MSM 181 A Separate Peace

Jokes You Can Use:

Pete and Larry had not seen each other in many years. Now they had a long talk trying to fill in the gap of those years by telling about their lives. Finally Pete invited Larry to visit him in his new apartment. “I got a wife and three kids and I’d love to have you visit us.”
“Great. Where do you live?”
“Here’s the address. And there’s plenty of parking behind the apartment. Park and come around to the front door, kick it open with your foot, go to the elevator and press the button with your left elbow, then enter! When you reach the sixth floor, go down the hall until you see my name on the door. Then press the doorbell with your right elbow and I’ll let you in.”
“Good. But tell me…what is all this business of kicking the front door open, then pressing elevator buttons with my right, then my left elbow?”
“Surely, you’re not coming empty-handed.”

*******************************************************

A Police officer approached a motorist stopped in the middle of the road before the river overpass holding up traffic. The officer noticed the driver jotting on a notebook frantically. He asked the driver, what in the world are you doing? The driver replied, “The sign says Draw Bridge”.

On Our Mind:

Congratulations to Dr. Monte Tatom

NMSA/AMLE early registration extended a week.
Dr. Debbie Silver is rumored to have a new book out soon on motivating the hard to motivate student.

Eileen Award:

Sara Kaviar

Middle School Science Minute

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or davidbydlowski@mac.com)

Part 4 of the podcasts on Lab Safety.  It is about the 7 Standards for Maintaining a Safer Laboratory Environment.

From the Twitterverse:

News:

A Separate Peace

Alliance’s founder and lead teacher, Tina Owen. She decided to start the school after she was outed at a large Milwaukee high school where she worked as an English teacher. After word spread, she decided her sexuality may as well be all the way out.

…suggested that such a school would not only create the impression that intolerance would be permitted everywhere else but also leave its sheltered graduates unprepared to deal with the sometimes harsh realities of being a gay person in America.

…He recently attended a homecoming dance at his boyfriend’s school, and though people said nasty things as the two boys made their way inside, Dylan notes, somewhat optimistically, that the trash talkers were parents rather than students. He adds, “It seems like my generation is getting over it.”

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2095385_2096859_2096805-1,00.html

Resources:

iPads in the Science Classroom

Last year, around October 2010, I got 13 iPads for my Science students through a service-learning grant. This is the start of my second year using those iPads with my Science students. The summer before I got the iPads I was able to try one out myself and wrote about the possibilities here. I elaborated further on how I was going to use the iPads here. Once students started to use the iPads I used a Google form to see which apps they liked the best. Here are the results of that survey.
http://www.educatoral.com/wordpress/2011/09/28/ipads-in-science-2/

Common Core Maps

http://commoncore.org/maps/

National Geographic Xpeditions

Geography lessons and free resources for your classroom:  http://www.nationalgeographic.com/xpeditions/lessons/g68.html

Better Lesson

http://betterlesson.com/home

Google Lit Trips

The short version is simple. Google Lit Trips are free downloadable files that mark the journeys of characters from famous literature on the surface of Google Earth. At each location along the journey there are placemarks with pop-up windows containing a variety of resources including relevant media, thought provoking discussion starters, and links to supplementary information about “real world” references made in that particular portion of the story.
The focus is on creating engaging and relevant literary experiences for students. I like to say Google Lit Trips “3-dimensionalize” the reading experience by placing readers “inside the story” traveling alongside the characters; looking through the windshield of that old jalopy in The Grapes of Wrath or waddling alongside Mr. and Mrs. Mallard’s duckling family in Make Way for Ducklings.”
What Google Lit Trips AREN’T
Google Lit Trips aren’t like sparknotes and other resources that can be used to circumvent the need to actually do the reading. They are designed to stimulate higher level thinking skills and to connect the story’s themes and messages to the issues of the real world in which students live.

http://www.googlelittrips.org/

Web Spotlight:

Welcome to the 21things4Students Site

This site was created by a grant from the REMC Association of Michigan for the creation of an educational resource for students preparing for 21st century skills. Members of the REMC Instructional Technology Specialists in Michigan along with teachers from around the state have created this site to provide project-based activities which are aligned to the National Educational Technology Standards for Students (NETS-S), and the Michigan Educational Technology Standards for students (METS) as well as the Framework for 21st Century Learning identified by the Partnership For 21st Century Skills.
http://www.21things4students.net/

For Educators:
http://www.21things4teachers.net/

For Administrators:
http://www.21things4administrators.net/

Deb’s Data Digest

A wide variety of resources and strategies.
http://datadeb.wordpress.com/

ScreenCasts as Assessment/Instruction

Here are some examples.
http://wwcsd.net/groups/screencasts/

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

• National Conference: Thursday, November 08, 2011 —Saturday, November 10, 2011 Louisville, Kentucky.
• Promotional Materials:
• Crossword Puzzle! (Maryland Conference)

• Other News:

• ISTE Eduverse Talks are the recorded sessions held on ISTE Island every week. Join ISTE in their Second Life conference location for their weekly talks on education.
• The ISTE Special Interest Group:  Virtual Environments is holding meetings on Mondays from 4:00 – 6:00 pm (SLT) on ISTE Island.

Ohio Middle Level Association:

• The Ohio Middle Level Association will hold their annual conference.

• OMLA Registration Form
• OMLA Presentation Proposal Form

Michigan Association of Middle School Educators

• The Michigan Association of Middle School Educators Annual Conference is coming up March 2012 in Warren Woods, MI.  
• MAMSE Exhibitor Form
• MAMSE Registration Form

• MAMSE Presentation Form
• MAMSE Conference Program Book (2011)
• The North Carolina Middle School Association’s Annual Conference March 13-15, 2012
• Conference Brochure  
• Presenter’s Application
• Who They Are . . .
• This year’s sessions . . .

• Classroom 2.0’s Live Calendar.

• Classroom 2.0’s Ning Blog: Archived content is available.

• Second Life:
• Regular Tuesday meetings are scheduled. See the board on the ISTE Island for up to the minute details.  Check frequently this week as the ISTE Annual Convention is this week.
• Video: Educational Uses of Second Life