June 2007 Blog Posts (163)

Technology "Unplugged"

I hope that in this space I will be able to share some information about technology.

Added by Kirsten Carter on June 14, 2007 at 5:30pm — No Comments

Campus Improvement Plans - Let's Get Real

[cross posted at www.shannonprincipal.edublogs.org]

Let’s be honest, there are only two reasons we write Campus Improvement Plans.

Reason Number One, because we are required to by Central Administration. How many Campus Improvement Plans have been written in the past few years? How many reams of paper, administrative hours, even valuable teaching time has been lost meeting, reaching consensus,…

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Added by Greg Farr on June 14, 2007 at 3:15pm — No Comments

Showdown at Bloggybottom

[cross posted at www.shannonprincipal.edublogs.org]

What are the top 10 inventions of history?

Take your pick…here’s Encyclopedia Britannica's Greatest Inventions.

It’s fun reading…I mean, afterall, WHO considers the bikini an “invention”? Anyway, we can always narrow down the lists by imposing some purely…

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Added by Greg Farr on June 14, 2007 at 3:14pm — No Comments

A New Chapter

I am completely convinced, that just like anything else in our lives, used properly, social networking can be the absolute best thing for our students. Let me illustrate:

A wonderful honor student I know...okay, my daughter is going to college next year. Throughout high school, she has been going on the internet to visit her friends websites. Early in high school it was Xanga sites. Later, they used myspace, and most recently facebook has taken over. My daughter dutifully visited her… Continue

Added by Nadine Norris on June 14, 2007 at 9:53am — 2 Comments

Hello all!

Hi all. I'm a Houstonian (Texas, USA) living in Ankara, Turkey with my wife and two

sons. I help coordinate the International Baccalaureate program and

develop other projects for a large Turkish private school. Those "other

projects" at times include instigating more integration of ICT

(especially Web 2.0) in education. I guess an indicator of my success

is that I have nearly 30 students listed as my fans on del.icio.us… Continue

Added by Tom Hemingway on June 13, 2007 at 1:25pm — No Comments

"First Timer"

Someone write me back - I'm just trying to do this for the first time and there is so much good info that I see!

Added by Regi Wieland on June 13, 2007 at 10:10am — 3 Comments

DR. SEUSS EXPLAINS COMPUTERS

If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port,

and the bus is interrupted as a very last resort,

and the address of the memory makes your floppy disk abort,…

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Added by Doug Davis on June 13, 2007 at 8:02am — 3 Comments

It's becoming clear..

Don't get me wrong, I love/loved the concept of Classroom 2.0 but it just occurred to me that the only way I can interact with a person on their page is limited to one click which makes it seem one-directional to me.

Kevin Honeycut ROCKS! His ideas continue to inspire those in the trenches. Make sure you subscribe to "Driving Questons" in the iPod Directory through your iTunes! ......and his website if you please.

Learning is an… Continue

Added by Karla Murray on June 12, 2007 at 7:17pm — 1 Comment

Toondoo and Spresent in other Languages - Yes!!

Great news for teachers of students for whom English is not their mother tongue, particularly in elementary school.

ToonDoo www.toondoo.com now supports unicode - meaning that students can create comics in any language they choose. UI is still in English but the editor is very user friendly and easy to learn.

This is my first attempt - a bit predicatable maybe, but my aim was really to test the language option, that's my…

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Added by SusanTsairi on June 12, 2007 at 2:20pm — 1 Comment

Stifled Learning

How many times a day does this happen in classrooms across America?

I personally believe this is a result of all the focus on passing standardized test and not really about the learning. I learned how to play school. I did what I needed to get by, but I really did not learn until I started my Masters. Since that time I learn everyday for the sake of learning and not for just passing the assignment or…

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Added by Ed Newman on June 12, 2007 at 9:54am — 1 Comment

Celebrating the Yugo Blog Entry

Just added a blog entry called "Celebrating the Yugo" over at my other site.
(Look on the left side of the page for the feed)

Anyway, I appreciate the feedbackfor all of my writings.
If you have a chance to read it. please do.
Thanks

Tim

Added by Tim Holt on June 11, 2007 at 10:09pm — No Comments

Ten Things I learned from Apple Computers

From my Dec 3, 2006 Blog Entry:

Apple Computers has been an interesting company to watch over the last 30 years or so. While tons of computer companies have come and gone (remember Amiga’s, Atari’s, or even Wangs?), few have actually lasted as long as this venerable educational technology company. And don’t be fooled, Apple is indeed an ed tech company.… Continue

Added by Tim Holt on June 11, 2007 at 10:04pm — No Comments

The school-year is just about over, and I thought I’d highlight my Top Ten Websites for this month early. I post this feature regularly on my blog (http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/). Since quite a …

The school-year is just about over, and I thought I’d highlight my Top Ten Websites for this month early. I post this feature regularly on my blog (http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/). Since quite a few on this list are new Web 2.0 applications, and not necessarily appropriate just for English Language Learners, I decided to crosspost it in case others might find it helpful.

Here they are (in no particular…

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Added by Larry Ferlazzo on June 11, 2007 at 6:18pm — No Comments

Completing my Master's Degree

I will finish my Master's Degree later this month. It has been an exciting experience.

Added by Jodi Moore on June 11, 2007 at 2:37pm — No Comments

Digital Confusion

Over the past few weeks, I’ve noticed a few themes that have caught my attention. Now, a few of them are very positive, like the Future of Education that is being hosted by George Siemens over at University of Manitoba. Another is planning, especially for the summer months as many teachers

prepare for some time off and away from the school. Now, I would…

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Added by Kelly Christopherson on June 10, 2007 at 10:28pm — No Comments

Research Papers

Once again I tried something new in my 8th grade science class. This year for a final assessment I borrowed a research project on Influential Thinkers. Students could choose from Newton to J. Goodall for topics. They then had to do research using both the internet and books. A final typed paper of over 1 page (2-3 hand written) was the expectation. Here were the problems.

1. Half the 3.5'' drives in the library didn't work.

2. Every kid wanted to use Wikipedia, but the district… Continue

Added by Scott Beiter on June 10, 2007 at 6:40pm — No Comments

ning and vle integration

I've been really impressed by the ning interface (and this network of course). I had a look round some other ning communities today (wow, there are many!) but few as active as this one.

One of the really appealing things about a ning community is the web interface. It integrates so many crucial aspects so sweetly - blogs, forums, video, audio, images.

The 'my page' is a neat feature that I've not seen in Moodle (our institution's VLE) and I wondered how I could integrate a ning… Continue

Added by pete whitfield on June 10, 2007 at 1:23pm — No Comments

OFSTED sounds like a disease

OFSTED sounds like a disease. It is a stress-related disorder teachers

suffer from. We have just got over it. The overall result was OK but

the cost in stress and lost sleep was not worth it. I had a lucky

escape. One of their days was Wednesday and I don't teach at all on

Wednesday. On the Tuesday one of my colleagues was very stressed out

because her year 9s had been playing up and OFSTED came in. My year 9s

played up but OFSTED didn't come in. I don't like… Continue

Added by user1951 on June 10, 2007 at 1:15pm — No Comments

First blog entry on Classroom 2.0

I am very happy to be able to see and interact with other people in the educational world pushing the Web 2.0 tools. I am currently using a variety of tools with in our district for internet communications from moodle, blackboard, joomla, wordpress mu, most on an apple server.

I also want to encourage our staff to use online web 2.0 mash ups to increase productivity.

Added by Yancy Gunhammer on June 9, 2007 at 3:01pm — No Comments