The Moss-Free Stone

We probably take more pictures and record more video during the summer than at any other time of year. Vacations or time spent outdoors in the warm summer sun offer many opportunities for gathering the raw materials of some fantastic multimedia projects. For teachers, it is also a rare opportunity to explore some great tools in a more relaxed atmosphere, free from the demands of lesson planning, grading papers, etc. Below are listed 5 projects, with a couple of examples, that you might consider trying for yourself or using with your own children. This is a great way to encourage writing, storytelling, and creativity, as well as a fantastic way to preserve memories. My 8-year old daughter completed her first summer project just today, and her VoiceThread is shown below.

1. Animoto. One of the easiest ways to create professional-looking slideshows, complete with dramatic animations/transitions, audio, and text. Simply upload your images, add any desired text, and select your music. Animoto does the rest. 30 second videos (12-15 images) are free, and educators can sign up for full-length videos. An example of a 30-second video can be seen below.
2. Glogster. Glogster enables users to create online, virtual “posters.” They can include images, text, audio, video, and hyperlinks. There is a little more to the site, so a slightly greater learning curve does exist, but I have seen Glogster used very effectively with elementary kids, so don’t hesitate to try this for a summer project for your children. Again, educator accounts are available.
3. VoiceThread. Possibly the easiest digital storytelling tool out there, VoiceThread simply requires images be uploaded and comments added, either through text, audio, or webcam. The interface is simple to learn (My daughter took control shortly after we began.), and, perhaps most exciting, comments can take the form of text, scribbles, audio, or video. Here is Reagan’s first try (We wrote out her comments before recording and practiced reading each one.):



4. Tikatok. As a way to encourage young writers, why not have them actually publish (and even sell!) their works. Tikatok has a number of publishing tools for children. They can upload their own images or photographs, use a selection of graphics from the site, write original books, or utilize story starters on the site. When books are finished, they can be purchased fairly reasonably, shared with the world, and even sold to other buyers. A very engaging and motivating site!
5. Photopeach. New to me, this site acts very much like Microsoft PhotoStory. Simply upload images, add any desired text, select from a variety of background music, and publish. There is even a feature which allows users to include quiz questions in their shows. This is a very suitable and easy-to-learn tool that is worth a look.

Father-Daughter Dance on PhotoPeach

These are just a few suggestions. Another idea would be to create a family YouTube channel and have kids create and share videos of the family adventures. There are endless possibilites for combining the fun and adventure of summer with some powerful vehicles for creativity and self-expression. I’ll be posting more as the summer progresses and my children complete new projects. If you have others that need sharing, please do so!

Edit: Another idea that I’m trying with my own daughter, who just finished the 2nd grade, is to use email and a blog to encourage her to write. I’m using Gaggle for both, which allows me to have editorial and administrator rights over what she posts or receives, which is valuable with a new, young user. She is extremely excited about the possibilities of both, and has notified her Nana to be expecting correspondance.

Here is the live blog listing the sites/tools shared at the TCEA Region 7 Conference last Friday.

• 3:42 PM: rrodgers Shareski: CoolIris
• 3:43 PM: rrodgers Couros: presenti.io
• 3:44 PM: rrodgers includes conferencing (audio and chat) features
• 3:45 PM: rrodgers Couros: Skitch
• 3:46 PM: rrodgers Shareski: Picnik
• 3:49 PM: rrodgers Shareski: Jing Project
• 3:51 PM: rrodgers Couros: ScreenCastle
• 3:53 PM: rrodgers Couros: EverNote
• 3:56 PM: rrodgers Shareski: Doodle (meeting scheduler)
• 4:00 PM: rrodgers Shareski: Google mobile
• 4:00 PM: rrodgers Couros: Qik
• 4:06 PM: rrodgers Couros: Tinychat
• 4:07 PM: rrodgers Rodgers (guest dueler): Glogster, Voki
• 4:07 PM: rrodgers Shareski: geoGreeting (Uses Google maps mashup to create text from building images)
  
• 4:09 PM: rrodgers Couros: Greasemonkey addon for Firefox (shared Twitter Google search, Flickr attribution scripts)
• 4:12 PM: rrodgers Couros: type “pwn” before YouTube link to be able to download vids
• 4:14 PM: rrodgers Shareski: Tubechop (cut out parts of vids)
• 4:17 PM: rrodgers Shareski: blip.fm (my kryptonite)
• 4:19 PM: rrodgers Couros: Hulu
• 4:20 PM: rrodgers Couros: Polleverywhere

Session 1 (9:30-10:15): Twitter, Are You Serious?

• Twitter
• TweetDeck
• Twitpic
• Bit.ly
• Twitter for Teachers
• Twootles!
• Learning Professionals on Twitter
• Dial2Do
• GroupTweet
• Plodt
• 25 Interesting Ways to Use Twitter in the Classroom

Session 3 (12:45-1:30): Live, From Your School!

• Ustream
• Glomera
• Livestream (formerly Mogulus)
• Qik
• Moss-Free-TV

Session 4 (1:35-2:20): Not Another PowerPoint!

• Presentation
• iSpring
• TeacherTube
• Google Docs
• Slideshare
• Slideboom
• SlideRocket
• Animoto
• VoiceThread
• Prezi
• GoAnimate
• Glogster

The 2008-2009 school year saw some exciting developments in the use of technology in Birdville schools, and there are increasing signs that many teachers and administrators here no longer view technology as an exciting addition, but as a critical necessity. Among other trends, the district witnessed explosive growth in the number of students enrolled in online courses. A new digital media system will make storing and retrieval of digital content faster and accessible from any Internet-connected computer. Video is gaining momentum rapidly, as more campuses add webcams and small, portable video cameras to the arsenals of teachers and students.

Web 2.0 tools also continue their steady infiltration of the day-to-day activities of students, teachers, and administrators. Our department launched a very successful program to educate administrators on a wide variety of educational technologies this year. Called Lunch and Learn, the program offered short (1 hour) introductions to technology over a gourmet lunch (usually pizza). The response was very positive, and plans are under way to continue the program next year.

The 12 Second Tech Challenge was started on a whim as an effort to encourage reluctant teachers to try new tools in short bursts. I offered the challenges (and possible prizes, such as web cams, graphics tablets, wireless presenter mice, etc.) to my own campuses, and I received excellent participation and feedback asking for more. I am hopeful that the project will be a district-wide offering next year.

Numerous Web 2.0 tools have gained a significant foothold in the teaching practices of our district campuses. Blogging and wikis continue to have a significant impact. Two campuses, for instance, established student news sites using Edublogs. Students published researched stories, conducted interviews, reported on school events, and incorporated videos of campus events. Twitter is beginning to be utilized in exciting ways. As examples, a middle school teacher (Twitter name foxworth) utilized the tool to communicate news and course information to students and parents. Several campuses, such as Birdville High School and Holiday Heights Elementary, are using Twitter to broadcast campus events and announcements to parents and the community. Ustream was used by the technology department, campuses, and several teachers to stream class and district events, training, and more. The availability of YouTube in the district let teachers and students access powerful educational videos and, even more exciting, to create and share their own work with a global audience. Communication tools, such as Skype, Dimdim, and Mebeam allowed classes to collaborate with other students in distant locations and teachers to attend training (see below) from the comfort of their classrooms.

Student creativity was encouraged through the use of online tools such as Glogster, Animoto, and VoiceThread. Online office applications began to be utilized, with tools such as Google Forms showing particular promise for conducting surveys, gathering data, assessing student progress, etc. The online quiz tool MyStudiyo gained a following among teachers who incorporated the interactive products into class websites and blogs.

The list could certainly go on, but this gives a good, general view of some of the exciting ways teachers and administrators have taken to the use of Web-based instructional tools in the district. Were I to create a “grade” for our progress, I’d give us a solid B+. Our faculties are showing tremendous creativity and enthusiasm, but the utilization of technology needs to see continued growth in the coming year. Far too many of our classrooms are still the domain of well-intended but out-dated practices, resources, and curriculums. The encouraging thing to witness is the fire that is spreading from small sparks of innovation, and the potential exists for a blaze of 21st Century teaching and learning to engulf the classrooms of our district.

Not directed at anyone in particular…

Dear Parent,

You are, first of all, the type of caring parent every child needs and deserves. You want what is best for your son or daughter’s healthy growth and bright and happy future. You wish to protect them from as much of the harmful, ugly badness that permeates so much of the world. Thank you for loving your child so much–such attitudes produce strong, successful students!

Recently, you discovered that your child’s school has the Internet, and even more shocking, you found that anyone could get into YouTube through a simple search. You also quickly tested the site and found that objectionable videos could be accessed by merely typing in the right search term. Justifiably, you are very concerned about this scenario. You wonder how a school can allow such potential harm to befall its students. You even begin to consider what steps might be taken to remove this horrible threat. Should other parents be recruited and organized?

Before you go farther in your commendable zealousness to protect your child, please consider several points in favor of keeping such a frightening site unblocked.

1. Educational content. YouTube has thousands upon thousands of outstanding educational clips and full-length videos, from such reputable producers as NASA, National Geographic, and the BBC. It is an excellent resource for today’s student to find videos that supplement written materials in their research. Taking this to an even loftier perch, YouTube EDU now offers actual videos of courses being taught at the biggest and best universities on the planet. You’re child can begin learning from Ivy League teachers while in elementary school!
2. Global connections. YouTube allows users to create personal accounts and channels. A teacher might use such a channel, for instance, to share student videos with a world-wide, authentic audience. A viewer in China might be provoked to leave a comment or ask a question, leading to real dialogue between students on opposite sides of the earth. It happens everyday!
3. Creativity. YouTube offers students a place to become inspired and motivated to express their own creativity. It also offers a unique and very relevant platform for putting their creativity on display. Creativity, it is fair to say, is a skillset that receives far too little attention in classes today, yet is vital to student success and opportunity beyond the classroom.
4. Digital wisdom. Filters, vigilant teachers, and monitoring software work wonderfully in our district to create an atmosphere that discourages or even prevents students from getting into “trouble” while using the Internet. These tools are worthless, however, when the student is on his own. At home, at the library, at a friends house…these are the places where research shows a student is far more likely to experience harmful or inappropriate content on the Internet. By teaching responsible use and allowing enough freedom for students to demonstrate integrity while online, schools become partners in bringing up young people who will use the Web safely and respond appropriately when danger appears. Research also has demonstrated the value of such an approach over tightly locking down the Internet filter.

Most of all, please remember that we love and care for your child, too. Our goals are similar to your own, and we wish nothing more than to see your young man or woman grow up happy, healthy, and safely. We also wish for them to be successfully able to cope with the evolving, increasingly digital stream of information and communication that they will be faced with, and we believe being proactively educational is preferred to simply locking the gates to keep the wolves out. Part of being a citizen in this century is knowing how to utilize its vast resources ethically and responsibly, and we wish to be a partner in assuring that.

Sincerely,

Your Child’s School

I wanted to thank the 25 teachers and administrators who took part in the Tech Challenges this semester. You completed 105 total challenges! Thank you for your very positive feedback and encouragement to continue the challenges next year. Also, congratulations to the 5 of you who won the drawings for prizes. I’m looking forward to working with you to use them in your curriculum. 8 teachers completed at least 4 challenges, meaning I have some serious baking to attend to next week (I may be re-thinking that particular part of the Challenges next year!).

I am wrapping up a doctoral course on emerging technologies this week. I have to admit, this has been the most enjoyable course I’ve taken to date. The subject matter was right down my alley, and there was much more interaction in this course than in previous classes (I’m working on an online degree.). I wanted to take the time to share a few things that were particularly significant to me as I plan for next year.

Games in education

While I have read many wonderful pieces on the blogs of such educators as David Warlick on the subject, gaming is not something I have devoted much thought or energy to. The research makes it clear that games are an effective and engaging way to promote higher level cognitive skills, such as problem solving, collaboration, and creativity. They also reinforce many academic skills, and they do so in a setting which kids actually enjoy. I will be looking for ways to bring games and simulations more attention in our district next year.

Moodle

Learning content management systems, like Moodle, are the present and immediate future of our profession. They make learning objects easily accessible by teachers and students, they facilitate collaboration and communication, they integrate Web 2.0 tools wonderfully, and they draw upon the collective knowledge and experiences of educators. The limited exploration I have done with Moodle this quarter has convinced me that it is well within the capabilities of our teachers and the time is now to get the implementation rolling in BISD.

Synchronous collaboration tools

This includes such presentation resources as Elluminate, WebEx, and Dimdim, but it also includes simpler tools, such as Skype and chat rooms. I received very positive feedback from participants in my first Dimdim professional development session, and I will be offering many more next year, perhaps even outside of the district. The convenience and extensive feature set simply make these tools essential for professional learning, and they go far beyond some of the existing online tools used in our district, which are asynchronous in nature. They also have many classroom applications. Elluminate will be available next year, and it will be exciting to see how we utilize the tool, particularly if we can find effective ways to incorporate it into our expanding number of online courses. It just might be an effective method of decreasing attrition and creating a greater sense of community among our online students.

Cell phones/personal electronic devices

Our district’s cell phone policy is now much more open, meaning it will be essential to explore and articulate best practices for utilizing the ever-increasing capabilities of the devices in the coming year. There will be an adjustment period for teachers, without a doubt. However, I truly foresee the wireless Internet capabilities, text messaging, and video/photographic capabilities being put to some creative and powerful applications.

Digital presentations and stories are really gaining momentum in our district. One challenge that persists, however, is finding quality, free images for students to use in their creations. Picfindr is a very helpful tool for locating images without worrying about copyright issues. The interface is simple enough. Simply choose the copyright level (none, give credit, or ask permission) and the category of use (education). Enter a search term, and PicFindr searches a number of sites to find images that fit your criteria. By choosing “none”, students can use images without any copyright restrictions or citations required. I’ve tried the tool with several search terms, and I was amazed by the number of results it produced. Note that there are some results which are sponsored, and sponsored images may require a fee to use, but the vast majority are completely free for students to utilize to create exciting products.

Lucky 13! The final installment of this semester’s 12 Second Tech Challenges focuses on a very useful tool, the Google Forms tool.

BISD 12 Second Tech Challenge #13 on 12seconds.tv

You will need to create a Google account, if you don’t already have one (and you really should). The video below shows you how it works. You could create a student or parent survey, an online test/quiz, or whatever. Be sure to share the link to the survey in your comment. (I will give you 2 credits for this if you actually administer it!)

Thank you guys for trying so many new tools! I will announce the winners of the big prizes next Wednesday!

In a recent blog post, David Warlick discusses his experience presenting a discussion of the value of gaming in education to a group of parents and educators. He related some resistance on the part of some attendees, particularly one woman, who challenged his assertation “that the video game generation is more sociable and better collaborators than the previous generation.” The woman asserted that, in fact, the opposite was true, and that today’s students had difficulty interacting and adjusting to life in the work force. Warlick responded basically that there were many factors that “make our children”, not simply their participation in online games, and that most of us struggled initially as we entered the workforce. He also added “that to see and leaverge these skills we have to alter our expectations and even aspects of the work environment and schedule and even the nature of our assignments.” In other words, as I understand him, employers (and, I would assume, educators) need to examine the environment that we create and the type of work we expect our young people to complete and adjust them to better take advantage of the skills that they are developing while playing these games (particularly the online, social-type games).

This is an interesting idea, as it calls into question the very nature of many of the standards by which the success of our students is measured, both in the classroom and beyond. It also would require a radical re-thinking of the work environment and the nature of social interaction and collaboration. Certainly, avid participants in the online video game culture do engage in many tasks that have either overt or implicit value in the working world. They solve problems, formulate hypotheses, apply subject-specific skills, communicate, and collaborate. However, the nature of these actions is certainly significantly different in many ways than the forms that they would take in a traditional classroom or workplace.

Two competing questions come to mind, then, one putting the impetus for change on the student/employee, the second, posed by David, on the employer/teacher. First, how do we take students from the virtual application of these skills to the physical, real-world environment? Research is beginning to bear out the idea that they truly are developing valuable skills, but will they have value if they cannot transfer them? Secondly, what can future employers (or schools) do to make their work environments places which leverage the types of tools that take advantage of young employees’ (or students’) affinity for and skills with these games? For instance, are social networks or simulations perhaps more effective tools for job training than traditional, in-person training sessions with this generation?

I suspect the most productive answer lies somewhere in the middle. I do agree with the premise that David makes that systemic change in the workplace should be considered. But I also think that there needs to be a transitional focus, and students need to be able to adapt the virtual experiences and interactions they have used to build their skills to the application of those abilities into marketable and useable traits in the workforce. Adaptability and the ability to respond to changing environments and situations are actually key qualities of the successful gamer, so this should be feasible. I don’t know the solution, but I do recognize the value of online gaming and the diverse skillsets that research has demonstrated can be gained/enhanced. We would be remiss, as educators, not to put some serious effort and thought into considering just how best to take advantage of this fact.

I would add that, piggy-backing off of David’s post, I went back and re-read the ISTE NETS for Teachers, and I found several ideas that could be easily applied in the workplace. Simply substitute “employers” for “teachers” and “employees” for “students”. A few examples…

1.  Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity
Teachers Employers use their knowledge of subject matter, teaching and learning, and technology to facilitate experiences that advance student employee learning, creativity, and innovation in both face-to-face and virtual environments. Teachers Employers:
a. promote, support, and model creative and innovative thinking and inventiveness
b. engage students employees in exploring real-world issues and solving authentic problems using digital tools and resources
c. promote student employee reflection using collaborative tools to reveal and clarify students’ conceptual understanding and thinking, planning, and creative processes
d. model collaborative knowledge construction by engaging in learning with students employees,colleagues, and others in face-to-face and virtual environments
2.  Design and Develop Digital-Age Learning Experiences and Assessments
Teachers Employers design, develop, and evaluate authentic learning experiences and assessments incorporating contemporary tools and resources to maximize content learning in context and to develop the knowledge, skills, and attitudes identified in the NETS•S. Teachers Employers:
a. design or adapt relevant learning experiences that incorporate digital tools and resources to promote student employee learning and creativity
b. develop technology-enriched learning environments that enable all students employees to pursue their individual curiosities and become active participants in setting their own educational occupational goals, managing their own learning, and assessing their own progress
c. customize and personalize learning activities to address students’ employees‘ diverse learning styles, working strategies, and abilities using digital tools and resources