Infographics

I was inspired at TCEA to start exploring a model of Flipped Professional Development.   After a week of toying with the idea I decided it was time to actually work design and complete a flipped training to get my feet wet.  I've learned a lot so far and I am only in the beginning stages.

Here are my take-aways so far:

1. It is a lot of upfront work!   


2. Have a good outline of what you want to cover and then create your presentation.  I started with the presentation and had to scrap it as I needed to get a better focus on the outcomes of the session.


3. Determine the best format to present the information.   What needs to be video, what needs to be written and what should be done face to face.


4. Choose a presentation tool to fit your audience.   I chose Prezi for this training because it allowed me to zoom in on the images so I could point out the details.   I thought using powerpoint would be too flat for a video and would lose their interest for this.  Also - I haven't played with it in a long time and wanted some practice.


5. Make sure you are having a good hair day if you are going to include a webcam shot of you during the presentation.  Vain I know, but this video will be around for a long time.


6. It takes a lot of work!   I know I am repeating myself, but I have spent hours on a simple presentation becuase my hope is to create something that I can use again and again with different groups.  That makes the time investment worth it.

I am going to set up the video in our district's moodle and will incorporate an embedded google form to ask questions after the video.  I am choosing google forms to demonstrate how the teachers can use them on their own websites when they are intimidated by moodle.

Here is my Prezi that I will be narrating and recording with Camtasia Studio.   The topic of the training will focus on creating Infographics in the social studies classroom using tools they are familiar with, more specifically Powerpoint.

Gmail - Undo Send

Have you ever sent and email and then thought “I forgot something!” or “Who did I send that to?”Well - now you can have up to 30 seconds to pull the email back and make those last minutes corrections.

 

In your inbox, click on the cog/wheel and choose "Settings" from the drop-down.

Click on the "Labs" tab from the top menu.

From the list of labs, scroll to the "Undo Send" lab.

Click the radio button to "Enable" this lab.

Be sure to click "Save Changes" at the bottom of the page.

Now under the General Settings tab you can set the amount of time available to undo the sending of the email. Choices range from 5 to 30 seconds.

When you send an email a pop-up will show on the top of the gmail page that will allow you to “undo” the sending of the email.

 

Clicking “Undo” will stop the email from being sent and allow for any changes that need to be made.

Make Your Images Interactive with Thinglink

Edmodo

Tech Camps - SumoBots

So two years ago I came up with the idea of offering Technology "Camps" during the school year.  These run for one week at a time from before school through advisory.  Each one focuses on a different technology topic. Students complete applications and the first 24 to return their complete application are in the camp.    I have offered camps on Scratch, Kodu, Blender, PhotoShop, Stop Action Animation, and Robotics.  My most popular camp is SumoBots.  Students work in teams of 2-3 to build NXT Robots that compete against each other to dominate the Sumo Ring.   I made the rings out of MDF board and painted them black and white.   The next camp starts the first week of December and I started advertising today for it.   Here is the Animoto video that I created from video of the previous two years of SumoBots.    I am looking forward to working with these students and seeing what they come up with this year!

Back to School: Student Motivation

As we head back to school it is a good time to consider what can I do as a teacher to motivate my students?   I have done a little research and compiled a list for consideration.

Student Motivation Ideas:

•  Make your subject personal.   Show your own enthusiasm and relate the material to the lives and interests of the students.


• Ask students to think about the materials and then use their statements as you study the readings.


• Be able to answer – Why do I need to know this?


• Get to know your students on a personal level.


• Measure student’s progress and show interest in helping them be successful.


• Promote good will!  State what is going well and connections that are being made in class with the materials.


• Make the classroom a safe place to learn, to participate, and take risks.


• Role model what a learner looks like and what mastery looks like in what you do.


• Understand that your class is not the most important thing in your student’s life.

When giving assignments:

• Give students a purpose and focus for reading, like take a side that you have to defend in the next class period.  Research shows that students do not see a correlation between reading and academic success so only 20% of them will do the reading.  Make them see the connection in your classroom.


• Assign reading that is essential to the understanding of the course.  The less is more approach.


• Focus in on what is worth knowing from your content.


• Make the assignments challenging but attainable for your students and expect success


• Differentiate whenever possible in what is to be learned, how it is to be learned or how the students can show mastery.

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 References

Hobson, E. (2004). The IDEA Paper #40: Getting Students to Read. The IDE.A Center. Retrieved August 18, 2012, from http://www.theideacenter.org/sites/default/files/Idea_Paper_40.pdf

 Svinicki, M. (2005). IDEA Paper #41: Student Goal Orientation, Motivation, and Learning. IDEA Paper #41. Retrieved August 18, 2012, from http://www.theideacenter.org/sites/default/files/Idea_Paper_41.pdf.

Teaching Resources - Motivating Students. (2011, October 11).Teaching Effectiveness Program. Retrieved August 18, 2012, from http://tep.uoregon.edu/resources/faqs/

Technology Tuesday - Web Curation

The internet is crowded with tons of resources and ideas.   How do you manage all the content you find online?  Do you add it to your favorites?  Do you add a link on your website?  Or have you taken advantage of one of the web 2.0 tools out there that help you curate your links in a way that make them accessible, ready to share, and ready to use.   Here are 5 of my favorite Web Curation Tools that are available for free.

1.   Pinterest –have you heard of it?  I know most of you have since I see your pins all the time.   Pinterest is a web curator site, or another way to organize your links that is social and visual.   You set up “boards” to which you “pin” websites. Each board can have a theme and you can look through other people’s boards (if they make them public) for more ideas.  Other users can follow your boards, like your pins or re-pin your pins onto their own boards.  There is a section labeled Education that displays people’s pins(website finds) that have to do with education.

I have created an account on Pinterest dedicated to educational resources.  If you would like to check it out (or follow them) go here:  http://pinterest.com/techrobin/

If you need an invite to Pinterest, please let me know!

2.  Livebinders  - http://www.livebinders.com/ - collect all your resources, images, videos, pdfs, websites, and group them into a “binder” where students have easy access to the websites that you have.  Inside the binder you can divide the content into tabs and each tab can have sub-tabs.  Students can create accounts and add the binder to their own collections or create binders on topic assigned to them.

 Examples:

• Algebra 


• Social Studies


• ELA – Hunger Games


• Science 


• Technology & Web 2.0 for Educators


• Art 

3.  Linoit - http://en.linoit.com/ - An online collaboration tool in the form of Sticky Notes.  Create a bulletin board of ideas and files on any topic.  Organize ideas and resources be rearranging the sticky notes on the board.  This is an easy, visual ways for students to find the resources or information they need.  This can also be a great collaboration tool as students add in notes (if you allow that) and collect ideas.

4.  Diigo - http://www.diigo.com/user/robiny - Diigo is a bookmarking website that allows users to create groups, share links and have discussions.      Researching biomes?  Give the websites you find a specific tag and gie that link the to students so anytime you add more resources their list is updated without having to add a link to your website.

This is a resource that I have been using for a long time and still love it.  I can add bookmarks from school and still retrieve them from home.   They also have apps that are useful for mobile devices.

 

5.  Wall Wisher - http://www.wallwisher.com/ - another online bulletin board that has been around for a while.  You can add stickies that contain text, images or links to websites.   This tools is great for collecting images of a certain topic and them having students use those images for their projects and since the kids can help add in the resources, this can be a great collaboration tool.