EduTech’s West Central Region Blog

Using videostreaming in the classroom is a great way to extend learning!

Here are a few websites to explore:

• Apple Learning Exchange http://newali.apple.com/ali_sites/ali/exhibits/1000355/
• Explore Learning http://www.explorelearning.com/
• The Futures Channel http://www.thefutureschannel.com/index.php
• History.com http://www.history.com/media.do
• NASA Virtual Scanning Electron Microscope http://learn.arc.nasa.gov/vlab/index.html
• Teacher Tube http://www.teachertube.com/

A list of resources to utilize when you are just getting your feet wet with using podcasting in your classroom:

http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-11293_7-6246557-1.html?tag=bnav
Step by step podcasting directions and a wealth of links.

http://www.edublogs.org
A free hosted blog solution for any educator or researcher.

http://www.addysg.org.uk/ipodined/news.php
Discusses using iPods and Podcasting in education.

http://learninginhand.com/podcasting
Contains information about podcasting in education and links to podcasts and podcast directories.

http://www.epnweb.org
The Education Podcast Network brings together podcast sites for teachers.

http://esp.mit.edu/web/discoveresp/studentpodcasts.html
Educational Studies Program, MIT Middle and High School students from MIT produce podcasts as part of an Educational Studies Program.

http://www.power-team.org/kidcast/kidcast.htm
Elementary students using podcasts to develop reading fluency.

http://www.stager.org/podcasting.html
Gary S. Stager Podcasting resources for educators and students

http://www.apple.com/itunes/podcasts/tips.html
Apple Education Essential tips for podcast lovers

http://www.liberty.k12.mo.us/~elanghorst/blog
Speaking of History Middle school students produce history podcasts

http://www.mpsomaha.org/willow/radio
Radio WillowWeb Elementary students create podcasts. Tony Vincent is the first teacher to have student podcasts in iTunes.

http://www.smithsonian.org/podcasts/default.htm
A collection of podcasts from the Smithsonian

http://www1.gcs.k12.al.us/~podcast/
Gadsden City Schools “Podcast Central” contains elementary students podcasts.

http://school.discovery.com/schrockguide/evalpodcast.html
Kathy Schrock posted a guide to evaluating podcasts.

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/help
Audacity documentation, tutorials, and a wiki are found on this page.

http://www.learninginhand.com/ipod/audio.html
Downloadable audio content like music and historic speeches and sounds.

Here is a list of sites with music that can be used in videos and podcasts. Be sure to check the license agreements for each site.

http://creativecommons.org/legalmusicforvideos
-many musicians choose to release their songs under Creative Commons licenses, which give you the legal right to do things like use their music in your videos.

Freeplay Music
-a good collection of royalty-free music

Soundzabound
-royalty free music for education grades K-12

MagnaTune
-another good collection of music

Download.com
-and another

Partners in Rhyme
-royalty free music and sound effects

Free piano music by William Cushman at Ghost Notes Blog
-royalty free impressionistic improvisational piano music by composer, William Cushman, that explores different feelings and situations.

Today, I will be presenting at the North Dakota Association of Technology Leaders Conference in Bismarck. My presentations are entitled, “What in the World? Google Earth, GPS and Geocaching in the Classroom” and “Creative Ways to Use Electronic Portfolios in the Classroom”.

Here are the Resource and Reference Links to these presentations:

What in the World

Electronic Portfolios

Recently I taught a SMART Board™ workshop and found a great website that contains a weekly SMART Notebook™ lesson, a podcast and resource links. Here is the site address: http://pdtogo.com/smart/ The podcast can be delivered automatically to your iTunes or email address. Past lessons can be searched by category.

Also, on March 7, 2008, SMART Technologies began working with Scholastic to design lesson plans that provide teachers with digital resources to complement their SMART Board™ interactive whiteboards and Senteo™ interactive response systems. The microsite features SMART lesson activities for Notebook™ collaborative learning software, resources to help with lesson activity creation and links to customizable tools and templates. Math and science lesson activities are currently featured, and additional lesson activity subjects will be added regularly. http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/lessonplans.jsp

According to Grantastic Designs, there are 5 basic rules of web design and layout.

Your web site should be easy to read
–High contrast with the text and background
–Text should not be too large or too small
–Good use of white space

Your web site should be easy to navigate
–Consider the audience
–Organize consistently

Your web site should be easy to find
–The URL should be easy to remember
–The URL should be as concise as possible

Your web page layout and design should be consistent throughout the site
–Each page has the same look and feel
–Text should be consistent

You web site should be quick to download
–Images should not be too large
–Animations should be kept to a minimum
–All linked documents should be in PDF format

To find out more information about Grantastic’s recommendations, go to http://www.grantasticdesigns.com/5rules.html

Wikipedia also has some good information regarding the terminology used in web design. Here’s a link to that page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_design

Have you ever wished you could remember where that great article, resource or web page was located? Social bookmarking is a way for Internet users to store, organize, share and search for bookmarks of web pages. Just like creating a bookmark in your web browser, a social bookmark is stored on the web for access from any computer. This makes it possible for you to find your favorite web page you’ve bookmarked at the office at home as well. With social bookmarking the links can be made public to share with others via email or online. People can then view your bookmarks chronologically, by category or by search engine.

There are many free social bookmarking services. I have listed a few below:
Connotea
del.icio.us
Digg
Diigo
Furl
Ma.gnolia
Netvouz
Newsvine
reddit
Simpy
Stumbleupon

There are advantages to using social bookmarking. Remote access from any computer connected to the Internet, tags created by human beings rather than algorithmic software and rank based on use are a few.

I currently use Furl. Check out my Furl page http://www.furl.net/members/lynneanneanderson
Happy bookmarking!!!

Ideas For Using The ActivBoard in the Classroom

Get the most out of your lessons by using the ActivBoard in your classroom. Here are just a few ideas that I found on the Promethean Planet website:

• Annotate over an image or text (pen or highlighter) to make corrections or add punctuation
• Draw lines to match concepts
• Use images from the resource library to tell a story
• Link to a short video and ask students for the main idea and supporting details
• Create templates for completing story elements such as background, character, and plot
• Use spotlight to illustrate location or identity of an object
• Use the paint bucket to color certain words or objects.
• Travel to different continents and explore foreign countries using “Google Earth”
• Drag objects into Venn diagram to establish similarities and differences

Whiteboard Interactive Links

These links are not just for whiteboard use, but work well with them because of the interactive factors each contains.
1. EdHeads is a science site containing interactiveness with simple machines, virtual knee surgery, and weather. http://www.edheads.org
2. K-3 math sites http://www.juliethompson.com/SMART.html
3. K-12 math sites http://www.d131.kane.k12.il.us/Bardwell/smartboard.html
4. Learning Planet http://www.learningplanet.com
5. Set Game http://www.setgame.com/index.html
6. eFieldTrips http://www.efieldtrips.org
7. National Library of Virtual Manipulatives http://matti.usu.edu/nlvm/nav/vlibrary.html
8. Various Science Sites for High School Students http://jc-schools.net/tutorials/tools/science-hs.html
9. Various tools to enhance Math education for Elementary and Middle School students http://www.arcytech.org/java
10. Various engaging math games for students grades preK-7 http://www.learningplanet.com
11. Interactive lessons to boost a child’s success in school. http://www.dositey.com
12. A multitude of web sites aimed at assisting foreign language teachers. http://www.internet4classrooms.com/flang.htm
13. Another site that contains foreign language resources. http://www.csun.edu/~hcedu013/eslsp.html
14. Comprehension and phonics site for pre-school to 2nd graders. http://starfall.com

Interactive Research Sites

1. The National Student Research Center recommends these science sites for high school students. http://www.youth.net/nsrc/webs.html
2. Locate historical pictures, maps, music and more at The National Geographic site. http://www.nationalgeographic.com

Streaming Video Sites
1. Brainpop contains K-8 math, science, social studies, technology, math, English, and health video clips and quizzes that are tied to standards. http://www.brainpop.com Many videos are targeted toward 3rd Grade and up, but Brainpop junior is found at http://www.brainpopjr.com and is targeted for the lower grades.

2. United Streaming is a digital video-based web site featuring more than 5,000 full-length videos divided into 50,000 content-specific segments. This site contains lesson plans tied to standards, quiz builders, writing prompts and more. http://www.unitedstreaming.com

3. KidsHealth contains an abundance of health information pertaining to kids, parents, and teens. Phy-ed and health teachers will find this site useful as it has streaming videos, an interactive treasure hunt, healthy recipes and more. http://www.kidshealth.org

4. Google Video contains free and for pay videos for educators. http://video.google.com

Smartboard and Activboard Resources

1. K-12 whiteboard templates http://www.center.k12.mo.us/edtech/SB/templates.htm#K2
2. SMART Technologies web site http://www.smarttech.com
3. SMART Technologies education site http://www.smarttech.com/education/
4. EdCompass http://edcompass.smarttech.com/ec/en-us/
5. Promethean Planet site http://prometheanplanet.com

With the inception of EduWeb, I have decided to devote a few posts to web design. Today I would like to talk about navigation design and organization. If you don’t know much about web design, I recommend “The Non-Designer’s Web Book” by Williams and Tollett. It’s easy to find answers to specific questions and it contains a lot of graphics. Here is a quote about navigation design from page 142, “If you can easily find your way around a site and find your way back to the home page at any time from any page, the navigation is well designed.” One of the really great things about EduWeb is that the navigation is built right in so that you don’t need to create it yourself!.

You will still need to decide on the way your site will be organized, however. To begin this process, make a list of the information to be included in your site. Next make an outline based on your list. Sketch a flowchart, use sticky notes or use a visualization software like Inspiration to graphically represent your outline. During this process of moving things around, you may decide to combine several smaller topics together or to split larger topics into smaller, separate ones.

You may choose to organize your website by grade level, by subject taught or by teacher. Whatever plan you use, try to be consistent. Ask others how they would organize their site. Go school website surfing and see how others have done it. One place to begin your search might be http://www.edutech.nodak.edu/schools/

Consider your audience! Most school websites are visited by parents, students and community members. Remember, the aim of great web organization is ease of use!

Sometimes adults feel like they don’t know quite as much as their children do about the Internet. These resources will help concerned parents, guardians, grandparents, teachers, or friends to better understand the opportunities and challenges children face online. It is more beneficial to help build children’s confidence while working online so they are better equipped to respond to dangerous situations than to simply tell them to avoid “strangers” they may meet.

Online Resources:

http://www.isafe.org/
http://www.netsmartz.org/
http://www.safekids.com/
http://safeteens.com/
http://www.staysafeonline.info/index.html
http://onguardonline.gov/index.html
http://www.netlingo.com/index.cfm
http://www.cyberbullying.us/resources.php
http://www.stopcyberbullying.org/index2.html