MC in NC

Spell with Flikr

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 13:09:00 +0000

As I was browsing over other campers' answers to Week 3 homework, a fellow camper (Kelly Brannock) had created a really cool banner for her page using Spell with Flikr. Couldn't be easier: Go to the site, key in the word you want it to create and it pulls images of letters from Flikr. If you don't like a particular letter, you can have it go find another one. Not something I will use daily, but I can see how elementary students might like to use this for a spelling assignment or to jazz up online/print publications. For me personally--I'm using it to make labels for all of the containers of school supplies that I consolidated on Tuesday:)

Warning: Moderately Off Topic at first, but I get around to being relevant:)

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 00:46:00 +0000

I have just finished (started at 9:30 a.m.) clutterbusting our pantry--in the time that I was not untangling animals--today was a let's see how many times I can get wrapped around a tree and turn over my water bucket day, but at least I didn't get peed on today--that was yesterday's ordeal. Anyway... I felt inspired to blog about it. Managed to fill the trash receptacle that was just emptied this morning--sorry Waste Mgmt. And set aside two boxes and a trash bag that will go to Goodwill. Used a banana box to collect trash as I waded in and made seven trips to empty it--hence aforementioned full trash receptacle. Amazing how a change, like your children growing up--they are about 7 inches away from catching me, creates organization opportunites:) They can reach the top shelves in the pantry now, so more of the things they like have been relocated there...They can both lift close to 60 pounds, so I was able to chunk things together into bigger containers that they can move to get to whatever they want. They each still have a box for school things they want to save (oh, alright, things I want to save).

Reminds me that just as our family's use of space changes as we get older, so will my students' use of the media center. I normally do moderate rearranging each year, but feel like the time has come to create some areas designated for particular groups of learners. Historically, I have striven to maintain a "generic" space that can adapt to whomever needs to use it. Beginning to feel that maybe this is most suitable for the adults, but not necessarily the students who outnumber us 25 to one. So, hmmm??? Who should the space be most suitable for? The students.

Google Forms and Spreadsheets

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 03 Jul 2010 00:13:00 +0000

**Anyone who has seen the American Pie movies will get this next line**. So this one time at PBWorks Summer Camp, a presenter during one of our weekly webinars mentioned using a Google form for students to complete vocabulary practice activities. The simplicity of it is beautiful--the form gives the students a template to use, then their answers appear in a google spreadsheet that the teacher can use to check that the students have completed the assignment. Up to this point, I have mainly used google forms for surveys and sign up sheets. I am eager to try this use of google forms when I return to school in August. I will probably use it as a learning checkup to see if students have met the lesson's objectives.

**In the American Pie movies there is one character (a band geek) who attempts to relate everything to band camp. She begins a lot of her lines, "So this one time, at band camp...".

Virtual Camps and Unconferences

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 00:39:00 +0000

I have been attending PBWiki Summer Camp 2010 since June 21st and I must say, I am impressed with the content and the requirements. The leaders and mentors "get" that many of us are on summer break, on vacation, at home with school age children who are also home for the summer, etc. I am enjoying learning about how wikis work best in an educational setting. Week 1 was all about wiki basics, Week 2 is all about using plug ins to make the wiki more inviting, engaging, and interactive.
I was curious about the ISTE conference that is being held in Denver until tomorrow and as I was following tweets on Twitter, someone mentioned the ISTE Unplugged wiki. I have enjoyed plunking around the wiki and have had my own sort of Unconference by looking at the blogs/wikis of presenters that are mentioned by the people I follow on Twitter. Update--July 3, 2010--thanks to Marsha Erskine for sharing the ISTEVision site where you can go to see ISTE sessions that were recorded.

Text to Speech

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 12:07:00 +0000

Text to speech technology is rapidly improving and adapting. During the last two weeks of school a fourth grade teacher and I used glogster and xtranormal with her class to publish their research about technology in N.C. While using xtranormal, the students quickly caught on to the need to phrase questions carefully, so that the technology could get the intonation right. Just this morning while I was visiting the PBWorks Summer Camp wiki I read about someone using voki to embed a talking avatar into their wiki--takes all of five minutes, even if you fancy up your avatar. And of course, voicethread has been around for a long while now.

Enough about the cool factor--what I like about sites is the text to speech capability--users key in text and the tool transfers it to audible speech. I am amazed at how eagerly students approach learning tasks when these tools are used. And their increased conscientiousness is leading to better finished products that include more polished compositions. Afterall, who wants their avatar or their video characters to sound, well, you know, d@*b (there, I didn't say it)?

You Tube, Teacher Tube, Vimeo

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 13:01:00 +0000

Been aware of these Web 2.0 tools for a while, but never really given them much thought as to how they could fit in an elementary setting, so I never spent time to explore them until I read about a guy who is delivering lectures via You Tube (College 2.0: A Self-Appointed Teacher Runs a One-Man 'Academy' on YouTube http://bit.ly/bNTTy0
Thanks to Larry Ferlazzo for tweeting about it:)

I just uploaded my first You Tube video earlier this week to allow the colleague that I was preparing it for to review it and was amazed at 1. how easy it is to upload a file 2. contrary to my initial uninformed opinion, I was not besieged by pop ups, raunchy ads, raunchy videos, etc. and 3. I can control who has access the videos I upload.

Beginning to think that these tools would be an excellent way to implement reteaching activities and increase the students' capabilities to allow other students to provide feedback. For teachers--when they are preparing things for professional development, they can record real-class examples of the strategies they are using. And, finally, kids in our summer reading program really enjoy Storytime Online, so I am considering recruiting some of our local "celebrities" to complete a similar project.

Just exciting to think about the possibilities from these tools that I had more or less written off:)

I Know my mama, but not my MoMA

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 21:49:00 +0000

But I plan to use the Do You Know Your MoMA? feature with students who absolutely love art, but could care less for reading. Each segment has a blurb about each work of art. We have Word Masters and Math SuperStars at our elementary school--wouldn't be too hard for someone to keep track of results of students who want to play along. Makes me want to look to see if other opportunities exist for other content areas:)

Where in the world???

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 01:32:00 +0000

Happened to glance over at David's laptop the other night while he was studying for a Cultural Geography quiz and he was using activities at:
http://lizardpoint.com/fun/geoquiz/index.html
and
http://www.maps.com/FreeStuff.aspx#
to prepare. Pretty good success rate--he scored 18/20.
What I like about both sites' activities is that users get multiple chances to answer and I also like how both sites give informational corrections. Finally, the GeoQuiz at the maps.com site uses high quality maps and included movement from place to place as if the user is turning the globe.

It's Been a While...

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 21:51:00 +0000

With this new post comes a new goal--to visit at least every other day and discuss at least one new thing I have learned.

Was just thinking today as I was helping two of my colleagues burn DVDs of their 2nd grade class' year-in-pictures projects that with my use of google docs and the capacity to upload any file, that I have developed a much better understanding of file sizes,which elements of videos really bump up a project's size. Knowing these facts is helping me plan more effectively and communicate to our faculty how much production they can realistically expect to complete in a day's time. As a result, we are creating higher quality products, because we are not in a frenzied panic to get something done in 45 minutes that will in reality and by the necessity of the medium, software, and hardware we are using will take 2 1/2 to 3 times as long.

New To Me...Resources, Events, and Applications

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 12:29:00 +0000

I will be updating content as I learn about new resources, events, and applications. Decided to combine earlier posted content. If you know of something that absolutely, should be here, let me know:)

RSS is Really Simple Syndication: Using Feedburner makes it possible to set up an RSS feed in less than 3 minutes, and yes, I really did read all the options:) My husband has been using RSS on the pages that he builds for people, but it had never really dawned on me to use it, until I started subscribing to other people's blogs. Now granted, some of the content I include in this blog will be far from earth shattering to some, but now, at least if someone wants to keep tabs on what I am learning and posting, it will be easy, I mean "really simple":)

Constructing Modern Knowledge: Read about this event in David Warlick's blog this a.m. Looks like a wonderful opportunity for anyone interested in fusing creativity, communication, technology, pedagogy, etc. No go for me--in Texarkana that week for family birthdays. http://www.constructingmodernknowledge.com/Home.html

EPA Education Resources: I will be suggesting this to our Science Club sponsors since much of their programming focuses on conservation, preservation, etc.
http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/education/index.htm

Tomie DePaola Lit. Trip : by: Andy Losik--linked via Twitter

Exuberant Games : by: Natasha Oliver--Beginning Math Animated games with NO advertisements--woo hoo:)

I never knew that...

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 22:24:00 +0000

I will be updating this regularly, as I seem to learn daily, random, but very helpful tidbits about applications and programs that I have been using for years. I will insert newer content at the top, so, well, you know...

4. Adding labels to a blog post is as simple as noticing that there is a field for labels/tags, and taking the time to key in major topics mentioned in the post. I have been using this blog since Nov. 2007 and I guess I will see if the labels really make a difference as far as people being able to find the blog without me telling them where it is.

3. Clicking History in the drop down navigation of Internet Explorer makes it possible to see and browse to pages that I have visited within the past two weeks.

2. Paint's fill tool will fill in pretty much any space inside black lines with whatever color you choose. Again--had to slow down and explain to someone else exactly what all those tools in the pallette do.

1. Inserting a picture is a fill option in WordArt. I was helping a colleague finish up Techno-Hounds by showing her the how-tos from her how-do-you-do-? list and just stumbled across it when I was showing her how to fill WordArt with preset patterns, gradients, etc. It's been there all along, and I never had noticed it until I slowed down to show her how to access the menus that Format WordArt opens up.

New to Me

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 00:04:00 +0000

I have met 200% of yesterday's goal:)

Tomie DePaola Lit. Trip : by: Andy Losik--linked via Twitter

Exuberant Games : by: Natash Oliver--Beginning Math Animated games with NO advertisements--woo hoo:)

Has It Really Been A Month???

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 23:52:00 +0000

Yes, Because it really has been a month...

We are currently in full skid and scamper mode toward the end of the 2007-08 school year. After closing our very successful last book fair, I have turned my attention toward several units that will help me get a pretty clear picture of the cumulative effect my classes with students have had. I will also be wrapping up Techno-Hounds and various other staff developments via SEASystem.

We should be hearing about more ACTIVBoard grants soon, I hope, so that I can get the rest of the equipment out of the media center and into classrooms where it can do more than take up space.

I will also be helping with the Rockingham County Reading Association's Community Reading Conference to be held at RCC on Saturday, June 7. I will be chairing and running the book fair in the Whitcomb Student Center.

Enough about that...I am going to make a concerted effort to at least pop in daily, if only to describe one thing new that I have learned. I have got to get better at this, eventually:)

A Weeding We Will Go...

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 19:57:00 +0000

A team of five media coordinators from across our district converged upon Central Elementary to help Ms. Smith with weeding. These observations are as much for me as they are for anyone else who wants to use them, and these are not intended to lay blame. The present media coordinator inherited these situations from other media coordinators who inherited them from their predecessors, so on and so forth-- ad infinitum. These are situations that exist in many media centers, and because they have the potential to create collection development nightmares, should be avoided:

1. Failing to check copyright before making purchases. Several of the books in nonfiction were technically too old when they were added to the collection, and many were already four or five years old when they were added. Your collection will be better off in the long run if you allow minor gaps to avoid purchasing "old books". If patrons ask why you haven't purchased for a particular area, simply explain to them that no one has published a suitable book on that topic in the past one to two years.

2. Beware: Celebrities and bulging biography collections. Celebrity biographies are high interest materials, but should a celebrity meet an untimely death (think Heath Ledger), all of a sudden, the biography has inaccurate information and should be removed. Also to be considered, several weeding guidelines suggest removing biographies in general according to demand. It is so easy to crowd the biographies by falling into the what-if rut: Q: "It's not that old; what if I take it off the shelf and someone asks for it?" A: You will make a note to replace the one you removed and you will replace it with one that has a more current copyright.

3. Pretty is not always a good sign. Don't be tempted to breeze over a section of books that are in emaculate condition. These "pretty books" may be exceeding their shelf life, because they never leave the shelves. If your media center's circulation system is web-based, wireless laptops are an excellent tool to use during weeding, because you can key in the item barcode and check to see how many times it has been circulated. If it is not being used--get rid of it. Your patrons have to search for the other books they want in the midst of all those pretty...I mean, pretty useless books.

4.

Walking in a Wiki Wonderland

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Spent a good bit of time today updating Wiki 101, HESMedia and MCNNC wikis. The information shared at NCAECT really helped me get a better grip on the outline and structure that wikis should follow. I realized that I created Wiki 101 and HESMedia needlessly; I could have just added them as a page to the existing MCNNC wiki. Now I need to decide if I want to consolidate.

Excited to share the idea of students using the wiki to publish their booktalks in a medium that their parents can see. I hope their classroom teacher gives me the go ahead.

Not really surprised at all the edits to the Educators wiki at PBWiki--lots of new pages added/edited today. Curious to see if PBWiki will send me a presenter pack, considering that I have already presented.

Dewey Is Not Dead

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 03:10:00 +0000

Phyllis and I gave our kids a very telling, but very unintentional pop quiz on how to locate materials in the media center.
We had long been lamenting the state of the upper end of our E materials, because our E SHA all the way through E Z were all smashed together on regular shelving and were perenially out of sorts. We decided that if we moved the materials on the other side of the shelving, that we could spread out our E materials and be able to keep them better organized. Doing so required us to flip our F section (our shelving is on casters, so we literally turned the shelves around).
After the switch we began to encounter many students who were asking questions like:
"Where did the Captain Underpants books go?"
"Where are all the Louis Sachar books?"

Once being reminded of the shelf labels, the kids were like, "Ohhhhh---", but this little experience emphasized that our elementary readers are creatures of habit. Our kids were familiar with where things were located, but their familarity more closely resembles spacial familiarity, not expert use of the Dewey system. They were sort of on Dewey Auto Pilot.

Funny to watch, and also neat to see them use the signage and find what they were looking for.

High Tech in a Hurry

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 02:57:00 +0000

Kudos to our Dept. of Instructional Technology and Media and Maintenance
Departments for working together to install ACTIVBoards in what will be 6 21st century classrooms. Looking forward to all the great things that will result from this initiative. Hoping that we will be successful with grant cycle II--I think we have 18 teachers interested in writing a grant. If we continue at our current rate, we will hopefully be fully outfitted with 21st century classrooms by the end of 08-09.

Surprise--It's a snowday:)

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 14:32:00 +0000

Checking back through some of the projects that I have been slack with, and this is one of them. Going to begin sharing this blog with other elementary media coordinators in my district, because we never seem to have enough time--just to talk about all the directions we are moving in. Really great break out session yesterday seemed to help gear us up to try some new things, then wouldn't you know it---SNOWDAY--plan E--only 12 month employees are to report today:) Good day to catch up around the house and make a big pot of noodles. Going to Blue Man Group in Winston this p.m.

Is Anybody Out There???

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 02:45:00 +0000

Just spent a pretty good bit of time looking at the possibility of acquiring online pen pals, and I stumbled over E-Pals. Curious to see if the questions I left in my profile will generate desired results---responses to those questions from people all over the world. And in particular, answers from people who have first hand knowledge. If I am able to get students into E-Pals, I look forward to them being able to share their knowledge about the U.S. with sudents in other countries to hopefully get an understanding that everyone has information based on our day-to-day experiences that is needful to others. Now, the tricky part--waiting.....

Time Flies...

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 20:46:00 +0000

Beginning to realize that unless I share this blog and let others generate content, that it will become one ball that gets dropped when things get chaotic as they are right now. Thanksgiving was great and everything at school is pretty much business as usual.

Anyway....the faculty reception of the wiki for the book study was mixed, as I had expected that it would be. But for the most part, once everyone realized that the wiki behaves pretty much like a word processor, everyone was pretty cool with it. An added bonus, was that one of the team members that presented the first session this past Monday (11/26), absolutely loved the wiki. In just a few editing sessions, she uploaded all the files she used into the wiki, and delivered her group's presentation via the wiki. Later, I posted her group's "homework" onto the wiki, and during this past week, the faculty have posted their homework by editing that wiki page. Our principal was extremely pleased when I informed her on Thursday (11/29), that not only had everyone completed his or her homework, but that they had also completed it, digitally, either via wiki or via email that was then pasted into the wiki.

I am currently scouting faculty members who want to experiment with letting students build a wiki as a research product and in the meantime I am trying to think of other practical products that I could use wikis for.

Is It Really This Late???

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 03:27:00 +0000

10:30 p.m. here and I have been working to create wiki pages for an upcoming book study that our faculty is starting after Thanksgiving. I hope everyone will enjoy using the technology, or at least appreciate the fact that wiki pages can help us save paper and time. Still needing to explore Moodle, but that will have to wait until tomorrow. Not a good idea to bake on 1/2 a night's sleep. Coca Cola cake here I come.

Funny Things Happen When You Sit Still

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 16:57:00 +0000

Holding down the lunch fort at circulation and taking time to read Classroom Instruction That Works by Robert Marzano, et al. especially Chapter 3: Summarizing and Note Taking and trying to think of a way to help myself and fellow media colleagues more effectively use Marzano's research along with steps 3-5 of Eisenberg and Berkowitz's Big Six as we help students and our learning communities at large with their information needs.

I have been giving students pre-marked 5 x 7 note cards with the writing area divided into two sections--one area for notes and the rest for crediting the source. I ask them to assign a category to each note card on the unlined side, so that as they use resources they can organize the information according to where it will fit later when they are sharing what they have learned. The lack of space discourages the frenzy of copying that usually commences when I ask them to make notes.

For my older students, I am experimenting with using PowerPoint slides with a title bar for the category and two text boxes--one for the note(s) in 40 point font, one for crediting the source. When students finish their notes, they can pull up their slides, decide to paraphrase or quote, then insert the information into their learning products.

What I see over and over again with both of these approaches is the need to reinforce note taking by showing students how I would decide where in the source to look for information and how I determine which pieces of information to record. My targeted students are easy to locate--they are the ones who look rather like a duck that keeps diving after bread crumbs all the while looking to see if there are more bread crumbs in another part of the pond.

Second Life on Sunday

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 22:31:00 +0000

After getting home from church, I have spent the better part of the afternoon getting used to moving around in Second Life. Having a hard time training my eyes to see everything, and realized that I was receiving audio cues--I did not have my headphones on--duh. Plan to go back tomorrow to see how streaming video works and hopefully be able to see some classes in action. Looking forward to seeing some of the Edunation events.

Getting My Mind Around It All

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 14:29:00 +0000

Up on this Saturday morning experimenting with technologies that I have been hearing about lately. Attended the NCSLMA(N.C. School Library Media Association) conference in Winston-Salem, N.C. (11-15+16) and wanted to tinker with the open source programs mentioned and/or used by several presenters.
I am especially intrigued by educational applications of social networks like SecondLife, but wonder if I will have time to complete Orientation Island in time to attend an event that I learned about on Twitter this morning.