Ed Tech Geek

I viewed the video Larry Lessig: How creativity is being strangled by the lawfrom the TED conference, and was very impressed with Larry as a presenter. He is poised, well spoken, funny, and the flow of his presentation is very enjoyable.  I found him to be very entertaining.  I loved how he compared the norms of different eras and tied it all back to creativity.  The examples were hilarious, but a tad racy.  I was surprised that he could use the examples but couldn’t directly reference creative commons.  I thought it was very fitting how he alluded to it though.  Overall, this was enlightening and entertaining.  On a side note I have just posted my first pictures on flicker, and I made them all available to the public for no commercial use.  Ever since we learned of that advanced search feature in flicker I have been using it for everything. 

Wow. That is about all I can utter at the moment. I just finished listening to Going Global with Alan November, and I have a new fear for this county. For years now I have feared our county’s environmental destruction and disregard for our natural resources and waste, but now I have an additional concern. Alan tells a compelling point of view regarding the education of children in the US and our lack of global perspective and empathy for other countries. I have respect for his opinion based on his own world travels, and I realized how little I knew about education in other counties listening to some of his examples. The truly nerve racking part is the economic ramifications that this could have on our county as a whole. I think we are often such an ethnocentric county that we forget that there is a great big world out there. Foreign relations should be a concern of our county and society as a whole, not just our government, and our large corporations. Education does seem to be an obvious missing link. We in education are so focused on our national requirements, state standards and county requirements that it is easy to forget that there is a much bigger picture. I thought it was interesting that he recommends Skipe, Podcasting and a blog as three things a teacher can do to help their classroom move in a more global direction. Is this really the answer? Why is our government not helping to make our schools more competitive on a global level? Was NCLB supposed to do that? We seem to be stuck with requirements placed on us at a national level that work against this change in the way we educate. Can teachers really change education from the front lines up?

Please visit the following link to listen to listen to “Crossing the Copyright Boundary in the Digital Age” by Karen Richardson:

http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=185

I chose this as my last session because this touches upon the topic of our last class.  I really enjoyed the discussions that we had in our last class, and I found that this presentation had some good points, but it didn’t really bring anything new to the table that we hadn’t discussed in our copyright discussion.  I did find the length of time that a piece can be copyrighted for to be very interesting.  I guess I never realised how it has historically become harder and harder to use someone else’s work.  I always assumed that things have always been strictly copyrighted. 

I think I agree with the increased amount of time that something can be copyrighted for, because I definitely believe that the creator should have full rights to their work and be able to use it however they want and try to earn as much money from it as possible.  I think that Fair Use helps to balance these restrictions out in a fair way (hence Fair Use).  I am a little confused about Public Domain though, and I wasn’t able to get that much more clarification from the materials in this presentation.  I understand taht Public Domain can be used by anyone, but I don’t know how you know when something is Public Domain.

I absolutely love the Creative Commons idea, and I think this is a great way for people to decide exactly how they want to share their creations with the world.  The whole concept is a fabulous idea.  I wasn’t aware of it at all prior to our last class, but there was a great video about Creative Commons in the extra materials for this presentation.  My favorite find in this presentation though was the spoof on Disney movies entitled “A Fairy Use Tail” by Eric Faden.  If you haven’t seen this you need to take a look.  Not only does he have a great point, it is just a fun and entertaining little creation.   Most importantly, he has shared this work with a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/4bK8AZSYtPU" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Please visit the following link to listen to “The Collaborative ABC Project: Using Technology To Tell Stories” by Kevin Hodgson:

http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=182

Ever since I was introduced to the concept of digital story telling I loved it. I introduced this concept to my staff by reading them a story I wrote about my summer vacation and then showing them a Photostory in which the same story played, and they could see the pictures that second time around. It made a huge impression on my staff for the impact pictures can have on story telling. Take a look if you are interested: (double click on the video player when the page opens) My Summer Vacation . I had a few teachers use MS Photostory to create some really great class projects last year, but one problem always arose. I couldn’t figure out an easy way for all of the students to actively work on their part of the project at once. They could each do separate projects, or we could pull students one at a time to voice record their section of the class project, but if we were trying to create one collaborative class project they couldn’t all work on their section at once. When I heard Kevin’s idea about an online collaborative digital story telling project I was really excited.

I loved his idea for the ABC story, and the thought of so many people being able to submit their portion of this project was great. The actual presentation was wonderful, and I loved how they included the final product and many extras all on the same website. The deal breaker for me was when I went to jumpcut to see if this was a tool that could help me stich together pieces of student projects. I might be able to use this tool myself, but my initial reaction when I got to the jumpcut homepage was: WOW, I really hope this site is blocked at school. I haven’t checked to see if it is fact blocked yet, but the homepage shows there are a lot of people using jumpcut to make some extremely inappropriate videos.

I loved the idea of a web based tool where students could collaborate and piece together one final project as a group, so I am now looking into VoiceThread. I have just started to dabble earlier today, so I haven’t quite figured it all out, but I love what I see. I love the fact that a group can voice record together for one project, and just like a blog, they can receive responses on their creation. The only catch is that again, they would have to login. I really wish that the login didn’t require an email address, because one generic login would work to get the students in to this tool. I guess I could just set up a completely bogus email account separate from my own junk account and pick a random password. Does anyone have any thoughts on using a web based tool where you are using an email address as the user id?

As a current technology specialist, it is embarrassing to admit that this blog is truly my first blog experience. As a first timer I don’t feel that I have a great platform for sharing a strong opinion of the use of web 2.0 tools in school. I can piggy back on the ideas of others at the moment, but I am solely basing my opinion on what I have been told and my brief exposure to these tools.

I do feel that much like the introduction of the internet to classrooms there are great possibilities, but there are also tremendous dangers. I think that there is great value in teaching our students to share their intellectual thoughts with others and to reconsider their thoughts based on the comments of others. This is a simple concept that has been taught for years in classrooms. The idea of web 2.0 tools and more specifically a blog is that students are reaching beyond the confines of their traditional classroom and tapping into the ideas of the world. The world…that is almost too hard to truly take in. I am not a parent myself, but I really don’t have a hard time understanding parents trepidations when it comes to allowing a child to share not only their thoughts, but possibly an ongoing conversation with “someone out there”.

I guess for me, I am still really struggling with pushing beyond the possible dangers and allowing elementary aged students to use a public web 2.0 tool. I do think that the concept of using a blog is a wonderful tool and could really bring a grade level or school closer together if they are all actively participating in a blog together, but I think I am more comfortable with a blog on a school tool that is on an internal network and password protected to those within the school system. I have seen too many teachers use the internet very poorly with students regardless of reminders about pre-checking websites and monitoring the students that the idea of actually letting students interact directly on a completely public site is fairly terrifying to me. The tech geek in me is so intrigued by blogs, and I can’t wait to hear other people’s ideas on possible reasons to use a blog in the classroom, because for me I am still very undecided.

The following question was offered as a common question received in a school:

You can copy this music cd for me–can’t you?

This is a fabulous question. The catch is the difference between what “can” be done and what “should” be done. With the speed of technology today, it very common for something to be not only possible, but also very easy and still not be legal. Even when someone purchases a music CD from the store, they can not legally copy it so that they have two CDs to actively use. Now I will pose an additional question.  It is legal to make a copy of a software CD as long as it is not used.  This copy is for backup purposes only.  So would it also stand that you can make a back up copy of any music CD that you purchase as long as it is not used?

Please visit the following link to listen to “The Electric Slide! Twenty-First Century Style” by Kurt Paccio and James Gates:

http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=171

Kurt and James each had their own seperate presentations in this session. Kurt introduced sPresent and James presented splashcast. I watched Kurt’s presentation on my iPod this weekend, and I couldn’t wait to get home so that I could jump online and try out sPresent. I have to say, I have had a lot of fun with this tool. It is the same type of presentation application as PowerPoint, but there is just something about some new bells and whistles that make a new application fun for me. The newness factor has taken me in. I am now trying to think of a creative way that I can use it myself.

The great thing about this tool is that it is completely web based so there are no compatibility issues. I find that to be fantastic because updates, different versions and different platforms are a part of my daily obstacle course. A web based application would circumvent those issues. I also love the ease in which you can add videos from YouTube. One of the features that stuck out in my mind as great for education is the window that pops up to let you add a link to a video or image. When you put in the URL there is also a text box to give credit where credit is due. I think that just works well as a reminder and a very easy way to add a citation.

Sadly, I don’t think this will be a tool that I use in my school with students for one simple reason. You have to log in with an email address and a password. Most of the students at my school don’t have email addresses and I am not very comfortable with the idea of giving out one general email address for all of the students to use as their user id. Any ideas or comments?

James presented splashcast, and unfortunately the archived files didn’t include video. I downloaded the audio to my iPod so I was able to listen to it over the weekend, but was disapointed to discover when I logged in this week that the full version was also just audio. sPresent was a very user friendly application and that presentation would have okay if it was just audio. Unfortunately I had a much harder time following James’ presentation.

I have now successfully created a splashcast account and a presentation that allowed me to try out the tools that splashcast offers.  The interface is not that difficult to use, but it isn’t as easy as sPresent.  The more I played around with splashcast the more I was reminded of photostory and MS Movie Maker.  The product that you are creating can be done in a similar way with these two programs depending on how much media and what types of media you are going to include.  I do like the ease in which you can pull pictures from flicker, but the main point of using this tool as mentioned by James is to post your presentation so that it can be viewed by others.  He mentions posting the presentation on a wiki.  Again I am temped to say, couldn’t we just make similar presentations in photostory and movie maker and post them either on the blog or the wiki within our school blackboard site?

Visit the following site to listen to “Classroom 2.0 or You Live Where?” by Clarence Fisher:

http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=150

This session was the keynote for the Classroom 2.0 strand of the K-12 Online Conference. Clarence shared his thoughts on the use of web 2.0 tools to create a new type of classroom. First of all I have to compliment whoever was in charge of setting up the iPod ready versions of these sessions. I had to go out of town unexpectedly this weekend, and knew I wouldn’t have internet access. I was able to download my selected sessions ahead of time and take them with me on my video iPod. I think this is the first time that my iPod has truly felt like a tool to me and not just a toy. Beyond my fascination with the fact that I could put these sessions on my iPod I really enjoyed this experience. It was great to be able to sit in an airport and simultaneously be listening and viewing the conference at my leisure, pause it, come back to it later, and then replay it to review the main ideas.

Clarence spoke of a change in pedagogy and not just using web 2.0 tools for the sake of using them. I really liked that concept because we shouldn’t be focused on just the technology, the technology should support what is going on in the classroom. He also mentioned that he has started to think of a classroom as a studio and not a classroom. It is truly amazing how different the mental picture is (at least for me) between those two words.

I think the most important concepts that Clarence focused on were the concepts of community and the irrelevance of geography in today’s world. He did a wonderful job of demonstrating the feel of how geographic barriers are blurred by including educators from around the world and filming his presentation not only at his school, but in his home and out at a lake. I agreed with his ideas of a classroom as a community, and his thoughts on allowing students to participate in the discovery and creation of information really did make me think about web 2.0 tools more carefully, but I didn’t feel like there were enough specific examples to actually make me say “this is definitely something that I need to start doing”.

This was the keynote speech, so I understand that it is a little more about the ideas and not necessarily detailed examples, but I just didn’t walk away with a good enough handle on how he is actually using these tools to support his curriculum and what his class is doing. I definitely see positives, but my current thought is that having students publish on the public web and communicate with people outside of the classroom is a huge step.  I really think that I would prefer to start with an interface only available to the school.

Please post your ideas and thoughts about how you can actually use these tools to support the curriculum.  If you are currently using any of these tools I would love to hear about it.  I am still very on the fence with all of these ideas.  I guess I like the ideas of teaching the tool but only in a “training wheel” environment that isn’t open to everyone in the world.

Fourth grade students have a wonderful science unit on simple machines. They learn what defines each of the simple machines (inclined plain, screw, wedge, lever, pulley and the wheel and axle). They are also introduced to and find additional examples of each of the simple machines. They then go on to use hands on models and experiment to gain a better understanding of how the simple machines truly make work easier.

There is one question that is posed at the end of this unit, and it is usually just a very brief discussion. The question that is presented is: what would life be like without one of the simple machines?

My proposal is for a culminating activity at the end of the unit to put a little more focus on that great question. This activity would require students to delve into the question a little further and create a visual with a group of students that incorporates what they have learned about one of the simple machines (of their choice) and a creative description with visuals of what life would be like without that simple machine. They would have a choice between MS Photo Story, MS PowerPoint, the brochure template in MS Publisher, or a website created in Web Blender as a tool to create their final product. They can also use additional resources to help them in creating this final project. These resources could include a digital camera, the internet, Pixie, Inspiration or a scanner. Students would work in groups of four and include the following in this assignment:

• Name and description of the one simple machine they have chosen.
• Examples of how we use that simple machine in our daily life including images.
• Images and a creative description of what life would be like today without that one simple machine.

simple-machines-lesson-rubric.doc

I have recently read an excerpt from Linda Hoyt’s Make it Real, Strategies for Success with Informational Texts, and I currently have all kinds of wonderful ideas for teaching writing floating around in my head. Many of these ideas are sending memories flooding back to me from my own days in grade school, and some of the strategies my own teachers used. I love watching a class participate in a shared writing assignment together. It is always interesting to see what a whole class can collectively create. Now the big question is how can you integrate technology into these ideas in a way that supports the lessons, but is also transparent and unobtrusive to the process?

Using technology in language arts has always been very interesting to me, but I also find it one of the more challenging subjects in which to use instructional technology. When I have discussed language arts with teachers in the past and ideas for using technology to support their writing workshops, modeled writing and even reading comprehension prior to a writing response I tend to find a common answer amongst many teachers…”our students use technology in language arts more then they do in any subject because they type up their final papers,” or “students take so long to type that they get to spend plenty of time on the computer for writing.” Yikes! This response just leaves me scratching my head and trying to decide how I can turn the conversation around.

My own personal experience with technology as a child was that prior to honing true keyboarding skills, the computer was actually a bottleneck for all of the ideas and thoughts that I was trying to record. I could web, write, rearrange and organize my thoughts so much faster on paper and the thought of sitting down to a blank word processor and being told to start writing was terrifying to me. It is very interesting that now I much prefer to do all of my writing on the computer because I can now type faster then I write, but I digress.

Inspiration software or any other software for graphically mapping out concepts and ideas is a great way to actually incorporate technology into the process of writing, and not just the creation of the final product. The one area that I love to see technology support in language arts is visuals. This doesn’t require students to compare their typing skills to the student next to them, and look at the clock to see just how little time they have left to finish their paper. Instead, it just encourages them to think. As a class or in a small group guided writing could greatly be enhanced by the use of some projected photographs, images or even a well structured diagram. You can ask students to describe, explain and get the words flowing based on what they see.

The common concept that I found throughout Hoyt’s writing was to actively teach writing, and have students actively participate in the process. This seems so profound, but in reality it was interesting to see how many different ways there were to do this. The majority of the ideas incorporated a wonderful final product that could be utilized by the students as a resource. In many of these ideas, the group was creating this product together. I think it would be useful for a class to use technology as the medium to create this final product, because we are now in a world where we are learning “24-7” and students are going to be practicing writing at home as well as in school. Capturing that resource digitally so that it could be accessed both from home as well as in school could enhance the result of the lesson.