Live Broadcast

Does my hair look OK?

Naturally this is the first thing I though of when reading the "Live Broadcast" assignment. Although it could be audio only, I needed to use the webcam to demonstrate some activities and show student papers. My purpose was to tell the other Advisory Teachers at our school how I assess students who were recommended for a special reading and spelling program (Barton*). I also wanted them to be able to ask questions if needed and was glad there was a chat area. Prior to the event I communicated with them via email to promote the discussion. Here is the nine minute video.

*With the Barton program our homeschooling parents attend the video trainings so they can teach it at home. We have four Advisory Teachers who serve as tutors in the program. We meet weekly with the families to help, encourage and teach. I assessed 10 students this past week. Instead of describing my screening process 10 separate times, I offered to let them participate in this live webinar. Only 3 were able to attend, so I recorded it in order that they may view it anytime on our channel. Two ATs have done so already. I should have warned them that they'll need to listen to a short commercial to watch, but they figured it out.

Additional notes:

I began practicing on Ustream, but ended up choosing Livestream as it seemed easier to use. I practiced recording live broadcasts on both with a coworker, but got confused while trying to "upgrade" Ustream's downloaded app-Producer, and decided to go with the basic Livestream channel. It works like a charm! The additional Studio piece helps the administrator organize and tweak video clips. Signing up was a breeze although both required a birthdate and BOTH had me scrolling down forever until I got to my birth year. Seriously! I was afraid maybe the lists did not go back that far. The email they sent to verify my account had links to helpful tips and upgrades.

I started working on this project early as I was afraid it would be complex, but the Livestream website offers many suggestions to create a successful live presentation. I read the tips, then made sure the lighting was good to show the papers (tricky with the webcam), unplugged the home phone, silenced the cell, and locked the dog in the laundry room. I turned on the channel live-but without it recording-so those who looked at the site a few minutes early could see me (instead of the "offline" message). I chatted with a coworker in the chat box to make sure it worked, then quickly deleted the dialog prior to the live, recorded event. When 10:00 arrived, I pushed the record button and began the dreadful 9 minute recording. Although it was educationally sound, it is frightening to not be allowed to erase mistakes or edit. I realized later that a live presentation needs more than one person. There are reasons for moderators, such as reading the dialog chats while the speaker was speaking. There was no way I could keep up with anyone's chat while trying to present. Next time, I will grab a team member to help.

I can see us using this channel for all sorts of live events. Our families not only live in Stanislaus County, but any adjacent county, so some live 1 1/2 hrs away. This would be a neat way for us to give demonstrations or lessons on curriculum. Students, both individual and classes, could share their work with others by doing a live broadcast at school in our Mac lab or on an AT's laptop. For example, the guitar class could play a song and broadcast to the school, family and friends. In fact, although the ATs meet regularly at the school, it would be neat to communicate other times as I did today with my live chat. The potential is huge!

I was able to participate in EdTech Talk live show on Sunday, September 26. It was their weekly general topics presentation. This week they had guest speaker Camilla Elliott, an author/librarian from Australia. There were two moderators that managed the chat. Camilla discussed the good points and pitfalls of ebooks in classrooms/libraries and shared some exciting Google Earth curriculum projects/adventures. Meanwhile the moderators asked questions, typed links into the chat box (as well as posted them later on the EdTech website) and gave their opinions and ideas. A few listeners participated if they had a question or link to share. I was just observing as I had nothing noteworthy to add. This weekly "meeting" on Sunday is a wonderful idea and I'd love to continue checking in each week for general information on technology and education.

EdTech as well as Classroom 2.0 lists tons of daily shows with varied topics that would be useful to me. The archived shows are also valuable. I'm glad that recording is an option! One small annoyance that others noted was that the sound cut out a few times and the network was slow, rebuffering quite a bit. I did, however get lots of ideas for future K-8 educational pursuits, such as Googlelittrips.org and Googletreks.org. I could see the use in our parents and students watching some of the shows. For example, on the Classroom 2.0 website this week the following shows occurred: Monday: "Stress!" and "Teaching with SciFi films." Thursday: "Solving mysteries in Elluminate", and "Edublogs" (chosen by popular poll vote-fun!) The positive aspect of it being live means we can be participating; we're much more inclined to focus, be interested, motivated, and get on-the-spot help or clarification as needed. We get to be a part of the education instead if it being "thrown" at us. Students especially need that.

Social Networks

Warm Fuzzies to Hart-Ransom Charter School's Ning Network to help relieve stress and make learning fun!


After a fairly unsuccessful attempt at social networking with our school on Facebook in addition to concerns about online safety and privacy, I have decided to create a custom private social site with Ning. I began by looking at the top 3 that are frequently recommended: Edmoto, ShoutEm and Ning.


I liked the fact that Edmodo is designed with education in mind-a way for students and teachers to connect. It is free for educators and has many wonderful ways of organizing and communicating. In our particular situation (homeschool) I work with families as a whole. I do not have a class of 30 students in 1 subject, therefore do not need much of what this site offers, such as posting of assignments and groups. I needed a place where Advisory Teachers, students and parents can intermingle.

I tried ShoutEm. Right away I was intrigued as it is available on the iphone. It appeared fun to personalize, decorate and share. However, for this "digital immigrant" I found it extremely difficult to manage. Did I want Flicker uploads? I had to read a complex page on how to do that. I could not even figure out how to get people signed up. I quickly decided it was not worth the effort.

Finally, I looked at Ning. Based in Palo Alto it seemed to be designed just for me. All the required set up steps were very intuitive. I began with the free 30 day trial, and as an educator will be able to get it for free with Pearson as a sponsor. I set it up currently as an open, public site so this EDIM class can access it without having to be "accepted", but will switch over to private next month. I will only allow current families at our school to have access to keep it a safe site. Ning offers a place to post, share and comment on photos, videos, and blogs. Each member can personalize their profile. There are forums where our families can interact, get tips from those "in the trenches", encourage and help one another. This is something our parents have been requesting for quite some time.

The assignment I gave our students will fit grades K-8. Each year they are required to demonstrate that they have covered the state standards in the Visual and Performing Arts category. Many are confused about what type of sample that would be. I chose 4th grade to be the sample grade for demonstration purposes.

Each student will be required to go to our Ning network and read my blog "Visual and Performing Arts Sample." I put a link to a chart I made in the assignment which will clarify what that category encompasses. My blog gives a brief description of what they are to do.

The goal is to show mastery of one standard in the appropriate grade level "arts" category. It will be shared on the Ning network. They will comment on a classmate's work which will actually fulfill the state standard "Analyze Art Elements and Principles of Design
1.5 Describe and analyze the elements of art".

The objectives are to:

1) Show families what that category encompasses and provide some ideas or an assignment
Example: Visual Arts category includes photos, paintings, mobiles, etc.
How does color affect mood?
2) Do one of the suggested activities (or one similar) from the chart
Example: Do a dance, paint a picture. My sample posted on Ning was a photo collage.
3) Share their own project in Ning -
Example: post a video of a dance or a photo of what you made. Write a blog to describe the difference between jazz and rock music.
4) Critically assess other art. Make a comment on someone else's art sample, keeping it positive
Example: "I like how you used pastel colors to show calm and brights to show excitement."
5) *The most important objective will be for students to begin utilizing this site and learn how to utilize social networking to their advantage. The majority do not currently use any site and will need to know for their future success. Ning is easy to use and by requiring an assessment of others' art they will become more proficient.

In our November HRCS School Newsletter, I will give the suggested assignment. I will provide them with the Ning network private link code for them to become members. It will tell them to look at my blog in Ning for the assignment and look at my sample photo in Ning for an example.

Evaluation will be based less on the quality of the work completed in the "Arts" than their sharing their work with others and commenting and evaluating on art.

Only through a safe social network am I free to encourage my families to interact and share. Students will be motivated to do an assignment when they can show others. I began with the arts as that is the easiest and most similar to what some are already using to share online. Eventually we may ask our 8th grade students to make a GlogsterEdu poster to show they understand the activities leading up to the Civil War (posting the link on Ning) or our 1st graders to contribute to an ongoing story (in a blog) using 5 of their own spelling words. My hope is that parents begin to use the site to network with other parents at our school to build one another up and students will be encouraged to create and demonstrate mastery of a concept in a different format. No doubt students will encourage more use as they will be eager to share. I can't wait to get started!

Evaluating Web 2.0 Sites

What a challenge! To begin, our class put together a rubric that would be used to evaluate Web 2.0 tools/sites. We all looked at five sites and evaluated them based on that rubric. How to decide where to begin? Which sites to view? I fell back on the advice from three of my favorite Bloggers. I looked at sites they recommended that I was not familiar with. I also looked at the people they follow and what sites those experts had used. In addition, I took suggestions from my teacher and fellow classmates, and finally, joined the awesome Classroom 2.0.

Here are links to my top 3 Bloggers:

1) Vickie Davis http://coolcatteacher.blogspot.com/
Vickie has the most inspiring stories! Her views and recommendations are always top-notch, up to date and relevant. She is dynamic and encouraging. She can be counted on to find the best information available on the web.

2) Sue Waters http://theedublogger.com/
Sue is the BEST at showing all of us "digital immigrants" how to utilize technology in education. Her guest blogger Kathleen McGeady's information for students about Creative Commons and use of images is wonderful. Sue's tips on how to set up a classroom blog are posted as well as plain language about personal learning networks which helped me finally"get it".

3) Doug Johnson http://doug-johnson.squarespace.com/
Doug is a writer whose motto is "Leaving readers confused at a higher level since 2005." His humor, insight into technology and education, and superior teaching abilities have been a real asset to me. His latest post gives numerous (uncomfortable) social networking scenarios for us to read and discuss with students.

*Honorable mention to David Andrade's blog http://educationaltechnologyguy.blogspot.com/
This science teacher has links to numerous excellent sites, such as this interactive Periodic Table of the Elements.

So with their expertise (and the expertise of those they follow) I have chosen these five Web 2.0 sites to review. In order to limit the length of this blog entry, I'll just explain each part of the rubric for the first two sites then list the others.

Kerpoof
This site is intended for younger students to utilize in order to create pictures, movies, stories, etc. Teachers are able to set up classroom accounts so students can interact with others by sending messages, commenting and reviewing their art. Since this is a Disney-sponsored site, it is very safe and age appropriate. The parents submit their email and must approve the use by their child. The information given to parents is very thorough and explains how they fulfill all COPPA regulations. There were virtually no links to inappropriate content and posted comments and creations are clearly checked for safety. There is no cost to use this site. There is a membership for additional added benefits, but a teacher is able to set up a classroom account with no cost. There is no learning curve involved to utilize this site. It is clean, easy to understand, and free of advertisements. Students are encouraged to collaborate with others. The final product can be saved to the computer desktop, saved in the actual Kerpoof site, and is given a web link for further publishing options. Educational purposes abound! The student is able to use tools to create an original story, artwork, movie, etc. They are able to be creative and use teacher input to fulfill any given number of state standards. They have the ability to use higher-order thinking skills, although discussion with a teacher in order to gain the most benefit would be helpful. For example, they may review another student's artwork, but would gain more with a teacher guiding the criteria for review, or discussing in-depth what made it stand out. The name is somewhat easy to remember and the site is obviously educational, especially under the "arts" category. Students must sign up individually, but can be associated with a class or school account. Here is a link to my rubric assessment of Kerpoof! Final score was 26/28.

Glogster Edu- A wonderful resource for teachers and students! Creators make their own interactive posters. As a teacher, I have used it to make my own "learning tour" for students to learn about innovation. I added links to videos in Discovery Education, sticky notes of writing assignments, a website to visit, and more. My Glogster blog post (7/26/10) explains all the details. I could just as easily assign a student to make their own poster to show understanding of a concept. It is mostly age appropriate with some potential risks. The Edu site is considerably safer than the Glogster stand alone. Although the basic poster-making site is free, there are annoying advertisements to encourage the premium (pay) site. It is fairly easy to navigate, with just a bit of clutter. Both teachers and students could collaborate with others, and final products are given a web link for access. Creators get to decide how it is utilized. This site encourages use of higher-order thinking skills, especially when working with partners or in teams with a teacher-directed guide of expectations. Registration is required. Score: 24/28

More of the Wondeful Web 2.0:

SchoolTube
Ning
Wikispaces


In addition, here are some great Web 1.0 sites our families may enjoy:
Family Fun
This site is perfect for our homeschool students, grades K-8. There were craft projects, links to historical information, science activities, creative endeavors, learning games, recipes, etc. Since this is a Disney-sponsored site, it is very safe and age appropriate. There were virtually no links to inappropriate content and posted comments are clearly checked for safety. The site is free. There were quite a few ads, however, but they were clearly labeled and site navigation couldn't have been any easier or more intuitive. I loved how the projects allowed for feedback and showed a 1- 5 star rating based on prior feedback. Students could post images and comments about projects they had made as well. Although there really was not a lot of the higher-order thinking skills being utilized, a good parent-teacher would use this site as a springboard to do further investigating or analyzing. The name is easy to remember and no registration is required.

Online Math Learning

This awesome site has math tutorials for ALL grades and all math concepts. Our Kindergartners can learn about patterns, our 8th graders about algebra. This is a safe site and very easy to use. I clicked on Grade 4, topic "finding the median". I was given lots of helpful instruction. There was a written description of how to do it, a YouTube video of a teacher teaching the concept, some practice questions, and more. This same sort of scenario was presented in all grades and is an excellent resource for our parents and students.

*This is the site, however, that I felt I should contact the developers. I had an issue with the fact that once in a while the advertisements were not clearly labeled as such. A student could easily think it is a lesson and waste time looking at it. They had a "feedback" section that I used, but have not heard back from them yet.

Another great site was Noodle Tools.

This was a bit different than the other sites. It simply helps you choose the best search based on your information needs. This site has earned 7 awards, has no ads and is continuously updated (last time was 8/30/10). I am not convinced, however, that it is 100% safe for students as it basically lists links they follow on their own. I searched for "Reputable Health Information". They listed three different sites to view, all with a good description. I chose KidsHealth.org, which I had never seen, but now LOVE! This site has sections for parents, teens and kids. Just what our school needed to help with Jr. high health resources.

A third useful site I spent a lot of time with was Class Brain. Apparently, many schools (except ours..yet) use this site as a resource for state reports. Well..that is one small piece of this neat Web 2.0 powerhouse. There are actually 17 major areas, with topics listed by subject, grade, Biographies, State reports, games, teens, parents/teachers, etc. Our families would use this site quite a bit, although monitoring would need to be in place. If you want to do a state report on New York, there are 51 links to NY information! Of course, some of the links were no longer valid, but the idea of students finding their own information on the web is helpful.The advertisements were small, but I was annoyed at a pop-up each time I visited. I also had a bit of trouble trying to navigate. I could not see how to get out of the teen section back to the home page. Lost in teen section! Horror of horrors! Overall, a worthwhile site:

The final site I analyzed was Amphi.

This site's goal is to show parents and teachers all the wonderful reading sites available for students. It is basically just a page of links listed under topics such as "Comprehension and Fluency" or "Spelling and Grammar." There is a short description of each link's content. I was unable to figure out who the developer was in order to tell him/her that many links were no longer valid. However, there are some jewels in these lists. For example, StarFall is a site our school uses to help teach Kinder-1st graders how to read. There are letter/sound games, blending exercises and short stories to read (Karaoke style!). The link to Learning Planet paid off as well. However, Fluency through Fables took me to a site that seemed to just list numerous products for sale. As an educator, some time would need to be spent checking out all these sites. I'd rather just find out from EdTech leaders which sites they recommend. On this site, there was no interaction, no way of knowing which sites were more worthy or valid.

This was a very valuable assignment, and I have learned quite a bit. I personally thought MY rubric fitted my situation ( K-8 homeschool; primarily parents as teachers) better than the aggregate rubric until I realized that the sites I originally looked at were Web 1.0 sites, not Web 2.0 sites. As the instructor ever so patiently pointed out, Web 2.0 sites are for students to USE, interact with and create within. I was looking at sites that primarily give information without interaction. As a result, in the end, I came across a number of excellent Web 1.0 sites as well as super-cool web 2.0 sites. I look forward to utilizing the information to help my students become more effective learners.

Creative Commons Resources

I found some excellent FREE resources on the web that have the Creative Commons license.

Check them out on my diigo-social networking "bookmarks" page:
http://www.diigo.com/user/sarasdobie

There are links to free movies and films, art and photos images, music, educational courses at MIT, lesson plans and teacher resources, and various media files. They are all easy to view, use and download. Most, based on type of Creative Commons license, even allow you to utilize them in your own unique creative projects. Amazing!

Creative Commons License

Sara's Blog by Sara Douglas is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

I chose the moderately restrictive Creative Commons License " Attribution-Non-Commercial Share-Alike" cc by-nc-sa. I would recommend the same license for students' use.

Here are the parts and why I chose them for my blog/ recommend for student-created work:

Attribution (others can copy if they give me credit) I want people to be able to freely use or change/build on the original work as long as credit is given. I believe that creative thoughts and actions should be shared, but the original creator should be noted. That is just giving credit where credit is due and something students should always be striving toward.

Non-commercial (they can't use my work for commercial purposes) Others should be able to do re-mixes, mash-ups, etc. but I believe that they should not be allowed to profit financially from work others have done. A student should protect an original creation and have the opportunity to keep the commercial rights to it. I based this on a part of the FAQ section of the Creative Commons website I had read:

"And most educators who put their their educational resources online do so with the idea that they will be widely shared. But if you depend on controlling the copyrights in your resources for your livelihood, you should think carefully before giving away commercial rights to your creative work. For example, many musicians have discovered that offering work for noncommercial use can be quite rewarding."

http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Before_Licensing

Share-Alike (they must share in the same way I have) This allows others the freedom to create their own original works using some of my ideas and keep it equally accessible (yet non-commercial) for future creators. It ensures that the content will be able to be tweaked and shared in the same way in the future, always giving credit to those who have created originally. This seems like the "Golden Rule" theory of keeping up the intent of the original creator with regards to his/her sharing philosophy. Students should share.

I love the idea of creative thought/media being made accessible to the world. The final sentence of this article below enthusiastically tells us where it can lead. However, there should be guidelines as far as usage of others' work. Creative Commons licenses are the perfect fit to balance the rights of users with creators. This blurb from Creative Commons site says it well:

The Inside Google Books post announcing the initiative talks a bit about what this all means:

We’ve marked books that rightsholders have made available under a CC license with a matching logo on the book’s left hand navigation bar. People can download these books in their entirety and pass them along: to friends, classmates, teachers, and so on. And if the rightsholder has chosen to allow people to modify their work, readers can even create a mashup–say, translating the book into Esperanto, donning a black beret, and performing the whole thing to music on YouTube.

http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Before_Licensing

EDIM 514 Introduction

Hello from the West Coast!

My name is Sara Douglas and I am currently in my third class at Wilkes. Personally, I love to travel, read, cook and play. I adore my family: 2 daughters in high school, a husband, a shelter dog and 2 horses. I live in Modesto (the central valley of California) among almond orchards, approx. 90 minutes East of San Francisco/South of Sacramento. My friends and I like to train for endurance events (cheap therapy) and have done some century bike rides, half-marathons and Olympic distance triathlons.

I have taught various grades over the last 22 years and specialize in English as a Second Language and Dyslexia testing and tutoring. I have just started my 10th year as an Advisory Teacher at a K-8th grade public charter school. Our charter is home-based meaning parents serve as primary teachers for the core subjects. I assess, recommend curriculum, tutor in math, reading and writing, help parents with planning and paperwork, and so much more. It is truly a dynamic, challenging and fun job.

This is my third class at Wilkes and I am enjoying the journey. This past summer I completed Digital Storytelling and Digital Media in the Classroom-two excellent courses that I have already been able to incorporate into my job. My hopes are to utilize technology/media to help students enthusiastically learn core academic content while they respectfully and ethically work with others-becoming global citizens. I believe the use of media and newer technologies help educators attend to the various learning styles and abilities, encourage creativity and develop in students a love for lifelong learning. I look forward to what the future holds!