John Adams -- Founding Father

In my not too distant past, I had a little time to delve into a biography of John Adams. What an amazing guy, and his wife, Abigail, was no less amazing!

The Boston Library has a wonderful online library dedicated to John Adams, with many handwritten documents from his life.

I strongly recommend the John Adams Library!

A Periodic Post

I know, dear Reader, you're saying.....what else is new? Like when's the last time you posted to your own blog, HJ? Months ago.

Okay, okay. I'll try to get better about it!

So, in that spirit, I want to share a website I've discovered that presents an array of information about the periodic table that we all studied in science class.

This site presents the information in a way that seems ideal for kids (and grown-ups, too). I liked the way the site is organized and how the background and introductory information is written. And the interactive game where you have to identify elements by their components (electrons, neutrons, protons) is very well done. Great site and learning resource!!

Annenberg Media, Learner.org -- Interactives, The Periodic Table

PNAIS Tech Share Conference 2007

Held at the Sleeping Lady Conference Center just outside of downtown Leavenworth, Washington, the PNAIS Tech Share Conference took place June 27-29, 2007. This was my second tech "share" event having attended last year's first-ever get-together (that one was held at IslandWood Conference Center on Bainbridge Island, Washington.

This year's event proved to be rewarding, as was last year's. Here follows my summary of what I saw and learned.

Day One

Megasession 1

Is Social Software Changing Everything?

Presenters: Richard Kississieh (Catlin Gabel) & Tom Frizelle (Overlake)

Richard began this first “megasession” with an introduction to a site he created just for this conference. He touted the tool “Drupal” (http://drupal.org/about) which I haven’t yet looked into in detail, but I believe Richard described it as something like Moodle but (in his estimation) better. Not only was this site to serve as a record of attendees’ experiences and observations while here (if they chose to share them online), but it is also incorporates one of the central characteristics of Web 2.0 applications: users access and interact with data, and have the ability to add their own original content to what is already there. Web 2.0 was to be a central theme of this conference.

The PNAIS site Richard set up for this Tech Share Conference using Drupal is at:

http://pnaistech.org/drupal/

He gave us an “in class” survey to complete and then turned his focus to the following examples of social software:

wikis
blogs
podcasts
student-oriented sites

If Web 1.0 is seen as a static resource – one visits a site and accesses the information made available there – in Web 2.0, one can access all the incredible breadth of information available and, in addition, interact with that information to add, change, or otherwise update what is already there (i.e. a Wiki) or to post new information, opinions, or perspective in the media of your choice (i.e. written blogs, audio or video podcasts). The ways in which these tools can build connections between people and assure that we can all access the best of many minds collaborating is increasingly amazing the more one thinks about it!

Megasession 2

Introduction to Web 2.0

Presenter: Cheryl Wolotira (Northwest School)

Cheryl opened her presentation with a video available via YouTube called “The Machine Is Us”. I had seen this once before. It’s a clever demo of how information can be and is manipulated by people starting with pencil & paper (and eraser) but moving to the far more flexible and instantaneous way to transform text with the computer, mouse, software, and the human brain.

The question posed by Cheryl was: Why should Web 2.0 matter to us (as teachers)? Her answer: Because it matters to our kids (our students). “It’s where the kids live.”

She went on to talk or demonstrate the following:

podcasts
v-casting
social network sites
blogging
wikis
video conferencing

Cheryl noted that, even as software tools evolve and change, the hardware we use is also in the process of being transformed. As an example, she showed as a FlipVideo camera (http://www.theflip.com/). Available in 30-minute & in a 60-minute versions, the FlipVideo camera is a one-piece video camera able to record video with the press of a button onto flash memory (no tape). To download the video, just connect the FlipVideo camera to a computer via its built-in USB connector (no cables!) and it’s done. Apparently the camera also comes with basic editing software. She did not go through an entire sequence but it did look easy as can be. The cameras are also quite reasonably priced and widely available (she got hers at Costco). Cheryl invited us to think back to what digital video cameras used to be and how “user friendly” and less expensive this hardware is getting. It’s another indication of the doors that are opening to teaching and learning options not readily available before.

As far as podcasting is concerned, Cheryl talked about the wide availability of easy-to-use and reasonably-priced digital voice recorders. Using Audacity (free audio editing software) and educational sites offering distribution networks, doing podcasting in the classroom is also becoming easier.

Web 2.0 also offers us Issues to wrestle with. From Cheryl’s standpoint, we, as educators, must keep ourselves and our students informed about:

Internet safety
copyright/fair use
reliability of content

Cheryl did not spend a great deal of time on these issues. Clearly each could be a workshop in and of itself. Still, I think her point was to make sure that mention was made of these areas where we need to be fully informed and prepared to teach (and reach) our students.

Day Two

Breakout Session #1 (Teacher Track)

Using Moodle and SharePoint

Presenter: John Newsom (Lakeside)

John’s session gave us an overview of Moodle and provided all an opportunity to set up a practice Moodle site on a temporary server he provided. We used session time to work on our Moodle experiments. John indicated that 2007-2008 would be a trial year for classroom/teacher use of Moodle at Lakeside.

Once I was able to create a site for next year’s 7^th grade Laptop Prep class, I spent time learning how to add/remove modules and begin trying to plan and organize how I might construct a Prep Moodle site.

Certainly still in the planning stages, I plan to keep modifying and adding to what I was able to start at the conference

.

Breakout Session #2 (Teacher Track)

Using Web 2.0 Tools

Presenter: Cheryl Wolotira (Northwest School)

Cheryl invited us to visit a set of links on the very recently activated site she has set up for teachers at The Northwest School. She and her school went with a service called SWIFT – which costs only $500/year. SWIFT provides easy web page creation and hosting for all teacher sites. Page templates are provided making assembling and maintaining a website quite doable for the typical teacher (she believes). Cheryl pointed us to her site (below). In particular she had us go through her list of Links since so many of them relate to Web 2.0 sites and resources.

http://teachers.northwestschool.org/nws/cwolotira/index.php

Links include:

Interactive Web

• Blogspots - Great blog site for those new to blogging.
• bubl.us - Online and collaborative mindmapping and brainstorming.
• de.licio.us - Collect, tag and annotate your favorite websites
• Education Webcast Network - David Warlick's podcast site
• iTunes - Find educational podcasts, how-tos, or post your own or your student's podcasts.
• Learn Out Loud - Podcasts and Audio Books, many of the free! Great site to look for audio, and educational podcasts. Think about this for students that have difficulty reading or need other ways to process written information.
• Second Life - Virtual reality world. Create an alter ego for yourself and then have a look at what educational institutions are doing! Think distance learning in a virtual world.
• stu.dicio.us - Collaborative tools for students. Take notes, create schedules and calendars, share your work with group partners.
• TeacherTube - Teacher-created v-casts on all sorts of topics including specific lessons for students, tutorials and social commentary.
• Wikispaces - Create a wiki for yourself or others to use. Educational institutions can get the premium account for free.

Professional Development

• 2 cents worth - David Warlick's entertaining and very informative blog about the state of education and educational technology today.
• Digital Directions - A new online journal from Education Week on what's new, what's exciting and what's workin in educational technology.
• Landmark for Schools - Links to all sorts of useful sites for students and teachers.
• Read/Write Web - An article from Read/Write Web outlining all sorts of interactive web applications.

Social networks

• Facebook - This probably doesn't need much explanation but think of the possibilities for collaboration!
• Flikr - Upload, tag and create using your photographs.
• Furl - Save links and pages you find on the internet.

Another tool Cheryl talked about (although we didn’t spend much session time on it but it does look worthwhile for further looking at) is Classroom 2.0 (http://classroom20.ning.com/).

Day Three

Breakout Session #1 (Teacher Track)

Putting It All Together: Rebuild, Remodel, or Rethink

Presenter: Cheryl Wolotira (Northwest School)

Cheryl announced to us that her intent for this session was summarized by the first four words of the session’s title…..putting it all together. We were all set about to work on whatever we had with us that we started while here at the conference. My time was spent mostly helping two of our Middle School teachers, who were also at this session. Their focus was on following up on the beginning they had made in setting up Moodle sites for their foreign language classes. I got a little done on mine, too, but most of my time at this session was helping others.

Breakout Session #2 (Teacher Track)

Copyright ≠ The Right to Copy

Presenters: Eric Stratton (UPA) and Kristen West (UPA, unable to attend)

Eric presented a PowerPoint and a .pdf handout that he along with Kristen West (Coordinator of Academic Technology at UPA, who was not present), covering many, many websites covering copyright and fair use along with tools for finding royalty-free and public domain items. The discussion also included the increasingly higher profile and attention being given movements such as Creative Commons where content creators can attach less stringent copyright protections onto their intellectual property.

As many in this session acknowledged, raising awareness copyright law, the fair use exemption, and the ethical issues arising out of the whole question of intellectual property is a big challenge to tech folks, librarians, and teachers alike. Truly reliable and consistent information on copyright and intellectual property rights is available but all-too-often ignored or disregarded. The list of resources provided by Eric and Kristen on their .pdf sheet are quite comprehensive.

Another reality is that many of the students who come to us seem to have adopted the “whatever I can get on the Internet is free to use” point of view. Again, there were some among this group who also recognized that some of today’s challenges in dealing with the issues surrounding copyright have to do with the adults in our institutions, too. It was not lost on some of us that the realm of copyright, fair use, and intellectual property – and how the Internet has had impact on those concepts – is one challenge where we have nearly as big a job educating and convincing our colleagues as we do our students.

Adieu…….

Eric’s copyright session was the last one of the conference and it brought to a close the 2007 Tech Share Conference. Now it was time to head home. As was my experience last year (after attending the first Tech Share Conference at Islandwood), I found my time to be well-spent at this conference. I’m grateful that PNAIS offers this kind of professional development opportunity. It’s a lot of work to put together such an event and I hope those who organize this conference know that many of us “out there” are very appreciative. The good part, of course, is that I went home with much learned and much more to explore!

The Bolles Tablet Insitute 2007 -- April 18-20, 2007

The group attending the 2007 Bolles Tablet Institute was housed at the Hampton Inn near downtown Jacksonville. The eighteen attendees came from a variety of areas including New Mexico, Texas, Virginia, Illinois, and Washington State.

Each morning at 8:30, a bus from Bolles picked us up and transported us to the day’s session. Days 1 & 3 were held at the Upper School campus; day 2 took place at Bolles’ Bartram Middle School campus. Each and every day was full of presentations, classroom visits, and hands-on practice time. Oh, and every day brought us a new and even more delicious lunch! Our days concluded late afternoon as the school’s shuttle returned us to our hotel.

The most obvious differences between my Tablet Institute experience and any other conference/workshop I’ve attended previously were four major (and extremely important) factors:

1) The small number of participants (a total of 18)

2) This conference about educational technology took place at a school while students were in class making classroom visits possible.

3) All the presentations were done either by Bolles’ Technology Team and faculty, not outside presenters or “experts”. I believe that, over the three days there were about 20 presentations [presentations and classroom visits], not counting those by tech staff. This seems to say volumes about the vitality of Bolles’ technology program and the interest-level of its faculty.

4) A thoroughly “hands on” philosophy in the design of the workshop, including a tablet PC (Lenovo X41) for each participant to use and practice on for the duration of the conference.

Having a limited number of participants meant that more individual attention was possible, more participant questions could be posed and answered, and more true acquaintanceship developed among those of us attending. Chatting with these folks between sessions almost always opened up new thinking and discoveries providing new perspectives, ideas, and brainstorms! I recognize that not every technology conference can or should have such a small group of attendees, but in this instance, it was a great treat to able to attend something with this design.

Another attribute of this conference that I have rarely encountered before is an educational technology workshop where, along with the presentations, we had the chance to make classroom visits and watch some of the same people who had presented to us working in their classroom with their students. The advantage of being at an educational workshop with real students and instruction going on is difficult to overstate.

I had assumed that all teachers at Bolles had laptop computers, and I was correct. They use Toshiba Portege M200 and M400 models.

I was wrong, however, in thinking that there is a student laptop program at Bolles; there is not. I understand that moving to a student laptop program is under some discussion, but it does not yet appear on the horizon.

Tablet PCs have been phased in among the Bolles faculty over a three-year process. The school moved from desktop computers for faculty to tablet PCs. At present, all teachers have a tablet PC. Though Bolles makes no claim that all teachers fully integrate the use of tablet PCs into their classroom, my observation was that the faculty “buy in” was substantial.

The Tablet Institute arranged for each participant to have a tablet PC (Lenovo X41) for the duration of the conference. Being able to use a tablet PC, both during the sessions and at “home” at the hotel, for practice and review of the day’s sessions, was a tremendous plus to this conference. Three days of tablet PC experience does not make one anywhere near an expert or experienced user – especially in the use of the tablet software such as Journal and OneNote. But having a machine to use for those three days was a great asset.

The theme that ran through so many of the presentations and classroom demonstrations is the tablet’s ability to allow the teacher to annotate in real time the results of classroom discussion and content arising out of the dynamics of the classroom. We looked at ink annotations (being able to write directly on the screen in “standard” applications such as Microsoft Office Suite) and specialized applications specifically designed for use on a tablet computer (e.g. Windows Journal, Microsoft Office OneNote, Ink Desktop, Snipping Tool, Ink Art, Ink Flash Cards, Equation Writer, Tablet Music Composition Tool – we even took a look at the My Font tool which makes it possible for you to create a font that is based on your own handwriting!).

The typical room set-up at Bolles had the tablet PC stationed at or near the front of the room. Teachers move freely about the room, facing their students, returning to the tablet to add notes or comments, or inviting students to do so. And all the ink annotations added to the “ink enabled” applications can be saved (or not) and used for future classroom presentations, distributed to students who missed class, posted to a class webpage as a resources, and so on. In most cases, the content of the day’s curriculum was prepared in advance and displayed on a large screen from a ceiling-mounted projector. The tablet computer was used by the teacher and students to add to and amplify the content based on the dynamics of the class, including the give-and-take among teacher and student and students among themselves. The stylus and ink annotations allowed that all of it to be preserved.

All at Bolles credited the installation of ceiling-mounted projectors as a major step in propelling the success of the tablet PC as a classroom and teaching tool. I’m wondering if, as teachers at Bolles accrue more experience with tablet PCs – and the technology for better display of multimedia over wireless connections – that teachers will be even less oriented toward the podium and use their portable tablet to roam more freely throughout the classroom.

My “take aways” from the Bolles Tablet PC Institute included the following:

• Tablet PCs offer a number of tools that seem posed to make portable computer much more of a practical, day-to-day reality, one far more integrated into the teacher’s use in the classroom and in the process of teaching.
• The tablet technology – hardware and software – has made noteworthy improvement. The tablet technology seems poised to become much more attractive as a first option in considering a recommended laptop for use in schools.
• Among those hardware and software improvements include:
• The stylus and screen interface are much improved – pen responsiveness to and on the screen, the clarity and brightness of the screen itself
• The speed improvements in processors, the tablet operating system itself seems much more reliable and stable, and especially the strides made in handwriting recognition
• The instructional tools such as Windows Journal, Microsoft Office OneNote, ink annotation which is available in a number of programs (including Microsoft Office), snipping tools for taking screen content and bringing it into programs such as Journal and OneNote
• Based on the sense I got at Bolles, teachers are drawn into the use of tablet PCs in their classroom once they get an idea of what they can do (no rocket science discovery, in this case!). There is also much “cross-pollination” as teachers see what colleagues are doing with respect to the use of this technology in their teaching (which is also a model for growth and success we see over and over).
• In my classroom observations at Bolles, my general impression is that student and teacher eye contact, interaction, and student classroom engagement were strong. (Reminder: Bolles does not have laptop program and, therefore, students are not on the other side of a screen which I see in some situations at our school with student laptops, so we’re not directly comparable.)

Questions that I remain uncertain about include:

• Are SmartBoards and tablet PCs redundant? In other words, is what they can do equivalent enough that if you have one you aren’t missing much by not having the other?
• Will an even greater “buy in” for a tablet PC at Bolles going to have to wait until a rock solid wireless transmission for multimedia is available?
• The Math Department Head at Bolles – who was clearly one of the most knowledgeable and systematic proponent of tablet use in the classroom – spoke of major enhancements to Microsoft Office OneNote in the newest version (Office 2007). Of particular interest was an improved filing and organizational structure. Another highly-touted feature, which he had not yet experimented with because his students don’t have laptops in the classroom, was OneNote’s capability to allow collaborative sessions. I would very much like to research this tool thoroughly.

These thoughts, and those questions, are what I have on this last day of the Institute. I’m sure more will come to me as I continue to digest and think through the many presentations, discussions, and observations I’ve made over these three days. No doubt, more will follow!

Laughter Is The Best Medicine

I thoroughly believe it the positive benefits of humor and having a good laugh. All good-naturedly, of course!

Check out HelpGuide.Org's site, Humor and Laughter: Health Benefits and Online Resources.

Laugh it up and stay healthy! :-)