I was honored when Richard Byrne, from FreeTech4Teachers,  asked me to contribute to his latest project: a collaborative Super Book of Web Tools for Educators. I am fascinated by the production power of teachers who collaboratively are creating work to help other educators. I am fascinated by their willingness to donate time, expertise and share resources.

Here is the list of contributors to The Super Book of Web Tools for Educators:

• George Couros
• Patrick Larkin
• Kelly Tenkely
• Adam Bellow
• Silvia Tolisano
• Steven Anderson
• Cory Plough
• Beth Still
• Larry Ferlazzo
• Lee Kolbert
• Richard Byrne

You will find chapters about:

• An Administrator’s View
• Elementary School Tools
• Middle School Tools
• High School Tools
• ESL/ELL
• Teaching Online
• Connect Via Skype
• Elementary School Blogging
• Alternative Ed Tech
• Social Media for Educators

The Super Book of Web Tools for Educators- A comprehensive introduction to technology in all K-12 classrooms.

There are teachers around the world who want to use technology in their classrooms, but they’re just not sure where to start. That’s why eleven prominent bloggers, teachers, and school administrators got together to create this free book.

Except where noted, all content is the property of the respective authors. you may read, download, print, and distribute this work in its entirety under the following conditions:

• You cannot charge for access to The Super Book of Web Tools for Educators.
• You cannot use The Super Book of Web Tools for Educators as a “free gift” connected to a workshop, training, book, or other services or product for which you are charging a fee.
• Unless granted permission for the author(s) you cannot use excerpts from The Super Book of Web Tools for Educators for inclusion in another electronic or printed book.

Super Book Educators Web Tools

Title: Engage Young Learners with Web 2.0 Tools
Presenter: Gail Lovely
Description:  Discover curriculum-rich possibilities of engaging Web 2.0 tools like Skype, YackPack, Wikis, and VoiceThread in primary classrooms. Explore real learning ideas, not just “Gee Whiz!”

lovelytcea09.wetpaint.com

• Moving from Computer as a toy to computer as a tool
• Younger students should be encouraged to work in pairs.
• Get headset splitters.
• Teach and reward process AND products.
• Link computers in the lab to student learning!
• Easy website accessibility is VERY important for the younger students. They should not have to type in any URLs- > too big of a risk>> create your own website /wiki to publish these links for your students. Try to include images, so they are not only text driven.
  

Tools:

• Kerpoof.com
• Voki.com
• YackPack.com
• Animoto.com
• vocaroo.com

Technorati Tags: TCEA09

I learned from Jane’s E-Learning Pick fo the Day about a cool little Twitter site:

Twitter Sheep

Enter your Twitter username and password and it will create a Wordle-like cloud of the bio profiles of your followers.

This is a word cloud generated from the bios of @langwitches’ followers.

All of our teachers are administrators of their own wordpress blog (hosted on our domain) As part of our monthly workshops, the past week “Embedding Media on Your Blog” was offered.

The definition of “embedding” is :

To enclose snugly or firmly.
To cause to be an integral part of a surrounding whole

In the world of our classroom blogs that means to insert an image, a slideshow, audio or video, so it can easily be viewed as part of your post.

There are many third party websites, that allow you to upload images and then easily embed them into YOUR classroom blog by copying and pasting special code that they provide to you. You can also upload and embed audio and video files directly. The blog software will automatically use a special player that plays directly inside your post without the need for the visitor to download the file.

Here is an overview that was shared with faculty members. You might find the following links helpful yourself or are able to pass it on to your staff as well.

Images (jpeg file)

Smilebox

Bubbleshare

Photoshow

Slide

• Embed code for my space
• Tweak code: delete after </object> to remove buttons that allow to click through

Voicethread

• In your VoiceThread click on menu>embed> then copy the code
• Go to your blog
• Create a new post
• Click on the HTML tab
• Paste (CTRL-V) the code into the text box

Audio (mp3 file)

• Audacity
• Once created, upload to blog by clicking on “Add Audio”
• Once uploaded, highlight the URL and copy it (CTRL-C)
• Type in your blog post [audio:your_mp3_file.mp3 . After you type in “[audio:” then paste the URL you have copied (CTRL-V), don’t forget to type the closing bracket. We use the Audio Player WordPress Plugin
• Publish your post and you should see the audio player in your post

Movies (.wmv file)

Windows Movie Maker

• Upload the .wmv file by clicking on “add Media” and browsing
• Copy the URL (CTRL-C)
• Click on the “Insert/edit embedded media” button on the second row of the toolbar
• Paste the URL
• Enter dimensions 400×400
• Under the advanced tab-uncheck “Auto Play”
• You will see a yellow box inserted in the blog text box. Once you publish, you will be able to watch the movie

Photostory

Animoto

• get embed code (push pin icon)
• copy-paste in blog post on the HTML tab

Presentations

Google Presentation

• Upload the PowerPoint presentation to Google Docs
• Share
• Embed
• Copy code-
• Paste in blog post on the html tab

Slideshare

• On your blog- add media
• browse for the file on your computer
• upload

Remember

• Use your school account email when signing up for any third party site. Do not use that account for personal projects
• Do not upload students’ personal information or pictures that display their names
• When embedding media in your blog:
  • Type any text on the visual tab
  • Then paste the embed code on the HTML tab

Muchísimas gracias a la dirección de la Goethe Schule en Buenos Aires, Argentina por darme la oportunidad de hablar con ellos acerca de la integración de tecnología y la alfabetización en el siglo XXI.

Gracias a Verónica D. y Heidi M. por organizar ese encuentro. Ich freue mich schon auf gemeinsame Projekte!

¿Qué es un Instructional Technologist?

• La carrera universitaria de un Instructional Technologist es una combinación de cursos de educación, pedagogía, diseño gráfico, diseño de cursos, investigación de programas de estudios, diseño de paginas web
• Planifica y enseña con los maestros/profesores en las aulas y en la sala de computación como co-  teachers.
• Responsable en el ámbito tecnológico del desarrollo profesional de profesores y dirección.
• Trabaja directamente con el coordinador de programa de estudio, el administrador y técnicos de la red

Video “Did you know?

• ¿Sabías ?

Desarrollo profesional de los docentes

• Planificación semanal
• Co-teaching y apoyo en la sala de computación y en los aulas
• Reuniones y talleres mensuales
• Ayuda uno a uno -  One-on-One help
• Conferencias y talleres afuera del colegio
• Crear una comunidad de aprendices
• Incentivos y Evaluaciones
• Prioridad la enseñanza y el apoyo de los profesores
• Crear una red personal de aprendizaje (Personal Learning Network)
• Micro- Blogging: Twitter o Plurk
• K-12 Online Conference
  • iPods- iSpeak- iSing- iListen- iLearn
  • Travel through Space and Time

Cambio en la enseñanza y el aprendizaje

• De enseñanza aislada a enseñanza paralela y de ahí a enseñanza integrada
• Enseñanza y el aprendizaje- Donde sea, como sea, cuando sea..
• 24 horas al día, 7 días a la semana, 365 días al año
• Los chicos están siempre conectados (instant messaging, MySpace, Facebook, celular), esperan resultados inmediatos, respuestas instantáneas
• Los alumnos muy buenos para acumular información, pero necesitan ayuda para analizar y comprender
• El cerebro evolucionó y las neuronas conectan en forma diferente
• Tareas múltiples para concentrarse- escuchando al ipod, chateando …….
• Aprendizaje y enseñanza a distancia

Traducido de “How the Google generation thinks differently ” by Catherine O’Brien

Habilidades, conocimientos y competencias del siglo XXI- 21st Century Skills

• Comunicación
• Colaboración
• Conexiones
• Preparar a nuestros alumnos para SU futuro, no para NUESTRO pasado.

Alfabetización en el  Siglo XXI – 21st Century Literacy

• Los analfabetos del Siglo XXI, “no son aquellos que no saben leer y escribir, sino más bien aquellos que no puedan aprender, desaprender lo aprendido y volver a aprender. Alvin Toffler
• “leer”: una foto, un video, diferentes medios, como analizarlos
• Informacion:
  • acceder, manejar, integrar, evaluar y generar información, y la utilización como herramienta
  • Cómo organizarla?- uso extensivo del “tagging” como forma de clasificación de la información
  • Cómo manipularla, crear nueva información y nuevos conocimientos
  • Cómo conectarla a otra información en nuevas maneras.
• ¿Cómo se lee un Wiki o un blog?
• ¿Cómo se escribe, como se crea enlaces para conectar mas información?

Web 2.0

• Cambio de herramientas tradicionales (MS Office), dependientes de la plataforma, instalados y que funcionan desde el escritorio, a herramientas basados en el web (el web es la plataforma) aplicaciones que generan colaboración, son personalizadas
• La información es lo que mueve al Internet
• Cambiamos de ser consumidores /receptores de la información a ser productores/ autores de la Red
• Herramientas de la web 2.0:
  • Blogs- Blogger , WordPress
  • Wikis- Wikispaces
    • What Could it Mean? Wiki
    • Cities Around the World
    • Global Collaborations
  • Redes Sociales- MySpace , Facebook , Ning
  • Social Bookmarks- web de intercambio de enlaces/favoritos- Del.icio.us , Diigo
  • Google Docs : Word Processor, Spreadsheet, Presentations
  • Skype – Video Conferencia
  • Flickr – web social de intercambio de fotos
  • YouTube
  • VoiceThread
    • What could it mean?
    • Jose travels to Egypt

Storytelling has existed since the beginning of time as a form of human interaction. It evolved from cave paintings and oral transmission of how and why our people existed and as an explanation of the world around us to troubadours who traveled the country to inform others of news and happenings of places and people far away.

As human interaction and the range of imagination changed over time, so have the methods that allow storytelling to reach a wider audience and allow us to preserve a voice, an image and a moment in time for posterity in a way that was never possible before.

The Digital Storytelling tools posts, such as Moviemaker , Photostory , Google Maps or VoiceThread , are new kinds of tools that create a final “story product” in a different media than we were used to before. The use of technology tools has created a new process and new forms of storytelling.

We can easily use different kinds of media and rearrange them in new ways. We can now publish and share them with the world for enjoyment or to solicit their perspective or information. It is a new way of documenting our history, our way of looking at the world, of materializing our memories, or of passing on to the next generation what is important to us.

Mixbook.com is web-based but sets itself apart from the previously mentioned tools. It allows us to use storytelling in a way that we all are already comfortable and familiar with. The process does not create a new media, such as a podcast, a video clip uploaded to YouTube or a VoiceThread embedded in a blog or wiki, that most people are still getting comfortable in handling. Mixbook is a tool that allows anyone to tell a story by creating and publish it as a book!

With images and/or text, anyone can create a photo book, an illustrated story, or a scrapbook. The ratio of text and images is up to. What makes Mixbook so attractive and what earned itself a spot as a Web 2.0 tool, is its ability to allow collaboration among many authors of the same book. No need to sit next to each other on the same computer. Collaborators can be classmates or teachers within the same school or who live a world away from each other.

Mixbook allows you to create books with your friends and family  about the things that are important in your life. Mixbooks can be shared online or as coffee-table quality printed books.

Get started by creating an account with Mixbook.

Once logged in, simply click on the “Create” tab.

Once you click “Create Mixbook” , you now have a choice between allowing them to AutoMix the images for you or to create the layout from scratch. You an always change your mind later too.

Get started by uploading the images you want to use in your book. These can be photos, scanned in illustrations or other momentums. You can choose from a wide array of sources where to upload your images. I prefer uploading directly from my computer or through the integration with Flickr.com , where I have an account.

Once I allow Mixbook to access my Flickr account, it is as simple as selecting the image set to locate the images for the book and selecting each image by clicking on it. In order to select multiple images, hold down the CTRL key before selecting more images.

Once images/photos are uploaded, make sure the correct page is selected that you want to work on, then click on the “Layout” tab and choose from many layouts available. These layouts are images or text only or a combination of both. You can choose to include 0-21 images per page.

Once you have the layout selected, go back to the “Photos” tab, select an image and drag and drop it into the workspace of the page on the right. Don’t worry you can always change your layout later and the images you have selected will adjust.

Once the layout is set, you can move on to the “Background” tab and choose a sold colored background or scrapbook like design backgrounds. Click on background of your choice and it will be instantly displayed in the preview window. Change as many times as you like.

In order to add and select a new page in a double page layout, click on the green circle with the plus sign. You are immediately ready to choose your layout and drag and drop images from your “Photos” tab.  You can also add or delete a page from the Page Tools menu.

Once your images are placed in the layout, you can continue manipulating them by selecting each individually. You can edit and personalize the previously chosen layout by rotating the frames, and changing their color, width and style. You can also zoom in or out of each image within a frame or send the entire image with frame to the back or bring it to the front of the page.

In order to delete an image, simply select it, move your mouse over the trashcan a click.

When you have completed your book, it is time to publish it, which allows you to purchase a hard copy of the book or distribute a link for others to order your book from the company.
You can also go back to the main page of your book, scroll down and find the code that allows you to embed your mixbook into your blog, website or wiki.

Check out the following examples and ideas how to Mixbook as a tool to tell a story with your students.

• Kids for Kenya: An A-Z book for Childrens’ Rights
  A project created by Karen Kliegman.
  A rare opportunity to hear from children what they believe their rights as young humans are. A poignant example it the letter “I”, “Children have the right to express their ideas.”
• San Jose Episcopal Day School’s Journey to Egypt
  SJEDS traveled to Egypt in the 2007-2008 school year. Follow along as each grade level learns and experiences the journey.

Michele Martin posts on her Bamboo Project Blog the Web 2.0 Wednesday Challenge

One of the beauties of Web 2.0 is how it connects us to people from all over the world, in different cultures with different ways of life. This gives us wonderful opportunities to learn from each other. So here’s this week’s activity:

Use a Web 2.0 tool to tell us something unique and interesting about where you live.

I absolutely love this task and can’t wait to see what everyone else is communicating about their hometown, how they are connecting us to a place we maybe have never been to and how we collaboratively will paint a portrait of the world through web 2.0 tools.

Since the hometown of my heart is Buenos Aires, Argentina and I am currently  "living" during my summer vacation here… here is a Wordl illustration of words that come to my mind while I am living and breathing Buenos Aires.

Since I have been playng with my Flip camera and been taking clips of Buenos Aires, I threw them together in iMovie and uploaded them to YouTube for your viewing.

Technorati Tags: web2.0wednesday

I wanted to share, but also highlight for my own sake, the following PowerPoint that was created by datruss on Slideshare.net.

I like the point this presentation makes. Teachers can continue to:

• teach the way educational institutions have taught for the last 100 years
• ignore new tools that will bring the world to their students
• tell themselves that materials they have used successfully in the past will continue to engage and challenge digital natives

but they have to realize that they are placing themselves and their students at a disadvantage.

| View | Upload your own

It is not about using the latest and greatest technology tools. It is about the way we think about learning and teaching that is undergoing a revolution.

It is not about using “insert newest technology of the times here from the list below ” to lecture, visualize or document a lesson, if the lesson stayed the same

• chalk
• ink pen
• pencil
• photocopies
• overhead projector
• dry eraser
• LCD projector
• SmartBoard

No matter when (on a time line) teachers lived and used corresponding technology tools, learning always depended on the way teachers were able to connect with their students’ world and previous knowledge . If the learning outcome stays unchanged from the learning that occurred without the tech tool, then the “new” technology merely is a glorified (and usually more expensive) version of the traditional one used in the past.

We need to shift the focus off the technology and emphasize the way it can affect the teachers’ teaching style and ultimately the students’ learning. IMHO, today’s students’ learning is influenced by multimedia, interactiveness, connecting, communicating, and creating. if technology can allow us to do that, then we can reach our students in a whole new way and on a different level than ever before.

Yesterday, during our last technology professional development workshop of the year, I introduced a group of our elementary school faculty to the concept of a custom Google Search Engine. Everyone present was invited to be a collaborator and created (if they did not have one) or signed into their google account. I created a step-by-step tutorial for adding a URL to our custom search engine. We are also encouraging faculty to start adding sites through out the summer months, when planning for next school year.

Dear Faculty,

In an elementary school setting we are hesitant to go to a search engine, like Google or Yahoo, and simply type in a keyword or phrase in front of our class. You will receive millions of search results. It is a lottery to click on a link. You cannot be assured that the website you are about to display will be age- appropriate in text, graphics, videos, advertisement and content for your students. We also worry about our students when they are at home and needing research material for projects and homework assignments.

You are invited to collaborate in growing our very own San Jose Episcopal Day School Google SEARCH ENGINE. This search engine will be accessible for students by going to http://www….
Students will be typing in their search keywords and phrases and will receive ONLY results from websites that have been added by collaborators of the our faculty . By adding relevant and pre-selected websites to our custom search engine, you are aiding your students to focus on content for their research, rather than quantity of information. They will become more efficient web searchers in a safe environment.

Please follow the steps to add a URL (website address, that starts with http://) to our custom search engine.

1- Go to http://www.google.com and click on sign in

2- Type in your e-mail and password, then click “sign in”.

3- After you signed in, click on “more”

4- Then click on “even more”

5- Click on “Custom Search”

6- Click on “Manage your existing search engines

7- Click on “Control Panel”

8- Click on “Include sites”

9- Open up a new tab or window in your Internet browser.
Go to the website you would like to add to SJEDS Custom Search Engine. Highlight the URL (http://www …) and right click on the URL to then copy the address. You can also use CTRL-C on your keyboard to copy after the URL is highlighted. Go back to the search engine and right click into the text box, then choose paste. You can also use CTRL-V on your keyboard to paste the URL after you clicked in the text box. After the URL is visible in the text box click on the “save” button.

10- Congratulations! You just added a valuable site to our search engine!

Remember that this search engine will be only as useful as the sites that are contributed by the faculty. If you are planning for your students to research a certain topic or subject and want to give them a more directed research focus, be sure to add YOUR pre-selected sites to our search engine.

Added thought:

If you want to make adding a URL to your Google Search Engine even easier, you can add a Google Marker button to your FireFox or Internet Explorer toolbar. That will automatically launch a annotation window. You must be logged into your google account though.  I might install this on all our teachers’ computers.

Global Work Ethic- You can design your own assignments, nobody tells you what you do. You are in charge of your own learning.

Questions :

• Who should we look to as key agents of change?
• The biggest barrier of students using technology?
• Have you visited a school outside of the US?
• Do you believe your students will be competing with others utside of the US?
• Do your students have a global work ethic?
• Do you think the close book exam will be replaced by the open source knowledge exam?

There will be a google doc available to access the data of these questions.
How do you shift the control of their learning to the students?

The most successful schools are the ones where students own their own learning. It is a function of vision, culture not technology. Has to change:

How we assess teachers and students.

Teachers are assessed how to manage learning. It would be wiser to leave the room to see if the kids can solve the problem without the teacher there. How much have students learned to solve problems on their own.

Design your own search engine. Should be taught like reading and writing.

Invite people to build collaboratively search engines. Only the web addresses we put in are searchable. All of your links are fully searchable.

Go to Google> Custom Search Engine. You can invite up tot 99 collaborators to add to your search engine.

Help your students stay focus on the search. Keep younger students safe within the

Site: (country extension) ex. Search in google for site:tr will only return results from websites from Turkey

We need specialized search engines to allow and teach students how to get information with global awareness. Make sure you teach your students to use search engines properly. If you want to have insight from a different country’s perspective. Use a current event. If you allow your students to only do research from one country’s perspective, you will not get the “full” picture. Ex. Whatdo the British say about the “Available Revolution”. They will have and teach a different perspective on the same events.

What if you challenge your students to prepare for a live debate with a real British expert on history?

What kind of motivation would you have from your students if you were to tell them that the debate would be broadcasted, uploaded to iTunes, published on a blog compared to the motivation you would get to study for a pencil and paper exam?

Alan suggest to assign one student to be the “researcher” of the day. Any kind of factual question the students might have is directed to the students researcher. We need to teach research skills and the skills to be life long learners.

Have kids produce their own tutorials (screencasts) with programs like Jing, Camtasia. have them own their own learning. What if every day one child in class is the researcher and one is producing the tutorial of the problem of today. What if you were to create a DVD with all these mini lessons/tutorial? All the kids know that they making a contribution to all other kids in class.

“Low hanging fruit”

1. Tutorial Design Team
2. Building a Search Engine
3. Research Team
4. Collaborative Documents/Presentations/Spreadsheet,

Teach kids collaboration tools. You don’t sit there to take your own notes. Kids are social, they LOVE and want collaboration. Using the revision to see the process of creation.

Work around the world collaboratively, contribute to others, earn their own learning.

We can shift control of learning to the students in order to compete in the global economy. Self directed. Kids contribute to the development of the whole. Human need of feeling of contribute to the good of the whole. Central contributors.

Podcast their learning of the past week. Students can contribute more than what we are asking.

[tag] FETC08 [/tag]