It is that time of year again, and we are all getting ready for a new school year.  I just received an email that had information about a free online conference. 

 The K-12 Online Conference invites participation from educators around the world interested in innovative ways Web 2.0 tools and technologies can be used to improve learning. This FREE conference is run by volunteers and open to everyone. The 2008 conference theme is “Amplifying Possibilities”. 

You can find additional information about this conference at: http://k12onlineconference.org/.  Details and times are located at “Welcome to the K-12 Online conference!

I’m looking forward to a great school year!  Maybe we will chat during one of the Web 2.0 online classes!

Melissa

Hello!  I apologize for not adding new postings for so long, but I have been working on several professional and personal projects.

At this time I would like to share information with you about Portaportal.

Portaportal is a web based bookmarking utility that lets you store links to your favorite websites.  Several teachers that I have talked to that use Portaportal find that it is visually less distracting than Del.icio.us.com, which is another social bookmarking site that I referred to in an earlier posting.

As teachers of digital natives we can manage our web resources by using portals. Click on http://portaportal.com/ to sign up for free.  You can create a Portaportal of sites for students to explore that are approved by you or you could assign a problem based learning activity where the students have to explore websites on a topic, check them for accuracy and create their own Portaportal.  Portaportal.com is a user friendly site for web based bookmarking of your Internet favorites.

The next time you come across a website you like, simply copy the URL, go to http://portaportal.com/, and add it to your portal.

When you get your Portaportal established, post a comment and let me know what you think of this site.  As I obtain good examples of portals, I will share them with you.

Melissa

I have been investigating the use of Text to Speech software for some of my students.  There is a free software program called Natural Reader available online.  With this software, once you download the program, you may copy, cut and paste any text into their reader program.  Or, just press Control plus F9, and the computer will speak any text on the computer screen. When the program speaks the text aloud, the current sentence being read is highlighted in yellow, and the specific word is highlighted in blue.  

There are also levels of paid versions of this software.  For 39.50 you would receive more functions such as add-in toolbars in the Internet Explorer, Microsoft Office Word, PowerPoint and Outlook programs.  With this version you can also convert text into an MP3 or WAV audio file, to burn onto a CD or to listen to at a later time.   The paid versions also provide better voice options.

I think this program will provide a great support to our students, and increase our teacher’s ability to differentiate their instruction to meet the needs of their students.

 When you use this program, please let me know how it works for you in your classroom

Here is a wiki which will enable you to interact with Dr. Marzano and other teachers across the world, discussing “best practices” in instruction and problem-solving how to best reach students for their learning success.  Let me know what you think of this site.

Sonja Phillips, a Curriculum Specialist at Elkview Middle School shared this information with us!  Thanks Sonja!

The West Virginia Department of Education has developed a website designed by teachers for teachers to assist in the preparation and delivery of effective 21st instruction.
As their website states: ” It enables educators to quickly access 21st Century Content Standards, Learning Skills and Technology Tools for WV Schools, as well as other resources that exemplify rigorous and relevant instructional design and delivery.”
This website provides West Virginia teachers with standards-based units, instructional guides, researched-based instructional strategies, differentiated instruction strategies, and classroom assessments.

The website http://wvde.state.wv.us/teach21 has direct links to the following resources:
Interactive CSOs - Search by content and grade level, or search by key words
Power Standards - Search Power Standards by subject and grade/course
Strategy Bank - WOW - Here you will find a tremendous amount of researched-based strategies to increase the effectiveness of your teaching, and meet the needs of your students. This is a must see for all teachers.
Instructional Guides - These guides are available by grade level and content area. They are a great model of instructional design.
Interactive Professional Development - Here you will find links for independent professional development.
Learning Skills - Search here for 21st Century Learning Skills and Technology Tools by Learning Skill and Grade/Course. You may search by key word also.
Technology Tools - Search here for 21st Century Technology Tools, by Learning Skill and Grade/Course. You may search by key word also.
WESTEST Sample Questions - Download sample questions here.
WESTEST Writing Prompt Sample - Download sample writing prompts here.

You can also navigate this website by clicking on the interactive 21st Century triangle. Each side of the triangle is labeled: Left side is 21st Century Learning Skills, Right side is 21st Century Technology Tools, the bottom is 21st Century Content, and the heart of the triangle is Student Performance, which will take you to the instructional guides.
This is a wonderful website. The more you explore it, the more you will find to benefit you and your students.

Sonja Phillips is a wonderful teacher in Kanawha County. She made snapshot directions to complete a search on the Teach 21 website. Those directions are attached. Thanks for sharing Sonja!
Directions to complete a search on Teach 21

I attended a meeting recently and a teacher, Lauri Nichols from another county told me about a great educational website, www.Think.com. I shared this information with Lynda Gilkeson, Principal at Dunbar Middle School. She was interested in obtaining more information for her staff, so she set up an account for her school. In order to make directions on how to navigate Think.com, I developed 2 lessons on this site. The interactive educational potential of this website is fantastic.

The following information is directly from their website:
What is Think.com?
Think.com provides free websites, email, and collaborative tools for everyone in your school. It is a web-based learning community for primary and secondary schools, sponsored by the Oracle Education Foundation. Members have individual websites allowing them to create and share their work within the password-protected community.

How can Think.com be used in the classroom?
There are many ways that educators can use Think.com as a learning tool. A school can integrate lessons from any curricular area into Think.com, including writing assignments, projects, peer review, student collaboration, WebQuests, homework assistance, after-school programs, and much more. Think.com can enhance any lesson by integrating text, video, images, and sound. Visit the Tutorials and sample Classroom Units for more ideas. Teachers can also use Think.com to communicate with parents by posting homework and classroom news to their Parents Page.

How do I join Think.com?
If you are interested in enrolling your school in Think.com, please have a school representative click the Enroll button on the Home page. (Individual students and teachers can only obtain Think.com accounts through a school.)

I made directions for teachers to use to get started with this website.
Think.com Directions

The Thinkfinity website (http://thinkfinity.org/home.aspx) is a wonderful educational resource for teachers, parents, and students. This site has recently been updated and is very user friendly!
Under the main heading are the categories: Educator, Student, Parent, and After School.

Within the Educator category you will find:
1. Search for lesson plans, interactive and more by keyword, subject, resource type, content partners and grade.
2. Visit Partner sites - A drop down box provides your choices for you.
These Partners are:
 

ArtsEdge provided by The Kennedy Center ArtsEdge has Arts Integration Lessons.

EconEdLink provided by the National Council on Economic Education has economic lesson materials for K - 12 teachers and their students.

EdSitement, sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities has Subject catalogs for Art & Culture, Literature and Language Arts, Foreign Language, History and Social Studies.

Illuminations, sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics have 99 online activities that help make math come alive in the classroom or at home.  View their collection of 516 lessons for pre K - 12 math educators.

Read-Write-Think, sponsored by the International Reading Association has the highest quality practices and resources in reading and language arts instruction.

Science NetLinks sponsored by AAAS provides a wealth of resources for K-12 science educators; Science NetLinks is your guide to meaningful standards-based Internet experiences for students.

Xpeditions, sponsored by National Geographic provides Geography Standards in your Classroom. Xpeditions is home to the U.S. National Geography Standards—and to thousands of ideas, tools, and interactive adventures that bring them to life.

I have been contemplating on how I could share the Internet resources I have found beneficial with the teachers I work with. As we all know, time is precious and very limited. I recently began utilizing the social bookmarking website http://Del.icio.us.

Del.icio.us is social bookmarking software on the Internet that utilizes a simple feature where users can attach a word or phrase to a bookmark their favorite websites. This framework has redefined web navigation. Not only does this wonderful website allow you to tag your favorite websites by categories, but it aggregates the bookmarks with all the users who also select the same website. This will inform you at a glance of the popularity of each website you bookmark. This process called “folksonomy” indicates how the total users value and refer to the content.

Del.icio.us allows users to add tags and bookmarks on their computer. I am an itinerant teacher, and have installed the tags on computers in several classrooms I work in. This allows me access to “my favorite bookmarks” on any computer I use, and it enables me to quickly share information with many teachers. I have found great value with this tool. I have installed my tags on my Microsoft Internet Explorer toolbar.

I am attaching directions for installing Del.icio.us to your computer.

How to Register for Del.icio.us

My Del.icio.us website link, as well as others I find useful are posted under the Del.icio.us Category on my blogroll (right side of this blog). Keep reviewing my Del.icio.us site, I will be updating it frequently!

I had the extreme honor of participating in a small group meeting with Bernajean Porter, the author of “Digitals The Art of Digital Storytelling” in August 2006. I share her passion of using multimedia formats to increase our student’s interest and motivation in writing and creating digital stories.

Bernajean has constructed a wonderful process to teach the elements of “Good Digital Storytelling”. She has a PDF file attached to her website titled: “Take Six” Elements of a Good Story” describing these elements. Bernajean has a “Resource” button on her toolbar. I would like to refer you to the first article on her list titled: “Beyond Words the Craftsmanship of Digital Products” published in May 2006 in Learning and Leading with Technology. I feel this article will bring a deeper meaning to this topic for you. As Bernajean states in this article, “Printed text has lost its monopoly to multimedia. For students to be effective communicators in the 21st century, they need to be sophisticated in expressing ideas with multiple communication technologies, not just the written word.”

This website is packed full of great resources to begin your personal journey of digital storytelling, as well as considering the benefits of incorporating her processes into your classroom with your students. One stop you must make when exploring her website is the DigiTales Storykeeper’s Gallery. I would like to recommend that you review the story under the category, “Path of Me” titled “New Life”. Can you imagine your students writing a storyline that is meaningful to them and creating a multimedia product to share the content of their story?

Bernajean has a specific “Digitales Toolbox” listed under “Digitales Tools” on her toolbar. Please explore her recommendations here.
http://www.digitales.us/tools/toolkits_macintosh.php

Now that I have shared my thoughts on why we need to incorporate multimedia formats into our instruction, I would like to share another product with you.

Microsoft Photo Story 3

This is a free download for those who are customers running genuine Microsoft Windows. To use this program you will also need to download Windows Media Player 11 for Windows XP.

The Overview from the Microsoft website describes how you can prepare slideshows using digital photos. This program allows you to touch-up pictures, crop and rotate your pictures. You can also add special effects, soundtracks, and narrate your stories. The slideshow may be viewed on your TV, computer or Windows Mobile-based portable device.

I have presented a training workshop to a group of teachers on incorporating this multimedia tool into their classroom instruction. They were delighted and all had wonderful suggestions on the instructional applications for their students. This software may not have all the products that were recommended by Bernajean, but it is a great way to start introducing this process in your classroom with your students with no start up costs.

I am attaching a PDF file that has picture directions for using Photo Story 3. They were written by David Jakes, Instructional Technology Coordinator, Community High School District 99, Downers Grove, IL 60563. I downloaded his directions from the Internet.

Picture Directions for Photo Story 3
photostory

Please let me know what you think of this process, and if you incorporate any of these suggestions into your classroom.

As we have entered the 21st Century, we have been inundated with a “plethora” of wonderful resources on the Internet. I have participated in many professional development sessions over the past few years and have obtained a lot of great resources that enhance education for all students. I have also heard from many teachers that they just don’t have enough time to “look” for additional resources on the Internet.

This is my attempt to begin to organize the information I have obtained (and will continue to obtain), so it will be useful to other teachers.