Digital Literacy in the Elementary Classroom
Janice Friesen, Eanes ISD
Handout is online on NECC Site
References Daniel Pink
Talking about eInstruction
Talking about Alex’s Lemonade Stand Project
Resource
wordweb.info/free - pc only - check it out...very cool!
Photo Story - Kelly Manzano
100 Days of School - What each student brought to the 100 day celebration.
Headset microphones to record text.
Digital Storytelling with Minimal Clicks
Wes Fryer and Others
thinkingmachine.pbwiki.com
teachdigital.pbwiki.com/digitalstoryteling
Ear v. Eye - dialup v. broadband
“Do Curriculum”
Tell a Story with 5 Photos for Educators - Karen Motgomery
(on Flicker) - other group available also but not moderated by an educator so may have questionable content.
5 photos = 5000 word story
Text Century v. Visual Century
Professional Development - VoiceThread with Coffee 2.0
Digital Picture for Name Tent (no directions first)
Moodle Model 5E Lesson
Mark McCall, Charles Ackerman
Bryan ISD, Bryan TX
www.jukeboxedu.com
Teaching in a 1/1 classroom.
Extrovert v. Introvert
(Lab-Based v. Web-Based)
Other from Today:
Blog to Check out: http://learning20.blogspot.com/
Monday, June 30, 2008
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Moving Skyscrapers, Moving Pedagogy
If Dubai can plan a moving skyscraper (thanks to Jim Gates for this link) then we can plan for moving pedagogy. How do we do this? We begin by having discussions that focus on what some might call "out of the box" thinking. In a technology meeting today my team asked me how we would support PowerPoint from school to home if we were moving to Macs, iWork and Open Office. I suggested that we talk about using SlideShare and other Web 2.0 tools with students.
It was a new thought process for them, using the web to present. If we don't start having the discussions, we can't start changing the thinking or moving the pedagogy. A school district near mine has communicated to it's teachers that it is moving to Office 2007 so that they can take advantage of the additional 1500 features available in this new software. WHAT??? I would be willing to be that most people can't even list 50 features that they use now! So, to that I say...let's look at Google Docs. Thinking out of the box...what do you think??!!
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Monday, June 23, 2008
Friday, June 13, 2008
Learning to Change, Changing to Learn
A colleague of mine shared this video with me today. It includes perspectives from Cheryl Lemke, Daniel Pink and Chris Dede among others. It is worth taking 5 minutes to watch. As an educator and advocate for 21st century classrooms, we need to keep these kinds of ideas in front of educational leaders and teachers to continue to promote the seamless integration of technology in the teaching and learning process.
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
False Sense of Connection
We had an awesome summer thunderstorm near my house this evening. As I sat here and enjoyed watching the unpredictable weather from the comfort of my front porch, I reflected upon the fact that at the moment I was watching, my fun loving golden retriever kept wanting to connect to me, then the cat, then me, then the cat, to get someone to play with her. It reminded me of an old saying, "on the internet, no one knows you're a dog" which also made me think, if you're a dog, really, you can't connect with your owner or the cat via twitter on the internet. Some connections really just need physical interaction! It is human (and animal) nature to want to physically connect to one another.
Wes Fryer and Vicki Davis have both recently blogged about taking time to disconnect and refresh ourselves, connect with our family and stay positive. I wholeheartedly agree that all of these are very important to do. In fact, I think it is important to try to do these things more than once a year. Many of us take one vacation in the summer for about a week. The rest of the year we are connected with our colleagues, friends, family and significant others, via email, twitter, text messages, occasional phone calls (if we feel it's too much to type or text) and, if we're lucky, we meet in person. I am reminded of an initiative in our school district where we are educating the "whole child." As part of that, we were presented with the fact that to thrive, children, actually all humans need 6-8 respectful touches a day. There was no research on how many respectful twitters or emails equated to respectful touches.
Hmmmm....so I'm wondering...text connections without human interactions...do they give us a false sense of connection? As I begin to plan for a one to one initiative for my teachers this summer, I will pause to remember that the goal is not to disconnect but to strengthen connections. I will push myself to go the extra mile and not just send an email, text or twitter, but extend a hand and a friendly smile and hopefully create a human connection. Maybe even give a hug or two to those that have a special place in my heart. I urge you do to the same!
Wes Fryer and Vicki Davis have both recently blogged about taking time to disconnect and refresh ourselves, connect with our family and stay positive. I wholeheartedly agree that all of these are very important to do. In fact, I think it is important to try to do these things more than once a year. Many of us take one vacation in the summer for about a week. The rest of the year we are connected with our colleagues, friends, family and significant others, via email, twitter, text messages, occasional phone calls (if we feel it's too much to type or text) and, if we're lucky, we meet in person. I am reminded of an initiative in our school district where we are educating the "whole child." As part of that, we were presented with the fact that to thrive, children, actually all humans need 6-8 respectful touches a day. There was no research on how many respectful twitters or emails equated to respectful touches.
Hmmmm....so I'm wondering...text connections without human interactions...do they give us a false sense of connection? As I begin to plan for a one to one initiative for my teachers this summer, I will pause to remember that the goal is not to disconnect but to strengthen connections. I will push myself to go the extra mile and not just send an email, text or twitter, but extend a hand and a friendly smile and hopefully create a human connection. Maybe even give a hug or two to those that have a special place in my heart. I urge you do to the same!
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Making Learning "Safe" for Teachers
In today's world of accountability, it is hard to find ways to allow for positive accountability without some kind of "evaluation" tied to it. However, I think this is what we, as educational technologists and advocates of changing pedagogy desperately need to do to support teachers!! If we do not make their professional development learning environments "safe" for exploration and free of negative evaluation, the willingness of teachers to try new things will be sorely diminished.
Safe environments invite exploration, creating avenues such as moodle sandboxes are just the type of activities that can begin to facilitate this type of professional learning. I have learned that people who are enclosed in walls for a long period of time have a very difficult time knowing what to do when the walls come down and they have opportunities for growth. I think we need to be cognizant of these feelings and make sure that we understand that while teachers may want to embrace change and new learning, they need support, hand holding and being told that it is OK not to know it all, or to have it all together as they explore these new frontiers.
We must also loosely structure their learning so that they have time to explore and but also give them small successes so that they get excited about learning more and take it upon themselves to continue to explore. These ideas may sounds simple and you may say to yourself that you are already doing these things and if so that's great. If you don't see teachers jumping on the bandwagon behind you, stop to talk to them and see how they are feeling. Safety for learning and exploration may be just what they need to get going. Try some structured facilitation and consistent support and watch them grow. Just like young plants, they need constant attention, at least in the beginning until they are strong enough and have a deep enough root and developed enough stem to survive a bit of drought and still stay strong and continue to grow!
Safe environments invite exploration, creating avenues such as moodle sandboxes are just the type of activities that can begin to facilitate this type of professional learning. I have learned that people who are enclosed in walls for a long period of time have a very difficult time knowing what to do when the walls come down and they have opportunities for growth. I think we need to be cognizant of these feelings and make sure that we understand that while teachers may want to embrace change and new learning, they need support, hand holding and being told that it is OK not to know it all, or to have it all together as they explore these new frontiers.
We must also loosely structure their learning so that they have time to explore and but also give them small successes so that they get excited about learning more and take it upon themselves to continue to explore. These ideas may sounds simple and you may say to yourself that you are already doing these things and if so that's great. If you don't see teachers jumping on the bandwagon behind you, stop to talk to them and see how they are feeling. Safety for learning and exploration may be just what they need to get going. Try some structured facilitation and consistent support and watch them grow. Just like young plants, they need constant attention, at least in the beginning until they are strong enough and have a deep enough root and developed enough stem to survive a bit of drought and still stay strong and continue to grow!
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