OneNote, One Stop, One School

Check out the expanded blog post from my write-up for Office Blogs below!

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Teachers need feedback for growth just like our students. Yet any administrator will tell you there’s simply not enough time to visit classrooms and provide teachers with meaningful and effective feedback in a timely manner.
 
As a Professional Development Liaison, I get to travel to K-12 schools in Hillsborough County and see what systems of support are in place for teacher growth. Nationally, administrators struggle with the same issues: high teacher to admin ratio, and a tendency to get pulled into building operations issues. Very rarely does the administrator get to visit classrooms, and even more rarely do they get to provide meaningful feedback.

Hillsborough county has worked hard for the last few years to change this and to provide administrators with an opportunity to be teacher leaders, not managers. And their job just got a little easier with Microsoft Office 365. 
 
Bellamy Elementary School was selected last year to become a pilot 1:1 school. It was the perfect fit, a Title I school with an amazing group of teachers and administrators to support students. I was excited to see how access to technology would affect student achievement. 

Dr. Seits, Assistant Principal, and Dr. Lazarus, Principal of Bellamy Elementary School

But before the school year started, before any students got their hands on devices, my mind was blown. 

OneNote Staff Notebook
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​Administration, Dr. Lazarus (Principal) and Dr. Seits (Assistant Principal), wanted to increase communication and collaboration amongst their teachers. They decided since most teachers planned on using OneNote in the classroom, they would create a Faculty Notebook for the staff.
Technically, we created a ‘Class’ Notebook’ because I wanted them to keep the Collaboration Space and Content Library permissions, as well as, the ability to ‘push’ things out using the Class Notebook Tool. 

They wanted the Staff notebook to be the one place teachers could go to for anything related to the school, sort of the ‘hub.’ But they also knew they would need to help ‘push’ teachers who weren’t tech-comfy to explore the notebook.
 
Dr. Seits had a genius idea. They would replace the original feedback form teachers received in their mailboxes on paper with a digital version in their private notebooks in OneNote.
 
Now teachers had a place where they could access faculty agendas, professional development materials, input school wide data, and so much more.
 
But how could administration track the implementation of professional development and trends in teaching across grade levels? How could they give teachers meaningful feedback in a way that felt like a conversation, without taking the time to meet with each teacher individually every week?

Office Forms as a Tool for Teacher Feedback

I wish I could say I was the mastermind behind using Office Forms, but that was all Dr. Seits. She had the vision of what was possible, I just had to show her a few clicks to get her going.
 
An Office Form was created for each grade level. Why? Because now all feedback data would be broken down into grade levels that teams and administration could easily reference. The walkthrough forms for the grade level had some similar components based on the instructional focus for the year.
 
Check out Dr. Seit’s example form here.
 
The administration fills out the Form each time they visit a classroom. They created shortcuts on their smart phones so they could easily access them. 

​Then, at the end of each day, the data is copy/pasted into the individual teacher’s private notebook. There is even a column for the teacher to write any comments on the feedback given.
 
Once a quarter, the data from each form is copy/pasted into the grade level section of the OneNote so teachers can meet and celebrate kudos, as well as, discuss how to tackle any weaknesses. 

​OneNote and Forms is revolutionizing the way of work at Bellamy Elementary School. It’s not about working harder, but working smarter.
 
Yes, the administrators are still busy with other things. Yes, they still have to schedule time to visit classrooms. But Forms is making the most of the time they are in the classroom, and OneNote ensures teachers are collaborating and growing from those visits.

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Disclaimer: This blog is a representation of my views alone and do not represent in any way the views of Hillsborough County Public Schools.