Professional Development
Season 1- Episode #4
In this episode we are focusing on professional development. We will discuss the Wisconsin Assistive Technology Regional Network meetings, a brief recap of ATIA, and talk about Twitter as a source of professional development and networking.
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Transcript
Welcome to the disruptive teaching podcast, a podcast about upsetting the average teaching and increasing your ability to reach every student in your classroom. We will focus on high and low tech tools for your classroom, along with a variety of assistive technologies that will help you create environments that are inclusive, engaging. Hi, I'm Cassie Frost, a former special education teacher specializing in emotional and behavioral disabilities and current Assistive Technology Specialist.
Hi, I'm Carolyn Meronek, a speech language pathologist who has been working in the public school system for the past 12 years. I have worked in a variety of settings and also have a special education background. In today's episode, we're going to focus on professional development, talking a little bit about the Wisconsin assistive technology regional network and what we're doing in the state of Wisconsin to bring assistive technology to the forefront of education. talking a little bit about the ATIA conference and then a little bit about Twitter for professional development. Okay, let's go.
So, a lot of times we'll talk about where do we get information from how do you network with other people. Wisconsin is actually the home to ye which if you do any assistive technology, anything you'll have heard about why he why he is the Wisconsin assistive technology initiative initiative. I just want to make Institute or something I know I mentioned his name. It's WATI.org. If you're looking online,it has all kinds of information out there. If you go under Resources, they have like their manual of how to do assessments and it walks you through like everything you can ever think of when it comes to looking at as any form of assistive technology. What's really great about it is when it originally came around quite a few years ago, it was actually grant funded. And it was a group of people. But that was what they did is they spent their days developing all of these resources and the systems, and they still remain like one of the go to places for information on assistive technology on assessment. And we're really this phenomenal thing around the state of Wisconsin that now has went around the country. Unfortunately, the grant funding stopped. And while it is no more, they keep their website up. So the resources are still there. There's not really new resources really being added at this point. So about a year and a half ago, a group of people got together and said, you know, here in Wisconsin, we've kind of lost this, how do we get it back? And the answer to that was to form a new group in Wisconsin, more volunteer base, there's no funding involved. Its called the Wisconsin assistive technology regional network or WATRN. WATRN has a website actually under the Wisconsin AC network, dot org, and the WATRN in website lives under that I did just tried a minute ago. If you search WATRN and assistive technology, it will come up. Um, the biggest thing about this is we don't have like this big collection of resources like what he does. If you're from Wisconsin or interested in copying something similar in your state or your area, we actually do quarterly meetings. Yes. So around the state. We've got, I think, this regions, six regions now And really, the regions aren't anything hugely formal. We're adding new regions all the time. Basically, it just takes somebody that wants to run it in a space to run it. And we meet online and kind of plan the meeting around what we've heard people are looking for information that we know about. People need. And we kind of put together this slideshow this presentation so that all around the state, everybody's giving the same information so that everybody around the state that's interested is getting the same. And then we schedule the meetings and people who are available come depends on, you know, people's availability, how many people we have there. It's open to anybody, teachers, slps administrators. We have some community organizations that come and join us to help us with continuum of care and services. Absolutely. And so we spend about three hours. Typically, we go over some new information at the beginning, a lot of times we'll have a vendor come in and kind of show some of their products. Some of the companies are great about actually sending us like kits, other stuff so people can get hands on with some of the devices that they may otherwise not have access to. And then we spend a little bit of time problem solving, kind of talking with each other forming those networks. Our group actually Sounds a little bit longer just to be able to make those contacts and do some of those things together because most of us are islands on our own. So to be able to have those conversations with people that do the same thing as you is very important. And I think you'll kind of catch that theme throughout this podcast as I was talking about how important it is to network to get to know other people. Um, so Carolyn just said to about staying after, that's something we actually started spring for, yeah, probably over a year ago, year and a half ago, um, that Carolyn and I and another at specialist or a couple of other AP specialists, actually, we started this out trying to get together monthly, to just kind of talk through things, try out devices, problem solve, and we typically just came with a list of like four or five things we needed help with. And now that's kind of morphed into this after the water meeting. So we have the water meeting, and then we get together and actually just Problem solved for a while. So, again, if you're in Wisconsin, check out water. If you are not from Wisconsin, definitely check out WATI. You'll have access to all of those resources, all of that information, some great contacts, as well. And if you're interested in finding out more information or setting up something similar in your state or your region, definitely reach out we'd be more than happy to help you out with that.
Well, this past week, I had the opportunity to attend ATIA down in Florida, which is an assistive technology Industry Association Conference. It was a really amazing time the weather in Florida wasn't as wonderful as perhaps we had hoped it would be. However, you know, coming from Wisconsin 50 some degrees 67 degree weather is definitely a step in the right direction at the end of January. I got in late on Wednesday night, Thursday, I had the opportunity to join A group that was competing in a Jeopardy style competition. If you check out our Facebook page, disruptive teachings Facebook page, you can check me out with a tattoo sleeve, temporary tattoos sleeve looking pretty tough. We discovered that it's definitely harder to come up with an answer when you're put on the spot. But it was definitely a good time. I'm really glad I was invited to participate in that. On Friday, I had the opportunity to present on executive functioning. So the concept of getting yourself put together to do what you need to do, talking about attention, memory, organization, time management, all of those things and really looking at some high and low tech tools to help support that. If you're interested at all learning more, I know that I have an upcoming session I believe in March with a TA for a webinar, and that exact topic. So again, it's it's linked on our website. site if you're interested in more information on that. So that was Thursday or Friday, it was pretty amazing. There were so many people interested. It was really awesome to see so many educators really looking for more information on executive functioning, really making that a key point and recognizing that students really need to have that put together in order for learning to happen. Friday Night was Ed camp access International. It I believe was the third. This was the second one that I've attended. If you've never been to an ED camp, I would highly recommend you go. Nice thing about an ED camp is it's not a speaker or expert or professional standing up front talking to you. It's a group of people sitting around talking about what topics they're interested in. So I was able to talk a little bit about resinous certification, I was able to sit in a group that talks about more district wide or program wide. change and how we can help make that happen. So some really great conversations there again, hanging out with my fantastic PLN and professional learning network people that I don't get to see super often. I can connect with usually only online so it was amazing to have that time. And then Saturday morning I got to stay for my first ever maker day down at a ti It was wonderful to see all of the things being created. Teams there helping people solder, learn how to make their own switches and adapt is adapted styluses the super super, super excited to see adaptation for Intellakeys. Intellakeys are now working again with an extra piece that has been created for it by 18 makers. So it's amazing to see those kind of coming back to life for the people that really need them. And some accessible gaming was happening which is super cool. Had a session on So that day that I presented on behavior had good turnout for that, again, a lot of really great questions. So the conference as a whole was a great experience and highly recommended if anybody's interested. Also, if you're interested in seeing some of the sessions from a Tia, I do believe if you look online for the next, um, I think month here or so few weeks, you actually can order like 100 plus sessions, I believe the cost is about $150. And you actually get 100 plus recorded sessions. So if you are unable to make it to a Tia, but it's something you really, really want to see, they are making that a possibility. Obviously, it's not the same as going there's not the networking piece, but it is an opportunity in a way that they're trying to spread that out for the people that could not attend. So if you have any questions or information on it, some of these things that I learned and we talked about will be coming up on the website, and after Future podcasts. And again, as far as executive functioning goes, there is an online webinar that I will be presenting through a Tia in early March. If you're at all interested visit our website under the speaking or presentation section of the site. On the far right, you'll see a link of upcoming presentations and I know that one's listed there. So in keeping with the whole theme of this podcast with professional development and where we get that, um, I really want to spend a little bit of time talking about Twitter, which Carolyn I know you love. I'm learning to love Twitter, I was not a Twitter user at all. However, there's a really cool tool out there called Tweet Deck and Tweet Deck really makes looking at Twitter, a bit more manageable and it like makes it Make sense, as opposed to just going through random posts that pop up on your page. So I'm on Tweet Deck, you can like, subscribe to specific hashtags, and then you follow it, they all come up in a column, so that you can follow an actual conversation that is happening with within that hashtag. So I can actually have a whole string of posts that are on the same topic. What a novel idea. And I don't maybe I should make a quick video about this too, and throw up online it might help people visualize that a little bit. I know I wasn't a huge Twitter fan either, because when I first joined Twitter, I like followed some people and ended up being news websites and all of this disconnected stuff and it took forever to plow through it. Um, I think again, it was at a conference somewhere that somebody had talked about Twitter as professional development. And I thought Twitter for professional development like, this doesn't work for me. Um, and actually, I think it was at chat and my burrata, actually, that got me into Twitter. And I'll talk about that, I guess now in a minute, but I guess that's kind of up next. So one of the great things about Twitter is you'll hear people talk about Twitter chats. And when you know, Twitter and you see this, like long line of things that people are throwing out, it's kind of hard to like envision a chat happening in Twitter. So the way Twitter works is it really lives on hashtags. So whenever you post something on Twitter, it just goes out to the people that are following you. That's it. So when you say it, it goes on to the people that are following you. But in order to get like a group of people around a topic or for people to see things, you use a hashtag, so think of it like a Google search term. So what I learned is that if I wanted to participate in this group called a tea chat, I needed to use The hashtag at chat. So this group in particular, meets Wednesdays at seven o'clock central time. And every Wednesday they have a chat around assistive technology. So at the top of the hour, somebody will tweet out a question. And they will use the hashtag a key check if you're watching for that hashtag. So either you've searched it on your phone, or you've used the marvelousness. That is tweet back to keep tabs on that chat. The question will show up when you answer you also hashtag at chat and everybody that's watching that hashtag can see it and respond to it. So it's a really easy way to have a chat. They do tend to go pretty quick. Yes, but the nice thing is, is again, you can search at hashtag at chat at any point and read back through those. Um, so it's also nice about that thinking about reading back through hashtags is you can actually use hashtags even from conferences. So like this week, FEC is coming up so the future of education Technology Conference. I'm probably saying that wrong, but it's something along those lines down in Florida, and I can't get there. One of my goals is to get f etc. But since it comes right before a Tia, and I'm going to a TI, unfortunately can't escape Wisconsin for two weeks in January, unfortunately, um, but I do plan on watching at FETC 2020. So on Tweet Deck, I can search hashtag FETC 2020 and open up a column. And as people are at this conference, and they're learning things, they will tweet about them with that hashtag. anytime they tweet something with a hashtag, it will show up in that column for me, and it happens to when we go to closing the gap. So that's just another easy example to be able to follow things you know, they'll post things about, Hey, I saw so and so's presentation. You know, go check out their handout or go visit tool. Yeah, go visit this vendor in the vendor Hall. They have this awesome new tool It's it's handy to keep up with what's going on as it happens. And so it's great if you're at the conference and it's great. If you're not at the conference, you can just get information. So Twitter for professional development, I can find more and learn more in like 15 minutes on Twitter when I'm looking for the right hashtags. But I can googling for hours. So I highly recommend you give it a shot. Again, if you're confused about it, we will try to put up a video that kind of explains TweetDeck just kind of a quick, short one, um, some great hashtags to follow. And maybe we'll put up a blog post with these as well. Hashtag disruptive teaching, that's ours. So anything you hashtag with that we will see. It also comes up on the website for others to see. Hashtag water. We talked earlier in the episode about water. So again, that comes up to the Wisconsin research Technology Group. I'm Carolyn, I know you have used them. SLP ones, as l peeps is one that I've used. I've also used at UDL. So it just talks about using it across the board, not just for our special needs clients. And some of those, I'm like at chat doesn't actual chat for an hour every week. Some of these other ones, maybe not, don't do chats, just whenever somebody is interested in something, they're sharing it out to that group. There's not like a set time. Um, another great way to get information is if you find a person that tweets out a lot of really good information. So for example, Mike Marotta, I know he's somebody you follow? Yes, I started following him. After closing the gap, I saw a lot of information. And so now I follow him. He also posts off and on at chats, but then you can look at the other things that he's posting on and then you can find some of these other groups too. So just keep digging. And you're going to be able to find all kinds of information out there and you just got to be a little tech savvy. Well, persistent when you're trying to find this stuff. Once you found it, then it's easy. And I love the fact that I say you follow Mike like I don't you actually know like, I know, I don't know him but and I'm going to give a plug there actually, Mike Marotta actually has his own website and his own podcast as well. His podcast is called inclusive technology for all. I really recommend if you're interested in inclusive technology for regular education, special education, check out his podcast, he does some great stuff. And we meet up and he team will be at ATIA too. I'm pretty sure I would think I'm recording some stuff on this podcast there. So definitely check him out. And then, um, I guess if you have any other hashtags, so if you're already a Tweeter, Twitter, Twitter, I don't know. I don't know. Come on. We got to make up a word for this. Anyway, if you are already involved on Twitter, and you have hashtags that maybe we didn't mention, or we should check out, visit the podcast page. On disruptive teaching.com, and comment, I'll turn the commenting on for this one. That'd be awesome. I will rip you're going to remind me to turn the comment and add your favorite education and or at hashtag so that we can kind of share these out and find new ones that other people don't have. And that's a disruptive hyphen. teaching.com I always have to add a hyphen in there when I don't I live our eventually remember. Thank you for joining us for this episode of the disruptive teaching podcast. We hope you found something useful to support engage the students you work with. For more information, visit disruptive helping teaching calm and follow us on social media on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. And connect with us on Twitter with the hashtag disruptive teaching.