[podcast]
All right afternoon everyone welcome to this breakout session on leveling up with Google certifications. So you just want to say thanks for watching. And hopefully we can give you some great information during this breakout session.
A couple of things just to take note of as we get started. There is a question and answer page that you can ask any of your questions in and I will answer those at the end. So feel free to ask a question any time and we’ll get to those towards the end. If I get to answer it live on the call I will answer it via a message on the same page.
When we’re doing anything live online, sometimes the quality can be a little bit varied based on where you are and your bandwidth and so on. So there is a cog right down in the bottom right hand corner. And if you click on that you can change the quality of the broadcast so you can take that up or down accordingly. So feel free to use that if you need to.
Right at the end of the session I’m going to give you some resources including a link to receive some vouchers for the certification exams at a discounted price. So make sure you stick around and to be out to pick up those vouchers available right throughout December. So I know it’s a crazy time of year right now but you might find a bit of time at the end of the year just to sit down and have a look at the education center and then have a go at one of the exams.
Now in session today, what I’m going to do is just take you through a bit of a certification pathway and show you some of the resources how it works just to give you a bit of context in orientation and that we should point you in the right direction so that you can get started or continue on your journey.
I’m just going to share my screen right now and then we’ll continue the conversation. So without certification pathway there is a number of courses or levels that you’re able to take in so we start off with Google Level 1. Then we can progress on to level 2, then we can progress to the certified Trainer. And then lastly we have the certified innovator.
When you work your way through these lessons, basically you can get one of the badges that you can see on the bottom here. And you can use that on your resume in your email signature, different places where people like to put those.
So I encourage you to think about that in terms of, not so much a micro credentialing course, where it’s really short and sharp . There is a fair few lessons involved in each of these levels but you can progress at your own pace which is which is fantastic.
All right. So you might be interested to know that there have been over 40,000 teachers have been through the certification process and that means that they’ve gone through the training centre at least at some level, and then they’ve gone on to sit the exam for each of those levels and then moved on. So tell you a little bit about what’s in the training centre what’s involved in the exams and how you go through and join that tribe of certified teachers various levels.
One of the things that the Google online training center provides for us is a whole range of lessons, and you can see here that they’re based on the SAMR model and are based on these the ISTE standards for those who may be watching from America. Those of you and Australia New Zealand who are interested in the ISTE standards. Basically it’s not just about the tool it’s about how do we use these tools effectively in the classroom. So the lessons teaching you how to use the tools that Google provides education, but they also have a really nice framework and an application and the whole concept of this has been developed by teachers so it’s it’s it’s a very teacher centric kind of program.
You’ll notice that the next thing that we have here is that the content all is free and it’s online. Now there are quizzes as you go throughout the content to test your knowledge, there’s videos that you can watch. There’s all the lessons that are there. There is a place for you to take notes under your account and so on and so you can access all of that 100 percent for free.
[bctt tweet=”One of the things that the Google online training centre provides for us is a whole range of lessons.” username=”mikereading”]
And then there is a test that you can take. You don’t have to take it, but it’s a nice way to demonstrate your mastery of the content, and those tests do have a fee associated with it. It isn’t a large fee. We’ll explain all of that as we go.
There are the three main themes that all of the lessons throughout the level 1 and Level 2 certified trainer program around. It’s about increasing efficiency and time. When we survey the teachers that we work with. The number one complaint that we hear is that we are busy and so there are some great tools to help you save some time and become more efficient in your teaching practice.
We also talk a little bit about professional growth and leadership and how do we lead change in the school and so on. And then we can look at how do we facilitate inspire student learning and creativity, so there’s multi-level that’s how you layout change how do you train advantageous and impart knowledge. How do you work with students and someone.
Now, in the level 1 course, I guess one of the things that I like to do is you know answer the question why would you want to look at becoming a level one educator. And I think one of the major reasons is that you just love to learn new things. As teachers we should be modeling the fact that we want to learn and quite often you know I will go to professional development days, or we’ll have a speaker come to school or will say something on Youtube or Twitter. And we’re constantly learning. But one of the things that a Google level 1 course does is it consolidates all of that learning into a really nice framework and a pathway for us.
Now one of the other things that it does is it gives us a big picture, so we get to see from start to finish. How do you use Google Docs effectively in your school? and how do you use that with collaborative planning? Or how do you use that with your students? and it kind of fills in some of those pieces.
When we run boot camps on this one of the comments that is most frequently given to us. at the end was “wow I thought I knew a lot about Google, and now I realize how much I didn’t know”. So it does fill in some of those gaps in terms of your knowledge and your practice
The third reason that you’d want to consider becoming a Level 1 educator is that it’s great to demonstrate your competence. Whether that is to the staff around you. Whether it’s just your own self, whether that’s on your resume because you’re going for a job or something like that. So there are a number of reasons why you might consider having a look at a level one certification program. Inside the program, and I’ll show you how to access the program, and a little bit about its structure and functioning.
[bctt tweet=”Becoming a Level 1 educator is that it’s great to demonstrate your competence. ” username=”mikereading”]
But just as an overview there are 39 lessons that are in that and if you were to fully engage in all of those lessons, to read all the text to watch all the videos and so on. It would take you about 12 hours to work your way through all of that content. So again it’s a robust program it’s certainly not something that you just sit down in an afternoon and just rip your way through, it will be something that you spend a little bit of time on.
So here’s what’s required to achieve the level 1 program. You need to have a good understanding of the benefits of technology and in education and in digital citizenship.
So that’s one of the themes that you’ll be required to understand a little bit and how Google supports that. Then you’ll also learn about Google chrome, and how to use search properly. You’ll learn about Gmail, and Google Hangouts, and you’ll look at Google Calendar, and keep, and drive, docs, sheets, slides, forms and everything that goes inside the G-suite package.
You’ll also uncover how you use classroom effectively. You learn about google groups for communication and so on, and you’ll also look at Google sites and YouTube. So you can see that there is quite a bit in here in terms of what you will learn, and what you need to know.
Now in terms of demonstrating your knowledge, you could go through all of that and just feel great about the fact that you’ve learnt something. But if you want you can also sit an exam. Now the exam isn’t just a google form, and you know answer a multiple choice questions. It’s quite a robust exam.
It’s run by a third party company, and you do have a time limit of three hours to sit the exams. So it is a timed exam. Now, I would say, that of all the teachers that we’ve worked with, and to be honest that’s you know thousands, in a live scenario watching them take these tests. I would say that half of them take the full three hours. Whether that’s they’ve gone through and they finished it and then they want to take some time to go back and look at their answers again. But it is quite a long test to be able to sit.
There are 20 multiple choice questions that you need to answer, and that could be drag and drop. It could be you know select the three most you know correct answers. Those sorts of things. There are 11 scenarios. And so you actually be required to do and demonstrate your knowledge inside a test environment.
You don’t need to have a webcam. The reason for that is that it would just take pictures of you inside the exam environment every now and then to make sure that it is you doing it. Obviously you need to have stable internet. It is an open browser exam, so you can be, you know searching for the answers. But again a lot of people struggle with time, so you need to be good on your knowledge and your skills. You’ll see here that the questions need to be answered in an exam account.
So when you register to take exam, it takes about a day for the exam centre to prepare the exam and send it through to you. And then you’ve got a seven day window to take the test so you really don’t want to be registering for the exam until you know within a week you’ve got a little bit of availability that you can set aside the three hours to take the test.
Now if you fail the exam, and you’ll see up the top here, that you do need to have an 80 percent passmark to pass the test. You need to wait 14 days. You will need to pay for the exam again to resit it, but you can at least you learn from your mistakes and you move on, which can be really helpful. And obviously we talk to teachers all the time and we say the same thing that we say to our students “Failure is not final, it’s just a learning opportunity for us.”
So you can see that this is quite a robust process that you need to go through. Here’s an example of a scenario that you might be asked in the level 1 exam. So you can see that they would give you a bit of a scenario, then I would say open up Google Groups and create a new group. And then configure the settings to a particular way that you want that group to run. And then I want you to invite some people into that group, and then maybe you need post in that group. So you can see from that one scenario that you need to have a really good understanding of how Google Groups would work, how to create them, how to post to them, how to invite people, and so on.
Now you can see here that is another one that might use Google Sheets for instance and will ask you to make copies of files, and ask to use formulas and filters, and charts, and be able to really engage with the data that’s in that spreadsheet.
So one of the things that I would encourage you just having a look at a little bit of an example of what’s a you know what sort of level you need to interact in, is that when teachers finish this exam they quite often say that this is one of the most stressful things that I’ve ever done. I really do feel the pressure that the students are under.
So one of the things that we need you to understand is that just because it’s a Google level 1 certification. Level 1 does not equal 101, in terms of introduction and ease. So it certainly does introduce you to the topic and it takes through, and scaffolds you through that that. It’s not like that’s not the type of thing where if you use Google a fair bit, then you can just go, ah I use Google, I’ll just have a go at the exam. We do find that teachers who have tried that approach. There is a failure rate of around about 65 to 70 percent. Just to give you an idea of how that floats.
Now in the level 2 exam once you pass level one or you can just skip level one altogether and go straight to level 2 if you really wanted to. You can sit through a level 2 certification. Again, why would you do this? Well this is for people who just want to dig deep into each of those tools, and really explore the functions and features of those tools. Plus get introduced to a few other tools that weren’t part of the level 1 certification.
Also what it does is it really develops your confidence and competence as a teacher. You just know that you know your stuff when you’ve been through this course, and it just gives you that confidence. Whether that’s presenting to staff and helping them and adopt Google technology, or whether it’s with your students and so on.
Again this is structured very similar to the level 1 course, and I’ll show you again in a second what all of this looks like. But there are 31 lessons. if you were to go through all of those lessons, it would take you about 15 hours or thereabouts to do that.
Again, what you’ll find to get the level 2 course, is that now you don’t just need to have like a sound understanding of G-suite. You need to have a really advanced understanding, and we do introduce some coaching models into that. So you know we look at different ways that you can start to support our teachers in your school and help them on a particular journey.
So now you need to understand not just the basics of Google search but we start to look at things like Google Books and Google Scholar and some of those also known google search tools. We go deeper into Gmail, calendar and keep. We go deeper into Google Drive, Docs and slides and so on. We start to dig into using add ons, and we start to look at things like HyperDocs and so on. And of course you’d expect us to dig even deeper into Google Classroom. Then we also introduced some features like Google Maps, and Google expeditions and so on.
Now in terms of that exam, the exam is exactly the same. So it’s a three hour exam. But there are more questions. so there are 25 multiple choice questions. There are 12 scenarios, not 11, and by the way, each of those scenarios will have a different number of tasks in them. So it could be that there would be a one scenario might have four elements to that particular task.
Now again you need to pass by 80 percent. And again, the exact same in terms of registration process it takes about a day to spin up the exam account. You log into that exam account that Google create for you. So you don’t do the exam in your own account, you log in with the one that I’ve given you.
From what you can do is go on and look at the Google certified trainer program. Now most people who would get to this point would be doing this because they have a responsibility of training other people other within their school, or within the classroom of schools, or again, maybe just loved to learn. And the fact is you go and engage in all of this information but then not go on and take the exam and not apply. So the process for the certified trainer is a little bit different. There is an exam that you need to do. And there is another application process that goes on top of this and I’ll show you that in a minute.
Now this one’s a little bit different. That’s about 20 lessons and it’s about 30 hours if you engage fully in the content. And this, to be honest it’s all about coaching models professional development planning and things like that. So it’s quite interesting for people who are in that role with a leading change inside the school.
Now just to give you a little bit of insight into the exam and then the application process that follows that. The exams are a lot shorter. So it’s just a 90 minute exam and it’s just 25 multiple choice questions. So again, a little bit different to how level 1 and level 2 happens, and to be able to apply, before you even get to the application process, you need to gone through and completed the course and pass that exam.
You’ll notice here that you also need to have the Google level 1 and level 2 educator programs, so if you’re the type of person who would like to just get to level 2 and have a go at that first. If your intention is to go on to become a Google Certified Trainer, then you will need to go back and do level one anyway.
You will need to create a video explaining a little bit about you, and demonstrating some knowledge and then you can go through an application process or show you give you the links to all of this in a minute.
The last one we have here is a Google Certified Innovator. It used to be the Google Certified Teacher. If you’re familiar with that term, and this is a little bit different it’s not so much about using Google tools per se, although obviously that is a part of it. What this, I guesses is about, is you’re doing something innovative in your school, and you know you’re making some changes, and you may be pushing some boundaries and you’re thinking a little bit outside the square. And now what you want to do is you want to join with another tribe. You want to connect with other teachers, you want to be recognized for the work that you’re doing in your school or in your district around that.
So this is a little bit different. It’s not a training course. There’s no exams that you need to sit but there is an application process that goes with that. So to apply, you need to have at least Google Certified educator level 2. There is a presentation you have to make a slide deck talking about the project your big goal. You know your your vision for changing education and what you would like to do within your capacity or sphere of influence to try and enact some kind of change.
You need to make a quick video about that, what your what your project is, your passion project is and then you go through a application process. Now for the Certified Trainer and the Certified Innovator. What we do have, is a number of activities that you have to participate in once you become approved, and I’ll just running through those in a second.
So let’s just jump in and have a quick look at the training centre. When you go to the training centre, and if you just google search Google education training centre, you’ll come up to a page that will look something like this, and you have access to the different certifications here on the left hand side.
When you’re looking at the Google level 1 and level 2 sections. What you’ll see is that there’s a good training section, there’s a get practice section, and then get certified. And this is where you would register for the exam. And again I’ll give you a code which drops the price dramatically for that exam, you just drop the code and takes about a day and then you’ve got a week to sit it.
So if I was to click on these get training sections just here what you do is you say that it drops me into the fundamentals training, that’s the Google level 1, and then I have a range of different lessons in here or segments or units and each of those units will have different lessons within them.
Once you complete a lesson, you’ll see that it gets ticked off and to complete a lesson, basically you just click this section just here, and we’ll have lessons on the left hand side. So this lesson here is all about exploring the benefits of digital technology in the classroom. So you could read through some sections, you could think about a couple of questions, you could jot down some ideas if you wanted to. You can engage in whatever people have shared in terms of their thoughts and reflections.
There’s some videos that you can watch if you want, and so on. At the end of every lesson you’ll see that there’s a lesson check and what you can do is you can choose the answer and say check answer and we’ll give you some immediate feedback. Now you can try this as many times as you like and you say that you get through.
Now you don’t have to answer all these questions correctly. You can just move on to the next lesson which is fine. At the end of the unit you will also see that there is a unit review, and when you are doing the unit review, it we’ll just ask you some questions in here. Give it some answers. This is very typical of the multiple choice type of questions that you would be asked in the exam. And then what you can do write down the answer at the bottom is go submit answers and I would just tell you what your result was. Again, it’s not a requirement. It’s just there for your own benefit.
If I was to look at the level to the advanced training, it would be exactly the same as that. But if I go to the training course, this is a little bit different. So you’ll see here that there are units of work in each of those units in here have different lessons and that gives you a rough indication of how long each lesson will be. But when you get right down to the very end it says here become a Google for education certified trainer.
What that will look like when you get to the end of all of this is, it will show you a little bit of a application process. So there’s a couple of questions like who should join in here and why should I join. What’s the benefits and so on. And then if you have a look at these how can I join. It will tell you what the requirements are and you’ll see that I just took this and put it into the slide presentation from just before.
So you can see what the activities will be here at the end. What you need to be able to do is conduct and report at least 12 training coaching sessions per year. You need to share ideas and resources with the community of trainers, so we’re sharing ideas as a tribe. And then you need to re-apply every year or so and just keep things up to date.
So it could be that you want to engage in the content but not necessarily all go through all the way. Or it could be that you want to really go through and be recognized as your role in your school or in the district as being able to lead change effectively and so on, and having that badge certainly helps.
One of the great things about this is that you do access also a community of other trainers and there is a community where we discuss questions and share ideas. So it’s a great place to stay up to date. Always seeing what people are doing trying innovative things and so on. And that’s exactly the same as the Certified Innovator that you join a community of like minded professionals who work with you on that certification process.
So to wrap up in a minute and just answer some of your questions so just a reminder that there is a question and answer section and I’ll check that in a minute and make sure that I answer your questions before we finish.
So I want to just give you a couple of resources that will help you get started on your journey. And a couple of different ways that we might be able to work with you on this.
So the first way is, we’ve got a certification cheat sheet that you might like to access. And basically what we do it’s just a bank of resources where we give you some checkboxes to just check that you understand some of the content. We give you some example questions and some of the resources that we’ve developed. So if you are interested in that then you can just go to utb.fyi/google-edu-centre
Just fill out the form. So we’ve got your e-mail and then more than happy to send that out to you and have a look at it and you can use that in conjunction with the Education Centre. It’s kind a like just a bit of a summary of what goes on in there.
The next option is that you might like to join us for a live boot camp. We get together with teachers for two days and we take you through all the content you need to know. And we also sit the exam together and in a supportive environment. So if you’re interested in that obviously it’s the end of the year and we’re wrapping up all of our professional development. But if you would like to be notified about that for next year or if you’d like to host one of these boot camps in your school or in your region and certainly let us know we’ll organize that with you next year. Boot camps are a great way just to be in a room set the time aside, do it in a consolidated way, sit exams so you’re not putting it off, and then you were good to go after that.
Last one is that we actually do have all that training available online. So you may want to have a look at our online professional learning network. We’ve got all of our training videos in there. We give you a real time support and so on.
In terms of cost. The level 1 exam is $10 USD. And the level 2 exam is $25 USD. So again, not a massive cost.
So let me just have a quick look at some questions as we wrap up, and I’ll leave those details up on the screen for you to take a screen capture of them.
So someone’s asking, Cindy’s asking, are the exams NESA registered for New South Wales teachers? That is like the number one question we get asked! If we do a boot camp, our training is registered with NESA, but in terms of the doing it just on your own I’m not 100 percent sure if that’s the case but if a boot camps in the exam they go with that definitely.
Someone’s asked here, after getting certified for level 1, am I certified to carry out onsite training for our teachers? Well, I guess the answer to that is yes and no. I mean yes you can, you don’t have to have a certification to go to present to have a teachers, although what it does do is it gives you I guess a little bit of credibility that you can say, you know what I know my stuff and I’ve answered the exam, and I’ve passed the exam, so that the people that you are presenting to, are feeling confident about your ability. So I guess the answer to that would be yes.
So someone’s asking is a certification global or region specific? It’s a global international program. The program is in different languages. I’m not exactly sure what languages they are but you can have a look at that. For sure.
Can this SlideDeck be made available? Absolutely. If you put it out on Twitter and you can follow me @mikereading it’s just there on the screen that you’re looking at or if you put your details into this google form here put that as one of the resources that we send out as well.
All right. And Ingrid’s asking the certifications available both New Zealand and Australia slash worldwide? Yes absolutely. We can and we provide training for both countries in terms of our bootcamps and so on. All right let me just have a look. Any other questions that are coming in.
And by the way in terms of global, it is a globally recognized certification as well. So one of the things we do is you know for instance we provide training in Singapore in America and so on and we know that the people that we’re working with when they get the certification in those countries it’s exactly the equivalent to what’s happening in Australia or New Zealand the UK and so on.
If you’ve got any questions keep filing them into that Q&A page are more than happy to answer them, or send us an email at support@usingtechnologybetter.com or shoot me a message on Twitter. More than happy to answer your questions for you about the exam or about the what’s in the course and so on. So appreciate your taking your time out here, your Saturday to be a part of this session, and I hope we enjoy the rest of the breakout sessions that are starting right now.
