Thursday, March 15, 2012

3-15-12 Last class :(

resources:
http://www.eschoolnews.com/
http://www.edutopia.org/
itunesU  - K-12
*lit2go
*FL - ACSD (university of southern FL)

Curriki.org k-12 open curriculum community
Utah education network
ORVSD
IDEAL (AZ)
West Virginia Department of Education
OER's - Open educational resources

Presentations:
ibooks author - what a cool app to use for free, can publish and set the price, very exciting to see and think about all of the possibilities!

Awesome video you made.  I appreciate the comments about the "Apple mind" vs the "PC" mind.

I have never seen a google survey before.  I have to do a survey soon, and think I might try to do one.

ipad: tool or paperweight  upad / penultimate

Prezi is rad...if you put the time into it.. need to listen to drive while I am driving, leadership and self deception, how (like this on facebook for a free book),

concept board  - check this out

Moodle for credit recovery  - great video about education and where to really drill down into work.

Last class... thanks for all of the great presentations, conversations, and insight. 

Thursday, March 8, 2012

3-8-12

cool page : http://www.merlot.org/merlot/index.htm

The power of pictures is impressive and sometimes forgotten....
Web design: primary navigation - no more than 6 links, careful of white space, pay attention to color

There are good conversations that have taken place tonight so far in class.  I so appreciate listening to other people's perspective about things and their situations at work.  It is a great part of my week. 

I think I have decided that our next home device will be a Mac Book Air... or will it be the new ipad?  one of the two for sure.  I am liking the ease of using the programs apple but my fear is that my products that I create will look like all the other home videos made with that same program  (it's the canned program worry).  We will see where we go with that.

Our visit to Canby School district today was thought provoking and has left me inspired and thinking of how to make it work on our district... knowing that there needs to be a clear plan in place (just throwing it out is not effective).

That's all for now.  Hope everybody has a great week!

Thursday, March 1, 2012

3-1-12

New resources for technology:
NCCE
ISTE - international society for technology in education (join this)
ITSC
S2N -  Signal 2 Noise - Beaverton School District sponsored event - May

Just downloaded the Prezi app on the ipad... going to try making a presentation on this.  Will have to think of a topic that will be interesting enough to share with the staff. 

"Me too books"  so true.
Convergent media - taking all of the information with you
the technology is getting better and better, and cheaper and cheaper... = in classrooms sooner!!!!

How do we learn better? (text is the same) tablet vs book.  what do they like more?

Learning improves when you can add pictures with the words... there has to be a balance

dual channel theory - audio vs visual .... get it... the right combo will enhance learning...

All media are not created equal - video/animation is great with text to teach process or things with steps
games are good to teach cooperation and decision making, not good for teaching facts

The learning did not differ between the book or the ipad.  motivation is a key factor

people who used the ipad liked the media more, and said they were willing to change.

The message I am hearing tonight is loud and clear.  The technology is not the absolute answer, you must still have thoughtful (with purpose) intentions to the instruction/learning to make it effective.  You have to keep the learner in mind.  You have to tease the learners motivation and interest (hook them).  You have to be a teacher and teach/lead the instruction with thought, purpose, and intention.  The art of teaching.

Another great evening of intriguing conversation and thought.  I am having two main thoughts, one of stress to get my project completed (Have only scratched the surface) and  the other wanting more time to explore technology.  Have to carve out the time (same with everything else).  Best of luck to everybody with their projects, I am excited to see what is in store.  I am thinking that my project presentation is going to be very boring in comparison to the other projects (district technology plan update).  Sorry in advance for that.  

Thursday, February 16, 2012

2-16-12

We had a nice discussion about the excitement around video as a teaching / presentation tool.  The ideas are spinning.

new fun page http://www.todaysmeet.com  that I want to use at my school. 

google may be my new hero... I learned how much I do not know. Ok, as this presentation continues I really feel behind... and I feel like I cant get this into our school fast enough.  I want more.

I just made my own sketch in google sketch... too much fun.

love the idea of teaching technology classes for the parents... YES!

Inspired is probably the best word to describe me right now and not a lot to say.  There are several different ideas that I have swirling around my head and I am not even sure where to take them.  No doubt, I need to carve out time to sit and play with all of the different features in google.  No only do I want to increase my personal understanding, I keep going back to the big question "how to I promote positive technology change in my school / district"  I know several of our teachers are dong some things with technology already but not to the depth or full capacity.  I really appreciated the mentality that this is happening now, lets do it now.  It's not just innovating people talking but doing and fostering opportunities for students to do. 

We talked about the traditional school not jiving with how the brain is built to work.... WHY do we keep doing it?  My dream is to work in a small school one day where the focus is on authentic learning experiences where students determine their path to education and teachers support and guide....  and we stop trying to shove kids into boxes.

Sunday, February 12, 2012

2-9-12 make up

I will start this blog out just to say that this week has been crazy, in a bad way:(  I was not able to attend class last Thursday because my back-up fell through and we had home basketball games (6 to be exact), our senior athlete recognition, and our dedication event for our new scoreboards.  It was a long evening to say the least... did not leave the gym until after 10:30 and did not arrive home until 11:15... would have been better off going to class;)  Thinking that I had made it through one of the crazier weeks at school, I wen to school Friday morning tired and glad that I did not have any major things scheduled for the day.  At about 10:30 I received the call from my mom to let me know that I dad had just been in a serious car accident... so in my car I went to see what was going on with my dad.  A totaled car, broken arm that will require surgery, broken teeth that busted through a bottom lip and lots of bruises later we are wrapping our heads around my dad's wreck and thinking how we will help him through.  So, now at 8:56 pm on Sunday evening I am finally taking some time to review what was covered in class and doing my blog responses.  Life happens.

In response to the motivation video I have several different thoughts that are going through my head... how do we motivate students, how do we motivate staff, how do we motivate some families, how does this message apply to my school?  In my mind, this ties back to authentic work for students.  I believe that if you provide authentic opportunities for students to learn, they will take much more away from the experience and achieve more than we expect.  In regards to our staff, I loved the example of the 24 hours to work on whatever they want.  I know I have a long list of things I would like to do if I had a blocked out chunk of time to work on a special project.  It is exciting just to think about it.  This was a good message and a great reminder for what motivates. 

I am completely impressed with the Khan academy.  I do believe that I have seen one of our science teachers use these videos, but I wonder if they are fully aware of the number of videos available to them.  This is a link that I will add to our school web page for a resource for our teachers as well as use it for my own refresher courses.  The concept and idea of flipping the classroom is great, and he did a great job selling the idea.  We have one teacher working "flipping" her classroom and this initial steps have gone well. 

Each class I come to and the more I delve into the topic of technology and education I get a little more excited.  I am feeling empowered to influence my school, and am happy to report that we are having more and more conversations and taking more steps to using technology as a resource, not a replacement for our teachers, and finding ways to make the classes come alive for our students.  It is a lot to digest...

Thursday, February 2, 2012

2-2-12

Well... what a day.  Had to come to class late today due to a technology meeting that I have to facilitate.  It was a good meeting and I am very excited about the direction that our conversations are headed. Small side note.... Dear DHS, please do the right thing.

We took the opportunity to share +/- examples regarding use of technology.  After hearing what others are sharing I am feeling positive about some of the new conversations we are having in our district.  We are "behind" in regards to our technology implementation, however, we ARE headed in the right direction.  We ARE having the right conversations regarding new platforms for student portfolios and eliminating the "U" drive (local storage for students).  I loved hearing what other districts are doing because I now have a direct link for advice on some of the issues I know we will have.  Likewise, we can learn form what works / or not in other districts.  Admittedly it has taken a while to get there and we have a ways to go, but we are headed down the correct path.  Woo Hoo!!!!!

I love the idea of remoteness shared in the video...  because I live there.  Wow, so many of the comments seem to be real (quality of teachers, teacher retention).  I would argue that we DO have good, no, Great teachers in our small and remote community.  They care about the community and the students where they live and work hard to support learning in meaningful ways.  Don't get me wrong, we can all improve and continue to grow. And the example shared about the younger children teaching the older ones... hummm... are our students teaching us about technology on a daily basis?  The best line in the video was the point where the question was raised about replacing teachers with technology... if this can happen, then they should be.  I believe the art of teaching is bringing the curriculum alive and teachers should use technology as a vehicle to reach out to students, get them engaged and guide them in thoughtful learning. 

This past week I have had many conversations about technology, how it is used in the district, and where our vision of technology will lead us in the future.  These conversations have been promising and I feel like my conversations from a few years back are starting to take hold.  I have a revived hope for the future in our district and am excited that I am learning new skills to help guide the journey. 










Thursday, January 26, 2012

Class Reflection 1-26-12

It's 5:12 and I am sitting here in class refreshing my memory of what we covered last week, remembering how to log in to my blog and google account took a couple tries... I'm sure I will remember it for next time;)

Also going to need to remember frimoth.com, looks like I will spend a lot of time here for the next two months.  I am happy to say that we are going to look at wordle.net because I have actually seen it before:)

Wow, the first two videos are impressive with the numbers and so true.  We have to stop staying where we as adults are comfortable and start working in the realm of our students.  Through our discussion we are reminded that we do need to manage the technology.  We still are responsible for thoughtful instruction and holding high standards for our students. Technology in the wrong hands can be a dangerous or scary thing.  In the correct hands it can do great things... guess it is a lot like money;) It is just frustrating when people have a lack of understanding and create barriers to positive use... again several parallels to real-life, real-world issues.  

The best part of class is the rich discussion and hearing different perspectives and examples from other schools and realms.  It is so easy to get stuck into our realm of doing "the things we do" without ever being aware of other issues in other districts/positions.  

I am leaving class tonight with excitement about my final project because I can work on a project that is relevant to my job (Thank you) and hopefully have an impact on the technology that is being used in our district.  I have some lofty ideas about technology and I am hoping through this class I can do a temperature check to see how realistic/informed some of my ideas are. 

Thanks for reading.  Have a great week!