Red Clay is doing exciting things with iPod Touches in our elementary schools, and I got to sit in on a meeting this afternoon. It helped to be able to talk about it with a couple of Apple consultants. We’re focussing on lessons and activities to support ELA at first.
Mainly, I want to remember the link to the new wiki that Vicki Green set up for iPod Touches in Red Clay classrooms: http://redclay-ipod-touch.wikispaces.com/
The two schools housed in my building are discussing a move to commmon block scheduling next year. We’re expecting to have eight periods, with five meeting each day. Currently, the schools are on schedules that are quite different from each other, but there are two common periods where students from one school can take classes at the other school. Moving to a common schedule would allow more flexibility for students, as almost any class could be available to students from either school (assuming seats are available in a particular class).
Faculty at both schools have identified several issues that we need to deal with, including:
I’m collecting resources about block scheduling, and this seems as good a place as any to file them!
The second Glogster project this year was with Dr. Fetzer’s section of US History, and we added a couple of refinements. Students created glogs to compare the decade of the 1920′s to the present decade. They were asked to write three documents (nearly everyone used Google Docs) and link to them in their glogs. They used EasyBib’s “share bibliography” function to include their Works Cited pages. Find details of the assignment and Dr. Fetzer’s student gallery at http://fetzercpushistory.wikispaces.com/1920s+GlogsterProject.
We tried to use the new Glogster EDU, but couldn’t make it work properly for us (it was still in beta testing when we began the project). If/when we do the project again next year, we will start with EDU Glogster. I liked the ability to create a glog for each student and have access to all of them from the teacher’s account.
I read about Glogster on several other library blogs, and was looking for a way to use it when Mrs. Sullivan came to the rescue! We developed a lesson for her US History classes (both freshmen and AP) that worked so well that she used it with her AP Psychology students, too.
The original idea was to give students some practice in developing good thesis statements and synthesizing information to support the thesis. Glogster offered a cool alternative to the typical essay or research paper. The lesson plan, rubric, and links to student Glogs are posted on the library wiki. Check it all out on Mrs. Sullivan’s section of the library wiki!
I got a new SmartBoard in one of the library labs, and wanted to try it out. A Social Studies class had planned a visit to (re)learn MLA citation format, and it seemed like a good opportunity to practice with the Notebook software from SmartBoard.
The lesson itself went well. Students loved to write on the board and check their answers using the pull tabs built into the lesson pages. I did find that some students were distracted by access to the computers in the labs. Next time, I’ll move the keyboards or mice, or turn off the monitors for the lesson. Also, our Sentio responders didn’t seem to recognize the questions built into the lesson. (I know they were installed properly, and I could successfully set up classes, both anonymous and using IDs, but couldn’t get the responders to talk to Smart Notebook. Still waiting for our Technology folks to figure this out.)
Just finished library orientation for the 6th graders, and did something completely different this year. I found some great suggestions from a school district in Missouri (http://www.rockwood.k12.mo.us/CRESTVIEW/library/masl%20web.pdf). I ended up creating three different activities that covered the same content, and students could choose the worksheet that appealed the most. The activities included the “library tour” (a scavenger hunt), a “create your own hidden word puzzle”, and a map activity. Most students chose the map activity because they really love to use markers and colored pencils. In our 48 minute periods, I had enough time to introduce the activities (5-10 minutes), have students complete the activities (30 minutes), and then go over selected questions from each activity at the end. Reviewing the questions ensured we covered the most important points for orientation, and the students had spent the period finding the answers on their own, so they seemed more engaged than if I had lectured or shown a Powerpoint the entire time.
So, my online class is ending, and the question is “will I continue to maintain this blog?” Does it serve a purpose for me? How does it help me in my job?
Although this blog has turned out to be more of a public reflection than a genuine dialog with anyone, reflection serves a purpose. Taking the time to write out my thoughts does help me clarify my thoughts in my own mind. So, yes, I think I’ll try to keep posting!
One assignment in my online Web 2.0 class this week was to post to my blog something I’ve learned from a podcast or streaming video. We had a great list of resources for streaming video, including PBS Nova, the Library of Congress webcasts (I love their author presentations, and enjoyed watching a talk given by David Baldacci at the time of his release of The collectors–set at the Library of Congress and around DC), History Channel speeches and videos, TeacherTube, and School Tube.
However, the “video” I learned most from this week was a webinar presented last week in Pennsylvania titled Code of Best Practice in Fair Use. I heard about it from reading Joyce Valenza’s NeverEndingSearch blog (and Bloglines clued me in about this new post!). The webinar lasts an hour, but it is full of links, information and video resources. Plan some time to view this; it’s a great introduction to the principles of fair use, presented by staff at the Temple University Media Education Lab. (Speaking of the Media Education Lab, check out their “Schoolhouse Rock”-type songs on copyright. My favorite is “What’s Copyright?”.) Check it out!
An eighth grade social studies teacher shared this cool Web 2.0 tool with me last week and brought a class to the library yesterday to try it out. SKRBL (www.skrbl.com) is a (free!) online interactive whiteboard, and the students definitely enjoyed using it. We needed to do some immediate etiquette instruction, though!
Here’s the link to yesterday’s lesson: http://www.skrbl.com/marytise. The lesson asked students to rank three websites that were potential sources to answer a question about the Battle of Wounded Knee. They had to give their reasons for ranking, and then use their reasoning to develop their own “checklist” for website evaluation. Finally, they had to answer the question (Was the Battle of Wounded Knee justified or genocide? Explain) The student instructions were embedded in the page as a Word document. They were to open the Word document and respond to the web evaluation part of the lesson, and then use SKRBL to post their answers to the Wounded Knee question.
Reflections…Students loved the program, and needed little or no instruction on the technical aspects of posting. However, as middle school students in the library the last period of the day, they did need some etiquette instruction! Anyone can post anything to the page, and it is visible to everyone instantly. Before we had finished going over the instructions, silly messages began appearing on the skrbl screen.
The skrbl page loads slowly. We should have had students type in the URL for the lesson before writing their “do now” (which was “If you had to answer a research question about which you know nothing, what steps would you take to answer it?”).
The lesson was a little too long for many to finish within the 48 minute period. This was OK, though, because the work that didn’t get finished was easy to complete as homework.
It is possible to “freeze” the skrbl page (by saving it as a .html file) once the lesson is complete. That’s nice for archiving student work without leaving it vulnerable to future vandalism.
OK, so I was just thinking about wikis and wondering how I can try one out in my library. I had the idea a few weeks back that I would use wikis for student-created pathfinders. What did I need to do to make the wiki-work as simple as possible for students?
I created a wikispace for the library. Check it out at: http://cablibrary.wikispaces.com/! Since I’ve had pathfinders (research starting points) on the brain, I decided to create a template pathfinder, along with an example, so that students can have some idea what I want to see. Setting everything up has taken a couple of hours, but part of that time was creating a sample pathfinder for Cab Calloway (the musician/performer). I’m thinking the students can copy the text of the template, paste it into a new page, and create their own pathfinders. Now, I need a class that can serve as a test of the process!
Although wiki might mean “quick”, I need to find out what that means when working with 25-35 students in a class. I think they’ll need one class period just to master the basics of creating a page, and at least another class period to create the content (or perhaps they will have created some content in the classroom before their library visit…) I haven’t observed many/any students updating or creating wiki pages in the library before now, so I don’t think it’s something many of the students in my building are familiar with. On the other hand, I know there are students who have created web pages using Dreamweaver and other free web authoring software, so maybe it won’t be very difficult for them!
