Seedlings Podcast: Show 98

Last Thursday I joined the team over at Seedlings for their 98th podcast. You can listen to the recording below to hear me talk about the history of iLearn Technology, more about my post on Dreams of Education: When Hunches Collide, and my dreams for #twitacad.  Thank you to Bob, Cheryl, and Alice for having me!

Seedlings @ Bit by Bit Podcast: Show 98
November 11, 2010

Links from the show:

“Geek of the Week” Links for 2010-11-11

Chat Transcript from EdTech

Digital Book Talk: Book Trailers for K-12

What it is: There is a new trend in reading: book trailers.  It seems that lately book trailers are popping up on all of the video sharing sites.  Digital Book Talk is a collaborative effort from the University of Central Florida where Dr. Robert Kennedy and Dr. Glenda Gunter have completed research on what motivates reluctant and striving readers to select, read, and complete books.  “The student productions of DBT (Digital Book Talk) focus use the technological skills taught in the undergraduate Digital Media and graduate Educational Technology curricula that teach teachers how to create dynamic digital games, trailers, and Web sites. Many of these skills include research and writing, Flash animation, visual storytelling, video recording and editing, audio recording, graphic design, website development, programming, and database creation.”  On the Digital Book Talk site, you will find high quality book trailers that will whet your students appetite for a good book.  Students can search for books by content level, and interests.

How to integrate Digital Book Talk into your curriculum: The Digital Book Talk site is an excellent place for students to start their search for a book that will hold their interest.  Just like a movie trailer, the book trailers give students just enough information to leave them wanting more.  The Digital Book Talks will help your reluctant readers understand the adventures that await them in a good book.  Find a book trailer to introduce a novel that the whole class will be reading or set up classroom computers with a link to Digital Book Talk where students can be inspired to find their next read.  After students read, they can create their own Digital Book Talks using video cameras or tools like Xtranormal, ZimmerTwins, or Kerpoof movie.

A few years ago I had my students create bookcasts.  These were the same ideas as a book trailer but instead of being video, they were audio podcasts only.  I created a wiki where the students uploaded their bookcasts as they finished them.   The wiki was a place where students could recommend books to their peers, demonstrate their understanding of a book, and find the next book to read based on a classmates recommendation.

Tips: Be sure to check out the student work tab to see book trailers created by k-12 students around the country.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Digital Book Talk: Book Trailers for k-12 in your classroom!

Aviary Education

Great news! Aviary has come out with a special education edition!  In the Education version, teachers can create private student accounts, manage assignments and projects, use the image editor, vector editor, audio editor, and music creator.  All content and images will be 100% school safe!  Right now the Education site is in Beta, you can request an invitation to test the site with your students.  If you aren’t familiar with the Aviary tools, check out my previous posts HERE. Aviary is a fabulous online alternative to those expensive Adobe creativity suites.

NASA Space Place

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What it is: NASA has hundreds of excellent educational resources online.  NASA Space Place is another awesome site for elementary kids to explore science and space.  The Space Place has fun online games, animations, projects, and fun facts about Earth, space and technology.  Space Place Live is an animated talk show where all the guests are real scientists and engineers who work on space and Earth missions.  Students can find out what it is like to work for NASA, how the scientist or engineer got started, and what they like to do for fun.  There are currently 7 episodes that students can enjoy topics include: solar wind, satellites, weather, space missions, telescopes, engineering, the birth of stars, Mars, robots, and black holes.  Even though the show is animated, the experts involved are the actual experts.  NASA Space Place has a variety of on and offline games with everything from scrambled pictures, to world puzzles, crazy quizzes and board games.  Students can learn more about weather, space, satellites, the environment, (and much more) through game play.  There are a variety of projects and experiments on the site with step by step directions for students.  These are great for the classroom, science fair, or at home on a rainy day.  Space Place makes finding games, animations, and projects related to your curriculum easy arranging the site by subjects.  Use Space Place when you are learning about planets and the solar system, stars, galaxies, and black holes, laws of the universe (light, motion, gravity), the Earth, and space technology.  Space Place has several storybooks that can be viewed on or offline.


How to integrate NASA Space Place into the classroom: Because of the wealth of resources on this site, there are a variety of ways to use it in your classroom.  The animations are a neat way to bring expert scientists and engineers into your classroom.  Share an animated video a week as your students explore the solar system and universe.  The games reinforce learning, use them as a center activity on the classroom computers as they relate to your curriculum.  Many of the games encourage exploration and trial and error (these are my favorite kind of learning games for students).  Students can explore the Amazing Facts section of the site and then complete the trivia game to test out their understanding.  In the project section, you will find experiments and science crafts. Choose some of these to complete as a class or assign each student a different project to test and share with the class.  Projects would also make an excellent stop during science fair time.  Use the Space Place Storybooks as animated flipbooks online as a class with a projector/interactive whiteboard, or print them out for your classroom library.  The books could be used as an online reading center on your classroom computers as well.  These stories are sure to capture your students imagination!


Tips: Be sure to check out the educator page on NASA Space Place, it is packed full of good ideas, newsletters, printable images of space for bulletin boards, space related articles, math related articles, printable posters, and podcasts to download.  With the renewed push for STEM education, there has never been a better time to include sites like NASA Space Place to excite and engage your students.


Leave a comment and share how you are using Nasa Interactive Timeline in your classroom.

Pinky Dinky Doo

What it is:   Pinky Dinky Doo is a site I was destined to review, I saw the show advertising the website while channel surfing one day, and on the very same day, Kevin Jarrett Tweeted about it.  Needless to say, I checked it out and was immediately hooked.  This is a great website for pre-k through first grade students.  The site is based on a PBS show of the same name.  The website has fun activities for kids to take part in including word games, story podcasts, videos, and a place for students to create their own story podcast.  Pinky Dinky Doo loves making up stories and teaches students that every story has a beginning, middle, and end.  The stories are often full of metaphores and similes and often have a great message for kids too.  Every story also has one giant fancy word like “collaborate” or “gracious” teaching students rich vocabulary as well.  I love the way that this site expands student vocabulary!

How to integrate Pinky Dinky Doo into the classroom:  Put your students listening skills to work, listen as a class to a podcast story and discuss parts of a story together afterward.  Every story has a distinct beginning, middle, and end.  Students can draw and visualize the story while they listen to it.  The podcast stories would also make an excellent listening center in the classroom.  Pinky Dinky Doo is a great way to teach students new vocabulary, each story has a ‘fancy word’ that will expand your student vocabulary.  It would be fun to use the ‘fancy word’ from the story as  the classroom word of the day.  See how many times your students can use the ‘fancy word’ correctly during the day.  I love the section where students can create their own story podcasts.  Set up a story station in the one or two computer classroom where partners can create a story and listen to a classmates story.  Students in a computer lab setting could create story podcasts of their own and play the word games independently.  The site is easy enough for students to work independently.  

 

Tips:  Check out the grownups section on Pinky Dinky Doo for some great offline activities.  They even have directions for creating a Fancy Word box of your own and directions for playing the circle story game. 

 

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Pinky Dinky Doo in your classroom.

The Cool Teacher Podcast

 

What it is:   The Cool Teacher Podcast is a podcast by educational technologist Chris Haskell who is an instructor for pre-service teachers in methods and applications of technology integration in the classroom (notice any similarities to iLearn Technology?).  The podcast “delivers cool tools, techniques, and tactics to transform your teaching.”  In episode #7 that came out yesterday, Chris gives a shout out to iLearn Technology’s post on Glogster (thank you Chris!!).  The podcasts are very entertaining to listen to and give great ideas for using technology in the classroom!

 

How to integrate The Cool Teacher Podcast into the classroom:    The Cool Teacher Podcast is a wonderful stop (in addition to iLearn Technology) for great ideas and tips for integrating technology into your classroom.  You can find the Cool Teacher Podcast at the links here as well as on iTunes in the iTunes store (it is free to subscribe to).  Listen to these great podcasts while you are grading, on the drive home, or while you are cleaning up your classroom for the day…just be sure to keep a pad and pencil handy to jot down the great ideas you are sure to hear!

 

Tips:  Chris also has a blog related to the podcasts, you can check that out here.  Thanks again Chris!

 

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using The Cool Teacher Podcast in your classroom.

Inspiration

 Some school years start out much bumpier than others.  This year has definitely been a bumpy one for me.  Nothing seems to be working the way it should, the kids are disappointed that in the first 4 weeks of school they have not had computers available in computer class.  I am feeling frustrated at the lost teaching time (so many things to fit into a 35 min. once a week class!)  This weekend one of my professors from my college (Colorado Christian University) days spoke at church.   Sid Buzzel was/is one of the most influential educators in my life and one the I deeply respect.  He came to teach about education.  It was exactly what I needed, I loved hearing his passion for education and his explanation to parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, children why he is an educator.  He reminded me of why I am an educator.  I miss being taught on a regular basis by Sid.  The church recorded Sid’s inspirationalwords.  I highly recommend this podcast.   I’m sure it won’t take long to figure out why this man made such an impact on me and my teaching career.  I’m ready to press on through the problems and teach my students…with or without computers! 🙂  Take a break, put your feet up and get renewed.  Let me know what you think and tell us about the influential educators in your world.   

Tech Chick Tips

So, here I am listening to a podcast of Tech Chick Tips in iTunes while I update my blog with Mapness and what should I hear but a shout out for iLearn Technology!!  So much fun to know that I have a hand in (sort of) creating episodes of Tech Chick Tips!  If you haven’t subscribed to Tech Chicks yet, it is a great blog/podcasts all about technology in education.  Episode 45 is the one that mentions iLearn Technology.  Check it out 🙂

Capzles


What it is: Capzles is another interactive timeline maker. I really love all the little extras that Capzles has! With Capzles teachers and students can add photos, videos, audio, and text to their timeline. Themes, colors, backgrounds, and background music can be added to the timeline making it unique and personalized. Capzles also provides options when sharing your Capzle, it can be private with a specific list of who can view the Capzle or made public for the world to see.

How to integrate Capzles into the classroom: Obviously Capzles is a great way for students to create timelines about any subject. The web 2.0 collaborative aspect of Capzles makes it very appealing to students. I think Capzles could also be very valuable in the primary classroom. Students probably won’t be creating their own timelines in Capzles at this age, parent helpers paired with students to create simple timelines would be appropriate. Becasue Capzles has the capability of adding audio, photos, and text, it would be the perfect place to record students reading throughout the year. As you assess student reading through reading records, record the students using a program such as Gabcast, Gcast, Audacity, or Garageband. Take a digital picture of the student reading. Througout the year, you can make a Capzle for each student. This is an excellent motivator for students, especially your struggling readers. Students can see their growth throughout the year in pictures, and hear their reading progress made throughout the year. You can share the Capzle with parents (they will go crazy for this keepsake!) and with the students future teacher. How much would you love getting a timeline of your students from the previous year? You would have a jump start on their struggles and strengths in reading as you quickly flip through their timelines. Cool huh?!

Tips: When assigning students to create a timeline, direct them to concentrate on the “meat” of the timeline first. Then they can go back and design their timeline with themes, colors, and backgrounds. If you don’t specify they will spend all of their time tweaking the look and run out of time to add the content.

Leave a comment and share how you are using Capzles in your classroom.

Bookcasting


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What it is: Bookcasting is actually a term I made up. It is essentially a podcast about a book. My third grade students just finished their first round of Bookcast recordings that we uploaded to a Wetpaint Wiki. A Bookcast is a movie trailer-like review of a book that students create and share with one another. My students used GarageBand to record their podcasts (you could also use a free tool like Audacity) and add sound effects, then they published the Bookcast on our class G-cast account, and finally embedded the media player onto our WetPaint wiki.

How to integrate Bookcasting into your curriculum: Bookcasting is a fun alternative to the standard book report. It allows kids to be creative and gives them a great sense of audience. Bookcasting also has the added benefit of acting as a book review for other students to listen to. Bookcasting makes story retell a lot of fun! My plan is to have a link to our WetPaint wiki in the library so that students can listen to a peer review of a book before they check it out.

Tips: I had all of my students create a Bookcast on the same book before reviewing on their own. This gave them an easy starting place but still provided room for creativity. Click on the Easy Reader link on our wiki to hear the Bookcasts the students created.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Bookcasting in your classroom.