Edmodo North Carolina Spotlight Webinar - February 21, 2:00 Eastern

Learn how school districts in North Carolina are using Edmodo to enhance classroom collaboration, as well as connect teachers and administrators throughout their districts. This session will provide examples that teachers and administrators can use to engage their students, build Professional Learning Networks (PLNs) and deliver online courses. Highlights include:

• Cumberland County Schools will highlight Edmodo’s rapid adoption throughout the district and showcase how teachers and administrators are using it as a platform for their PLNS.

• Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools will discuss how teachers are using Edmodo to connect with classrooms around the globe and create technology support groups for their peers.

• Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools will demonstrate how the district is leveraging Edmodo to deliver online professional development to ESL teachers that models how technology is used in the classroom.

• iCivics provides free lesson plans, games, and other resources to make teaching and learning about civics fun, exciting, and relevant. Check out the new curriculum unit on civil rights, shared in their Edmodo Community this week – View Civil Rights Curriculum.

• ReadWorks provides free, research-based lessons and non-fiction reading passages for teaching reading comprehension in grades K-6. Take a look at their featured units, lessons, and reading passages for Black History Month – View Reading Passages.

• VocabularySpellingCity helps teachers and students enjoy learning vocabulary and spelling. In honor of Black History Month they have shared a pre-made word list or you have the option to make your own! – View Word List

• Introduction to Edmodo
  This introductory webinar is designed for teachers and will teach you how to set up your account and use the core features of Edmodo. Register to attend:
  Tuesday February 21st @ 6 pm EST
  Tuesday, February 28th @ 7 pm EST

• 20 Ways to Use Edmodo
  Edmodo has many uses for teachers, students, and administrators. In this webinar we will focus on 20 practical uses shared with us by teachers around the world. Register to attend:
  Wednesday, February 22nd @ 5 pm EST
  Wednesday February 29th @ 6 pm EST

• Edmodo for Schools and Districts
  This webinar highlights subdomain features and discusses best practices for rolling out Edmodo throughout a school or district. Register to attend:
  Thursday, February 2nd, 16th or 23rd @ 1 pm EST

Based on feedback from teachers, administrators and parents, we’re making a few additional changes to better serve the entire Edmodo community.

1.     Restoring visibility of direct messages between teachers and students. In our efforts to streamline the parent dashboard, it looks like we got a little overzealous.  Based on your recommendations we will enhance the new parent dashboards to include students’ direct communications with their teachers. It may take us a week or two to add this functionality, but rest assured it’s on its way. Thanks to members of the Edmodo community for pointing out so quickly the need to include these types of messages in the dashboard.

2.     Restoring teacher-parent messaging: After discussions with teachers and administrators and a review of how parent accounts were being used, we made some changes that we believed would allow us to meet the needs of as many users as possible.  Based on your feedback, we’ll be making additional enhancements.  We will be adding back the ability for teachers and parents to directly communicate with one another on Edmodo. With the release of the new parent dashboards, teachers and administrators are still able to send out messages to all of the parents they are connected to and in the next version of the parent dashboards which we are working on right now teachers will have the option to turn on parent direct communication. We’ll keep you updated on the timeline for the release of these features.

Thanks so much for your continued feedback. We’re pleased to see so many parents engaging with Edmodo via the simplified Parent Dashboard and hope these additional enhancements will provide even further value.

We are especially excited to be the official social media platform for the conference. Conference attendees will be able to download presentation materials, backchannel during sessions and connect with other attendees- all through Edmodo. To learn how you can use Edmodo to make the most of your time at FETC, be sure to attend Betsy Whalen’s presentation on Wednesday at 10:00 in room S310GH.

To join Edmodo groups for the sessions you attend, simply use the 6 character session code as your group code. In addition, be sure to join the FETC Edmodo Community to get connected with other attendees.

Parent Account Updates

Based on teacher feedback and analysis of parent accounts, we’ve made a few new updates to parent accounts, including:

• Improved navigation: We’ve given parent accounts a new look! The new design will now have a dashboard from which parents can easily access their child’s grades and assignments.
• More accessible: Parent codes are now accessible from student profiles. This means that teachers will no longer need to distribute codes to parents.  Parents can easily obtain the code from their child’s profile and create their own Edmodo account to track their child’s school activities.
• Streamlined communication:  Based on feedback from teachers and analysis of how parents are currently using parent accounts, we’ve streamlined communication.
• To ensure security, since codes are now accessible by students, the parent account dashboard allows parents to view grades and assignments; however, direct messages to teachers can no longer be sent from the parent account.
• Parents can view important announcements and messages from teachers and administrators.

Post Moderation

Group owners can now elect to moderate posts. This new option is available in the group settings panel and if selected, requires the group owner to approve all posts and replies made by group members, before they are published to the group stream.

Note: Post moderation is also available on Android devices and will soon be available for iPhone devices.  Please update to the most current version of the app to utilize this feature.

French Language

We’re pleased to announce that Edmodo is now available in French! Select the French flag located at the footer of the site to switch the language. Merci beaucoup to our own, Jérôme Heuzé, for assisting with the translation.

District Administrator Badge

All school and district administrators associated with an Edmodo subdomain will now receive a badge. If you’re currently an administrator, check your profile for your new badge. If you haven’t claimed an Edmodo subdomain for your school or district, sign up now.

Beyond the Classroom Toolkit: The Alliance for Excellent Education encourages all programs that interact with young learners, both in and out of school, to explore and learn more about the power of digital learning. This toolkit highlights several programs from across the country. http://www.digitallearningday.org/toolkits/beyond_the_classroom

Parent Toolkit:  The parent toolkit provides resources, sample letters, and recommendations on how parents can participate in Digital Learning Day and learning more about technology and digital learning as it relates to their students.  http://www.digitallearningday.org/toolkits/parents

Make Your Own Poster: Digital Learning Day has a brand new original Digital Learning Day artwork that you can use to make your own posters, fliers, and emails. Check them out athttp://www.digitallearningday.org/toolkits/artwork.

If you’d like to learn more about how to make the most of Edmodo during the conference, please attend our featured session:

Edmodo: Powering FETC 2012
Wednesday, January 25, 2012 10:00 am – 11:00 am in Room S310GH
This session will introduce how FETC 2012 attendees can get the most out of their conference experience by using Edmodo to backchannel with fellow attendees, as well as access session materials and conference information. Attendees will also learn how Edmodo can be used beyond the conference to engage their students and to build their Professional Learning Networks.

We will also be hosting a follow up session in our booth on Wednesday, January 25, 12:00 pm. Visit us at booth 512 to learn more.

Don’t forget to join the FETC Community to connect with other conference attendees and download the free Edmodo mobile app from the App Store or the Android Market to get up-to-the-minute alerts, updates, and follow session conversations while you’re at the show.

Digital Learning Day culminates a year-round campaign to improve the educational experience of all children by encouraging educators to use technology to engage their students. This could take a variety of forms, from using mobile devices in the classroom to project-based learning activities. Participants are asked to discuss how digital learning can help their schools and communities, to try new projects and technology, and to showcase examples of how they are  using technology with their students.

Go to digitallearningday.org to find out more and to submit an example of how you are using technology to engage your students.

We’d love to see a strong turnout from the Edmodo community in this very important campaign.  Submit examples of the innovative ways you are using technology with your students, and be sure to let us know, so we can give you a shout out here on the blog!

During holiday break we put out a call asking educators to share one Edmodo mini-lesson with the community. These mini-lessons were meant to be a great way for teachers to engage students and help them get started with Edmodo.

Today we’re pleased to showcase our first batch of submissions! You can view them on the new Mini-Lesson section of our Help Center.  Thanks to all the educators who took the time to submit a lesson during their holiday break. We hope these will be a valuable resource for the community.

If you are interested in submitting an Edmodo mini-lesson to be showcased on our Help Center, follow these steps:

1. Create a brief lesson or activity that uses Edmodo. Please keep the lesson to five steps or fewer. (See example)

2. Include grade level and subject area as well as a link to any recommended content (e.g. video, game, worksheet, etc.)

3. Join the Edmodo Mini-Lesson Challenge Group using this “request to Join” URL.

4. Once your request to join has been accepted, post your lesson in the group.

The Edmodo team will monitor the group and update the Mini-Lesson section of the Help Center periodically with new lessons.