PBS TeacherLine Monthly Station Conference Call
Thursday, March 25, 2010
12pm to 1pm ET
Minutes
Welcome new PBS TeacherLine Stations KTWU and KMOS! At KTWU, Topeka, Kansas, Cindy Barry, Director of Development/Education Service; Jim Pendarvis, Education Outreach Assistant; and Beth Perry, Ready to Learn Coordinator will be promoting TeacherLine in the state. At KMOS, Warrensburg, Missouri, Rosemary Olas, Education and Outreach Manager, will be promoting TeacherLine in central Missouri. Rosemary will also be working with Gary Brock, Director K-12 Media Services, at KCPT. KCPT, St. Louis, Missouri, has been a TeacherLine station for many years promoting the service in parts of Kansas and Missouri.
Welcome new staff at WVIZ! Laurie Heikkila, Online Learning Coordinator, and Jennifer Schwelik, PreK-12 Technology and Professional Development Director.
Ready to Teach Update
The US Department of Education released the request for proposals (RFP) for Ready to Teach in the March 23 federal register. In summary, the U.S. Department of Education is looking for new professional development models that incorporate innovative strategies and emerging technologies into digital professional development content disseminated through open education resources (OER). There is a big focus on innovation and in delivering digital PD content through new learning environments such as cell phone applications, games, and simulations available as OER through the Internet, online portals and other digital media platforms. The RFP doesn’t specify a particular curriculum area but the target is K-12 teachers in high-need/low achieving schools. The RFP includes a research and evaluation component to demonstrate the impact of the content on teaching practices and student outcomes. The US DOE is holding an informational Webinar on April 15. Notice of intent is due April 22 and applications are due May 24.
PBS is working diligently to draft a winning proposal and we will continue to keep everyone informed of our progress. Please let us know if you have any questions.
Station Sharing
Louisiana Public Broadcasting Partners with the Louisiana Governor’s Office and School Districts to Offer PBS TL Peer Connection
PBS TeacherLine Peer Connection has had tremendous growth in Louisiana. LPB is seeing a lot of excitement among coaches and mentors as Peer Connection meets a professional development need that TeacherLine online courses have not been able to address in Louisiana since hurricane Katrina.
To grow awareness and understanding of the power of Peer Connection, Nancy Thompson has created training accounts in Peer Connection (each TeacherLine station has a Peer Connection account that they can use for training and demonstration purposes). First, Nancy provides an introduction demonstration that is two-hours and hands on in a computer lab. She goes through the three S’s of Peer Connection: Search, Save, Share. Nancy then has the coaches do a hands on activity that allows them to really experience how Peer Connection works. Nancy has received very positive feedback and coaches have commented that they really love the coaching modules. After the demonstration, more than likely they choose Peer Connection as a resource for mentoring. Once a group has committed to purchase a subscription, Nancy will go back and do a more in-depth training on Peer Connection. Also, she has started to meet with principals to grow awareness and support as they aren’t necessarily aware that their coaches are using Peer Connection. The process is very high-touch and has yielded great results! So far, Nancy has secured seven districts and the LA Governor’s Office initiative of Nonpublic School Early Childhood Development Program’s to utilize Peer Connection for coaching and mentoring. The attached press release provides details on the partnership with the LA Governors Office.
For more information, please contact Nancy Thompson at .
Iowa Public Television Aligns PBS TeacherLine Courses to Iowa Early Childhood Education Standards
Iowa Public Television received a Local Innovation Fund grant to document and promote the alignment of several early literacy courses to Iowa’s early childhood education standards. Kelly Nesheim was hired to work on this project. Her background in education and understanding of Iowa standards helped in this process. Five Iowa standards and twelve PreK TeacherLine courses were identified for alignment. At first, this was a long process, but once the first course alignment was completed, it went quicker. So far, seven courses have been aligned. Iowa Public Television has made these alignment results available online at http://sites.google.com/a/iptv.org/rtl-iowa/alignment-activities/alignment-documents-1.
Standards:
o Iowa Early Learning Standards,
o Iowa Every Child Reads (3-5 years) principles and strategies
o Iowa Quality Preschool Program Standards
o Iowa Core Curriculum Reading Grades K-2
o National Association for the Education of Young Children Early Learning Standards.
o Any public television station marketing PBS TeacherLine could use the alignment to the NAEYC Early Learning Standards for the purpose of marketing the courses to child care providers and other early childhood educators.
Courses aligned thus far:
o Raising Readers: Preparing Preschoolers for Success
o Raising Readers: Ready to Read and Write with Digital Media
o Read with Me: Developing Early Literacy with Children.
o Teaching Phonics and Spelling for Emergent Readers
o Teaching Narrative and Expository Comprehension
o Effective Writing Instruction
Along with aligning these courses to state standards, Iowa Public Television has received approval for CEU and CDA credits. Iowa State University has approved Raising Readers: Preparing Preschoolers for Success, Raising Readers: Ready to Read and Write with Digital Media, Teaching Phonics and Spelling for Emergent Readers, and Teaching Narrative and Expository Comprehension courses for continuing education unit credit (CEUs). The application for CEUs for Read with Me: Developing Early Literacy with Children and Effective Writing Instruction has been submitted to Iowa State University and is pending approval. The hours for completing Raising Readers: Preparing Preschoolers for Success, Raising Readers: Ready to Read and Write with Digital Media, Teaching Phonics and Spelling for Emergent Readers, and Teaching Narrative and Expository Comprehension courses have also been approved as counting toward the Child Development Associate (CDA) credential. Approval of the Read with Me: Developing Early Literacy with Children and Effective Writing Instruction courses are pending.
Iowa Public Television submitted a request to the Iowa Department of Human Services to request an exception to the State of Iowa Administrative Code regarding approval of training organizations to provide continuing education to meet Iowa child care regulatory requirements. The Iowa Department of Human Services approved this exception. Therefore PBS TeacherLine is approved as a training organization to meet child care regulatory requirements until November 30, 2010. All PBS TeacherLine courses can be counted toward meeting childcare provider certification renewal requirements.
We are pleased to share that Iowa Public Television received word yesterday that the United Way of Central Iowa will fund 25 participants in the Raising Readers: Preparing Preschoolers for Success online course. United Way will assist with recruiting the participants in the Making Connections neighborhoods in inner-city Des Moines. Making Connections consists of 15 of Des Moines most challenging neighborhoods with large economically disadvantaged populations.
For more information on this initiative, please contact Kelly Nesheim at
WGBY Awarded an ARRA Grant for PBS TeacherLine in Partnership with Two School Districts
WGBY has partnered with two school districts--Easthampton and East Longmeadow--on a two-year, $50,000 ARRA grant through the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) Office of Instructional Technology. WGBY will be the provider of PBS TeacherLine professional development courses in elementary math, which will be licensed and run on the DESE’s MassONE Moodle platform. For the first year, they are planning to deliver the course beginning March 24th followed by two face-to-face professional development sessions over the summer for teachers to share their new lesson plans, gather feedback, and plan for the coming year. The second offering of the course will be in 2011 and will train a new cohort of educators. Part of the grant money allows for the purchasing of classroom technology such as whiteboards and projectors to help the teachers who are integrating technology.
WGBY is the PBS TeacherLine Local Course Provider for Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Vermont.
Operations
New Course for NBPTS
We are excited to share the following announcement, which was emailed to the TeacherLine station listserv on March 22.
We are pleased to announce a new partnership with the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS). PBS has provided consulting services over the past few months to NBPTS in converting its face-to-face workshop called the “Candidate Support Provider” (CSP) program into an online course. This will allow NBPTS to reach more learners across the country, especially in rural areas, more cost effectively. The CSP course is not a public TeacherLine course, will NOT be promoted by PBS TeacherLine or be included in the online or offline catalogs. This course is very specific to a portion of NBPTS membership and therefore is not applicable for the general teacher audience. NBPTS is responsible for all of the promotional activities. Since this is not a public TeacherLine course and stations cannot directly influence enrollments in their territories, no revenue share will be provided for these enrollments. However you will see these learners on your enrollment report as it would require reconfiguring the database to separate these learners from specific territories. NBPTS recently completed the pilot course whose course number is LEAD590. LEAD is a new subject area called “Leadership.” This is the first and only course in this subject area right now but we hope to expand the course offering in this subject if/when additional funding is found to do so. This course will be NBPTS’s first official online course and will be offered on the PBS National term schedule beginning June 23.
We have entered into this agreement with confidence that this will be the first step in a growing partnership. Marcia Foster is currently in discussions with NBPTS to distribute a math course they are developing targeted at the general teacher audience. I am also working on a separate agreement with NBPTS to promote PBS TeacherLine courses to its membership. If this agreement is finalized, stations will receive revenue share on these enrollments.
Because the CSP course will only be offered through private sections, stations will not see or hear much about them. However, we feel that it’s important that stations are aware that PBS has partnered with the NBPTS to distribute this course.
Please contact me with questions,
Tim Taylor
Director of Operations
PBS TeacherLine
703-739-5215
Oregon Department of Education: Course Licensing
We’ve been working with the Oregon Department of Education for about a year and a half to license 62 courses. This will not be a standard course license as the courses will not be facilitated and we will remove the discussion boards, Dropbox and class list as well as keep in the PBS branding. All course content will be in Moodle. This is a one year experiment to license non-facilitated courses. We are also discussing licensing facilitated courses with the Oregon Department of Education. We will keep stations posted as this relationship develops.
Moodle Update
We are on schedule for importing courses to Moodle. We are piloting one section of each of the following courses in Moodle: RDLA051.86 Raising Readers: Preparing Preschoolers for Success
MATH410.35 Seeing Math™: Linear Functions; TECH325.99 Searching and Researching on the Internet;
INST320.87 Connecting Family, Community and Schools. The goals of the pilot are to revise facilitator training, edit learner help documents, improve course structure, and learn basic lessons of administrating Moodle. Moodle pilot facilitators are in their course and becoming familiar with Moodle structure.
The deadline to have courses imported to Moodle is May 27. We will be training facilitators and staff between May 6 to May 20. Once courses are fully converted to Moodle, we plan to have them available for stations to preview in the station course preview account.
Between June 1 to July 1, all sections should be running in Moodle. We plan to demonstration a course in Moodle during the April station call.
Product Development
New Course: TECH345 Developing Understanding with Dynamic Media and Digital Storytelling
We are very pleased to announce that we have launched a new technology course: TECH345 Developing Understanding with Dynamic Media and Digital Storytelling. This course is open for enrollment for the national spring term. PBS TeacherLine stations may also order this for local course offerings.
TECH345: Developing Understanding with Dynamic Media and Digital Storytelling
Grades: K-12
Hours: 30
Description: Digital storytelling and dynamic media have the power and the potential to engage learners in remarkable new ways. In this course, you will explore the basics of these 21st century teaching and learning approaches and connect them to an updated version of Bloom's Taxonomy. Learn about useful Web 2.0 tools like 'mashups' for creating and sharing stories and study the steps involved in creating digital stories and corresponding evaluation rubrics.
Marketing & Sales
National Conference Update
Conference season is in full swing and PBS TeacherLine has had a strong presence at three conference in March. We exhibited and presented at the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD) Conference in San Antonio, TX on March 6 , 7 and 8. We had a 10x10 Booth and collected 500 leads. Elizabeth Wolzak and Nadyne Hick had a packed session of 66 people for a hands on presentation. Participants were very engaged in the one-hour interactive “Engaging Digital Natives with Web 2.0 Tools” session. At the Celebration of Teaching and Learning (COTL) conference in New York City on March 5 and 6, TeacherLine was part of the PBS Neighborhood and with WNED, ITVS, PBS Teachers, PBS Educational Media. We collected 1000 leads during COTL. The National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) in Philadelphia, PA on March 18, 19, and 20 was a large show with 1500 leads collected and special appearance from PBS characters. Conference leads that are from TeacherLine station territories will be shared with the appropriate stations. Following up with these leads is a great way to make a local connection with educators.
A special thank you to stations borrowing the banner stands and sending to the next station! Information on borrowing a banner stand is available on TL Admin > Marketing/Sales > Collateral > Banner Stands.