The OneNote Team shared a guest blog today written by Gerald B. Johnson, a data support specialist at Feldwood Elementary School in Colledge Park, Georgia. As a former teacher promoted to data support, Johnson found himself switching from a classroom of 30 students to collecting information for 30 teachers instead. Johnson’s tasked seemed daunting, managing that amount of data stored physically in binders, but towards the end of the school year of 2015, he found an alternative method.
His school had purchased Microsoft Office 365. Over the summer, he participated in a conference that taught customers how to use the available programs. Because it didn’t include a specific OneNote session, he decided to put his nose to the grindstone and learn about the program himself. Over two weeks, he had self-taught from both the perspective of the teacher and administrative faculty, with the help of a few friends. He found the experience invaluable and highly suggests that any other educators do the same.
For Feldwood Elementary School, Johnson was able to set up the Content Library to provide teachers with access to all of their resources such as documents, spreadsheets, forms, and assessments that they might need. Teachers find it easier to declutter their previous methods, utilizing the Collaborative Space of OneNote to share discussions, reminders, updates, and group results through a combined effort.
OneNote isn’t only useful for teachers, Johnson noted. In fact, the administrative team found it useful to document assessments and benchmarks. Using the private notebooks, the school can review and better understand evaluations on teaching methods, learning, and progress.
It’s just another example of how Office 365 has helped educators connect and collaborate easier. Lynette Barker created and organized a ‘Grade Book’ to assist teachers in making and collaborating lesson plans. Across the education field, OneNote is praised for breaking the barriers of communication and accumulating the massive amounts of information that teacher’s need to form lesson plans, student assessments, and build student portfolios for more individualized learning.