Learning, Teaching & Technology

I was curious about this session for a couple of reasons. I wondered about the title and I wondered if there was something we should be doing in all classes. Once I saw that it was about using cartoon creators and mindmapping online I knew there would be plenty for me to learn. A couple of teachers and I have used the read/write/think site for writing activities and we have had some conversations about the idea of using the comic creator site for an engaging way to storyboard, print it out and then have kids write from their beginning, middle, end story starters. I had planned to use the site this year and this session movie will be a helpful tool to share with teachers in a team meeting.

I was intrigued by the ToonDoo site as a web-based tool that has more creative possibilities for learners who want to go further. Last year was the first time I heard a lot about some 4th graders being drawn to graphic novels and some would have loved a place they were allowed to do their own creative work. I will work with teachers this year on using this site, esp. as I will be spending two days a week working with Alice Barr at our High School after 16 years at the elementary level. Wendy points out the safety option of marking a “toon” so it can only be viewed by friends which could be useful even at the high school level.

While I have made podcasts with iPod or iBooks and microphones, I hadn’t tried Gcast. I setup an account and I am wondering if this might have some options for students at home recording book reviews to a class site via. the phone. Certainly we will be expanding our use of podcasts in many ways this year. Kids love microphones!

While I was aware of gliffy as a mindmapping site I hadn’t thought about using it for spatial design planning or some work we do with “structure workshop” in 4th grade. It all starts to blend with sharing photos, thinking about design and sharing work in new ways for conversations.

These tools and sites that Wendy references are all changing and expanding their utility. I found this session a good way focus on a select few and I will use her wiki and the conference blog as places to return to when a need another tutorial.

Over the past year I have been working with teachers on the initial idea of blogs, for themselves and then for their students. Teachers who take our district technology courses have to set up an edublog and they have to enter the conversation by responding to others during the course. The first resistance is, “Why a blog?” We have had an email system for about six years, why not just write to each other by email? During the course it is wonderful to watch the process as teachers are thrilled by the comments that others leave on their blogs and the ways that interaction adds and even changes the relationships they have with colleagues. Some have sustained their personal/professional blogging practices, more often they become readers of blogs at first and hang back a bit on the writing.

Last year I had my first elementary classroom teachers setting up classroom blogs. I was surprised that it was at 2nd and 3rd grades and I wondered how well they would be able to “sustain” the blogs beyond the initial buzz. The teachers were careful in setting them up, added student artwork, brought drafts of student entries to the lab and wrote letters explaining blogs as part of the classroom reading and writing instruction. I was so impressed by the way they brought their skills of good teaching to the process of the blogs. One of the blogs can be viewed here: http://classblogmeister.com/blog.php?blogger_id=135362.

Today I talked to a teacher who has been a pioneer in other aspects of assimilating technology into her classroom, but has not been able to see a way to sustain blogging, thus has not started it. This summer she began to interact with a group of teacher/writers who had found each other through an online course and agreed to give each other feedback. This collaboration has been unlike anything she has experienced in 18 years in her school setting and has helped her feel empowered to try some new things in new ways. Her network of teachers has naturally included conversations about blogs and this year she is able to conceptualize a way to build writing and reflecting about science observations into a blog format. I shared with her the quotes from classroom teachers that Jeff posted on his wiki page and I know she will now be part of the collegial conversation about the possibilities of 4th graders learning through blogs.

The majority of this session is a set of resources in a wiki that includes a nicely scaled set of activities geared toward initial users or experienced users of classroom blogs. There are well-designed webquests that I could have teachers do in a self-paced session on there own or as part of a course I teach. In going to the SlideShare link I was able to follow along with the presentation. Now that slideshare.net allows us to add a voiceover podcast I hope to post more of my teacher materials on this site as I think the audio is a very helpful addition.

I had a few classblogmeister pioneers last year and the most use was by a 2nd grade teacher and a 3rd grade teacher. We sat down together in the lab one day with David Warlick’s book “Classroom Blogging” and followed the directions. We each went home and “played” a bit more and very quickly they had created classroom blogs with access for each student. We were a bit nervous about young students having the patience to fill in text boxes, type in scrambled spambot text and manage it all; we shouldn’t have feared any of it as they were undaunting in their efforts to publish and share their work. One blog from last year can be viewed at: http://classblogmeister.com/blog.php?blogger_id=137726.

As Anne mentions, David Warlick manages the hosting and the software development of this tool on his own and he also encourages teachers to join a classroomblogmeister yahoo group that is a wonderful place to connect with other teachers, ask for help and participate in the community of learners who are attempting to incorporate blogs into instruction.

Thanks to the pioneers in my school this year I have more interest in classroom blogging. Many were hesitant to put in the work if it was just a technology thing, but in a course on Writing taught in the district last year a teacher shared her blog, the student’s excitement and that for her it was the best way she had ever found for sharing student work with parents. She found is was saving her time as the parents weren’t asking so many questions in emails and extra conferences; not to mention it was the first time parents were interacting with their child’s writing!