 Hi, my name is Todd Nessloney and I'm going to be talking today about connecting kids globally. I'm a fifth grade teacher in Waller, Texas at Field Store Elementary. Waller is about 30 miles west of Houston. I myself have learned over the last year and a half what it's like to be a connected educator. And the more I learned about connecting myself with a global audience of educators, the more I learned the value of connecting my students with an audience, it's just the same. And so I started thinking, why do my students need to connect? Why do I need to connect my students? And the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I'm the kind of person and my generation are the kind of people that we like positive feedback from people that we know and respect. But that's not always the case with kids. Kids these days want positive feedback from anyone. They don't care who they're getting the feedback from, whether it's the neighbor down the street or some stranger in a different country. That's why our kids post random photos of themselves everywhere. Kids are connected beings. They are collaborating and connecting and working with people all the time. And what we need to do in education is we need to find ways to use that want of theirs to connect with others and use it in the educational realm. So where do we even begin with that? There's so many ways to do it. Three of my favorites, one of them is Skype in the Classroom. Skype in the Classroom is an educational site that Skype has incredible resources. The website is education.scipe.com. And what they are is they have created this website where you can go and find other educators who are looking to Skype. You can find companies, businesses, celebrities, authors, all kinds of things. Almost every single Skype that my students did last year, they did because of the resources that I found on Skype in the Classroom. Another new resource that's come around recently that's completely free is Google Hangouts. I have fallen in love with Google Hangouts just because they're easy to use and they can be recorded. You have to have a Google Plus account, which if you have a Gmail, all you have to do is open up a Google Plus account. It's really easy to do. And then starting a Google Hangout is very simplistic and inviting people. You may have to play with it a little bit before you get started, but it's really not much more difficult than Skype. And my students really kind of prefer the Google Hangout too just because of the way it looks. And like I said, the fact that we can record the Hangout because I teach several classes. And so when I schedule Hangouts with different countries or different teachers or authors or things, they can't always do it multiple times and I can't always get my students all together. So being able to record the interaction between us is very important because I want my students to be able to watch it later. Twitter is my third avenue that I use to really connect with different people online. I've built quite a big social network PLN through Twitter. And that's where I go and find people to do different Skype switch, find people to do the Hangout with. That's where I found some celebrities that we've done it with, some Olympic athletes. It's just been an incredible resource for us to use to constantly find people that we can interact with online. Now, you have the tools. You know you have Skype, Google Hangouts, Twitter, whatever. Now what do you do? Well, an excellent place to start with connecting your classrooms are Mystery Skypes. Mystery Skypes are something I heard about last year. They are so easy to do and they are a blast for students. You can search Twitter and search the hashtag Mystery Skype, but Skype has recently partnered with that hashtag and they now have an entire section on their education website about Mystery Skype. And what that is is that you go and you as the teacher connect with another educator or individual from somewhere else in the world. And then you know where that person is from and that person knows where you are from, but your students don't know. And so what we did was this year we did a Mystery Skype with a friend of mine in Michigan who teaches third grade at Bloomfield Hills Elementary in Michigan. And what we did was I knew he was from Michigan, he knew I was from Texas, but our students didn't know that. And so when we started the Skype, I introduced myself, I introduced my students, he introduced himself and his students, and then our students went back and forth with yes or no questions. And there's different ways you can do this. This is just kind of the way we did it. We asked yes or no questions. Are you in the United States? Are you west of the Mississippi? Is the climate hot all year long? Things like that. We asked lots of questions. We had maps out. We had Google Earth going ice and kids on Google. We were prepared and ready to go. We asked if they lived near a beach, if it snowed, if they had mountains. And then through the questioning back and forth, you try to be the first class to guess where the other one is from. And so they were able to guess we were from Texas. I think it's probably because I accidentally say y'all quite a bit. It kind of gives away our location. That's something I'm trying to work on. But it's just so much fun to briefly meet somebody else from somewhere else on the planet. And then just to ask them yes or no questions, the kids get really excited. There was not really much prep necessary. I know some teachers assign jobs ahead of time. Some teachers prep questions ahead of time. It's kind of whatever you're comfortable with and the time that you want to put in. But Mystery Skypes are great. Some other strategies that I have for when doing Mystery Skypes though, definitely talk with your kids about behaviors and expectations that you have of them before you get on any kind of Skype or Google Hangout. Much less a Mystery Skype because I know kids get really excited their first experience. And what they want to do is they want to wave at the camera or they want to act silly. I had an issue with students getting so excited about the Skype that they weren't even paying attention to the other questions that were being asked. And I would have my class ask the same question multiple times, which not only is a little crazy, but it makes us look kind of ignorant. And so we've had a lot of discussions about behavior expectations and setting the best example. But it's really been an excellent experience. This year we've already done four Mystery Skypes. We did two out of Michigan. We did one out of California. And we did one out of Florida. And I'm looking to find some teachers to do from other countries too because I think that would be a really great experience. There's also more ways you can connect. I think that doing a Skype and a Google Hangout and all that is all great and awesome. But there's also ways to get your kids connected to activities outside of the classroom. One of my favorite resources that is completely free is Classroom Champions. I love Classroom Champions. It was started co-founded by Olympic gold medalist Steve Messler, who was on the men's box play team. He started this program as a way to connect Olympic athletes and Paralympic athletes with classrooms for free. And when you go to their website, there's tons of character education activities where you can use to work with kids to learn about goal setting and fair play and getting along and all kinds of things done by actual Olympic athletes and Paralympic athletes. You can also, in the spring, apply to be a Classroom Champions teacher. And what that allows you to do is you get assigned an Olympic athlete for a year. So my class this year is a Classroom Champions class. We're one of 33 in the nation, the United States. And so what's exciting is we have an Olympic athlete, Josh Sweeney, who is actually a Paralympic athlete. He does sled hockey. And my kids get to watch a video with him every month. We're going to get to Skype with him a couple of times. And our kids get to connect with and learn from him. And then the best part is my kids get to watch him on the Olympics in the winter Olympics and get to cheer him on, somebody that they've connected with and learned from. What better experience? And I always think about, I've got to have the great opportunity to talk with Steve Meslow, the co-founder, quite a bit. And one of my favorite stories that Steve shares is a kindergarten class that used the program. And they used the program all year long and watched videos. And all the videos they watched was of a Paralympic athlete who played basketball from a wheelchair. And in kindergarten, kids don't really have that term disability in their terminology. They don't understand what disability is. They just see everything as the same. And so after learning about this athlete all year and learning about these great character skills, they ended up going on a field trip at the end of the year. And when they got there, one of the kindergartners pulled on the teacher's sleeve and said, teacher, teacher, that girl over there is missing an arm. What sport do you think she plays? And to me, that's the power of connecting kids with experiences outside of the classroom. Right there, that kid no longer saw that girl as different as being a bad thing. That little kindergartner saw that girl and thought, wow, she's got to play a sport because she's different. What is more powerful than an experience like that? And so I always tell teachers, you know, my kids that I teach, I teach in a very low socioeconomic status school. Many of my students probably won't ever leave the state of Texas. I want to give them experiences that make their life better, that take them outside of the classroom, outside of their city, outside of their state so that they can go and experience these incredible things that otherwise many of them never would. Some really cool Skypes that we've got to do this year. Last year we got to Skype with Sweden and Australia and the UK and Canada and Turkey and Venezuela in addition to many states in the United States. My kids probably will never travel to those countries. And you know, I teach math and not one Skype that we have done has had anything to do with math. So why do I do them? I'm very passionate about giving kids experiences because if they love coming to my class, I have them in their life putty in my hand. And I can use those experiences and say, you know what? Remember that Skype that we did with Sweden? It was so much fun. I want to do it with Australia, but we've got to get through all this curriculum first. So you've got to work with me. You've got to put forth the effort and then we'll go and do this. And my kids work really hard for me. So I always tell people, you know, don't miss your opportunity to inspire your students, to give them these great interactions. I have a couple of pictures here on this slide. One of them in the top right corner is our Skype that we did with the 2012 ISEF winner, I am still in shock that we got to do a Skype with him. He is now 16 years old. He was 15 when he won and he's essentially developed a cure for pancreatic cancer. It's a little paper sensor test that with one drop of blood or urine can 100% of the time detect pancreatic lung or ovarian cancer. Now when pancreatic cancer is detected in the early stages, it's 100% curable. And so he has developed this amazing resource just by using Google and Wikipedia. And to have him come on into Skype with my kids and he talks about, you know what, guys? I am not some genius. I used Google and Wikipedia because I was emotionally impacted by losing somebody in my life to pancreatic cancer. And look what I've developed. You can do anything. And for a fifth grader to hear that, that, wow, this kid is telling me that I can do anything because he did something incredible. He's not the president. He's traveled all around the world. He's spoke at the White House. My kids just ate it up. And it was such a neat experience. Like I said, we've gotten to do Google Hangouts and Skype classes from all over the world. But besides that, if you notice another picture I have on this slide is a little robot with an iPad attached to top. Kevin Honeycutt was a friend of mine. And we were able to go in and connect with that robot and control the robot while he was doing a project-based learning activity with students. And we got to walk around in the room in a school in Kansas. Even though we weren't there, my students got to control this robot and have their face on the screen and walk around and talk to kids and look at their presentation all in the middle of their class. The possibilities are limitless for us to bring kids outside the classroom wall. We have to step out. We have to take the lead. And you know what? Like I said, sometimes it won't fit the curriculum. But we as teachers need to be providing our students with experiences that they will remember for a lifetime. That's when you reach a kid. You reach a kid when you get those experiences and get their heart. And I am really passionate about that. If you have any questions about any of the stuff I talked about or any of the ideas, please feel free to contact me. I'm very active on Twitter. My Twitter name is Tech Ninja Todd. There's my email on the screen. I also included my Skype name. I love connecting with classrooms and with other businesses and corporations. So if you're interested in skyping with us, let me know. I'm totally game. And also my website down there so you can get some other resources from it or some other ideas. But don't be afraid to step outside the classroom wall. None of us are great at anything the first time we try it. None of our Skype are huge successes. But the real success in coming on building that experience with your students. So I encourage you to step outside your comfort zone. Step outside your box. Use Skype. Use Twitter. Use Google Hangouts. Use whatever you're comfortable with. But bring those experiences into your student. Because you will be amazed at the difference it makes when you bring those kids outside of those classroom walls and give them experiences they never would have been able to experience otherwise. Thank you guys. Have a great day.