Maria's award ceremony

weekly tech update 12/10/07

Update on Netday Speakup – 75 students, 12 teachers, 4 parents, 1 school leaders
I sent home a reminder in the Bridge. Hopefully we will get more parents.

Hints:

• If you are in grades k-2 there is a group survey. Print out the survey from the website and fill in the numbers over a couple of days.
• If you kids get part way through and run out of time, submitting what they have is better than quitting.

Out of the Building - I will be in all week except for Tuesday afternoon.

Tech work (These are big projects in addition to daily issues and the infamous list.)

• I am still working on a survey about Instructional time at the request of CRB.
• We got another generous computer donation from the FAA. If you would like an additional computer in your room. let us know.
• Garde is continuing his work on getting the wireless access set up and the last of N-Computers installed.
• Working out the bugs for installation of Pixie and MicroWorldsJr. in the primary.
• Curriculum work on Friday's early release. We wil be working on rubrics for portfolios
  

weekly tech update 12/3/07

Your GLL should have mentioned to you by now that we are once again participating in the NETDAY Speak up. The deadline for this survey has be extended until December 21st. Last year a couple of classrooms participated and the results were very helpful to our planning. this year we will be revising our technology plan and I would really like to see additional classes participate.

This is the link for taking the survey http://www.netdayspeakup.org/ the secret word is dcstech

There are surveys available for Teachers, Parents and

Grades K - 2: Group Survey
Grades K - 2: Individual Survey
Grades 3 - 5
Grades 6 - 12

If you would find it helpful there are Speak Up Lesson Plans
to encourage students to reflect on their use of technology both in and out of school , and how they learn math, science, and 21st century skills.

• Lesson Plan for Grades K-2
• Lesson Plan for Grades 3-5
• Lesson Plan for Grades 6-12

• Out of the Building - I will be out of the building Monday morning to attend an MMS update session
• Work flow - When you need help email with copies to both Garde and I. We both do repair and support, but I manage the work flow.
• Tech work (These are big projects in addition to daily issues and the infamous list.)

- This week I will be working on a survey about Instructional time at the request of CRB. I will be also working with Kandy to use survey monkey to streamline supply ordering.

- Garde is continuing his work on getting the wireless access set up and the last of N-Computers installed. N-computer allows a host computer to run 3 additional Screens and keyboards as additional work stations.

http://www.ncomputing.com/ncomputing/solutions/school.php

Using n-computing is allowing us to provide computers for staff and more clusters in classrooms. We have a list of where computers have been requested. If you would like an additional computer in your room. let us know.

- Working out the bugs for installation of Pixie and MicroWorldsJr. in the primary.

weekly tech update 11/26/07

Out of the Building - I just wanted to let you all know that I will be out of the building at the McAuliffe Conference Tuesday -Thursday. Garde will be out of the building on Friday to take Andrew back to RTI

• I will be presenting Mp3 players in the World Language classroom and Using Inexpensive Digital Video Cameras (like $100) in the classroom. Ginna and I will be presenting DCS Portfolio work and Maria will be doing a couple of sessions on using iPods in the classroom. She will also be working on blogging from the Bloggers corner at the conference.
• Speaking of podcasting, check out these dcs blogs. After the first of the year we will be doing some after school sessions on how to set up your own class blog.
  http://classblogmeister.com/blog.php?blogger_id=51141 - Maria's class blog
  http://dcsprimary.edublogs.org/ - Primary sharing space
  http://dcsshare.blogspot.com/ - renewed dcs tech sharing space
  http://worldhug2007.blogspot.com/ - Sharing the art work of children from around the world. The common theme of the work is Hearts.
• Tech work (These are big projects in addition to daily issues and the infamous list.)
  - current priority getting the printers back up
  - This weekend Garde and Andrew completed the wiring necessary for setting up seven wireless access points through out the building and modulars (Yes each access point needs to be hard wired in.) The next step is to get the devices installed and set up.
  - Working out the bugs for installation of Pixie and MicroWorldsJr. in the primary

Portfolio Matrix

2007 McAuliffe Conference Blogger's Corner

Mp3's in the World Language Classroom

Link to another DCS presentation at the 2007 McAuliffe Conference.

Rubrics, Rubrics, Rubrics

During our second summer we grappled with the developing rubrics.

sample rubric

We tentatively decided on a scale of 1-10 with different rubrics for Primary, Intermediate and Middle School

Spreadsheet rubric

digital communication

digital research

We decided that in addition to technology rubrics we needed a student centered scale and a content scale.

These are all works in progress we are working out the wrinkles with:

• Developmental skills over time
• Special need population
• Student migration
• Setting the standard for achievement - proficient? adequate? lack of?
• What do students walk away with?
  
• Student reflection
  
• How does this fit with current paper portfolio?

Mission impossible for a Sub

Here is a quick cut video for a sub to play to introduce and assignment. I recorded the music from the web and used Audacity to playback the sound file. I just put the two sound files and the video file together

Our Resources

DCS Tech Integration Guide - this is a developmental guide created in 2000 based on the then current Nets for Students guide.

New NETS for Students Standards - this is the recently revised NETS for Student s from ISTE.

Understanding by Design - this is an online summary of Understanding bu Design

Other approaches to meeting the standards

Other schools and districts have chosen a scope and sequence approach or a grade level designed project.

SAU53 triad - scope and sequence
Concord School District - grade level designed project

This is the introduction to our online work together presented at the 2007 McAuliffe Conference. View other resources.

Welcome to Rubric Sharing

After doing a bit of research I chose Google Docs because we could follow each others work and get inspiration. I also want to walk the talk and explore new digital collaboration together. If is cumbersome to work with you can do your work in word or excel and upload it to google docs for review.

I have also included a copy of the new NETS Student standards released in Atlanta. We will work to incorporate these into our work. Make comments in a different color on them with your thoughts.

Maria- I think it best that in addition to the color, we state our name. If you underline your name, it will be noticed easier - perhaps.

I am going to summarize the work that we planned for this summer. If this does not jive with your notes or thoughts add you 2cents. We had talked about completing a draft by the end of July but I have slowed down the process. Remember our meeting to share and go over these is Thursday, August 23rd

Rubrics to do:

• Data Handling - Pat and Deb
• Multimedia - Ardy and John
• Desktop publishing - Kathy and Lena
• Digital Communication - Maria and Deb? Sue?Maria I think that this will be my color.
• Internet Research - (This could include ethical use) - Kathy, Lena, Virginia, Deb
• Technology Fluency (This is the working title for the new row. this could include technological foundations) - Deb and Pat?
• This may leave Acceptable Use Policy to Cover but we are putting this on the back burner for now.

We had said that we would have something for others to respond to by the end of July. We are off to a bit of a late start, mainly because I have not gotten to this yet. We will do the best we can from here out. I know Virginia is going to the Bahamas very soon and Maria, Sue, Ardy and I will be at November Learning next week.

Format:

We agreed to use a 1-10 scale on a spreadsheet. I am thinking that it may be helpful to create the intermediate rubric first and then compress and expand the two ends as appropriate. This is just a sample use if it is helpful.

To Use It: Open it. Go to File make copy. Go to file Rename to make the name of your group. Click the share tab in the upper left corner and share it with the group. Make any additions of changes that you want. It will track you changes under revision.

See sample rubric form
Research
Communication
Data Handling
Content
Ownership

Foray into sound editing

I promised my tech aid class that in addition to learning how to take apart mice and keyboards, clean them and put them back into working order. We would do some work with mp3 editing and recording. The time has come for me to get better at Audacity. I looked around the web for tutorials to help the kids and me both. There were lots. Some were too technical, some were not particularly school appropriate. Finally, once again the Aussies came to the rescue (You may remember the Max's Sandbox originally was developed down under, with support from the South Australia Training and Employment Department.)

I discovered the Technology School of the Future (TSoF), a staff training and development centre within the South Australian Department of Education and Children's Services. Inside I found the perfect Audacity tutorial for my needs. I am going to try it out with the kids this week and will let you know how it goes.

PS In the quest I found an early tech literacy site with Early ICT skill tracking which might be helpful in our portfolio work.

Universal Design

Many years ago (1997) a special educator friend, Annie Miler, gave me a copy of an article from The Council for Exceptional Children, Creating Readable Handouts, Worksheets, Overheads, Tests, Review Materials, Study Guides, and Homework Assignments Through Effective Typographical Design. I have hung on to it ever since and have gone online periodically to look for it without success.

Today I ran across it again and tried online once more. Hurray! There is a new, similar article Using Universal Design to Unlock the Potential for Academic Achievement at At-Risk Learners. I think the points covered, especially on layout and design would be a help for all teachers, I guess that is why they call it Universal Design [also posted on Learning Circles]

Rubrics

The DCS Tech Committee is having a discussion on portfolios and rubrics. I shared the following rubric maker. If you haven't seen it already you may want to check it out.

http://rubistar.4teachers.org/index.php This is my favorite rubric maker.
1. They have a number that are already created.
2. You can modify all of them.
3. You can start from scratch if you like.
4. You can save them and go back and change them later.
5. You can enter your results and look at class distribution.
6. You can export it to Excel if you want to adjust the format.

Cool huh?

There is also a link on this page to Equity Index: http://equity.4teachers.org. This is an index of all special ed related materials on their site.

Blog class

What is a Blog?

Blog Defined:

A weblog or blog is a web-based publication of periodic articles (posts), usually presented in reverse chronological order. It is an online journal with one or many contributors.

Blog Content:

Besides straight text and hyperlinks, some blogs specialize in incorporating other forms of media such as images (see web comics, photoblog), video (see videoblogging), or a particular theme.

Difference from Forums or Newsgroups:

Blogs differ from forums or newsgroups in that only one person or group can create new subjects for discussion on their blog.
[Blog, Wikipedia, online avalable at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog#Blog_Defined, 11/6/05]

How do I find blogs that are interesting for me?

Blogs often refer you to other blogs you can also Google them Some examples: Bob Sprankle, NHSTE Book Blog, DCS Tech Share, Learn 2 Blog, Social Studies

How do I keep involved with blogs?

·Bloglines or other RSS feeds
·RSS Google search

How do I use blogs with students?

There are many freely available tools that facilitate blogging, but none seem especially suited for the classroom. That is the reason for BlogMeister. This online blogging tool is explicitly designed with teachers and students in mind, where the teacher can evaluate, comment on, and finally publish students' blog articles in a controlled environment. If you are a DCS staff member and would like to set it up for students, email me for the setup code.

Other resources