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

Digital Portfolio discussion

Here are some sites and examples I have found

Digital Portfolio Overview

HOW TO Create Your Own Electronic Portfolio, based on the "5-by-5 Model" of Electronic Portfolio Development, ©2000, Helen C. Barrett, Ph.D.

Digital Portfolios Reference Links

Sample Digital Portfolios

Technology Committee plans for the New State Standards

On July 7, 2005 the State Board of Education approved new Minimum Standards for in Public Schools. Part of this lengthy document was a revision of the technology component to reflect up to date Information and COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES (ICT) Literacy standards and says:

The ideal ICT Literacy Program in grades K-8 weaves technology experiences into all content areas and all grade levels, so that a student can demonstrate ICT competency at the end of 8th grade. ... Digital portfolios at the K-8 and 9-12 levels are ideal demonstrations of competence, as they can show how students competently use technology tools and resources within the context of core content areas.

This year the assignment of the DCS Technology committee is to plan the implementation of these standards. The technology committee, DB, MK, JF, AS and KW, will post regular updates on this blog so that everyone has access and can contribute to the development and implementation of the plan. This will be a strong addition to the current DCS Technology Integration Guide. With digital portfolios in place, we will be able to discontinue the 7th grade technology class and be confident of what are students have been prepared to do at each grade.

Survey Monkey

Okay here is a baby step that I am proud of. This summer I got and email from my friend, Sonja, about upcoming tech classes from Fremont. She used Survey Monkey to create it. Survey Monkey had been on my list of sites to check out, but I never took a look at it.

I was impressed with a class sign up application. I did lots of classes 2 or 3 years ago and got burned out because people didn't sign up and didn't show or didn't sign up, then showed and wanted to know why it was canceled. I never seemed to get around to planning them out, putting it in the memo, making signs etc.

I finally got around to setting up survey monkey. I have gotten 35 responses in 6 days. This is awesome. I have never gotten this kind of response before.

Survey Monnkey is free. As a free account you are limited to surveys of 10 or less questions with 100 or less repsonses. This works well for our staff. I have been talking to GiGi and am thinking about getting the next level of account. It costs $200 per year. It allows you to do longer survey, receive up to 1000 responses per month and export your results to Excel. In addition to classes, we could survey the staff, parents and our students. On the other hand free is free and I got a lot of results for less than 10 questions.

Did you notice I am not there?

Today I am at two David Warlick workshops Integrating Contemporary Literacy into the Classroom (with Virginia) and Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts: Students Journalists & Information Masters(with John).

One of the really cool websites that he shared was http://del.icio.us . This is a free site that allows you to save bookmarks and access them from anywhere over the web. Take a look at David's del.icio.us site. In our discussion he suggested that we might set up a shared delicious account to organize educational websites. By using tags the websites can be organized for easier access.

I am thinking I will set one up and and create a link to it from this site.

For Your Listening Pleasure

I have been enjoying a podcast/webcast that I thought you all should know about. It is found at edtechtalk.com. It is a bi-weekly webcast - they do it live and you can listen online. I haven't managed to do that yet. I'm having trouble with GMT time and have missed the live broadcast. But luckily, they save the files as podcasts and I download them to my iPod and listen to them when I'm driving to work.

I don't understand everything they are talking about but I find the conversations enjoyable and thought provoking. The 3 main people involved are from different parts of North America - NH, Michigan and PEI, and sometimes there are people from Europe and Asia. Check it out. I'll put a link to the webpage on this blog.

Professional Development Tech/ 21st Century skills

David Warlick will be in NH September 26-29 as a dinner speaker at the NHSTE annual meeting on Wednesday and presenting 6 different sessions around the state. This is an opportunity not to be missed.

Integrating Contemporary Literacy into the Classroom Keene, 9/26 8:30-11:30am, Penacook, 9/27 8:30-11:30am, Manchester, 9/28 8:30-11:30 am

Harnessing Emerging Technologies for the Classroom Keene, 9/26 1-4pm, Manchester, 9/28 1-4pm

Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts: Students Journalists & Information Masters Penacook, 9/27 1-4pm

Right & Wrong on Info Highway: For Love of the Truth, Exeter 9/29 8:30-1130 am

The Three T's of Teaching in the 21st Century 9/29 1-4 pm For more information or to register for sessions

Telling the New Story David Warlick will be the guest speaker at the NHSTE Annual Dinner 9/28 4:00-8:15 pm St. Paul’s Concord For more information or to register for the annual dinner

How Important Is Technology In Our Classes?
(Paul's update in the summer Communicator)
If you asked our technology coordinator she’d say it’s critical. Some teachers who feel comfortable with technology would say it’s important. Others who struggle with keeping up with the latest developments would say it is not needed. There are very efficient ways to deliver instruction without it. I was somewhere in the middle. At least until I attended a recent conference!

In June, a group of DCS faculty members attended the National Educational Computing Conference in Philadelphia. Listed as a national conference it was attended by thousands of individuals, many from other countries and all of them had the same goal – to find out how to make education more effective by integrating technology. It’s easy to list ways where students use computers, an important tool of their generation, but one keynote speaker really left his mark with me on why we need to get up to speed on using technology for our students.

Think back to when your ancestors came to the US. They probably did not understand the native language. The customs and traditions they brought from their homes were different from those in the US. They were immigrants and it was important for them to assimilate themselves to the ways of the country that was their new home. Now think of yourself as an adult in the year 2005. How many features do you use on your cell phone (or do you even have one)? Do you use a palm pilot, synch it in your office, and beam data to another co-worler? Do you IM instead of phoning, or sending a note through the mail?

These are not hi-tech tools anymore. If these ideas are uncomfortable to you, then you are probably a “digital immigrant”. Like your ancestors, you are living in a land where most of the next generation uses many if not all of these tools, regularly and with comfort. This next generation has learned to use these tools often without our help – it makes their lives easier and often more efficient. They expect it to be available to them. These tools of technology are the tools of their generation and they expect that delivery of education will be carried out using their tools.

Are the basic areas of education still important? Absolutely! Proficient readers, writers and mathematicians are clearly what are most important. But how we teach this next generation these areas is where we need to think about keeping up with the tremendous amount of new information that is out there. My goal today was to have you think about whether or not you are an immigrant in this new world. Think about your children and grandchildren and the comfort level that they have with technology that you might not have. Think about how much has changed in such a short period of time. Think about where technology will be in 2, 5, or 10 years. For the first time in history, we don’t know what we are training our children for. That’s how fast our world is changing. The team that went to Philadelphia will investigate this more during the year as we analyze our practice to provide the best education possible to those who live in a different world that we adults do. We’ll keep you posted as we learn more about leaving our “immigrant” status behind.

Mimio workshop

We had a workshop last Thursday using new interactive whiteboard software,Mimio Studio, and hardware, Mimio Xi. Hopefully you will all see it being used in staff meetings, curriculum meetings or grade level meetings in the near future. If you have questions about what it is or how you might use it check with Paul, Gigi, Ardy, Edith, Kathy W, Danielle, Ellen, Karen L., Rod D, Maria, Bruce, John, or me. I will add more about what it does later.

Now is the time and a bit of a change in direction

I have been gathering my wits about me for new staff orientation and the upcoming staff meetings. I think we are all frustrated by how to most effectively get the word out about various topics. I, for instance, have printed different resource lists from time-to-time. I feel like they always are incomplete and often lost in the shuffle of someone else's desk, if not mine. Sooooo...I have been inspired by a colleague at Newfound Elementary. She uses a blog to discuss technology at their school. She shares websites, ideas and projects that others are working on. It would also be a good place to put reference materials. I thought we could give it a try, hence the name/description change. Let me know what you think about these changes.

Now is the time
On a related topic, it is now time to get back into your NECC projects. Please post ideas that you have. They do not have to be firm, polished or any thing else that would give you a reason to put it off. I just got the shipping notice on 6 small and 2 large mp3 players. I will be ordering microphones for them, hopefully this week.
More later -

Announcing A New Arrival @ the Knee's!

It's twins!

Bill and I are the proud caretakers of 2 brand new iPods. It's Geek City at our house and we are not getting anything done except playing with our new arrivals. Remember, this is the couple who celebrated their 25th weding anniversary @ NECC and bought iBooks for each other!

Look for more updates as time goes on! We are having lots of fun!

Update

Just wanted you all to know that I ordered 6 iRiver 790's (256m) and 2 799's (1g)on the recommendation of the Bob Sprankle website. Maria got me hooked I've listened to all of his pod casts. I would especially recommend number 7 and 8. I have not had a chance to listen to number 9, but it should be good also. I will order the rest of the bits and pieces so that we can try out podcasting this fall.

I am also hooked on Bloglines. This has helped immensely on monitoring this and other blogs. You can see when there are new posts for you to check out. I am currently checking out some of the blogs from NECC sources to decide which ones I will follow. I thought I would do a mini workshop in on all of this when we start back. Any requests for dates?

Any other project ideas?

I am hammering out the end of the technology plan. It is not my favorite activity in the world...but it is very exciting when I look at the projected growth. I will post the summary once I get there.

Podcasting- something else to try...

Hi everyone. I'm in the midst of making multiple receipes of yummy chocolate cake for the upcoming wedding but I've found something else to occupy my time when I'm not cooking. No - I'm not actually podcasting but I have subscribed to a couple podcasts by Bob Sprankle, a 3rd/4th grade teacher in Wells, Maine. He and I have been corresponding by email since the last week of school. His students have been podcasting and he has recently started 2 new podcasts - one for teachers and one for children about reading. The most recent podcast for teachers is a recording of a speech by Angus King, former gov. of Maine. He spoke at the McAuliffe conference 2 years ago. I particularly liked what he said near the end of his speech about Darwin and the Origin of the Species. He also mentioned Wayne Gretsky, former Canadian hockey star and Gretsky's explanation about why he was able to score so many goals. He said, " I skate to where the puck is going to be. Everyone else skates to where the puck is." Hmmm...something to think about for us.

So...ready to try a podcast. Here's what you should do. If you don't have iTunes, download it now. It's free!!! You don't need it to listen to podcast but it's set up so that you can subscribe to a variety of podcasts and listen to them whenever you want. Then you can subscribe to Bit by Bit and get updates whenever he adds a new session. Check out our links list for a link to Bob's podcast for teachers called Bit by Bit. From his site you can also get to the iTunes download page. Have fun.

The Vision...just a beginning....

Instead of feeling like we are expected to do new and different things when using technology and adding more stuff to our plate, I like to think of using technology for doing the same classroom tasks with new and updated tools. I think the next three years do not have to look brand new and inventive in terms of ideas but rather in the tools that we use to do whatever it is that we do in the classroom. Teachers are innovator and no matter what the tools, they have to invent and reinvent in order for the learning enviroment to work for all children. Technology gives us new tools and expands the ways we can implement our ideas.

Here is a simple example....For many years, I sent hundreds of dollars on film and developing so that I could have photographers of my students to display at open house, curriculum night or for them to write about. I also used photos to document projects and to record things about field trips. i still use photos in the classroom but it has been years since i have gone and had a roll of film developed. As for uses of the photos, even that has expanded because the technology has made it easier. i now put photos in my memos, send photos home to show a parent what their child did at school, make slide shows for curriculum night, keep folders of photos on the computer for each child and would like someday to burn a disk with their photos for the end of the year (haven't found the time for this during the end of the year crunch) and now I am planning on documenting in more detail the progress a child makes over the course of the year with digital portfolios.

Another idea that I have been playing with since early spring, is the idea of replacing the tape recorder in my classroom. After reading about some ways to use digital recording with the iPod and a microphone, I have been rethinking how to use recording in the classroom. Somehow, the ole tape recorder and the cassettes seems way too cumbersome and having digital files is very appealing. More about this at another time...but just start thinking about the classroom uses for a tape recorder and then shift to new technology and see where you go.....

Tech Plan Question 2

What kind of staff development plan/expectations/training etc will get us where we want to be?

Tech Plan Question 1- The Vision

What is your vision for technology at DCS over the next 3 years.
Don't get hung up with finding the time for a novel, let's just brainstorm.

Online Calendar

I haven't researched much about online calendars but I've been playing with this one from Trumba. I think it would make a great calendar for the family and I'm trying it out for the school. I got a free subcription for a year when I visited their booth. You can check it out at http://www.trumba.com/calendars/ryejh

Trumba will also give you a free trial at their website at trumba.com otherwise it costs $40/year. Sheila

Digital Portfolios

I'm glad to hear that Pat is interested in digital portfolios because this is what I'd like to do as a project also. I have already talked to Sue L. about ways we could begin this fall. She is a techie too but as a single mom, it's hard for her to get involved with lots of afterschool stuff.

We want to identify which curriculum areas we want to document and begin to take lots of pictures and notes about those pictures. We already use my camera quite often in the classroom. We know that we need to get into the habit of downloading the pictures to the computer daily , or maybe even between sessions. We'd create a folder for each child and then organize the pictures each week into folders. We keep a notebook of general classroom observations and we could use this to note something about the picture each time we take one. We would also want other adults in our classroom to use the camera as well, since there would be opportunities to record something with them as well.

Perhaps we could work together on this and if Sherri comes on board (with Pat's help) we could begin ongoing portfolios for several kiddos. I want to do this with typical and identified students. I also know that we most likely can't tackle this with all of the class. ...but who knows. I'd also want some video in there too.

Thermal screen printing

Just before the conference ended, I stopped at the Welsh Products booth. They have products for printing to t-shirts, mouse pads, etc. from transfer paper, ink jet, and a thermofax. They gave me some ink, frames, and a couple of screen materials. I'm going to try it out later. We are trying to find a new logo for our Belize program so I think I will try it out on that.

Welsh Products - www.welshproducts.com

Sheila

Rye Middle School just set up a blog too. It is funny that we need to go to Philly to work together more closely at home. Hey, whatever works. Here is the address for the Webcast Sessions. When I look through the listing I want to spend a couple of days reconferencing unfortunately the rest of the world has many demands. If you notice, I figured out how to customize the links on the left hand side. Let me know if there are other links you would like to see included or I will show you how to do it.

Guess Who?

Got Palm? Got photos too!

There's no place like home! Except maybe NECC!

My suitcase has it's contents turned upside down but not put away. There's plenty of time for that - later. I've checked out tons of websites, picked snow peas, listened to a few podcasts, dead-headed some of my flowers, gone to the NECC website, picked up a few items at the store, read my email, searched for chocolate cake receipes, IM-ed a few folks, and now it's the end of the day. Good thing I checked my school email before going off to do something useful because here I am posting on our very own DCS blog. hey folks, we're making DCS history.

I'm still processing the past few days and recuperating from the airport experience. It was great to have a common experience with colleagues. Thanks for the memories. What fun we will have this year as we keep the tech torch burning at school! Sorry if I laughed too much on the plane ride home.

Why did Rodin stop with The Thinker?

Banquet shots

Here are a couple of shots from Marc Prensky banquet.

If you want to listen to his presentation again or other ones that you may have missed select the WebCast link on the left.

He will be at the McAuliffe Technology Conference the week afer Thanksgiving.

Who is the strange new staff member? It is Anna's daughter Karen who joined us from NYC.

Deerfield Community School Blog

Good Morning!

Everyone up and ready to go this am. As promised here is our space, let's test it out.