Category: Tech

MSM, Podcast, Strategy, Teaching Tip, Tech, Web SpotlightBy Troy Patterson

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:

*pammoran How 2 get started writing fiction – insights from master writing class teacher-novelist Jill Dawson via Guardian bit.ly/qxcmzF #nwp
*s_bearden Googlelittrips seems like a great tool for teaching Language Arts/English! #edcampcitrus #elemchat #engchat
*mcleod Congrats to @johnccarver for being recognized as a 2011 Innovator in Education! goo.gl/2yb4G #edtech #vanmeter
*robertjmarzano If you have more questions about Leaders of Learning, you can ask me live on Oct 17 6:30pm EDT on #edfocus. bit.ly/phLXht
*tombarrett The Graphic Classroom: The Best Comics List (for all grade levels) bit.ly/oXK5Nn #comics #graphicnovels

Graphic novels in the classroom | Scoop.it via @dilaycock #graphicnovels #comics
kevcreutz 60 Second Science Lessons bit.ly/qbHUI5 via @rmbyrne #edtech
*TeachnologyNews Riddle Of The Day For Students: What is easy to get into, but hard to get out of?- Trouble.
*fabclassroom Huge List of New Printable Coupons twrt.me/o2q8tv via @DebbieDoesCoups
*SeanBanville Soooo many fab blogs – RT @annabooklover: Best grammar blogs: bit.ly/pwSEo4
*AncientProverbs The greatest virtues are those which are most useful to other persons. -Aristotle
*Larryferlazzo “Should we all buy India’s new $60 tablet computer? ” BBC bbc.in/qmVhIN
*VirtualLrnAcad iNACOL Revises National Standards Guide for Online Learning j.mp/rtsVlF #onlinelearning #edtech
*russeltarr Rubrics for Assessment: tinyurl.com/5vdf878

Don’t forget to join the conversation on MiddleTalk and Twitter at #midleved this Friday at 8:00 pm EST.  

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/

Strategies:

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:

      • 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:

Michigan Association of Middle School Educators

  • 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
advisory, MSM, Tech, Web SpotlightBy Troy Patterson

MSM 180 Last Stand, Sift(eo) my way, QuickClassics & Memories (all alone in the moonlight . . . )

Jokes You Can Use:

Ruth_A_Buzzi

1.  Why are hot dogs at Detroit Tigers’ stadium so much better than the ones sold by the Seattle Mariners? Because you can eat them in October.

2.  Ultimately, my ex broke up with the blond chick and married a sweet little Native American lady. I hope they’re one big Hopi family.

On Our Mind:

New “toys” for Shawn.
https://www.sifteo.com/

Eileen Award:

  • Kerry Derminer
  • Noel Parish
  • Kevin Upton

Advisory:kkinstruction Kalysta

How to Make a 1920s Flapper style Dress in only One Hour! Includes 4 Special Bonuses. http://j.mp/nDRXcO

Middle School Science Minute

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

Part 3 of the 4 part series on lab safety.  This podcast focuses in on standards on specific safety precautions involving chemicals and lab equipment.  The importance of lab safety was pointed out last week in the Chicago area when a student suffered a serious injury while passing around dry ice and water in a plastic bottle and it exploded.  The full article can be found at:
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2011-09-26/news/ct-met-science-class-20110926_1_chemistry-class-nsta-national-science-teachers-association

From the Twitterverse:

*ShellTerrell 10 Reasons Teachers Make Great Punching Bags bit.ly/mTIOEa #edreform
*web20classroom RT @hopkinsdavid: QR Codes in the classroom bit.ly/d1m6Ux #QRCode #edtech
*jybuell How Your Brain Reacts to Mistakes Depends on Your Mindset bit.ly/o6uY3L ScienceDaily cc:// @occam98
*DianeRavitch Is this the best education parody site on Twitter? laststand4children.org
*2learn2 germinate – to become a naturalized German #stevec
*JohnMikulski Schools need a social media strategy that goes beyond simply blocking everything. #edtechconf
*missnoor28 Some of the best resources of #QRcode “My QRCode page” http://j.mp/oNdEKF #dtech #mlearning
*AskAaronLee Are you an educator? Try Google+ as a tool for your class – http://ow.ly/6J4XR rt @chrisbrogan
*web20classroom iPad Apps To Support Blooms Taxonomy from @kathyschrock: bit.ly/oSkbu0
*mcleod New from CASTLE: Virtual Schooling in the News bit.ly/nwbFIE
*rmbyrne New post: dotEPUB – Convert Any Webpage into an ePub Document goo.gl/fb/g8xie

Don’t forget to join the conversation on MiddleTalk and Twitter at #midleved this Friday at 8:00 pm EST.

News:

A bet on No Child Left Behind

Diane Ravitch is a glass half-empty kind of gal, while I suffer from excessive Panglossian tendencies. In the spring of 2007, we made a bet. The payoff is dinner at the River Café, at the foot of Brooklyn Heights, overlooking New York harbor and the Manhattan skyline, tucked neatly under the lights of the Brooklyn Bridge
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/who-won-a-2007-bet-on-no-child-left-behind/2011/09/26/gIQAwBBi0K_blog.html

How Teacher Turnover Harms Students

By Barnett Berry
Finally reaching the bottom of one my reading stacks, I found myself fascinated and frustrated by the findings of a new study on the relationship between teacher turnover and student achievement.
http://transformed.teachingquality.org/blogs/advancing-teaching-profession/09-2011/how-teacher-turnover-harms-students
http://www.nber.org/papers/w17176

How to fix this mess called middle school

“Twelves (and thirteens and fourteens for that matter) probably do not belong in formal school environments at all, but in some kind of cross between summer camp and the Civilian Conservation Corps camps of the Great Depression — plenty of physical activity, structured groups and time with peers, with a little formal education thrown in.”
I’ve written before about such a proposal, but it’s worth repeating again as school districts tackle the problem anew. The answer: blowing up middle school as we know it and turning at least some of it into a “boot camp for life.”
Enough with “academic rigor.” Stop testing kids ad nauseam.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/how-to-fix-the-mess-we-call-middle-school/2011/09/25/gIQAjCx1yK_blog.html

Resources:

Dead Sea Scrolls Online

It’s taken 24 centuries, the work of archaeologists, scholars and historians, and the advent of the Internet to make the Dead Sea Scrolls accessible to anyone in the world. Today, as the new year approaches on the Hebrew calendar, we’re celebrating the launch of the Dead Sea Scrolls online; a project of The Israel Museum, Jerusalem powered by Google technology.
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/09/from-desert-to-web-bringing-dead-sea.html

VizLingo

Turn text into a video representation.
http://www.vizlingo.com/

History Pin

Historypin is a way for millions of people to come together, from across different generations, cultures and places, to share small glimpses of the past and to build up the huge story of human history.
Everyone has history to share: whether its sitting in yellowed albums in the attic, collected in piles of crackly tapes, conserved in the 1000s of archives all over the world or passed down in memories and old stories.
Each of these pieces of history finds a home on Historypin, where everyone has the chance to see it, add to it, learn from it, debate it and use it to build up a more complete understanding of the world.
Historypin has been developed by the not-for-profit company We Are What We Do, in partnership with Google.
YouTube introductory video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdT3eKdto4w
http://www.historypin.com/

SpeakIt!

Speak It is a Google Chrome extension that enables you to have the text on most webpages read to you. With Speak It installed just highlight the text on a the page you’re viewing then right-click to activate Speak It. Then click the play button to have the text read to you. The voice is very digitized, but it is clear.
http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2011/09/speak-it-text-to-speech-in-google.html

Web Spotlight:

Cheating

Here’s an overview of some of the most shocking instances of teacher cheating, plus a few episodes that may have been overblown.
http://www.propublica.org/article/americas-most-outrageous-teacher-cheating-scandals

Students need to develop Grit

http://edcommentary.blogspot.com/2011/09/teaching-character-strengths-and-values.html

Teaching All

Jeremy is a special education teacher.  Jeremy’s classroom is a great example of universal design for learning, as his students have access to a myriad of technology tools including iPads and interactive whiteboards.  Outside of the classroom, Jeremy works part-time as a Family Trainer and Technology Advisor.  As a Family Trainer, he consults with families who have children with autism to develop behavior plans, design Intensive Teaching programs, and determine the best technology solutions for children.  When it comes to special education technology, he is an iOS expert!  When Jeremy is not browsing the iTunes App Store or posting about apps on Facebook, he enjoys being outdoors and spending time with his friends and family.
Site has activities for Interactive Whiteboards (IWB’s), iPad Apps and much more.
Tons of links!
http://teachingall.blogspot.com/

Digital Promise

Founded after more than a decade of effort, including a 2004 report to Congress, Digital Promise has been endorsed by virtually every major national association of educators and educational institutions, libraries, and museums. The project that gave rise to Digital Promise was launched by the Carnegie, Century, Knight, MacArthur, and Open Society foundations, sustained by the Federation of American Scientists, and championed by a coalition of Republicans and Democrats, civic and business leaders, who came together on its behalf.
http://www.digitalpromise.org/

Strategies:

Read Ten Classic Books in Under a Minute

If you’ve ever lamented to someone about not having enough time to read, there’s a cure for what ails you. While nothing can replace the feel of a good novel in your hands — and the eau de stink of the used bookstore you found it in — the Book-A-Minute website aims to catch you up on all the classics you’ve been meaning to read since … forever. “When even the CliffsNotes are just too long, come here. Covers everything from Shakespeare to Steinbeck,” the site teases. They’ve taken fine literature, science-fiction/fantasy, and children’s bedtime stories and condensed them into amusing one-minute reads. Interestingly enough, you’ll find that many of them are dead-on descriptions of the actual works. Skip through ten classic books below and check a few to-dos off your bucket list.
http://flavorwire.com/213381/read-ten-classic-books-in-under-a-minute

What Will Improve a Student’s Memory?

By Daniel T. Willingham
Question: I often have students tell me that they studied for a  test, meaning that they reviewed their notes and the textbook, but they still did not do well. If they have reviewed the material, why don’t they remember it? Is there anything I can do to help them study more effectively?
http://cdl.org/resource-library/pdf/What%20Will%20Improve%20a%20Students%20Memory.pdf

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

      • 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:

Michigan Association of Middle School Educators

  • 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
advisory, MSM, News, Podcast, Strategy, Teaching Tip, Tech, Web SpotlightBy Troy Patterson

MSM 179 Common Core, Bad Baseball joke, and iPad Resources.

On Our Mind:

Changing positions
Start of the school year

Eileen Award:

Dr. Tatom:  Thanks for the mention on Twitter!

Advisory:

Permanent Record

http://www.slate.com/id/2301449/

The Secret to Success

https://plus.google.com/117689362923608221663/posts/8v7RBNncmAJ

How many really?

http://howmanyreally.com/

Middle School Science Minute

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

Part two on lab safety and focuses in on personal safety of students.

From the Twitterverse:

*
drmmtatom #iPad Note Taking Apps Showdown zite.to/nztk9G via @zite #fhucid #hardintech #ccstech @msmattersNBC’s “Education Nation” Summit Begins September 25 #fhuedu610tinyurl.com/3aud82p

Highlights from the 2011 Educational Technology Conference [ETC] in Missoula #fhuedu642 http://www.speedofcreativity.org/2011/09/23/highlights-from-the-2011-educational-technology-conference-etc-in-missoula/

Building better teacher evaluations #fhuedu610   http://www.joannejacobs.com/2011/09/building-better-teacher-evaluations/

Virtual Schooling in the News #fhuedu642
*mcleod Scott McLeod
New bookmark: Presenting Learning with Stop Motion AnimationNew bookmark: The Myth of Learning Styles bit.ly/qqB1dg
*Mimadisonklein Use Emotion and Technology to Spark Writing nblo.gs/nx17m
*kevcreutz Video – The Last U.S. Veteran of WWI bit.ly/qQmavJ via @rmbyrne #edtech
*laroncarter Having trouble already with classroom management already? My Mission Statement has worked for thousands.
*congerjan shares tinyurl.com/4yhfdds (Livebinder of tools you never knew you needed!) plurk.com/p/e3tynm
*AncientProverbs Motivational Quotes
What is told into the ear of a man is often heard a hundred miles away. -Chinese Proverbs
*BethRitterGuth RT @mykidcancode: Free Online Lesson Planbook Software for Teachers bit.ly/jbDwyc #engchat

Don’t forget to join the conversation on MiddleTalk and Twitter at #midleved this Friday at 8:00 pm EST.

News:

Beautiful Teenage Brains

Moody. Impulsive. Maddening. Why do teenagers act the way they do? Viewed through the eyes of evolution, their most exasperating traits may be the key to success as adults.

Thanks to Richard Byrne for the link.
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/10/teenage-brains/dobbs-text

Resources:

Writing Prompts

These are some of the daily writing prompts that I use in class. The prompts and pictures are scraped together from so many sources – forgotten websites, old journals, overheard conversations, the crusty recesses of my hard drive – that attribution is difficult. I’ve tried where I can, but if you know how any of them should be attributed
http://writingprompts.tumblr.com/

YouTube for Teachers

http://www.youtube.com/teachers
http://www.youtube.com/education

iPad App Resources:

In iTunes, go to the iTunes Store (sidebar on the left).
Then select App Store on the bar along the top of the window.
Then select the drop down Education under Categories on the right
(OR-Just to the right of the word App Store on the top will be a small triangle- click that and select Education)
This will reveal App categories for Teachers including:

  • Apps for Teachers
  • Special Education
  • Education Volume Purchasing

Mobile Learning

After reading this report, you’ll know more about:

  • How mobile technology has become a game-changer in education
  • Mobile device best practices from teachers and schools
  • Mobile device management
  • The latest in apps and mobile technology available today

http://www.eschoolnews.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/2/files/2011/09/mobile_star.pdf

Alternate Assessment Apps for Eighth Grade

Eighth graders need to demonstrate their mastery of skills in English, math and science.
http://www.techlearning.com/Default.aspx?tabid=67&EntryId=3110

Web Spotlight:

Implementing Common Core Standards

Over the next year, the accomplished teachers I met at CTQ will face down these tough questions. They will design—and test-drive in their own classrooms, with their own students—lessons and assessments linked to the Common Core State Standards.
http://transformed.teachingquality.org/blogs/advancing-teaching-profession/09-2011/implementing-common-core-standards

Cheating

Here’s an overview of some of the most shocking instances of teacher cheating, plus a few episodes that may have been overblown.
http://www.propublica.org/article/americas-most-outrageous-teacher-cheating-scandals

Students need to develop Grit

http://edcommentary.blogspot.com/2011/09/teaching-character-strengths-and-values.html

Common Core Maps

From the website:
“Common Core has released a new, Second Edition of the K-12 Curriculum Maps in English Language Arts. The Maps are designed to help educators meet the expectations of the Common Core State Standards, which call for the standards to be “complemented by a well-developed, content-rich curriculum.”

Our draft ELA Maps have received more than three million views since last August. We’ve listened to your advice and have added many new features, including:

  • Nearly 200 new writing, grammar, and research activities
  • Guidance for differentiated instruction
  • Library of seventy digital resources
  • More informational and contemporary texts throughout

Map users can now:

  • Rate and comment on each of the seventy-six unit Maps along with thousands of suggested works, activities, and resources
  • Submit lesson plans
  • Get preferred pricing on Maps services and tools that are under development

Common Core has been inundated with requests for professional development services, more Maps-based curriculum tools, and more Maps, including math Maps. In order to generate the resources needed to respond to these requests, we are offering the opportunity to become contributing members of the Mapping Project for a nominal cost.”

Strategies:

Inside Story Flash Cards

Combine visuals with vocabulary words to help increase retention.
http://www.insidestoryflashcards.com/

Jokes You Can Use:

Years ago, the Seattle Symphony was doing Beethoven’s Ninth under the baton of Milton Katims. At this point, you must understand two things:

1. There’s a long segment in this symphony where the bass violins don’t have a thing to do. Nothing. Not a single note for page after page;

2. There used to be a tavern called Dez’s 400 right across the street from the Seattle Opera House, favored by local musicians.

It was decided that during this performance, after the bass players had played their parts they’d quietly lay down their instruments and leave the stage rather than sit on their stools looking (and feeling) dumb for twenty minutes.
Well, once they got backstage, someone suggested that they trot across the street and have a few brews. After they had downed the first couple rounds, one said, “Shouldn’t we be getting back? It’d be awfully embarrassing if we were late.”
Another, presumably the one who suggested this excursion in the first place, replied, “Oh, I anticipated we could use a little more time, so I tied a string around the last pages of the conductor’s score. When he gets down to there, Milton’s going to have to slow the
tempo way down while he waves the baton with one hand and fumbles with the string with the other.”
So they had another round and finally returned to the Opera House, a little tipsy by now.
However, as they came back on stage, one look at their conductor’s face told them they were in serious trouble. Katims was furious!
And why not? After all (get ready, here it comes…)
It was the bottom of the Ninth, the score was tied, and the basses were loaded.

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

      • 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:

Michigan Association of Middle School Educators

  • 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
advisory, MSM, News, Podcast, Strategy, Teaching Tip, Tech, Web SpotlightBy Troy Patterson

MSM 174 Beyond Seat Time & Jeff for the Win!

Middle School Science Minute

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

It runs a little longer (2 minutes–but hey, I took off my watch and found I had all the time in the world).  It is about the announcement of the new Science Framework that was released last week.  From the framework will come the new science standards (late 2012).  This will probably become the common core for science, just like ELA and Math–thus the National Curriculum in Science.  So, it is a good heads up for people.  If you want to mention it in the show notes, the audience can download the full 320 page report for free at:
http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=13165

News:

Beyond Seat Time: Advancing Proficiency-Based Learning

Can we do without the traditional school year? Is it feasible to shift to a system of student advancement based solely on proficiency? iNacol’s Susan Patrick shares her vision of what such a system would look like and what it will take to get there. (Hint: It’s already underway in some states.)
http://thejournal.com/articles/2011/08/10/beyond-seat-time-advancing-proficiency-based-learning.aspx

NMSA becomes AMLE:  Watch for the change during the months of August and September.

Jeff LaRoux wins NMSA/AMLE election!

Congrats!

Resources:

U.S. Debt clock

http://usdebtclock.org/

Ten ideas for interactive teaching

By Jenna Zwang, Assistant Editor

  1. Follow the Leader:
  2. Total Physical Response (TPR):
  3. One Word
  4. Opposite Arguments
  5. Historically Correct
  6. Test Tournament
  7. YouTube Video Quizzes
  8. Electronic Role Playing
  9. Puzzle Pieces
  10. Pop Culture Statistics

http://www.eschoolnews.com/2011/06/06/ten-ideas-for-interactive-teaching/?ast=42&astc=3032
http://www.fctl.ucf.edu/TeachingAndLearningResources/CourseDesign/Assessment/content/101_Tips.pdf

Web Spotlight:

Teenage Girls And Social Media: Tips For Parents From A Best-Selling Author

Nearly 10 years ago, author Rachel Simmons wrote a best-selling book called Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls. Now she has updated her book to include the role of social media and technology.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2011/08/09/139176817/teenage-girls-and-social-media-tips-for-parents-from-a-best-selling-author?ft=1&f=1019

ISTE 2011:  Professional Development led by Liz Davis

In a non-review year, she meets with teachers to help them prepare for their review year. Teacher had kids make stuff:

Kids prepared Choctaws (?) and rotated every 20 minutes.

Kids develop a wiki on the subject. Teachers meet with their TEAM leader to pull together stuff for their bi-annual review.

“Tech Tuesdays” Techies getting time to work with teachers. Tech coaches/IT departments justify their jobs by the level of tech integration. They survey the staff and then evaluate to see how far they’ve moved the staff from where they were to where they are at the end of the year. Tech department evaluations based on level of tech integration/use. Tech department schedules time with the teachers to help them with their job reviews and in doing so, helps them prove their value to the district.

Lots of teachers forget they use the tech and the IT people help them remember the projects to include in their portfolios. Teachers started meeting outside of school time to teach each other once they learned a new tech skill.

(The Geek Mustangs) Side note: lots of aluminum cases for iPads. IT organizes their PD for staff very similarly to what we do here at EduBloggerCon. Some put it in a survey monkey thing and have them pick their sessions there.

Use a food/menu metaphor: Appetizer, Main Course, Dessert Appetizer: Something I want to dip my toe it, something I want to find
out about, but not explore. Main Course: Something I want to learn in depth Dessert: Something fun at the end to wrap it up and I can use in my
classroom. Make an annual report at the end of the year and compliment teachers on their tech integration. Make a celebration at the end of the year out of it. (Culminating experience) Organize the kids to do tech PD for other students.

Students did a screen cast for each of the Google products. Checkout Flipboard for the iPad.

On Our Mind:

Starting of the school year.

Eileen Award:

  • Linda Chapman Broderic
  • Dave T.
  • Debbie T.

Advisory:

From the Twitterverse:

*web20classroom Integrating Technology Into The Common Core-based Curriculum: bit.ly/pejYGM
*russeltarr Voicethread Examples in Education: tinyurl.com/3uoda3q
*middleweb Latest MiddleWeb news: more tips for newbies, graphic novel debate, wonderful sci images & hashtag PD secrets. bit.ly/phyKvJ #ntchat
*johntspencer Schools need to be a little more like CSI and a little less like Jeopardy.  #tvandteaching
*karlyb Picked up a lot of great education apps for free this weekend from this list: digital-storytime.com/sale.php #edapp
*AncientProverbs Giving your son a skill is better than giving him one thousand pieces of gold. -Chinese Proverb
*twibbon It’s International Left Handers day today! Celebrate with other lefties like @oprah and @justinbieber – bit.ly/axHpPV
*Ron_Peck Calling all Social Studies Teachers! If you want great collaboration and resources, join the SSChat Ning. sschat.ning.com #sschat #elemchat
*AngelaMaiers NEVER Open With This One… http://twrt.me/5fvwe via @westfallonline
*TopPublicSchool @Dianeravitch Atlanta Public Schools will leave corrupt principals in positions of authority using the evaluation to retaliate & silence.
*Harvard Mini-lectures from Harvard faculty are available for download on Harvard’s iTunes U channel http://hvrd.me/ik8Ex3

Don’t forget to join the conversation on MiddleTalk and Twitter at #midleved this Friday at 8:00 pm EST.

Jokes You Can Use:

Anytime you see a young man open a car door for his girlfriend, either the car is new or the girlfriend is.

Little Johnny comes downstairs crying. His mother asked, “What’s the matter now?”
“Dad was hanging pictures, and just hit his thumb with hammer,” said little Johnny through his tears. “That’s not so serious,” soothed his mother. “I know you are upset, but a big boy like you shouldn’t cry at something like that. Why didn’t you just laugh?
“I did!” sobbed Johnny.

Morty was in his usual place in the morning sitting at the table, reading the paper after breakfast. He came across an article about a beautiful actress that was about to marry a football player who was known primarily for his lack of IQ and common knowledge. He turned to his wife with a look of question on his face. “I’ll never understand why the biggest jerks get the most attractive wives.”
His wife replied, “Why thank you, dear!”

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

      • 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:

Michigan Association of Middle School Educators

  • 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
advisory, Lesson Plan, Podcast, Strategy, Tech, Web SpotlightBy Troy Patterson

MSM 173 BYOD to solve the debt- picture that!

Jokes You Can Use:

Trees are pretty smart… but they can be stumped.

Two men were walking through the woods and came upon a big black, deep hole. One man picked up a rock and tossed it into the hole and stood listening for the rock to hit bottom. There was no sound.
He turned to the other guy and said “that must be a deep hole…let’s throw a bigger rock in there and listen for it to hit bottom.” The men found a bigger rock and both picked it up and lugged it to the hole and dropped it in.
They listened for some time and never heard a sound. Again, they agreed that this must be one deep hole and maybe they should throw something even bigger into it.
One man spotted a rail-road tie nearby. They picked up the tie, grunting and groaning, and lugged it to the hole. They tossed it in. No sound. All of a sudden, a goat came flying out of the woods, running like the wind, and flew past the men and jumped straight into the hole. The men were amazed.
About that time, an old hayseed farmer came out of the woods and asked the men if they had seen a goat. One man told the farmer of the incredible incident they had just witnessed…they had just seen this goat fly out of the woods and run and leap into the big hole. The man asked the farmer if this could have been his goat.
The old farmer said “naw, that can’t be my goat…he was chained to a railroad tie.”

A man was pulled over for speeding down the highway; the officer came to the driver’s window and said, “Sir, may I see your driver’s license and registration?” The man said, “Well officer I don’t have a license, it was taken away for a DUI.” The officer, in surprise, said,” What, do you have a registration for the vehicle?” So the man replied, “No sir, the car is not mine I stole it, but I am pretty sure I say a registration card in the glove box when I put the gun in it.” The officer stepped back, “There is a gun in the glove box?!?” The man sighed and said, “Yes sir, I used to kill the woman who owns the car before I stuffed her in the trunk.” The officer steps toward the back of the car and says,” Sir do not move, I am calling for backup.” The officer calls for backup and about ten minutes another highway patrolman arrives. He walks up to the window slowly and asks the man for his driver’s license and registration. The man said,” Yes officer here it right here.” It all checked out so the officer said,” Is there a gun in the glove box sir?” The man laughs and says,” No officer why would there be a gun in the glove box.” He opened the glove box and showed him that there was no gun. The second officer asked him to open the trunk because he had reason to believe that there was a body in it. The man agrees and opens the trunk, no dead body. The second officer says, “Sir I do not understand, the officer that pulled you over said that you did not have a license, the car was stolen, there was a gun in the glove box, and a dead body in the trunk.” The man looks the officer in the eyes and says, “Yeah and I’ll bet he said I was speeding too.”

On Our Mind:

RIM buys JayCut for the PlayBook.

Eileen Award:

BuzzGarwood (twitter)

Advisory:

Visualization of the United States National Debt.

From the Twitterverse:

*Funderstanding Eric Cohen Media Strategy: Getting the Free Press to Teach Civics
*mental_floss Mental Floss From last night: 15 Wonderful Words With No English Equivalent (We need a word for ‘grief bacon’) — bit.ly/nz6OKB
*tomshepp tomshepp Announcement on JayCut site: http://ow.ly/1uTMML about RIM buying them. #edtech #webapp
*kevcreutz Kevin Creutz WOW!!! A visualization of United States debt bit.ly/nR0EkJ” via @Nunavut_Tweeter @intrepidteacher #fb
*FlyontheCWall On the ClassroomWall luv! RT @punkmaki: More evidence at #mnli2 : When you give teachers time to collaborate, you give teachers time to innovate.
*mikeklonsky Mike Klonsky State Supt. Bennett: Indiana must have the “courage” to hand public schools over private companies.
*JusticeinBah Maria RT @MathEvolve Using iPads in Education:Resources for teachers using iPads in the classroom #ipaded #mlearning #edchat #ipad
* onlinecourse Distance Education Why Flunking Out of College Might Be a Good Thing – http://dedu.org/9WqUtE
*ShellTerrell Shelly S Terrell If schools embraced social media then we could help students learn about digital footprints & help support positive footprints #Edchat
*drmmtatom Monte Tatom Creating a Personal Success Plan – A Sensible Alternative to Standardized Tests by Lisa Nielsen #fhuedu610 http://tinyurl.com/3rk62ey

Don’t forget to join the conversation on MiddleTalk and Twitter at #midleved this Friday at 8:00 pm EST.

News:

Atlanta Cheating

There had long been suspicions that cheating on state tests was widespread in the Atlanta public schools, but the superintendent, Beverly L. Hall, was feared by teachers and principals, and few dared speak out.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/18/education/18oneducation.html?pagewanted=1&src=recg

Resources:

Bill McBride

Click on Pages & Files. Lots of resources: including:

  • Graphic Novels in the Classroom
  • Debate Resources
  • Gender Differences
  • Student Engagement
  • Teaching with Technology
  • Vocabulary Resources

http://billmcbride.pbworks.com/w/page/14094960/Welcome-to-my-Wiki

Timer Tab

Online Timer, Alarm & Stopwatch. Keeps time on a tab in your browser.
http://www.timer-tab.com/

Pic4Learning

Pics4Learning is a copyright-friendly image library for teachers and students. The Pics4Learning collection consists of thousands of images that have been donated by students, teachers, and amateur photographers. Unlike many Internet sites, permission has been granted for teachers and students to use all of the images donated to the Pics4Learning collection.
http://pics4learning.com/

Web Spotlight:

Lino

Online stickies.
http://en.linoit.com/

ISTE 2011:  BYOD Bring Your Own Device

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 though 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 go 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)

ISTE 2011:  Professional Development led by Liz Davis

In a non-review year, she meets with teachers to help them prepare for their review year. Teacher had kids make stuff:

Kids prepared Choctaws (?) and rotated every 20 minutes.

Kids develop a wiki on the subject. Teachers meet with their TEAM leader to pull together stuff for their bi-annual review.

“Tech Tuesdays” Techies getting time to work with teachers. Tech coaches/IT departments justify their jobs by the level of tech integration. They survey the staff and then evaluate to see how far they’ve moved the staff from where they were to where they are at the end of the year. Tech department evaluations based on level of tech integration/use. Tech department schedules time with the teachers to help them with their job reviews and in doing so, helps them prove their value to the district.

Lots of teachers forget they use the tech and the IT people help them remember the projects to include in their portfolios. Teachers started meeting outside of school time to teach each other once they learned a new tech skill.

(The Geek Mustangs) Side note: lots of aluminum cases for iPads. IT organizes their PD for staff very similarly to what we do here at EduBloggerCon. Some put it in a survey monkey thing and have them pick their sessions there.

Use a food/menu metaphor: Appetizer, Main Course, Dessert Appetizer: Something I want to dip my toe it, something I want to find
out about, but not explore. Main Course: Something I want to learn in depth Dessert: Something fun at the end to wrap it up and I can use in my
classroom. Make an annual report at the end of the year and compliment teachers on their tech integration. Make a celebration at the end of the year out of it. (Culminating experience) Organize the kids to do tech PD for other students.

Students did a screen cast for each of the Google products. Checkout Flipboard for the iPad.

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

      • 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:

Michigan Association of Middle School Educators

  • 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
MSM, Podcast, Teaching Tip, Tech, Web SpotlightBy Troy Patterson

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:

 mthman Ron King Hey @MSMatters…do you remember the #NMSA session about HOTS question stems on colored paper in the teacher’s line of sight? #midleved

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

Book for sale – I haven’t read it. Does point out 12 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:

      • 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:

Michigan Association of Middle School Educators

  • 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
MSM, News, Podcast, Strategy, Tech, Web SpotlightBy Troy Patterson

MSM 171 TwittervISTE #ISTE11

Jokes You Can Use:

How does a guitar player make a million dollars?
He starts out with eight million.

My brother told me I needed to study more on my gardening.
I had a rock garden this year, and one of the rocks died!

Read this from Readers Digest a long time ago: One day a Cowpoke riding the plains, came upon a warrior with his head down on the ground with his ear on a wagon track, the warrior looked up at the cowpoke and said” Wagon with two horses, one black, one white, man with beard drive, smoke pipe, women ride, wear blue dress with bonnet” the cowpoke looks at the warrior and said” you mean you can tell me all that just by listening to a wagon track? The warrior looked up and replied, “No! Run over me half hour ago…

A frog came into a bank to obtain a loan. He spoke to the loan officer Mr. Paddywack. When Mr. Paddywack asked the frog what he had for loan collateral, the frog held out his hand. “What’s that?” asked Mr. Paddywack, but the frog could not talk. So, Mr. Paddywack took the frog in to see the manager and explained the situation. The manager then asked the frog what collateral he had for the loan and the frog held out his hand. “Oh,” said the manager, “that’s a knickknack Paddywack, give the frog a loan.”

The manager of a large office asked a new employee to come into his office. “What is your name?,” was the first thing the manager asked. “John,” the new guy replied. The manager scowled. “Look, I don’t know what kind of a namby-pamby place you worked at before, but I don’t call anyone by their first name! It breeds familiarity and that leads to a breakdown in authority,” he said. “I refer to my employees by their last name only – Smith, Jones, Baker – that’s all. Now that we got that straight, what is your last name?” The new guy sighed and said, “Darling. My name is John Darling.” The manager said, “Okay, John, the next thing I want to tell you…”

Eileen Award:

Allen D. for the web site recommendation.

Middle School Science Minute

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

Part 2 on the relationship between the core standards for ELA and literacy in Science. I look at the three reading standards that relate to science in grades 6 – 8 in the area of craft and structure.

From the TwittervISTE:

* dakinane dakinane  RT @gwoitas: Trends and tools in the classroom from #iste11.What is a flipped classroom? lots of cool tools! bit.ly/jAjEwq #elearning
* surreylearn surreylearn “@stevehargadon: #isteunplugged session recordings all posted! #iste11 bit.ly/mL7okU” #sd36learn
* dwarlick David Warlick How I took notes at #ISTE11 – http://ow.ly/5vrdo
* tcbird1 Tammy Audaer Bird Awesome! RT @mrsebiology Before, During, & After Reading Strategies: #edchat #engchat #midleved #elemchat
* dmcordell dmcordell I’m still trying to process it all! Your presentation was very effective. RT @cathyjo My #ISTE11 Faves http://owl.li/1dzixK
* gret Greta Sandler Webcasts and Keynotes from #ISTE11 by @rmbyrne #edchat
*gcouros gcourosRT @jaymej: @WestEnglish ISTE 2011 Closing Keynote: Chris Lehmann (full) #ISTE11
* lingsc scling The Nerdy Teacher: 10 Things I Hate About You (#ISTE11) thenerdyteacher.com/2011/06/10-thi…
* edmodo Edmodo Recovered from #ISTE11? EdmodoCon2011 – Call for presentations opens tomorrow! August 10th, Global virtual conference –details to come.
* KellyGToGo Kelly Gallagher Harry Potter and the Hatred of Teachers: esquire.com/features/thous…

Don’t forget to join the conversation on MiddleTalk and Twitter at #midleved this Friday at 8:00 pm EST.

News:

The 7 Golden Rules of Using Technology in Schools

July 6, 2011 | 3:43 PM | By Tina Barseghian
Sometimes teachers and administrators need a kick in the pants to see what they perceive as problems re-framed in a different way.
1) DON’T TRAP TECHNOLOGY IN A ROOM.
2) TECHNOLOGY IS WORTHLESS WITHOUT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT.
3) MOBILE TECHNOLOGY STRETCHES A LONG WAY.
4) THE NEW ‘F WORD’ IS FEAR.
5) TECH TOOLS ARE NOT JUST A PASSING FAD.
6) MONEY IS NOT THE PROBLEM.
7) INVITE EVERY STAKEHOLDER TO THE CONVERSATION.
http://mindshift.kqed.org/2011/07/the-seven-golden-rules-of-using-technology-in-schools/

Resources:

Be a Great Learner: Take Notes
by Jeff Cobb
Establishing a consistent habit of writing things down can be very powerful.  A significant body of research supports the idea that simply writing something down contributes greatly to the process of moving it into long-term memory.
http://www.missiontolearn.com/2011/06/note-taking/

Leveling the Playing Field: How to Make Standardized Test Preparation Accessible to All Students

By Andrea Alexander
Strategy 1: Encourage Predictive Reading Habits
Strategy 2: Build Good Vocabularies
Strategy 3: Take Advantage of All the Resources Offered by the Internet
http://www.edutopia.org/blog/how-to-make-standardized-test-prep-available-to-all-students

Desmos

Desmos is a place where anyone can create and share rich, interactive content that works across platforms – from computers, to interactive touchscreens in classrooms, and even to many tablet devices and smartphones. We believe that educational content should be easy to build, easy to access, and easy to share, and should never be restricted to one device. Desmos is in private beta, but taking requests to join.
Desmos, at its core, means connection (in English, the study of ligaments is known as Desmology). We build software that allows people to create content and collaborate online.
http://desmos.com/calculator/
http://desmos.com/

One Teacher’s Three-Tiered Intervention Strategy

Jean Laurance and Michael Laurance

I had no sooner returned from Rick Wormeli’s seminar on differentiated assessment and grading than my administrator walked into my office. Her face showed apprehension and a bit of weariness.
My class sizes would be pushed to a staggering 37 students!  “We don’t have enough students to run separate classes, so they will be mixed, but about 10 percent are repeating the class.”
Having the tools required for differentiated instruction is one thing, but here I was faced with the task of truly implementing it. More than that, I would need to adjust differentiation to my teaching style, a diverse group of students, and a bulging class size. I quickly realized that manageability would be just as important as the instruction itself.
http://www.ascd.org/ascd-express/vol6/620-laurance.aspx

Web Spotlight:

What Does Successful Project Based Learning Looks Like?
by Bob Lenz
Project-Based Learning (PBL) is a teaching approach, a mindset, and a framework for teaching skills and content. (Both our working definition and criteria are derived from our own work, as well as the work of, Adria Steinberg’s 6 A’s of PBL, The Buck Institute for Education, and Expeditionary Learning.)
http://www.edutopia.org/blog/project-based-learning-definition-bob-lenz

Troy has a new project . . . . Just Arrived!

Stencil:  http://stencil.sourceforge.net/
Make games.  No need to understand programming.  Can make iPhone Apps from this program.  Allegedly Angry Birds was made using this program.

Summer Reading List:

Troy:

  • The Watchman’s Rattle ( just finished) by Rebecca D. Costa
  • What the Dog Saw by Malcom Gladwell

Shawn:

  • Toys to Tools,
  • Safe Practice for Life Online &
  • Web 2.0 How to for teachers
  • The Devil Dogs of Belleau Wood  ✔

Our Listeners:

@mthman:  The Classroom of Choice, First Days of School (4th Ed), Worksheets Don’t Grow Dendrites, & Great Ways to Diff Math Instr (I & II), Leading & Managing a Diff Class, Learning to Love Math, PBL Starter Kit (via Buck Institute), UbD Guide 2 HQ Units

#midleved:

@Waukeestudent:  I plan on reading @johntspencer ‘s new book and maybe his two older books two.

Bonus:

http://www.missiontolearn.com/2011/06/recommended-reading/

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:

      • 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:

Michigan Association of Middle School Educators

  • 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
advisory, Conferences, MSM, News, Podcast, Tech, Web SpotlightBy Troy Patterson

MSM 170 Football Fields, ISTE, Tweet Me.

Jokes You Can Use:

What goes up and never comes down?
Your age

1 egg takes 5 minutes to boil. How long do 10 eggs take to boil?
The same 5 minutes.

How many times does a tailor have to cut 100 yards of cloth to get 100 equal pieces?
99 times. You don’t cut the last piece, it is already there

What side of the teacup is the handle on?
I really don’t know the answer

Which is heavier? 1 pound of hay or 1pound of metal.
They both weigh a pound

Peter piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. A peck of pickled peppers, Peter piper picked. If Peter piper picked a peck of pickled peckers, how many pickels did Peter piper picked? How many Ps are there in THAT?
None…T..H…A…T…..there are NO P’s in the word THAT

What has 100 eyes and cannot see?
A potato

Two Indians standing on a bridge. One is the father of the other ones son. What is the relation between the two Indians?
Mother and Father

What has NO legs and CAN run?
Water

On Our Mind:

ISTE 2011 (#iste11)
The problems with skipping a show

Eileen Award

Gabe Walker & Michael Cohen

Advisory:

BBC – Witness

Witness – history as told by the people who were there. Five days a week we will be talking to people who lived through moments of history to bring you a personal perspective on world events.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/witness

Middle School Science Minute

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

In this podcast, I look at the ELA Reading Common core for grades 6-8 and see how they apply to science.  This is the first in a three part series.  It focuses in on Key Ideas and Details.

From the Twitterverse:

*MSMatters Shawn & Troy “Treating students as only test scores is the worst form of identity theft.” -Dr. Stephen Covey at #iste11
*deangroom DeanGroom If ya cant build a community, build a creepy treehouse and pretend its a community. After all, its all about you anyway.
*pernilleripp Pernille Ripp Did you know Banana Republic offers a 15% discount for teachers? I didn’t http://ow.ly/5tKLw
*chubbuch Chris Hubbuch Attended a powerful session yesterday on improving our presentations. Reminds me of this ow.ly/5tKuR via @geraldaungst #edchat
*carolynstarkey Carolyn Starkey Updated LiveBinder: School Librarians and the Common Core State Standards: Resources tinyurl.com/3pdrejs #aslachat
*kbkonnected Karen Bolotin 45 recorded sessions from #ISTE – via @dsmacdonald I’m listening to @dmantz @livebinders right now. Awesome…http://tumblr.com/xtl38xls1q
*scottmerrick Scott Merrick #iste11 – @scottmerrick ustream.tv/channel/iste-s… for ustream archive of our fine 1st annual SIGVE Machinima Festival. New faces there! Thx, KC!
*web20classroom Steven W. Anderson RT @dataliberation: We’re happy to announce The Data Liberation Front’s revolutionary new product, Google Takeout:dataliberation.blogspot.com/2011/06/data-l…
*sccsdtechjodee Jo Dee Weltz Adam Bellow: ironic we get our “PD” from Twitter and YouTube, yet we block it in our schools #ISTE11
*cyberteacher Stephanie Madlinger RT @adambellow All new FREE eduTecher apps available now for iPhone, iPad & Android! Check out & enjoy! #education #iste11 #edtech #edchat
*elemenous Lucy Gray Mobile Learning Finds (Apple iOS) (weekly): – Hipstamatic Combination Chart Chart… http://goo.gl/fb/T8Hmg
*kjarrett Kevin Jarrett RT @isteconnects: New Post: Web 2.0 Tools Smackdown: Ideas and Resources from EduBloggerCon 2011 bit.ly/lqWbPD #ebc11 #iste11
*courosa Alec Couros “9 Presentation Apps for the iPad” http://rww.to/jKbxby
*gret Greta Sandler Webcasts and Keynotes from #ISTE11 by @rmbyrne #edchat
*edmodo Edmodo Recovered from #ISTE11? EdmodoCon2011 – Call for presentations opens tomorrow! August 10th, Global virtual conference –details to come.

Don’t forget to join the conversation on MiddleTalk and Twitter at #midleved this Friday at 8:00 pm EST.

News:

University of the People

University of the People (UoPeople) is the world’s first tuition-free online university
dedicated to the global advancement and democratization of higher education.
The University embraces the worldwide presence of the Internet and dropping technology costs to bring tuition-free academic programs within reach to millions of people around the world.
With the support of academic leadership from top universities and a student body comprised of students from over 115 countries, UoPeople has become a tuition-free higher education global leader.
Currently, University of the People offers the following four undergraduate degrees: Associate (A.S.-B.A.) and Bachelor (B.S.-B.A.) degrees in Business Administration and Associate (A.S.-C.S.) and Bachelor (B.S.-C.S.) degrees in Computer Science.
It should be noted that unless and until University of the People receives state licensing, it will be unable to grant degrees to graduating students.
http://www.uopeople.org/

What’s the Best Way to Grade Teachers?

By Kristina Rizga| Wed Jun. 29, 2011 11:35 AM PDT

That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try, because we do know that while poverty accounts for much of students’ achievement gap, within a school, teachers make a bigger difference than any other variable.
Elden’s suggests that education reformers spend more time talking with teachers to avoid unintended consequences like firing teachers who want to work with the most challenging students. Hire teachers from diverse backgrounds and varying viewpoints to develop these systems, not just policy wonks or teacher union reps, she says. “Realize that schools are deeply collaborative communities and setting up competition will not always be the best thing for the kids.”
http://motherjones.com/contributor/2011/06/grading-teachers-evaluations

First Digital Only Textbook:

CINCH, is a cloud-based curriculum for K-12 math and 7-12 science. It makes all course materials, which include ebooks, presentations, assessments and animation clips, available from any device with a browser. Students in a class can also participate in Facebook-like conversations that stay with the text. “We’re trying to meet students and teachers where they’re at digitally,” Stansell says.
http://mashable.com/2011/06/27/iste-textbooks-k-12/

The many health perks of good handwriting

Not only does it help the brain develop, it can also improve grades and confidence
Emerging research shows that handwriting increases brain activity, hones fine motor skills, and can predict a child’s academic success in ways that keyboarding can’t.
Handwriting can change how children learn and their brains develop. IU researchers used neuroimaging scans to measure brain activation in preliterate preschool children who were shown letters. One group of children then practiced printing letters; the other children practiced seeing and saying the letters. After four weeks of training, the kids who practiced writing showed brain activation similar to an adult’s, said James, the study’s lead researcher. The printing practice also improved letter recognition, which is the No. 1 predictor of reading ability at age 5.
http://www.healthkey.com/sc-health-0615-child-health-handwriti20110615,0,5764943.story

Resources:

ISTE Online:

Free PD for you.  What happens at ISTE . . . goes social:
http://tumblr.com/xtl38xls1q http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2011/07/webcasts-and-keynotes-from-iste-2011.html

Socrative:

Socrative is a smart student response system that empowers teachers to engage their classrooms through a series of educational games and exercises via smartphones and tablets. Our apps are super simple and take seconds to load and run. Teachers control the questions and games on their laptop, while students respond and interact through their smartphones/laptops. Run it as an app or on any web browser.
Currently free. No mention of what prices will be once it is out of beta.
http://www.socrative.com/

Weaving History

Create ‘factlets’ — places, people, events — and string them together into ‘threads’ at the click of a button.Automatically visualize the results temporally and spatially, search by any attribute, automatically import Wikipedia articles and much more …
Very bare bones currently. It’s reliance on Wikipedia could cause some problems for schools (but maybe not).
Potential to be exciting and useful for students and teachers.
http://www.weavinghistory.org/

Web Spotlight:

Ujam

You sing the lyrics, it figures out the tune.  Even if you can’t carry a tune in a bucket, sing into the mic and it comes up with the music to go along with it.  Anybody can become a musician with this app.  Think of it as your answer to the kid who says, “You can’t make a song out of that!”  Now you can.  http://www.ujam.com/

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:

      • 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:




Michigan Association of Middle School Educators

  • 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

 

advisory, Podcast, Tech, Web SpotlightBy Troy Patterson

MSM 169 “I got you a cookie!” Resources Bonanza!

Jokes You Can Use:

The prison officer tells the warden, “Sir, I have to report that ten prisoners have broken out.”
The alarmed warden says, “Blow the whistles, sound the alarms, alert the police.
With a surprised look the officer says, “Shouldn’t we call the doctor first – it looks as if it might be measles.

Did you hear about the skunk that went to church?
“He had his own pew.”

A nursery school teacher was delivering a station wagon full of kids home one day when a fire truck zoomed past. Sitting in the front seat of the fire truck was a Dalmatian dog.
The children fell to discussing the dog’s duties.
“They use him to keep crowds back,” said one youngster.
“No,” said another, “he’s just for good luck.”
A third child brought the argument to a close. “They use the dogs,” she said firmly, “to find the fire hydrant.”

It was an elegant dinner party and the hostess had left nothing to chance, except that a little water had splashed on the marble floor. And when the waiter came into the dining room carrying the beautiful roast suckling pig, he slipped and fell flat, sending the roast flying. “Don’t worry, Tomas,” said the hostess calmly. “Just take the roast back to the kitchen and bring out the other one.”

On Our Mind:

Job changes.

Week “off”.

Eileen Award

Monte Tatom


Advisory:

Belongings

By SAM DOLNICK
There are three million immigrants in New York City. When they left home, knowing it could be forever, they packed what they could not bear to leave behind: necessities, luxuries, memories. Here is a look at what some of them brought.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/nyregion/27belongings.html

Middle School Science Minute

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or davidbydlowski@mac.com)
GIS (Geographic Information Systems) with middle school students. (We attach the device to an area they can’t reach, that way if they wander off the floor we can find them!  Oh, wait, that’s the mental ward . . .)

From the Twitterverse:

*Larryferlazzo Updates to “The Best Resources For Helping Teens Learn About The Importance Of Sleep”
*DanielPink Take 2 minutes and tell Congress not to cut arts education . . .
*pammoran inspiring post by MissShuganah about one of those 1 in a million teachers who changes lives http://is.gd/bw6GB7
*DanielBeylerian Top 46 #Free #Mac Downloads –
Top 100 #Free #iPhone Apps – Top 100 #Free #Android Apps –
*willrich45 If Lassie could Tweet:
*MSPortal2 Learning From Mom Boosts Low-Income Kids’ School Readiness http://1.usa.gov/iiA1tB
*russeltarr The seven secrets behind great teaching: http://tinyurl.com/3wmr4dp
*brasst iLearn – iPod touch and iPad Apps gameslab.radford.edu/iLearn/apps.ht… Created by students, for students
*Larryferlazzo RT @shermandorn: “Give me the money or I shoot my foot!” and other political theories of education reform
*drmmtatom QR Codes – What are they & how can I use them in my classroom? | The Spectronics Blog http://zite.to/m528ca via @Ziteapp #fhuedu642

ASCD Inservice: Seven Ways to Go from On-Task to Engaged #fhuedu610 http://tinyurl.com/3vfgyhr
*pearson Pearson eText for iPad youtube.com/watch?v=6eIBta…
*theresawhite “@NAESP: Study Links Job Stress In Teachers To Student Achievement http://j.mp/mDKQ8o”
*Ruth_A_Buzzi Easy Reader; Thunderbraille; Deaf Man’s Chest; The Bridge on the River Quiet; The Best Ears of our Lives #silentmovies

Ruth_A_Buzzi #funeralhomeslogans When taxes are the only remaining inevitable.

Ruth_A_Buzzi #funeralhomeslogans Option 13, take him back home minus the snoring.

Ruth_A_Buzzi #funeralhomeslogans At least Navy Seals aren’t dropping you in the water.

Ruth_A_Buzzi #funeralhomeslogans Formaldehyde or napalm, the kids decide.

Ruth_A_Buzzi #funeralhomeslogans Where the Bloods hang with the Crypts.

#myworstinvestment How to Read Braille, the video series.
*HappyTeacherLA @toughLoveforx @DianeRavitch waiting 4 edreformers 2 pass laws 2 jail prnts 4 not reading the prescribed minutes 2 their children at home.
*DianeRavitch RT: No high performing nation in world evaluates teacher quality by student test scores. None. tinyurl.com/44jegl8

Don’t forget to join the conversation on MiddleTalk and Twitter at #midleved this Friday at 8:00 pm EST.

Resources:

Multi-media in Education Report

http://www.edweek.org/ew/collections/multimediareport-2011/digitaledition-multimediareport2011.html?r=1130997812

77 Web Resouces to Explore this summer

The school year is either over or almost over for the majority of readers of Free Technology for Teachers. The summer is a good time to explore and experiment with new things that you might use in the fall. In the PDF below I’ve compiled 77 resources that you might want try out over the next couple of months. Even if there’s nothing new to you in it, please consider passing it along to a colleague that could discover a few new things from it.
http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2011/06/77-web-resources-for-teacher-to-explore.html

Stick Pick

A Corona teacher has developed a handheld-computer application to call on students randomly and ask them questions that are easy or hard enough for their current learning level.
http://www.pe.com/localnews/stories/PE_News_Local_D_wapp17.409d429.html
or
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/stick-pick/id436682059?mt=8

Succeeding with Science

http://www.succeedingwithscience.com/

OKAPI

Reading level and CBA (Curriculum Based Assessment) probes.
http://www.lefthandlogic.com/htmdocs/tools/okapi/okapi.php

Web Spotlight:

Summer Reading List for new teachers:

http://www.edutopia.org/groups/new-teacher-connections/52655

MichiganScience

By connecting to the new MichiganScience Facebook page you’ll have quicker access to science news from Michigan and across the country. Plus, there are the fun features, guest columnists (like Chuck Gaidica and PaleoJoe), book reviews and dazzling graphics you’ve come to expect. All you have to do is visit our MichiganScience fan page and click “like.” When we reach 1,200 fans, we’ll award one lucky fan with a new iPad 2.
http://www.facebook.com/MichiganScience

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

      • 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:



Michigan Association of Middle School Educators

  • 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

 

advisory, Lesson Plan, Strategy, Teaching Tip, Tech, Web SpotlightBy Troy Patterson

MSM 167 Fairly Infinite

Jokes You Can Use:

Why was the cat afraid of the tree?
Because of the tree bark. 

Guy: Haven’t I seen you someplace before?
Girl: Yes, that’s why I don’t go there anymore.

An Antartian ordered a pizza and the clerk asked if he should cut it in six or twelve pieces.
The Antartian replies, “Six, please. I could never eat twelve pieces.”

Five doctors went to on a duck hunt: a GP, a pediatrician, a psychiatrist, a surgeon, and a pathologist. After a while a bird came winging overhead, the GP raised his shogun but didn’t shoot because he wasn’t sure if it was a duck or not. The pediatrician also raised his gun, but then he wasn’t sure if it was a male or female duck, so he didn’t shoot. The psychiatrist raised his gun and then thought, I know that’s a duck, but does the duck know it’s a duck?” The surgeon was the only one who shot. Boom!! He blew it away. Then he turned to the pathologist and said, “Go see if that was a duck.”

Q. Why was the strawberry so sad?
A. His parent’s were in a jam.

On Our Mind:

The nuttiness of the end of the year.

Eileen Award

Carol Brown. Thanks for the thoughts.

Advisory:

Turn o Phrase

You can do a three before you sign in. This would be enough to show the students how it works. They could then create their own.
http://turn-o-phrase.appspot.com/

Sixty Second Lectures

Lectures in 60 seconds. (Warning: links to YouTube for videos).
http://www.sas.upenn.edu/home/news/sixtysec_lectures_archive.html

Middle School Science Minute

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

You were both talking about measurement during the last podcast and then starting talking about units (thanks for the Bydlowski Unit).  I got to thinking about measurement in middle school science and its connection to the math curriculum.  In Michigan, we stop teaching measurement in grade 6 and it all becomes application.  I think it is a good idea for middle school teachers to check out the math curriculum on measurement so that they have a solid understanding of the knowledge that students have, coming into their classrooms.  Often, science teachers will say that their students can’t measure, but math teachers know they have been teaching a lot about measurement.

From the Twitterverse:

*missnoor28 Creating a Summer Reading Network by @edutopia #edtech #edchat 

RT @kylepace: RT @mmorley: 14 Steps to Meaningful Student Blogging #edtech #edchat
*rkiker http://newsmap.jp/ is like Wordle for the news – cool interactive news cloud!
*janellewilson One last time: an overview in photos of what a year in my classroom is like. animoto.com/play/0iwDUqHo3… #NASATweetup #scichat #edchat
*russeltarr Turn a work of literature into a boardgame #englishteacher: http://tinyurl.com/3p3ugjm
*jstepheng Comics in the Classroom: 100 Tips, Tools, and Resources for Teachers http://zite.to/mBsN4N via @Ziteapp
*drmmtatom RT @skipz: Five Historical Map Resources thx dougpete #ccstech 

FlipSnack: Turn a PDF into an embeddable Flash Flip Book http://tinyurl.com/3jx6mqa #ccstech
*russeltarr The 500 most recent “Fakebook” creations from teachers/students: http://tinyurl.com/3nlpzxs
*coolcatteacher Tons of apps on sale for memorial day weekend. – From AppAdvice.com: Popular iOS Apps And Games On Sale For… http://tumblr.com/xxh2pupmr4 

Qr code classroom implementation guide is approaching 200 tweets glad it is helpful. #edtech
*RT @mathonthemind: The new Common Core Math Standards in the US will have a writing portion. Students must explain their work. #mathchat
*DianeRavitch Works every time: push out low-performing kids. See scores and grad rates go up. A miracle! trib.in/lPyXdg
Don’t forget to join the conversation on MiddleTalk and Twitter at #midleved this Friday at 8:00 pm EST.

News:

Make My School a Prison

This is why I’m proposing to make my school a prison. The State of Michigan spends annually somewhere between $30,000 and $40,000 per prisoner, yet we are struggling to provide schools with $7,000 per student. I guess we need to treat our students like they are prisoners, with equal funding. Please give my students three meals a day. Please give my children access to free health care. Please provide my school district Internet access and computers. Please put books in my library. Please give my students a weight room so we can be big and strong. We provide all of these things to prisoners because they have constitutional rights. What about the rights of youth, our future?!
http://bigthink.com/ideas/38573?lolamericanpriorities

Film Depicts Hardships, Dedication of the ‘American Teacher’

By Anthony Rebora on May 25, 2011 1:24 PM
Researchers, policymakers, and parents tend to agree that effective teachers are the key to high-quality schools—and, by implication, to maintaining an educated and thriving citizenry. So why are teachers in the United States so undervalued and lately even disparaged?
Narrated by Matt Damon, “American Teacher” seeks to counteract popular misconceptions about the teaching profession…
But the film’s central theme is money.

http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/teaching_now/2011/05/the_struggles_of_the_american_teacher.html?cmp=ENL-TU-NEWS1

Strategy of the Week:

Put the Directions to the Side, Make the Learning Central

We’ve all heard about and experienced the Digital Natives’ ability to navigate the world of technology, and I am not going to contradict Marc Prensky’s enormously influential thesis in any way, but I do have an observation to make, as well as a suggestion (skip to the end if you just want the tip)!

1. Create a new document to be used as a template for students’ work.
2. Highlight specific points of the assignment where you feel the language load of the directions will be challenging for any/all of your students. From the Google Docs menu, select Insert>Comment.
3. Write step-by-step those areas of the assignment for which you anticipate students may need clarification (remember later the docs you have done this with, so that you can copy and paste procedures that are repeated across assignments)
4. Share the document with your students as “View Only” with the anticipation that they will need to make their own editable copy.

http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2011/05/put-directions-to-side-make-learning.html

Resources:

Flocabulary

We provide a free song from each of our titles in Vocabulary, Literature, Social Studies, Math and Science. You can find these samples by clicking on the subject heading above. We’ve produced videos for some of these songs. We’ve also created a handful of free songs and videos that don’t correspond to any particular album.
http://www.flocabulary.com/teacher_free_songs_videos.html

Tildee

Quick and easy way to create step by step directions. Allows for editing. Email address is needed to edit and create accounts. Directions can include Google Maps, Videos, and Images (and text, of course).
http://www.tildee.com/

Teach Handwriting

http://www.educationworld.com/a_curr/strategy/strategy057.shtml

Web Spotlight:

Computer Desktop Clutter Reveals Your Personality

Computer users with messy desktops are more likely to be liberal, educated city-dwellers who are career-minded and good at math, while those that keep their computer icons neat and tidy are more likely to be young tech-savvy suburbanites that say their personal life is more important than work. At least according to a new survey.
http://www.21stcenturyfluency.com/blogpost.cfm?blogID=1931

Myth of Bell to Bell teaching

Many teachers have been told to teach from bell to bell. Unfortunately, some teachers believe this means they must stand and deliver in front of the board for 50 minutes. Big mistake! In traditional urban schools, it is hard to keep students’ attention for even 5 minutes without them taking out their phone or simply daydreaming while acting like they are paying attention.
http://ascd.typepad.com/blog/2011/04/bell-to-bell-instruction-vs-golden-rule-of-15-minutes.html

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

      • 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:


Michigan Association of Middle School Educators

  • 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