MSM 172 Confused, Sounds of Silence, Next Week we’re talking about ISTE! Really, we promise. Maybe.
Jokes You Can Use:
While walking to the ninth hole, one psychiatrist said to his colleague, would you believe that yesterday I had a patient who claimed he heard music every time he put on his hat?”
“Really? What did you do?”
The psychiatrist answered, “I took it away and removed the band.”
A man was on a beach when he discovered an old lamp in the sand. He rubbed it and a genie popped out. The genie said “I will grant you three wishes. The only condition is that you cannot wish for more wishes.” “Alright,” said the man, “I wish for more genies.”
A tribal farmer watching a Tarzan movie rushed out of the hall the moment a tiger appeared on screen, advancing menacingly towards the audience.
The gatekeeper trying to stop him argued that it’s only a movie, to which the tribal replied: “I know it’s a movie, you also know it is, but does the tiger know”?
Q: How do Eskimos have babies?
A: They keep on rubbing their noses together until the little boogers come out.
On Our Mind:
Eileen Award:
Liz N. and Tim H. Thanks for the kind words.
Middle School Science Minute
by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or davidbydlowski@mac.com)
Part 3: This middle school science minute is about the ELA common core standards in Reading and their relationship to science. The four areas of reading include: key ideas and details; craft and structure; integration of knowledge and ideas; and range of reading and level of text complexity. In this podcast, we look at the three reading standards that relate to science in grades 6 – 8 in the area of integration of knowledge and ideas, along with the range of reading and level of text complexity.
From the Twittervse:
 *stardiverr L. Lee Why test scores are not a measure of all students’ learning. http://tinyurl.com/3ggk9op |
 *willrich45 Will Richardson Btw, I’ve got 8 Google+ invites if anyone wants one… |
 *middleweb John Norton RT @MSPortal2: Blended Learning Helps Us Mind the Gaps | Powerful Learning Practice plpnetwork.com/2011/07/13/ble… #vflr @snbeach @rhawk |
 *shannonmmiller Shannon Miller Love that Steve put this together 🙂 RT @kylepace: LiveBinder of resources on Google+ from @web20classroom:
Add and Share Content With The @Edmodo Bookmarklet http://ow.ly/5G28p |
 *ckeech Cynthia Keech great idea!RT“@ransomtech: Idea: Share one a day w students. “eEtiquette – 101 Guidelines for the Digital World” eetiquette.com” #edchat |
 *lisibo lisibo Comic Life app for iPad is half price this weekend – £2.49. |
 *annemareemoore annemareemoore Another great scoop.it @townesy77 iPods and Education on @scoopit bit.ly/poTuti |
 *RickWormeli Rick Wormeli In classrooms we negotiate for what level of hypocrisy we should tolerate this day. Some days we’re more tolerant than we should be. |
 *fisher1000 Michael Fisher LiveBinders Update!! Curate your own shelf of others’ binders! #cmi2011 Read about it here: livebinders.wordpress.com (Thanks Barbara & Tina!) |
 *BethStill Beth Still Ten Sure Ways to Help You Destroy Your Twitter Cred: Are you guilty of any of these? |
Don’t forget to join the conversation on MiddleTalk and Twitter at #midleved this Friday at 8:00 pm EST. |
News:
http://www.minddump.org/you-have-the-same-hours-per-day-as-helen-kell
https://www.sifteo.com/product Coming this summer.
Show & Tell
These results suggest children are extremely sensitive to the subtleties of a teaching scenario, Schulz says: What matters is not if children are shown a function, but how they are shown that function. If they believe that an informed teacher has taught them everything, they will be less motivated to explore.
http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/2011/06/30/if-students-believe-that-a-teacher-has-taught-them-everything-they-will-be-less-motivated-to-explore/
The original post:
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-06/miot-dsd063011.php
What should students be able to do with technology in grade school?
http://www.edutopia.org/blog/elementary-technology-skills-mary-beth-hertz
Resources:
Fur.ly
Multiple URL’s into one window. Adds a bar on the top of the window where people can click through the URL’s. I had trouble getting the Capta to work. You can track how many people have viewed the site.
http://fur.ly/
Brain Rules
EXPLORATION | Rule #12: We are powerful and natural explorers.http://www.brainrules.net/about-brain-rules
Brightstorm
Thousands of FREE video resources for Math & Science. One neat thing is that you can search by textbook. There is also Test Prep materials. Includes transcripts for the videos.
http://brightstorm.com/
National Archives Document of the Day
A different historical document every day. Includes support links. Also a mobile app is available.
http://www.archives.gov/historical-docs/todays-doc/
Knovio:
Knovio™ is a free tool for turning PowerPoint slides into rich video presentations right from your web browser. No fancy hardware or video software needed – just a webcam and microphone. Currently in private Beta. Will have a free component. Go sign up if interested.
http://www.knovio.com/
Animaps
Create and view beautifully informative animated maps, for free!
http://www.animaps.com/#!home
Kodu
Kodu is a visual programming language made especially for creating games. Kodu’s language is entirely icon-based, fairly easy to learn, and aimed at kids 9 to 17. It works on PCs and on the Xbox.
http://mindshift.kqed.org/2011/07/students-create-games-that-focus-on-global-issues/
Show Me
iPad app.
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/showme-interactive-whiteboard/id445066279?mt=8
Web Spotlight:
Snag Films: Red, White & Blue
Voting. 35 minutes.
http://learning.snagfilms.com/film/journeys-through-the-red-white-and-blue
ISTE 2011
Led by Scott Meech
References:
https://profiles.google.com/smeech.net/posts
http://www.linkedin.com/in/smeech
http://globaleducation.ning.com/profile/ScottMeech
Kenilworth School District has been piloting it with 8th graders.
No spike in behavior issues, let the kids bring ’em in as an expansion of current policy.
As they refreshed the teacher devices, they moved those into use for student use.
They put all the stuff in the cloud and got rid of individual student folders on the drive.
Kerns High School did a tech initiative: What devices?
Kenilworth SD used them mostly with executive functioning.
Use for RTI: Pushing notifications to the kids who need the executive functions piece.
Jim Gates: Statewide video conference on BYOD (PA)
Even through allowed to bring devices in, students didn’t want to.
Heavy
Fear of being stolen
When allowed, it changed the dynamic, expectations changed lesson design and desire to bring it to class.
How did you get past the IT wanting control?
We don’t control other things (paper, magazines, etc.) why control this?
How would you start?
Approach: How do we want the kids to use this?
3-5 years out we will probably be talking about how in the world were we worried about this stuff?
Return on Investment: Are we at the tipping point where it is more expensive to manage it rather than allow it and educate on how to use it?
School didn’t get rid of all technology that they had, they are using the BYOD for executive functions (time management, calendars, etc.)
What about renting/subsidizing devices?
The opening of iOS will open the use of these in education.
The kids will get around a filtering system. It comes down to learning respect for the system and responsible use.
How Paul R. Woods got it in his district:
Install wireless first.
Students can bring in their own machines, but they must allow the school to put their proxies on their machines.
If kids try to get around it, the network locks their screen and they have to see the building tech person to get it unlocked again.
How did you get teachers on board?
First year: bring your device in and allow our techs to look at it.
Following years: pick an electronic textbook.
The school bought the licensing for all the books on all the devices.
The best way to get teachers involved is to let the kids use it and then let them ask the teachers that don’t use it if they can use it in their classroom.
BYOD is a better way to sustain a 1 to 1 program. District provided computers are an unsustainable way to provide tech.
Find schools that are doing this successfully and then going to the IT department.
Get administrators on your side before going to IT department.
There is some risk going forward:
3-2-1 Rule: Save in 3 different spots.
Create a safe place to fail in to create buy-in with your staff/admin/tech.
www.schoolweblockers.com: Cloud storage for $1.00 per year.
@paulrwood on Twitter.
http://twitter.com/#!/paulrwood
Website:
http://whatisyouritvision.blogspot.com/
Related:
Scott McLeod (http://bigthink.com/blogs/dangerously-irrelevant)
UCEA Center for the Advanced Study of Technology Leadership in Education (CASTLE)
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.
Michigan Association of Middle School Educators
- The Michigan Association of Middle School Educators Annual Conference is coming up March 2012 in Warren Woods, MI.
- The National Substitute Teacher Association’s Annual Conference July 22-24.
- The North Carolina Middle School Association’s Annual Conference March 13-15, 2012
- 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
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