"Copyright" - Enough Said

What can we do to help everyone get on the same page with Copyright Guidelines? How can we make any and all information available to everyone so that informed decisions can be made when it comes to using digital materials in the classroom.

Someone has gone and made it a little bit more simplified. The Temple University Media Education Lab, along with National Association for Media Literacy Education, the Action Coalition for Media Education, the National Council of Teachers of English, the Visual Communication Studies Division of the International Communication Association have all collaborated on their most recent project.

This project was to develop a an easier format to aid educators in understanding copyright when using "digital materials in teaching and learning." They have created the "Code of Best Practices in Fair Use for Media Literacy Education." This document was created to help educators in making good and appropriate decisions on how they use copyrighted material.

You can also watch the pre-recorded launch event from November 2008. As well read more about it from the Temple website.

The Technology-Rich Classroom for Free

There are an amazing number of technology tools available for teachers to support their classroom, and even more services purchased by our district for teachers. These tools aren't just websites to visit, but tools for instruction. And workshops in all of these are currently offered by our department. So although we hope all classrooms will eventually have interactive whiteboards, projectors, document cameras, newer computers, etc...these are some tools you can use now. And if your classroom is outfitted with good tech equipment these tools will enhance what you can do in class.

Blogs provide a great way to engage students using technology. Whether posting assignments or showcasing class events, blogs using Blogger are free and relatively easy to set up and get going. Photostory is a great program that can be installed on all computers, but if you prefer to use a service that allows you to communicate with a much broader audience and house digital stories, take a look at Voicethread. Accounts are free, and we have several teachers and schools in our district using this with students. If you need a kid-safe search engine, we have a district license for netTrekker. You can also use DEStreaming for finding digital media that we also have a site license for. If you want a way to organize bookmarks try delicious; for organizing RSS try out Google reader. If you'd like to videoconference but don't have a big budget, see if you have a projector and webcam in your school, and use Skype (part of the Creating Global Connections workshop). If you need to collaborate with a group in a website set up a wiki.

The great thing about using these tools is that most are web-based and don't require installation. So start working on that technology-rich classroom, on a budget, with some of these free and worthwhile options.

How Stuff Works

Inquisitive students in your class? Need a new direction to point them towards for answers? Check out howstuffworks.com! This website was first known as “the” place to go for how common gadgets worked. It quickly evolved, and now, this site has become a place that offers answers and great, simplistic explanations on all kinds of topics and processes.

There are now TONS of questions your students can find answers too. You can also easily build lesson plans around some of the questions/topics. Some questions are even answered in the form of a video!

Categories include History, Geography, Animals, Computers, Health, Science, Money, and many more. Need Examples? Take a look at these links… I am sure they will catch your creative eye!

Is the Dead Sea Really Dead?

Who Owns the Oceans?

How Viruses Work

How Stocks and the Stock Market Work

How Barack Obama Works

My personal favorite is a section called “Everyday Science”. Here, you can find the answers to questions like “How do Sunglasses Work?” or “What Causes an Ice Cream Headache?"

These are all questions that easily make you tilt your head and go hmmmmmm. Well, now you can find the answers!

Cooperative Learning

Cooperative learning is not a new concept. Designing learning situations where students work together to achieve designated goals has been a long term instructional strategy. Research reminds us that effective learning groups are well structured and rely on positive interdependence, social interaction skills and accountability to assure success for all participants.

With these guidelines in mind, consider the expanded options for cooperative learning groups. Updated connectivity and global technologies make local and international collaboration equally accessible. Students can establish shared bookmark sites and online calendars to manage project tasks. They can use video conferencing tools to meet across the miles. Students can work together to complete quests online or in a virtual world.

As educators we have the opportunity to align with colleagues across the hall or across the globe to remove the walls and expand the outlook of our students. Let's think beyond our past experiences and embrace the power of technology.

Let's rethink the possibilities.

Based on content found in: Classroom Instruction That Works: Research-Based Strategies for Increasing Student Achievement written by Robert Marzano, Debra Pickering, and Jane Pollock and Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works written by Howard Pilter, Elizabeth R. Hubbell, Matt Kuhn and Kim Malenoski

About Manga Shakespeare

William Shakespeare, in my opinion is a great classical writer. However, his plays were often written in a manner that was difficult for me to understand. Most school aged children will read or study at least one of his works before graduating from high school, atleast that was the case when I was a high school student. And so, creating an interest in the classics may prove to be a challenge for a few teachers.

On the other hand there is Manga. (Visit the following website Manga genre for more information about Manga ). The series that my son owns is a set of comic books that are bound to look like novels. For example my son owns a collection of the Prince of Tennis manga books. He currently owns 29 episodes and can hardly wait until they print the next edition. Seemingly these novels are the rant of my teenager. (see the link for more information about Prince of Tennis)

Classics and Manga, these two genres could not be more different. Nonetheless, a new manga collection, Manga Shakespeare is the synthesis of Shakespeare’s works and the manga genre. This is a somewhat interesting concept in my opinion. Even the combination of the genres creates an Oxymoron at its best. According to wikepedia' website, http://www.wikipedia.com/ , an Oxymoron is a figure of speech that combines two normally contradictory terms – classic and manga.

Based on information from Promethean Planet's website, http://www.prometheanplanet.com/ they have partnered with SelfMadeHero Inc., the company that publishes Magna Shakespeare to develop and provide resources for the interactive whiteboard. Of all the classics written by Shakespeare, I believe that most students will read Romeo and Juliet, but even this visual creates more interest. (Manga Shakespeare Romeo and Juliet) - see the link for the website.

Bloom's Digital Taxonomy

Most educators have heard of Bloom’s Taxonomy and how he proposed that learning fit into one of three psychological domains – cognitive, affective and psychomotor moving from lower order thinking skills to high order thinking skills. The original taxonomy categories are:

• Knowledge


• Comprehension


• Application


• Analysis


• Synthesis


• Evaluation

Then in 2001 a revised taxonomy was developed by Lorin Anderson and D Krathwohl which listed the categories as:

• Remembering


• Understanding


• Applying


• Analyzing


• Evaluating


• Creating

Recently I read an article about Bloom’s Taxonomy in the digital world from an educator named Andrew Churches. Briefly outlined, this is how Andrew sees teachers using technology with the revised taxonomy in the digital world.

• Remembering – retrieval of information
  Digital World – bulleting to mark key words, bookmark websites, social bookmarking or Googling
  


• Understanding – interpreting, summarizing, paraphrasing, comparing
  Digital World – refining basic searches, Blog journaling, Twittering, categorizing, commenting / annotating files



• Applying – implementing using information and executing tasks
  Digital World – initiating a program, operating / manipulating hardware and applications, gaming technology, uploading and sharing of materials on sites such as Flickr, editing Twitters or blog journals



• Analyzing – comparing, organizing, structuring and integrating
  Digital World – mash ups (several data sources melded into single usable information), links within documents and webpages, validating information found on the web, making judgments about found information, tagging, meta-tagging



• Evaluating – hypothesizing, critiquing, experimenting, judging, testing and monitoring
  Digital World – blog commenting and reflecting, posting threaded discussions, moderating blogs, effective collaboration that involves evaluating the strengths and abilities of participants, evaluating the contributions of others, testing: analyzing the purpose of a tool or process, analyzing and evaluating data sources and making judgments



• Creating – designing, constructing, planning, producing, inventing, devising and making
  Digital World – Programming, filming, animating, videocasting, podcasting, mixing and remixing to create unique products, directing and producing, publishing, video blogging, building / compiling mash ups and at the highest level creating a program application or developing a game

This is an excellent article to assist teachers as they implement digital tools into the curriculum. Included in Andrew Churches’ article are more detailed examples for each category and scoring rubrics.

Listed are several links to learn more about the revised Bloom's Taxonomy and Bloom's Digital Taxonomy by Andrew Churches:

• Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy


• Bloom’s Taxonomy and the Digital World


• Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy (PDF)

Google image:
http://images.google.com/images?gbv=2&ndsp=20&hl=en&q=+site:blogger.com+bloom%27s+taxonomy

Have Fun With SUMO Paint

Freehand drawing is not one of my given talents, but I do like to use drawing and paint programs to create images that go with curriculum I'm teaching. SUMO Paint is a free, online paint and image editing program that is fun and easy to use. This program has most of the higher quality features of Photoshop but is as easy to use as Paint or Kid Pix. Just a few of the offered features are layers with various filters, special blending and opacity effects, and numerous brush variations. Color schemes seem limitless. The best part is you don't have the expense that goes along with the "big name" products. Saving your creation online makes it available everywhere and anytime. Setting up the free account takes just a few seconds.

Images created by others are available to load into the program for a new creation or can be saved, printed, and even rated. Different views and sizes of each image are offered. The images library is searchable in the personal or public domain. The images have a size limitation of 15MB. Your creations can be copyrighted.

SUMO Paint is a wonderful tool to use with your students since it is all online and you don't have to purchase any other software. Images can be created and printed without a login. Why not try introducing it in your classroom and watch the creativity grow!

Inspiration, Kidspiration & Webspiration

According to www.wikipedia.com "A concept map is a diagram showing the relationships among concepts. They are graphical tools for organizing and representing knowledge. They include concepts, usually enclosed in circles or boxes of some type, and relationships between concepts indicated by a connecting line linking two concepts" (definition from wikipedia.com ). Two of my favorites are Kidspiration and Inspiration. Kidspiration®.

Recently, I noticed while searching for something to write about,t the same company that develops both Inspiration and Kidspiration developed and published another software product called Webspiration™. To find out more about webspiration, visit there site at this link: Webspiration.

Gigapan.org.....wow

There is no shortage of sites with great digital pictures on the web, but gigapan seems to offer something a little different. The images offers a panoramic view composed of many picutures allowing the viewer to move around the picture as well as zoom in to areas. The photo resolution is amazing. The only drawback I found was because the resolution is so impressive and the image is huge, it may take some time for it to load in your browser. But the payoff may well be worth the wait.

One of the recently featured panoramas is David Bergman's President Obama's Inaugural Address. This panorama was created from over 200 images with a final size of 1,474 megapixels. I was able to zoom in on the President as well as the snipers positioned on rooftops on buildings in the distance. The panoramas can even be downloaded and viewed in GoogleEarth (version 4.2 or higher). Check out the image from the Mount Rushmore panorama in Google Earth below.

This site can allow you bring images into the classroom in stunning detail.

Using Vuvox To Create Exciting Multimedia Presentations

Here is a new way to add flare to your presentations. It’s called “Vuvox”, your visual voice. This free online resource allows you to create a multimedia filmstrip that you can slide left and right on your monitor. You can add pictures, text, video, music or voice files and hyperlinks to your sliding filmstrip. Go to http://www.vuvox.com/. Click “get a free account”. Fill out the info. Click the “create” tab at the top of the page and choose either express, collage or studio. Express is a fast condensed version of the studio creation. Choose a presentation style and links to your media libraries through RSS feeds. Collage is a multimedia platform that allows you to combine your photographs, videos, sound files and text into interactive stories. The collage can be published or embedded into any website or blog. You can cut out parts of an image to use it as a frame or mask. There are multiple layers so you can place an image behind your newly created frame to spice up your photograph. You can create “hot spots” or links to other media, text or websites. You may choose to add your text, soundtrack or audio file directly to the page. When you choose to create a collage you have the option to watch three short instructional videos to help you get started. When you click “create with studio”, you will go through a series of steps to collect your media, create an interactive presentation and embed your presentation in a blog or a website. Give it a try and add flare to your lessons or presentations.

Don't be Left Behind or Left Inside

Public School Insights recently republished an article titled, "Last Child in the Woods": A Conversation with Best Selling Author Richard Louv. This served as a reminder that while many initiatives focus on leaving no child behind academically, we also need to be concerned about alienating children from the natural world. Schools are asked to take advantage of "nearby nature" to increase awareness of plants and animal life that are working to coexist with us in any environment.

Technology is portable. Take a laptop outside to record observations. Use the digital camera to capture images of interesting plants and animals to research back in the classroom. Go exploring.
Don't let our students suffer from "nature deficit disorder". Let's not forget our interdependence with the environment. As Louv points out, we use all our senses when we are outside which optimizes learning.

Get out and explore the wonders around you.

Are you Blue?

Have you heard of Digital Blue? Their name is becoming common among kids in some classrooms across the globe these days. Digital Blue is an innovative technology company that specializes in products for today's youth. What are they known for? Their Digital Movie Creator which easily allows kids to become film directors and executive producers of their own movie productions. Digital Blue has gone so far as to incorporate their products into the classroom by teaming with another company called Freshi (pronounced Fresh Eye).

With the collaboration of both companies, state standards can be met in Science, Social Studies and even Math. They are also in the process of creating specific lesson plans for teachers.

Want to check them out? Visit them online at http://digiblue.com/education/

Check out freshi at http://www.freshifilmworx.com/

10 Ways to Boost Learning

In my last blog I wrote about the seven skills that students desperately need by the time they graduate from high school. I also wrote about employers who need employees who can think and be able to see a problem and come up with a way to fix that problem. We as educators need to teach 21st century skills to students finding ways to assess those skills through performance measures. We need to find ways to teach today’s multi-tasking students who need visual stimulation and constant contact with their friends. But knowing that we need to be reaching out to our students in a more creative, productive way using technology is not enough. How do teachers and schools do this?

I’ll start by listing those seven survival skills again:

1. Problem-solving and critical thinking
2. Collaboration across networks and leading by influence
3. Agility and adaptability
4. Initiative and entrepreneurship
5. Effective written and oral communication
6. Accessing and analyzing information
7. Curiosity and imagination

As I thought about those survival skills I began to think about what part of those skills some students may already possess and how we could build from what students already know. Let’s see, problem-solving – OK, if you can’t set up your new cell phone and are tired of reading the manual just give it to one of your students. They will set up your cell phone in 10 minutes flat. How’d they do that? They are not afraid of technology, they are not afraid of trying different things and they will sit and work on something until they figure it out. Problem-solving, simple right? Yea, right. It was easy for them. So students do possess some problem-solving skills. How can we build on that tenacity to help students refine and expand their problem-solving skills?

Collaborating across networks – do students collaborate? You bet, everyday. They work together building Facebook and My Space sites, they form bonds of friendship from texting their many friends everyday and join forces as a team for many of their video games. I continue to read about companies that are using video games for educational purposes. Can we as educators build on the collaborative skills our students already possess? Sure we can.

I don’t need to go through the rest of the list because by now you’re thinking about the students you work with everyday and seeing the skills they already possess. This led me to an article that outlined 10 ways to boost learning with technology. No one would disagree that we have a crisis in education today. In spite of the resources and money used for education students continue to fall behind students in other countries.

The State Educational Technology Directors Association (SETDA) came up with an action plan with ten recommendations for national, state and local education leaders:

1. Ensure that technology tools and resources are used continuously and seamlessly for instruction, collaboration, and assessment.
2. Expose all students (pre-K through 12th grade) to STEM fields and careers - Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM).
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 and education portals.
5. Incorporate innovative, consistent, and 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 and virtual learning.
8. Obtain societal support for education that uses technology from all stakeholders – students, parents, teachers, state and district administrators, business leaders, legislators, and local community members.
9. Provide federal leadership to support states and districts regarding technology’s role in school reform by passing the ATTAIN Act, the Achievement Through Technology and Innovation Act.
10. Increase available funding for e-Rate so that schools can acquire telecommunication services, internet access, internal connections, and maintenance of those connections.

This is a comprehensive list that covers what all school systems, communities and districts should be doing. As I think about what our school system is doing in technology I know we are ahead of other school systems in the state with our use of technology. How does your school compare to other schools in the district where you live? Across your state? Can we do more with the technology resources we currently have? I think so and it’s up to all of us to learn new technology skills and strive to teach the content while reaching out to our students in a more creative, productive way using technology and helping all students gain 21st century skills.

Live from Winston-Salem It's Saturday Night Live

Are you looking for something that your middle school kids can do and enjoy? Do you want to make sure that they are safe at the same time?

Well try out "Saturday Night Live" sponsored by the West Forsyth YMCA.

Six Saturday's between Jan 17 and May 23 the YMCA is providing the fun and friendly environment for teens in grades 6-8.

Each Saturday there will be a different theme so the students can dress up as well to enjoy the fun. As well there will be dancing, sports, laser tag, Guitar Hero and many other events for each night. Food and drinks will be sold to raise money for scholarships. Go to the link above and get all of the info and schedule to make your plans to attend.

One more Powerpoint Presentation!

Ever hear the statement, "If I see one more Powerpoint presentation!" Many times when students, teachers, or any presenter needs to share information they reach for the usual application, only to find it is an outdated version or won't work on a particular computer. As our ideas become more vivid in current technologies, another choice for making a presentation look awesome as well as be accessible by others would be SlideRocket.

Since SlideRocket is web-based you don't have to worry about using up your hard drive space or filling up a home directory on the server. Creations can be stored and shared from centralized libraries where everything can be searched, tagged, and sorted. Imported personal images, flash animations, and video can be stored in the Assets section. Video from Flickr, TeacherTube and other sites can easily be imported. Its plug-in architecture allows for an endless number of slide transitions and effects, 2-D and 3-D, that will work on a PC, Mac, or Linux.

Sharing your work with everyone is as easy as publishing the URL or embedding it into your webpage. You can control who sees your creation by only inviting certain people. Once shared, either to a few or many, you have control and can see when it was viewed and by whom, and how long they spent on each slide. Any Google spreadsheet can be imported and then it becomes a fully styleable table or chart. There are shapes and drawing tools to make annotations or diagrams. Hyperlinking to any element is a breeze.

SlideRocket is another solution to help make presentations look great and add a little more "attitude." As Nick Yingling says, "Sometimes its not always what you're saying so much as how you're saying it."

Free Audio and Podcast Directory

As America waits for the inauguration of our 44th president how about reviewing some other great speeches in history or audio files that might peek your students' interest or supplement your class instruction? The site learnoutloud.com offers a wide array of podcasts and audio files for free download. The podcast directory offers everything from Great Speeches in History to Learning Japanese to Aerobics. The site also links to other providers of media where you could find both the video or audio of Barack Obama's speech from the 2004 Democratic National Convention (complete with the transcript) on americanrhetoric.com.

Learnoutloud.com boasts "the Internet's largest directory of free audio & video learning resources." And you might be surprised at the variety and selection, which is the one drawback of the site. I found it time consuming to locate some of my files of interest. I didn't find an easy way to find my files, but once I did it was very simple to stream. So take a few minutes check out some of the audio offerings on Learnoutloud.

photo from http://www.learnoutloud.com/

Web Proxy

We have all heard the terms “Web Proxy” but is there true understanding of what those words really mean? To understand this process, let’s first answer a few questions.

What is a proxy server?
A proxy server is a computer that offers a network service which serves as a middle-man in allowing a person/computer to connect to a website indirectly.

How does a web proxy work?
You are essentially allowed to anonymously browse websites. For example, if you try to connect to myspace.com on your computer and it is blocked/filtered within your internet access, you would connect to a proxy server web address and the proxy server web address would then connect to that site for you…. Literally, your computer connects to the proxy service on another computer and that computer then connects to the site you want to visit – and allows you to view it.

Why should a web proxy be a concern in the classroom?
There are many, many sites that students would love to visit and interact with during school hours. These developed web proxy sites allow students to temporarily side-step filtering processes in place that are set up to ensure and encourage their safety online.

How can educators and parents work together to solve this problem?
Continue to give students instructions on what is and what is not appropriate to visit online. Filters are already in place within schools, but new web proxy sites are developed all the time! Teachers must monitor what their students are viewing online. And, equally, parents must monitor their children online at home, as well.

Rest assured that ever-increasing technologies allow these web proxy sites to become filtered. So, even though students may have found a temporary solution to visit their favorite sites – those proxy sites soon get caught in school filtering systems and the students will be unable to visit those sites. District technology departments are always on the lookout to catch new web proxy sites and put them in their place - on the filter list!

Save Paper and Assign an Educational Glog!

Are you in a mood to save trees and promote creativity in your students? Check out http://www.glogster.com/edu/. Click register and fill out the information. Open your email and click the verification link. Click "create a new glog" to make your own. But first let me tell you what a glog is. A glog is an online poster that can include graphics, text, images, video and sounds. To start your own glog you will want to add or create a background or wall as they call it. Then add your text, graphics, pictures, videos and sounds. Students can create glogs about things you already have them do in class. Instead of writing what they learned on a piece of paper have them create a glog. You might be pleasantly surprised at what they produce for you. When they are finished with their glog, they can email it to you as a glog gift. And just think; you won’t have any papers to carry home!

Telling Stories via Flip Mino

According to their website: "Flip Mino is a mini camcorder". In the classroom, the Flip Mino can become a digital learning device in which teachers may use to do a lot of things. For example, they may use it to capture a student solving a math problem in which the students can revisit as a study guide. Students may also use this little device to record each other’s projects and presentations and then view them together. High School and college students may use this device to gather research information and create mini documentaries. Students entering high school may want to consider using this mini device to begin documenting and recording information for their senior projects.

Video Conversations

Feel like sharing an idea, thoughts on a subject, or just express an opinion? Sounds very similar to blogging or twitter. I've been looking at a video conversational site called Seesmic. It allows you to communicate online through video conversation and have others from around the world respond.

The site is intended for posting a short video (most are between 1 1/2 - 3 minutes) and then have others respond to your topic. Video can be recorded directly onto the site with your own camera or mobile phone, uploaded from a computer, or linked to a video posted on a social network site.

The site is developing at leaps and bounds with conversations of various topics. Some are open-ended questions; while others state an opinion and then ask for your thoughts to see what direction the conversation will flow. All conversations are put in a public access area when first recorded and can be moved to a private area for monitored discussion and responses. Seesmic posts topics for discussion. Using the site with students would require strict monitoring while they were online and not giving them free run of the site.

21st Century Weight Management

Have you been wondering why your clothes do not fit as well over the past few weeks? Have you made your New Year’s resolution to lose weight? Here is a new way to keep track of your food intake. Go to http://www.livestrong.com/ and click on 'The Daily Plate' on the dash board. This site, along with the Live Strong site bring weight management into the 21st Century.

This site is great for those of us that are wanting to lose weight, gain weight, or just maintain...counting calories. After entering height, weight, etc. and how much you’d like to lose, gain, or maintain a week, it will calculate how many calories you should be allowed in one day. After entering all the items you eat/drink each day, it will calculate the fat, calories, sugar, etc. that you have consumed and how many more/less calories you should consume for the remainder of the day. It contains many brand name items like the McDonald’s Crispy Chicken Snack Wrap and even that Biscuitville Ham Biscuit. You can also enter items from your own special recipe. It will show a pie graph of the carbs, fats, and protein you are eating daily. By the end of the day, it's amazing how much sugar I had consumed. It contains many other excellent features, but be sure to check out the exercises that can burn fat…Did you know that making copies and applying makeup can burn those calories?

3-D Virtual Field Trips

Did you ever think that you could take a virtual field trip to ancient Rome circa 320 A.D.? Well now you can with a little help from Google. Yes I said Google.

Google Earth has recreated a new three-dimensional representation of Rome around 320 A.D.

They have recreated nearly 7000 individual structures from the city including the Circus Maximus and the Colosseum. It really makes you feel as if you were there. You have the feeling of being a citizen of Rome as you travel through the streets to the Markets and the Forums, and up to the Palace.

With the updated version of Google Earth you can access this new package from the Gallery Layer. You get to tour the buildings and also learn about the lives of the people of Rome. The program offers the visitor pop up material about the buildings, maps and aerial imagery of the city.

The "Ancient Rome 3-D" concept and design is based from a simulation created by an international team of designers which was led by the University of Virginia, and the University of California.

Well here is something else to think about not only is this pretty cool but Google is also holding Curriculum Contest around the "Ancient Rome 3-D" Google Earth layer. They are taking in curriculum submissions from K-12 so no one gets left out. Oh and I almost forgot about the Prizes. Yes, you know that there cannot be a contest without prizes.
Here is a list of the prizes.

Apple MacBook laptop
Digital classroom projector
Digital camera
3D Navigation mouse
$500 in gift cards to Target or Office Depot
Engraved Google "Top Educator" plaque

The deadline is February 9th so go take a look at the Ancient Rome 3D Curriculum Competition.

Being Deliberate

Today's scan of the collection of ideas and information gathered by my Google Reader included an Education Sector article by Andrew J. Rotherham. Mr. Rotherham points out that the need for critical thinking, problem solving and global awareness are nothing new. These skills have been necessary for advances throughout the ages.

What has changed is the need for the masses rather than the few to be trained in these areas. We can no longer hope students will be lucky enough to have a great teacher somewhere along the way who has the foresight to purposely structure instruction to address the challenges of the 21st Century. Schools and school systems must be "deliberate" about teaching these skills to all students.

The state requirement to develop new School Improvement Plans provides a wonderful opportunity to pause, reflect and make a dedicated effort to revise instruction with a focus on integrating 21st Century skills in every classroom. Let's stop preparing students for our past.

Let's make a deliberate effort to prepare all students to

meet the challenges of their future.

Read the complete article at http://www.educationsector.org/analysis/analysis_show.htm?doc_id=751582 .

Seven Skills Students Deperately Need

Recently eSchoolNews had an article by Tony Wagner about the seven skills that students desperately need to acquire before graduating high school. Several groups have been offering advice as to how federal policy makers and state and local education leaders can transform education and help students obtain 21st century skills through technology.

One misconception is the fact that a lot of people think the skills that students need for the workforce and the skills needed to be good citizens are two separate things, but they’re not. Students who become successful in the global workforce will also be successful people at life. Employers want people who can ask good questions and people who can engage others in thoughtful conversations.

Employers know that technology changes so fast that they are not concerned if their employees know the latest version of software when hired, they want employees who know how to think. Teaching to the test is not helping the future workforce achieve success in the job market. The future workforce needs to be able to see a problem and come up with a way to fix the problem and not wait for the employer to tell them how to fix a problem. If students are not taught how to think beyond multiple choice answers and to find solutions to problems then the future employees for America will not be able to compete with the global market.

Many teachers who feel pressured to cover a lot of material to teach to the tests are not allowing students the time needed to search and work through problems, finding the answers on their own. The pressure is to cover “x” amount of material in so many days and prepare the students to take a standardized test. Many students today who graduate high school don’t have the skills to make it in college or the workforce.

The article states that education needs to move from content standards to performance standards and that education stakeholders need to think of ways to start assessing 21st-century skills. I think teachers need to teach the content and allow students to show what they have learned through performance standards. We need to design assessments that measure the performance and 21st century skills of the students. Many students who are bright are being turned off from AP classes and other accelerated programs because of all the testing. Students should be encouraged to study subjects they love but many times the subjects they love require too much testing which turns them away from the more challenging courses.

Today’s students are multi-taskers, who like visually stimulating websites, who want to be in constant contact with their friends who also use Web 2.0 tools and they enjoy working in collaboration with their peers. What we as educators need to do is find a way to motivate them to learn using Web 2.0 tools and the technology already provided by the school or through the technology the students use every day. Just going to the computer lab to type up a paper is not using technology. We need to teach the content while reaching out to our students in a more creative, productive way using the technology the students are using.

Here are the seven survival skills that students need by the time they graduate from high school:
1. Problem-solving and critical thinking
2. Collaboration across networks and leading by influence
3. Agility and adaptability
4. Initiative and entrepreneurship
5. Effective written and oral communication
6. Accessing and analyzing information
7. Curiosity and imagination

I agree with Tom Wagner’s quote from the article –
“We are making [Adequate Yearly Progress] at the expense of failing our kids at life. Something has to change.”

Website to access the complete article –
http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/top-news/?i=56127

Web Versions?

The World Wide Web has progressed tremendously over the past 10 years. I remember vividly the days of html programming before WYSIWYG (what-you-see-is-what-you-get) editors came along. The days when animation was “the” going thing on a website are long gone. Instead, we have evolved to the dawn of a new era we are now entering called Web 3.0.

Before fully appreciating Web 3.0, we must first understand Web 1.0 and 2.0! Here are some simple (definitely debatable) characteristics that function/have functioned under each web version.

Web 1.0
-Reading, Reading, Reading
-All types of publications were posted online for viewing (brief “paper-less” time period) (lol)
-Usually “static” webpages there were not always updated on a consistent/evolving basis
-Sites were informational only, usually not requiring/providing the capability for website visitors’ input
-Sites were usually about selling/marketing products/services; informational
-Netscape (VERY popular browser then)
-Success sometimes defined by the number of page views!
-Web 1.0 was in full swing around the dot.com business boom and then losses…
-Mostly Dial-Up connections!

Web 2.0
-Interaction, Interaction, Interaction
-User-created/generated content
-Social Networking (Face Book, MySpace, etc.)
-Social Bookmarking (Delicious, etc.)
-Blogs
-Wikis
-Google
-Twitter
-YouTube
-TeacherTube
-Flickr
-RSS
-Open Source Applications
-the list goes on and on...

What can we expect next/now?

Web 3.0
-Advanced computer graphics
-Artificial Intelligence/Semantic Web (computer-driven information & content distribution/sharing)
-Greater and more intriguing user-interaction
-Broader open-source applications
-More open-data sources (content to the masses with less restrictions)

Based on research from Nova Spivack, Wikipedia sums it up in an excellent manner… Web 1.0 was "read-only", Web 2.0 is "read-write", and Web 3.0 will be "read-write-execute."

Tales from Tech Workshops

Last Tuesday afternoon I journeyed out to Moore Elementary for a technology workshop. And besides my frustrating (and self-imposed) exile to the stationary car-rider line prior to the workshop, I had a very good time. I was impressed at the turn out for this workshop. Twenty-three teachers converged on the "cozy" setting of the computer lab, some sitting on the floor in order to watch me give an overview of the interactive whiteboard and software for an hour after school. Most of the these teachers don't even have the boards in their rooms, but they hoped to get a head start on next year, as Moore Elementary will move into a new building outfitted with many interactive whiteboards in classrooms. I don't think these teachers were required to attend but rather wanted to get some early instruction or a refresher on using this technology in their future classrooms. I was pleased at their desire and willingness to learn about technology that for many of them won't be in their classroom until next year.

Sometimes installing new tech equipment is much easier than getting people to learn to use the technology to impact their classrooms and instruction. In this case, early indicators show this may not be a problem at Moore Elementary.

picture from www.wsfcsmagnets.net/moore-home.asp

You're looking at Colleges, now how are you going to pay for it?

Did your parents ever tell you that it pays to have good grades? Have you told that to your own children the same thing? In this case it does. How, you ask?

Take a look at GradeFund, which was developed by two brothers from Harvard and Princeton, which actually pays students for the good grades they get.

Michael and Matthew Kopko have really taken helping students pay for college to a new level and with this site they have launched it can make that dream happen for so many students out there that are struggling with wanting to go to college but may not know how they are going to pay for it.

How does it work?

Well the first thing is that the site is doing is matching up students, who have determined their own achievement level in a specific class, with sponsors that have determined what level of contribution for a certain grade. The sponsors of the students watch the grades that the students upload onto the site and award them with the amount per grade.

The student will create an account and determine themselves what their goals are for each subject, let's say an "A" in Math. Their sponsor, which could be a relative, a friend, a company or a complete stranger, verifies the grades made against the students transcript and then will either pay the student directly or the amount will go to the University for the student.

This site also offers additional help and support for students to help them with finding jobs and with internships that can also help pay for their higher education.

What is the appeal for Sponsors in this site, I think that it is a way to not only get family and friends involved in student achievement it is also a chance for corporations to get involved in academics. We see it in the news everyday about companies giving money for scholarships to universities, colleges and tech schools. That money then goes into a fund that is then spread out across all eligible students. Would it not be better for a company to award money for specific academic goals. A Bio-tech company, Law Firm, Bank, Hospital, etc. could sponsor students who were in a specific career path in school as a way to recruit new employees.

Take a look for yourself and read all about the GradeFund site and make up your own mind.

Nintendo DS: A Revolutionary Learning Device

If you teach middle school students or if you are fortunate to be the parent of one, words like Nintendo DS (Dual Screen) is all too common. This device also serves as a learning device. Read a recent USA Today article, In Tokyo School, Nintendo DS is an English Teacher to see how some people use it as a learning device.

Using this ground-breaking game turned learning device is a familiar activity for digital natives. Most of them, like my son, will be able to make a seamless transition from playing the traditional Nintendo DS games to learning with the newer Educational games. Based on what I have seen they will not experience a learning curve in the process. (see the above link to read about digital natives.)

Using Google Docs & Skype To Discuss The Revisions Of Your Students Term Papers

How many times have you had to rush through a discussion with your students about their term paper? You have tried to talk with them in early in the morning, during class or after school but the time was too limited. You can write the corrections in red on their draft but sometimes they don’t understand what you want them to change so the revisions take much longer or they don’t get done at all. What if you could talk to your students during a previously arranged convenient time to discuss the revisions? Google Docs and Skype could be used to go over the necessary corrections. First of all your students need to upload their term paper into Google Docs and invite you as a viewer. Your students would need to go to https://www.google.com/accounts/ServiceLogin?service=writely&passive=true&nui=1&continue=http%3A%2F%2Fdocs.google.com%2F&followup=http%3A%2F%2Fdocs.google.com%2F&ltmpl=homepage&rm=false and create an account and then upload their term paper. If you would actually like to type some things in their paper, they would have to invite you as a collaborator, your choice. Then, you and your students would create an account in Skype. No worries, all of this is free! Go to http://www.skype.com/ to download Skype and create your free account. Each of you would need to have a microphone/headphone set plugged into the computer to communicate with each other. A decent headphone/microphone will cost about $20.00.

Bob Kuhn, an English teacher at the Career Center, believes he can help more students using this method in addition to the face to face consultations that he offers his students in the class.

KartOO Search Engine

While looking for different search engines to use, I found one called KartOO. Not really sure about the way it is pronounced, maybe "kar - too" like a sneeze or maybe "kart - oh". It was developed in France and can be searched for websites, images, videos, and Wikipedia content. KartOO is a free, cartographic search engine that retrieves results from numerous other engines, such as Yahoo, AltaVista, Hotbot (and the list goes on) and then shows them in a visual, interactive map using Flash.

You can choose which language you want to see the results in and the words and menus are specific to each country. The left-side column shows the initial search in categories. Then as you move the mouse cursor across the result pages, keywords are highlighted and a brief description appears on the left side of the screen. A separate window opens when you click one of the pages. Gold lines link the subjects and sites. Clicking on one of the Topics in the left column takes you to more interactive maps.

There is a filtering system, bit it is very weak. Some words would give the message that if you were under 18, please do not go on into the site instead of blocking it. Our District filter caught most of the "usual" searches, but unfortunately some others came on through. I wasn't able to create my own custom search engine like I do in Google so only specific sites can be searched.

A first time user may not find KartOO very user friendly. The graphics aren't displayed in any type of organization, just kind of thrown around on the page. Options for saving and printing the maps are two very usable features.

If you have found a search engine you would like to recommend, please leave us a comment.

What is the River City Project?

River City is an interactive computer simulation for middle grades science students to assist them in learning scientific inquiry and 21st century skills. River City looks like a videogame but the content for the game was developed from the National Science Education Standards and the National Educational Technology Standards. River City is funded by the National Science Foundation. Picture taken from the River City Website: http://muve.gse.harvard.edu/rivercityproject/index.html.

Basically River City is a MUVE (Multi-User Virtual Environment) that enables many students to access the virtual worlds simultaneously, communicate with other students through instant messaging and to interact with digital artifacts.

This is a view of the four areas of the interface for the students taken from the River City website:

http://muve.gse.harvard.edu/rivercityproject/view/rc_views_interface.htm

Students travel back in time to address 19th century problems that are based on historical, sociological and geographical conditions in a town called River City. The city’s citizens are falling ill and the students must work together to help the town understand why the citizens are becoming ill. Students work in small research teams to look for causes of the illnesses, form and test hypotheses, develop controlled experiments to test their hypotheses, and then make recommendations based on the data they collect. This is all done in an online environment.

The River City Project is supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation which provides access to the simulation, provides the curricular materials, professional development and assistance free of charge to the schools. The River City Project mainly works with middle grades science teachers but they have also worked with social studies, math and language arts teachers.

River City is a 17-hour curriculum that students will begin by taking a pretest and a research conference at the end of the unit. The curriculum is designed to replace existing science lessons. The curriculum is interdisciplinary covering ecology, health, biology, chemistry, earth science and history. Students will explore three diseases and learn how the diseases are spread and how the human interactions will the diseases affect the people and city. Students are given situations to identify problems, investigate the problem, and determine the multiple underlying causes for the diseases.

Screen shot from River City.

How do teachers determine if River City is right for their students? Check out the section on “Is River City Right for You?” http://muve.gse.harvard.edu/rivercityproject/join/right_for_you.htm

Also several videos have been created to help teachers better understand River City. The videos may be viewed in Quicktime or Realplayer. Here is the link to the River City videos: http://muve.gse.harvard.edu/rivercityproject/view/rc_videos.html