GSB Teachers are Lifelong Learners

This summer, the GSB faculty and staff are actively engaged in a myriad of professional development programs to enhance their teaching strategies, including sessions by Global Online Academy, Responsive Classroom, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Community (DEIC) awareness and training, Advanced Placement workshops, classes provided by the GSB Technology Department, and learning opportunities from NJAIS and other professional organizations.

Head of School Sid Rowell notes, "The summer work that our faculty and staff are doing to enhance their skills and understanding is really impressive. When our students return in September, they will be the beneficiaries of this major professional commitment."
 
Global Online Academy
 
According to Dean of Faculty Irene Mortensen, “Faculty are taking Global Online Academy’s Designing for Online Learning courses, which has four distinct modules: Design for Student Agency, Design for Wayfinding, Design for Relationships, and Design for Assessment. Elements from these courses will guide lesson design for the 2020-21 academic year.”

  • Design for Student Agency: “The most important system to design is communication. Online learners need agency in to succeed, and good communication empowers learners.”
  • Design for Wayfinding: “Wayfinding is how your students orient themselves and navigate their way through the online space, and it can include anything from video instructions to visual cues.”
  • Design for Relationships:  “As with brick and mortar classrooms, relationships are central to successful online learning experiences. Educators must be intentional when it comes to building strong, healthy communities.”
  • Design for Assessment: “Online learning opens up the possibility for students to collaborate with students and experts who don’t share their location, leverage digital tools, and curate and create content relevant to real-world issues.”
Diversity, Equity, Inclusion & Community
  • On July 16, the New Jersey Association of Independent School (NJAIS) hosted a film screening and @BlackatDiscussion: The Prep School Negro, facilitated by the film’s creator André Robert Lee.
  • Diversity dialogues for faculty and staff were held in early June, and initiatives for preliminary curriculum review and enhancements have begun.
Responsive Classroom
 
Lower and Middle School teachers are participating in Responsive Classroom training, which is a student-centered, social, and emotional learning approach to teaching and discipline. It is comprised of a set of research, and evidence-based practices designed to create safe, joyful, and engaging classroom and school communities for both students and teachers which focuses on engaging academics, positive community, effective management, and developmental awareness. 
 
Advanced Placement
 
Upper School faculty in all departments are completing Advanced Placement (AP) training to enhance their teaching of the following College Board AP courses:
  • AP Art and Design 
  • AP English Language and Literature  
  • AP Environmental Science 
  • AP European History  
  • AP Latin 
  • AP Psychology 
  • AP Statistics 
Summer 2020 Technology Workshops
 
GSB’s own Joan Mruk, Director of Technology, and Brendan Flanagan, Technology Integration Specialist, are teaching a series of engaging workshops to faculty and staff, including:

  • Creating Multimodal Content  - Learn to deliver content through multiple media, including screencasting and video recording, audio recording, interactive “static” knowledge products, interactive videos, recorded presentations, and “hyperdocs.” Tools: , Screencast-o-matic, Soundtrap, Animoto, Newsela, ThingLink, Playposit, PowerPoint, GoogleDocs/Microsoft Word. 
  • Creating Multimodal Assignments - Learn to use multimedia approaches to assign your students work and learn how students can use multiple media in demonstrating mastery and/or organize knowledge, including podcasting, video production, “web design” (air quotes), and others. Tools: , Microsoft Sway, GoogleSites, Padlet, Soundtrap, Flipgrid, ThingLink, BookCreator/Storyboard That.
  • Digital Collaboration – Learn tools that allow students to work together for both regular studying and in group assessments. The focus is on the means of collaboration, rather than the end-product of the collaboration. Tools: Office365/Google Apps, Padlet, Soundtrap, Adobe Spark, Quizlet, Kahoot! 
  • Digital Assessments - Discover digital tools for “alternative” means of assessment, specifically formative, rather than just summative. While “standard” assessment tools (such as Microsoft & Google Forms,  Assessments, etc.) will be presented, we focus on how students can demonstrate knowledge in other ways. Tools: , Office365/Google Apps, Padlet, IXL, TurnItIn, Nearpod, ThingLink. 
  • Engaging Synchronous Lessons - Learn how to best utilize your “live” time with students. Less about tools and more about teaching, this session covers best practices for “live” online teaching and how to prepare your students for lively and engaging sessions. Tools: , Microsoft Teams/Google Meet, Nearpod, Padlet, Kahoot!, “hyperdocs”, Flipgrid. 
     
    Developing Asynchronous Lessons - This session covers such concepts as “timing” lessons and how to make “out of tune” not “out of touch.” It will cover tools to “liven up” the standard “read and respond” format of asynchronous assignments. Tools: , Nearpod, Padel, Flipgrid, Playposit, TurnItIn, Book Creator/Storyboard That, ThingLink, Soundtrap, Seesaw. 
  • G-Camp - A five-hour “deep dive” on the Google apps, this session covers both basic productivity through Google Docs, Slides, and Forms, and delves into the interactive and dynamic side of Google, allowing you to make your teaching through the Google suite more dynamic and engaging. Apps to be covered: Docs, Slides, Forms, Sites, Google Earth, Jamboard, Drive. 
  • M-Camp - A five-hour intensive session on the Microsoft365 apps to introduce some basics to the familiar apps of Word and PowerPoint, and also introduce the cloud-based functionality offered with more recent updates to Microsoft, including new apps and add-ons. Apps: OneDrive, Word, PowerPoint, Forms, Sway, OneNote/Class Notebook, Stream. 
  •  Boot Camp – A less formal presentation, these five-hour intensive days are dedicated to setting up your virtual classroom. Introductions to best practices (and refreshers on old ones) are offered. This will be a primarily “hands on” workshop dedicated to giving you time with Technology staff to prepare your class Bulletin Boards & Topics for the coming year. 
NJAIS – A Sampling of Additional Webinars/Workshops/Courses 
  • NJAIS Online Teaching and Learning Workshop:  Literacy, Laughter, and Learning as well as Math, Manipulatives, and Monitoring 
  • NJAIS Innovating Instruction Conference 
  • Foreign Language Educators of NJ (FLENJ) Summer Refresher Conference 2020 
  • Rutgers University Webinar: Generating Ease in Troubled Times: Lessons from Neuroscience 
  • Broadway Teachers Workshop 
  • Bureau of Education and Research (BER)
    • “Distance Learning in Kindergarten: Successful, Practical Strategies” 
    • “Teaching and Learning in the Block Schedule” 
 
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Gill St. Bernard's School

P.O. Box 604, St. Bernard's Road, Gladstone, NJ 07934  |  908-234-1611
Gill St. Bernard’s is a private, coeducational day school for students age three through grade 12, located in suburban New Jersey. Each of the three school divisions provides a rigorous, meaningful, and age-appropriate curriculum, and all students benefit from the environmental learning opportunities that exist on our 208-acre campus.