I.E.T.C.: Week of November 26, 2012

-


This week I attended the Illinois Education and Technology Conference in Springfield, IL.  This is a fantastic conference for all teachers, not just technology teachers.  There were record numbers this year.  For more information on the conference and the individual sessions be sure to click on the link above and visit the conference ning.

These are some of the sites that stood out for me:

Mike's Technology Closet (http://mikestechnologycloset.com)

Mike did a session titled "50 in 50".  We had a quick glance at 50 different websites in 50 minutes.  While I knew of most of these resources (not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing) there were a few that I had forgotten about that I felt it might be worth taking another look.  Here they are:

http://www.xtranormal.com/  Xtranormal allows you to make mini-virtual movies simply by typing in text.  The free version is somewhat limited.  There is an educator's account for $10 a month but I would try the service out via the free version to see if it fits your needs.  Mike kicked off his presentation with a virtual teacher introducing him via xtranormal.  It was a great opener!

http://www.pearltrees.com/ Pearltrees is another example of a social bookmarking tool.  Its visually attractive and allows you to search other users Pearltrees as well.

http://todaysmeet.com/  TodaysMeet continues to be a great backchannel service.  They are growing in popularity- it is no longer an option to keep a room open for a year.  The longest time now is one month!  Here's a great example of using TodaysMeet.  On Saturday after I came back from I.E.T.C. I attended ICE's Flipped Classroom Workshop.  Jon Bergman opened the backchannel during his keynote.   I'm thinking of using this during my graduate class' Webquest presentations!

http://storybird.com/ Storybird is such a great site to get students writing and creating.  This site, which is geared for younger students allows them to create books using artwork already provided for them.  Sign up for a free account or let your students read through the stories already in place.

http://www.scrible.com/  Still in beta, Scrible is a site that allows you to highlight and add sticky notes to webpages.  This is appealing because many times we want to point out specific parts of a webpage for our students but they become distracted by everything else on the page.  Consider checking out this site.

http://youcanbook.me/  Similar to Doodle, YouCanBook.Me allows you to have multiple users book multiple appointments.  Mike said his school is considering using this site to help the teachers set up parent/teacher conferences.  The site integrates Google Calendars.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Twenty Years is Worth Two Cents

-
Image
Time It’s been an interesting year.  My twins entered middle school (time flies).  My mom died unexpectedly leaving me parentless with probate and a house built by my grandfather in 1948 (time stands still).  Oh…and CPS is shuttering my school  (time to move?). The school I’ve built my career at and spent the last twenty years with students. I sat in the library with my colleagues and was read two scripts; one by my principal and one by a Chicago Public School Central Office employee.  With that, it was done (or in the beginning phase of 'done'). Teachers were told to “have a good day of teaching and learning” (one of our daily mantras) and were sent off to teach their students after just being told our school was not remaining open after this school year but our building would remain open with a new faculty and three student bodies.   George Leland school would inhabit our building while May Community Academy and Louis Armstrong Math & Science Elementary would be
Read more

Understanding Plagiarism

-
Image
Our middle school is 1:1 with Chromebooks so students spend a fair amount of time researching topics online.  A teacher noticed there is a lot of copying and pasting of information by students and asked me to come in and have a conversation about plagiarism.  I developed a Prezi with an accompanying notes guide for the students to complete as I presented the content to them.  The Prezi and notes guide are below.  As we wrapped up the students were able to use their Chromebooks for a bit of fun (with a topic that isn't so fun).  We played a Kahoot game where they reviewed concepts about plagiarism from their guide.  They loved it!  What I loved is that Kahoot also provides a summary of student responses to the game- I can see which students missed specific questions which allows me to follow up if needed. Resources used in the presentation (good for teachers and students): http://www.plagiarism.org http://en.writecheck.com (this has a plagiarism checker available) https://o
Read more

Water the Flowers, Not the Rocks: Tips from 10 Years of Instructional Coaching

-
This June I wrapped up ten years of instructional technology coaching. Soon (tomorrow, in fact) I will begin a new journey in my career where I will still utilize my coaching skills but in a different capacity. This new opportunity has caused me to reflect on lessons learned throughout my time as a school-based coach. If you are a coach or aspire to be one following are ten tips I've learned during my ten years in the role. Be a model . Practice what you preach! If you want your teachers to join Twitter make sure you are already there. If they would like to try a new tool or lesson familiarize yourself with it first in order to lend additional support. Be honest . If you don't know something, say so. As a coach, your faculty will look to you as an expert. There have been several times throughout my career that I've said, "I don't know that tool/concept/strategy but let me see what I can find out about it." If you are a former classroom teacher, remind peo
Read more