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EdTech Show Daily Thursday, February 9, 2017 1 2 FOCUS SCHOOL SOFTWARE AWARDED CONTRACT BY HARRIS COUNTY DOE AND CHOICE PARTNERS School districts nationwide can purchase or upgrade student information systems technology without having to orchestrate their own proposal process, thanks to a contract awarded to Focus School Software by Harris County Department of Education for its Choice Partners pur- chasing cooperative. Following an exten- sive review period which culminated in onsite vendor demonstrations, a new con- tract for SIS was awarded to Focus School Software at the October 2016 HCDE board meeting. In the company's response to the HCDE Choice Partners request for SIS proposals, Focus School Software met or exceeded every requirement in terms of key functionality, ease-of-use and state- reporting. Known for system scalability and outstanding return on investment, Focus develops and customizes Student Information Systems, Learning Management Systems and Enterprise Resource Planning Systems for some of the largest public school districts in Texas and Florida, serving more than one million students. Focus puts a premium on responsive customer service, and Chief Executive Officer Andrew Schmadeke believes the new SIS contract with Choice Partners is proof HCDE does as well. "At Focus, we dedicate ourselves every day to providing our clients with the best soft- ware and service found anywhere in K-12," said Schmadeke. "Our new contract with Choice Partners is a perfect fit for our customer-first philosophy. Traditionally, school districts wishing to upgrade infor- mation systems had to go through a com- plicated and time-consuming RFP process. Thanks to Choice Partners, the vetting for the most advanced, user- friendly SIS solutions has already been done. They've gone through the RFP process so districts don't have to tie up their own resources." Choice Partners national coopera- tive offers quality, legal procurement solutions to meet the purchasing needs of governmental entities. Contracts are competitively bid so members can act immediately to access the contract they need, saving time and money on the bidding process and purchase. In addition to technol- ogy and supplies, Choice Partners offers contracts for edu- cation, facilities, food services and a unique supply catalog. Choice Partners is a division of the governmental entity of Harris County Department of Education. For more information on Focus School Software, contact Focus at 877.250.1771 or visit www.focusschool- software.com/texas. You can also visit www.choicepartners.org/vendors/focus- school-software to learn more about HCDE Choice Partners contract 16/059KH-01. Visit Focus School Software at booth #235. For more information, go to www.focusschoolsoftware.com. FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT IN THE CLASSROOM By Ann Hayes, Ph.D., Manager of Online Content and Research, Measurement Incorporated Formative assessment has been around for decades. Benjamin Bloom, well- known for his Taxonomy of Learning Domains, emphasized the need for instructional differentiation that matched the needs of each student. Based on his study of how tutors worked with students, he maintained that adding more time for those who needed it as well as re-teaching would allow all stu- dents to be successful. He also thought that assessments should be used to give students feedback and to serve as guides for correction (Bloom, 1968). According to a policy brief on formative assessment published by the National Council of Teachers of English (2010), excellent formative assessment empha- sizes the quality of student work instead of the quantity; coaching and encour- agement for improvement rather than grades; student-instructor dialogue as opposed to lectures; and as many chances for success as necessary, con- centrating on a few increments of under- standing at a time. Many types of formative assessment happen naturally in the classroom, as instructors give specific, timely feedback to students on their learning and then work to strengthen understanding of con- cepts. Formative assessment does not result in a grade in the grade book. It instead guides instructors and students in making decisions during learning about what additional learning needs to take place. There are also more formal methods of formative assessment. PEG Writing ® is one of these meth- ods. PEG Writing allows stu- dents to practice writing in a low-stakes environment and receive timely feedback on their efforts. PEG Writing offers several forms of feedback to the student writer. First, it provides in-text conventions and sentence structure feed- back. Students also receive scores for each of the Six Traits of Writing, so that they can see which areas need improve- ment. In addition, they may also receive targeted feedback or suggested lessons on one or more traits. It's a great way for students to polish their writing on their own, without teacher input. Outside of automated feedback, instructors can leave "sticky notes" and messages for students to give them sug- gestions or corrections on which students should focus. Moreover, there is a place for instructors to score content accuracy and textual evidence, which are not auto- matically scored by PEG Writing. Using PEG Writing should be a partnership among the student, instruc- tor and program. The goal is not to earn a specific overall score, but to improve on each trait using feedback from both the program and the instructor. It is important to note that while PEG Writing is an excellent tool for stu- dent writing practice, it is merely one tool for teaching writing. Just as a con- tractor cannot build a house with only a hammer, instructors cannot teach writing solely with PEG Writing. Used in con- junction with a writing program that includes instructor modeling, instruction and assessment, PEG Writing can help students increase their writing skills and confidence. You can find the full article on form- ative assessment and a list of references on the PEG Writing blog. Learn more about PEG Writing at booth #1552. EXPLORING ROBOTICS TAKES AIRBLOCK DRONE INTO MIDDLE SCHOOL An interview with Linda Nichols- Plowman, Chief Executive Officer, Interactive Media Publishing/Exploring Robotics. ESD: Tell our readers about your prod- uct. LN-P: Many schools have drone classes, but the brand new Airblock Drone is a modular drone that transforms into a hov- ercraft. It is like nothing else before it. ESD: Why are you so excited about this drone? LN-P: Exploring Robotics searched for a drone that could be used safely in the classroom and would be rugged enough to withstand years of use, and we finally found it. The Airblock Drone kit not only can be assembled as a drone, it can also be assembled as a hovercraft for use on land and in water. The multiple configu- rations that can be made from the kit are magnetically snapped together in seconds to create both aerodynamic and hydrody- namic science experiments. It is made of a rugged type of styrofoam with the mechanical parts tucked safely inside. The parts snap together with magnets, meaning it can be reconfigured easily in just a few minutes. When it hits a wall, it just bounces. If it falls, it can easily be snapped back together. Students are excit- ed to use it, and teachers are excited by all the science topics they can teach with it. ESD: Tell our readers about your company. LN-P: Interactive Media Publishing was founded in 1996 to produce online cours- es and interactive content. We began cre- ating curriculum for robots and selling robots as a Value Added Reseller under the Exploring Robotics brand in 2012. ESD: How do you plan to integrate this new product? LN-P: The Airblock Drone fits well into the middle school part of our Mobile Robots and Internet of Things pathway of products. It works well with the physical science and math concepts that can be taught in grades 7-9. It also uses Scratch for coding, so it fits well with other products we offer that use Scratch. By using the Airblock Drone as the hardware piece to our Exploring Drones curriculum, we are able to explore sever- al different aspects of drone technology covering land, sea and air while creating a safe environment to learn about the lat- est drone technology. ESD: What is unique about the curricu- lum? LN-P: The Exploring Robotics curricu- lum is self-paced, with videos. We also provide professional development and support for teachers. We're including content from NASA in the curriculum for aerodynamics. While planning a flight route, students will use math to calculate weight, height, angles of rotation and speed. They will also consider physical science concepts of airlift, force and ener- gy transfer. Concepts such as fric- tion and buoyancy are easy to grasp with activities in air, on land and in water. Other topics include safety, flight physics, mimic drones in industry, systems, Scratch coding, career opportunities and lots of fun competi- tions! ESD: How do the students control the drone? LN-P: Students use apps on a tablet to control the Airblock Drone or Hovercraft. They can also customize the actions with Scratch code with a drag and drop puzzle-like interface in Windows or Mac OS. They send code to the Arduino microcontroller brain on the drone with a Bluetooth connection for easy control in activities and competitions. For more information, visit www.exploring robots.com and www.makeblock.com or call 760.650.2687.