Curriculum and Technology: 2012

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Class 10

You guys did a great job last class presenting your Powerpoint files. Good show!

As of this posting, I've received most of the Zunal Webquests that were part of the requirements for this course. When I get the rest, I'll place them in a spot where you all can access them for later reference. The method I'll use will depend on when they all come in just because of time limitations, but in any event you'll be able to see them all. We'll spend part of this class showing and discussing them.

Finally, please make sure that you fill out completely, the additional evaluation forms from FSU. I'm hopeful that Kelley will collect them much the same way she did the others. They will be sent to the college via mail; grades will be submitted to them electronically. The evals that you filled out last week will be delivered to MEC prior to the end of the school day on Thursday along with copies of you grades.

I enjoyed you all immensely and I hope that I get to see at least some of you in the future. I know that I'll be seeing Nancy again, because I want to bring my wife, Maureen, out to the restaurant for lunch-one of my favorite occasions and occurs daily!

Your class was a little different for me since you all knew each other as colleagues.. As a rule, my classes are a mix of teachers from different levels, schools and systems. You were colleagues that seemed to genuinely like one another and therefore helpful to each other.

Here are the links to your Zunal Webquests:

Author: Jon Hurd
Title:
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=150927

Author: DonnaLee Tignor
Title:
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=150919

Author: Cid Vargo
Title:
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=149792

Author: Amanda Kelly
Title:
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=150922

Author: Roseann Bartok
Title:
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=150930

Author: Casey McNally
Title:
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=149812

Author: Mike Robichaud
Title:
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=150924

Author: Kim Curry
Title:
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=150925

Author: Rebecca Heglin
Title:
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=150921

Author: Judy Logue
Title:
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=150918

Author: Anne Marie Cataldo
Title: Creating Stimulating Preschool Environments
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=150900

Author: Nancy Despres
Title: Restaurant Customer Service
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=150923

Author: Kurt DeArellano
Title: How to Make a Solution

URL: http://zunal.com/webquest.php?w=149809

Author: Shannon Cleveland
Title: The Baby Book Project
URL: www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=150939

Author: Michelle Savanelli
Title: Answering patitent questions about dental x-rays
URL: http://zunal.com/webquest.php?w=140550

Author: Kelley Curtin Davis
Title: Graphic Novels: Legitimate Literature for High School?

URL: http://www.zunal.com/webquest.php?w=149199

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Class 9

This post is intended to address our last project component, a Webquest, which, you'll be working on during this class. Some of this blog post is a reiteration of information posted last week. Remember that once you've published your Zunal Webquest (on their site) it will remain on there for eternity (who knows how long that will be?), where they can be exported later as various file formats for distribution to your students.

Today:

please prepare to copy your Powerpoint Presentations on my flash drive
please work on your Webquests and try to bring them to completion
please be prepared to export your finalized Webquest as a PDF that I can collect (TBD)
please take an evaluation form with you when you leave in order to spend the time required to comment on the class in a thoughtful way (We discussed this last week. Please return them to Kelley Davis prior to our last class)

Please address the various parts of the Webquest by following the guidelines provided in each section. You are only required to do those in a way that pertains to or makes yours effective to your students. Precision and clarity should be most important; not wordiness.

I will be moving around to each of you today in turn to help you with any of the above.

At the same time I also need to collect your Powerpoint Presentations during class. I did receive some via email during the last couple of days, but had spotted success opening them.

As I come around today, I'll collect them on a flash drive. We can quickly go through them, if you wish, before they get posted this weekend.

This is all leading to a culmination of your work that I want to publish for you in one place on the Web. All of your work should unite with your movies in the same location, so that you could either access it yourself during a lesson presentation, or you could direct your students to do so.

It will take a considerable amount of time to organize and post to the Web all of your work, so please try to complete your Webquest during class today or at least by Friday afternoon (really). That will give me the weekend to post all (64 total) of the pieces of your units.

The Webquest should complement and complete your integrated learning unit. With that in mind, I'd like to direct you to a number of sites that contain, either tutorials, or examples of Webquests, including Zunals. You'll have most of Class 9 to work on these. Just take a a look at what follows and begin thinking about what you'd like to do and set yourself up with an Zunal account. Use your complete email address for your username.

Class 8 Review Material:

Definition of WebQuests from The Zunal site:

Professor Bernie Dodge of San Diego State University defines a WebQuest as an inquiry-oriented activity that uses resources on the World Wide Web. WebQuests pull together the most effective instructional practices into one integrated student activity. These Web-based projects use World Wide Web sites to help students develop problem-solving and decision-making skills. WebQuests are interesting and motivating to teachers and students. An effective WebQuest develops critical thinking skills and often includes a cooperative learning component. Students learn as they search for information using the Web, following a prescribed format that focuses on problem solving and authentic assessment. A well-written WebQuest requires students to go beyond simple fact finding. It asks them to analyze a variety of resources and use their creativity and critical-thinking skills to solve a problem. WebQuests help students analyze, synthesize, and evaluate information.

WebQuests.org

Matrix of Sample Zunal WebQuests http://www.zunal.com/index-matrix.php

Zunal Webquest Guidelines   http://www.zunal.com/help-about-whatiswebquest.php

Zunal Webquest Tutorial and Workshop   http://zunal.com/site.php?s=1

Tech Insights and Zunal Webquests   http://www.wiu.edu/coehs/techinsights/blog/?p=983

Thursday, April 26, 2012

Class 8

This post is intended to address our next project component, a Webquest, which, depending upon the comfort level of the group, should occur sometime after we've dealt with our Powerpoint presentations at the beginning of class 8.

Please do not export your presentations, but leave them in their pristine state. I need a little more time to think about the most advantageous way for us to run them. Here's the question: Can you guys run them off the server from within your folders at school? If you can do that, we should be able to run them in the lab from the teacher's workstation. In addition, please bring a copy (complete, in a folder named YourLastName, with no other extraneous files-only those necessary) on your flash drive.

This is all leading to a culmination of your work that I want to publish for you in one place on the Web. All of your work should unite with your movies in the same location, so that you could either access it yourself during a lesson presentation, or you could direct your students to do so.

The Webquest should complement and complete your integrated learning unit. With that in mind, I'd like to direct you to a number of sites that contain, either tutorials, or examples of Webquests, including Zunals. You'll have most of Class 8 to work on these. Just take a a look at what follows and begin thinking about what you'd like to do and set yourself up with an Zunal account. Use your complete email address for your username.

Definition of WebQuests from The Zunal site:

Professor Bernie Dodge of San Diego State University defines a WebQuest as an inquiry-oriented activity that uses resources on the World Wide Web. WebQuests pull together the most effective instructional practices into one integrated student activity. These Web-based projects use World Wide Web sites to help students develop problem-solving and decision-making skills. WebQuests are interesting and motivating to teachers and students. An effective WebQuest develops critical thinking skills and often includes a cooperative learning component. Students learn as they search for information using the Web, following a prescribed format that focuses on problem solving and authentic assessment. A well-written WebQuest requires students to go beyond simple fact finding. It asks them to analyze a variety of resources and use their creativity and critical-thinking skills to solve a problem. WebQuests help students analyze, synthesize, and evaluate information.

WebQuests.org

Matrix of Sample Zunal WebQuests http://www.zunal.com/index-matrix.php

Zunal Webquest Guidelines   http://www.zunal.com/help-about-whatiswebquest.php

Zunal Webquest Tutorial and Workshop   http://zunal.com/site.php?s=1

Tech Insights and Zunal Webquests   http://www.wiu.edu/coehs/techinsights/blog/?p=983

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Class 7

Welcome back and I hope you all had an enjoyable and restful vacation.

Good show...our online class went well. I hope you all concur and if you have any thoughts regarding how it might have been made more effective, please share them with me.

Our syllabus calls for us, during class 7, to work on our Powerpoint projects, complete them, and view them in class as a group. I know that some of you have either begun them, or substantially completed them.

I'm going to poll the group as you come into class to get a feel as to the portion of the class that fits the above. If you haven't begun yours, that is as it should be and everyone will have time in class to work on their projects.

At the onset of class, I'd like to go through 6 or 8 short tutorials, much as we did with Windows Movie Maker. They'll deal with formatting, text, saving in different formats, and spell checking, etc.

I lied to you. There are roughly 25 tuts that I'd like you to see, but time will not allow for that many. So I think I'll let you see the list of topics in order, then run them allowing you to zone in on those that you would consider germane to you.

So, once we finish going through the tutorials or currently, I'd like you to spend the rest of the class working on your Powerpoint creations; either starting them, finishing them up, or polishing them. Please remind me to discuss what your method of delivery would be and how we might publish them as we did your movies.

Once you begin to work on your projects, I'll come around to offer help to anyone who might need it. Please remind me to view yours if it's finished, when I come.

If we can pull it all together, we'll plan on running them during the beginning of class 8. The second half of class 8 with be devoted to creating Webquests.

Just a little aside: as I was viewing the Powerpoint tutorials I grew nostalgic for an old friend no longer around and long forgotten by many. It's name was HyperCard (notice the signature mid word capitalization that can still be found on so many logos today). I see so many features within Powerpoint that were first introduced to us in HyperCard.

Sample Home cards and stack using HyperCard

(notice the hyperlinked buttons)

A little background from Wikipedia: HyperCard is an application program created by Bill Atkinson for Apple Computer, Inc. that was among the first successful hypermedia systems before the World Wide Web. It combines database capabilities with a graphical, flexible, user-modifiable interface. HyperCard also features HyperTalk, written by Dan Winkler, a programming language for manipulating data and the user interface. Some HyperCard users employed it as a programming system for Rapid Application Development of applications and databases.

It had just about everything-sound, graphics, and it could run laserdiscs with it. You could make interactive lessons. Non linear lessons that in essence, tailored themselves to the viewer. You could even pprogram with it using its unique languages, HyperTalk and HyperScript. It was an exciting program and the kids loved it. The Boston Computer Society (RIP) had bunches of floppies loaded with educational stacks designed by teachers on all sorts of subjects. All long gone.

At disappeared because it was a little hokey, it didn't support color (black and white only), and it was not marketed very well and left to wither on the vine by Apple much as the Newton was. Who remembers HyperCard or the Newton; both were cutting edge. Both were superseded by IBM products when, back in the nineties, Apple lost some of it's polish because of failure to counter it's image as not as serious as other business oriented platforms. The real kiss of death, came shortly after HyperCard's inception when it was given as freeware. Many thought that because it was free and PC based software was so expensive, it couldn't be worth much. Oh well.

Monday, April 9, 2012

Class 6

Thank you all,

I heard from almost everyone by now and it looks like you all have the capabilities to view each others movies at locations other than the lab at Monty Tech. This assignment was essentially a dry run for our 6th class which will run on April 17th.

My thought is that rather than trying to get you all together simultaneously in my virtual office at TappedIn, it's going to be more effective that you view the class through this blog. In that way, wherever you choose to be during vacation, you can accomplish everything you need to at your convenience. More importantly, this venue will allow each of you to concentrate on the work of your colleagues, in a quiet and thoughtful manner without the clutter that usually occurs in a chat window.

I will post all the finished movies to the same relative location as the sample movies that you viewed last week as soon as I can.

*Assignment:

Please complete this assignment prior to April 21st. That way I'll be able to view everything on the blog and prepare my own comments as well as get ready for class 7. Thank you.

Please view each of your other class members during the week of April 17th by clicking on the link with their names below. Presently you'll see placeholders for each one of you by last name. The links will be blind until you all give me your movies, I get to post them to MEC's Webspace, and activate them. When you come in later this week, you'll know when the links become active by their color and underlining.

Remark on each one using the comments component of our blog. I will create a series of blank comments (placeholders) for each of you so that the other can have their say keeping all under each of your names.
That way each commenter can easily keep track of their viewing/commenting progress and each contributor will be able to see all the comments written about their movie.
My philosophy regarding criticism, is to ALWAYS keep it as positive as possible. Each of you will move to improve what you've done as you glean ideas from what others have done. That's the purpose of this viewing/commenting exercise and why it was included in the syllabus.
Please remember that we all come to these classes with different strengths and skills and that none of you (save possibly one) was familiar with Windows Live Movie Maker prior to this course.

My plan is to be in my virtual office holding office hours during our regular class time, 4:00 pm to 7:45 pm on April 18th, in case any of you have trouble with the assignment or wish to discuss any other class related issues. It is not necessary or otherwise a requirement that you visit me there during that time. I offer it as a matter of convenience to you. You can also call me during that time just in case either of us has trouble accessing TappedIn. I will email you my cell number as well as the land line (better for reception) I will be closest to during that time.

Here are the movies. Placeholders for the comments for each one of them are at the very bottom with corresponding titles. By Friday, April 20th, there should be 16 comments for each one of them:

Bartok

Cataldo

Curry

DeArellano

Davis

Despres

Heglin

Hurd

Kelly

Logue

McNally

Robichaud

Salvanelli

Tignor

Vargo

Cleveland

Eric

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Class 5

Good afternoon all,

We need to reiterate a couple of items before we move on to saving our movies in a format other than a wlmp (Windows Live Media Project). At the end of Tuesday's class, a couple of class members had trouble saving their wlmp files to the server. I didn't see what they were doing or how they did it, so I cannot say with certainty what happened. Luckily (I hope) they saved all their component files to their flash drives. Remember that we discussed keeping everything together in one folder in case we had to reconstruct our projects.

Another class member separated their wlmp project file from its related assets and found their clips and pics showed up as ghost icons in their storyboard when they launched it in Movie Maker.

Usually, employing an abundance of caution, I save computer files in their primal state so that later reconstruction, if necessary, is not that complicated. Unfortunately, it carries over into Life for me sometimes, leading to excessive clutter. Computer files take up negligible amounts of space, while tangible items do not.

Your original project was saved as a wlmp along with it's related files in a folder. Please do not consider turning it into an actual movie file until I get a chance to speak with you about the possibilities.

The best course for us is to come to class next week with everything related to your movie project loaded on a flash drive. That will allow us to save it as a movie in multiple formats at any time in the future. Different formats will allow you to utilize different methods of delivery constraints due to resolution quality and file size. We'll use a lower res movie file for the Web posting we'll use for our online class while you may wish to use a high res movie file to play on a DVD.

Next week, we'll spend a couple of minutes viewing short tutorials explaining movie file options and how to save them. Windows Live Movie Maker uses the term, to save, for both the initial save when you create a wlmp as well as when you essentially export it to another format.

Also very important:

save to your flash drive only (we want to avoid the nasty network gremlins)
save you original project (wlmp) file early and often
keep all your related files in the same relative location as your project file
do not relocate any files or rename any of them
please call me over to your computer if:

you have any trouble saving
you are uncertain about where your saved files will go
you are uncertain about where your saved files have gone
you have files related to you movie scattered about

I hope you enjoy this quickly done movie below. I used a video that I took of you all in class while I was droning on and on, mainly with Jon, to cover my tracks. The stills were created from simple pngs and jpegs that I took of the Web after doing a search for images related to Monty Tech. The introductory audio track was recorded using the Open Source and cost free program called Audacity. It was exported as an mp3 and imported into this movie. The subsequent music that you'll hear in later was downloaded, again cost free, as part of a Creative Commons site.

I did the movie for a couple of reasons:

The first is that while thinking about how we could conduct our vacation class, I wanted to chose the most effective virtual space for our classroom. Should it be in my office at TappedIn (a synchronous session requiring all to appear there at the same time) or would it be better to conduct it through our blog (asynchrous-meaning anyone could view the subject matter anytime, anywhere independent of the others in the class).

I think that a good use of that time would be to use the allotment provided for in the syllabus to view our movie creations. Since the week when I asked you all who would not be around during that makeup class when everyone said they would, a few people have told me they wouldn't. So, I guess that makes me lean toward the asynchrous. That way you can view all the movies at your leisure wherever you may be that week.

The second reason is that if you all can view this movie where I posted it to the Web linked through our blog, then I could post all of yours to be viewed by each of you sometime during our vacation week. I just need to be sure that you all can do it.

I also posted a movie shot by Donnalee on her cellphone. She prepared a wonderful short with a student in Automotive. The purpose of it was to educate the viewer about the meaning of numbers on the sidewalls of all the tires we all purchase.

*Assignment:

Please view both movies and comment on your ease of access in doing so by using the comment component of our blog. Simply let me know if you can view mine, but be sure to let Donnalee know what a great idea she had.

MontyTechSampleMovie
DonnaLee
More to follow...

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Class 4

Please use the comments component of this blog to accomplish the assignment below:

Read the article, Five Riveting Ideas, at the following: http://www.edtechmagazine.com/k12/article/2006/10/five-riveting-ideas

The Five Riveting Ideas article presents a variety of ideas, classroom applications and solutions relevant to the emerging technology needs of our culture and our students. Which of these do you find relevant to your needs as a teacher and how could these be utilized as practical solutions in your classrooms. (I realize that we all work in imperfect environments, so please do not use up energy explaining all the reasons why these ideas cannot be implemented. Try to be positive and see if you can cull from these ideas ways in which you can move forward in your own particular educational environment. Also, please acknowledge and validate ideas from your classmates which you have found useful. This way we can use this forum as a means to do some productive sharing.)

Use our blog to briefly discuss the role technology will play in expanding relationships between and among students, teachers and the larger community. To what extent will technology allow control of learning to shift from teacher to student? One or two paragraphs will suffice.

Thank you all!

First of all, I'd like to thank you for the way in which you fulfilled this assignment. I spent the past (5:30 am to 7:00 am) reading your analyses. They were all exceptionally thoughtful and well written.The assignment (not conceived by me) worked perfectly with a group of teachers I consider one of the most cohesive that I have worked with. The interwoven comments throughout were thoughtful and cogent as well.

I have to confess to you that my middle name is Thomas (true) and I say that as someone who's an eternal optimist (BTW There is a blog entitled, The Eternal Optimist). There is within me, however, a touch of skepticism, not cynicism, just mild skepticism.

As I read the articles, I tried to fit each theory into my concept of reality within the classroom-the one I was familiar with. And I asked myself, "How well would this work, really?"

Then I looked at the short bio of each author and asked myself, " How close to the classroom were they, and were they more theoretician than teacher?"

Johnny Mercer was the one who said, "Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate the Positive" and you guys certainly did that well and that was, after all, explicit in the assignment directions. You managed to identify strategies that you could use or do use. In short, you all had very good ideas about how to meld technology reality with your classroom situations.

When I read your comments, I noticed that there was a shared gratitude of place. There was an appreciation of being part of a vocational school in general and being part of Monty Tech in particular. I saw the fortune of time and place very soon after coming on your campus. "We can't do that here," is a common refrain at most schools when speaking about the promise of technology. Not so at your school. And yes, as noted, Jon is part of the equation. Thank you , Jon. It wasn't just Jon, either. I came to Monty to visit the lab weeks before class began and called six weeks before that. I received the same nice treatment from everyone I encountered here. Staff people were ready to help me do my job (facilitating technology) better rather than delimiting it.

My feeling (without ever visiting your classrooms) is that you are technology aware and employ an above average amount of it in your classes and that you try to push the envelope with it whenever you can. You understand that technology is not an end unto itself, but is best incorporated into our curricula. The emphasis should not be on learning "the software," teaching with it, otherwise we get caught up with the bells and whistles.

Today, we'll spend our class time working on and hopefully finishing our Movie Maker flicks. I'll be coming around to help you any way that I can. I'm going to bring in a few microphones, so if you need to add narration using your own voice, I'll have 'em. I know that at least one of you will be doing that and will be using the adjacent classroom as a recording studio.

But before we do any of that, I'd like to show you a half dozen or so tutorial videos on Movie Maker from a site my daughter and I belong to. It's called, lynda.com, it's a pay site and it's authored by the same company that has been selling computer how-to books and DVDs for a long time.

Each video runs from 3-5 minutes. I'll run one that demonstrates the interface and then I'll go through a half dozen or so dealing with utilizing the features of the program. They are designed to help you come up with a professional looking movie as quickly as possible.

After I'm done, I leave the site up and logged in so that should you wish to view any of the remainder of tutorials, you will be able.

If you choose to do that, please confine yourselves to those tutorials that deal with Windows Movie Maker.

Eric

Monday, March 26, 2012

Class 3

Today's class:

Today will be a work session for all intents and purposes. I'd like to come around to each one of you and go over your work so far, as well as have you tell me how you're doing and how you plan to proceed. The spacing of seats in the lab as well as my size really don't lend themselves to that purpose, but we'll persevere somehow.

You need to utilize me as much as you can while you're in class. I don't mind; I love it when that happens. The more I can help you, the more satisfaction, the happier I'll be.

While we're doing that, I'd like you to the following:

Please make sure that you've viewed all the Powerpoint resources that were listed at the end of Class 2's blog. If you need any help or advice, please ask me as I make my rounds.
Next, I'd like you to view the following links below that relate to Windows Live Movie Maker.
After viewing the tutorials and education related Movie Maker files, please work on an outline that you would use to create your video. Just come up with an idea for implementing a short video within you project. It could even be part of the introduction-your way of introducing to your students that which you'd like them to accomplish.
Some of the videos that you will sample tonight will contain no recorded video (from a video camera), and animation has been achieved through placement and manipulation of static pictures and screen text. The audio tracks have been added to enhance the viewing experience.

Windows Live Movie Maker Related Videos:

Windows Live Essentials: Movie Maker
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-live/movie-maker-get-started

Tell a Story with Windows Live Movie Maker
http://www.microsoft.com/education/en-us/teachers/how-to/Pages/tell-story.aspx

How to Make Lessons Memorable with a Movie
http://www.guide2digitallearning.com/professional_development/how_make_lessons_memorable_movie

Movie Maker Student Created Short Movies
http://www.sciencekids.co.nz/studentpagesmovies.html

Sound Files for Your Videos

Just below, I've also included some sites that offer free music downloads for tracks that you may wish to include as background:

http://www.laurasmidiheaven.com/indextest.shtml#null

http://www.last.fm/music/+free-music-downloads

http://archive.org/details/opensource_audio

http://www.madeloud.com/download-music/instrumental

If you wish to voice over with your own voice we can use Audacity to do that.

Take a look around at these sites, have patience, and don't get bogged down with the amount of choices. I have two royalty instrumental music files on my computer desktop. I've used them when creating podcasts with teachers. If you want to play with them for now, let me know and we can drag them off onto your flash drive.

Image Sites:

Google Images
http://www.google.com/imghp

Free Stock Photos (be sure to read copywrite restrictions on their homepage)
http://freestockphotos.com/

Free Stock Images
http://www.turbophoto.com/Free-Stock-Images/

Pics4Learning
http://www.pics4learning.com/

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Class 2

Prepare a “rough draft” of the expository paper. This should be a 2-3 page, single-space paper about a topic which will become the basis or an introduction to the learning unit within which the later power point presentation and Webquest will be part of. Please save any graphics you wish to have included and know which websites you need to visit to download images from the Web.

....more to follow

Have a great weekend!

See you on Thursday evening or Friday morning.

Eric

Hic nos vado...

Thank you so much for being such a great group. I had a great time with you guys. You were punctual, receptive, and in possession of a good sense of humor. I could also tell that you all genuinely like each other.

Please take a look at this 6 minute video which will help you with your word document and text wrapping graphics: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAmVwXKEUVI

It's comprehensive and very well done. Please let me know how you found it with a brief comment below.

Important! If we are going to use TappedIn for our makeup class, it's essential that each of you can communicate with the rest of us via the chat window. Please login to TI at the computer you will be using during that class to make sure that you have chat capabilities. Java has to be installed and there will be a troubleshooting FAC on site if you need it. When you comment about the Youtube video, just add whether you can chat or not while you are at TI.

Please plan to email me your drafts as attachments before Monday morning so that I can look them over before class. Thank you.

Have a great weekend.

Eric

Although all of the above is related to the second (this afternoon) class, what follows is what we'll try to accomplish in class.

***If you forgot to take a dry run using the chat window in TI last week, or you tried with no luck, please make yourself known to me at some point during today's class. If our April makeup class is going to run without a hitch (I know, I know, you're thinking about that man Murphy who always seems to show up unwanted) or as close to it as possible, we'll need to eliminate to all the obvious problems.

I read all your drafts and they prove my contention (I spoke of during the first class) that I always gain more from the teachers I work with than they do from me. They all contain wonderful ideas. There were a couple missing, which is probably my fault. So if you didn't receive a recognition email from me today, please let me know when we're in our work phase and I'm coming around to assist you.

A large portion of today's class will be set aside to finalize your papers. Please use me to help you with any formatting issues you might have as well as the inclusion of graphics. As I told you last week, I enjoy working with teachers so please do not be reluctant to ask for help with your work.

I promised you that we would spend some time formatting word processing files (tabs and indents) and we shall. I have 9 or 10 files I'd like to show you and have you go through. They are designed to take you quickly through some formatting concepts that I would almost bet you hadn't seen before. When we're finished with them, you may not be Word certified experts, but you'll be equipped to make your documents a lot more attractive and, more importantly, easier to read.

I'll also use a Powerpoint (which you'll all be using) presentation to tie in some desktop publishing design concepts such as font selection, text reduction to bullet points, punctuation, and online aesthetics. We'll use Powerpoint to cover some of basic document styles and design.

These are merely Powerpoint FYIs

Microsoft Developing an Interactive Story with Powerpoint

http://www.microsoft.com/education/en-us/teachers/how-to/Pages/interactive-story.aspx

University of Minnesota Using Powerpoint to Create Educational Games

http://www1.umn.edu/ohr/teachlearn/tutorials/powerpoint/games/

Educational Virtual Museums Developed using Powerpoint

http://christykeeler.com/EducationalVirtualMuseums.html

Powerpoint Dos and Don't s

http://www.hrsonline.org/Education/WomensLeadership/ProfGrowth/EffectivePres/PPT/DoDont/

Absolute Basic Powerpoint Tutorial 1 (part of a series)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYhDZ7yjM3w

Storing your resources:

I also want to talk about collecting resources such as graphics and their formats such as png and jpg, etc. Where they should be stored and how they should be named.

Graphics should all be stored in one folder.

Graphics should b renamed only if necessary i.e., 230986wsk.jpg is not very user friendly and since its name reveals nothing about what it represents, it could be renamed textbook.jpg or baseball.jpg keeping all the letters lower case and including no spaces or special characters except a dot or an underscore.

Once in situ, they should not be moved which could break any link to them.

If we keep all your related files in one folder, should anything happen to your project such as having trouble locating it, you will able to reconstruct it and avoid starting from scratch.

More to follow...maybe

Class 1

Dear Colleagues,

Welcome to "Curriculum and Technology". I'm so glad to be teaching this
course and it's going to be nice to see some familiar faces as well as get to
know some new ones.

Welcome to our first class. I hope that you'll find it low stress, enjoyable, and that you'll take much useful information away with you during and after the class.

IMPORTANT: Carefully record all usernames and passwords that you create today (and every day actually) so that you don't find yourself wasting time looking for files that you need!

Please bring a flash drive or some other portable digital storage device to class each week for your work.

This blog is going to be one way that we stay in touch, given the fact that most of the classes will take place in class, while one session might be synchronous and online. An overriding concern of mine has always been the comfort level of my students, since I believe that it has a direct correlation to how readily and enthusiastically the technology will be transferred to the classroom. To that end I will reiterate what we do in the course here and in my office at a virtual professional development center called Tapped In (http://tappedin.org).

Please make sure to check both sites during the week. After we have spoken today, and before our next class, we'll set aside a regular time to perform that checking each week. In asynchronous classes, assignments get viewed by classes over the course of the week-and sometimes in an untimely way that does not allow enough time for thought and responses.

I'm acutely aware of the incredible demands on every classroom teacher. I think that you'll see that in the flexibility of the way in which I conduct my courses. We do need, however, to touch base a couple of times each week, no matter how briefly. In addition, please let me know as soon as necessary if anything I can control, is causing you undue stress.

This afternoon, we'll do brief introductions, discuss our schedule of classes, trade email addresses, (mine is egroves@comcast.net), visit my office at TappedIn and set up accounts for you there.

Please be patient with our pace whether it be, in your view, too slow or too quick. I'll try individualize it and tailor the material covered to each of you as best I am able.

Second Caution. IMPORTANT: Carefully record all usernames and passwords that you create today (and every day actually) so that you don't find yourself wasting time looking for files that you need!

Then I'd like you to access our blog again and sign on as a public follower by clicking on the "Follow" button at the top of my blog page. In that way each time our class blog is updated you'll see the link when you access your own blog.

Next I'd like you (we'll all go there together) tappedin.org. Login as a guest. You'll be asked to give a username for yourself and then to check their user policy. You'll then find yourself in the reception lobby. Look up to your left under the "Reception" link and click on "In this building." At the next screen, locate "6 Tapped In Offices Floor" and click the link to the right. At the next screen, click on the link (upper left) "On This Floor."

Next click on the link "Tapped In: Places" then "Search Rooms" at the next screen. In the next search box type in "ericg" and then look for the blue link to my office. That will take you there. Later when you've set up your own account and reenter my office, you can pull down the "Favorite Places" menu and add my room. That way you'll have quick access each time you go to Tapped In.

Your next assignment is to back out as a "Guest" and go back in and set up a permanent account for yourself. When asked, please list me as a sponsor.

When you get back in as your new self please (no stolen identities please just a bit of humor), navigate to my office and set it as a "Favorite Place", sign in on the whiteboard and date your visit. We must discuss two small windows (time) each week that we can at least briefly check both places (our class blog and Tapped In). Please be sure to remind me to iron this out before you leave class today!

Next on the agenda-accessing the syllabus for this course. I've posted it in my office. It will remain there so don't feel the need to print it out. In the spirit of conservation, we'll try to leave as many documents as we can in digital format.

This post is essentially a dry run, but it is only one of a number of ways
that we will communicate during the next 10 weeks or so.

The class will meet at 4:00 PM on 10 consecutive Tuesdays. Our last class should meet on May 15th, leaving the 22nd as our snow/makeup day. I'm going to try to have one class will online; therefore you can break out the snuggies and the hot chocolate and never leave your couch.

In addition to our actual class time in MT's lab, we'll be meeting virtually in
my office in TI's virtual professional development center (more about that
later) or via blogs (yours and mine) and email.

During the beginning of the first session, I'm going to try to learn about your
interests for your project and which directions you might want to proceed in with regard to it.

Before I forget, I want to give you my email address. It is egroves@comcast.net
and you'll find the addresses of your fellow students in my first email's header. The address (URL) of this blog is the following: http://egroves-curriculumandtechnology.blogspot.com/ and I will be using it to communicate with you between classes and as a fairly accurate chronicle of what we cover in each class.

Eric

BTY 5 bonus points or a trip to the prize closet to whoever reads this first and reminds me to append the additional resources twice (two stages)!

FYI or Interest Only:

If you are so inclined and wish to learn more about educational blogs for teachers or students, please feel free to take a look at the following sites related to finding and using educational blogs:

Blog by Carol; 38 Ways to find Edublogs

http://cooper-taylor.com/blog/2009/02/38-ways-to-find-great-edublogs/

Take a look at the entry entitled Concerns over teen blogging continue, by going to http://www.bloggersblog.com/cgi-bin/bloggersblog.pl?bblog=112505

Blogging with pseudonymous and protecting student identity: http://blogsforlearning.msu.edu/blog/archives/2

Also see the entry, Blogs and Kids-Staying Sake and Having Fun, http://homeschooling.gomilpitas.com/articles/031606.htm

High Tech High Overview Videos and Files:

Wikipedia Article about HTH

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_and_Jerri-Ann_Jacobs_High_Tech_High_Charter_School

Where Everyone Can Overachieve

http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2004/1011/080.html

High Tech, Higher Learning: A School Grows Its Own Teachers

http://www.edutopia.org/high-tech-high-graduate-school-video

Transformed by Technology at High Tech High

http://www.edutopia.org/high-tech-high-collaboration-age-video

Project Based Learning at HTH

http://www.hightechhigh.org/projects/

High Tech High Students Learn Art Of Storytelling With Sound