As a follow up to the series Stepping it Up: Learning About Blogs FOR your Students, I would like to crowdsource more samples of blog posts and comments for teachers to practice recognizing, evaluating and assessing various levels of quality work.

A meme might be a good way to get the ball rolling.

Wikipedia defines a Meme as:

A meme  is “an idea, behavior or style that spreads from person to person within a culture.” A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena. Supporters of the concept regard memes as cultural analogues to genes in that they self-replicate, mutate and respond to selective pressures.

Quality Blogging and Commenting Audit Meme

In order to gather more audit samples from a large variety of age groups and authors, I challenge you to publish a blog post with a post or comment audit.

1. Select a blog post or blog comment to audit (Professional or Student)
2. Take a screenshot or copy and past the post or comment into your blog post (be sensitive whether you want to reveal any names or references)
3. Include or link to the rubric you use to assess the quality of post or comment
4. Audit the post or comment by describing your train of thought regarding the level of quality you would assess your chosen post or comment
5. Suggest how you would coach the author of audited post or comment to improve
6. Tag (at least) three educators and challenge them to audit a post or comment
7. Leave a comment with the link to your audit post on Langwitches

If you have not been tagged, please feel free to jump in, write and link your own audit blog post.

I am tagging Andrea Hernandez, Maggie Hos-McGrane, Nancy von Wahlde, Edna Sackson, Linda Yollis, Kathleen Morris, Kim Cofino

Looking forward to their quality blogging audits

While scanning my RSS Reader, the words book and meme, struck me.

Chris Craft from Crucial Thought posted a fast and easy book meme, that you can participate in.

Here are the rules:

• Get the book nearest to you. Right now.
• Go to page 56.
• Find the 5th sentence.
• Write this sentence – either here or on your blog.
• Copy these instructions as commentary of your sentence.
• Don’t look for your favorite book or your coolest but really the nearest.

The nearest book on my desk is  IT’s Elementary- Integrating Technology in the Primary Grades by Boni Hamilton.

Here is the sentence:

In many schools, the distrct ITS department may be uncomfortable about who will manage the new equipment, so the person in charge may need to assure in writing that ITS will not be required to service donated computers.

There is a Wordle Meme floating around the bloggersphere, started by GeekyMomma. Here are the instructions:

1. Create a Wordle from your blog’s RSS feed.
2. Blog it and describe your reaction. Any surprises?
3. Tag others to do the same.
4. Be sure to link back here and to where you were first tagged.

I would like to take the meme several steps further.

Since the RSS feed of your blog will be only a snapshot in time of what your are posting to your blog,

5. Create different Wordle clouds of your blog’s RSS over a period of time. Do it once a month for the next year.

Save your  Wordle screenshots in a special folder on your computer or even better create a set on Flickr to store your archived clouds. See what story your  Wordle clouds tell as you compare them to each other. Start documenting your “Zeitgeist” (Spirit of the Times) as mentioned by Chris Betcher in his K-12 Online Conference presentation I like Delicious Things. An Intoduction to Tagging and Folksonomies

6. Share other uses (at least one)  you have found for Wordle (for your students or personally) to your blog post

Look at Web2.0 Wednesday Challenge‘s examples

Here is Langwitches’ RSS blog feed November 26, 2008

Reaction:

What are some of the tags that stick out the most:

tags, tools, children, ICT, storytelling, classroom, Animoto, great, Art, Journey, Alphabet.

The word “tags” must be so big, because I post daily my del.cio.us links to my blog. The last few days were mostly these automated del.cio.us posts and few authored posts. So, I feel that that it is not an accurate “snapshot” of what Langwitches is mainly about. It is a snapshot if this past week only.

The following is my del.cio.us cloud taken as of November 26th, 2008. I will also start storing this snapshot with a timestamp on Flickr, in order to be able to compare in the future to others.

Here is my “other” suggestions how you could use  Wordle with your students. Our elementary school teachers may times(in different grade levels) have their students create a self portrait and ask their classmates to write an adjective or describe that person in a sentence around the illustration. How about if you start a text document and ask each student to start writing their name about ten times. Then have other students add to that document words that they think of when describing him or her. You can then paste it into Wordle and voila have a word cloud about the student. Make sure you make it clear that it is OK to write the same word more than one time.

I created the following word cloud by copy and pasting several recommendation letters that were written about me into  Wordle.

I am tagging the follwing people to join in by contributing Wordle uses in the classroom and getting into the habit of “wordleing” to documenting their “Zeitgeist”:

1. Paige McGee
2. Katie Bennett
3. Kathy Balek
4. Melanie Holtsman
5. Andrea Hernandez
6. Chrissy Hellyer
7. Kim Cofino
8. Heather Vlach
9. Nancy van Wahlde
10. Anyone else who wants to jump on board

Andrea Hernandez from EdTechWorkshop and SkipZ from Integrating Technology in Teaching and Learning both tagged me with the Professional Development Meme that originated from Clif’s Notes .

Directions

Summer can be a great time for professional development. It is an opportunity to learn more about a topic, read a particular work or the works of a particular author, beef up an existing unit of instruction, advance one’s technical skills, work on that advanced degree or certification, pick up a new hobby, and finish many of the other items on our ever-growing To Do Lists. Let’s make Summer 2008 a time when we actually get to accomplish a few of those things and enjoy the thrill of marking them off our lists.

The Rules

1. Pick 3 professional development goals and commit to achieving them this summer.
2. For the purposes of this activity the end of summer will be Labor Day (09/01/08).
3. Post the above directions along with your 3 goals on your blog.
4. Title your post Professional Development Meme and link back/trackback to http://clifmims.com/blog/archives/353 .
5. Use the following tag/ keyword/ category on your post: pdmeme.
6. Tag 8 others to participate in the meme.
7. Achieve your goals and “develop professionally.”
8. Commit to sharing your results on your blog during early or mid-September.

My Goals

1. Take time off to let my brain rest, so I can return refreshed and ready to "create" in the new school year.
2. Finish my "How to Guide for Educators: Digital Storytelling" book.
3. Frame my approach for introducing the use of SmartBoards to our faculty as something MORE than a big projector, monitor and mouse.

I Tag…

1. Paige McGee
2. Kathy Balek
3. Katie Bennett
4. Melanie Holtsman
5. Brian Crosby
6. The TechTrainer
7. Dennis Grice
8. Kevin Jarrett

Technorati Tags: pdmeme

Jess McCulloch from The Rise of Reflection Blog has tagged me for The Thinking Blogger Award. Thank you Jess, for taking the time to write a little blurb about each one of the blogs that make you think. I am thrilled that my writing and my thoughts have resonated and inspired someone. Isn’t that what teachers live for? Isn’t that what makes teachers get up in the morning? Someone actually listens to our rambling…

Here is how this Award works:

1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs (I changed mine to three) that make you think.
2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme.
3. Let the people you tagged know what you tagged them!
4. Optional: proudly display the Thinking Blogger Award with a link to the post you wrote. (Here is an alternative silver version if gold doesn’t fit your blog).

In addition, there is a note: Please remember to tag blogs with real merits i.e. relative content and above all – blogs that really get you thinking!

Here are the three blogs that make me think:

1. CoolCatTeacher by Vicki Davis
   Vicki was one of the first bloggers I starting reading on a regular basis. What brings me back to her writing every time is her ability of breaking down concepts, isolating skills for learners (Students AND teachers), and proposing solutions.
   What I appreciate most from Vicki’s blog is her way of making newbies and beginners feel welcome, appreciated and curious to explore and dive into the blogosphere, web 2.0 or any other community she is involved in. Her willingness to share, especially her pitfalls and mistakes, are a needed reminder for me that “It’s ok”.
2. Always Learning by Kim Cofino
   Kim’s blog is a wonderful blend of practical tips & project ideas for the elementary school crowd combined with reflective posts about life as a 21st century media specialist. I have learned so much from Kim about the role we are playing in coaching and guiding (preparing), not only the students, but also the teachers in a present (future) that most people in the educational field are not even aware of (yet!).
3. Around the Corner by Miguel Guhlin
   Miguel’s blog constantly pushes me to remember and consider that I am a small part of a whole. My contributions matter as part of a bigger picture. While I might be posting more reviews, recommendations and narratives of what projects are happening in the classroom, Miguel reminds me that I have the power and maybe even the responsibility to affect students, teachers, administrators and even companies in a larger world outside the realm of my colleagues and students.

“Um den heissen Brei reden“- Literally translated from the German to “To talk around the hot porridge”.

There is a similar metaphor in English that is being used in a similar fashion “To beat around the bush“

While thinking about my last post “Unwilling to Make the Effort to Learn” and talking with my mother about the issue of humans’ resistance to change, she used a great metaphor in German.

People see that things have changed and they know that they will need/should adapt. Many still prefer to stand in front of that “change” like an “Ochs vorm Berg“.

Which directly translated would mean : Stand in front of something like an Ox in front of a mountain. The ox will look at the mountain, waiting for the mountain to move. If the mountain did not move the next day, it will stand in front of it again… waiting…

Image by drurydrama

Isn’t that one of the differences between humans and animals? That humans are able to change, innovate, re-think, re-evaluate, adapt… Animals live on instincts and habits that they repeat time after time without questioning.

In the English, Spanish and German language we use a phrase related to animals, when we talk about people who like their routines and feel uneasy about change.

• Animales de Costumbre (Spanish, direct translation: Animals of Customs)
• Gewohnheitstier (German, direct translation: Animal of Habit)
• Creatures of habit (English)

Another post in my metaphor series.

If you can’t take the heat- Get out of the kitchen - Meaning don’t take on a job if you are unwilling to face its pressures

Sticking out your neck- Meaning taking risks, exposing yourself to criticism

Tirarse a la pileta (Spanish: Literal translation for “Throwing yourself into the pool”) meaning taking a risk without knowing or caring for consequences. Throw caution into the wind and just do it!

Pam Shoemaker from Yes Tech! and Kevin Jarrett from NCS-Tech tagged me for this new meme, ” Passion Quilt” created by Miguel Guhlin. I am to find or create an image that captures what I am most passionate for kids to learn about.

Participating in this meme is yet another way to be challenged and to express myself in a different media. Another learning opportunity, which process I can try to transfer to my students.

Global Awareness: Different points of view and backgrounds

3 Simple Meme Rules:

• Post a picture from a source like FlickrCC or Flickr Creative Commons or make/take your own that captures what YOU are most passionate about for kids to learn about…and give your picture a short title.
• Title your blog post “Meme: Passion Quilt” and link back to this blog entry.
• Include links to 5 folks in your professional learning network or whom you follow on Twitter/Pownce.

I would like to know what YOU are passionate about:

• Andrea Hernandez from EdTechWorkshop
  
• Melanie Holtsman from Once Upon a Teacher
• Naomi Szoychen from Jewlearn-it
• Nancy von Wahlde from Digital Media Kids
• Chrissy from TeachingSagittarian

Metaphors have always been used to help understand the world around us. To continue to work on my Metaphor IQ which I wrote about last week, here are a two more metaphors.

CC photo by Cisco

“Like Adam on Mother’s day” when you are feeling alone.
(“Cómo Adám en el día de la madre”; quote from a song by Alejandro Lerner)

“The Technology Toolbox” when needing to pick the right tool for the job at hand.
(From Kim Cofino’s post)