2019 One Word: Resolve

Sometimes my career feels like a battle. As an instructional technologist, I don't feel like my role has ever just been trying to help willing teachers integrate technology but also to be an evangelist or even prophet about the future of education and the impact technology can have. About this time every year,  I begin to feel a wee bit weary. I feel fatigued from having to defend educational technology which is always odd to me that this has become part of who I am.

I look back over the past few years and see a theme:
2015's one word was "Let's"
2016's one word was "Beta"
2017's one word was "Brave"
2018's one word was "Perspective"

This year as I tried to decide which one word to choose to help me as a professional, I found myself feeling less joy about what I do because of the weariness of having the same old conversations year, after year, after year. Every year, choosing one word in January gives me a sense of where I have been during this school year and a focus on where I want to be at the end of May.

So this year my one word is RESOLVE. After a year of diligently trying to look at and balance perspectives of others, I am ready to own who I am. I am an instructional technologist who currently is in the role of Director of Instructional Technology and Innovation. This year I am resolved to stand firm in sharing the virtues of educational technology with the educators, students, and parents that I come in contact with day in and day out. For me, this means that I will stand firm in touting the importance of students having the skills that support the ISTE Standards for Students for their futures.

I have been toying with the one word, "Resolve", for a few days now. This morning I felt affirmed in that word as we read the scripture from Mark 6: 1-4 in church:

Jesus left there and went to his hometown, accompanied by his disciples.2 When the Sabbath came, he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were amazed.

“Where did this man get these things?” they asked. “What’s this wisdom that has been given him? What are these remarkable miracles he is performing? 3 Isn’t this the carpenter? Isn’t this Mary’s son and the brother of James, Joseph,[a] Judas and Simon? Aren’t his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him.

4 Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his own town, among his relatives and in his own home.” 5 He could not do any miracles there, except lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them. 6 He was amazed at their lack of faith.

Now, I'm no Jesus but these words resonated deep within me this morning. Jesus's own family and friends in his own hometown didn't believe in him and the things he was sharing. One of the hardest things about my role is that I am often asked to speak at other schools and educational conferences but my fellow educators in the school I've been at for 15 years push back the hardest. My insecurities imagine what they say "Who is she? She was just an elementary computer teacher?" "How could she possibly think she could tell me better ways to teach my class?" "She knows nothing about my subject matter." None of those things have been said to me, mind you. Then my pride gets in the way and I'm convinced I do know best sometimes (hence the chosen word "perspective" last year to make sure I was being balanced.) 

But here I am today choosing "resolve," not to push my ways on others but to stand firm on believing I have an important role at my school to be an evangelist and prophet about the future possibilities of education. My prayer is that just like Jesus in the scriptures we read this morning, I can do it with humility (this was his second time to go to his hometown and try to reach them). I want to have the resolve to bravely share concepts and ideas based on what I have learned might be helpful regarding technology integration.

What will this look like immediately?

• Explaining the analytics data of digital testing inside Canvas and how it can benefit or students and teachers when creating assessments.
• Explaining how we are in an era that has never been before: we can now have immediate feedback after a lesson and adjust our teaching to that feedback to best meet our student needs.
• Harking the benefits of rubric-based assessing so that students can share their learning in ways other than a paper/pencil/digital assessment of questions.
• Explaining that Canvas is a learning management system that our school can "grow into"  as we consider mastery paths and learning outcomes associated with our questioning of students.

Digital Testing Safeguards

In 2013 I wrote my first blog post on managing technology usage in the classroom. The fear of off task behavior still seems to be one of the main reasons teachers are hesitant to use technology five years later. While the devices may vary, the concepts on how to teach students good internal management of appropriate use has not changed. It starts with intentional boundaries being placed on students anytime technology is in their hands from pre-K forward.

I believe wholeheartedly that classroom management of students on devices is a digital citizenship issue. We are teaching students how to manage their impulses by setting expectations of appropriate usage. I also believe that if we are requiring students to use technology in our classrooms, we also need to be teaching students how to use it wisely and timely. Expectations are important for appropriate usage.

As our high school is moving forward to prepare for exams using Canvas for objective assessments my mind has been thinking on various ways to prepare the testing environment and test itself for integrity purposes. Below are my thoughts on this subject:

• Classroom seating setup- make cheating hard but make monitoring easy for you. Exams don't take forever, move your desks or your students to help you monitor better. I work with a teacher in the elementary school that has her students sit on one side of their desk when she is giving instructions and then when it's time for them to work on the computers she has them move their chairs to the other side of their desks so she can quickly see their screens when she is working with small groups in the back of the classroom. Another option might be setting up your room for the task at hand by setting up desks in the following ways that allow you to quickly move around your room as you proctor an exam:

• Question banks/groups -By creating Question Banks in your learning management system you can very easily differentiate a quiz to students by allowing the system to choose questions out of a question bank. Basically you are telling the Question Group how many questions you want on the quiz and it will randomly select questions from your pre-created banks. When creating question banks for randomization purposes it is important to create banks that have the same level of critical thinking within the groupings so that the quizzes will be equitable in rigor. Use Canvas LMS? Check out these links to help you:

• https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-13000-415250747
• https://www.uwb.edu/learningtech/canvas/canvas-for-faculty/quizzes/question-banks#using 
•  https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-12979

• 1. Access Codes- Codes serve as a safeguard that students cannot access exams when you are not ready for them to access it. Giving students the code right at exam time and then changing the code once everyone is in is a way to make sure different sections you teach are not accessing the exam when they are not in your presence. This can be set on the detail page of any quiz/exam you make in Canvas. 
• 2. Filter IP Addresses- Many learning management systems have the ability to only allow a quiz/exam to be taken on campus. By choosing to filter the IP address you can prevent students from possibly accessing or finishing an exam at home without a proctor. This can also be set on the detail page in Canvas. Be aware that sometimes if a device is being managed by a VPN students will not be able to take the exam due to this setting. 
• 3. Change feedback setting - One of the beautiful things about accessing digitally is that exams are graded immediately and teachers can spend more time on other things. In Canvas there is a setting for students to see question feedback right after taking an exam (in fact, it defaults to this setting). For testing integrity purposes, I would suggest changing this setting to a time after all of your students have taken the test so that you can be more assured that students aren't sharing their results with each other. 
• 4. Shuffle answers - In most robust LMS options there is an option to shuffle the answers inside a quiz/exam with one click. When this is utilized to automatically it is important not to have answer choices like "both a & c" because it will randomize the answers and this answer will not be correct. 
• 5. One question at a time - By choosing the option for students to see one question on a page it keeps wandering eyes from looking over and seeing another student's page of answers. The downside to this is that many students find it cumbersome when taking a test. Think of it like a hand covering the last question as the quiz taker moves along the test. Easy access is eliminated.

• Lockdown Browser.  Using a lockdown browser so students cannot take screenshots or navigate off the tab they have open is another option. This is not a built-in option for most LMS options. Any time add-ons are used there is sometimes an added level of opportunity for things to go wrong. Keep in mind that you may have to troubleshoot this in your classroom as well. This document gives our teachers an overview on how to use Canvas with the Respondus lockdown browser as well as showing them how students will use the software depending on which device they are using. 

The above list give teachers various ways to create quizzes/exams that ensure testing integrity. Teachers can pick and choose things that seem most beneficial to them but the value of test proctor movement is invaluable in both digital and non-digital assessment. It is also the easiest management tool. 

The last thing I want to share are ways to overcome students getting kicked out of a Canvas exam  and not being able to continue taking it after accessing it again. This could happen due to a connectivity anomaly or due to a student just needing extended time for testing purposes. The easiest way to handle this is to not assign a "available until" time when creating a quiz/exam. This allows the test to remain open until the student submits the exam. To monitor this well we suggest these steps:

• Use an access code (as soon as all students have accessed the test change the code).
• At the end of the class period have any students who have not completed the exam come to you and physically watch them exit the exam. This way they cannot continue the exam except when you give them the new code. This prevents students from finishing up a quiz/exam in study hall with access to information to help them.

THE HOW: Tricks for Digital Testing

On a regular basis I am asked by teachers, "but what about cheating and digital testing?" It does happen but it also happens without your testing being digital. I remember being in 9th grade Spanish class and writing the answers my vocabulary quiz on the edge of a piece of notebook paper, strategically placing that paper inside my Spanish book so I could still see the answers and placing said book under my neighbors desk so I could see it while I took the test. I'm not proud of this, but I did it. We all did it and we never got caught...let's leave the philosophical and ethical issues for another blog and agree that cheating happens. In today's constantly connected world it can be anything from a student taking a photo of a paper test and sending it to their friends to hacking a teachers account to get access to the test and answers prior to the test. Educational technology companies know this is an issue and they have created solutions to give educators a little more piece of mind. Currently as our teachers are creating their courses in the learning management system Canvas, they have access to the following ways to trick the tricksters:

• Question Groups- By creating Question Banks in Canvas you can very easily assign different quizzes to different students by allowing the system to choose questions out of the bank. Basically you are telling the Question Group how many questions you want on the quiz and it will randomly select questions from your bank. Question groups also allow you to randomize question order as well. FYI, you can also manually create Question Groups to utilize this as well.
• https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-13000-415250747
• https://www.uwb.edu/learningtech/canvas/canvas-for-faculty/quizzes/question-banks#using 
•  https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-12979
• Access codes- You can make it so no one can access the quiz until you give them the access code/password to do so. 
  
• Shuffle answers and show one question at a time - When setting up your quiz click on the options that shuffles the answers for wandering eyes that can see a mark but not necessarily see the wording in a classroom setting. Also by only seeing one test question at a time helps. Think of it like a hand covering the last question as the quiz taker moves along the test. Easy access is eliminated.
  
  
• Time limits- Set time limits so students can't access it for too long of a time so that they can do "research" in the midst of a quiz. This is especially important if you are having students take quizzes when they are not in your presence. 
  
• Filter IP Addresses- Make the quiz available only when students are on our school wifi. If you use the magnifying glass next in the box labeled "Filter IP Addresses" you can see what our school's is and add it to your quiz. This way no one can access the quiz off campus when you are not able to proctor it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AozWAwkmkVs 
• Don't release the student's grade until all students are done taking the quiz. You can do this by choosing "mute assignment" in the grade book.
• You can see the start and stop times for quizzes. Check it occasionally. If you see someone flying through the material, ask yourself why. 

TEACHER CHALLENGE QUESTION: If you are unsure if a student has cheated or not, ask yourself how you can change your classroom structure to have more formative feedback so you would feel more certain about a student's knowledge base before they take an assessment? As teachers, our goal is for students to learn our curriculum, use formative assessment to create a pathway that gives you feedback to make that happen.