Created a Zooburst augmented book. Very cool project for younger kids. The free version allows for 10 books, which is enough for a class at my school. It does not allow voice recording, whereas the paid version does.


Click on this link to check it out  -->    My Zooburst

If you choose webcam mode, and print the image as indicated, you can look at the book in augmented mode.  Let me know what you think.

Reflection on Day 6

I appreciate the time we spent starting from scratch to create a project. The decision making as to which tools to use and how to get started was valuable. I also loved the quick easy collaboration using Google Apps. (Somehow  I have to get our admin to see this value and allow student email accounts.) We saw some limitations to this method, as we spent quite a bit of time working on a tool (Present Me) that we were not able to include at the end. Although it is powerful learning to explore independently and  discover something new, students would most likely want to have a good looking project to share in the end. They would not be as satisfied with telling about learning from taking the wrong avenue.

Day Six

We spent much of the day working on presentations, using Google Docs and Dippity, both of which proved to be highly interesting tools. I really enjoyed working on them, especially searching Youtube for applicable material. That was lots of fun. Wish we had more time to work on something a bit more complicated.

I think I may work Dippity in the wiki project my students will work on.

Day Five

The discussion about blocking sites stirred up a lot of passions in people. While I can see the logic to blocking sites for students, I have to come down on the side of giving teachers the power to unblock sites for educational purposes. Teachers are professionals and districts should trust their judgment as to what is appropriate. And if teachers show poor judgment, then there are disciplinary procedures in place just like for any other inappropriate activity.

Jing is another tool I like, particularly when combined with Google Earth or other application. Then there's Edmodo. I wonder which would be better for students to exchange information and comment on media: Blogger or Edmodo?

Day Four

What can I say? I love Google Earth. The ability to view almost anywhere on the planet (or Mars or the Moon) is addicting. I hope someone makes up a Marcellus Shale drilling sites ap for it. My students would eat that up.

Day Three

In day three, we talked about Tweetdeck, which is an interesting way to following Twitter. Twitter itself is useful networking tool. As a learning aid, however, I am kind of skeptical. It requires students to follow the feed and keep up with the instructor's tweets.

Creative Commons is one of those things that seems to be growing in popularity, especially among people who create digital content. I love that it makes content usable for educational purposes.

Wolfram Alpha at first sounds like something from a Joss Whedon TV series, but it is another useful tool for looking up information.

One thing that I think I disagree with is the Pecha Kucha approach to presentations. Maybe it's because I see PowerPoint slides as an aid to presentations and not the presentation themselves.

Day Two

Day Two was all about wikis, Diigo, and Google Docs. Diigo, while an interesting way to mark and leave comments about websites for my students, I wonder how many would go out their way to mark websites if they weren't assigned to them. On the other hand, Google Docs are a fantastic tool for students to collaborate on group projects. Wikis are what I feel the most enthusiastic about. I think having students put together wikis as a class project would be very effective as a learning tool.

Day One

Now that I'm finally able to log on to the blog, I'm going to put my thoughts down on each day.

Bloom's Taxonomy was a new concept for me. I'm sure to the members of the class with elementary and secondary ed degrees this was old news, but for me this was new.

The discussion about the ubiquity of mobile devices was fascinating, as was the use of blogging as a tool to help kids learn. I was really impressed how young kids were enthusiastic about putting their experiences and thoughts into blog form. I have to wonder how college-age students would feel about this, though. My experience is that college students is that they do things mainly for social reasons. I don't know if they would like to write stories about being a balloon.

Thoughts about Thursday 7/28/11

Yesterday's activity was very helpful. Being able to create a product using some of the tools we have talked about was a good way to apply what we learned to an actual project like our students may do. We can debate the effectiveness of projects over traditional learning but I think that may be a futile debate. Most people people agree there is value in most types of learning and the important thing is to do multiple activities and teaching strategies.
I was impressed with Jim's decision to let us know he wasn't happy with the way the course went and that he plans on changing it to a format with more involvement and use of the web 2.0 tools. That taught me something very valuable about teaching; never be afraid to realize you want to do something different and to also let your students know what you're planning on doing. It shows them that this is an ever-changing process and one of the worst things you can do is become stagnant.

That's All Folks

I have always been on board with technology in the classroom. I was lucky enough to take over for a teacher who volunteered for the CFF program and so I inherited her outfitted classroom. As a result, technology has been a part of the way I have approached teaching quite literally from day one. I have always seen that there is a better way. However, after this class, I now see that there is a better way for me as well. I used to duct tape projects together using what I knew and what I knew I had to work around. I have so many new tools at my disposal now that I don’t have to just make do. We can make a legacy. For example, in the past I would have my myth students create a time line of the events of the Trojan War using a PowerPoint Slide. I created a time line template, threw it in Moodle, they slapped in some pictures and turned it in. Well, now I have Digity! A real interactive time line! This year I’ll be going in to lessons that I like or don’t like for that matter with a better way. Consequently, I think that I need to be more vocal with my tech department and coach when things aren’t working out. Now that I have experienced the power of the wiki, how can I not use it in my class? We have to figure out the wikispaces/lightspeed issue this year. Last year, I sent in one request. What they attempted didn’t work, so I moved on. That was one battle I didn’t have it in me to fight. Well, watch out filter! I’m coming for you! All this being said about my better way, it can’t be just me. Students can’t deepen their learning just in 506. Every single teacher in my school, my district, my state needs to be championing this shift. I feel like sometimes we rely on excuses to get by with business as usual. After seeing the power of the these tools, it is not ok anymore.

Innovations in teaching

After watching the videos the last few days yo have to wonder where is education heading and what will the classroom look like in 10-20 years. On the one hand it may not look much different than it does today. Education has a way of moving slowly and changing slowly. I don't think this is a bad thing. Contrary to popular opinion I think our system has done an excellent job educating people in this country. As with most things in a free society we give you the tools and the opportunity and then it's up to you. We've talked about change in education a lot over the years but I think the shift with using technology is real. I can see in as little as 10 years at least half of the students will be in a classroom at least half of the time they are now. This isn't a bad thing, it will simply over more opportunity and different opportunities for teachers to teach. For teachers it will require a different set of skills. This is the difficult part for me. I know how to teach chemistry and I know what kids need to do to learn chemistry but I don't know how to do it using web 2.0 tools. As we watch these examples of what teachers are doing and how they're doing it it's very scary yet exciting. I think we're going through big changes in education and staying ahead of the curve is becoming more and more important.

Working with Jing

Of all the tools we have investigated so far Jing is the one I think I will use the most. Whenever I am trying to learn something new on the computer it is always helpful to see an actual illustration of exactly which keys and which icons to hit. Sometimes it sounds very easy to do but often times with procedures it is easy to miss a step. In class when I show students something new I usually spend a lot of time with just 3 or 4 students going over the exact procedure we just did. This is okay but with Jing a lot of time will be saved and the students will have something to review.

Issuu

A few hours ago I took a PDF document I uploaded onto my ISSUU account and put it in to a new personal/my blog. I then posted a link to the PDF (on my blog) on another site and ... had the following nice response from the moderator of the other site (and a big-wig in the field). I, like most other people, really like seeing this jazzy stuff for the first time! :)

[These built-in scroll bars as sooooooooo slow. Ancient technology!]


Nancy Hayfield Birnes [Moderator] 1 hour ago
Thanks, Lou! I keep meaning to check that out, and now I can. I wonder how it will compare with the reams of stuff I have in boxes from Corso. Might make a good show, too! Excellent work, Lou!

Lousheehan 2 hours ago
This is out of context, but here is a link to Lt. Col. Corso's FBI file (click on the thumbnail). Enlightening stuff! http://lou-sheehan.blogspot.co...

Wed, July 27

One focal point in today's videos that I will remember is that creating learning that is meaningful and significant to students will make students come alive in the learning process. For me this means talking with their regular classroom teachers a little more, but mostly, it means just thinking outside the box of traditional computer lessons. I love the idea of students doing screen casts to teach other students what they have learned; or making podcasts about something they have experienced or are interested in. These are lessons I would never have thought of before this class.

I remember my excitement when I first learned about Jing and its ability to make cropped screen shots. I thought the video capture was great, but could not image the logistics of using it. Now I can see how to save and embed in a Wiki. (Unfortunately, I also found that embeding in Ppt 7 is way too difficult for even the teacher to do.) I never would have thought of students using Jing, but now I think students making how-to's to share would be a "meaningful" addition to a project.

Although my students have made Google Earth tours, I find that there is always something new to learn about the tool. Today I learned that with a little bit of HTML, you can add a picture to the info bubble. I am officially getting at the point of Web 2.0 overload. Perfect timing. Time to start planning some web 2.0 lessons. Lots of choices, but some are jumping out and saying "pick me".

Day 5

Today was a great day for trying things out and becoming more comfortable with some of the technologies that may be new. I loved the ideas and discussion from other classmates...always great to hear how others are using the tools in their classrooms.

Good conversation too about the flipped classroom, presentation styles, and traditional instruction v. collaborative learning in the real world.

I'm excited to brainstorm project ideas and hear what others will be working on.

And the coolest part of the day? Google+ hangout! Loved it!

What will your legacy be?

Of course I’m going to Jing it up this year, but what really stuck with me today was Alan November’s idea of a legacy. The other 9th grade English teacher who also happens to be a friend of mine has a sign hanging in her room asking her students what will their legacy be. I never really gave it much thought. Their legacy is not to make me mad today. (I kid!) As I plan for this coming school year, I would like to create learning objectives that really create a 9th grade legacy. I want what they create in my class to really last and not just be taken down off the walls in June to make room for next year’s work. I love the idea of a digital textbook produced by students. Don’t just write the paragraph for me; put it out there to share with everyone. I think it is important for students to start crafting their global voices early. I know that we should be practicing what we preach, but I don’t know how ready I am to starting working on my own global voice. I might not have this hesitation to just put it out there if I came through an educational environment that taught me how to have one. This is clearly not the fault of any of my teachers. I didn’t know about the internet until 6th grade. However, we just shouldn’t be waiting now.

7/27 Reflections

Today was a great example for several of us in class on experiencing the frustration when the technology doesn't work the way it is demonstrated. On the positive side of the situation, during the class today we had time to sit and try and work through the problem without the added stress of a time limit or having 25 students stare at us as we try to solve the problem or move to plan B. As many of us have probably experienced, when this happens in a classroom situation, the frustration becomes even greater mainly because we are trying to move on with the lesson without losing control of the students as they wait for the technology to work. As we have mentioned before, this is also where professional development is so critical. If there is a technology meltdown for someone who is somewhat comfortable with using technology, there may still be frustration, but they are probably better equipped to handle the situation. For someone who is starting out and experiences problems, it is easy to understand why they throw their hands in the air and decide that technology isn't worth the aggravation. That is one of the reasons I like taking classes on this topic because it allows me the time and space to learn and practice using the tools with a knowledgeable person available to help with problems before using them in the classroom. In order to provide other staff members with a higher level of comfort in using these tools, I want to make a greater effort in demonstrating some of the technologies we have learned about in class to staff in my building and help them learn to use the technology with their classes.

I learn something new every day in LTMS 600 class. Sometimes, it can be frustrating when you are learning new tools because they don’t work they way you want it to work at first. Like they say “The more you practice working at something the better you get.” I really enjoyed learning about Jing and Edmondo. I believe that I can use these tools in my classroom and introduce them teachers to integrate in their lesson plans.

I really enjoy what we learn today about using Google earth. I believe that it has a real place in the classroom. In addition, I know that a lot of social studies teachers are using the technology. Yet, if they are not using it, they really should be using Google Earth. I can truly see teacher giving their students virtual of cities, and famous landmarks.

PLE

I'm starting to understand the importance of a personal learning network and see the relevance of tools like Twitter and RSS Aggregators. I've always wondered where people find information and not it's coming to me! This class has hooked me up with a good number of resourceful people on twitter and google reader and I'm excited to explore more.

The skype with Will Richardson was good today. Was interesting talking to the man who wrote the book if nothing else! Proof that people are out there and willing to connect.