Students Create ePub iPad Book for the World

Our first graders created their own eBook for the iBook. I have had many request to share the Butterfly ePub file with other teachers, so they could use it as an example for their own classes.

Leave our first graders a comment, tell them where in the world (geographically) you are reading their book. Maybe you can also share any other facts or stories about Monarch butterflies to help them continue learning.

If you are reading this post on your iPad or iPhone, simple click on the ePub link, and choose to open in “iBook”. Otherwise, if you are on your computer, download the ePub link and drag it into your iTunes library before you sync your device to it.

I also created a FlipSnack  Issuu book to be placed on the classroom blog, for parents and relatives of the students, who do not have an eReader, to view the file.

FlipSnack only showed the first 15 pages of the book, so I switches to Issuu.

It was a little tedious to be able to create the pdf file from the ePub file. I wish that FlipSnack Issuu would allow ePub files to directly be uploaded to their service.

1. take a screenshot of each page of the book.
2. export the images
3. crop the image (so the time and battery life of iPad was not visible)
4. import each image into separate PowerPoint slide
5. export the ppt to a PDF
6. upload PDF to FlipSnack Issuu
7. grab the embed code and embed on classroom blog

Coming Soon: Stepping it Up- Learning About Blogs FOR your Students

Over the next few weeks, I will be publishing a guide  (in several parts) for teacher, new to blogs and blogging with their students. The guide will be based on the assumption, that in order for a teacher to facilitate quality student blogs, the teacher needs to have their own understanding of quality blog writing.We will

Stepping it Up: Learning About Blogs FOR your Students

Stay tuned for:

• Part I- Reading
  As teachers, we need to be aware of  blogging potential in relationship to learning. We need to formulate and address intended student learning outcomes beyond checking off “technology integration” on our lesson plans. Becoming an avid blog reader of a variety of other blogs will help expose teachers to the potential blogging holds. As we read blogs regularly, the better we will become in RECOGNIZING learning opportunities, GAGING the quality (or lack) of our own students’ blogs.
  This part will include sample blogs for different grade levels and subject areas to give teachers a head start in finding quality examples.
• Part II-A- Writing
  addresses the need for teacher to be writers (bloggers) and to experience the process of learning for themselves, if they are to teach/model/coach/facilitate writing via student blogs.
• Part II-B- Student Writing
  We acknowledge that most of us (teachers) did not grow up with blogs, nor did someone teach us how to write our own blog or comment. If we require our students to blog,  we need to be become knowledgeable about blog writing. Quality blog writing includes
  • logistics of digital writing, such as hyperlinking, embedding media, categorization, etc.
  • focused quality content
  • traditional quality writing characteristics
• Part III- Commenting
  We are our students’ first and primary commenters. When we comment on our students’ blogs, we model quality writing AND content as well as encourage them to expand their own horizons to make connections in the online world. It takes time to learn how to become a quality commenter FOR our students. We, as teachers, need to
• model commenting
• model writing
• model proper grammar, etc.
• take the time to discuss and reflect on comments left by others on our blogs
• to respond to continue a conversation.
• Part IV-Connecting
  We need to make a conscious effort to connect our students to a global authentic audience. A global audience for our classroom or individual student blogs does not happen on its own. How do teachers drive traffic to their students’ blogs in order to connect them to an audience?
• Joining pre-existing blogging projects
• tweeting to our network
• cross posting and linking on our professional blogs
• Part V-Reciprocation
  If we expect others (educators, mentors, etc.) to take the time to comment on OUR students’ blogs, we need to be prepared to reciprocate. If we want our students to have an audience, we need to be the audience for others. Teach your students to leave quality comments on other blogs with a link back to their own blog or formally volunteer to be a mentor teacher for other blogging classes or students.
• Part VI- Consistency
  We are understanding that blogging is not about technology, but about literacies (old & new) and learning. Blogging is a process, not an event that happens as a culminating activity to a lesson or unit.
  Consistency, in using blogs as a platform, constitutes a building block
• to build classroom learning communities
• to experience the cognitive process of learning over a period of time
• Part VII- Quality
  Reading, responding, assessing and monitoring our students’ progress on their blog requires pedagogical commitment. It is a commitment to student learning, not a commitment to using a specific technology platform. How does an assessment for student blogging look like? How can teachers recognize, encourage and support quality student (digital) writing?

Learning About Blogging FOR Your Students

Since writing my last blogs post titled We are Blogging…Now What? Stepping it Up!, my train of thought has turned towards creating a guide for teachers, new to blogging WITH their students. Blogging with students is a process, not an end in itself! In order for a teacher to facilitate and mentor his/her students in blogging, he/she has to have a clear understanding how blogging can enhance and benefit the learning process. That thought has taken me to focus on:

Teachers learning about blogging FOR their students!

• How could I make it easier for teachers to learn about the process of teaching and learning with blogs?
• How can blogging enhance student learning?
• What are components of QUALITY blogs?
• How can I guide teachers in experiencing a shift in teaching and learning and help them make a pedagogical commitment to blogging.

Chic Foote, commented on my post (which was cross posted on the Curriculum21 Ning)

As an educator who reads a wide range of blogs,  I really endorse the importance of this strategy as a way to develop insight and understanding of quality blogging.  However as a novice blogger,  I am realizing the importance of being selective about the range of blogs I read in order to get the greatest advantage from the reading I have time to do.  You have prompted me to think about what I find most engaging and what makes me want to continue to follow a blog.  Thank you Silvia!

Considering my own experience, and how it will inform my writing in the future, has started me thinking about the range of teachers I work with and what this will mean for them.  There are those that would find these guidelines a helpful addition to what is, for them, a natural process. But for others who are not so familiar or confident with blogging there may be a need for further scaffolding.

There is such an expanse of material out there and it would be very easy for over worked teachers to feel swamped with the vast array of difference. To guide teachers it might be helpful to suggest choosing a strand (theme/focus) and a number of blogs to follow over a period of time……perhaps 4 different blogs.  They can then really get a sense of what they identify as quality and how this might inform their blog writing and their strategies to gauging and guiding quality student blogs.

As teachers develop the confidence in managing time to read and review their (4) selected blogs there will be a natural extension to reading other blogs.  The increased range of blogs read will become self perpetuating.

Perhaps with this deliberate scaffolding we can help a wider range of teachers gain confidence. This increased confidence will lead them to discover the rich opportunities for blogging to replace the more traditional forms used to apply skills and content knowledge.

Thanks to Chic for pushing my thinking further and to dig deeper in order to help educators who are just starting out in their journey of using blogs as a platform for LEARNING.

You can help too, by contributing links to quality blogs for a variety of grade level and subject areas that can provide a solid start for “novice blogging” teachers to learn from. You can fill out this form as many times as you wish.

The document with the contributions is available to everyone.