[music playing]

Narrator: OTAN, Outreach and Technical Assistance Network.

Brenda Gomez: Good morning. We are the DLAC team from Hacienda La Puente, Adult Education. And today, we would like to share with you our two-year journey and our DLAC final report. Let me tell you a little bit about Hacienda La Puente. It's the second largest school, adult school, in California. And I always like to brag about this, it is the birthplace of OTAN.

We offer a variety of classes on three main campuses, and outreach sites, as well as workplace classrooms. We serve about 20,000 students per year. Hacienda Heights is the home to one of the largest Buddhist temples in North America. So therefore, our largest population is Asian. Our second largest population is Hispanic. However, we have served students from all over the world and every walk of life since our establishment in 1959.

I'd like to start by introducing us. There are three of us, and each of us have our own focus. And Brenda and I focus on ESL.

Yecsenia Delgado: I'm Yescenia and I focus on parent education.

Armida Chow: And my name is Armida Chow and my focus areas are ABE, ASE, and IET.

Brenda Gomez: OK, next slide. I'd like to start by sharing our journey of technology integration in the classroom with our ESL instructional team. It would be impossible for me to relate to you all the ups and downs and twists and turns and obstacles and successes that we've had in the last two years in this timeframe. So instead, I would like to focus on our DLAC goals and how we achieve them.

But before we do that, I just wanted to let you know that before DLAC came along, we had a solid, experienced staff that was very effective in their instruction, which was predominantly textbook and paper-based. And Dr. Porter taught us that growth happens when we get uncomfortable. And let me tell you, we got uncomfortable.

Basically, our teachers had to acquire a new set of skills in technology, and then teach those skills to their students when they barely knew them themselves. So it was a difficult and challenging time, but we traveled quite well with it.

So our major goal for ESL was to integrate technology into the classroom. And the way we were going to do that is by providing Chromebooks in every classroom that the students would work on at least once a week for language acquisition and digital skills. I also created EL Civic assessments using Google forms, and the students had to complete those in class on their Chromebooks.

Another goal that we had was to convert our existing distance learning, which was paper packet and DVDs to digital, using Putting English to Work Moodle course. And then that year, in 2018, our leader, Yescenia, created a bit.ly website for our program, where students could view their distance learning videos, and it had all kinds of digital resources that they could use in the classroom and at home.

So that was what we were going to do, and this is how we're going to do it. We had equip our teachers and our students with the technological skills that they needed to live and work in our society. So we started monthly training programs, or monthly training sessions, for the teachers. The top two pictures are the teachers. And then we also went into the classrooms with the teachers to help them get their students comfortable with using Chromebook.

So we found our greatest obstacle to our goals was instruction, learning curve, and buy-in. Remember, our teachers were extremely uncomfortable with their new skills that were required of them, so they weren't really excited to be uncomfortable in front of their students. And then we all know that students want to please their teachers. So if the teacher is excited about something, the student is also going to be excited about it. So we had to find a way to climb over this obstacle.

And the way we did that was with continuous and frequent trainings once a month, using ourselves and OTAN, and then we provided wraparound support for our teachers. So we'd give them the training. Then if they needed individual help, we'd give them individual help.

Then we'd go into the classroom and we'd help them when they used the Chromebooks in the classroom. We'd make instructional videos for the teachers and the students. We'd make click by click instructions with screenshots for the teachers and the students. And then we recognized and we celebrated staff successes and accomplishments.

Our administrative support was outstanding everything we needed, they provided. OTAN, same thing. And then we had our DLAC support, which was me, Yescenia, and Armida. Each with our varied strengths, we supported each other in all our focus areas and we really made a strong team. And then, of course, we were patient, patient, patient with the teachers, with the technical glitches, with the Wi-Fi that wasn't strong enough, with troubleshooting technology in the classroom. So all of this created a lot of success for us.

So data tells us how we're doing, right? So this is a survey that the teachers completed in the fall of 2019. It shows their growth in their technology skills. So the blue line on top is the fall of 2019. The green line is the fall of 2018. And as you can see, there was growth in every area. And I'm sure if we gave one of these surveys to our students as well, we'd see the same thing. So we're going to talk a little bit more about our successes at the end of our presentation, but now I would like to introduce Armida to share her focus area.

Armida Chow: Thanks, Brenda. So with our DLAC goals for our ABE and ASE and IET, we started small. We just started with two, and then it expanded for the two-year project that we had with DLAC. So we generated digital homeroom for ABE and ASE and IET. We integrated Moodle courses in ABE, expanded distance learning opportunities, and also created Google classroom in our IET program.

So for our first year project, we created a digital classroom for our ASE class. And so we created teacher contact info. Students are able to contact their HLPAE examiner. And also, our teachers are able to share resources with teachers, because all of us are from different sites.

Our first year project with ABE, we added blended learning to our ABE instruction through adultedcourses.org. Since OTAN has shared courses, we actually implemented the developmental math, English, and also putting English to work. So because we introduced blended learning to our students, the transition to distance learning during COVID-19 made it less difficult for our students.

With our ASE instruction and our high school diploma program, we already have an existing blended learning component using our Apex learning system. During our first year of DLAC, we piloted distance learning with few students who showed interest. Then this school year, with the support of our administrators, we fully embraced distance learning, and our students are prepared during the pandemic.

For our second year project, we piloted the Aztec Learning System in February of this year, for our distance learning. Because we offered distance learning, we are able to assist our students as a response to the pandemic. And during the first week of April, we also utilized the Locator Test for Aztec for new students to be placed in specific courses while we were waiting for CASAS remote testing.

We also piloted our IET program in 2017. We used the alternating teaching model, where students attend two courses at two different times. We used Burlington English during our first year of DLAC for VESL students so that they can use it for their distance learning. In the fall of 2019, we created Google Classroom for our three IET instructors, and students use it for workforce prep and course prep. So the classroom helped our Esthetician instructors to use during COVID-19.

We also implemented Orientation Tuesdays for ESL teachers. So for our new ESL students, they're able to learn and use Chromebook. So we introduce them. We give them instructions, how to log in, to log off, how to register in their class. We use Putting English to Work for ESL students. And we've also implemented our tech lab every Wednesday and Thursday. So students who are registered are able to use our Google Chromebooks to utilize for their distance learning, for computer literacy, and also use free language websites.

And lastly, we implemented, and also improved, our instructional strategies. So we used the new pedagogies for deep learning. So we are school participated in a global collaboration of schools. We focus on citizenship and character. So we want our students to answer the question, why go back to school? And also leverage digital for our students since we had new Chromebooks. We also embedded NPDL for our civic objectives, and also many lessons with our projects. Now let me pass to Yescenia, our group leader.

Yecsenia Delgado: Hi, everyone. So I'll be going over my program specialty area, which is parenting education. So our parenting program began with face-to-face presentations, which we're done in our district schools in a workshop format. One of the biggest obstacles in our parenting program was parents not being able to come to the classes due to time restrictions, parents not having transportation or having limited time to come in at the time that they were offered. So one of the things that we wanted to do is really create an innovative program that would set us apart and be different, and also provide our parents with more opportunity to be able to look at the workshops and gain skills to help their children be successful in their education.

So what we did is we built our online curriculum, and we utilized our Moodle platform through adultedcourses.org, and this is a platform that is managed by OTAN. So we began to build one lesson at a time. Each workshop that was given face-to-face was converted into an online workshop, and we created a pre-activity. Our presentations were done with PowerPoint. The same PowerPoint that we used for our face-to-face was utilized for our online presentations, and we added our voice over on the PowerPoint and created a video for our parents to watch. Videos were uploaded into the platform, so they were able to be seen by the parents, and then we did a post activity to provide support further learning from the video.

Our program was very successful. In our first year, we started with zero online participants, and we got over 350 participants our first year. Some of the things that our parents really enjoyed through Moodle was their phone app. So we did create worksheets with step by step of how to log into the phone application and utilize Moodle on their phone.

Our marketing was done primarily through our after school program. So we created flyers and we created large posters that were posted in our after school program classes, where parents were able to access it, and this really allowed us to reach a larger population. One of the things that our after school program did was for parents that did utilize the parenting workshops, they provided them with priority registration for their after school program, so that really motivated our parents to complete 10 of the lessons so they can get a certificate.

As you can see, our program's success was very successful. This year, we did drop off a little bit, but we're still over 300 participants, and I think that has to do with COVID, and also parents, we're living in a very unprecedented time, where they have a lot of worries and a lot on their plate with trying to help their students with online learning.

One of the things our parenting program did do this year, to support our parents throughout this pandemic was we did online workshop that was done live through Zoom, and we did have a large amount of parents that registered for the workshop and participated through the Zoom learning. One of the things that we found out in our first year of holding our online program was that a lot of our Spanish parents did not speak any English, but still had a large interest in taking the workshops in Spanish.

So we did start our Spanish online course, which is completely in Spanish. All our workshops are in Spanish. The Moodle itself is in Spanish. And we try and embed some ESL learning in there to teach them vocabulary words that they will need for their children's school education as well.

Our biggest obstacles I think with Moodle is just adding one lesson at a time in the beginning. Learning about open-ended questions take a lot of time to grade. So we began to transition some of our open-ended questions to matching activities or to multiple choice questions to take advantage of Moodle's ability to self-grade.

And then, also, training our parents the log in and registration was also a little bit difficult. But through the transition, we have learned that step by step worksheets seemed to work really well with them, and we've also created videos that will just walk them through the process of registering and logging onto the Moodle site.

Before I hand it over to Brenda, I just want to say that all of this could not have been done without the support of our admin. They have been completely supportive throughout all our programs and our successes, as well as our coach, Susan Coulter, who has walked with us every step of the way. And our admin from OTAN, Netta and Penny, have been outstanding in supporting us in everything that we do, as far as integrating our technology and our schools. I'm going to pass it over to Brenda to discuss some of our school accomplishments.

Brenda Gomez: Hello. So as we tally up our successes, we see a lot of growth in our staff. Through our training sessions, individual and group, a culture of technology and collaboration has taken a hold in our staff members. We now have an atmosphere of learning, trial and error. OK, I can try it. I can fail. It's OK. Our staff is so much more confident and equipped in technology.

And Chromebooks are being used-- were being used-- in the classroom weekly. A lot of this transferred over to our COVID response, especially the teachers started collaborating on their own after we had closed. They learned new technology that they needed, such as Zoom, very, very quickly, and so did the students.

Growth in the students. By the time we closed, 30% of our classes were on blended learning online, and so that just continued. And in the same way, the students were also very confident, much more confident in using technology. They weren't afraid to click anymore, where they used to be really afraid to do anything with the computers.

So because of all these things, our instructors and our students weren't just prepared for the closure. I would say they were empowered, and they were empowered to transition to the remote instruction. So we'd like to close with a couple videos from our administrator and two of our teachers.

April Felix: Hi. My name is April Felix and I teach with Hacienda La Puente. I teach ESL intermediate low. I've learned a multitude of things from the DLAC team members. Last October, they assisted me in putting all of my students on Putting English to Work online, our distance learning program. So my students were well-versed in it. They knew how to log in and out, move around through the system, check messages, send messages to me, submit their homework, check their grade.

So one moment they were doing blended learning, the next moment they were doing everything online, and they didn't have to miss a beat. The other thing is I came out of one of our DLAC trainings, and I was really inspired to do a classroom website. I don't think I would have done that otherwise. But when I had some questions, the DLAC team members were there to assist me so that I could get my classroom website up and running. Thank you, DLAC team.

Yecsenia Delgado: Yeah, I don't think I'm going to be able to share the other two videos. So the other two videos were of our admin speaking about our DLAC program, and one of our other teachers also expressing the change in DLAC. I think Zoom has changed one of their options, and my videos are directly on my desktop, so I'm not able to access them. I'm not sure why.