Tech Quest 4 Teachers

ASCD Gets it Right!

2011-12-15T08:49:00.002-05:00

Educational Leadership, the journal for ASCD (Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development), always seems to have "on target" articles and information. This month is no different. The Dec. 2011/Jan. 2012 issue is packed with expertise. I wonder who is listening. This is one organization worth joining for the monthly information, the journal, and books sent out several times a year. This issue ties several issues of budgets, public schools using the corporate reform movement, oportunities, thinking outside the box, parent opinions, and teacher quality. It's like being back in grad school with bright minds pushing for answers and talking through the issues schools face. Questions are raised and cases are presented of school success. There are many professional organizations. This one keeps you tuned to the current issues and keeps the dialog up to date, while helping you to understand issues and stay in the fight for good public education.

Respect

2011-09-12T13:40:00.001-04:00

Educational Leadership, the journal of ASCD (Association of Supervision and Curriculum Development) has a great article by Marie-Nathalie Beaudoin about school respect in its September 2011 issue (pages 40-44). This goes into school culture and shares how the staff needs and wants are passed on to students. If the teachers "are stressed, unhappy, and unsupported by their peers" they "are more inclined to treat their students with disrespect." The good news is there are many articles in this issue with starting points, ideas for improvement and pathways to respectful school climates and communities.

Web Tools for 2011-12

2011-09-05T17:14:00.002-04:00

Last year, I introduced Google Apps for Education to my 2nd - 5th graders. They enjoyed working on the cloud and especially loved making webpages. Also last year I introduced Glogster.edu to our 4th graders (paid for that one). I'm continuing with those two this year, but adding in voki classroom. For just under $30 you can get 200 logins - voki uses an avatar that students create and then allows either voice uploads or typed script (with a choice of voice accents). Students create these on all curriculum topics and share or post online. We're also using a new Edmodo our school system provides to offer another web tool for students to have input for a classroom. The 3rd-5th graders login to the 3rd grade lab or the 4th-5th grade lab. They had two assignments. One is to learn to make a quick post in response to a teacher request and the other is to vote in a poll. This webtool has the look of Facebook, but does not allow students to post to each other, only as a response to a teacher. Then the post is reviewed by the teacher before it is seen.

I use a wiki for my lesson plans and posting student work or links to their work. Here's to a great year using web tools with students!

July - New School Year

2011-07-20T11:21:00.001-04:00

Thinking about the new school year that begins on Aug. 17. I've spent a wonderful month off fostering two dogs, one that had foot surgery. Also done a lot of house cleaning and removing and remodeling. But thoughts of the new school year are creeping in!

Two ideas helped me a lot last year and one was having a class wiki. It allowed me to post my plans online, post student work samples, with permission, and explore ideas while teaching over 650 students. This easy to edit wiki (you can get a free one at http://pbworks.com ) allows editing anywhere. You can choose to allow comments, keep a private wiki, or a public, interactive wiki, or a public, invite only interactive wiki.

Another great idea that helped me teach and was easy for students to access was using a school level Google Apps for Education. We had some ethernet issues, and often had 8 computers that would not load the student home folder from the school server, so using Google Apps allowed these students to do genuine work and continue with everyone else in the class. Students only have 40 minutes per week in my class, so our time is valuable. We use the docs (presentations, spreadsheets, too), video, and the students absolutely love the webpages or "sites." Who wouldn't rather create a webpage than write a report?

Two other good experiences last year were using Glogster (the edu version) with 4th graders and a Voicethread project with a school in Australia.

The wiki was free (but you can upgrade for a fee), Google Apps for Ed was free (only a charge for the online domain name), Glogster.edu offers reduced rates for classrooms, Voicethread also has a free version (but limited in the amount of threads) and a paid upgrade. Many other web 2.0 tools are available with free versions and paid upgrades. These tools are helpful in introducing ways to share information rather than writing the standard report. These tools show students that many options are available and can be chosen to present information. This goes hand in hand with information gathering and sharing in the classroom, adding to interest and thinking skills in figuring out how to use these applications. Allowing students to collaborate with each others locally and at a distance, offers more opportunities to think, reason, and express themselves while working with others. Our 3rd graders participated in a project through icollaboratory.org and enjoyed the experience.

Edtech offers many opportunities to our students and using them helps our students listen to others, hear other points of view, work in collaborative projects, share individual work, and many more. Don't be afraid to try web tools. Get a permission slip from the parents of each student; give the rules for use and misuse; be positive in sharing, and start with one tool at a time. Use it with a small group, extend it to the whole class, share your success on a wiki, and try another new tool. Ask for feedback from students and families about using the tools. It is amazing!

Woohoo - another school year is coming!

What is a good principal?

2011-04-24T20:43:00.000-04:00

Last week, Edutopia posted an article by Maurice Elias titled "The Seven Characteristics of a Good Leader." It's a good article with links to other writers and their ideas of what makes a good leader, a good principal. The seven characteristics given by Elias are attributed to Sargent Shriver.

A sense of purpose
Justice
Temperance
Respect
Empowerment
Courage
Deep Commitment

There were two other good reads there - "How to Give Your School Leader a Grade" and "Ten Big Ideas of School Leadership" - Join and get email "heads-up" on many relevant topics. Worth reading!

Best Ideas

2011-04-23T12:11:00.000-04:00

One of the best ideas for my classroom this school year is using a class wiki. As soon as I heard I was probably going back to the classroom, I created a pbwiki for my class. It is free and allows for so many different applications. I use pbworks (formerly pbwiki). It is easy to add a page for different topics and activities and easy to embed movies, and student projects. It has also become my virtual plan book. I post K-5 plans with state goals each week. Parents and staff can see what the children are doing each week (and in advance). My class site is named with my last name and the word "class," helping to make it unique in addressing and in remembering the page address. There are links to projects, links for students to have easy access, and links to use with movies and web searches.

As the grade levels approach activities, and web searches, I can simply add a great link to a project page and it makes it easier for all of the students to locate. I believe it has improved the students' tech vocabulary, too, as they work and share their final products. I have learned as much as the students this year and am enjoying this total collaboration with student learners. The 3rd-5th graders enjoyed learning about web 2.0 tools and shared some tools that they use or that they see their parents using (wikis, blogs, flickr, delicious, twitter, skype, and google apps).

Challenge: Why do you teach?

2011-04-17T08:53:00.000-04:00

For me, this is a choice. Something I do and give back to my community. Every year is different, new students, new challenges, new problems to solve, new students to engage, and the yearly cycle begins again. This had been an extremely difficult year. Many sweeping changes - having programs I started that evolved over 13 years, winning state and national awards - dropped. OK, move on. Then some segments of the political arena decided to blame teachers for the economic problems of our country. What?

This year of change brought me back to the continuing cycle of why do I teach and why connecting to students is so important. I've been told by administrators that I'm a "natural" teacher. It's my own quiet way to speak out to the world of children. For 28 years I jumped out of bed, continued with home duties (in the past included raising two sons), and raced off to school - where I felt at home, too. Welcoming children into my class, hosting a friendly environment of surprise, challenge, and imagination, helping students make progress in their learning, all of this was so much fun I couldn't believe I was getting paid for it, but like so many teachers, spending such a large amount of my paycheck - more than a tithe - seemed like the "right thing to do." That is part of why this is so important - having a positive outlook, sharing the good parts of learning, schooling, community, and country with students was always such a pleasure. Encouraging, pushing to work harder, making choices, so many ways to engage a student and bring them into success. (And, yes, God; but when those questions come up, I ask my students to talk to their parents or their Sunday school teacher or someone at their church.) I believe in the constitution and the separation of church and state - this is definitely the parent's job.

This year I teach about 650 students in the computer lab. In elementary school, the "specialists" are teachers who give planning time to regular classroom teachers. So all students have the same, equal time, attention spans or content are not at issue. Technology is fun to teach, and it is always different. But, like any good teaching, you have to bring yourself to it - teaching doesn't happen just because you are in the room. Students have so many reasons, and many good ones, to tune out a teacher. What happened at home, on the bus, was there a fight with a sibling, was there time for breakfast, did mom or dad loose a job, is someone ill, is the family intact? These problems and more enter classrooms every day. Teachers deal with these problems, too, at home, then off to work like many other parents, trusting their most precious to a classroom teacher and specialist. For me, teaching in a classroom was easy - 24-28 students (teaching grades 1, 2, or 3). With one set of students all day long, you knew them and they knew you. With 150 different students every day, it is tough knowing their names, much less the meanings of their faces, eyes, and personalities. The subject is easy, knowing the students is not. I think the most important ingredient in the teacher is the personal contact, the engagement of a person in another person's success. Knowledge of the curriculum is second. The good teacher is a cheerleader for each and every student and likes every single one of them.

I've had after school (volunteer) Math Club for my students, sponsored Odyssey of the Mind, Computer Club, and Quest Atlantis (great software) Club. Now towards the end of my career, I find that teachers are not respected, not appreciated, and blamed for the economy - that is, according to news media and political pundits. I just don't believe it. Like the email that goes around and around, I'm a teacher! I make children work hard, teach them ways to solve problems, think for themselves, get along with others, share, demonstrate examples of good character, and have high expectations for all of my students. So, for the finger pointers, media talking heads, and anyone else - I help children experience learning in positive ways (the good things in life) and deal with the tough parts of life at the same time. I love each child that comes in the door and help them to explore their talents while learning good character and I love my job. These days, I have the children of students I taught in 1st, 2nd, or 3rd grade, and even some from teaching the K-5 computer lab - it is interesting to see the faces appear; I ask, "Is you ___ (insert mom or dad) named ___ (insert name from former student). This brings evidence to the nature nurture debate - behaviors, looks, characteristics, amazingly the same, and different, too!

So, this year, number 29 for me, is different, too. I'm a grandma now; started teaching in my 30's instead of my 20's; 3 degrees and a certificate later, I still love teaching, students, and the cycles of learning. Amazing technology to share with students, good, positive tasks to build and master; many students to greet and help grow; choosing ways to engage students in curriculum activities that include sharing with others (we can all help others learn).

To answer my question - Why are you a teacher? - Because it is part of who I am; I'm curious, love to learn new things, love to see things from a different angle, love the excitement of learning something new and sharing it with someone, and love to make that positive connection to a child.

Why are you a teacher?

-- Please respond with your reasons for teaching and tweet the website or reply to this post.

EdTech_365/2010

2010-12-23T20:11:00.001-05:00

Last December, an Ed Tech person posted on Twitter and challenged other ed tech's to keep a daily photo blog of the year 2010. It was such an interesting and simple step and a great reflection on ed tech, work/school, home, changes, and unexpected occurrences. Some days had such powerful statements and others were just fun, while others, were just looking for a picture.

This is a great project for students. Create a blog and use a camera to keep a journal of life, a specific academic topic, or group project, and write about them. Simple, clean assignment. My journey is here. It certainly keeps one from forgetting the little things. And, one I will probably do again.

What We Need - More Videoconferencing

2010-11-23T18:19:00.000-05:00

"There are three basic skills that students need if they want to thrive in a knowledge economy: the ability to do critical thinking and problem-solving; the ability to communicate effectively; and the ability to collaborate." This quote is from Thomas Friedman's column in the NY Times on Nov. 20 as he speaks of "The Global Achievement Gap" by Tony Wagner, Harvard. The article goes on to say countries that rank higher than the US have teachers in the top 1/3 of the class. The article includes references to the Race to the Top to give money for innovative ideas in education. Change is needed.

Some educators like problem based learning as a way to engage students in learning, collaborating, and thinking skills. Adding videoconferences to these collaborative efforts brings in communications over time and space and brings our students face to face with students from other cities, states, countries. Imagine!

One of our second grade classes meets monthly with a class in Michigan to share math problems. The students work in their groups and individually and then share their answers with the other class. Along the way, these students polish math skills, have some fun, learn about another community (geography, weather), hear accents, and make friends. They are learning to work with others, step one. As they grow, these classroom to classroom activities extend and increase experience in working with others (who may not be just like them) - it becomes a standard learning technique -- listening to others and valuing opinions of all people involved.

Imagine - middle schools and high school students using videoconferencing to discuss and learn about environmental problems or social problems. Students using these skills to discuss and offer solutions to today's problems - isn't that what we want?

Videoconferencing collaborations use all of these skills - critical thinking & problem solving, communications, and collaborations. Add some multimedia, blog or wiki for scheduling, posting schedules, information sources, and you have a mix of learning that changes, allows for updating, and continued collaboration.

After 28 years in public schools, two sons who attended public schools, and eight years working with videoconferencing, I continue to see, daily, the needs of our students, and I feel that videoconferencing offers many opportunities to develop these skills.

"Flat" Communications with Voicethread

2010-10-28T10:33:00.000-04:00

Hello to the Austalians in St. Joseph's Primary School in Merewether, Australia! We are thrilled to be involved in the Voicethread project with your school. We will post our voicethreads on the project page and embed them on my class wiki. Yesterday I mailed our "bulldog" mascot to your class and it should arrive within 10 days. Because the mailing is expensive, please just keep our bulldog at the end of the project. We will enjoy the voicethreads and enjoy seeing you and your students with the bulldog!

We love the idea of sharing our cultures on field trips - we'll see your exciting and interesting places and you will see ours. We also will enjoy the different accents. American - southern and Australian.

Links: St. Joseph's Primary

School website: St. Joseph's Primary

Rural Hall Elementary - Distance Learning

Mrs. McDermon's Class Wiki - click on projects and voicethread

Desktop Videoconferencing

2010-10-02T14:21:00.000-04:00

If you don't have a school videoconference set-up (Polycom or Tandberg) using h.323, you can use a desktop set-up. The only drawback is that when a lot of classes webstream, your quality can vary a lot, depending on your bandwidth. This is also great for home to visit those family and friends who do not live close-by.

Carol Skyring found a free link to download Polycom PVX software for a PC (not mac). You should read her post for more details. You can use this with a usb camera to do high quality desktop videoconferencing for five minutes at a time. I have used this software and it is great - quality and easy to use. We used it one year to share our student school news with a school in New Jersey. We saw their school news live and they saw ours live the next day.

Skype is also a great alternative and it's free. Again, you need a usb camera and can google a search or look through the skype link for webcams. With these desktop solutions, you can do classroom to classroom (with a data projector or white board (Promethean or SmartBoard). Skype works with PC or Mac. We have used skype, a usb webcam, and a laptop (or desktop) computer to easily visit other classrooms. These projects are easy to set-up and blog or share on a wiki.

There are websites and listservs for locating a connection on specific topics. Some of these are listed below:

Global Leap - http://www.global-leap.org/index.php
Skype in Schools - http://skypeinschools.pbworks.com/
TWICE - Two Way Interactive Connections in Education - Capspace
CILC - Center for Interactive Learning and Collaboration

Currently these web cams do not work with museum visits or h.323.

What do you use?

2010-09-05T14:37:00.000-04:00

In the computer lab this year, we are using a class wiki (mcdermonclass.pbwiki.com), EduGlogster (mcdermonclass.edu.glogster.com), and Google Apps for Education along with digital pictures, movies, voicethread, and blogs (several different blogs at blogspot.com) to teach the NC standard course of study. The technology has changed quite a bit since I last taught the lab 7 years ago, but being the school instructional technologist, I've kept up with web tools to share and encourage teachers to use them in their classrooms - now I get to use them with students -- wow -- what a fun job!

What types of web tools and software are you using? The biggest change is for students expecting to play games in the lab. The only software games I think we will be using (at this time) are Type to Learn Jr. and Type to Learn. If possible, we will upgrade the software and then students will have access at home (online).

I'm also looking for projects that go along with the NC SCOS and involve other classrooms. The first project is partnering a 4th grade class with a class in New Jersey and a class in Australia. These students will use school mascots to take on field trips and then create voicethreads to share. I love it! Imagine a southern US accent, a New Jersey accent, and an Australian accent. This should make the project entertaining, interesting, cover content in instructional areas along with technology content. This type of collaboration is allowing our students to work with others over time and space and cover instructional content. School was not this much fun when I was an elementary student!

Time to Go - It's August!

2010-08-05T10:17:00.000-04:00

So excited - teaching the computer lab this year, K-5, so many new changes. Bought some new digital cameras and headphones with microphones so students can put different media in their work. Exciting about student webpages, sharing, and collaboration.

Just ordered some cool, inexpensive, attention getting devices (read toys), to toss out to students from trainerswarehouse.com. These inexpensive devices will add to moments of attention and "no fade-outs". Also saw a really cute "Exceed Expectations" to drive home the idea of excellence is expected.

It seems like each year June is the "wind-down" time with staying busy with details and finishing a year; July is vacation; August is "gear-up" time. I'm geared-up, completed some lesson plans, many "rough" ideas for using the new tools and collaborations.

Read an article yesterday about computer labs being passe. It was based on college level. That I can understand, but not at elementary level. This is the place to learn the basic skills so that by later elementary years, students are applying these skills to their own content; using these skills to communicate collaboratively; using these skills to create their own learning. Just like reading and arithmetic are the basics, so are the computer skills to then transform the basics to your "own" work. Without these skills, students haphazardly use computer games to pick-up on their own, unfortunately, not learning enough basics to go to the level of independent usage.

Computer games are great for basics in "mousing" or "track" control, basic motor skills, visual perception, reading, math, and others. But seeing basic word processing skills, presentation skills (PowerPoint or HyperStudio), spreadsheets, spreadsheets with formulas in real life usage, offers another level of understanding and raises the level of computers as tools, not just games or entertainment. Using these tools in class aids work communication to other students and provides skills for further sharing and work related products.

I am looking forward to a great year in the computer lab!

Summer Reflection Time

2010-07-09T16:07:00.001-04:00

Completing a school year always brings me to reflecting on what I liked and what worked and what could be better and what didn't work at all. This year, I've been slow in working through this. We had so many changes last year with moving into a new building and having new technology in each classroom in this building. Changes for the good.

With the building changes and the budget changes, I'm sure that we will continue to change and grow in many new ways.

Our videoconferencing program - completed year 7 last year - will continue to offer programs from our wonderful state museums and other state institutions. We also use VC with NASA Digital Network, Sea Trek, These institutions offer expert classes for our students. We have taken these opportunities and expanded them in our curriculum to specific class to class projects with RAP (Read Around the Planet), Carolina Connections (4th graders around the state studying the state regions), PPS Megaconference, UK Poetry Day, and others. We have collaborated with other schools using the school wiki and used this collaboration to present shared content to Megaconference Jr. (Mega Jr. is a 12 hour around the world live VC.)

As we expand these programs and opportunities each year, we are only limited by our imaginations and our resourcefulness to meet our students needs while pushing our students to be their best and reach for higher goals in their own learning. For the 2010-11 school year, the teachers will be responsible for facilitating the vc classroom during the conferences, along with any follow-up. The teachers can simply come 10 minutes early to set-up materials, seat students appropriately, and maintain good behavior and aid the instructor with materials. Ending the conference should only take an additional 5 minutes in clean-up and returning materials to the mailing box, leaving the room ready for the next vc class. With each teacher being responsible for her class, the dl coordinator can simply set-up the vc schedules from the teacher and grade-level requests.

The biggest challenge will be planning for, setting-up individual class projects, and arranging rehearsal times, but the richness of these opportunities for our students will keep us focused on the end products.

Another big change for me personally, will be returning to the classroom to teach the computer lab. I loved this before and will enjoy the increase in student contact as we prepare our students for technology use/skills that they can integrate in their class projects, science fair, and daily lives. Remember, our students do not live in an analog world - it is definitely digital and they need instruction that will allow them to be successful in choosing technology to help them meet their learning goals.

Of course, "thoughts" of past years and future years do not touch on the details, but those will be worked out. Now, after a week at the wonderful NC outer banks -- this year on Hatteras Island - I am truly enjoying summer vacation -- time to grow a garden, experiment with new, healthy recipes, and enjoy the beauty in the world. But at the back of my mind, as always, is the next school year and the things I can do now to prepare and enhance my teaching to be a better instructor, communicator, and learner.

It is raining! - Or Just Politics?

2010-05-21T09:05:00.000-04:00

This week our county commissioners, who hold the purse strings for our county's public schools, decided to deny 4.5 million dollars in funding for our school systems budget next year. Last night the school board met to make more cuts in the budget, which is not yet finalized.

Top of the list is elementary foreign language - we know that children learn languages easier when they are young - this hurts our students. Our school's Spanish teacher also does double duty as a translator. Who will translate next year?

Second on the list is technology facilitators - sounds harmless, but what do they do? They keep a school running with the technology that they have. Many teachers are tech savvy, but many are not. Do we want to loose good teachers because they are not tech savvy? Take away their help and what is left? Who does the web page? Who diagnoses problems and sends in equipment for repair? Who runs the computer labs and distance learning labs? Who sets up the reading software (AR/STAR, Orchard)or other school databased learning software? Who facilitates projects for collaboration over time and space (using wiki's, blogs, skype, or videoconferencing)? This is 21st century learning and the skills needed by our students to compete in today's world. Again, this is short-sighted. Our particular school was fortunate enough to move the 3rd-5th graders into a new technology rich building. We have state of the art technology in each classroom and a videoconference room for trips to state museums and other schools and countries. What parent doesn't want his/her child to go to a museum once a month? What parent would want to see this equipment sitting unused due to no personnel?

A third loss for our school is our office assistant. For the 28 years I have been at this school, this position has taken care of teachers clerical needs such as supplies and making copies for students. Her equipment is pretty sophisticated - another task that would be difficult for teachers to do as they are in the classroom. This equipment would soon be in dis-repair and wouldn't work. Just another stress for classroom teachers.

The list was about 20 items long - all of these jobs are needed to work with our students. I could write a paragraph about each of these jobs and how they will affect our students and teachers. By the time teachers make up for all of this lost help, when will they teach, or when will they be able to go home if they stay all of the extra hours needed to do the other "chores" they have had help with in the past?

Do we want the best education for our students? Do we care about quality? This is the question.

Our school board is in a difficult spot in trying to make the budget work. They have spoken up for the employees and cut with regrets. But their question to the county commissioners and my question to the county commissioners is the same - What kind of education do you want for your children and grandchildren? Top qualitly or mediocore?

The county commissioners are trying to make the point that it is the state's job to pay for public education. Well, that is only acceptable if the county commissioners are willing to allow our students a less than top quality education.

Today's newspaper, the Winston-Salem Journal, put the cuts at 4.5 million and said the county has 100 million in cash reserve - their rainy day fund. I do believe it is raining. Where is the umbrella for our students?

Google Apps and Our Staff - Part 5

2010-05-20T13:58:00.000-04:00

What’s next? Well, that is planning for next year! As we move into the last month of school with testing, look to summer training – we have a team of 5 attending NC Teacher Academy for Technology – we have a lot of exciting plans and some summer time to reflect and prioritize our next steps.

One is to increase our Google Apps for Education to more grade levels. Currently only our fifth graders and one fourth grade class are logging into the domain with the teachers. Next year, we will have 2nd through 5th graders involved.

I can see students working in pairs, teams, across classes, and grade levels to complete projects using web 2.0 tools and google apps for education. Plans have been developed and ideas are bouncing around to work together to develop skills and projects and share these with others.

One step at a time, we become stronger and wiser and make progress in learning together.

Google Apps and Our Staff – Part 4

2010-05-18T08:26:00.000-04:00

On May 5, our staff met for our fourth day of Google Apps for Education. On this day we shared google sites, blogs from blogger.com, and google groups.

We use google groups to send email 2-3 times a week to interested families and community. This free listserv allows us to share important information, news, events, and pictures with our community. I also use a google group for our local Friends of the Library board. It keeps us informed and connected.

I also shared two articles. The first was “Why Schools are Turning to Google Apps” http://mashable.com/2010/04/28/schools-google-apps/
The second article was “Improving School Communication with Google Apps” http://www.edutopia.org/google-educators-school-communication

This year we got very busy with our move into the new building, packing up materials and equipment for the move. Moving and setting up again, learning new technology – we have the “classroom solution” in all classrooms in the new building – called the 21st century schools. It is fantastic! This move and learning curve of this new technology has kept us busy learning and communicating.

Google Apps and Our Staff – Part 3

2010-05-14T07:33:00.000-04:00

On March 9, our staff met for our third day of Google Apps for Education. On this day, we logged into our domain and looked at google reader, google calendar, and google email.

I shared my google reader and how it helps me keep up with articles, news, blogs – at work and for hobbies. Using a “reader” brings the information to you—you don’t have to go out and search for it, it comes to your computer email or reader page. This helps me a lot in keeping up with work, new ideas (that I don’t have to create, but just implement). This saves a lot of time and I gain the knowledge from other educators.

Another great way to have information come to you is through google alerts. I use them for school and for hobbies, and family. Each day my mailbox has one email on my school alerts for videoconferencing and for instructional technology. I also use it for Old English sheepdogs (dog rescue & transport). For my personal life, I get an alert when one of my sons is the referee on a college soccer game or the other son has a new article published in the newspaper (journalist). It is a modern way to keep up with families across the country and world. Again, information comes to me and it saves time.

The great part about Google Apps for Education at RHES is that it is closed to the public. Our students can only email each other and their teachers. No email comes into our domain and no email goes out of our domain. This gives us the opportunity to teach students how to use email in a safe environment. Once students are 13, they can have an email account without parent permission and there is no instruction. Learning this at an early age allows us to include the importance of our character traits when using email, reminding children to be kind, write positives, use email for school work, and most important to tie it to the “golden rule.” Without instruction, our students are left to their own resorts, temperaments – they need instruction and positive, gentle, guidance.

Ed Tech Funding – Help!

2010-05-12T07:20:00.000-04:00

The “Enhancing Education Through Technology” program is about to die. HELP! In many states and school districts, this is the ONLY funding for educational technology. Congress first approved EETT as part of No Child Left Behind, with the idea that technology plays a big part in improving “student achievement, ensuring high quality teaching, and increasing parental involvement…” (this quote from ISTE – International Society for Technology in Education). We use technology in so many ways to connect to parents – through a weekly email listserv, school website, Twitter, blogs, and wiki’s.

As Congress begins to rewrite the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, it is certain that technology should play a large role in making (1) equity in teacher quality across all schools (2) creating data systems to follow students over time – allowing for more research into what is working and then duplicating those traits (3) making a better test – one that fairly shows what a child knows, not just what they can do on a multiple choice test in a segment of time – and improving state standards (4) supporting schools that need help – not throwing out the baby with the bath water – helping all students learn.

In North Carolina, the IMPACT grant funds have shown that teacher retention is higher and students are 33% more likely to improve one full grade level each year as compared to non IMPACT schools. IMPACT can be found on the web at http://www.ncwiseowl.org/Impact/igrant/
This is a document that provides coordination of the library media and instructional technology programs to enhance learning. Schools apply for this grant which includes teacher training, flexible staffing in the library and tech labs, and hiring of a technology facilitator and assistant. This team of library and technology work with classroom teachers to implement technology through-out the curriculum. This grant is funded from EETT. Last year 11 new applications were accepted into this program, which has run successfully since 2003.

Google Apps and Our Staff – Part 2

2010-05-11T07:37:00.000-04:00

On February 8, our staff met in the computer lab during planning time again to learn about Google Apps for Rural Hall School. Each staff member has a login to our “cloud” domain. We have email, docs, presentations, spreadsheets, forms, sites, calendars, and video. This is a great way for students to complete homework or classwork. There is no problem with software incompatibility or version or operating system.

We loved using the video site! Only teachers can upload video, so the student flip cameras have been put to good use. When the fourth graders went on a three day field trip to the NC outer banks, they took six flip cameras and took video of the stops along the way. Representative movies of each stop were uploaded on the google video site. We have some great photographers here! This was also a great way to have the students at Rural Hall who didn't attend the trip stay in touch with the students who did go - we used Google Moderator and posted questions for the students on the trip to look for things while touring. The teachers on the trip responded back to us at school. We also made a Google Earth tour of the exact trip with all of the stops along the way. The students enjoyed this tour in the computer lab. These applications allowed our students to stay in touch and be "connected" to the field trip even though they were at school.

Another great use we found for Google Apps for Education at RHES was the calendar feature. Each login has its own calendar. We created a calendar for the laptop cart lab. Now, our teachers login to our google apps and sign-up on this calendar to use the laptop lab. They can access this from home to check when making plans and sign-up without having to wait to return to school and use a paper sign-up on the door. – Improvement!

On this staff day in the lab, the teachers logged into Google Apps for Education at RHES and we looked around a bit. I showed the different applications briefly. During the next two staff days, we practiced all of these different possibilities. Having time between these staff days allowed us time to try out some of the applications, think about uses for the applications, and be ready to apply them.

Google Apps, Wiki, and Our Staff - Part 1

2010-05-09T20:03:00.000-04:00

We had four staff development days in our computer lab. Teachers and staff came during planning time in January, February, March, and May. (In April we moved into a new building.) Total attendance was 138.

Our first day was dedicated to our private school wiki. We use it for staff communication. Last summer I happened to see that pbwiki was offering a free wiki upgrade and a free six week class in wiki’s. (And it looks like they will be doing it again this summer – check http://www.pbworks.com for information.) The staff learned to login to the wiki and practiced on sandbox pages. We began posting grade level notes and meeting notes on the wiki. The principal added readings to the wiki and the teachers posted reflections. We also used the wiki to develop our new mission and vision statements.

This type of staff development and time to learn something new and practice was invaluable. The wiki has had over 2000 logins from the staff.

What a week!

2010-04-11T09:29:00.000-04:00

The end of one long adventure - is coming to a close. One of our school buildings is 60 years old and it has been replaced by a new state of the art technology building for 3rd-5th graders. The classes begin moving into the building on Monday. Next week will be an adventure - moving, teaching, checking that classroom computers are moved and set-up - of course, our county tech department has done a fantastic job having things ready for us - the building is wireless although the computer lab is wired. We have a separate room for videoconferencing - so good for our students.

The teachers are so excited to have a new teacher "classroom solution" (our county term) for a new desktop computer, slate, voice modulator, speakers in the ceiling, 6 foot Promethean board, class set of ActivVotes, and a new, larger room, with sinks, and of course new classroom furniture.

The original building was built in the early 1900's and has been changed over the years. The current "old" wing of the building was built in 1950 and will be demolished this summer. The K-2 building was opened in 1977 or 78 and has very large classrooms with sinks and restrooms in each class. These really nice rooms still look modern. They should have the "classroom solution" in the near future.

We can stop talking about not having resources and looking for money to improve equipment, but move on to using these resources to engage our students in learning. Teaching has always been a task where you must know your subject well, but to succeed, need skills to engage students in learning tasks and activities - like being a cheerleader on the sidelines, you must direct the activities and encourage students to do their best. Many people qualify for the knowledge factor, but the human factor of making that personal connection to a student and being their personal cheerleader for success - that is the key.

Now for a little nostalgia - my boys went to this school many years ago and at that time, the PTA was raising funds for air-conditioners in each classroom in this building. Education has changed so much over the past 60 years and so many things have improved for students. But, it still comes back to the basics of the teacher in the classroom - is he or she qualified (yes if licensed by the state) and the crucial part, does the teacher connect to the students. Teachers have very little influence over differing home situations, living conditions, parents support of schools and learning, but teachers can make that connection to make a child's life at school optimal - connect in an adult way, share your knowledge, be a cheerleader for every student at their current learning level - showing students respect & students respecting teachers - all of these are so important for learning - moving forward - learning to think.

Off the soap-box of my opinions and on to learning in new ways! Follow the yellow-brick road? :-)

Favorite 3 Web Tools

2010-03-29T17:37:00.000-04:00

www.wordle.net

Saw wallwisher.com and wondered what your favorite or top 3 web tools are (they do change often), but thought I might find new ones quickly this way -- I did! Sent out a message on twitter and found many replies rather quickly. Thanks folks!

Google Docs - Presentation

2010-03-21T19:19:00.000-04:00

Here's an idea for using google presentations to study a unit, giving groups of students different topics to study and work cooperatively to present to the class. The teacher creates a presentation, putting the name of the presentation in the title box and putting the students in the group in the subtitle box. Then the teacher shares the presentation with these students. See the lesson plan and rubrics to learn more details.
Lesson Plan
Google Docs – Presentations
Overview:
Teacher divides students into groups for making presentations on specific topic and shares with these groups of students. Students work in groups as they participate in presenting topic to class.
Time:
This presentation takes 2 class periods and 2 computer lab periods to prepare, with 1 class period for groups to share with class.
Preparation:
Teacher chooses unit of study and divides topics in groups. Teacher assigns students to groups. Teacher creates basic presentation with title and names of students in group for subtitle. Teachers shares each presentation with appropriate group members. Teacher prepares a list of requirements to include with each topic. Teacher prepares a rubric for assessment.
Specifics:
Teacher shares groups topics and group members with students. Teacher shares sample project. Teacher shares rubric for assessment. Students meet as a group and begin research on assigned topic. Students have two class periods to work on project. Students have two computer lab periods to work on project. Students can also work at home on project.

Students share completed presentations with classmates in classroom or computer lab. Students are given rubric assessment by teacher (privately). Students comment on presentation of other groups and use self-assessment on own group.

Assessment Rubric for Group Presentations
Directions: Circle one sentence on each row below the headings to represent the group presentation.

Excellent	Good	Needs Improvement	Incomplete
All students worked equally on completed project.	All students worked on completed project.	Most students worked on completed project.	Some students worked on incomplete project.
All parts of project content demonstrates understanding and deeper insight into topic content.	All parts of project content demonstrates understanding of topic.	Some parts of project demonstrates understanding of topic.	Content is at basic level of understanding.
Presentation includes audio and video content in exceptional presentation.	Presentation includes audio or video content.	Audio or video inserted does not work.	No audio or video.
Photos included show levels of ideas in presentation. All are cited correctly for copyright.	Photos included demonstrate ideas in presentation. All photos are cited correctly for copyright.	Photos are included, not necessarily on topic. Not all photos are cited correctly for copyright.	No photos.
5 points	4 points	2 points	1 point

HTML Tables

Rubric for Group Presentations - Self Assessment
Directions: Read the table below. Circle one sentence in each row that tells how you worked in this group. You may have circles or answers in different columns.

Good	Needs Improvement	Incomplete
I finished all of my work.	Other people did some of my work.	I did not do my work.
I listened and responded to my group.	I helped when someone asked me.	I didn't listen or join in discussions in my group.
I shared my ideas with my group.	I shared at one idea.	I did not share with my group.
I helped my group with problems.	I listened when my group solved problems.	I did not help or vote when my group solve problems.
I worked on my part of the presentation.	I worked on some of my part of the presentation.	I did not complete any of my part of the presentation.

NCTIES Reflections

2010-03-06T16:35:00.000-05:00

Short notes on conference:

Many great sessions and of course, difficult to choose which ones to attend! One of the great things about a conference, though, is learning from the people attending, too. There are conversations in the car - for us in Forsyth County, that's an additional 4 hours of conversations about edtech, what works, and what doesn't, what's new, what we want to try, etc.

Next month, we will move into a new building with new equipment. We have thought for a while we would have SmartBoards, but may have Promethean boards - just not sure. The first session I attended was on ActivExpressions, the new, upgraded handheld used with Promethean boards. He showed us how to do the software upgrades to the handhelds and several different ways to use them in a class situation. We should find out soon which we will have in the new building.

Another session was Cindy Phthisic's "Ride the Wave." She shared her top 10 google tools. Loved them. One tool that is advantageous for groups in education or in teaching is google wave. It has a great way to share and communicate and plan and you can add widgets and maps, so many things that aid the discussion. But, I think that they do work best with smaller groups - like a class -- 10 or 20 or 30 people can do a lot in a wave. If it gets too large, it is too bulky.

The absolute best part of the conference was Ron Clark's introduction and presentation at the luncheon. I've read one of his books. I've always enjoyed teaching with enthusiasm to engage students - singing silly little made-up songs to help students remember things. In the fall, we took the ship measurements of the Mayflower, used chalk to draw them in the courtyard, used tables, chairs, boxes to represent areas of the ship and tried to imagine how the people lived there during the voyage. We followed up by reading a lot about the first settlements, how the people lived, and what they did. We made our own Thanksgiving meal, made hats, collars, place-cards for our lunch, churned butter, baked a turkey, cooked the side dishes, and finally enjoyed our feast. This is just one example of many practical, hands-on activities. Like others in the luncheon, I identified with Ron Clark and his love of students and teaching -- finding out what students need and trying to help them learn and be excited about learning new things.

The session after lunch was about Ready Animation - software by John Lemmon and session by Julia LaChance. This session demonstrated one of the grant winner's project that worked great for her middle school students. We skyped with John Lemmon and had the opportunity to ask him questions. It was another good session. We could do parts of this with clay animation, or art, and use digital cameras, and powerpoint with 1 second slides. This is thought for a trial class to see how it works.

The last session of the day was a session from LearnNC about online learning. Many participants were beginning online learning opportunities for their teachers and staff just like we have in Forsyth County. There are many online courses offered to our teachers in the state and LearnNC is also offering COLT classes to add more classes - free classes - for counties in NC.

Friday sessions began with Leslie Fisher's updates on ipods and iphones. She shared many great apps for students, teachers, and techies.

There was a great session on using digital storytelling. This was appropriate for our new 6 digital flip cameras for students. Gained some new ideas for use. Our original idea was for students to take them on their field trip to the coast as they learn about other regions of the state and visit landmarks that they have been studying.

The last session was another digital storytelling session using flip video cameras. My head is spinning with all of the interesting sessions and the vendors demonstrations. WOW!

The benefits of this conference will be seen within the next year as we try out some of the ideas for technology in our new building and create some new ones of our own. Yippee - when you love your work, all is good!

Google Apps for Education

2010-02-17T13:22:00.001-05:00

Our fifth grade students and one fourth grade class volunteered to be a test group for our school using Google Apps for Education, a free, closed environment for our students to use some of the many web tools. Students have access to email, documents, presentations (like PowerPoint or HyperStudio), forms, sites (webpages), and calendar. We are not using chat at this time. Students have access from school and home. Teachers can send one email to the whole class with an assignment or announcement and students can use the tools (above) and save and share with the teacher. The teacher opens the documents and can grade and reply to the student--no paper!

Students can work on projects in groups. If the teacher begins a group project using presentations, she can name the project (the assignment) and in the subtitle area, list the students who will be working on the project together. Then the teacher shares the project with these students. The teacher can see who make which changes, if some students aren’t working, etc. When the projects are completed, the students can share in class, or by sharing in email with comments on the “sites” page.

In our county we are fortunate to have Winston-Net, which has computers in recreation centers around the county, plus the county public libraries. There are many opportunities for students to have access besides at school.

The entire staff has one day a month scheduled for staff development during planning times to work on google apps. The success is encouraging to teachers. I will update with links to lesson plans and ideas we have tried.

Lifelong Learners - Are you one?

2010-01-25T09:06:00.000-05:00

This is a common term tossed about in education. You see it in vision statements, read articles that mention it, and teachers say they want their students to be lifelong learners. What does this mean? Well, I think it means you are willing to continue to learn through-out your life. Whether it is school work, new teaching methods, or revised and renamed teaching methods, new techniques for business, interpersonal relationships, work environments, hobby information, health, or computer updates, or just about anything else. Data/facts/information has doubled, doubled, and doubled, and continues to at an amazing rate. We now know we can’t memorize or learn it all, but can learn to search for the information we need. Still, we need to analyze it and put it to use. Whether it is health information on lowering your cholesterol without drugs, or learning to do your job in a new way; it comes down to whether or not you like to learn new things. Attitude plays a big part.

Many people feel confident that they do a good job at work. Sometimes the question arises, “Why should I learn to do it differently when my way works so well?” This is a hurdle for people to overcome. Attitude is important here and can make such a big difference in success. Teachers who have taught in specific ways for several years find comfort in that routine, knowing that it works. Just as companies and assembly lines change their procedures and techniques, so must education. One big question is why do we test students like was done in the 19th century when we live in the 21st century? But that is a question left for another day.

These thoughts come from a person who loves to learn new things –- finds it intriguing and interesting. Back to the teacher who doesn’t want to learn technology, drags his/her feet in using technology – this teacher is the model for not being a lifelong learner. When we say one thing and do another, children and students see that. We need to remember that we don’t know it all and remember that facilitating instruction is a good method for teaching – not the “sage on the stage” that students quickly tune out. Sometimes this attitude can come from administrators who do not like change or technology.

We are very fortunate at our school to have an administration that enjoys using technology and encourages our staff to learn and offers opportunities in safe and comfortable ways. We need to be lifelong learners to function at our best for our students. For ourselves. What new things have you researched or learned recently?

Not High Tech, but Touches the Heart and Senses

2010-01-17T08:40:00.000-05:00

Cotton, the therapy dog, visits our school several times a month. He loves to listen to children read. Students leave their classroom in small groups and take turns reading their favorite book to Cotton. He looks at the child who is reading and wags his tail, showing comfort and approval.

The children are encouraged in their reading and happy to read daily so they can read to Cotton the next time he visits.

The NY Times has an article about research on pets and the effect on humans today (Jan. 17). There hasn't been much research over the years. In 1987, a NIH study suggested more study on the effect of pets on health and child development. With a background in child development, dog rescue, raising children with pets, teaching a regular classroom, I'm thrilled to hear about this research. Children should have fun and loving approval while learning at home and school.

Traveling Through Twitter

2010-01-11T07:42:00.000-05:00

One of the unusual aspects to twitter, for someone like me, who works in a job with no travel (teacher), I find the network of people who use twitter broadening. I love to travel and bring back those experiences for my students, but this is not something that happens often. I spend all of my county supplement on my classroom and there is just not that money or time to travel - I dream of traveling when I retire, but that would be so different, no students to return to to share. The web has brought the world to my home and classroom, which is great! Twitter has brought the personal touch to these experiences with contacts - pictures and short bio's of twitterers - which brings faces, personal contact to this network of educators who love to learn and to share. I love the ideas and find comfort in other professionals who want the best for their students and continually strive to improve. Folks who are not satisfied with the status quo and want to get better every day. I can spend time checking the ed tweets, clicking on the urls's and adding them to my delicious bookmarks to share with the staff at my school. It is amazing how teacher's love to share good ideas and that is wonderful for our students. This aspect was surprising to me, but as helpful as the ed chats and other web opportunities. Just one more tool to help me keep updated.

EdTech 365/2010

2010-01-07T17:22:00.000-05:00

OK, I've joined the crowd of folks who are blog posting pictures every day this year; my focus is on our new building which we will move into during the end of March. The new building, and older section, will all be outfitted with state of the art technology in each classroom - hallelujah! With so many changes, physically in the building, there will be lots to photograph. Our teachers and students doing new things, learning new ways to instruct and learn. This is so exciting! Heard about this from langwitches on twitter. I'm posting these pics on my flickr account in a set called EdTech_365/2010 and at mcdermon.

Educational Journeys

2009-12-31T11:23:00.000-05:00

This blog posting begins from Aaron Eyler's blog (Synthesizing Education) on Dec. 30, “The Appropriate Use of Technology in K-12 Classrooms”, and moves on to, what I think, is an example of teacher preparation, planning, and collaboration. His blog makes several good points - a weekly visit to the computer lab is not integrating technology. His view of “having students engage in critical thinking using technology that contributes to their overall learning” is spot on. In North Carolina, our new teacher evaluation does add technology integration into the evaluation - big step forward.

With all of the demands on teacher’s free time (40 minutes during the day and 30 minutes before and after school in elementary--with the required meetings), finding the time to create lessons that totally integrate technology is difficult. These lessons should use cooperative learning, use many levels of thinking skills, and have group rubrics; this requires a lot of planning, thinking, reflecting, and tinkering to develop, along with a tremendous desire to “do the best” for the students. It is exhausting. Time consuming. If teachers could work in cooperative groups (in elementary, grade-levels), like the students, it would help stream-line the planning. Add an instructional technologist to this group, and you have a group based on curriculum content and school level tech that is available, allowed by the district, and possibly some new web tools that add interest to the students. Being there, in the lab or classroom, when some of this work/web tools is being done or introduced, aids and supports the classroom teacher. It gives a boost to the work production. Many instructional technologists were previously classroom teachers and do have a good content background.

At our school, we are undergoing some new projects this spring (along with moving our 3rd-5th graders into a new, technology rich building). The 4th graders are going on a field trip to the NC outer banks to enhance their study of our state and its history. The principal bought 6 flip cameras to allow these students to participate and bring home their personal views of what they saw and why it is important. I made a blog to share links for content, pics of the trip, and allow a conversation to begin on this learning project. We have a good skeleton project and are adding details and rich content, done individually by the classroom teachers. I’ll begin working with the teachers and then the students (in groups of 6) to learn to use these cameras, how to download the files, how to discriminate importance of content, lengths of time and sizes of files, etc. (remember these are 9-10 year olds). Some of the finished products in this project include written reports by students posted on the blog or wiki page, the finished videos posted, student and teacher reflections of the trip, year’s work, and possibly some skits or reports on the school’s daily news program.

Time and postings will show our results - I imagine some will be more successful than others and some tinkering will be done with the ideas along the way. Interesting and exciting to see students engaged in their learning, making choices, owning what they know and want to know, and working together to strengthen their choices. Education is now becoming a more personalized journey for students. This is an exciting time to help students grow by facilitating instruction rather than the teacher as “expert”, lecturing.

Google Apps for Education

2009-12-19T07:21:00.000-05:00

We are beginning a new adventure in technology for our students when we return to school in January. Our students in fifth grade are our "test" students in using Google apps. They will be given a login to gmail and can access docs, calendars, and pages to produce and share their work in a closed environment. Our goal is to allow use of web 2.0 tools for student work at school and home, and keep it safe. We will be a totally closed environment. Only fifth grade students and their teachers, principal ,assistant-principal, curriculum coordinator, and instructional technologist will have access. Students can use email, docs (document, presentation, spreadsheet, and form) to complete their work and share it on their own webpage. All content will only be seen by other students and staff. Of course we hope to learn a lot with these students in our "test" and hope to expand these logins to more students/grade levels next year. Students can use docs to complete homework and save to share with teachers at school, or use the share feature and email the work to the teacher. With many families having internet connections, public libraries, and the Winston-Net program (puts computers in recreation and other community centers through-out the county), accessibility is possible for students.

I have to say, it took only a week (with just a couple of days) to set-up all the apps in Google for education The other days were waiting for the new web domain to get through the web (TTL) and send and receive emails. The help screens are excellent and the guide for set-up is very easy to follow. Just some quiet time to go through the set-up is all you need. We did purchase a domain so our students have a shortened email address, but that was the ONLY expense. We immediately applied to be upgraded to Google for education, which is free, and that gives us more logins than the 50 in the orginal set-up.

My experience so far is incredible - easy - offering more opportunities to students - and so exciting. Student excitement about using new tools brings/increases enthusiasm to projects and school work.

Our thoughts in the test group - fifth graders are only 5 1/2 short months from completing elementary school and moving to middle school. These apps will allow them to enhance or learn new skills while developing self-confidence in their abilities. These students are capable and ready to take another step in learning and technology. They will question, have problems, and solve problems, and give us experience in using these tools with students. Step one is complete - now it's time to implement - on to step 2.

Periodically I'll post more information on how our test group of students are doing and the successes and obstacles we find.

I did spend 2 days in Washington, D.C. with 1 1/2 of those days at the Google office there - it was an amazing experience - even though I had bronchitis and coughed a lot! The people from Google and the groups of teachers attending were helpful, thoughtful, and enthusiastic about helping students learn to manage web tools and learning. Google Teacher Academy is highly recommended - an experience unlike any other. Never once heard the words 21st century learning - as our local tech people say, we ARE IN the 21st century, we must step up and use the tools and offer our students the experiences they need to be successful and adjust to the fast-paced world of learning and sharing. We aren't "going there" we are here!

Read Around the Planet

2009-12-01T10:28:00.000-05:00

Time for teacher sign-ups for Read Around the Planet - this year eight teachers have signed-up. This is 30 minutes of "fun" sharing reading, writing, skits, learning, but emphasis is on fun! With all of the testing and time spent on test sophistication, this type of interactive activity with another class shares the joy of reading, the pleasure of sharing what you read, and for children who may not see their parents reading (may be asleep) or just our busy lives, this emphasis on reading for pleasure, besides the reading for information done in schools, jobs, businesses, allows the spark of reading fun to remain active.

Mrs. Church's kindergarten (right) has participated several years. They enjoy sharing poetry. We have classes from kindergarten through fifth grade at our school. The upper grade students usually prepare a skit or act out a favorite book. All of these communication skills help our students learn and grow.

Flip Cameras on Field Trips

2009-11-24T09:02:00.000-05:00

Our principal just purchased six new flip cameras for upper grade students to use. This will be a great addition to field trips - imagine when our 4th graders go the the North Carolina outer banks this spring... The history there: there is the mystery of the "Lost Colony" in Manteo, what happened to that first colony and the first European baby born here? The shipwrecks off the coast, the legend of Blackbeard who lived and pirated these waters, and died here, the wild horses found on the northern banks and on Ocracoke -- these horses are of Spanish descent (checked by DNA) and are thought to have survived when ships wrecked and swam to shore to live and reproduce. The horses' descendants still inhabit the islands. The thrill of visiting the historic lighthouses, all with unique histories and the joy of the students capturing this on camera and making movies when they return to school. There are so many reading, writing, communication skills, technical skills and just plain fun in learning opportunities that it will take awhile to post it here and on the school webpage. -- And this is just the example of one field trip. There will be many to come. Yippee!

Phones & Driving

2009-11-23T08:29:00.000-05:00

This is my 2 cents worth:
Technology - it is great and there are apps for just about everything. It can become a "jazz" thing of always learning the new thing and moving on with it, but you should always look at the application and its uses and even its effect on others. Recently I saw a tweet about a website that offers "hands free" apps while driving.
This might be a great thing for a few folks who may be driving long distances with little traffic around them, but for many who are driving in dense traffic or bad weather, this could be just the one thing too many that causes an accident. When I am stopped at a traffic light, I will answer my phone, but as soon as traffic begins again, I say good-bye, or use the other option and pull off the road. Driving while talking on the phone does distract the driver from giving full attention to safety. This cartoon says a lot. It's not just their safety, but the safety of all who are near-by. Take responsibility for yourself and others. Leave the phone alone while driving. As of December 1, 2009, it is illegal to text while driving in NC. Talking on the phone is legal while driving.

Orville & Wilbur Wright - PPS Mega 3

2009-11-21T14:34:00.000-05:00

The big day has arrived - our students are ready, they've researched Orville and Wilbur Wright, from Ohio to North Carolina - they've written a script, posted their work on the wiki, and practiced their skit. But first, there are some other presentations to watch and an interactive presentation about robotics. Teams of middle school students made robots - they researched to determine a purpose for their robot, then developed it to complete that task. Our students and teachers were thrilled as these students shared their projects. This all day videoconference was PPS (Pittsburgh Public Schools) Megaconference 3. Schools from Pittsburgh, PA, NC, TX, Canada, and England participated; schools from elementary through high school.

The fun of the culminating activity of collaborative projects -- sharing it with others, interactively, adds dimensions of learning to students and teachers. They stretch their abilities and observe other students in their pursuits. The atmosphere, the joy, the presentation skills, all allow opportunities to students. And to teachers, as they thoughtfully interact with students in discussion of the presentations, oral and written reflections of the activities.

Our students will travel to the outer banks of North Carolina this spring and visit Kitty Hawk. They will film and post videos and blogs of their travels - stretch the learning - take it to new layers. "12 seconds that changed the world" refers to the first flight of the Wright brothers. Yet, technology in education is changing the world as our students perceive it - and opening the world to our students, not to just a few who can afford to travel, but to all who can find internet access - sharing this learning through blogs, webpages, wikis, videos, videoconferences, twitter, web 2.0 tools, collaborative tools, and the new, yet to be invented, communication tools that enhance learning.

Interactive Videoconference - UK Poetry Day

2009-10-11T13:03:00.000-04:00

A teacher willing to jump into a new educational opportunity, do a little creative work, and her students are rewarded with an experience of learning unlike any other. This describes one of our fifth grade teachers recently. Late last spring, I ran across a good international educational opportunity, asked a teacher who is willing to give new experiences to her students, and it turned into a great learning experience. Our application to participate in the UK Poetry Day was accepted. We were put in the session with three other schools from the UK and English poet, John Hegley. The purpose of the conference was to write poems about Europe to share these poems. Mrs. Scott had her fifth graders list the countries in Europe and the facts and well-known landmarks from each country. They used this chart to create their class poem. Meanwhile, I ordered four of John Hegley's poetry books to give the students opportunity to read and be familiar with his work. They prepared questions to ask him about his poems.

Event day had us all excited. The room was set with chairs, one table at the front, and a British and U.S. flag on the table along with two of the poet's books. The students enjoyed hearing the other poems written by students, and they enjoyed the entertaining way the poets shared their poetry. Some read, some sang, and all engaged the audience. Some of the poems were read in English and French and some in Spanish. Many of the presenters allowed the audience to participate by repeating phrases.

This experience had so many levels of learning. The basic reading (the poet's books), writing the poem, thinking about and creating the chart of "what we know" about Europe (social studies), art - drawing pictures to share while the poem was being read aloud, practicing the poem (oral communication skills), and engaging an audience from other countries in other languages. WOW! Oh, and did I mention, it was free! :-)

POV's "The Principal"

2009-09-27T09:31:00.000-04:00

This blog is usually about technology, but this post is about good public education. Technology is my usual "soapbox," but back it up a little and it is good public education. Public education is a great equalizing force in America. It allows all students to learn, pull themselves up and do better, which public education has done for generations. An educated public is necessary for a democracy to survive. We need adults who think for themselves, not someone who is always fed information and follows along. When you hear or read a news story, do you question it? Do you ask (in your head) the unasked questions? Can you read opposing view points and decide for yourself? These skills are important for determining your own path in life; for keeping our democracy strong.

What is good public education? Where does it begin? How do we replicate it? It begins with good principals, good leadership, and good teaching. If you missed seeing it, check out the PBS website and search for POV or "The Principal." We are so lucky that we have so many of these characteristics in our county and schools. One thing I have been hearing locally for several years is "data driven" decisions. We are certainly doing that. Walk-throughs by principals, assistant-principals, & curriculum coordinators; K-2 assessments; and of course, the EOG's (end of grade tests for grades 3-5). All of these are tools to see that we are on task as professionals doing the best we can for our students. But the main ingredient at the base is emotional -- do you have "heart?" Do you love children and do you have patience to teach them social behaviors, manners, kindness, using words rather than fists, pushing, etc. Can you give a child a pat on the back, give a hug; do you believe that he/she can succeed? Do you believe that all children can learn and be successful? Some say teaching is a "calling" like being a minister or priest. Could be, but it does take that special extra caring ingredient, that if you don't have, you are only helping others to process information, not grow into caring, responsible human beings.

Watching these two principals in this documentary deal with the many problems of public schools (remember, we accept everyone, no entrance exams), and surviving, improving, making tough decisions, all come to play, but having the heart to stay strong, give help where needed, and be willing to change strategies, actions, make new plans for success and just work very hard--this is what I identify with and fortunately, see at my school. Our staff cares and has a community of learning and giving to students. Parents and community support our school. Teachers work on committees and stay after-school hours to communicate and plan for changes and improvements. Each day is an opportunity to do better than the day before. Each day is a fresh start for students to learn and show good behavior. Teachers volunteer their hours to have after-school clubs or activities to extend and expand learning. (We've had Math Club, Computer Club, Junior Master Gardeners, Quest Atlantis.) Some teachers do stay and tutor after-school for pay, but we all have the good-will and success of our students at heart.

Education is one entity that I have a problem with using the "business" model. Students are not widgets and are all different. Students need an individual approach. Students need cooperation, love, patience, and continued, constant support from the teachers and school community to succeed. All of this is directed by the principal. Without a good principal who is willing to give his/her heart and much of his/her life to the job, making those tough decisions, and trying to continually improve and help the staff to continually improve, you have mediocrity. We can do better than mediocre. This documentary shows two principals who do have these characteristics and demonstrate success in their schools. Watch it online if you missed it. It shows what is "right" about good public schools.

Twitter Professionally

2009-09-12T17:07:00.000-04:00

Emory, from our school system tech dept, wrote about Twitter and using it professionally. He was "spot on." I, too, get good ideas, suggestions, partners from videoconferencing folks and ed tech folks every day. It's utterly amazing to find connections around the globe on twitter. The distinction being, using it as a professional tool.

I've tried to explain to others (my husband and family) that it is so helpful, professionally. My first reaction to "what are you doing in 140 characters or less?" was "who cares." I joined and didn't tweet much. When I began looking at people whose blogs I read and looking at who they were following on Twitter and who was following them, I realized that this is a current, fluid, collective network of people - experts. Like going to an ed tech conference, but it was free. The network of users allows us to "pick the brains" of many talented people on a daily basis. This is not Facebook. I'm not trying to put myself "out there," but to locate relevant, timely, information and hints that help me work with my school staff and students. The only "social networks" I'm on by name are all work/professionally related. MUSE (Internet 2), and several ning groups.

Of course, I occasionally do tweet about personal things. My dogs, especially good day or happy occasion, but this too has some interesting results. Upon returning from our vacation, tweeted about the NC outer banks. Next thing I had a couple of tweets from folks who live there, rent homes there and located a great house for a trip on my birthday. Also tweeted while driving home from NY to NC about my son's wedding and honeymoon in Italy. Within 10 minutes, I had a tweet from a fellow in Italy with houses to rent and train schedules. Hmmm, now that would be another great trip.

There are over 7000 ning groups for Twitter. Many in education. Twitting is allowing me, professionally, to stay involved in and up-to-date with instructional technology and videoconferencing. It is also allowing me to make positive contacts with many people I will never meet or see in person, but can learn from, an open, free, extended network, like grad school. Yes, this technology application is worth applause.

Looking for Ways Technology Can Connect Students

2009-09-06T07:44:00.000-04:00

In our state we study our state in 4th and 8th grades. For 3 years we had a wonderful connection with a school in the mountains. That teacher retired and we have been working on finding other connections for the past two years. We'll still continue to look for interactive videoconference partners, but now will change our question or search to looking for other ways to connect with these classes so our students can learn and share together.

Of course, these same sources would work for searches for global connections of all types.

try Skype in Schools to locate someone in the U.S. or other countries (back out on the address -- take the Directory off)

try twitter - search for country names -- you'd be surprised how fast you may get an answer! -- twitted once about my son's wedding and honeymoon in Italy and within 10 minutes had a fellow from Italy twitting me with train stations, prices, and places to stay

new list for Technology Facilitators in NC posted a forum request there

NC ITS login - has lists of school served by NCVIP

ning groups - several - Videoconferencing, Global Education Collaborative, Classroom 2.0, Tools for the Classroom

then there are the blogs, too

Twitter for Teachers

listservs & websites - several of these websites have a listserv bringing you the new information daily - TWICE or Capspace, CILC
I plan to continue my search for partners, whether we use videoconferences, wiki's, blogs, or skype. Students connecting directly to students is a powerful way to learn.

Support Education

2009-09-05T20:38:00.000-04:00

I guess I'm surprised that people have concerns over the President of the United States addressing students. Being an educator, I encourage anyone supporting students to do their best; supporting studying, making goals, reaching for the stars. I can't imagine adults not wanting their children to be encouraged to improve and work hard. Seems like a no brainer. My first reaction was, "Wow, the President is taking the time to speak directly to students -- that's great!" Students need role models. They need adults that they can look up to. Of course, parents are number one in this position, but not all students have parents, one or two.

Just read the Einstein quote of the day--maybe it fits here: "Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds..." Is this just out of control politics? I'm not sure, but I hope that rational thinking prevails and adults choose to act like adults and applaud all encouragement of students doing their best and trying to improve their own education, taking ownership and responsibility for their learning and thinking. No matter who I voted for in the past election, I would support the President or any speaker who encouraged students to learn, think, set goals, and improve their world.

Scheduling IVC for Fall 2009

2009-08-29T14:59:00.000-04:00

We've updated the choices and are ready to meet and talk with grade levels about the opportunities this year for videoconferencing. The NC Museum of Natural Sciences has added a new program that fits well with our 3rd graders and their field trip to Reynolda Gardens.

The second grade teachers are taking a step forward and are participating in our own project posted on TWICE. We have many more responses than we will be able to use for partners. This project has the students studying weather (2nd grade curriculum in our state) and participating with a partner class twice, once in March and once in late May. We will use the state standards and lessons as we share our local weather information and activities over these two conferences. The project set-up easily uses science skills, presentation skills (oral communication), study and research skills. The actual interactions are similar to presenting a play or skit, and a lot of fun, too.

One goal I have for our school as we begin our seventh year of interactive videoconferencing, is to reach not only for the excellent content programs from our state and national institutions, but to tailor our own projects to fit our specific students, their skills, their content, and their needs for growth.

Geocaching with iPhone

2009-07-22T08:13:00.000-04:00

More Learning Fun
While checking out the geocaching website, I saw one of the thousands of apps for an iPhone - Geocaching with the iPhone- only $10! Even in this small town of about 2500 people, there are geocaches! Going out this morning to check out the one that is only .3 miles from my home and on the way to school. Ideas fly with using this technology for education. Of course it easily fits into 4th grade and up with the latitude and longitude, but can also work into so many other categories. Some of the amazing uses are introducing information, reviewing information, combining subjects--concrete examples:

one geocache for each of the 5 common verterbrates (mammals, birds, fish, reptiles, amphibians) or add the 2 common inverterbrates for 7 geocaches, (insects and spiders)

one geocache for each of the basic soil types (sand, silt, clay)

one geocache for each of the 7 biomes (tundra, taiga, temperate forest, tropical rain forest, desert, grassland, ocean)

one geocache for a food chain list (from sun to plant to rabbit to fox - 2nd grade)
And the list goes on.

There are simple geocache handhelds on the website, too. Working in groups of 2-5, students can share the jobs and experience collaborative learning as they locate, define, process, and record information.

Good-bye to NC Teacher Academy

2009-07-16T09:58:00.000-04:00

Today we pack up, leave the dorm, go to breakfast, go to class - typical student day. In class, we finish our projects, upload them to moodle, complete reflections, and wrap up our details. It has been an interesting class. We have enjoyed the week very much. We have some really good ideas to implement next year. Thanks, Teacher Academy!

We'll have an interesting conversation in the car as we polish-up our ideas to implement geocaching, PhotoStory3, and Senteo's in our classrooms.

PhotoStory 3

2009-07-15T10:00:00.000-04:00

Tuesday had us reading The Journey of Oliver K. Woodman and using the pictures we had taken on Monday while pursuing the geocaches. This was put together in PhotoStory3 as a beginning project.

Wednesday had us completing Oliver and beginning a curriculum based PhotoStory3. We listened to grant writing suggestions and saw a video on allowing 21st century skills in schools.

Geocaching - Monday, July 13, 2009

2009-07-14T10:27:00.000-04:00

Wet and rainy - 15 caches to locate. Can we do it? We found 11 out of 15 while juggling rain gear, umbrellas, cameras, voice recorders, logging responses on paper, and thunder/lightning. Later we found one of the caches had the wrong coordinates. Great food and some rest refreshed us.

GeoCaching - NC Tech Teacher Academy

2009-07-13T09:49:00.001-04:00

Today we're off - we are a team 6 - to locate 15 caches around ECU. Lots of walking, maybe some rain (80% chance) but only 80 degrees! Should be fun - after a few tries, we can try some digital recording for an introductory student video. Students you are going to love this!

Geocaching is an electronic scavenger hunt. Using satellite technology, the gps locates several satellites and the reader screen has a latitude and longitude and altitude.

We are using a digital camera, an audio recorder, a gps unit, and being the lucky 4th person on the team, I will be using the hd digital camera to record (love being behind the camera instead of in front of the camera).

Cool - we can really use these skills to locate historical locations in and around Forsyth County and share with other 4th grade classes in NC. We are in the piedmont region and would love to share with schools in the mountains and coastal plains.

Teacher Tech Academy - Our Adventure Begins

2009-07-12T20:47:00.000-04:00

Mrs. Howard, Mrs. McDermon, Ms. Leonard, and Mrs. Throckmorton (all teachers at Rural Hall School) began a great adventure traveling to ECU for the 21st Century Classroom: Digital Learning Environment at NC Teacher Academy.

The fun began in the car on the 214 mile trip from Rural Hall to Greenville. We laughed and shared ideas for next year. Talked about vacations, good books to read, and had some "catch up" time that teachers rarely get. We had a great meal and fantastic accommodations in a spacious new dorm. The first class was an introduction to the locals at the University and the instructors for this week.
Goals:

21st century strategies

21st century technology tools

GPS devices, GeoCaching, digital cameras

Google Earth, Picasa, Audacity, Audio recorders

PhotoStory 3, Grantwriting, Moodle, Smart Software

Monday - 1st Full Day - GeoCaching - Will we get lost? We will survive the summer southern heat? WIll we have fun? Yes! Tune in tomorrow for the fun details!

NC Technology Teacher Academy

2009-07-10T21:32:00.000-04:00

On Sunday afternoon, I go with a team of 4th grade teachers from my school to East Carolina University for a 5 day class in 21st century technology skills. This is an active grade level and we should have a lot of fun while learning new ways to involve and interest students in cooperative, interactive learning. Watch for updates.

Summer - Tech Refresh

2009-06-30T18:49:00.000-04:00

Time to reflect. School's out; vacation on the outer banks with relaxing family memories; time to complete some projects and take a few online classes and update some of my skills.

Currently I'm in week two of a three week PB Works Summer Camp. This online free class gives teachers a free upgrade pb wiki for a year. I currently have two, one for our school and one for my own personal learning network. It will take some thought to decide what to do with the free wiki, but I'm sure it will be good use for my students.

An uncompleted project is adding some laptops to the student group that can be checked out from the library. Then, there is a week at Teacher Tech Academy. Next is another online class and that will complete July. In August there is a presentation with Peg Kirk from NCSSM to some principals about videoconferencing. Also, I'll probably be at work the first couple of weeks to move and rename computers to accommodate changes in staff and several other miscellaneous changes. There is also a family wedding and that will also have some "tech" time, so all in all, it will be a busy summer when you add in some reading for pleasure time, gardening, treadmill, walking the dogs, and more home cooking. These unpaid two months off are so important in refreshing, updating, re-energizing and keeping the excitement in learning.

Digital Flat Stanley 2008-09

2009-05-27T16:25:00.000-04:00

Today we mailed home our four participating Flat Stanley's -- safe journey to you Flats! This fantastic project produced by Heather Weisse Walsh, sends each participating classroom of students to four different locations through-out the school year. What fun, learning, and excitement for communication this project brings to our students. We posted on the Digital Flat Stanley Wiki, too.

Outside the distance learning classroom, we posted a big US map and put small Flat Stanley's on each town we visited through-out the school year. That's 16 different cities, so our students learned a lot of geography. We shared weather, our communities, our state's, and favorite things. We took some cool pictures from our town, county, and state to share with the other locations that also gave some history, famous landmarks, and businesses and colleges located in their areas. We made large photos from our digital pics to share with our partner Flat Stanley classes. We shared poems, skits, favorite foods and favorite school subjects. We mainly learned that having Flat Stanley allowed us to learn a lot of different things in a fun way. We ended each of the sixteen journeys with a videoconference to see and talk to the students in the partner class.

Journey 1
Ms. Sisson's 1st grade traveled to Ms. Stelly's class in Houston, Texas.
Ms. Hollifield's 2nd grade traveled to Ms. Marino's class in West Orange, New Jersey.
Ms. Hicks' 3rd grade traveled to Ms. Koch's class in Nazareth, Pennsylvania.
Ms. Morefield's 3rd grade traveled to Ms. Hunter's class in Hopewell, Ohio.

Journey 2
Ms. Sisson's Flat Stanley traveled from Houston, Texas to Mr. Isselman's class in Birdsboro, PA.
Ms. Hollifield's Flat Stanley traveled from West Orange, NJ to Ms. Rowe's class in Douglasville, PA.
Ms. Hicks' Flat Stanley traveled from Nazareth, PA to Mr. Graham's class in Magnolia, Ohio.
Ms. Morefield's Flat Stanley traveled from Hopewell, Ohio to Ms. Eisenhard's class in Birdsboro, PA.

Journey 3
From Birdsboro, PA, Ms. Sisson's Flat Stanley traveled to Ms. Brown's class in Norristown, PA.
From Douglasville, PA, Ms. Hollifield's Flat Stanley traveled to Ms. George's class in Houston, TX.
From Magnolia, Ohio, Ms. Hicks' class traveled to Ms. Henderson's class in Irving, TX.
From Birdsboro, PA, Ms. Morefield's class traveled to Ms. Mueller's class in Houston, TX.

Journey 4
Leaving Norristown, PA, Ms. Sisson's Flat traveled to Ms. Graap's class in Fairfax, VA.
Leaving Houston, TX, Ms. Hollifield's Flat traveled to Ms. Haber's class in Waymart, PA.
Leaving Irving, TX, Ms. Hicks' Flat traveled to Ms. Cleveland's class in Steelton, PA.
Leaving Houston, TX, Ms. Morefield's Flat traveled to Ms. Pries' class in West Chester, PA.

Now all Flat Stanley's are going on the last journey, home to Rural Hall School. We have learned a lot and had a fantastic time sharing and meeting students around the US. Have a great summer, Flat Stanley and read a lot and be safe. We'll look for you next year! ;-)

Educational Technology and Common Sense

2009-05-24T09:24:00.000-04:00

Ask someone to define common sense and you may get similar answers. Ask someone what actions constitute common sense and you get a whole range of activities and these do not all fit into a neat box of common sense. Some of this could be generational as we do form opinions, produce actions of acceptance, based on the code of our teachings by parents and teachers and friends. Take "manners" for example. Good manners we could probably all agree are important for students to learn as they make dealing with people in all age ranges and from all different cultures easier, but manners vary from cultural groups to social groups to economic groups.

This is just one example of how difficult it is to define activities as "good educational ideas." From my viewpoint in the world, it is simply my version of "common sense." When I was teaching math in 3rd grade, I had an after-school club two days a week that was voluntary for any of my students to attend. We used puzzles, games, measured and built bird houses, etc. We cooked at least twice a month in class measuring and discussing the fractions and measurement standards in the recipes. We copied the recipes, and for Thanksgiving, planned a whole meal with everyone participating in donating an item. This was an opportunity to think backwards and figure out what needed to be prepared first, etc. for all of the dishes to be ready to eat at the same time. There was also washing and clean-up as we discussed not using paper or plastic products to keep from adding to the landfills. I spent 15 years in a regular elementary classroom teaching 1st, 2nd, and then 3rd grade, trying to focus on what made sense to teach children basics and provide thinking and reflecting opportunities. In 1984 I used an Atari game machine hooked-up to a small TV to teach time. This game machine became educational with the additional of a tape-recorder that loaded the time/clock game. The students could choose hour, half-hour, quarter-hour, and minutes. Also in use was a cartridge for Logo. This was a simple version to teach children basic programming using a turtle. The turtle moved with the commands that you typed. We used a big green paper turtle shell to put over one student and the class could literally see the turtle move when we gave directions. (Remember to always begin with concrete activities with young children.) This easily transferred to task cards with pictures of the turtle making a box, triangle, other shapes. We were building steps in logical thinking. Some might call this "problem based learning," but it is just common sense to me.

Now I work with technology with the students and staff. My how technology has changed our lives and thankfully, the classroom, too. Our students have a daily, live, in-house TV news program to share simple information while learning about oral communication, some computer jobs, and producing the final broadcast. Our students also use a weather station to compile a weather report and forecast daily. We began with a GLOBE station and recorded this information for 4 years, earning a national award for quality data. We changed to a Davis Advantage Pro electronic weather station that collects data every hour. This data was used in our computer lab for teaching databases. Common sense. This broadcast combines many skills and is an excellent way to share with our students in a real world situation something that they often see at home on TV and have the connection to actual work.--Common sense to me.

Our school also uses interactive videoconferencing (for six years). WOW! This is a biggie! Step back and think about what this means for our children. Our students have access to experts at our state institutions and museums. These folks send boxes of materials to us and our only cost is the return shipping. Can you imagine being a first grader and actually handling a dinosaur fossil! We don't spend hours on the school bus traveling down the highways, we spend time on task in our safe school building. One year's worth of field trips easily paid for expensive equipment, but you can also videoconference with inexpensive equipment. We did this last year with a free camera and free polycom communicator and a laptop. We shared our news broadcast with a school in New Jersey and they shared their broadcast with us. We don't miss out on opportunities because we can videoconference with experts and with other students around our state (Carolina Connections), country (Digital Flat Stanley), and world (Megaconference Jr., Pittsburgh Megaconference, Read Around the Planet). Our students make contact with other classrooms in classroom to classroom activities and projects. They use the school wiki to collaborate on work with other classrooms in our school system and in the world. This is practical experience with writing, oral communication, technology (skills), and learning to work in groups. These are skills our students need to survive in our global world economy. Common sense to me.

Our county talks about "rethinking the possibilities" and I think our "common sense" approach has helped our students to do this by learning in new ways the standard curriculum we need our students to master. Who knows what is next in the technology world or the world where we live? We will continue to use common sense to bridge what we need to teach to the real world for our students.

Meme

2009-05-10T12:51:00.000-04:00

There is always something new to learn - I've seen this term around for awhile and never knew what it was or had the time to check it out. Meme - Pronounced "mem" by some and "meam" by some - whatever the pronunciation, it carries this type of meaning:

An idea that, like a gene, can replicate and evolve.

A unit of cultural information that represents a basic idea that can be transferred from one individual to another, and subjected to mutation, crossover and adaptation.

A cultural unit (an idea or value or pattern of behavior) that is passed from one generation to another by nongenetic means (as by imitation); "memes are the cultural counterpart of genes".

The ones I've seen are people with same interests "tagging" other people and making lists about that interest.

So, here goes,
My meme list for instructional tech:

help others find effective ways to use tech
continual updates and learning for myself
trying new equipment and software
taking classes
videoconferencing
blogging
vidcasts
podcasts
wiki projects
live in-house broadcasts

What would you add to the list?

Alaska SeaLife Center

2009-05-05T17:58:00.000-04:00

Our kindergarten students are enjoying a visit with the Alaska SeaLife Center as they learn about sea birds. For 55 minutes, the classes learn through various means, watching actual fish tanks of swimming sea lions and harbor seals, video of specific birds, parts of birds (wing size, webbed feet, beaks, placement of feet--further back on body than regular birds, which allows them to swim easier), worksheet of bird parts, and finally, making a clay tufted puffin. Wow!

NCDLA - Virtual Conference

2009-04-24T13:58:00.000-04:00

Finally stopped for one hour today to listen, watch, & interact in a virtual conference instead of attending in person. Really good experience. We used elluminate; it worked very well. Heard keynote speaker Marci Powell, past president of USDLA and Polycom Global Director for Higher Education. Her topic: Connect, Collaborate, Create. She mentioned a couple of books I want to read, one is Clay Shirky's Here Comes Everybody, and The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch. She spoke of web 2.0, 3.0, and 4.0 (artificial intelligence). She shared about Abileen Christian Univeristy in Texas; they issue iPhones to all incoming freshmen who use them for traditional, online, & blended classes. The phones give the directions to the buildings on campus and interact with the students and profs in several ways. Also shown was Duke University's Telepresence and the Fuqua Global Conference System. Really cool stuff! I didn't realize that Polycom was working/supporting CAPspace, a fantastic source (database) for finding partners for projects that are classroom to classroom via videoconference. She spoke of the "3 R's plus Applied Skills" -- communication, problem solving, and team work/collaboration. This lead to the quote that I just love, "We must prepare students for their future and not our past." (David Thornberg)

Earth Day Celebration

2009-04-22T13:13:00.000-04:00

We enjoyed learning and sharing Earth Day with students on the school news and at an "Earth Day Learning Station" series of activities in the school courtyard.

Students shared their knowedge on different topics as other classes walked through the exhibits. Students signed an Earth Day pledge and also made a personal pledge in their classroom. Some of these are in vidcasts on the school podcast link.

IVC - PPS Megaconference

2009-04-21T14:39:00.001-04:00

This morning Ms. Leonard's 4th graders watched as Allderdice High School presented "My Trip to the Polar Bears." Then we disconnected for a NC Museum of History videoconference and after reconnected to Pittsburgh. Ms. Throckmorton's class of 4th graders interacted with PGH Murray and another school as Arlington ALA presented AfricQuest in a Jeopardy format. We had a lot of fun and learned a lot of interesting things about the continent, Africa. BTW, we came in second out of three. At the second roll call, Ms. McDermon chimed in hello from North Carolina (our classes were at lunch and unavailable).

Today some of our classes participated in the Pittsburgh Public Schools Megaconference. We interacted with two other schools as the fourth school presented. It was great!
Last, Ms. Verner's 3rd grade class participated int he "Discover West African Rhythms" (drums) presented by Eau Claire High School. Two Pittsburgh schools participated with us also, as we thumped out our drumming sounds.

We love learning and sharing with videoconferencing!

Videoconferencing

2009-04-16T14:54:00.000-04:00

Next Thursday, April 23 we are connecting to the Carolina Center for Excellence to share IVC with K-12 media and technology specialists who are there for a two day meeting/workshop. We are happy to share our experiences in videoconferencing. Each time we connect to another school, classroom, state, or country, we learn new things, make new understandings and connections to people. What a concrete way for students to learn similarities and differences, one of the basic lessons in elementary social studies and, most important, "civil" living--sharing this globe, we need to reach out to others to understand, build respect, and develop ways to share and understand other people and cultures.

On Thursday, April 30, we are connecting to the International Education Group at the School of Education at UNC to share our experiences with videoconferencing. Again, this is an excellent opportunity to demonstrate the face to face connections we make every week between students at our school in Rural Hall, NC to students in other towns around the world.

Teamwork

2009-04-05T05:02:00.000-04:00

The fast paced hurry of projects usually has the satisfaction on completion and the slower pace of a few days. Relief! Then the process usually begins again, roller coaster style, up and down. The pace seems quicker and the changes come faster--that's today's world. SETDA (State Educational Technology Directors Association) presents their "Class of 2020: Action Plan for Education" giving five topic areas.

Broadband Access for All Kids

STEM - Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics

Technology Based Assessments Improve Teaching and Learning

Empowering Teachers: A Professional and Collaborative Approach

Learning Virtually: Expanding Oportunities

At the school level, we depend on the districts and states to take care of the access, improve the standards in STEM, and the virtual schools. On the school level, this leaves us two items on the list, assessments and empowering teachers in a collaborative approach. Follow the links to get the reports, PowerPoints and other information downloads.

Measuring 21st Century Skills

2009-04-03T14:59:00.000-04:00

eSchool News has a new site with resources and information about measuring the 21st century skills. This quote is why we should be looking for all the good quality resources we can find for our students. "Our country's global economic success in the future depends on K-20 graduates honing their "21st Century Skills." Today's tech-savvy generation has no shortage of user-friendly devices...and they know how to use them. But are they putting these tech skills to good use? You've heard of the 3Rs, but what about the 5Cs such as critical thinking, creative problem solving, communications, collaboration and cross-cultural relationship building?"

Insect Research

2009-03-30T11:31:00.001-04:00

Ms. Throckmorton's 4th grade class checked-out the laptop cart last week and did some science research. Today, they presented their products in posters, print, and art from various modes -- paper mache, drawings, clay. Wow! What a super job!

Technology Facilitator or Instructional Technologist

2009-03-26T06:58:00.000-04:00

Our school system has a Technology Facilitator at each school in our county. We do the double job of helping with the technical updates and repairs of equipment and also facilitate good technology instruction. An Instructional Technologist is a specialist in using technology in instruction. Today I realized that this (tech fac) is like driving my car. I can drive it, but don't understand how it works--I flip a switch and my windshield wipers come on, twist a knob and my wipers will vary the speed. Works for me! My husband and a good car repair shop take care of the rest for me. I'm capable of the basic updates and repairs with the telephone help I receive. This is not my strength, but I can do it. Then there is the instructional end. That's where I can not only understand the instruction, purpose, and goals, but see the applications and new ways to use software and hardware to give students new experiences in learning, and in learning collaboratively. This is where I'm an eager learner, trying to figure it out and move on to extend or create new ways to help learners reach his/her potential.

I've often thought, "I have the best job in the state." I can work with students, staff, and the expert technical people in my county, along with other instructional technologists, technology facilitators, and eager learners to give our students the activities and possibilities in learning that they deserve. We reach out to our state, other states, and countries through our videoconferencing and utilize our wonderful state museums and institutions to give our students the BEST education possible. Then, recommend the simple, yet tried and true ways of experienced teaching -- having students write or reflect on their experiences. Offering to help teachers by blogging this student work, gives the students the opportunity to make the connections, use the new knowledge gained and have the time to connect this old and new learning together into new ideas. Then having the work posted and sharing this experience with families and community who comment on the web work of the students, offers the students yet another opportunity to rethink the information, reorder it, and feel accomplished and proud of the work. This is a building process. Building students who want to learn and be excited learners, and responsible for their own learning. I feel strongly that this is something our students need in 21st century learning.

Multiple Intelligences

2009-03-22T10:14:00.001-04:00

Found a link on Twitter for a Multiple Intelligences test. It gives information on the different intelligence forms, and then a 40 item test that shows results in a graph with strengths and weaknesses. A few of the questions seemed a little "guided" in the wording, but overall it was an interesting experience that may help students focus on how they learn and how they can improve.

Read Around the Planet

2009-03-15T19:00:00.000-04:00

Ms. Sisson's 1st grade class participated in Read Around the Planet with Long Island City, NY. The students enjoyed sharing. Ms. Sisson's class has been studying the United States, so they shared some of the symbols with the other class, sang a song and enjoyed presenting. They also enjoyed watching the other class present.

Ms. Tucker's 1st grade class participated in Read Around the Planet with a class from Texas. Her class wrote poems they put into a book. Each child read his/her poem and enjoyed hearing the other class read and sing. They all danced and sang to music; the experience was completed with questions and answers.

Glogster.com/edu

2009-03-15T18:43:00.000-04:00

Last Friday I tried the glogster.com/edu website with a fifth grade class. The students loved it and most caught on quickly. They helped each other with minor questions, but overall it was a great first class. The classroom teacher and the students liked the possibility of using this website to share a project instead of a written paper or regular "poster board." Our only unusual occurrence was that a few students came up with a blocked message. The "edu" site allows the students to share only with their class.

NCTIES

2009-03-06T18:43:00.000-05:00

I've spent the last two days at the NCTIES conference in Raleigh. My head is spinning and it will take a few days to reflect, read my notes, and share some thoughts. Our school system is also posting on their wiki; check it out to see many postings from attendees in our county. There are several pics posted on the Rural Hall School quick pic blog.

Some of the very good websites from the conference are:

Tools for the Classroom
Tools for the Classroom Blog
Imbee
Fantastic Contraption
Gcast
Animoto
My Studio -- creates online quizzes
Glogster
One True Media
U Stream
Quantum Shift
Yack Pack
Flowgram
Pixton
Geocaching
Apple Tutorials (now all are free)
NC Wise Owl -- eBistro
Metiri
Scratch
SassoStuff
Plurk

Enjoyed these sessions and interactions so much I'm adding a new wiki as my own learning network base for technology and schooling, adding to this "flatter" blog and my videoconferencing ning page.

Read Around the Planet - More Exciting Conferences

2009-03-03T09:09:00.001-05:00

Ms. Whicker's kindergarten class enjoyed presenting to Ms. Felt's class in Van Etten, New York on Feb. 25 in honor of Dr. Seuss' birthday. Ms. Van Etten's class sang a song and both classes of students danced to the directions. Great job, folks!

With snow the past two days, we will have to reschedule the remaining three RAP conferences.

Ms. Tucker's class at Rural Hall and Ms. Bolton's class in Paris, Texas will be rescheduled. Ms. Sisson's class and Ms. Burke's class in Long Island City, NY will be rescheduled. Ms. Leonard's class and Ms. Woodbridge's class in Edmonton, Canada will be rescheduled.

Thinking Out Loud

2009-03-01T09:55:00.000-05:00

One thing I do daily is look through emails, websites, and listservs. Of course, google reader is helpful. Originally I was looking for sources to create my position of "distance learning coordinator." I wasn't quite sure what that was, so being the dutiful student, searched and found a good online course at Univ. of West Ga. offering a year long course with a Distance Learning Certificate. That began my new adventure from a K-5 classroom teacher to interactive videoconferencing in 1998.

Some of the listservs and websites that have been helpful in my area are:

International Society of Technology in Education - http://www.iste.org/

Global Leap -- http://www.global-leap.com/

Center for Interactive Learning and Collaboration -- http://www.cilc.org/

NCIH - K-12 Videoconferencing -- http://www.ncih.net/hsncvip/index.html

NCSSM -- http://www.dlt.ncssm.edu/distance_learning/Enrich.htm

NC Museum of History -- http://ncmuseumofhistory.org/edu/DistLearn.html

NC Museum of Natural Sciences -- http://www.naturalsciences.org/education/distance.html

NC Wildlife Resources -- http://www.ncwildlife.org/fs_index_08_education.htm

NASA Digital Learning Network -- http://dln.nasa.gov/dln/

Collaborations Around the Planet -- http://projects.twice.cc/

Read Around the Planet -- http://www.twice.cc/read/

COSI -- http://www.cosi.org/educators/videoconferencing/

ISTE Ning Community -- http://www.iste-community.org/

Southwest Net Distance Learning -- http://www.remc11.k12.mi.us/dl/

Connect 2 Texas -- http://www.connect2texas.net/

MAGPI -- http://www.magpi.net/programs/

Harvard Graduate School of Education -- http://www.gse.harvard.edu/news_events/enews/2009/03.html

Self Learning Links -- http://selfmadescholar.com/b/self-education-resource-list/

Saint Louis Zoo DL -- http://www.stlzoo.org/education/outreachprograms/distancelearning.htm

Reef HQ Aquarium -- http://www.reefhq.com.au/home/visitor_info/video_conferencing

Another thing that has made it easier for me is my .mac membership, which makes podcasts and vidcasts streamlined processes. We take a couple of hundred pictures every week and send them to the local weekly newspaper, make movies of them for our news introduction, post on blogs and wikis, and send home to parents on a yahoo group listserv. Of course, we obtain permission from all students for videoconferencing and posting pictures. This helps build a school "community" and ownership for students and staff and culminates in 5th grade students participating in the school news program. -- I believe I've definitely left the original topic and rambled a bit here. Still waiting for the snow.

Reflecting

2009-02-28T15:51:00.000-05:00

Last day of Februrary and this is probably the busiest month for us in videoconferencing at Rural Hall School. We still have three more Read Around the Planet connections next week, but in the past two weeks have completed Megaconference Jr. and three Read Around the Planets along with two digital Flat Stanley's besides our regular museum visits. Time to take a breath!

Next week is the NCTIES conference in Raleigh. Looking forward to going and listening, learning, watching, and refreshing, not presenting. It's good to have time out to learn and not be "producing."

Hopefully the sleet, ice, and snow due tonight and tomorrow won't slow us down. :-)

Just received a kindal reader Thursday. Like it so far. Although it has been quite a long time since I read something for pleasure and not for work. Bought two books for it. Quite easy to use. Although one of the books I bought I've actually already read! Maybe a snow storm and something new to read (pleasure reading) would be good!

Saturday afternoon and just checked the computer lab for a horrible virus that seems to be around our county. None found here - thank goodness! Scans complete and time to go home.

Read Around the Planet

2009-02-23T13:58:00.000-05:00

What a great way to celebrate reading! Ms. Church's kindergarten class in Rural Hall, NC read to Ms. Coxson's kindergarten class in Dallas, Texas this morning. Ms. Coxson's class performed "The Three Little Pigs" play for us. Fantastic!

We have two more this week and three next week - These children have put a lot of work into their productions and are enjoying reading and sharing. Watch for the podcasts soon.

Megaconference Jr. 2009

2009-02-21T19:58:00.001-05:00

Wow! What a great day of activities, experiences, and learning! Ms. Howard's class enjoyed the segment on Obama's Inauguration and first 100 days. They returned to their classroom for a debate. Ms. Leonard's class enjoyed the idioms segment. The students played along and enjoyed guessing.

The interactions between the participants, activities, and the wonderful VJ's was amazing. Of course, the behind the scenes technology folks were excellent! -- Thanks to all for making this possible! Our students learned and gained experiences from this experience.

Our students did a great job and enjoyed a pizza party after their presentation.

Congratulations, students! Check the wiki for their reports, movies, and a poll.

Pictures taken that day.

Wiki Use - Challenges

2009-02-12T13:02:00.000-05:00

We are working on year two of our school wiki. It has definitely been a growing experience! As with much technology, it looks cool and fun, but does it have an educational purpose besides technology? We have grown into wiki usage; we seem to reach a learning point and it expands rather quickly after that. The recent article by Wheeler, Yeomans, & Wheeler (2008) at Wake Forest University points out the instructional uses. These include motivation (meaningful assignments), participation/collaboration, affirmation (all can post and edit),and synthesis. These are higher level skills and exactly what we want our students to use.

For our Megaconference Jr. 2009 project, we are collaborating with a middle school class. The 4th and 8th graders have made reports and teachers are posting on the wiki (due to time). Students can then download and edit and repost or compile the information into a newer version. We are learning and finding some things work well and are fairly easy while others will take more time and may need different strategies. Wiki usage, like many other technologies, is a building and growing process. Teachers and students are learning together -- students using the tool of technology while gaining the power of collaborative skills, and teachers defining and sharpening teaching and collaborative skills while redefining pedagogy. Both are learning new tools and skills for personal learning networks. Not just redefining "life-long learners," but addressing personal learning styles and skills and developing processes that give all participants new ways to address how they learn and what they choose to learn.

The project is February 19, so next month, we hope to post reflections of our work and the process we have used.

Faster - Tech Dollars and Innovation

2009-02-05T13:49:00.001-05:00

If you haven't realized it yet, change is the new "standard" or "constant" in life today, whether it is banking, shopping, education, whatever. And all of it is touched by technology. The recent article in THE Journal by Chris Riedel points our what is going on in education and how we can work on making it better. This article refers to Mark Benno's talk at FETC in Orlando. Interesting fact: "Nine out of 10 students don't wear wristwatches." What do they do? They use other technology - cell phones, music players (mine shows time and date), computers, other tech gear usually has date and time - often in many time zones. He goes on to say that it takes educators about seven years to adapt to new technology and integrate it into the curriculum (going through five stages: entry, adoption, adaptation, appropriation, innovation). Unfortunately, technology changes so much faster than that. The good news is that research shows that with professional development it takes two and one-half years instead of seven years to total integration and innovation. Hooray! Save those dollars in the budgets for instructional technology--even in tight budget times, these dollars allow better usage of dollars already spent on the hardware and software while giving students relevant and timely instruction. Whether we keep up or not, our students use technology in many ways. Allowing students to collaborate--use a wiki--share information, revise, and continue sharing and refining is one of the answers to collaborative learning. It is practical. Thinking and problem solving has always been a goal, now it has gone global and collaboration with technology is certainly that. It used to be, "what do you know?" Then it was "how do you find or locate it?" Now it is choosing "what technologies you use to solve your problems."

Megaconfernce Jr.

2009-01-29T20:43:00.001-05:00

In the midst of all the work with our students to prepare for Megaconference Jr. and our dress rehearsal, we are loosing our Principal of 17 years. He is retiring tomorrow. Last month our Assistant Principal retired. Our school, students and staff, are off on new adventures as we continue our learning and growing. We will miss our former leaders and wish them the best.

This year in Megaconference Jr. we have two interactive partners (both from the U.S.) and our 4th graders are working with 8th graders from a middle school, Kennedy Learning Center, in Winston-Salem. In North Carolina, the students in 4th and 8th grades study the state. So these older students are taking a lead while working with our 4th graders to share a skit, student movie, and Jeopardy game with our interactive partners. All of this takes place in 30 minutes while the world watches. We will spend the rest of the day doing such things as watching other productions in Megaconference and being the interactive partner in some of these productions -- all of this takes place in less than three weeks! Now that will wake up the winter doldrums!

Check-out Janine Lim's blog on Megaconference Jr. - She gives some great tips!

Catch-up

2008-12-30T09:48:00.000-05:00

While "catching-up" (does that EVER happen in technology) on reading, I found an email with a link to the Edublog Awards 2008 - time to vote. Well, each of the many categories has wonderful and thought-provoking ideas, truths, perceptions, possibilities... Oh, my head is swimming with ideas and possibilities. This is not too many cups of coffee speaking... Oh, how I wish I could work with these folks - well, I guess I can by reading and not being afraid of educational change and trying to implement some of these ideas. What a great time to be a teacher! Although there are many out there afraid of change and the work it requires, I find it exciting that change from the 1900 type classroom allows for many students to be engaged in learning and even excited about learning. A community of learners also includes the teachers who can facilitate learning and be taught by students in some areas. Saw several ideas that make me think, "We should do this at our school."

To begin this adventure in reading go to the Edublog Awards 2008 and click on the links to read and begin some "catch-up."

Megaconference Jr. 2009

2008-12-22T07:56:00.001-05:00

We are thrilled to be presenting at Megaconference Jr. 2009! Ms. Throckmorton's 4th graders at Rural Hall and Ms. Thompson-Richards' 8th graders at Kennedy Learning Center are collaborating on a social studies project, "History Mystery: North Carolina." The students are researching, posting work, editing, and then presenting on the topics: Blackbeard, the "Lost Colony", and the wild horses on the outer banks. Watch their presentation along with many others at Megaconference Jr. on February 19, 2009. Our presentation is at 11 AM. Megaconference Jr. is live from 7 AM to 7 PM. Our collaborations are posted on our school wiki; click on Megaconference Jr. 2009.

Inexpensive IVC

2008-12-07T08:19:00.000-05:00

Free videoconferencing? How do you do that?

In 2005 we won a Polycom PVX in a drawing for prizes among Megaconference Jr. participants. I played around with it and it seemed to be quite similar, although much better software, than a computer webcam. In 2006 we won a Polycom Communicator in a similar drawing for Megaconference Jr. This was set-up on my laptop to give me a Skype telephone since I didn't have a direct line in my classroom which is very helpful during videoconferencing.

Reading ED1VIDCONF listserv one day last fall I found a request for elementary TV news videoconferencing. What a great idea! Our big Polycom IVC equipment was installed on a large TV which is NOT movable, so I tried the Polycom PVX with the Polycom Communicator and it worked quite well. The school in New Jersey was very helpful and we exchanged broadcasts, with our school in-house news program going live to their school and the next day their broadcast was enjoyed by our school. We learned several new ideas for presenting our live program. What I found most interesting was the variety of set-ups possible to connect and use this equipment. As usual, I continue to learn so much from working with students.

We hope to do participate in this project again this year as we look for valuable learning experiences for our 21st century students.

New Class - Fun!

2008-12-05T10:21:00.000-05:00

Excited and enthusiastic! I haven't seen our teachers so excited over technology in a while. We have 12 teachers in a workshop via videoconference with NCSSM. It is two afternoons a week (3:3-5:30 + homework). They are excited and having fun learning new skills and feeling technology literate! Just like our students, we need to keep learning new things/skills; besides keeping us updated, it continues to remind us how puzzling, confusing, and frustrating students can feel when approaching new material. It keeps us honest as we work with students understanding a new concept. Having that error and stress free environment of working together as a team is working really great. We have a good teacher in Durham and are making progress. Although we are a loud bunch, we just mute our microphone as we chat and work together. We have posted several new class blogs on our school website. You should check them out and follow along as they continue.

eSchool News Article - "10 Ways to Boost Learning with Technology"

2008-11-18T12:56:00.000-05:00

This article by Meris Stansbury, Assistant Editor of eSchool News, is must reading for teachers, technology leaders, and communities who are serious about student learning for the 21st century. Saw this in an email (you can sign-up for email updates on eSchool News) and immediately was hooked. Being an elementary teacher and instructional technologist, I appreciate the list of specific tasks. Some of these tasks we have control over and we should spread the word to all who will listen. Being engaged in this conversation is vital to our students success in this changing world. If we can't adapt to changes in our instruction, how are we going to teach students to adapt to their ever changing world?

Thankfully we are well on our way to pursuing these steps in our county schools. We have good access to computers and internet sources in our schools. Teachers have ample staff development opportunities, we use home-school coordinators in schools and use email, websites, online services, and others for communication with students and parents. Our school system is on it's way with online staff development and is receptive to outside sources for staff development. They are open to new ideas and we find we are only hampered by web filters, at times, and that is adjustable. As teachers of students under 18, we must protect while instructing, so web-filtering is not only the law, but necessary. Our school has been using interactive videoconferencing for the past six years and we have found student engagement high during these conferences. This type of hands-on learning appeals to many different types of learners and is quite successful in retention of information. Our state museums send us boxes of artifacts and items our students use for the programs and we return the artifacts and items after the program's conclusion. I could go on and on about this as I feel it offers another very interesting way to engage students in learning, but that is not the topic here. So...

These 10 steps come from SETDA (State Educational Technology Directors Association). This is a plan called, "Class of 2020: Action Plan for Education" which includes white papers, a Student Bill of Rights, and these 10 recommendations. You should read the entire article (just a little over 3 pages).

The 10 steps are:
"1. Ensure that technology tools & resources are used continuously & seamlessly for instruction, collaboration, & assessment.
2. Expose all students (preK - 12th grade) to STEM fields & careers.
3. Make ongoing, sustainable professional development available to all teachers.
4. Use virtual learning opportunities for teachers to further their professional development, such as through online communities & educational portals.
5. Incorporate innovative, consistent, & timely assessments into daily instruction.
6. Strengthen the home-school connection by using technology to communicate with parents on student progress.
7. Provide the necessary resources so that every community has the infrastructure to support learning with technology, including assessments & virtual learning.
8. Obtain societal support for education that uses technology from all stakeholders--students, parents, teachers, state & district administrators, business leaders, legislators, & local community members.
9. Provide federal leadership to support states & districts regarding technology's role in school reform by passing the ATTAIN Act.
10. Increase available funding for the e-Rate so that schools can acquire telecommunication services, internet access, internal connections, & maintenance of those connections."

I admit that I familiar with the ATTAIN Act, so my next step is to find out more about it.

Guerrilla Learning

2008-10-27T12:20:00.001-04:00

This website is another great source of explaining and using web 2.0 tools. The videos are good and help users understand how they work and why they are useful tools. Let's face it, there are people who are afraid of or don't want to learn about or see the need for technology tools. Why should I take the time to learn something new when I already have a method that works for me? That's a good question. But it is possible that you may find good uses for these new tools. Do you like to learn new things? I do. It's like a puzzle or mystery. Something to figure out. Just as there are many modes of learning, there are many different types of learners. The visual is helpful for many, as is making connections, which web tools are great at doing! Anyway, give it a try. I plan on using it with the staff when we have our wiki class.

Jing

2008-10-23T16:58:00.000-04:00

Have you tried Jing? It's located at Jing Project . It captures and shares images and video and posts to a website for others to see. With all the emails we receive asking "how to do something" this is a quick way to share without making the handout and printing, or attaching as email and sending. Looks like it would cut down the steps of sharing and repeating as others ask the same questions. Nice! Watch their short video.

eSchoolNews Article: Prepare kids for exams or life?

2008-10-15T10:08:00.000-04:00

This article poses a question that is often mentioned by teachers at all levels - teaching to prepare students for required testing. This is often a complaint by teachers that teaching for a test is boring and doesn't necessarily educate students, but prepares students to take tests well, which doesn't necessarily translate to problem solving in life.

The Students at Presbyterian Ladies College (PLC) in Sydney, Australia, are in a study that allows students to use cell phones, the internet, & even "call a friend" to help them with test questions. The teacher/researcher in charge of the study says that "purely memory-based assessment is increasingly irrelevant in the modern world." She believes that it's better to measure the student's ability to locate or find information and interpret the information than to just memorize it.

This is worth reading and I'm curious as to the findings for the study, but hope that there is some longitudinal follow-up on these students in 5-10 or even 15 years.

Quest Atlantis Begins Today

2008-10-07T12:00:00.000-04:00

This year we have two teams of Questers in 5th grade. Ms. Pearman's and Ms. C. Parker's students in QA stay on Monday afternoons and Ms. Scott's and Ms. Bowen's students in QA stay on Tuesday afternoons. We began with a trial of 3 weeks at the end of last year with eight students; four in 4th grade and four in 5th grade. The fifth graders moved on to middle school. Our now 5th graders "spread the word" and we have 34 excited students in QA.

You can learn more about Quest Atlantis. The Questers begin.

Digital Citizenship

2008-09-30T10:51:00.000-04:00

Have you seen the article in T.H.E. Journal about digital citizenship? It's worth reading. This is a good discussion of "what, why, and how." This article mentions the website Digizen.org, which is "owned and operated by London-based nonprofit Childnet International. Our staff will be reviewing Mike Ribble and Gerald Bailey's ISTE publication, Digital Citizenship in Schools this spring in staff meetings. Of course, like anything else we teach in school, if we don't set the example, we are automatically harming students by our observable mis-use. Students still need to see value in digital citizenship and understand it is a choice of an informed, polite, and mature society to place our personal usage secondary in some situations.

The article continues on with a summary of the 9 steps in the Ribble and Bailey book.
1. Etiquette
2. Communication
3. Litracy
4. Access
5. Commerce
6. Law
7. Rights and Responsibilities
8. Health & Wellness
9. Security
You can purchase the book at ISTE's website store.

Quest Atlantis - MUVE

2008-09-16T18:03:00.000-04:00

Last year our school system offered training for Quest Atlantis teachers. We had a small group of students the last month of school. The students loved it and so did I. This year we have a larger group of students in an after school QA club. We hope to begin soon.

Just last week eSchool News reported student increases in math and reading using QA. The Fall 2008 edition of JRTE (Journal of Research on Technology in Education) arrived this week and one of the reviewed articles was "A MUVE Toward PBL Writing: Effects of a Digital Learning Environment Designed To Improve Elementary Student Writing." (MUVE is multi-user virtual environment) If you are familiar with Second Life, this is a similar environment designed especially for 4-5 graders and 6-8 graders. The students in elementary (4-5) are in a different world than the students in grades 6-8. The students use their avatars to complete quests on different curriculum topics. There are over 500 quests. Teachers assign or offer selection of quests. There are different worlds in QA, focusing on different areas. But the best part is QA is just plain fun! ASU uses a similar environment in their grad program in technology, called AppEdTech. Interesting way to learn for adults, too!

After reviewing different types of computer games (drill and practice, digital games & simulations, off the shelf games, and curriculum-driven games), the authors begin discussing their MUVE, Anytown, in Quest Atlantis. The use of PBL (problem based learning)in Anytown is well planned and presented.

There is anticipation that our students will enjoy these activities and surprise themselves at how much they are learning.

Have you checked-out Instructify?

2008-09-15T14:07:00.000-04:00

LearnNC has a great website and a blog called Instructify. This particular link has a list of the 10 essentials for students (and teachers who may not know about them! :-).

New School Year - Beginning with a Bang!

2008-08-15T08:15:00.000-04:00

August 14, 2008 - the Tech Facilitators from Winston-Salem/Forsyth County met for an all day meeting to hear changes and preview new systems we will use this year. The meeting began with an introduction of David Warlick speaking on the Flat Classroom. You can find his handouts and learn many of his widely shared techniques on his webpages. One of the new things I learned was "Knitter" on his site. It acts like Twitter, but brings all of the comments together on a wiki so you get the messages and thoughts from many on the same stream of communication like a chat room.

He broached 3 converging conditions: (1) preparing children for a future we don't know, (2) networked students, and (3) new information landscape. It is true that schools do seem to have the 19th century set-up and that seems to confer acceptance and "comfortableness" (is that a word?) to parents as it is a situation they understand and have experiences with themselves. But it is not the world we now live in. Students are wired - they do have mp3 players, use chat rooms, cell phones, text messages, make movies and videos - then come to the standard classroom and find the learning teacher oriented. Our students have mastered many of the devices themselves - self-learners and with others, cooperative learners - as they adapt to these new technologies. THese are some of the skills they will need for their future. We do not know what jobs and technologies they will need or use in their careers as many have not been developed yet. Taking David Warlick's look at schools and Howard Gardner's book Five Minds for the Future, you know that changes need to be made in traditional schooling.

David talked about personal learning systems, using RSS feeds to have the information you are interested in come to you automatically, Twitter to have instant feedback from friends who have similar interests, Technorati and netvibes. He demonstrated using these to bring a narrow quick search for teachers to present info to students. I have to admit that I can use some of these efficiently and others need to refine to make their possibilities easily fit my needs. I guess instruction sometimes means PRACTICE!

The ethics question was a topic and covered well by Marlo Gaddis in a discussion of the book Digital Citizenship.

The technology team has done a fantastic job updating our resources to help us do our jobs at our individual schools. Thanks to all!

The most important connection, to me personally, was David Warlick's overall message of concrete ways to use technologies to reach our students in today's world and Howard Gardner's book Five Minds for the Future as a goal for students developing into learners for the future. I feel these two are hand in hand for our children's future and give a basic strategy or guide for making positive changes to help our students prepare for their adult life as learners, adapters, and thinkers as they create new technologies, systems, in disciplined, respectful, and ethical ways.

I first heard David Warlick in 1998 or 1999 in an 079 (tech facilitator) summer class at NC State. His first book was our text and I've heard him in conferences around the state since. He is a great speaker/teacher/learner and always has something new to share.

I love learning something new and this day was a jump-start for the school year!

Ning

2008-06-20T08:29:00.001-04:00

Ning - This website allows you to create your own social networking group. There is a great Ning in Education group. These groups give you more than the email part of yahoogroups by having so many other features. It also seems to have members from many different countries, widening the contacts and information/sharing possibilities. Hooray!

Just created a Videoconferencing in Education ning group. Join us!

Summer - Technology - What's next?

2008-06-18T16:47:00.000-04:00

Summer - time to reflect again. What worked well, what didn't, what's new that will work in your classroom? How can we improve our teaching using technology? What can we do at our school to improve technology use for students and teachers? Can we develop some grade level plans and projects that will help with specific goals? What is the best way to improve classroom tasks as you move to the computer lab to complete? What technology goals do you have for your classroom? What kinds of technology goals do you think we need at our school? Do you have any videoconferencing needs? Are there subjects in science or math that need attention? We can look for additional sources or new classes. Mull it over and let me know your ideas and suggestions. Thanks!

Digital Citizenship

2008-05-29T20:14:00.000-04:00

Is this a new buzz word in the ed tech community or the real deal?

Our tech meetings always give us much information - information that takes time to comprehend and understand the consequences - today at our meeting we received a copy of Digital Citizenship in Schools. Interesting ISTE book. This fits into an empty area and appears to be a much needed resource for filling this gap in teaching and learning. With newly created technology a daily event, changing the lives of students, teachers, parents, families, communities, we must approach an ethical way to use this exciting technology in positive ways to benefit the world community. Section 1 asks some important questions, gives a definition of digital citizenship, and then lists 9 elements that explain and expand the idea. Using technology engages students and requires that we think in ways other than the routine 19th century classroom that is so familiar and "comfortable" to adults. The comfort zone of knowing what to expect is tempting, but may not be the best way to learn or to reach students.

More as the book is digested.

Technology Facilitators

2008-05-18T05:01:00.000-04:00

Looking into the state legislative website, NC House Bill 156 passed the house on the first reading in 2007, and was sent to the appropriations committee. Unfortunately, it stopped there. It is still written for 2008, so maybe it will be revived automatically and have a chance this year. This bill will put one technology facilitator in place for every 2,500 students, with one at the administrative unit. My elementary school has approximately 675 students. That would be one tech fac for every 3-6 elementary schools. This is a start.

The difficulty in understanding the need is the tremendous variety of uses and applications in this area. In some schools, the full time tech fac helps the staff and students by working one-on-one; being the first line of problem solving before calling the "help desk"; sets up new computers and other technology equipment; packs-up and sends in computer and technology equipment for repair; prepares workshops for the staff; works with the administrative technology staff in solving computer problems; stays updated by attending monthly meetings with the administrative technology staff; joins listservs and tech groups to continually update knowledge and ideas; spends own money to attend workshops and conferences; searches for new sources for curriculum deployment using technology to engage students; applies for grants to gain new technology or training; maintains communications with the parents, students, staff, and extended world community by emails; sends photos to local newspapers to inform community of school events; maintains listserv for school families; writes articles for professional journals; cooperates with state agencies; works with staff on software programs; discovering answers for problems and sharing; spreadsheet report cards; school webmaster; daily, live in-house TV production produced and presented by a team of students; school blogs; school wiki; audio and video podcasts; and more.

In my school, I have the added pleasure of scheduling interactive videoconfernces for each classroom teacher, establishing relationships with partner schools for class to class projects and world projects. What does this mean?

Can you imagine your child having the opportunity to visit the state museums in NC several times a year? Normally it costs over $2000 for a grade level of students to drive to Raleigh on buses for a day's tour (we are about 100 miles away). Add in the cost of fuel, lunch, and lost teaching time on the bus, and you have an annual outing. Now, consider walking down the hall to a classroom (1-3 minutes walking time) and instantly connecting to the NC Museum of History, NC Museum of Natural Sciences, NC Wildlife Resources Distance Learning, and NC School of Science and Math. You have free instruction from the state's historians, science, math, and wildlife experts. These expert instructors send boxes of materials for students to explore, manipulate, discover, discuss with grouped students, ask, and teach their fellow classmates in an interactive discussion. This is powerful learning! -- Now, go back to class in 1-3 minutes and you have no wasted class time spent on riding a bus or using fuel down the highway. This can be done monthly instead of annually! Have you chatted with a child who got to hold, explore, and discuss dinosaur bones and scat? Exciting!

Engaged students - is that what we want? After almost six years of facilitating videoconferences (15 years of elementary classroom teaching and 5 years teaching a K-5 computer lab) I find students actively involved in activities, discussions, and thinking during and after videoconfernces with a little follow-up. Students who may have difficulties paying attention are attentive and focused on the lesson activities. These skilled expert teachers use a variety of short activities geared to age levels, invoke skilled techniques, extending vocabulary to students, who leave the experience with a heightened sense of learning and accomplishment. Success does breed success.

Any good classroom teacher has his/her students write about a field trip upon return to school. This allows the teacher to generate discussion of what occurred, with students giving details of the event. This basic activity allows the student to build the connections in the brain and make sense of this new knowledge. You can do this too, with a videoconference. Having the students discuss, then write about what they learned can be written on paper, blogged to share with their class, school, community, extended family members, etc.

We have completed projects on a state level with 4th graders, classroom to classroom projects, state to state projects, and national and international projects where our students meet face to face with others and share learning (topics, curriculum, experiences). This is powerful learning. This year a class of 4th graders worked with a class in Pennsylvania and Spain to study the drought in the southeast U.S. and it's effects such as flooding. They used a wiki and the culminating experience in Megaconference Jr. This is 21st century learning.

Our county, Forsyth, has fiber connections in schools and by July 1 we will have 100mb connections in all of our county schools. The infracture is there; the possibilities of expert teachers and activities are present, too with our great school staff and the wonderful instructors at state institutions. Combining these time and fuel savings would be a good way to spend educational dollars for our children. One of my basic premises in education has always been "Is is good enough for my child?" If not, then it must improve because everyone's child deserves the best educational opportunities. As a parent and tax payer, I want the best for our children. As an adult I want practical applications for results. When I look at these YouTube and TeacherTube video's, I realize that without the best for our students we are seriously challenging our potential futures. We must prepare our students to live and work in the 21st century, using collaborative tools and interaction among groups as they develop learning strategies and skills for success.

Updates for May 13

2008-05-13T10:04:00.000-04:00

SP3
Please do NOT update desktops or teacher laptops to SP3 (service pack 3) until notified by the school system. This update may try to start automatically and if so, you should say "NO" -- this update may cause problems with our wsfcs software and services; they will test this software and let us know when it is safe to use on our computers. THANKS!

Technology Facilitators - 077 or 079
There is a legislative item for the state budget that would place a tech fac in each school. This is needed by our continued use of technology in 21st century learning. You can write an email to the Forsyth Legislative Delegation recommending this position. Currently this position is paid for with local funds or school funds, which are threatened each year. Many states use this position to help students and staff advance in technology uses and meet the new standards for technology learning, NETS. These goals are changing from learning "skills" to "application" in students and staff ability to collaborate across time and space with web 2.0 tools and, for us at Rural Hall, videoconferencing (H.323 technology).

Internet vs. Computer Use

2008-05-08T13:56:00.000-04:00

Remember that all students have permission to use a computer at school, as it is part of the SCOS. Because the computer is part of the SCOS, students may not be kept from using a computer. They must have parent permission to go on Internet, the dark purple form in the cumulative folder.

Also be aware that websites we use at school are FILTERED. If students have access to these same sites at home, they may or may not be filtered, depending on parent choices for Internet. This is an important topic that schools and parents should be clear about. A recent article in ISTE's Learning and Leading with Technology (Volume 35, Number 7, p. 26) discusses this subject and gives 4 steps to prevent a problem.
1. parent-education program about Internet safety and content filtering
2. see that teachers understand that web sources inside wsfcs are filtered and these same sites may NOT be filtered at home or in other locations (hence, use NetTrekker at school and home instead of google for elementary students)
3. use district supported web 2.0 resources (google docs and pb wiki and blogger are on this list)
4. stay alert to news and changing resources - stay updated

Instructify

2008-05-08T09:33:00.001-04:00

Learn NC has a new website that not only has access for teachers, but offers collaboration through social networking. The website is called Instrucitfy.
There are flash cards, too. The social networking is so helpful in allowing teachers from different schools, regions, states, countries to share ideas.

May 7 Update

2008-05-07T12:40:00.000-04:00

Lots of information to share from 2 months of meetings. Please read and let me know if you have questions.

Virus Scan
If you see a broken line or symbol on your blue virus scan icon on the bottom right of your taskbar, you need to "alt, control, delete" and choose task manager. Click on the processes tab at the top, if you see "authenicat" then you are OK and your web filtering is working. If you do NOT see "authenicat" under the processes running list, then you need to log off the computer and logon again.

Student Information
AUP - the grape colored paper is for the cum folders and goes at the very back - these are only sent once, with new students to wsfcs and for kindergartners. We need to encourage all parents/guardians to approve use of internet. I'm happy to talk with parents and explain what we do. Even if this is denied, the students is NOT off the computer, but only internet. Computer skills are part of the state mandated SCOS, so must be taught.

IMPACT study
This can be accessed on the ncwiseowl website. All schools can use this model and it is highly recommended by DPI.

Technology Plan
We are asked to think about where we should be in five years. This is a very difficult topic as many of the software, hardware issues for five years from now are not yet here. Think about how we can change our thinking, teaching, and skills to keep our students interested while teaching SCOS and relevant topics. This conversation should be ongoing. Please post comments or email me any suggestions or ideas.

NetTrekker
I will offer this at school next year if you haven't had it. We should NOT use google with students. NetTrekker is screened by teachers and is on target with elementary curriculum.

Shared Folder
If you want to have access to your student's work, get them to save a copy to the "student shared" folder on their desktop. Inside there is a folder for each teacher. Go inside the teacher folder to save. This way you can check, print, or grade and resave to this folder. You can pull up a student's work and "track the changes" by editing or correcting and then resaving. It saves time and is fairly easy. I'm happy to show you how.

WIKI
Be sure to check the YouTube and TeacherTube movies on the school wiki. The "how-to's" are excellent. The one about using excel for a poster is easy to follow and makes a nice product. An example poster is on the computer lab door, "Museum of History Mocassins to Motorcars."

Grade Level
Next year it would be great to meet with each grade level to see what you want for technology staff development here at Rural Hall School. We can develop projects and set-up access to the WIKI and class blogs for students to share work. The new NETS standards require students to "use" 21st century skills to collaborate, not just use an excel ss or word document or powerpoint presentation. We can put our heads together and come up with some easy strategies to help you do this with your students. The new teacher NETS standards will be unveiled this summer at NECC. They are tough, so we can look at how we want to work on these, too.

Updates - April 7

2008-04-07T16:38:00.000-04:00

We have a new podcast space for saving student and teacher made podcasts. This is on the K drive. It is NOT backed-up every night like the H drive. I will put folders there with teachers names upon request. If you are interested in learning about podcasts, check out the Technology Department website for classes. If you want me to come to your classroom to make a podcast of your students, just schedule a date with me for that. Remember, we can do podcasts up to about 20 minutes and video podcasts under 10 minutes (about 5-8 minutes works well). I use an ipod, digital video camera, and a mac G5 for editing and uploading the podcasts.

If you are interested in easy access to your student's work, get them to save it to the student shared folder. Inside that folder there is a folder with each teacher's name. The students can save there and then you can open and edit, grade, print, or save to your HD. The students have an icon on their desktop that says "Student Saved Folder." You have an icon on your (staff) desktop that says "Staff Shared Folder." The student shared folder is inside that one. A few teachers have been using this for a couple of years and find it easy to use. If you find your folder gets full, let me know and we may be able to switch around the memory levels.

Besides the wonderful possibilities of Google Documents, there are many other applications. The best way to start is to get a free google email account. At school we use blogger.com for our blog images. The google login is the same for all of these, so the one gmail account opens a lot of possibilities. There is a calendar (that can be shared), Google Earth, and I love iGoogle! I also use Google alerts. It sends me an email with a link to anything on the web that I tag as my Google alert. You can have more than one alert and tailor make them for you. With grown sons and one being a journalist, I get emails of stories, college soccer games, and other interesting trivia. There are Google: groups, talk, translate (translates webpages or sentences into a choice of languages), toolbar, video, desktop, pack, maps, mobile, and many more.

If you want access to a data projector for your classroom, ask Ms. White, Ms. Hicks, Ms. Clauss, Ms. Farmer, or Ms. Garcia. They have carts that can be used. There is also the student laptop cart in the library that can be checked-out. It is easy to use. Most schools have waiting lists for using this cart.

Another way to bring your classroom into the 21st century is using the school wiki. I've set up project pages for 4th and 5th grade and will add other grade levels upon request. This is another easy way for students to share work (beside google documents) and it doesn't require an email. If you are working on a curriculum topic and want to share your class work with another class, let me know and we can tailor make your wiki page. The wiki allows students and teachers to edit work and share at the same time. We can set up a grade level project or a school to school project. We can set up some simple after bus workshops for credit and help you create exactly what you need. Let me know if you want me to meet with your grade level and we can plan for 4th quarter or next year.

WSFCS BLOG
This keeps you updated with wsfcs - read it, bookmark it! :-)

Delicious information

2008-04-06T11:24:00.000-04:00

Interactive Videoconferencing - IVC

2008-03-27T18:46:00.000-04:00

Interactive videoconferencing is a fantastic way for students to learn from experts in our state institutions (NC Museum of Natural Sciences, NC Museum of History, NC Wildlife Resources DL, NCSSM). Next week the NC Distance Learning Association is meeting in New Bern for it's annual conference. The new slate of officers will be announced along with the winners of the NCDLA awards. After two years of being the K-12 representative for NCDLA, I must say I've enjoyed the experience and learned so much from these folks. North Carolina has so many talented, energetic, and hard working people in distance learning who share their talents and share with new people.

2008-03-14T14:50:00.000-04:00

Traveling to Concord for the NCaect is an adventure. Even the drive back and forth is educational if you car-pool. Finding new freinds who are talented, excited about their work, and bring enthusiasm to their students and staff is a shot of joy and adrenaline to be your best. Riding with April Patterson was informative, fun, and her school is lucky to have her as the instructional technologist.

Then you arrive for the conference of folks who have similar goals, desires for doing their best for students and staff, and experts to share knowledge, along with co-workers who have special activities, and experiences to share. Teachers need this boost in learning and enthusiasm; conferences inspire and make you look to why you are doing the job.

Of course, it looks like "time off" but teachers know better, there is still that work to come back to and catch-up on. But now it's done with a different attitude and outlook. The newest buzz is on wiki's. I looked at wiki's a year or so ago, but didn't see how it would be used at school, so just let it rest there awhile. Then, last fall we applied to present at Megaconference Jr., and when we were accepted, the connection just made such sense. We tried the wiki to collaborate with our partners at Vann School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and Catalonia, Spain. That project, on the drought in the southeast, was completed and presented on February 21, 2008. Now, we're going to try some grade level simple postings/projects. There's also a simple way for students to share books on the Books We Love page. We'll just give it a try and see what works and doesn't. Suggestions or experiences are always welcome!

Had a great conversation with Ellen Mulhern at the last conference session today. It was a moodle class and she had the fantastic idea of using it to put some basic computer directions or workshops online.

March 14, 2008

Tech Quest 4 Teachers

ASCD Gets it Right!

Respect

Web Tools for 2011-12

July - New School Year

What is a good principal?

Best Ideas

Challenge: Why do you teach?

EdTech_365/2010

What We Need - More Videoconferencing

"Flat" Communications with Voicethread

Desktop Videoconferencing

What do you use?

Time to Go - It's August!

Summer Reflection Time

It is raining! - Or Just Politics?

Google Apps and Our Staff - Part 5

Google Apps and Our Staff – Part 4

Google Apps and Our Staff – Part 3

Ed Tech Funding – Help!

Google Apps and Our Staff – Part 2

Google Apps, Wiki, and Our Staff - Part 1

What a week!

Favorite 3 Web Tools

Google Docs - Presentation

NCTIES Reflections

Google Apps for Education

Lifelong Learners - Are you one?

Not High Tech, but Touches the Heart and Senses

Traveling Through Twitter

EdTech 365/2010

Educational Journeys

Google Apps for Education

Read Around the Planet

Flip Cameras on Field Trips

Phones & Driving

Orville & Wilbur Wright - PPS Mega 3

Interactive Videoconference - UK Poetry Day

POV's "The Principal"

Twitter Professionally

Looking for Ways Technology Can Connect Students

Support Education

Scheduling IVC for Fall 2009

Geocaching with iPhone

Good-bye to NC Teacher Academy

PhotoStory 3

Geocaching - Monday, July 13, 2009

GeoCaching - NC Tech Teacher Academy

Teacher Tech Academy - Our Adventure Begins

NC Technology Teacher Academy

Summer - Tech Refresh

Digital Flat Stanley 2008-09

Educational Technology and Common Sense

Meme

Alaska SeaLife Center

NCDLA - Virtual Conference

Earth Day Celebration

IVC - PPS Megaconference

Videoconferencing

Teamwork

Measuring 21st Century Skills

Insect Research

Technology Facilitator or Instructional Technologist

Multiple Intelligences

Read Around the Planet

Glogster.com/edu

NCTIES

Read Around the Planet - More Exciting Conferences

Thinking Out Loud

Reflecting

More Read Around the Planet

Read Around the Planet

Megaconference Jr. 2009

Wiki Use - Challenges

Faster - Tech Dollars and Innovation

Megaconfernce Jr.

Catch-up

Megaconference Jr. 2009

Inexpensive IVC

New Class - Fun!