 Welcome. Today we are focusing on getting organized with digital portfolios and maybe you are someone who is moving from a paper portfolio system to a digital portfolio system and we're going to kind of walk through various aspects of both today. I'm Angela. I taught kindergarten for 15 years. I have, I'm a mom of two kiddos. I have now a fourth and seventh grader. And I lead the community team here at SESA supporting teachers getting going and also staying engaged with SESA as well from all over the world. So you can follow me at Mrs. Gadki. Let me know how you do it with your CSI and let's talk about a couple other things to note if you are watching this recording. We do offer certificates of completion for this session. So you're just going to want to listen for a six character code that I give throughout the session and you'll fill out a form that is available in the video description or in a follow-up email if you're watching the recording. So today's plan is that we are going to first talk about different types of digital portfolios and their purposes. We are going to work on creating folders and everyone's favorite topic, easier workflow, right? Save yourself some time. And then we're going to visit the topic of preparing for conferences which you might have coming up and then we're hopefully going to have a chunk of time at the end for your questions. So the first thing I want to just jump into are the various types of digital portfolios. So really when you start maybe rapping your reign about a digital portfolio or a portfolio in general, there's three main kinds that are usually talked about. A process portfolio, showcase portfolio and assessment portfolio. So they have some maybe similar characteristics. They're slightly different. So a process portfolio would really be a space that your students can use to document their learning throughout maybe a unit or throughout the process of a project. And it doesn't have to be a final beautiful end product that is only going into the portfolio. Now showcase portfolio on the other side of that would be mostly focused on really including that last piece of work. Maybe it shows a couple beginning stages, but mostly showcasing your best work at the end. And then an assessment portfolio, you might use that for gathering formative assessments or showing evidence of your work supporting various skills or standards. So I also link to an article that actually goes a lot more in depth in on this topic, but just generally that those are about the three main types of portfolios that are usually talked about. And the great thing is seesaw can be all three for you so you could use it in each of those various ways or maybe you want to really get started using it one particular way and then maybe add other components. So we're also going to talk today about folders and folders actually will also allow you to not only get a little bit more organized, but also be able to filter and sort out your folder, your portfolio, or your students can do that as well. So that can also be a place where maybe within a process portfolio like you're using maybe you're starting with that with seesaw and you want to pull some things out to really have more of a showcase portfolio. Your folders might come in handy for that type of work as well. So I want you just to think for a moment and take a second to first think about your purpose. Why are you hoping to use seesaw. What are you hoping to what need are you hoping to fill with the portfolio that you are creating so think about that for a moment. I always encourage teachers to, no matter what they're doing their classroom start first with your purpose. So just kind of giving you a brief introduction to various types, you may have already picked. Oh, that's absolutely how I'm going to use it. And you can kind of have that as a frame of reference as we continue our discussion here today. And I just also want to let you know it's completely okay to shift gears. So what I mean by that is sometimes if you have been doing something a certain way in your classroom and you already feel like you have a good system you might be thinking, why might I want to shift gears or how do I do this how do I even get started I'm not sure. So what I have on the screen here are a couple questions that you might ask yourself. So thinking first what did you include in a paper portfolio. So when I started teaching when I, you know, started teaching kindergarten. It was all paper. So we literally had physical portfolios that most of the time it was me trying to stuff, you know the pieces of work in and collected from students and you know get that get that all crammed in that paper portfolio. So if you're using that as your starting point. It's, it's kind of an easy way to begin to think about what did you include in that paper portfolio and again, why was it included in there who is the audience at the end that is going to either get this portfolio or view aspects of this portfolio. The other thing to think about is maybe you aren't using paper portfolios, but you maybe have binders right so I also myself transition into that as well. So maybe you have binders where you're keeping you know papers on assessment or checklist or you know other pieces of work that you still have in a binder. Think about how you might be able to shift gears and how that could potentially live in Seesaw. The other thing I want you to start thinking about is what do you currently do to prepare for conferences so I know when we talk about family conferences, or parent teacher conferences. We all kind of maybe have our different routine for getting ready for those and normally, there's a lot of work right you're always you're always kind of trying to plan what are you going to talk about what are you going to show what are the discussion of points or conversations you're going to have with your families. So we're going to get to kind of touch on all of those today as we get started here. So the first thing I actually want to show you and I'm going to before it happened to this slide I'm actually going to go into a Seesaw class. This is a grade grade class that I use for various sessions and what I first of all want to point out to you is that Seesaw itself is creating a portfolio for each of your students. So when you're in Seesaw and you're in as a teacher when you scroll, you are seeing your entire classes journal or portfolio. As you know, each of these individual student names if I click on Ali, for example, now I am just seeing her individual portfolio. So already just embedded in Seesaw, you are already creating that digital portfolio for each student. So anytime that they are posting, you're already doing it and you might be thinking, oh my gosh, it was that easy and I'm going to say yes it was. Okay, so that's really step step one is to realize, again, transferring from maybe what you were using in a paper portfolio or binder. A lot of that can just go into Seesaw and save you a whole lot of hauling and shuffling and sorting and organizing. So number one, it's probably already more organized if it's inside Seesaw. But the next thing I actually want to talk about is how to get even more organized when you start using folders in Seesaw. And again, folders are really used as a way to filter a student's portfolio. Okay, so when I go into my third grade class right here, I can create all sorts of folders. So in order to do that, I first can start in the upper right in my class settings so I can tap on their wrench. And once I tap on the wrench, I will be able to scroll all the way down here to a section that says folders. Now you can choose to manage folders and what that is going to do, it's going to bring you to all of the folders you have created. So let's start there. Now you can see I already have some folders created for this class. You'll also notice some of these folder names have emojis pasted in. And that is a pro tip for those of you that are maybe working with younger students. That's a really good way to kind of give them that picture queue as well as to what folder they are adding to. Now in order to create a folder, it's as easy as just tap and create folder. I'm going to choose a color and I actually am on a MacBook. So I am going to say I'm going to get emoji.com by the way, because I like to go here sometimes and copy and paste from here. So I'm actually going to copy this little detective folder or emoji. I'm just going to paste it right there and I'm going to call this science explorations. Okay, so there is my folder. Now again, you can paste an emoji in to the name of the folder. Again, the reason we're doing that is just to give a little picture queue if you're working with it. The other thing I want to show you is this one up here at the top has a period at the beginning of the name. And that is a special tip to let you know that that folder is going to rise to the top of all of your other folders. Okay, so if you're if you're doing something where you want students to just pick one specific folder and not have them try to, you know, search through these, then you would maybe use that trick. Um, so I've created a folder science explorations. Now, what does this look like in my class. So if I X out of there, I'm still in class settings. I want to look at this option right here show add to folder step. Right now, if I click on here there are three options. Do you never want to show this that means you don't have folder setup. Do you want only teachers to be able to see the opportunity to add to a folder, or would you also like students to have the operability, operability, oh my goodness, opportunity to add to a folder as well. So if you want your students adding to a folder as they are posting to see some make sure you have this option selected. So I'm just going to go like that. Now what I'm going to do right now is actually show you the flow of this. And I'm going to go to the green add button. I because I'm signed in as a teacher. I'm just going to choose post student work. I'm going to draw a wonderful masterpiece right here. And I'm going to tap the green check in the upper right. I'm going to choose my name. I'm playing around. So I'm going to say sample student upper right for the green check and now I have my opportunity to choose a folder. So I'm going to put this in science explorations. Your students can also choose multiple folders as well. So if you are doing, you know, an amazing lesson that really incorporates all sorts of subject areas they can also tag those folders. So just because I created science explorations we're going with that one. I'm going to tap the green check. And that post is being uploaded and added now of course because I'm in the teacher in the teacher view. I don't have to approve it because I just post it as a teacher. So you'll see under the post it is tagged with the science exploration folder. Okay, so I can also go to previous posts and just tap the folder icon under it. And then put it in a folder. So maybe I want this one to go in social studies and best of third grade. I don't know making it up tap the green check. And you'll see it's tagged with those two folders. Again, I can go to each of these and add it to a folder. I could do that one on time so that is something you could do after the fact if you're just starting to use folders now and you have a lot of content in your class you could do that. Now the great thing about folders and why they're helpful is because right now if I tap on the class journal that means everything in my class. I can tap on the right and I can see this folder icon. If I click there, I am able to say oh I only want to see math items right now so I'm going to click on math. And my feed is only going to show math work. Okay, so that's one way to filter it helps of course have a folder. I could also click on an individual student name so I'm going to Angela. And if I click on Angela I can tap on the right and then I could choose oh I'm going to go to Angela's got nothing in a folder so if I chose math it would show all of the math work in that one place. Let's try with that with Karina she might have more work in folders let's see oh look at this. So Karina has three items in the best of third grade. So here they are. Okay, so speaking of best of third grade if you actually go to our YouTube channel there's a whole video about this concept of creating a best of folder that will come in handy. At the end of your school year. It might also be something that you want to create in your classroom if you're doing student led conferences and we'll talk about that as we kind of keep progressing. The other thing I want to show you here if I tap on this folder. I also have a private teacher only folder, and that is available if you have the premium features of seesaw included in seesaw plus or seesaw for schools. Now what it means is exactly what it says here teachers only. So that means if you put something in a private teacher only folder, no one will see it. Don't get notified students don't see it only you have access to it. So you might use that if you know you have a specific assessment that you don't want to share or post you could put it there for example. Okay, so I'm going to get back into our slides and show you a couple more things so the other thing to think about is when you are starting with folders. It's best to not go too wild. Okay, start with a few key folders. In my classroom we started with the writing folder and that's that's what we started with first because that's what I was ready to organize to kind of the next level. We just show I just showed you how you go to manage class or your class settings, and then that show to students and teacher stuff and we just created some so I kind of already showed you that. The other thing to think about to is if you or if you have a co teacher or like a specialist, for example, maybe you create a folder for the specialist so that when they are posting from the specialist class. Then that work can be tagged with that class so there's a little bit more context for families as well when they see it. Other options is what I call a wow work folder, so that might be something where again you're having students reflect and pick out their best pieces to highlight in a certain folder, or a conference folder as well. If there are certain things you want to pull out to just show at conferences, which we'll talk about in a little bit, but we love to have using workflow goals right so I'm going to give you a couple tips. How your workflow might be used here. Boy, we've all been here right when you're hauling home all sorts of binders and stacks and notebooks and all of that. So again, think of seesaw as this place that all of that can live. So you're not trying to get that organized and haul it home and your wheelie cards and all of that. So when I was one of the ways that I share and explain about the use of folders and or portfolio is with writer's workshop so again when you're using seesaw you are already creating a portfolio for each student just by having them post. Now, as I mentioned a moment ago, I started with a writing folder because I wanted to have a very, a folder that really showed my students growth specifically related to writing. So at the end of every month, the students would choose one piece their very best piece that they would, you know, decide to add to seesaw. And of course they were posting with seesaw during writer's workshop at other times. However, this was the one time during the month that they chose one that would go inside the writing folder. And I did that. So we would have a sample from September and October and November and December. So we could filter by that folder and really, really see that growth quite quickly and have that those pieces to really highlight that. When we're talking about easy workflow. It's also good to know that you can tag an activity with a folder before you assign it to your students. So as I just demonstrated before. If you're at this session, you're like, oh my gosh, I so much work in my seesaw class. I want it all organized in folders. You could do that. I mean, you could just go at it, right. Or you could start when you are sharing an activity you could start by posting typing a folder. So let me just show you what that looks like. So as a teacher, if I were going to assign an activity. And let's say, related to what I was just saying about writing, maybe it's an assessment or a piece of work that you want to have from every single student. And you want to make sure that's in their portfolio say for conferences. So what I would do. I think a great place to start actually is in our seesaw activity library. Getting started collection because in the getting started collection. There is an activity that includes writing and reflecting. So I'm in third grade right now. So I'm going to tap on this one. This is right and reflect. So a little slightly different than what you'd see in my kindergarten class with writers workshop, but I'm going to choose a sign. And I'm going to just pick I have lots of classes so don't be alarmed. I'm going to choose this class but right now I can tap over here to folders, and I can choose the folder I would like to tag with this post so I'm going to say writing folder. And then I'm going to top the green check. So when I assign this to this class I'm actually going to put it in a different class how about the class I'm in the third grade rock star class right the one that we're we've been playing it I'm going to go to folders again sorry. And of course I don't have a writing folder so let's create one quickly. I'm going to create our writing folder. There it is. So when I share this out as students respond to this activity, it's already going to be tagged with the folder so let me just pretend I'm a student. I'm going to respond quickly. Okay, so in the example there was a note. I love third grade. Your students are going to be much more impressive than this right now when I tap the check. And you'll notice that it's going to be added and you'll see the folders already tagged right there, which is awesome again saving you some time as a teacher. The other thing I want to show you then is one more thing that might come in handy when you're getting organized and using folders so the other thing that you can do is you can tap the folder icon here. Say I'm doing a special project or say there's something one particular piece for conferences that I want to display outside my classroom. I could go to the folder for that special project. And then I have the option of printing a PDF. So what this will do is this will print a PDF of all the pieces of work in this folder. And you need to, if you're creating a digital portfolio but maybe you are still required to have a paper copy of a portfolio. This could be an option for you so it comes with a nice little cover page, and then it shows all of the posts and the QR code that would lead to the post so if you're doing a hallway display this would also come in handy too. That option you are going to see on a computer from the website that print PDF, when you sort by a specific folder. Okay, so talking about preparing for conferences right so everyone kind of you know could be a stressful situation but a couple things I want to show you. Number one we have a website completely devoted to preparing for conferences so the addresses right here so make sure you hop onto that site and really think through and look at our tips of how you can save some time preparing for conferences and I kind of already showed you step one preparing and maybe creating a conferences folder. The other thing I want to let you know about as well when you're using digital portfolios. Teachers have this moment of panic and I had it myself my first year using seesaw. I thought oh my gosh wait a second what's going to happen I've the parents have already seen all this stuff and seesaw what I'm going to show them what I'm going to talk about right. Couple things. Number one what I realized was that conversations can move beyond revealing. Okay, I don't think any family member loves to be surprised at a conference. So the fact that your families have seen this work in seesaw is not a big deal. That's great, because when they come in, you are not, you know showing them something they've never seen and that can create a lot of stress, but you're able to show progress over time, add additional context to the conversation and really focus on next steps and have time for that conversation within that 15 minutes or 10 minutes or 20 minutes that you have. You're not spending the majority of your time revealing to them and showing them things for the very first time. So that is a common question that we get like I want to edit to see somebody don't want parents to see it because we're going to talk about it at conferences. I would really encourage you to move beyond that, give it a try. It's okay to share it ahead of time and just go with it. Now if you really really really don't want them to see it you could use a private teacher folder that I did show you, but I highly recommend that you just go with it and give it a try and really enjoy those deeper conversations that you can have because you're talking beyond that you know revealing for the first time and showing work that way. So, boy we weren't really really fast, and we have some time for questions I also want to pause and give the code if you're looking for the certificate if you're watching the recording the code is 837261 and questions I'm going to pop into questions right now. And before I get into them I'm going to give you a moment to type, but please visit our community on all of these different channels if you're not already connected. This is a fun place to hop in the conversation.