Thoughts from a tech specialist...

Daily Bookmark Post 09/01/2010

Jerry Swiatek — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 09:30:09 +0000

“This Training Sucks!” The Why and How of Asking for Feedback « Mindflash Blog
Seeing an educational opportunity, Cumberland Valley gives students phone time between classes. – PennLive.com Annotated

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My daughter’s first short, short story

Jerry Swiatek — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 02:15:47 +0000

My daughter Madison, 8, is not one for busy work. When she discovered that her new 3rd grade teacher wanted to write out her spelling words 3 times each every week, she rolled her eyes and said “I have to do that again?” I decided that this year, I was going to ask her teacher if we could do something a bit more creative than the standard assignment. My daughter told me she wanted to write a story using the 15 weekly spelling words. Much to her teacher’s credit, she agreed. Here is my daughter’s first “spelling story.”

Chapter One – The Last Griffen

Once I saved my paper from a evil griffen. Whin I moved he followed me. I knew something was rong. My mom shopped. My dad was having a meting. When I was riding a horse the same thing happened.

Chapter Two – The Folded Paper

I said that I would fold a pece of paper. When I was waking up I pulled the lever to the running world. When I was drawing at my party I picked a pepper letting the owner go first.

Chapter Three – The Challenge of the Griffens

The Griffens were going to go to the hopping world when I said I am going to be baking. Come back soon!

Is it perfect? No, but she wanted to be creative and that’s what I love about her. She asked me to post each one of her stories to my blog, so expect to see a new one each week. We can watch her grow as a writer together.

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Daily Bookmark Post 08/23/2010

Jerry Swiatek — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 09:30:11 +0000

Presentation Zen: A long time ago, before death by PowerPoint | Diigo

tags: presentation

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It’s Official! EdCamp is coming to Citrus County, FL

Jerry Swiatek — Sun, 22 Aug 2010 15:01:24 +0000

EdCamp is coming to Florida! Citrus High School in Inverness, FL will be hosting Florida’s first ever EdCamp event. The event will be held on December 4th, 2010 in conjunction with the event in New York City being held on the same day. We are working with the folks in NYC to come up with a way to tie the two events together to make it an “East Coast” EdCamp.

With the backing of my school district’s Superintendent of Schools and the school district itself, the event will certainly be a huge success.

THE SPECIFICS:

When: December 4th, 2010, 8 AM to 5 PM

Where: Citrus High School, Inverness, FL

More information can be found at the event’s website: http://edcampcitrus.com

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Daily Bookmark Post 08/13/2010

Jerry Swiatek — Fri, 13 Aug 2010 09:30:09 +0000

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Daily Bookmark Post 07/29/2010

Jerry Swiatek — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 09:30:10 +0000

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Bending the super’s ear about tech PD

Jerry Swiatek — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 20:25:45 +0000

I’m pretty lucky to be working in the school district I currently work in. Fiscally, it’s a pretty conservative district, but when the financial crisis hit and so many educators lost their job, our district was left relatively unscathed. One area that the district has been willing to spend some money is in the area of technology. Every classroom in the district (23 schools total) has been equipped with a teacher notebook computer, a ceiling mounted LCD projector and an audio system with 4 overhead speakers and available microphones.

This is all well and good, but the most important thing that my district (and I am certainly included) has missed the mark is helping the teachers find ways that all of this tech can be used to improve their teaching and their curricula. I expressed this in an email to my superintendent a month or so ago and I am excited to be meeting with her next week to help develop a plan for technology PD in our district.

If you had an opportunity to meet with your superintendent about PD and the direction its taking in your district, what would you tell him/her?

Please comment. I’d love to hear the perspective of others on this.

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Post tags: education, Professional development, technology

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Daily Bookmark Post 07/26/2010

Jerry Swiatek — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 09:30:09 +0000

Smories – new stories for children, read by children
Smories are free original stories for kids, read by kids.

tags: reading children literacy storytelling
Serendip’s Exchange
Welcome to Serendip’s Exchange! Glad you stopped by.

Looking for “the answer” to a question? There are plenty of websites out there which will tell you what to think. Serendip instead aims at helping you to think for yourself, and in the process of discovery to formulate new questions and new explorations.

Nothing on Serendip is “authoritative”, but there is lots here that you can learn from and contribute to. See (and click on) the material below and to the right for recently added discussions. Click here for publishing guidelines.

tags: science brain learning
Digital Booktalk
How do you select books to read? Do you use the jacket cover? Word of mouth? Reading lists? Which comes first, reading a book or watching a movie made from it? We do not believe it has to be an ‘either-or’ choice. Book trailers are short, two to three minute videos that introduce the basic storyline and in which the story is re-enacted with similar artistic and creative decisions made by a movie director as to what parts of the story are presented in a film he or she is creating.

tags: booktalks reading literature LanguageArts

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Daily Bookmark Post 07/25/2010

Jerry Swiatek — Sun, 25 Jul 2010 09:32:10 +0000

Podcasting Toolbox: 70+ Podcasting Tools and Resources
Podcasting may not have lived up to the early hype, but with iPods and other MP3 players still selling like crazy, the potential audience for these audio shows is huge. We’ve compiled a monster list of 70+ tools and resources for podcasters and wannabes.

tags: podcasting podcast tools web2.0

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Daily Bookmark Post 07/20/2010

Jerry Swiatek — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 09:30:08 +0000

TxtBear – The Swiss Army Knife for documents
TxtBear lets authors publish their documents online. We aim to provide a series of useful tools, but most importantly we allow our users to extend the platform with their own software.
Your online guide to birds and bird watching, All About Birds, Cornell Lab of Ornithology
iFaceSearch : Best Face Search Engine – Find all face pics of the web
Stroome.com | mix it up. mash it out.
Welcome to Stroome, the world’s most collaborative video editing community. Upload videos, share clips, then mix it up and mash it out.
Thousands of clips, hundreds of collaborators, unlimited possibilities
I Write Like
Check which famous writer you write like with this statistical analysis tool, which analyzes your word choice and writing style and compares them with those of the famous writers.
- What is the minuam requirment of a PC to upload starcraftII multiplayer?
  
  PC Minimum Requirements:
  
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  * 1 GB system RAM/1.5 GB for Vista and Windows 7
  * 128 MB NVidia GeForce 6600 GT/ATI Radeon 9800 PRO video card
  * 1024×768 minimum display resolution
  * 4 GB free hard space (Beta)
  * Broadband connection
  
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