I. Am. Exhausted. It's been a long two weeks in my new job, mostly because I was required to attend three "back to school" nights for the three, grade level iPad teams. This was my first time attending three different grade level meetings, and it was an experience!
When I first starting teaching 1:1, we did not have a special back to school night for 1:1 students and parents. We still had parents attending our traditional back to school night with the entire staff. It worked okay, but parents had a lot of questions, and the teachers did not always have the answers. We, as a 1:1 staff, realized that we needed to place more importance on meeting the students' and parents' needs when it came to the iPads. So three years ago we started having separate 1:1 back to school nights.
They were a disaster. The first year we were in the gym, and no one notified the custodial staff that we were having a special event? The custodial staff turns off the air conditioning at night to save electricity/money. So we had more than 150 parents sitting in a gym with no air conditioning. It was miserable. So last year, we notified the custodial staff AND decided to meet in our classrooms. Unfortunately, the air conditioning still could not keep up, and it was hot... not as bad, but still terrible.
So this year, we split 6th, 7th, and 8th grade nights, and held the meetings in the cafeteria which is the coolest room in the entire building. We held the 8th grade meeting first, and it still did not go well. What were the biggest issues? 1) The wifi was unable to process so many people on devices in one room. We had an open wifi so that students could log into their devices. I have a suspicion that parents and students also connected their personal devices (hey, free wifi!). We found out later that we really can only have 90 devices connected per Meraki box. We had two boxes set up in the cafeteria but then discovered that one was not fully connected by an IT specialist. WHOOPS. 2) Most of the 8th grade parents had students on a 1:1 team since 6th grade, so they didn't need all of the information they were given. They were itching to get out of there, but our principal was planning on a 90-minute meeting.
So after a not great night, my principal, our 21st C specialist, and I got together to discuss how to make this better. We knew we needed to have it figured out before our 6th grade meeting. The good news is that I feel like we finally mastered the formula! Even one of the 6th grade teachers agreed :)
#1: Parents were given the iPad when they came in the door. This was not any different than what we'd done in the past, but we had directions on the screen for how to log in to the iPad. This meant that the wifi was not overwhelmed with too many devices at once.
Parents also filled out a questionnaire once they got connected.
#2: Teachers presented information about their classes. My principal told them she wanted the teachers to present, between the four of them, for 30-45 minutes. LOL. By the last night, she told them to talk for no more than five minutes each! Parents had access to their presentation slide deck, and if they had questions, they could stick around to address the teachers.
#3: I went over logging in directions one more time and explained why the questionnaire was necessary. I then told parents that they could stick around and get logged in, or they could finish at home. Then I dismissed them to check out. We finished the 7th and 6th grade meetings in less than 60 minutes (compared to 90 minutes for 8th grade). Getting the parents out promptly was incredibly important.
So, if you are starting 1:1 teams in your school or you haven't held a special "back to school" night for your 1:1 teams, I encourage you to think about trying this next year :)
Thanks for reading. I'll see you next week!
- Rachel
My Teacherspayteachers website
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