Classroom in the Cloud

Take Time to Be a Dad Campaign

2010-03-11T12:39:00.007-05:00

Last night my wife and I loaded our kids into the van so that we could surprise my mom and brother at the airport on their return trip from a week’s vacation. Never to be without a treasure, my 2-year-old daughter, Sophie, asked if she could bring something along for the ride. My wife told her she could take one special toy with her. She chose the painted noodle necklace she and I made together last week during an impromptu craft session at the kitchen table. I couldn’t help be feel a little proud that my craft beat out her usual picks - an Abby Cadabby doll or her pair of plastic flower-rimmed sunglasses.

On the way to the airport, I spotted something upsetting. There was a billboard depicting a man and his son bouncing happily across a grassy knoll. Above them was a simple directive – Take time to be a dad today.

Maybe it was the fact that my daughter was sitting directly behind me playing with her cherished daddy-daughter necklace, but this billboard offended me.

The display gives the over-generalized message that fathers don’t spend enough time with their kids. And to make matters worse, the organization that commissioned the ad, fatherhood.gov, is government sponsored. My taxes went to a billboard announcing that I was insufficient in my role as a dad!

Maybe I’m blowing this a little out of proportion. I understanding that nuclear families aren’t exactly the norm these days, and many times it’s the male figure that’s absent. But nonetheless, maybe there’s a better way to facilitate father-engagement than erecting large sweeping statements on Rt 33 heading toward the Buffalo Niagara International Airport.

It’s also surprising that a campaign of this nature hasn’t been faced with more opposition. Motherhood.gov doesn’t even exist, but if this fictional organization decided to promote a Take time to be a mom campaign, you can bet that the uproar would be earth-shaking.

Introduction to the Holocaust

2010-03-04T12:36:00.007-05:00

The New York State curriculum for Social Studies is bursting at the seams. Unfortunately, the students have no other option than to get a shallow understanding of a lot of information. Take, for example the topic of World War II. The Holocaust could be a full-year course in itself, but it is usually stripped down to little more than a tangent lesson from the war.

As an ELA teacher, I try to do my part by teaching something with Anne Frank, or a novel like Wiesel’s Night or We are Witness by Jacob Boas. This year, however, I am taking a different approach. Instead of teaching the content of the Nazi horrors, I decided to focus more on the context in which these horrors occurred. I want my students to understand not only what happened, but why it happened. I want them to understand the power that Hitler had as an authority figure, and how everyday, good-hearted people allowed for the extermination of their friends and neighbors.

To start this conversation, I asked my kids a simple question: Why do we follow the rules? In every class, I received similar answers – It’s the right thing to do; We have rules to protect from harm; Breaking rules means facing a consequence.

I then shared this story about a prankster who called public places under the guise of an authority figure and persuaded people into dangerous and disruptive acts of vandalism. After they listened to the audio clip, my students were asked to explain what this prank illustrated about obedience. They were beginning to understand that people do not necessarily follow the rules, they follow the person telling them the rules.

To reinforce this idea, I then moved on to Dr. Stanley Milgram’s famous shock experiment from the early 60s. If you’re unfamiliar with this study, Wikipedia has a pretty solid overview on Milgram’s work in understanding why we obey authority figures. The actual experiment footage is over three hours long, but I managed to find a 9 minute overview that the kids found fascinating.

To end the lesson, I again returned to the original question, Why do we follow the rules and asked the class to think about what they had just learned and then answer the question again. It was amazing how firmly they grasped the concept that following rules is something that is inherent in all of us, and when prompted by authority, we will do things that go against our better judgment.

I going to continue this conversation with the novel The Wave by Todd Strasser. It doesn't take place during 1940s World War II era, but I think it will tie in easily to best show how Hitler was able to convince Germany to commit such atrocious war crimes.

Here is the Prezi presentation I used with my kids to guide them through the lesson. Feel free to use it yourself and share with others!

Why do we follow the rules? on Prezi

Philosophy of Classroom Management

2010-02-24T12:58:00.005-05:00

About a month ago, I was pulled from my classroom to attend a full day department meeting. Behavior problems in my room are almost non-existent (or at least as non-existent as possible for middle school), so I’m never too worried about having a substitute cover for me when I have to be out. But when I returned, I found a note on my desk explaining that all of my classes were excellent, with the exception of one student who was disruptive and disrespectful.

This particular boy has a good relationship with me and has never been a problem in my room, although is occasionally trouble for other teachers. The next day when I saw him, I pulled him in the hall, read him the sub’s note, and promptly assigned him a week of lunch detentions.

Here’s my philosophy on classroom management:
I’m pretty loose with what students can and cannot do in class. I don’t have lists of rules posted around the room, and I certainly know the importance of choosing my battles. But my kids know that there is a very clear line drawn in the sand. They quickly learn to stay behind that line. If it is crossed, there is consistent and immediate consequence.

Yesterday I called in to work to help my wife take care of our brood of sick children. It was an unplanned absence but I emailed lesson plans and work in for the sub so I was not anticipating problems. This morning, I arrived to find a familiar note on my desk. It was a different sub, but the same boy, and same defiant, disruptive behavior.

When I pulled him in the hall, he said he knew why he was in trouble and he was aware of the consequence for his actions. He’ll again be enjoying my company as lunch partner for the next week.

But this got me thinking. I always assume that clear and consistent consequence is the way to deal with behavior problems. But if that’s the case, then why did he act up again when he saw a substitute sitting in my chair? Is punitive consequence ineffective, or is he just a little too impulsive and thick-skulled for it to work after only one instance?

What is your philosophy for effective classroom management?

Professional Development VS. Personal Development

2010-02-22T15:51:00.003-05:00

Last year I made the New Year's resolution to learn how to play piano. I found a quaint music shop that offers lessons, and every Wednesday I wait along with the other students (most being about half my age) in the lobby with lesson books in hand. I don't teach music, but the experience has reminded me what it's like to be the one whose job it is to learn, not to teach.

It's important to always be learning something new. If we forget what it's like to learn, then how can we expect others to learn from us? We hear all the time about professional development, but I'd hope that we are aware of personal development as well.

Can the personal and professional merge? They better, or else you may be in the wrong profession. Take, for example, my most current New Year's resolution. I've always wanted to learn how to create Flash applications, and with the help of my Instructional Technology department I now have a fresh copy of Adobe Flash CS4 Professional installed on my teacher workstation. While – and I'm aware that this is an awfully nerdy thing to admit – learning this is mostly grounded in recreational purposes, I can see Flash-based web apps, games, quizzes, and even iPod Touch apps to be something that could be integrated into my daily class activities. How cool would it be to create my own iPhone app and then host it as a free download to students through iTunes?!

I'm not there yet, but I'm learning. Here is my first Flash project - It's a pickle navigating through a maze. Okay, maybe it's lacking in educational value.

But hey, we all have to start somewhere.

Justin Bieber Penny Drive Winner

2010-02-09T12:41:00.000-05:00

Back in mid December, I mentioned that my school was participating in a local radio station penny drive to raise money for Women and Children’s Hospital. The school who collected the most would win a private concert by teen heartthrob Justin Bieber.

Wouldn’t you know it – we actually won.

57 local schools participated in the contest, raising more than $150,000 (or 15,000,000 pennies) for an important and worthy cause. Almost $17,000 of that came from our students. The fact that we won is near incomprehensible, but even moreso is the thought that in the past month and a half 1.7 million pennies have passed through our hallways.

Yesterday, our building (along with the support of Kiss 98.5) held a celebratory pep rally for the kids, and while the kids’ excitement over Justin Bieber was clear, something even more important was obvious. All the work they had done was for charity, and they knew it.

The feeling that nearly 1000 screaming preteens crammed into an auditorium evokes can be contagious. Even the boys who had previously cursed the name Justin Bieber sang along to his song as it played from the stage speakers. They realized that the pep rally wasn’t to celebrate Bieber, but to celebrate our ability to come together as a school and do something truly amazing.

My Online Footprint

2010-02-02T14:32:00.001-05:00

My first efforts at consistent blogging were not here, but at a blog that preceded it called 100 Days with the Eee PC. I received an Asus Eee PC for my birthday in November of 2008, just before the term netbook became a household word. Since they were still a fledgling technology, I decided to try a little experiment – to only use the Eee PC as my primary computer. I figured it would be a pretty clear case study to show the potential of the tiny machine.

My experiment was a success, but it came with a residual effect – I realized the excitement (and importance) to blogging. The blog you’re reading right now is a direct result of my netbook experiment.

The 100 Days blog has sat dormant for almost a year now, and I haven’t had too much need to go back to it – until yesterday. I was looking some source code I used about this time last year to create a online quiz for my students. I couldn’t remember where I had downloaded it from, but I did remember that I had blogged about it. I Googled my old blog to see if I could find the link.

What I found instead was sobering.

On the first page of results was a message board posting that someone had started about my blog. In it, they explained who I was, the purpose of my writing, and what subject area and grade level I taught. He then went on to question the legality of something I had written about. All of this information was easily obtainable through my blog or in my Blogger profile, but it was vexing to see it written by a stranger.

I once wrote that blogging is an open journal, but this Google search made me realize how true that is. There's a valuable message to share about your online footprint - If it's online, someone will find it. If it's something even remotely questionable, someone will question it. And unlike a footprint in the sand, what is said online is never washed away by the inevitable rising tide.

4 Easy (and Free) Ways to Convert Doc to Docx

2010-01-25T14:20:00.001-05:00

Microsoft has made some mind-boggling product decisions in the past few years. While many of you are thinking specifically about the Vista operating system debacle, I’m referring to the seemingly unexplainable choice to change the default file extension in Word 2007 to the docx format.

This has added some degree of difficulty to the student practice of typing up work at home and then bringing it in to school to finish. Not all online conversion sites support the new format, and some that do have tried to capitalize on Microsoft’s inability to make their own proprietary format backwards compatible.

Here are several quick and cost free ways to convert docx to doc.

Shortly after the release of Word 2007, Microsoft figured out that it had become its own worst enemy, so it released a compatibility pack allowing older versions to play nice with the docx format. Click here for information on installing the service pack.

OpenOffice is the free productivity suite of applications that rival Microsoft Office in features and capabilities. OpenOffice 3.1 and higher can open docx files. There are plenty of advantages to OpenOffice beyond this one (here is a previous blog post on the subject), So I encourage you to give it a spin.

Zamzar is a ad-supported service where a file can be uploaded and converted. A direct link is then sent via email. This works well, however, there is usually a delay between when the file is uploaded, and when the email arrives to the inbox.

If you have a following on Twitter, chances are very good that someone will have access to Word 2007. Email them the file and they will save it as a doc file and then send back to you. I tweeted for help on a conversion, and I had the correct file in about 10 minutes. This is less time that it would have taken to install the service pack or OpenOffice, or to wait for an email from Zamzar!

Knowledge is Obsolete

2010-01-20T12:38:00.000-05:00

When I was about 15 years old I was the proud frontman and guitarist in a small-town rock band. In addition to these duties, I also took it upon myself to wear the hat of webmaster. This was in 1997 - before the days of Myspace and Facebook. Instead, I turned to free web hosting sites like the now useless Geocities and Angelfire. WYSIWYG editors were still fairly uncommon at the time so I printed off some tutorials and started hard coding my site. This is how I learned HTML.

More than a decade later, and I’m still up to my old tricks. I recently started another band, and knowing the importance of a web presence, decided to create a website for the project. After looking through some links saved to my Delicious account, I realized something very important. All my coding skills from 1997 mean almost nothing in 2010.

Knowledge is obsolete.

Instead of HTML body tags, it’s CSS now. Instead of fancy Flash menus, it’s all about jQuery. And what the hell is AJAX?!

Fortunately for me, I know where to go for help, and how to practice and master new skills on my own. At some point in my formal education, I learned how to learn.

This is what teachers need to impress on students. Knowledge becomes worthless surprisingly fast, but the ability to acquire new knowledge is essential.

Don’t teach knowledge. Teach learning.

Amazing New Teaching Resource

2010-01-12T12:45:00.000-05:00

I found a new resource for teachers. After reading this impressive list, any teacher would be crazy not to want to use this as a teaching tool in their classroom.

Here are the highlights:

It’s a medium many students are very familiar with despite the obvious disapproval of parents.

It’s a world of fantasy where students use their imaginations to draw themselves into the action.

Students learn to interpret a distinct language and dialogue. Social interaction and understanding body language is also extremely important.

This resource is also highly differentiated. It caters to students’ needs, preferences, and interests.

This resource is already a major part of society. Your students practically live and breathe is, so you may as well take advantage and use it in your classroom.

Do you want to know what this incredible resource is? After reading all the attributes listed above, did you think this was about using video games in the classroom? If so, then you were dead wrong. I was describing pornography.

Looked at in the right light, anything can become an instrument of instruction. But that doesn’t mean it’s meant to be used as one. I thought about this while reading an article this morning from The Guardian, titled “Why playing in the virtual world has an awful lot to teach children.” It speaks highly of students interacting in a virtual environment and learning skills similar to those in the real world. Does this sound like an oxymoron to anyone else?

Why would I simulate a real world encounter when they can experience the real thing first-hand? Obviously, I’m not referring to opportunities like virtual field trips and Skype conferencing. I talking about the pedagogy of sticking a group of students in a computer lab and then holding a discussion with them using something like Second Life. This just doesn’t make sense to me.

I wouldn’t suggest showing a film illustrating tantric sex to introduce a phys ed unit on yoga, and I wouldn’t recommend to a science teacher that he/she show Ron Jeremy clips to spark discussion on Darwin’s natural selection and survival of the fittest. Why would I ever think to use a virtual world to encourage students to interact with each other?!

Just because the shoe fits, doesn't mean it's ever meant to be worn.

5 Similes

2010-01-05T23:11:00.000-05:00

How can teachers use technology in their classrooms when their access to it is so restricted?!

It's like asking a bricklayer to build a house with a $0 brick budget.

It's like criticizing a baker's bland cookies when he has a 1/2 cup sugar ration.

It's like making a race car driver jog the Daytona 500.

It's like auditioning for the philharmonic with a kazoo.

It's like eating spaghetti with chopsticks.

New Year's Reflection 2009

2010-01-04T14:41:00.000-05:00

2009 marked the birth of this blog, and it’s one of my goals to continue using it into the new decade. I didn’t want to set a quantitative resolution because a good blog has a natural ebb and flow. I don’t want to post just for the sake of posting. I’d rather have quality instead of quantity. Instead, I thought it would be a good first post of 2010 if I were to choose my favorite posts from 2009. My resolution is to do the same thing next year and hopefully have an even better crop of posts to choose from.

Classroom in the Cloud’s best blog posts of 2009

New Year’s resolutions are great (and I make/break them annually), but there’s another practice that I think more people should take part in – New Year’s Reflections. It’s okay that you’re four days late; take a few minutes today to think about what you did well last year and what didn’t go exactly as planned. 2010 is your chance.

Fundraising with Justin Bieber

2009-12-18T12:42:00.001-05:00

Several weeks ago, local pop radio station Kiss 98.5 announced a penny drive to benefit Women and Children’s hospital. The school that raises the most money wins a special concert by teen heartthrob Justin Bieber.

The middle school where I teach is all abuzz about the potential of winning the contest. Kids are bringing in money by the bag full. So what if he’s a flash in the pan? It’s raising money for a good cause.

To help promote the contest, I started making daily Bieber pictures for teachers to hang in their rooms. I’ve been Photoshopping stupid pictures since I was about 16, so it only takes about 15 minutes for me to make one, and the kids love it. I admit that I’ve never even heard a Justin Bieber song until just recently, but again, it’s for a good cause so I’ll pretend to be as excited about him as all the kids. Teachers seem entertained too – every morning I’m greeted with an inbox full of kudos from my colleagues on the day’s Bieber propaganda.

And this is why I’m so surprised to hear rumors of a grumbling few who find my daily emails offensive or inappropriate. A colleague warned me today that she had overheard two other members of the faculty complaining. They said they were going to email me and ask to stop sending pictures.

I look forward to reminding them that my pictures are all in good fun, and intended to raise money for an excellent organization. Furthermore, I completely stand behind anything that unifies a school and creates an environment of comradery.

Or maybe I can just remind them that it’s the holiday season.

Don’t be a grinch.

Live Like You're on Camera (Part II)

2009-12-14T13:15:00.000-05:00

The other day while flipping channels, I turned to CNN and caught a breaking news story. It wasn’t about the war overseas, or the numerous financial problems plaguing the U.S. – it was about TLC’s celeb-reality stars Jon and Kate Gosslin’s court appearance.

This was the event that demanded live coverage?

Over the course of the five seasons of Jon and Kate plus 8, viewers have taken sides between the irritable Kate and the seemingly irresponsible Jon, but they’re all wrong. It’s both of their faults that their marriage (and the lives of their 8 children) have gone down the gutter. They didn’t live like their life was on camera.

This is ironic, because they literally spent every waking moment with a camera crew recording their every movement and ever spat. The reason their relationship fell a part was because they forgot about the cameras.

Let their public debacle be a lesson learned for all of us. As teachers, we are not plagued by television cameras in our classes. Instead, we have something far worse - dozens of pairs of eyes always curious to see what their teacher is going to do or say. Never get too comfortable.

Live - and teach - like you're on camera.

(Like this post? This was part II in my series of "live like you're on camera" posts. Read my other one, here.)

Live Like You’re on Camera (Part I)

2009-12-11T12:32:00.001-05:00

Google’s chief executive Eric Schmidt got himself into some hot water earlier this week when responding to a question regarding the privacy of Google users. His response prompted Mozilla’s Firefox to shift support to competing Microsoft engine Bing as a suggested add-on to the browser, but Schmidt’s answer made sense and was perhaps just a bit too honest for Firefox to stomach. He stated, "If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place.”

Those are good words to live by, but I've got something better; similar sentiment, but with a nicer ring.

Today marks the beginning of a three-part series that has been rattling around in my head for a few weeks. Defenestrate your proverbs, mantras, and words of wisdom. Follow my simple advice, and you will lead a long life free from the tangles of controversy.

Live like you’re on camera.

Real World Example of Plagiarism

2009-12-08T09:20:00.000-05:00

I occasionally mark posts on here with the tag “practice what you preach” because we must lead by example – as adults, as role models, as professionals. Unfortunately, not everyone follows that simple, time-tested mantra.

Here is a review for the inspirational movie “The Blind Side” published by Erica Yunghans for Dunkirk NY’s daily paper, the Observer on November 28th, 2009.

And here is another review for the same movie published about two weeks earlier by Associated Press writer Glenn Whipp.

Notice any similarities?

There are two things about this that shock me. First, that a professional writer (I’m assuming Yunghans has a degree in journalism) would have the audacity to plagiarize in the first place, and secondly that the Observer has not yet reprimanded one of their editors for committing such a blatant crime. As a professional daily publication, I would hope the Observer is conscience of its credibility and reputation.

I wanted to share these two links so that they can be passed on to your students. Use this as a real world example of plagiarism. Let the lesson be that while it’s very, very easy to steal another’s work from the Internet, it’s even easier to get caught doing so.

If you’d like to contact Erica Yunghans, she can be reached at eyunghans@observertoday.com.

Using Etherpad in the Classroom

2009-12-02T12:50:00.000-05:00

My students have spent the past few days reading and analyzing Poe’s classic poem, The Raven. I plan to use it to teach mood and imagery, but before that can happen they need a firm handle on the poem itself.

Classes were divided into groups of 3-4 and given the simple direction to read each stanza and then summarize it. Some stanzas are trickier than others, but overall this activity gives them a nice overview of the poem.

In the past, I would conclude this by randomly calling kids to share summaries as I wrote them on the board. This was a slow and laborious task to get through considering the poem is 18 stanzas long. Instead, I decided to give Etherpad a try.

I wrote about Etherpad in my post 10 Useful Chat Sites for Teachers. The thing that struck me most about the service wasn’t the chat capabilities, but the shared collaborating space that updates in real time. This is similar to Google Docs, but students can hop on and start collaborating without registering a username. Quick and easy.

It took about 30 seconds to set up the Etherpad workspace. Students figured it out with another 30 seconds of explanation. The first task was to have the seven groups in my class enter summaries for the 18 stanzas. Then, they went back and checked over what was written and either adding or amending what was there.

Each group’s work was highlighted with a different color, so it was easy for me to keep track of who was participating. There is also a playback feature that allowed me to see the whole thing unfold once the activity was complete (I used this to show off my students’ work when I open the workspace for my principal later in the day).

The only problem I encountered was when two groups wanted to work on the same stanza. It was actually quite comical – while one typed, the other deleted it to try and enter their own interpretation. I guess I shouldn’t complain when students fight over who gets to participate in a class activity.

When I noticed the typing on the workspace slowing, I took it as a sign that the groups were running out of ideas. I stopped the class and then went through each stanza’s summary. If there were things missing, I entered them as we talked. At the end of the period, I downloaded their work as a PDF and I can now make copies and hand it out tomorrow. We’ll use it tomorrow to begin looking at the mood of the poem.

Including the time it took me to turn the computer on, this activity took less then 5 minutes to set up and explain to my students. Etherpad worked very well for me. Rather than spend the period hovering over an overhead projector, students took control of the lesson. And they did a much better job of it together than I ever could alone.

Internet Filtering - Restriction or Protection?

2009-12-01T14:58:00.000-05:00

I still believe we should be teaching Internet responsibility and digital citizenship to our students instead of trying to hide all the bad things behind a big iron curtain. But the fact remains that the Internet is a complex and sometimes seedy beast. It’s easy to forget that fact when search results for well-intentioned lesson plans get blocked, or when you watch students spend a period trying to sneak their way onto a gaming website. This is when the frustrated teacher throws his/her hands in the air and declares the filter to be the work of the devil. But for every game blocked, that filtering software is also blocking potential predators, unsavory images, and God knows what else.

I was thinking about this more over the weekend while flipping through the Black Friday edition of The Buffalo News. There were two stories on the front page of the City and Region section that highlighted someone using the Internet. One was about a Michigan man using a Genealogy website to find his long-lost birthmother. The other was about a local filmmaker getting arrested for having downloaded more than 1300 child-porn images. These articles create an interesting juxtaposition.

So what’s the answer? Is it to open the floodgates and hope no one gets swept away in the current? Is it to turn off the lights and sit in darkness? Perhaps it’s a bit of both, but where to draw the line is as big (if not bigger) or a question that whether filtering is needed in the first place.

Thank You, Dunkin' Donuts

2009-11-30T12:49:00.000-05:00

After just two weeks, my personal crusade against the grammatical inconsistencies of Dunkin' Donuts has come to a peaceful resolution.

On Monday, November 16th, I saw this sign hanging at a nearby Dunkin' Donuts. I wrote them a complaint letter via their website feedback form, and wrote more about the situation, here.

Within a few short hours, I was contacted via Twitter and this blog by Dunkin' Donuts. Within less than 12 hours of my original complaint, the sign had been removed. My blog post, here, explains more.

Two days ago, I received a package postmarked November 19th from Dunkin' Donuts headquarters. Not only did they send me a written apology, but they also included 2 pounds of delicious Dunkin' Donuts coffee grounds.

So this post is simply to say, thank you. You made good, Dunkin' Donuts.

Student Examples - Storybird.com (Part II)

2009-11-25T14:22:00.005-05:00

Yesterday I posted the first round of finished student stories using Storybird.com, and I figure it's only fair to give all the projects equal exposure. Here are the rest of them.

Students were more than thrilled to see comments on their work. If you find yourself looking to kill some time while waiting for that Thanksgiving turkey to thaw, perhaps you could leave some feedback for my kiddos. It would be greatly appreciated, and a chance for students to see what publishing for a real world audience is all about!

Was It Better Not To Know ? on Storybird

Monster In The Closet on Storybird

The Life of Destinino on Storybird

Charlie On The Moon on Storybird

The Mighty Jungle on Storybird

The Lonely Girl on Storybird

The Yeti on Storybird

Bad Luck on Storybird

The First Rabbit on the Moon on Storybird

The Orange Chair on Storybird

Who Stole My Cheese? on Storybird

Imagination Gone Wild!!! on Storybird

I Wish I was a Bunny on Storybird

There Is No Such Thing As Monsters! on Storybird

Where's Santa? on Storybird

Birthday Truth on Storybird

Student Examples - Storybird.com

2009-11-24T14:52:00.005-05:00

My students have been hard at work creating stories on Storybird.com that answer the essential question, "Is it better not to know?" I wrote about the project in a previous blog post, so I thought I would share their finished work. If you have a few minutes, please read them and feel free to comment on their stories. What a great experience it would be for them to come to class in the morning and see their stories have been read by a worldwide audience! (To add comments, click on the title of the story located under the embedded file.)

The girl who wished to be a mermaid on Storybird

The Tower on Storybird

The Disappearance on Storybird

Glenn's Adventure on Storybird

THE WOODS on Storybird

The Story Teller on Storybird

Lost Fish on Storybird

The Flutist on Storybird

The Fox and The Pig on Storybird

The Mystical Gorilla and the Monkey on Storybird

10 Useful Chat Sites for Teachers

2009-11-22T17:05:00.012-05:00

Several years ago, I used Chatzy.com to conduct an after-reading discussion on Poe's The Raven. I found using a chatroom to be more effective than a traditional verbal conversation. Quiet kids were more willing to participate, and even the kids who were not typing were actively reading the discussion as it unfolded in front of them. Imagine my disappointment late last week when I discovered Chatzy to now be blocked by my school's filtering software.

So the hunt for a new chat service began. The following sites came from Twitter, my Delicious account, and some creative searching on Google. I'm loosely defining them as chat sites, but they cover everything from chatting and back channeling to video chat and microblogging. I made this quick reference chart to give a very general overview of features for each site, and I also wrote a quick blurb about each. Of course, I omitted much, so I leave it to you, reader, to explore these sites to your heart's content. Enjoy!

Stinto.net is a German site. While the chat platform itself is in English, the help, about, and blog pages are not. This means that unless you are bilingual, Stinto does not offer any user support. This is the site I actually chose to replace my beloved Chatzy, and so far it has worked flawlessly with my students.

Tinychat is one of the more popular back channeling sites. Because of this, it is probably the most likely of the sites on this list to be blocked by your school’s filtering software. It has recently integrated a full-functioning video chat feature, which means incredible potential for use in schools, but also incredible potential that one of the rooms featured on the main page of the site will feature something distasteful or obscene.

Todaysmeet does not list the chat participants. This makes it impossible to know if a student is present in the chat but not participating, or if even worse, if an unwanted guest is silently listening in to the conversation. On the plus side, it's possibly one of the most stylish sites on this list. If you want something that looks and behaves "2.0," Todaysmeet is it.

Cover it Live is technically a “live blogging” platform, but I thought I would include it in this list because it allows viewers to submit comments to the moderating user. I could see this working in a more teacher-centered discussion. Cover it Live is designed to be embedded into a website, so this is ideal for use on a class blog or homepage.

Chatzy is ad-supported, but they can be removed and additional features unlocked for a $9 fee. This site also includes a private messaging option which can be turned on and off by the administrator (the person who created the chat).

Etherpad includes a collaborative workspace that is updated in real time for all users to interact with. This is a major advantage, however Etherpad only allows 16 users to be logged in to a pad at a time, which is a deal breaker if you’re working with a large number of students.

Edmodo is education’s answer to Twitter. It includes the same microblogging functionality as well as a few other features such as file sharing and scheduling. It takes some setting up though, so if you’re looking for a chat site that is quick and easy, this isn’t for you.

Tokbox is pretty overwhelming. Video messaging, instant messaging, video conferencing, etc. If you're a teacher looking to integrate long distance learning into your class for no money, this is an excellent avenue to explore.

Chatmaker is a bare bones chat site. It gets the job done, and does it well. The deal breaker for me was the Google-generated text ads. Most of them were suggestive, if not downright inappropriate for students. (Here's a screenshot of what I'm talking about.)

Shout 'em is another site, similar to Edmodo that allows a user to create their own microblogging network. The difference, however, is that Shout 'em can be specifically customized – everything from settings and functionality, all the way to design and color scheme.

Two Words That Start With Z

2009-11-19T15:11:00.002-05:00

5 Things Students Do (That Drive Me Insane)

2009-11-19T12:42:00.010-05:00

Write on my whiteboard
It seems that the moment a dry erase marker is left unattended someone feels the compelling urge to document who is their best friend on my whiteboard. Is it genetic? I suspect a correlation between whiteboard graffiti and children who get immunization shots. How's that for a possible case study?

After missing a day of class, ask “Did we do anything while I was out?”
We actually spent the day coloring you a get well card. Did it arrive yet?

Slam Books on the Floor
When I ask kids to clear their desks, I generally get three types of responses. A minority of students calmly take their belongings and place them beside their chairs. Well done. Another third of the class flings their things, with a wide sweeping motion of their arm, across the floor around them. It’s sloppy, but I can deal with it. It’s the remaining students that drive me nuts. Upon hearing my command to remove their belongings, the proceed to take their textbook (weighing no less than 18 pounds, or so it would seem) and hold it about shoulder height like a waiter carrying a tray. Then with a swiftness of hand, allow the book to fall flat to the ground. The sound of textbook-on-tile is the teacher equivalent to a mortar going off on a battlefield. Flashbacks after retirement are inevitable.

Ask to use the Bathroom at the Most Inconvenient Times
Let me illustrate this one with a fictional story (fictional only in the sense that the names and lesson are imagined – this scenario happens daily).

The teacher looked out at her students. “Time to practice math facts!” As she began calling out numbers, students’ hands shot into the air.
“Six times five,” called the teacher. “Go ahead, Jimmy.”
“Thirty.”
“Nice job. Three times three,” continued the teacher. “Katelyn?”
“Nine.”
“Good! How about eight times four?”
Josh raised his hand. “Is it forty?”
“Incorrect, Josh,” replied the teacher. “Who can help him out?”
Sam raised his hand.
“Yes, Sam?” asked the teacher, point at his outstretched arm.
“Can I go to the bathroom?”

Nothing brings a lesson to a screeching halt like learning of a student's need to urinate.

Sit in My Chair
When did it become okay to sit at the teacher’s desk? When I was in school I just assumed teachers lived in their classrooms. Sitting at their desk would be the same as inviting myself to their house for coffee and dessert. My chair is not community butt space. Stay out of it.

The Power of Twitter

2009-11-17T15:04:00.009-05:00

Last night I wrote this blog post about a grammar error I spotted on a sign at a local Dunkin' Donuts restaurant. It included a picture of the offending advertisement and a copy of the feedback note I sent using the form on the Dunkin' Donuts website. I tweeted the post to my 900 or so followers.

I noticed this morning more than a dozen visitors to my blog from Canton, Massachusetts. I had a hunch about this, and after a quick visit back to dunkindonuts.com, my suspicions were confirmed - this very blog was being visited by folks working in the corporate offices of Dunkin' Donuts.

How's that for the power of Twitter?

Soon after, I was contacted by Dunkin' Donuts. Out of their 38,000 followers and millions of other Twitter users, my voice had been heard and addressed directly. How cool is that?

It's nice to see a company that is willing to speak directly to their consumers; a quick look at @dunkindonuts reveals most posts to be replies to other users. They are not using Twitter to market, but to connect - and that's what it's really about.

It's also nice to see a company take responsibility for their actions. The sign issue is on the smallest of scales, but it renews my faith in consumerism just a little bit. Even moreso, it reminds me how powerful one voice can be when heard by the right people.

Grammar Enthusiasts VS. Dunkin' Donuts

2009-11-16T22:04:00.010-05:00

When did society decide to stop following even the most basic rules of grammar and punctuation? Take this sign, for example. I passed two Dunkin' Donuts restaurants on the way home from work today and both had these taped to the windows. Presumably they were professionally made and distributed to the franchises by the corporation. How did the glaring grammatical error go unnoticed?

Maybe I'm being extreme, but this isn't the first time I've caught a problem with a sign at Dunkin' Donuts.

So I wrote a letter. You can read it in its entirely down below. Wouldn't it be cool if you wrote a similar letter to Dunkin' Donuts (or copied and pasted mine) stressing the importance of grammar in promotional documents? The corporation can be contacted here. If you do, leave me a note in the comments. You never know - maybe Dunkin' Donuts will be compelled to send monetary compensation!

I am writing to alert you of a serious problem that I noticed while visiting one of your Dunkin' Donuts locations. Taped to the front window of your restaurant was an advertisement for an upcoming promotional offer. It stated “Were opening at 3am on Black Friday.” From a marketing standpoint, this seems like a great idea, however it was not the strategy that alarmed me – it was the blatant grammatical error. The spelling difference between “were” and “we're” are subtle, but the meanings of these words are quite different. It is alarming to me that such a well-known restaurant chain would make such a silly error on a sign that is undoubtedly hanging in every franchise window. I am skeptical of ingesting food and drink from a restaurant that cannot catch simple mistakes that are easily detectable by the average 4^th grade student.

UPDATE: (11/17/09) - Dunkin' Donuts contacted me about 12 hours after this was posted. Read about it here.