After the students are gone and the teachers have started on their summer breaks, I'll still be working and getting things settled from this past school year and getting myself prepared for next year. But I'm offering two PDS sessions for teachers at my school during my last two weeks of June. Both sessions can be found in MLP.
The first session will be a one-on-one technology training event, entitled "Implementing New Technology Tools". Pick the day and time you like to come in between June 18-25 and meet with me to discuss any piece of technology or software in the building you would like to learn more about. I'll give you the run down on how they work and discuss ideas. Hopefully, we can also put a lesson plan or two together. I had a teacher ask me yesterday, "Can we talk about more than 1 piece of technology?" Absolutely! Whatever time you have, we'll make it happen.
The second PDS session is called "Using the Smart Airliner". This will actually be about the Smartboard, airliner, and smart notebook software and will be more formal than the first session I'm offering. It will be on June 25 from 8:30-12:00. We'll learn all about all three tools and how they're similar and different and how to feel more comfortable using them. They'll be opportunities for practice time as well!
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Wiki, Wiki...This Summer!
I am going to be participating in a summer PDS series on wikis provided by PBWorks.com, formally PBWiki, called "PBWorks Summer Camp"! I think I found this on Twitter last week and I took a look and immediately signed up. It's a FREE (we all know how I like free learning tools!), completely online summer PDS on how to use wikis in the classroom. It runs from June 22 - July 21 and every week I will have assignments to complete, webinars to participate in, and homework! 
I have two reasons for doing participating in this: 1) While, I have learned about wikis before, I haven't really used them with a group of students and 2) There was some discussion earlier this year about the geography classes at my school wanting to use wikis, however, we all decided we weren't quite ready for that step. So I want to prepared to use them next year. Hopefully, through some of the assignments I have to do, I can start creating some ideas and lessons to get us ready for this!
The only hard part will be trying to complete assignments while I'm at NECC! If sounds like something you would be interested in, there's still time to register!
I have two reasons for doing participating in this: 1) While, I have learned about wikis before, I haven't really used them with a group of students and 2) There was some discussion earlier this year about the geography classes at my school wanting to use wikis, however, we all decided we weren't quite ready for that step. So I want to prepared to use them next year. Hopefully, through some of the assignments I have to do, I can start creating some ideas and lessons to get us ready for this!
The only hard part will be trying to complete assignments while I'm at NECC! If sounds like something you would be interested in, there's still time to register!
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!
Friday, June 5, 2009
Interesting Websites 06/06/2009
ReadWriteThink: Student Materials: Construct-a-Word
Construct a Word.
verbs-online.com: Online Verb Conjugation Trainer - Learn Spanish, Portuguese, German, Italian, French, English
Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Interesting Websites 06/04/2009
earth album alpha - a slicker google maps + flickr mash-up
a google maps + flickr mashup that allows you to explore the world
A free Resource for Teachers who use Google Earth. Providing everything from lesson ideas to complete lesson plans for both single computer classrooms to full computer labs.
Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Interesting Websites 06/03/2009
ESL Conversation Questions - What if...? (I-TESL-J)
A list of questions you can use to generate conversations in the ESL/EFL classroom.
Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
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!
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