Join us at the Apple Store in the West Towne Mall, Madison, WI on Saturday, February 18 at 8:00 a.m. to learn about how the iPad is being used in education.
In addition, STEM information, the Discovery Mobile App., and a variety of other educational apps. will be shared.  Discovery Education members are invited as we explore how the new iPad2, along with the thousands of apps. now available in the Apps Store are being used in education in many creative and innovative ways.  You will have a chance to hear from other educators as to how they are using the iPad in the classroom. In addition, you will also learn about Discovery Education’s ground-breaking iPad web app, which focuses on student exploration of safe and appropriate educational content.
This event is limited to 30 people, so don’t delay, register today!

If you have questions please contact
Rita A. Mortenson
Rita.Mortenson@verona.k12.wi.us
608-845-4445
Tentative Agenda includes:
8:00 a.m. – Arrive at the Apple Store and enjoy a light breakfast (rolls,coffee).
8:15 Apple iPad Staff will introduce the iPad 2 and ongoing updates.
9:15 Experience The Discovery Education iPad2 App and the different ways you can integrate this app with others to invigorate your students’ learning at any level K – 12! Learn how to integrate STEM  for any age of student.
9:45  Prizes and Group Photo
10:00  Official ending of the event.

Register to experience iPads in Madison WI

DEN News: ICE Conference :

Are you attending the ICE Conference in Illinois?  This is a fantastic event running from Feb 28 – March 2.  ICE : Innovate, Collaborate, Educate is an event not to be missed!  Make it extra special and attend the Discovery Education Minute to DEN-It Reception on February 29th  from 5 – 7 PM at the New Orleans Ballroom in the Pheasant Run Resort!

Come to this great networking event to kick off the 2012 ICE Conference, meeting and networking  with new DEN Colleagues while learning more about the DEN  while testing your skills at several “Minute to Win-It” type games!

Register Here for  the Minute to DEN-It at ICE 

All these apps and tools help students understand 21st C. STEM ideas, pushing our kids to analyze from multiple perspectives.
Hall went on to share apps that can help us all communicate on a global scale, sharing translations, shazam and wordLens.  As we venture into the global neighborhood, these translation type apps will help open communication between our students and countries.

I am so glad I ended my Digital Learning Day with Hall! Check out The Siemen’s Archives  to delve deeper into Hall’s STEMazing presentation! Thanks Hall!

Discovery Education members are invited as we explore how the new iPad2, along with the thousands of apps. now available in the Apps Store are being used in education in many creative and innovative ways.

You will have a chance to hear from other educators as to how they are using the iPad in the classroom. In addition, you will also learn about Discovery Education’s ground-breaking iPad web app, which focuses on student exploration of safe and appropriate educational content.

This event is limited to 30 people, so don’t delay, register today!

Tentative Agenda includes:

8:00 a.m. – Arrive at the Apple Store and enjoy a light breakfast (rolls, coffee).

8:15 a.m. – Hear a presentation from the Apple staff about the iPad2 and have an opportunity to try it.

9:15 a.m. – Have an opportunity to see the Discovery Education iPad2 App. and hear from other educators as to how they are using the iPad in the classroom. In addition, iPad  STEM integration will also be shared. This event if for ALL grade levels.

9:45 a.m. – Prizes and group photo.

10:00 a.m. – End of event!

If you have questions please contact

Rita A. Mortenson
Rita.Mortenson@verona.k12.wi.us
608-845-4445

To Register Click the Link Below:

I Want To Experience DEN  iPad in WI!

Step 1: We started out by having each child pick an African animal that they are interested in. They had to find book resources as well as internet resources to research their animal. Here is a link to the document that they used – Animal Research.

Step 2: Next each student went to Discovery Education and found a close-up image of their animal and the citation for the image. We used iPads for this part but a computer would also work.

Step 3: Each student FaceJacked their image to reply to the six questions that they had posed. Many students changed their voices to make it sound like the animal was talking. On the computer, blabberize will do the same thing as facejack. We then sent all of the Facejack images to the students email address since the final stage of the project would necessitate using a computer.

Step 4: Using our green screen and flip camera on a tripod, each student recorded their questions one at a time for easy manipulation later in the project.

Step 5: Day 1 in the computer lab (about 45 mins.). We took all of the resources that had been collected – 7 green screen video clips (including 6 questions and an introduction), 6 facejack video clips, and one citation page and put them into iPhoto. Students also found one more image on DE to use for their background image and citated that image. Now we had all the parts.

Step 6: Day 2 in the computer lab (1 hour) – putting all the pieces together.

Using iMovie, students designed their title page.

Next the facejack video were pulled into the project area in order.

Between each facejack video, students placed their background image with 2 images at the beginning for the introduction and the first question.

I showed students how to check the length of the green screen video clip and match the image timing to the video clip.

Lastly each green screen video clip was dragged on to the image corresponding to the space before each answer. With the advanced settings enabled, a choice for the green screen would show when the video hovered over the already placed image.

Here are just some of the amazing projects that my third grade students created.

What is project based learning?
Project based learning is an in-depth student/teacher designed investigation that incorporates
1. Posing real-life questions that students want to find the answers to
2. Researching, investigating, and documenting the answers to the questions that are posed
3. Sharing the investigation and answers with a larger audience

What is the role of the teacher?
The role of the teacher is to guide children through the steps of posing a question that can be answered or investigated, gathering accurate information through accurate research and observations, and sharing the information in a way that others can benefit from the learning.

What is the role of the student?
The role of the student is to pose the question, gather information, and share what is learned. This can occur as a whole group, small group, or individual depending on the project.

Why is it effective learning?
Project based learning incorporates all areas of learning which engages students to pursue something that interests them, learn how to research, gather information, use resources or observations accurately, and share their learning with others. These are skills that all life-long learners need to have which is why project based learning is so powerful.

Learn more about project based learning through these resources
“More Fun Than a Barrel of . . . Worms?!” – Diane Curtis, Edutopia
http://www.edutopia.org/more-fun-barrel-worms

“Geometry Students Angle into Architecture Through Project Learning” – Sara Armstrong, Edutopia
http://www.edutopia.org/geometry-real-world-students-architects

“March of the Monarchs: Students Follow the Butterflies’ Migration”
- Diane Curtis, Edutopia
http://www.edutopia.org/march-monarchs

Since the start of the school year, the 3rd graders in Ms. Karie Huttner’s class and the high school students in Ms. Julie Jenewein’s, class along with Ms. Rita Mortenson, have been busy making music, videos and skyping (video chatting) with schools around the world. As participants who applied, and were selected to the 15th season of “Rock Our World” they have been working with over 1000 students from 43 schools in 6 continents.

Each season, Rock Our World focuses on a challenged based learning project, as well as having students create music using GarageBand (a software program available on the Mac). On a weekly basis, students use GarageBand to create a music track that is then sent to other schools around the world. The end result after weeks and weeks of schools adding additional tracks –a beautiful song that everyone is proud of.

This season, Rock Our World’s Challenge was: Healthy Eating and Sustainability. The essential question that students researched was “How can we eat healthy with the lowest carbon footprint possible?” The challenge to all students was
“Improve your family’s healthy eating choices and find solutions for your community’s sustainable foods.” Carol Anne McGuire, Founder of Rock Our World has developed an amazing collaborative project that really gets students thinking about others around the world. Coming together on projects such as these gives students the opportunity to learn about
new cultures, meet new friends, and use 21st century skills while learning and having fun.

The culmination of the season ends with what is called family night. This is a time where students get to skype and be interviewed by a team of students in California. All schools participating can follow along via the live stream on the internet.

Rock our World: 2011
A few of the schools participating this year besides Verona Area School District were schools in: California, Ontario, Canada, Massachusetts, Hawaii, Tasmania, Australia; Christchurch, NZ; Nayland, New Zealand; Mexico, Lima, Peru, Poland, Germany, Belgium and Kita City, Tokoyo, Japan.

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Are YOUR Students Ready To Rock Our World? APPLY HERE

Read more about Kari’s  Students’ experiences

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Rita:

I am honored to announce that we have a brand new STAR Discovery Educator from Verona, Wisconsin – Ms. Julie Jenewein.

I had an opportunity to chat with Julie about her recent STAR status and how technology has impacted her students. Here is what she had to say.

Q: What is your certification and title at VAHS?
A: My certification is currently in English, Spanish, ESL, Alternate Education and I have my MS is in Educational Administration and C & I. I teach ESL and Spanish a little over half of my day and the other half of my day is spent as the ELL/Bilingual Coordinator at the high school and two middle schools.

Q: What is your favorite one or three web 2.o tools and iPad apps.
A: My favorite Web 2.0 tools for communicating and sharing are Edmodo and Google docs. I love Extranormal, Animoto and Blabberize for presentations and video presentations. Discovery Streaming is one of the best ways for me to differentiate and personalize instruction.

Some of my favorite apps on my iPad include Google maps, Instapaper, RecipeBook, iMovie and iBook.

Q: How have you seen technology change the way your students learn?
A: I feel that the use of technology really enhances teaching and learning of languages.
Technology has helped my ELL students become more confident in their use of English because many of the apps we use allow them to have fun while taking risks speaking a new language. We are very fortunate to have been able to provide each student with an iPod Touch loaded with lots of learning opportunities.

Q: What has been one of the best parts about being an educator?
A: The best part about teaching is being around so many innovative people, both teachers and students that are always eager to collaborate and share ideas.

We are fortunate to have Julie on our STAR DEN team and look forward to working with her on upcoming events. Congratulations Julie!

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Take time to Learn more about Julie and her role in 21st C. learning and Rock Our World and Bilingual Elementary Education

So this year I wrote another proposal and was able to get a class set of wood looms and another silkworm farm. Now I am a learner just like my students so this time I didn’t cook them.

Here is some of our footage using a proscope.

Our plan is to teach our students about the life cycle of the silkworm, document the cycle, harvest the silk from the cocoons, and weave with the silk.

Check out the example grant and go for it! What would you like to do in your classroom? What technology could help change your students’ learning?

Back in the day when I was in school, I was sometimes assigned to conduct research in many classes, demonstrating my knowledge gained through giving a speech, (or presentation) in front of class, or writing an essay. There were not many choices then. Sometimes we could choose between hand written or typed work. Speeches were allowed some variety in “visual props” that were used, utilizing posters, overheads, or the giant document projector that crowded the front of the room.

The options grew once schools had the power of computer labs; PowerPoint became the focus of contemporary, professional presentations. PowerPoint took center stage for a solid 10 years in the classroom, making teachers feel they were doing students justice, offering this computer support. We all started to Jazz up our PowerPoints with video and hyperlinks. Slideshows got longer, more wordy… and the presenter often became the narrator, reading each slide because all the thoughts were so well prepared, and people in the back row could not see the 18 pt font in shadow italics.

Many of our students  love to experiment with a number of new technology tools  available to the.   Because teachers have not had the opportunity to understand the 21st C learning shift, they may assign students to do a presentation using  only PowerPoint.  Sometimes a student may inquire about using Prezi, or another web tool, and the teacher, not realizing the options would  dismiss the idea of  choice. Why?… Maybe the teacher intimidated by the prospect of new technology he does not know… or maybe he does not realize there are other viable, respectful ways to present a speech…(Assuming this presentation objective was not relative to learning PowerPoint). I  do find times where PowerPoint is the best choice, but there are many more opportunities to use  new alternatives as well.  By allowing our students the opportunity to meet learning targets through multiple tools and resources, we encourage 21st C learning and sharing for all. 

Over the last few years, options beyond PowerPoint have grown substantially, offering opportunities for students to present their knowledge in many unique ways. Teachers only need to grade the student relative to a rubric based on the subject matter, offering and encouraging options to PowerPoint.  By expecting students to meet the needs of the content within their research, yet allowing students to choose how to express their final project, we create a learning opportunity for all.  Students who are naturally interested in trying new web tools, should be offered the latitude to attempt this integration into their projects. By offering this latitude, we empower students to share and teach us and their peers more than just the content, demonstrating we are all lifelong learners.

I’m sure many students will opt to use the PowerPoint, but some will venture out, using different engaging tools like Prezi, knovio, iMovie, MovieMaker, Google Chrome SlideRocket or iPad Publishing through apps like Explain Everything.

Students should be encouraged to seek out more than one dimension of presentation, incorporating other iPad apps, or web tools like Flip Cameras, Animoto, PicCollage, Flikr, Xtranormal, Green Screen or JellyCam stop action video, which can enhance and personalize their projects further. Integrating resources and videos from Discovery Education Streaming will further enhance both the initial research as well as the final presentation product.

My students are directed to create a web 2.0 production focused on “Closing the STEM Gap” Their rubric clearly defines the expectations:
• Introduce the scientific application, presenting information about scientific topic
• Explain the mathematical foundation providing an example or two.
• Show a demonstration of the scientific application
• Explain 2 examples of the scientific calculation.
• Find a Discovery Education Streaming element to reinforce your project, including a link to the resource.

The project design is meant to encourage 21st Century STEM Publishing.  Each project must stand on its own with no presenter needed because the best projects are published on our public wiki, becoming a resource for teachers and students from around the world.  Students are allowed to use any web 2.0 tools and iPad apps to accomplish this task. Students are exposed to the many options above over time, so as to not overwhelm them.  Students are encouraged to share new web 2.0 tools and iPad apps as they discover them.

Here are some examples of student presentations incorporating a variety of Web 2.0 tools and resources including Discovery Education Streaming:

Brandy uses flip video, Animoto, Prezi and iPad Explain Everything App to explain mathematics of pendulums She adds an extension to Discovery Education Resources!

Trevyn uses Prezi and iPad ShowMe, iPad Star Walk, and Pic Collage to explain Scientific Notation and dimensional analysis.  Trevyn was happy with using show me because the videos came out so well, but when he saw what other kids had made with Explain Everything, he wanted to use that app too.  Trevyn is about to redo his show me spots using Explain everything so he can republish.

Maggie uses Prezi, flip video, iMovie, iPad EasyChart, Discovey Education Streaming and Explain Everything for presenting slope of a line  relative to density.

Matt uses Prezi, Animoto,  YouTube, Flip Video,JellyCam Stop Action,  and Discovery Education Streaming to present inverse variation for pressure and volume.

These and other great projects are now available to you on  our wiki : STEMagic WI . This link takes you directly to the current 2012 projects.  Surf other pages on the wiki for specific STEM areas.

Surprisingly, my students were a bit intimidated at first, as many past projects  in other classes were more constricted and prescribed. The actual opportunity to be creative seems to intimidate them more than the web tools!  Part of becoming a 21st Century Learner, is taking the risks of exploring the resources and attempting the web tools.  Once students share what new publishing tools they integrated, the other students are motivated to attempt those new engaging tools too!

Empower Your Students to Present Creatively!

Scribble Press is a free iPad app that gives children the tool to create wonderful stories that they can share by email, to the gallery, or converted to an ebook.

Here are two examples:
Enrique created a story about Butterscotch, our classroom bunny.

David created a book about big cats using DE images though he forgot to add his citation page.

I love apps that engage my students in wanting to write and being excited about writing stories. Our iPad is filling with stories that my students have been creating.

Thank you Scribble Press!