New to Canvas LMS

Over the summer 30 or so fairly tech-savvy folks from our district were invited to take a look a several LMS for possible adoption. We were teachers, administrators and tech folks. We unanimously selected Canvas as our new learning management system (LMS). Early Fall we were given sandbox access and encouraged to explore. Unfortunately I could not find the time with 3 preps, a part-time job and family life (sound familiar?). I finally made the time at the end of January, just in time to start 2nd semester. I sat through some 3-4 hours of good tutorials:

   

So I jumped-in feet-first.

I made my landing page the syllabus containing my contact information, course calendar and upcoming assignments:

I added the HTML for several custom buttons at the bottom of the page, for instance "Daily Summary", which is a diary of our daily activities and the assigned HW. It is a Google Document which is embedded into Canvas using iFrame HTML. The advantage of doing it this way is that I can easily add or modify content through my laptop, tablet, Chromebook or iPhone using Google Drive. Canvas is then automatically updated as the Document is embedded:






Content is organized into Modules:

Here is an example of a webcam lecture I made (using ScreenCastify) and posted:

Here is an example of a Google Slide lecture I made (using ScreenCastify) and posted:

Here is a typical vocabulary practice quiz I made for each section of vocabulary we study:

While I do not profess to be a Canvas expert, I think I have become fairly proficient over the past few weeks. Feel free to share everything you have learned as well. Math colleague Erika Richards was instrumental teaching me how to create and use Canvas "Pages"; we can all contribute something.

Meeting their specimens

Friday students got to meet their specimens for the first time. They were a turtle, dogfish shark, squid, stingray and rabbit. Although the students were excited and wanted to start dissecting immediately, I felt that I had to hit the brakes; I wanted to see their dissection gameplan first. Most specimens came with a dissection guidebook (or we purchased one); the shark, rabbit and squid came with one while the turtle and stingray did not. In the weeks leading up to the arrival of their specimens, students have been researching dissection guides and dissection videos online in preparation. Although I did not want to stifle their enthusiasm, I wanted them to understand that their gameplan and incisions needed to be purposeful, not simply "slice and dice". Just like in carpentry: "measure twice, cut once". So we (I guess, mostly I) decided that Friday would be Picture Day. I asked all participating students to take pictures of their specimen's external anatomy for every conceivable angle, as well as close-ups of various features found in their dissection manuals. They will be documenting and labeling these pictures in the day to come.

Here are some picts I took around the room:

turtle

dogfish shark (made the room smell like a fish market)

 

 

bunny rabbit

Squid. Where's the rest???

Stingray. Dorsal surface is dark, ventral is light. Hmmmm...

We've got quite the zoo going on here!

 In addition, one of my students is learning about the anatomy of her pet tarantula. While I wouldn't say I am arachnophobic, spiders would not be my first choice of pets (personally). We obtained permission to bring the spider into class as long as it remained caged. The presence of the spider in class added to the excitement and interest. Not such a bad thing, eh?

Tarantula

Project Suggestions

Based on a discussion with John Zuk, one of our APs, we came-up with some suggestions for our 20% Time students:

• Reach-out to experts in your fields (using Twitter, Skype, GHO, email). You may be surprised how many will be willing to be interviewed.
• Document in your blog your sources of information; Digital Research Tools (DiRT) seems to be a rich source for data interpretation. Readers will want to know where you found your information and if it is legit.
• Why not make a table? For example:

Concept	Link
Normal anatomy of human heart	CHOP link
cardiomegaly	Mayo Clinic link

 

• Why not include some of these links in your blog? Readers would probably like to follow along with your thoughts and examine the original materials you used.
• Use Google Scholar to find peer-reviewed research articles and the MyLibrary feature to save papers you have found.

Keep at the research. Why. Why. Why.

Why?

Last Friday was spent working on blogging skills and blogging goals. As mostly first-time bloggers, it went fairly well; co-authors worked-out editing permissions, I commented on their blogs and made suggestions (so did John Zuk (@ZukJ) , one of our APs) Today students spent their time researching their topics. Not just summarizing information. Delving. Interpreting. Slogging-through technical biochemical jargon.

I really enjoy having the freedom to not answer factual questions but instead point students in the right direction; I like driving the Struggle Bus. I like asking "Why?" Don't simply write that adult-onset diabetics either do not produce enough insulin or are are not responsive to insulin. Explain why. At the cellular level. Don't understand the vocabulary? Let your passion for your project draw you in, fight through and come out more knowledgeable.

We also had a guest appearance by JZ (actually it was a clinical observation). He took this very flattering pict of us at work. Never mind that I look like a balding, pot-bellied hunch-back. That's irrelevant.

I also showed my students tweets by @ShannonOFoster and @bobloch demonstrating the power and reach of their projects (Shannon, a former A&P instructor and current AP hails from San Diego, CA):

 Bob hails from all the way down the hall, in B-wing. It was pretty cool that the students saw first-hand, while they were looking at the overhead screen, Bob's tweet pop-up. It's nice to know that what we are doing in the confines of our classroom is being shared and critiqued by folks from across the country. And from down the hall.

Week 4 Check-in

 

Well, we are now four weeks into 20% Time.  There have been a couple of hitches (mainly technical) but overall 20% Time has been a huge success! Here are some roadblocks that we have had to overcome:

• the inability to create some blogs from within school district network (IP address? firewall?)
• inability to publish one or two blogs (not sure why?)
• forgetting sharing permissions with a fellow classmate/co-blogger
• blogging inexperience; most of my students have never blogged before (and I certainly am no wizard)

Success-wise, many of my students lose track of time every Friday during 1st and 4th periods; they are so engrossed and engaged in their projects. Here are their blog URLs. Please peruse and feel-free to comment; we all could learn something from you.

Anatomy Scavenger Hunt

Although we do lots of Simon Says to practice learning anatomical regions, anatomy can still be a little dry. Necessary but dry.

So, after trading thoughts over the summer with Texas A&P instructor Cara Johnson (@AHSAnatomy) and tweaking @alicekeeler's classroom Twitter account idea, I came-up with the Anatomical Scavenger Hunt. Cara's students tweet Syndaver selfies (#syndaverselfie15), tagging them with the appropriate anatomical region, as well as a brief description of that region. Alice's students fill-out a Google Form with their tweet request, filling a Google Sheet. She approves the tweet and one click later it is sent-out via the classroom Twitter account.

Here is what the checklist and tweet directions look like:

Feel free to follow our escapades!

Introduction of 20% Time

After a full summer of meeting-up at #ISTE15 for #coffeeEdu, reading Teach Like a Pirate by @burgessdave and Ditch That Textbook by Matt Miller, perusing Twitter chats and connecting with many teachers, professors and facilitators, I decided to implement 20% Time in my A&P classes (I say "my" classes because I am the only one teaching A&P at our high school). I ran it by the Assistant Principal who oversees our Science Department.  Here was my pitch: give students one day every week to pursue ANYTHING they were interested in. They would research, create and present. They would learn to hone their researching skills, communicate with experts, organize their thoughts, create something from scratch, and present publicly to receive constructive criticism. Students would let their inner passions drive the process.

His reply? "Go for it."

Here is the introduction to my students:




I pitched it to both of my classes and they were very intrigued, shell-shocked and excited. We started the process by brainstorming some bad ideas (see below). The reasoning behind the Bad Idea Factory is that people tend to hit a creative wall when brainstorming. We, as humans, tend to want to fix "things". If we examine some "bad" ideas, we will have the tendency to want to "fix" them , essentially turning them into "good" ideas. In addition, once we get past the bad idea roadblock, good usable ideas tend to come to light more easily:

And this was the case!

"watch someone bleed to death" turned into "determine how long a person can survive when xyz artery has been severed" - a fantastic idea for civilian Emergency Services and military medicine.

"dissect roadkill" turned into "pick something out of our supply catalog to dissect on your own"

"bring the Plague into our classroom" turned into "can I [the student] somehow order a disease online to look at the effects of different medicines?"

"watch toenails grow" turned into.......nothing.

I am really excited to see what more my students come up with.  None of them have ever been in this situation; one free period, every Friday, no lecture, no lab, just the time to work on what interests them.