrees, GoGuardian, etc.). On a positive note, since students are able to work on other tabs, this allows you to have them move between the session and doing activities on other tabs. I, for instance, had students open a new tab mid-session to add the library cloud printer and to log into Destiny. The main complication that I found with having them do this is that several students accidentally closed their session tabs and so this broke the flow a bit.

Takeaway #4: Slide animations don't work.

If you're someone who has slide animations added into your slides, they did not work for me. (If you do happen to know some workaround, let me know!) An example of this is with some slides where I intersperse random personal stories. The slides have numbers that are transparent and only show a portion of a photo, and then I reveal the rest of the photo. In the past, I would do the reveal with a slide animation; but, after realizing that I couldn't get slide animations to work, I simply inserted the "before and after" images as two separate slides. It was a simple adjustment to make, but something I didn't learn until trying out a test session.

Takeaway #5: When presenting, hyperlinks in slides are clickable for students and not just you as "presenter."

Having links clickable for students can be very convenient if you want students clicking on them; but, it has the potential to be distracting if you're used to being the sole presenter of slides with students following along as more passive audience members. For instance, when including playable video links in slides, remember that students will also be able to open them. This happened to me in one session! Several students clicked on a video link and audio started blaring out of their Chromebooks. If you have video links like this, you should preface the slide with directions to not click the link. Alternatively, you might choose to not include the link within your slides and simply have the video prepared in a tab that you drag over to be projected. Or, perhaps you may wish students to watch links at their own pace; but in this case, they should have headphones ready.

Takeaway #6: The effectiveness of displaying student results varies depending on the type of interaction.

The types of interactions that I experimented with included the following four: 
  • Draggable - In this case, I asked students to read the goals and move the star to what they were most interested in covering during the session. This kept me from just reading aloud or talking about the goals. Instead, students reading them on their own and then I displayed where the concentration of stars ended up. Every session, there was a distribution of stars across the different goals, which I said meant that at least some students were hopefully interested in every part of the session.
Student view
View of responses in Teacher Dashboard that can be projected

  • Text - The text responses required a longer amount of time for students to reply and so I ended up cutting out one of them when repeating the session. I enjoyed projecting the answers and scrolling through some. I used responses as a jumping off point for sharing, which I think made the information seem more customized. It would have taken a lot of time to actually read through every response given our usual class sizes, but I am able to review them on my own time by accessing completed sessions via the www.peardeck.com website.
Student view


  • Choice - Mutliple choice questions were really easy to use and quick for students to answer. You could use them as a way to survey students or do some quick formative assessment. For me, I used them as multiple "make your best guess" pre-assessment questions and then discussed the answers after projecting student responses that are displayed in a bar graph format. 
Student view

View of responses in Teacher Dashboard that can be projected

    • Draw - For this question type, I had students draw lines between book covers and genres they fit into. I could quickly tell that some students were going wild with their drawings, and so I never bothered projecting results. Did I scrap the question, though? No! I did find it useful to allow students the chance to complete the exercise and then I just had students verbally share answers aloud. Having the time to interact with the content before going over the answers allowed all students a chance to participate more fully and then check their work as we debriefed.
    Student view

    Takeaway #7: You may need to adjust your timing due to the interactivity.

    While I covered roughly the same content this year as last year, I found that using Pear Deck took more time due to the points for interaction. I do not think this is a negative thing, but it did mean me cutting out some slides and reducing the number of interactive slides that I originally started with. I think that the best way to determine pacing will be through more experience, but just keep this in mind if you are adapting slides you've used in the past.

    As I mentioned above, the Digital Learning Coaches were my initial point of introduction with Pear Deck, and you may always request their support. My door is also always open, as well! If you are interested in trying out Pear Deck and would like to bounce around ideas or collaborate in general (with or without Pear Deck), I always love working with other teachers on campus. Stop by the library, call x60461, or email ssannwald@guhsd.net.