Discovery Education has just announced the creation of their newest support website for teachers! Web 20.10 is provides free online support and is designed to tune-up your teaching techniques! Get the latest on Internet Safety, Media Literacy, Web 2.0 Tools, and Tech Tips through how to videos. This website is specifically designed to help us teachers, keep up with our 21st century students.
While you're there, you can also sign up for their sweepstakes, where the grand prize winner will receive an all expenses paid trip to attend the educational tech conference of your choice, the latest in tech gadgets for your classroom, a new laptop and scholarship funds for an online degree!
Showing posts with label Discovery Education. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Discovery Education. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Thursday, September 24, 2009
A Day in the Life...
Sorry about the delay in my update today. It's not much of an update, unfortunately, as my allergies decided to rage again yesterday afternoon and evening and I didn't get to listen to the sessions as I'd intended.
The one session I really got to enjoy though was the Day in the Life of DE Streaming with Lance Rougeux, one of the DEN managers. His presentation was set up as if you were a student going through a day of school with DE Streaming in every class. We went from a mock setup of 7:30 in the morning down to about 2:30 in the afternoon. We started with Language Arts/English first and how to use DE Streaming with literature circles, guided reading groups, and writing prompts. More on this later.
Next we went to Math class and learned that DE Streaming also has some flash interactive games available. By using differentiation, teachers can have one group working on an activity and another group of students working at the interactive white board (iwb) with the flash activities. Lance also reminded us not to forget to use the curriculum standards when searching for resources, which is another good way to perform a search in DE Streaming.
Next we were off to Social Studies class. Lance showed us the Discovery Atlas in the teacher's center. This looks amazing, especially for Geography. Then we were shown how to take a DE Streaming video and add it to Google Earth. It's much easier than you would think. Streaming has a special new "share" button on the content pages of each video. Click on this button and copy the embed code. Then go into Google Earth, create a placemark and paste the embed code into the body of the placemark. Viola! When the students click on the placemark, they will see a link to the video.
In Science class, students would watch a video from Mythbusters and fill out a worksheet, making sure the busters followed the scientific method and steps in their experiments.
Finally, it was almost time to go, but not without homework! A new website from CDWG and Discovery Education will show teachers how to get over their fear technology. http://cdwg.discoveryeducation.com/web2.0 is especially for Technophobes, this website will be a guide to helping you integrate technology. So for homework, we need to try some of the strategies and report back. What do you think of this site?
I'll be bringing more later and the address with the archived sessions.
The one session I really got to enjoy though was the Day in the Life of DE Streaming with Lance Rougeux, one of the DEN managers. His presentation was set up as if you were a student going through a day of school with DE Streaming in every class. We went from a mock setup of 7:30 in the morning down to about 2:30 in the afternoon. We started with Language Arts/English first and how to use DE Streaming with literature circles, guided reading groups, and writing prompts. More on this later.
Next we went to Math class and learned that DE Streaming also has some flash interactive games available. By using differentiation, teachers can have one group working on an activity and another group of students working at the interactive white board (iwb) with the flash activities. Lance also reminded us not to forget to use the curriculum standards when searching for resources, which is another good way to perform a search in DE Streaming.
Next we were off to Social Studies class. Lance showed us the Discovery Atlas in the teacher's center. This looks amazing, especially for Geography. Then we were shown how to take a DE Streaming video and add it to Google Earth. It's much easier than you would think. Streaming has a special new "share" button on the content pages of each video. Click on this button and copy the embed code. Then go into Google Earth, create a placemark and paste the embed code into the body of the placemark. Viola! When the students click on the placemark, they will see a link to the video.
In Science class, students would watch a video from Mythbusters and fill out a worksheet, making sure the busters followed the scientific method and steps in their experiments.
Finally, it was almost time to go, but not without homework! A new website from CDWG and Discovery Education will show teachers how to get over their fear technology. http://cdwg.discoveryeducation.com/web2.0 is especially for Technophobes, this website will be a guide to helping you integrate technology. So for homework, we need to try some of the strategies and report back. What do you think of this site?
I'll be bringing more later and the address with the archived sessions.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
DEN Streamathon Tomorrow
The Discovery Educator Network (DEN) will be hosting the 4th annual DEN Streamathon tomorrow, a 12 hour day of Discovery and DE Streaming goodies! And again, it's FREE! 
Most of the sessions from the day will be re-broadcast tomorrow evening after school hours for those of you who can't catch it during the day. Sessions will also be archived and available soon after.
Here are the sessions I think will ones not to miss:
A Day in the Life of DE Streaming at 5pm
Back to School Changes in DE Streaming at 6pm
and The Discovery Educator Network 2009-2010 at 8 pm
Click here if you still need to register.
There will also be one hour sessions per subject area (Math, Literacy, Science, and Social Studies) on how you can use DE Streaming. I'll check back in tomorrow night after the DEN session on how everything went and the archive location.
Most of the sessions from the day will be re-broadcast tomorrow evening after school hours for those of you who can't catch it during the day. Sessions will also be archived and available soon after.
Here are the sessions I think will ones not to miss:
A Day in the Life of DE Streaming at 5pm
Back to School Changes in DE Streaming at 6pm
and The Discovery Educator Network 2009-2010 at 8 pm
Click here if you still need to register.
There will also be one hour sessions per subject area (Math, Literacy, Science, and Social Studies) on how you can use DE Streaming. I'll check back in tomorrow night after the DEN session on how everything went and the archive location.
Monday, June 15, 2009
Great summer sessions with the DEN!
Get ready for a new school year with the DEN! The entire month of August is jam-packed with free webinars, on Digital Storytellling, Leadership, Science, and Web 2.0. Each week in the month of August, the Discovery Educator Network will be having online webinar classes on the above topics and getting teachers ready to start the new school year back in style and with some new tricks! Sessions will be 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. You can enroll today at: http://community.discoveryeducation.com/webinar. I am definitely checking out the sessions on "Discovery Education Media and imovie" during the first week and the "Virtual Field Trips with DE Media and Google Earth" during the last week. How exciting do these sound?
Here's a rundown of the schedule:
August 3, 2009 Digital Storytelling Week: Thinking Outside the Slide
August 4, 2009 Digital Storytelling Week: Digital Storytelling Made Easy with Discovery Education Content, Animoto and PhotoStory
August 5, 2009 Digital Storytelling Week: Director's Cut - Discovery Education Media and MovieMaker
August 6, 2009 Digital Storytelling Week: Discovery Education Media and iMovie
August 10, 2009 Leadership Week: The Information Society is HERE: Are our schools up to the task?
August 11, 2009 Leadership Week: Policies, Safety and Social Networking
August 12, 2009 Leadership Week: Web 2.0 for Administrators and Others: Schools, Tools, and the 21st Century
August 13, 2009 Leadership Week: Data Driven Decisions with Discovery Education Assessment
August 17, 2009 Science Week: Myth Busted - Easy Ways to Integrate Digital Media into Your Science Classroom
August 18, 2009 Science Week: Getting Your Hands Dirty with Discovery Education Science
August 19, 2009 Science Week: Differentiating Instruction with the Discovery Education Science Assessment Manager
August 20, 2009 Science Week: More and Muir Tech Tips for Going Green
August 24, 2009 Web 2.0 Week: Get Your Glog On! The DE streaming Builders and Glogster
August 25, 2009 Web 2.0 Week: The Thread that Ties it All Together: Discovery Education Content and Voicethread
August 26, 2009 Web 2.0 Week: Virtual Field Trips with Discovery Education Media and Google Earth
August 27, 2009 Web 2.0 Week: Learning Through the Funnies: Mixing Discovery Education Content with Free Comic Tools
Which ones are you most interested in? Comment away in the comment section!
Here's a rundown of the schedule:
August 3, 2009 Digital Storytelling Week: Thinking Outside the Slide
August 4, 2009 Digital Storytelling Week: Digital Storytelling Made Easy with Discovery Education Content, Animoto and PhotoStory
August 5, 2009 Digital Storytelling Week: Director's Cut - Discovery Education Media and MovieMaker
August 6, 2009 Digital Storytelling Week: Discovery Education Media and iMovie
August 10, 2009 Leadership Week: The Information Society is HERE: Are our schools up to the task?
August 11, 2009 Leadership Week: Policies, Safety and Social Networking
August 12, 2009 Leadership Week: Web 2.0 for Administrators and Others: Schools, Tools, and the 21st Century
August 13, 2009 Leadership Week: Data Driven Decisions with Discovery Education Assessment
August 17, 2009 Science Week: Myth Busted - Easy Ways to Integrate Digital Media into Your Science Classroom
August 18, 2009 Science Week: Getting Your Hands Dirty with Discovery Education Science
August 19, 2009 Science Week: Differentiating Instruction with the Discovery Education Science Assessment Manager
August 20, 2009 Science Week: More and Muir Tech Tips for Going Green
August 24, 2009 Web 2.0 Week: Get Your Glog On! The DE streaming Builders and Glogster
August 25, 2009 Web 2.0 Week: The Thread that Ties it All Together: Discovery Education Content and Voicethread
August 26, 2009 Web 2.0 Week: Virtual Field Trips with Discovery Education Media and Google Earth
August 27, 2009 Web 2.0 Week: Learning Through the Funnies: Mixing Discovery Education Content with Free Comic Tools
Which ones are you most interested in? Comment away in the comment section!
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Woohoo!
I am very big on Discovery Education and the Discovery Educator Network (DEN). I became a Star DEN member back in 2005 quite by accident. I was a new teacher and looking for anything and everything to help me along the way.
A fellow veteran teacher suggested that I check out a unitedstreaming training taking place at one of the elementary schools. There I met other teachers finding out what this "unitedstreaming" thing was all about and two representatives of the DEN. At the end of the training, they told us about the DEN and what it was. Being an eager first year teacher, I signed up - I thought it would look great on my resume!
I went to my first DEN summer institute that summer at Valley Forge, PA and met people like Lance Rougeux, now the Director of the DEN; Jenn Dorman, another teacher and now an account manager with the DEN, and Heather Blanton, a great TRT down in southwest VA. I learned the most about podcasting and making movies with Windows Movie Maker and got to hear Will Richardson speak live to us about blogging. These were things I had never done before! It was an adventorous four days for me. It was also my first trip driving on I-495 by myself! And then some pretty nasty storms had gone through the Philly area before I arrived and half the roads I needed to take to the site were flooded and closed down. It was literally a miracle I found it, because I can tell you, I really did not know where I was going!
There have been other opportunities such as this one that have made me a true believer in the DEN. I've gotten a wealth of information from the online and FREE webinars, the Days of Discovery (like the one hosted by CRSTE I went to about two weeks ago), and the pre-conference events before the major technology conferences.
But I had no idea the hold this organization would have over me. It is such a great community of teachers! Everytime I go to an event I learn something or make a great contact, like the wonderful ladies from South Dakota I met at a DEN lunch when I went to FETC. So when I heard that the leadership councils were looking for new members I applied thinking I could give back some of what I've gotten. There are 22 leardership councils in the DEN and Virginia is one of the lucky states to have one.
And guess what I got yesterday? The official email telling me I was selected to be on the VA leadership council and then several other emails from current members congratulating me! I very much hope I can represent the DEN and the great state of Virginia as I take on this new role. I can't wait to bring some great professional development and learning to more teachers and get some new Virginia DEN members along the way!
A fellow veteran teacher suggested that I check out a unitedstreaming training taking place at one of the elementary schools. There I met other teachers finding out what this "unitedstreaming" thing was all about and two representatives of the DEN. At the end of the training, they told us about the DEN and what it was. Being an eager first year teacher, I signed up - I thought it would look great on my resume!
I went to my first DEN summer institute that summer at Valley Forge, PA and met people like Lance Rougeux, now the Director of the DEN; Jenn Dorman, another teacher and now an account manager with the DEN, and Heather Blanton, a great TRT down in southwest VA. I learned the most about podcasting and making movies with Windows Movie Maker and got to hear Will Richardson speak live to us about blogging. These were things I had never done before! It was an adventorous four days for me. It was also my first trip driving on I-495 by myself! And then some pretty nasty storms had gone through the Philly area before I arrived and half the roads I needed to take to the site were flooded and closed down. It was literally a miracle I found it, because I can tell you, I really did not know where I was going!
There have been other opportunities such as this one that have made me a true believer in the DEN. I've gotten a wealth of information from the online and FREE webinars, the Days of Discovery (like the one hosted by CRSTE I went to about two weeks ago), and the pre-conference events before the major technology conferences.
But I had no idea the hold this organization would have over me. It is such a great community of teachers! Everytime I go to an event I learn something or make a great contact, like the wonderful ladies from South Dakota I met at a DEN lunch when I went to FETC. So when I heard that the leadership councils were looking for new members I applied thinking I could give back some of what I've gotten. There are 22 leardership councils in the DEN and Virginia is one of the lucky states to have one.
And guess what I got yesterday? The official email telling me I was selected to be on the VA leadership council and then several other emails from current members congratulating me! I very much hope I can represent the DEN and the great state of Virginia as I take on this new role. I can't wait to bring some great professional development and learning to more teachers and get some new Virginia DEN members along the way!
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
CRSTE Day of Discovery
I spent my Saturday this past weekend in Arlington, VA at the CRSTE Day of Discovery. The Captial Region Society for Technology Educators (CRSTE) is a newly formed educational technology group and they partnered with Discovery Education to create this day. I apologize in advance as this is a long post describing my day.
It started at 8:30 with a keynote address from Matt Monjan, from Discovery. One of my colleagues who I attended grad school with commented, that she felt like she was back in class again hearing about the concepts of digital natives and constructivism. I think that describes a real attribute of this organization, is that they are current and know what students and teachers need to grow in their use of technology. Matt did a great job and I was ready to start off my day with Jen Dorman's session on "Roundtrip Tickets to Anywhere! Google Earth and DE Streaming". Jen's presentation is available on her DEN blog at http://denblogs.com/jendorman here.
I've done a little dabbling in Google Earth (GE), but really need to use this tool next school year. Jen had some great ideas and advice: First, the Google Earth pro version is free to educators by sending an email to GEEC@google.com. You'll receive an email with a download after a couple of weeks. Next, she told us about the "my maps" feature in Google Maps, which can be a good substitute while you're waiting for that GE Pro version to arrive, or if GE is not allowed your computers, which luckily is not the case in our district. The "my maps" feature allows you to add hyperlinks and more to your maps and is great for collaborating or for group work. The teacher can create the map and then "invite" students to join and each students can add to the map. Looking at this on my own, I also found some groups that had created their own and shared. There is one for teachers who use technology and you can placemark where you are in the world. There are other topics including real estate, islands, and points of interest. I would have to look at this some more though to create my own map.
For GE, Jen explained an example she did with a history class, where each group was given one major battle from World War II and they had to add events and placemarks as the battle occurred. Her greatest piece of advice, was making sure the first step each group was to create a folder for their project and to make sure all placemarks, videos, etc. were placed in this folder. This sounds like a great way to learn about events in history!
Another idea Jen had was to use the ruler tool for studying math. I had no idea there was a ruler tool in GE. She said Washington, DC is great place in GE to use this for. For example, students can find the circumference between certain parks or buildings, measure the distance from the Capital building to the Lincoln Memorial, etc. She added that Africa is another great place to use this tool.
After the GE session, I attended "Getting Interactive with Glogs and DE Builders" with Mike Hakkarinen from Frederick County Schools in Maryland. Mark did a great job and has some fantastic products from his classes. Mark just created a new blog for the builders at http://discoverybuilders.blogspot.com. Everything from his presentation is this site, as well. If you don't know much about the DE builders, they are the assignment, quiz, and writing prompt builders in DE streaming's teacher center. Each builder helps teachers with creating online assignment, quizzes, and writing prompts. Some inventive teachers have begun using web 2.0 tools with the builders, which is what Mark talked about in his session and the results are pretty amazing!
The first tip Mark gave was to put a link to the student center on the desktop computers students use, for our district, our CTT could add an icon to our Novell windows and it would take the students directly to the page, where they could sign in to use the online tools the teacher has created. The first builder Mark used was the writing prompt builder. He's a science teacher and recently his students were learning about the relationships between grass, crickets, and anoles. So he took a picture of a cricket from DE streaming and embedded it into the prompt builder and added a writing prompt for the students to type up. When they're finished, students submit their writings and it's automatically sent via email to Mark.
For the Quiz builder, Mark embedded a video from DE streaming. After students watched the video, they could then take a quiz on what they watched. The best part is that students can read the questions first, then watch the video; they can watch and then take the quiz; or they can watch, take the quiz, and refer back to the video when needed. Another great feature is that when you are setting up the quiz you can decide on how the students view it, such as multiple questions at a time or one question at a time.
In the assignment builder, Mark talked about using a web 2.0 tool called Blabberize, which is similar to a voki. If you've never heard of either, they are two tools that allow you to record messages and then post onto a website, blog, wiki, or just about anywhere! With voki, you actually create a character that talks and with Blabberize, you can make images talk, such as a lion. If your students are studying about Africa in Geography class or biomes in Science class, a talking lion could come in handy! Mark uses this as a way to describe to his students what they need to do in their assignment. He simply embeds the html code from Blabberize and pastes it in the learning objective box and he's all set! He also suggested trying Dabbleboard, an online interactive whiteboard, Voicethread and Glogster.
The last session I attended was on Professional Development in Second Life with Fred Delventhal, from Arlington Public Schools. I've heard lots of talk about how educators, especially DEN Stars are using Second Life, but I haven't really tipped my toes into this yet. So I was interested to hear what this is about. Fred talked about how Discovery has set up PD sessions here and the different tech society's that are located in Second Life as well, such as ISTE and VSTE. It was a good overall tour of what's in Second Life, however I would have liked to have seen how you get started, create an avatar, and get them to move (I hear this is not easy at first).
Overall, it was great day, with a few surpises. I got to see old and current colleagues that I didn't know were going to be there and chat with some teachers from other districts, as well as learn some great ideas!
It started at 8:30 with a keynote address from Matt Monjan, from Discovery. One of my colleagues who I attended grad school with commented, that she felt like she was back in class again hearing about the concepts of digital natives and constructivism. I think that describes a real attribute of this organization, is that they are current and know what students and teachers need to grow in their use of technology. Matt did a great job and I was ready to start off my day with Jen Dorman's session on "Roundtrip Tickets to Anywhere! Google Earth and DE Streaming". Jen's presentation is available on her DEN blog at http://denblogs.com/jendorman here.
I've done a little dabbling in Google Earth (GE), but really need to use this tool next school year. Jen had some great ideas and advice: First, the Google Earth pro version is free to educators by sending an email to GEEC@google.com. You'll receive an email with a download after a couple of weeks. Next, she told us about the "my maps" feature in Google Maps, which can be a good substitute while you're waiting for that GE Pro version to arrive, or if GE is not allowed your computers, which luckily is not the case in our district. The "my maps" feature allows you to add hyperlinks and more to your maps and is great for collaborating or for group work. The teacher can create the map and then "invite" students to join and each students can add to the map. Looking at this on my own, I also found some groups that had created their own and shared. There is one for teachers who use technology and you can placemark where you are in the world. There are other topics including real estate, islands, and points of interest. I would have to look at this some more though to create my own map.
For GE, Jen explained an example she did with a history class, where each group was given one major battle from World War II and they had to add events and placemarks as the battle occurred. Her greatest piece of advice, was making sure the first step each group was to create a folder for their project and to make sure all placemarks, videos, etc. were placed in this folder. This sounds like a great way to learn about events in history!
Another idea Jen had was to use the ruler tool for studying math. I had no idea there was a ruler tool in GE. She said Washington, DC is great place in GE to use this for. For example, students can find the circumference between certain parks or buildings, measure the distance from the Capital building to the Lincoln Memorial, etc. She added that Africa is another great place to use this tool.
After the GE session, I attended "Getting Interactive with Glogs and DE Builders" with Mike Hakkarinen from Frederick County Schools in Maryland. Mark did a great job and has some fantastic products from his classes. Mark just created a new blog for the builders at http://discoverybuilders.blogspot.com. Everything from his presentation is this site, as well. If you don't know much about the DE builders, they are the assignment, quiz, and writing prompt builders in DE streaming's teacher center. Each builder helps teachers with creating online assignment, quizzes, and writing prompts. Some inventive teachers have begun using web 2.0 tools with the builders, which is what Mark talked about in his session and the results are pretty amazing!
The first tip Mark gave was to put a link to the student center on the desktop computers students use, for our district, our CTT could add an icon to our Novell windows and it would take the students directly to the page, where they could sign in to use the online tools the teacher has created. The first builder Mark used was the writing prompt builder. He's a science teacher and recently his students were learning about the relationships between grass, crickets, and anoles. So he took a picture of a cricket from DE streaming and embedded it into the prompt builder and added a writing prompt for the students to type up. When they're finished, students submit their writings and it's automatically sent via email to Mark.
For the Quiz builder, Mark embedded a video from DE streaming. After students watched the video, they could then take a quiz on what they watched. The best part is that students can read the questions first, then watch the video; they can watch and then take the quiz; or they can watch, take the quiz, and refer back to the video when needed. Another great feature is that when you are setting up the quiz you can decide on how the students view it, such as multiple questions at a time or one question at a time.
In the assignment builder, Mark talked about using a web 2.0 tool called Blabberize, which is similar to a voki. If you've never heard of either, they are two tools that allow you to record messages and then post onto a website, blog, wiki, or just about anywhere! With voki, you actually create a character that talks and with Blabberize, you can make images talk, such as a lion. If your students are studying about Africa in Geography class or biomes in Science class, a talking lion could come in handy! Mark uses this as a way to describe to his students what they need to do in their assignment. He simply embeds the html code from Blabberize and pastes it in the learning objective box and he's all set! He also suggested trying Dabbleboard, an online interactive whiteboard, Voicethread and Glogster.
The last session I attended was on Professional Development in Second Life with Fred Delventhal, from Arlington Public Schools. I've heard lots of talk about how educators, especially DEN Stars are using Second Life, but I haven't really tipped my toes into this yet. So I was interested to hear what this is about. Fred talked about how Discovery has set up PD sessions here and the different tech society's that are located in Second Life as well, such as ISTE and VSTE. It was a good overall tour of what's in Second Life, however I would have liked to have seen how you get started, create an avatar, and get them to move (I hear this is not easy at first).
Overall, it was great day, with a few surpises. I got to see old and current colleagues that I didn't know were going to be there and chat with some teachers from other districts, as well as learn some great ideas!
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Win a Wireless Lab
CDWG and Discovery Education have announced the seventh annual “Win a Wireless Lab” sweepstakes. The program gives K-12 schools the opportunity to win a 21st-century classroom, complete with tablet or notebook computers, wireless cart, interactive whiteboard, student response system, projector, printer and document camera. The 2009 program will award five grand-prize winners. The best part? You can enter once a day until May 1, 2009! Go to http://cdwg.discoveryeducation.com/1208 to enter.
Even if our school isn't selected for one of the grand prizes we could still win a video projector from Epson or NEC Solutions, a notebook computer from Acer or Sony, or a digital camcorder from Canon. Random drawings will take place on Feb. 5th, Mar. 4th, Apr. 4th, and May 6th. You must have entered to win at least once in the preceding month to be chosen from this random selection.
So let's get out there and start entering!
Even if our school isn't selected for one of the grand prizes we could still win a video projector from Epson or NEC Solutions, a notebook computer from Acer or Sony, or a digital camcorder from Canon. Random drawings will take place on Feb. 5th, Mar. 4th, Apr. 4th, and May 6th. You must have entered to win at least once in the preceding month to be chosen from this random selection.
So let's get out there and start entering!
Friday, February 29, 2008
Watch This!
I found this great video from youtube on Steve Dembo's Digital Passport Blog for Discovery Education. Now, I wouldn't typically go wandering on youtube, but this time I did and after I watched this video, I watched some others. I think it may be time to change some assumptions again...
Watch this: Information/Revolution
Watch this: Information/Revolution
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