“Salt and water combine to form salt water, which sinks below pure water. Heating up salt water causes it to split back into salt water and steam. Steam rises and condenses, eventually forming water droplets. Plants drink water and grow, but die if exposed to salt water. And that’s just three of the nineteen materials available for you to draw.” - World of Sand

What I’ve discovered most about my students in this Gifted program, is that they want challenge. Not just any challenge, but a challenge that doesn’t have just one answer, but a myriad of possibilities. They want a challenge that can be done, and re-done over and over, with different results or possibilities. They want to create the challenge, to ask the questions, and to discover solutions. The epitome of inquiry?

Today, one of the students finally got to implement HIS challenge. Details posted on his blog post – “World of Sand Challenge” (A comment on his post would result in a  smile).

Using the REFLECTION app on the SMARTBOARD along with the iPad app World of Sand, he demonstrated how to combine the elements, tools and chemicals to create reactions. Once the students had a chance to practice, he set specific guidelines: Acid, Liquid Fire and Acid to be set as “automatic” – in that order. The problem? Combine the other elements so that these elements/chemicals do not touch bottom of screen.

Here is one student explaining their result. I feel humbled to be part of their learning journey.

Tags: Inquiry, World of Sand

Due Diligence and Social Media, Gaming and 21st Century Learning. Will education Institutions be held accountable?

“What?, you’ve been banned from 8 different servers?” I shrieked at my 11 year old son.  

“It’s part of the game – to build trust, act normal, get more responsibility from the server owner and then, destroy” he explained.

I gasped.

“In many servers, the point is to build and protect. If you are in a server shared by others, you always take the risk of having your things stolen and your creations destroyed…but for some players, hacking into a server and destroying is the main point”.

I gasped. “But it’s not nice…..”
So he explains, “most teachers and adults aren’t even aware of what is going on in the background of the server and chats”. He grins and asks me, “Do you know that most of us can get the brute force server hosting password?”  “Do you know how many servers don’t use ‘world guard or world bucket’ plugins to protect the word, protect the players?”
Minecraft is Boring.  The real fun and thrill comes from the design, the programming and the challenge. What we do in schools is just the “Basics”. Boring.

I gasped. “Where do you learn all this stuff then?”

“Online. Together.  Youtube”  Never school.

I gasped. “What about Ethics? Character? Kindness?”, I wonder. I continue to wonder (now with my TEACHER LENS),  “I’ve never heard of a school based PD about Minecraft servers, or world bucket”. Come to think of it, I’ve never heard of a mandatory in-service, PD session about any social gaming , or media tool or strategy. 

Step Up Districts and Schools. Parents can’t do this alone.   Make Social Media and Blended Learning Strategies as much a priority as traditional literacies. Be accountable and insist that all teachers have a solid understanding of the tools, strategies, and pedagogies so that we can help kids navigate in these online social environments. I want my children and my students to be safe online to understand online risks, and to have a chance to practice good online citizenship under the direction, coaching and support of a knowledgeable teacher. Help our children understand the hard and soft skills associated with these environments – help their parents understand how to coach, monitor, guide.

When it comes to the use of social media, gaming, multimedia and multi-modal learning strategies, I wonder, how many educators are encouraged to teach with it, without fully understanding the tool itself, or grasping the research behind its use, or acknowledging the implications of its use (including safety). How many educators are encouraged to teach with it without being provided the tools (computer, systems)  and aren’t given in-school time to practice and learn?

It isn’t about updating our skills (like other literacies) it is about learning the skill.

The problem is that with other literacies (like reading and writing) we already knew them before entering the profession – we don’t have to learn them. We have a solid grasp about grammar rules, reading strategies, sentence structure, writing process. But with new literacies, especially the use of online tools, we are having to spend more time and resources to learn them. I’m not sure if our resources  (people, infrastructure, knowledge) fully support this reality.

With this, I ask – where does the responsibility lay on education organizations to guide kids in an environment (even facebook, youtube, twitter, gaming)where they are spending so much time? Why are we OK with them teaching each other?

Ask yourself, in your school, or organization – Do teachers , leaders and parents know how to properly moderate a student blog?  How about protect gaming server? or properly cite resources?  or manage content privately while also being transparent and open? or create effective comments on a blog?  or understand ‘public audience’? or how to have a conversation in an online chat?

In going back to my own children’s online behaviour, the story I started with – I as a parent can’t do it alone. I need support from the school system to guide and support my child’s learning in these online environments.

Tags: Blended Learning, blogging, digital citizenship, minecraft, professional development

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how Knowledge is changing in the digital age.  With all the amazing resources, tools, connections, community information, mediums, people -it really all comes down to access, information and data. The World Wide Web has allowed us to access people, places and community – and how we are handling the abundant sources of information and data – which is changing how we are thinking and learning. I wonder how this is changing how we are learning literacy itself? Information is constantly being reconstructed and reshaped – in real time through combinations of mediums and perspectives and links and ideas. Our knowledge is being accessed, shared, given by anyone – adults to children and children to adults.

I was given a book to read by my thesis supervisor a couple of months ago and to be honest, I left it sitting on my desk because I wasn’t sure how relevant the information would be with a publishing date of 2003. But, I couldn’t resist to read a few chapters and ultimately got pulled all the way in.

Lankshear, C., & Knobel, M. (2003). New literacies: changing knowledge and classroom learning. Buckingham [England: Open University Press.

While these authors discuss a variety of perspectives, (historically and culturally) about the development of literacy in education, what resonated most for me is their discussion that “schools (today) operate on the belief that knowing, thinking, believing are located within the individual, and that knowledge is seen in the final analysis as a private possession and is examined, and accredited accordingly”. Here they ask, “Have schools operated to regulate scarcity of credentialed achievement – including allocations of literacy, ‘success’?”. It was this idea that began their critical reflection and journey of what literacy really is today. Does the demonstration of individual knowledge, on the spot, tell our true level of literacy for each individual? Is literacy for an individual carrying out on something that already exists? Today, knowledge and information are accessed, shared, discussed, reshaped, redesigned, edited, re-edited, co-edited and so on, in public spaces -in collaborative spaces – spaces where questions and inquiry are encouraged. Yet, even so, these authors remind us that “knowledge is seen in the final analysis as private”, based on a mindset that was developed long ago.

Eight years ago, even before Facebook and Twitter, these authors were questioning how we define knowledge and literacy in the digital age and how we are constructing and organizing our schools as a result.

I am left uneasy with the thought that still, even with all the research, books, articles, blogs, and discussions that tell us our society is now depending on a problem-solver generation that can work collaboratively and seek out ideas globally -is evaluated on individual performance and often without access to tools such as networks and people. Unless it is individually demonstrated, is it cheating? It really is in the mindset. When will the mindset change I wonder.
Thoughts?

Tags: 21st Century Literacies, book, knobel and lankshear, Knowledge, mulitliteracies

Learning Spaces
A couple of years ago, I landed an incredible job at a brand new school. The school was equipped with a Smartboard in every room, a Front Row amplification system in every learning space, wireless Internet throughout the school and mini computer pods attached to groups of rooms. I could hardly wait to start teaching that year. At first glance, it seemed like a perfect teaching and learning space for the 21st Century.
Today, I would argue the opposite.
It first started with a conversation I had with my students, who, in a podcast, describe their “ideal” secondary school. They didn’t mention technology as being essential (although for them, that is a given). They mentioned collaborative spaces, comfortable learning areas, choice and freedom. From that point, I not only began to look at my own learning spaces differently but I also began to explore this topic on a variety of levels.
In January 2011, Rodd Lucier and I presented, “Learning Spaces of Tomorrow” where educators and leaders from across North America joined together in groups to literally design learning spaces using Livescribe Pens (in person) and Scribblar (online). The major themes presented by all groups was that learning spaces should be collaborative in nature, flexible in design, differentiated, comfortable and engaging (almost verbatim what my 12 year old students described). Again, technology infrastructure was a given.
In my post, “Ultimate Learning Spaces” I describe the look and feel of the new Hamilton Public Library, which, interestingly, was designed using the major themes mentioned above – flexible, comfortable, collaborative and differentiated. Continue Reading »

Tags: Differentiated Learning, learning spaces, space and design

Last week, I started talking to my pre-service students about Digital Storytelling in the classroom. I was a little surprised that many of them had not heard these terms before. Teachers College is half over.
For me, digital storytelling, any storytelling actually is a KEY component in my instruction. It is the ‘Story’ that gives students the context, the imagination and the excitement. In my class, we made up stories everyday (my favourite was the time that I was to be sucked into the smartboard and visit my world-wide colleagues). Anyway, there is nothing new about telling stories in the classroom. In fact, storytelling is perhaps the earliest form of communication, before there were words, or tools to write with. Stories were always told.
But in today’s world, digital storytelling is what kids know. They play video games, watch TV (although not nearly as much as I did as a kid), create blogs, write in facebook, interact in real time adventures, collaborate in documents, share videos, pictures, music. They LOVE to create and the diversity of tools are endless. I know this because I watch my own two kids interact on World of Warcraft, and Spore and I see them create their own games using Scratch or edit pictures and mashup video using our Ipad or Itouch. I should mention, they’ve never accessed any of these tools at their school.

As new (or experienced) teachers, I encourage you to investigate and learn how to use these tools yourself. If YOU are the Movie Maker in the family, PASS THAT TORCH…teach someone else. It is such a wonderful feeling to create a digital story – It always feels like magic to me.

In digging around, I found my FIRST digital story. I was asked to REFLECT during a grad course I was taking and the professor said we can submit our reflection in “any medium”. Who knew that only a few years later I’d find my reflections here – on this blog. This video has  never been published until now (self published anyway). This was the “Zoe” before @zbpipe existed, before “Pipedreams” existed, before I knew any of you, before I had a Global learning environment, before my Mac, before my iPad, before Googledocs…when I still owned a PalmTreo. For you reading – it will be nothing special. For me, it is magic. I want my students to feel magic too.

2008

Do you have a resource to share? How to you use Digital Stories in the classroom? Share your thoughts.
Summary of Responses

GOOD LUCK WITH YOUR OWN DIGITAL STORIES. HERE ARE SOME RESOURCES AND GUIDES THAT MIGHT HELP!

DIGITAL STORYTELLING WORKSHOP: How much better can it get – all these FREE resources and tutorials? Amazing.
My students will create a Digital Story this week. For most of them, there will be NO context because I simply want them to experiment with the tools and create a mashup..of something.
Part One:
These are the Digital Storytelling tools (PROGRAMS) that will be used during the Digital storytelling workshop:

1) Windows Movie Maker(sorry Mac users but it is important to be familiar with Windows programs that are used in the classroom)
Printable Classroom Guide

2) http://streaming.discoveryeducation.com/
(All Brock Education students have a license for Discovery Streaming)

3) MS PAINT to Edit Images
(A quick simple program that exists in ALL Windows computer)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uk2sPl_Z7ZU

4)Screen shot -Take a screen shot by pressing the PrntScrn
(This might seem OBVIOUS, but I just learned this recently myself thanks to my PLN when I was in an IBM emergency!)
NOTE: The computer places a copy of what is currently displayed on your computer screen on its internal clipboard and will keep it there until it is replaced by another screen shot or until you turn off the computer.

5) Audacity:
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/

Audacity in Education: http://wiki.audacityteam.org/wiki/Audacity_in_Education
http://audacityined.wikispaces.com/

Part Two:

WEB 2.0 DIGITAL STORY TELLING TOOLS
(I’ve picked only a few of my favourites)

Digital Storytelling resources:
http://www.jakesonline.org/photostory.htm

Online Photo Editing:

http://www.phixr.com/

http://www.splashup.com/

http://pixenate.com/

SCREEN CAPTURE:

http://www.techsmith.com/jing/

VIDEO EDITING:

http://jaycut.com/

FIND SOUNDS:
http://www.freesound.org/

http://dig.ccmixter.org/music_for_film_and_video

VIDEO EDITING

http://jaycut.com/

http://www.youtube.com/editor

Resources:

http://www.edutopia.org/use-digital-storytelling-classroom

Examples of Digital stories

Tags: digital Storytelling

This video is a collaborative effort from people across Ontario, Canada, and the world to demonstrate and reflect how they have incorporated 21st Century Fluencies and NETS (s) with their students and colleagues. These interviews and discussions were done over the past two weeks using Skype and incorporate a large demographic of perspectives in education (students, teachers, principals, consultants and faculty members). Thanks to @Royan_Lee and his class from providing the background music (via Skype)!

Consider widening the perspectives in this video by answer the same questions (audio, video or text form)

1) What is your name, your role and where are you from?

2) What was your favourite learning activity (yourself or with your students)?

3) What advice do you have for other educators learning (and using) about the NETS (ISTE standards)?

4) What are you looking forward to for next year?

Dear Mom,

I was asked to reflect upon what made me so passionate about educating students within a global perspective. From the time that I can remember, you have always taught me to pay close attention to what is happening in our world.  You provided me with a foundation of which I use today as a focus of how I live. You gave me the inspiration and passion to continue your path as an educator.

I know that education has changed since your first years. However, your vision to make change in our world and to advocate for social justice has not changed. You taught students to be fair. You helped impoverished families. You tirelessly helped immigrant families find their place our community. You taught children to make connections to the world beyond themselves. You helped them see that  they need to be active and engaged participants.

35 years ago you recognized that students need an inquiry approach to learning. Today – we are are saying the same thing, and we say its because they have access to instant information – but its not. It’s because students need to be active participants in their learning.

It is now my turn to continue what you started. To connect myself and my students to the world beyond their own. Many years ago, you said that people are more educated now about injustices- and that it is thanks to groups that were the first ones to bite the bullet, the first ones to talk about things like racism .

YOU SAID.. It may not be popular, but it’s necessary. I hear this same statement everyday about students learning across our world. It is necessary that we provide them with adequate, fair, and universally designed learning space. Not always popular, but necessary.

It was about 10 years ago when I made my first personal connection, as an adult, to the world outside my own.

Sometime in the spring of 1999,  Kosovo hit the international headlines when forces under the Yugoslav President Milosevic tried to suppress the Albanian majority’s independence campaign. This news item struck my interest because you taught me to pay attention to what was happening in our world, to always ask questions and to listen to stories. So I did. I wanted to know more. With my new computer and first ever Internet connection, I  began following blog posts from Kosovo Albanians who were being forced to flee their homes – thousands killed. Night after night I read posts from people all over the world expressing their disgust and concern over the Milosevic rule.

That was my first taste of the Web 2.0

– My first time publishing my own thoughts for the world to see. This was my first Social Network outside my personal space. I felt incredibly empowered and excited that this could be possible. I had passion ,

I had an opportunity and I had a platform to do what was necessary and give my students the same opportunity to learn that the world needs them.

You taught me to be authentic and current. It is my goal to give my students the gift of a Global Learning Community and as a result, I have found one myself.  And, You were right when you said, “don’t do it alone”. 10 years ago, I began to share my voice to strangers, and  I felt connected. Today, I share my voice with colleagues, friends and supporters from all over the world and I never feel alone.

You helped me see how one person’s passion and dedication can lead to progress and change and you told me to network and be active. I can’t compare my experience with your involvement in anti-war protests in the mid 1970’s or your leadership in the civil rights movement, or your membership in Affirmative action coalitions. But, I can tell you that I am become networked. I have met so many people – across Ontario and Canada- and the world – that share their knowledge, their passion.

Jenny from Australia inspired me to use tools like ipods in the classroom so my students can blog and read news and events from their homelands – in their languages. Doug from Ontario sends weekly props as encouragement. Andy from Bellville –always the first to offer help with any tech question, Jen from Alberta and Kathy from Saskatchewan share their classrooms with me in literacy and numeracy and remind me everyday with their blogs and tweets that learning and teaching is fun and engaging and connected.

You might think that my world as an educator is much different from yours. In many ways, it is. Today,  technology has provided opportunities, and tools, and choices – but most of all – access. With these, tools I can translate,  podcast, listen write, share and collaborate – all for free.

It is my vision – my dream,  I suppose to provide equal opportunity for my students, like you did. While the tools that I currently use in my classroom will change, I promise that I will continue to learn new ways of reaching peoples potential -.

Through innovation, creativity and new technologies, our world is catching up to a movement you started years ago.

Mom, enjoy your retirement.

Have comfort in knowing that the community of activists for students around the world continues growing bigger everyday.

With Love, Zoe

What was your first taste of 2.0? Do share…

This week, students will be exploring a variety of story telling animation and art tools as part of our Olympics and Social Studies Connections Unit. I did a similar unit with a group of primary students last year, resulting in the following video:

For this project, students will have a choice to create a biography of a Canadian Athlete, a Time-Line of a winter sport, or a spotlight about the Vancouver 2010 Host Nations. Students have already had opportunities to conduct research and create an assortment of graphic and text based accounts of sport highlights, athlete highlights and highlights of the Host Nations.

In using Windows Media Maker, we ran into a variety of problems. First, students found it difficult to change the transition times after the picture import. Often, students found that the program crashed during import due to the size of the pictures. They had to use photoshop first to do a batch import and edit the file size. This two step process is unnecessarily and difficult for some students. The use of the chroma key for blue/green screen functionality was not clear for students and required additional downloads or add on’s. Ultimately, the final version of the show was downloaded into my MacBookPro and I used Imovie to create a final product.

For this group of learners, I will use Frames:

• Ontario has recently purchased the license for Frames – More Info
• Frames allows easy import of pictures as well as camara hook up
• Frames has thousands of pictures ready to use
• Frames allows easy voice integration

As well, I will re-introduce students to an already familiar site called Creative Commons, where they can access pictures, sounds and movie clips and import them directly to Frames.

• By using creative commons pictures, my students will become familiar of copyright rules and regulations as well as using creative commons attributes for their own work.
• Students can create Google Searches directly in Creative Commons and will begin to understand the variety of licensing levels and choices that an author can make when publishing work.

How will student upload and store pictures?

For this activity, I will introduce them to Dropbox.  As a student in our district, they receive an email account using First Class. With drop box, I will share a file easily using their email. See example here:

Last week, I participated in a online session with Will Richardson (@willrich45) and other Ontario teachers. A major theme to our discussion was the concept of risk. To be at the forefront of change and innovation, we need to be comfortable with taking risk. We are entering new territory by having our students use online tools, including social networking. We are ‘exploring strange new worlds, boldly going where no one has gone before…” (I couldn’t resist). It is risky to try something new because we are not conforming to the norm. I have met many teachers in schools across our globe that say they are embracing a new way of teaching and learning, but feel alone in their school community or district. Perhaps that is why we have adapted so well to the concept of an online professional network. A place where a bunch of ‘individuals’ making change, taking risks and being innovative are working together, in a professional learning community.

Here are few recent tools that I have been exploring with my Grade Six Class:

1. Evernote: Evernote can be summed up in two words: ‘Remember Everything’. In fact that is how the company is advertising the product. That is what got me addicted to this application
There has been a hype about Evernote this year. In fact, I have now sat through 5 presentations at a variety of conferences where Evernote was highlighted. Like all applications presented to me, however, I try to find a way to make this useful for a classroom teacher. A way to make documentation, assessment, feedback and information more accessible

• With the Iphone or IPod-touch, I can use evernote to take pictures of student work, make audio comments or make anacdotal notes. With 31 students in my homeroom class, this feature allows me to make quick notes, on the spot. I can then share the notebook with the student as way to provide feedback.

• Student Use – Our students have just begun using this application. With your account, Evernote can be accessed on any computer. I strongly believe that we need to be teaching students online literacy. Students need a way to organize and keep track of information and research and teachers need a way to provide internet sites and reading resources.  Further, with the ‘isight’ function, I allow students to use a webcam feature to take video notes, and video journal of themselves and progress.

2. Diigo: Another great online application for bookmarking and sharing resources. But how do I incorporate this feature in a Comprensive Literacy program?

• Diigo allows my students to highlight and comment on their reading passages. This skill is considered a Best Practice for any literacy program. Teaching students to highlight important information, use of stick notes to ask questions. The beauty of Diigo, is that they can read and collaborate. Students can see what other students are writing – can learn from each other. Creating a “classroom” in Diigo is how we share our resources.

3. E-Learning for kids: Elementary/Middle School.

• What a great site for students to practice skills in all areas of a program. In fact, I have used some of this content to incorporate in my online learning management program (learning.com). Students requiring individual programs, or extra practice have benefited from this site.
• A quick and easy lesson to allow students to work on smartboard during a literacy program. In my class, my students normally have “projects” to work on. But every now and then, they enjoy the video and audio resources and interactive of this site.
• This week some students will be practicing the skills learned in our Solar System Unit by using this activity: http://e-learningforkids.org/Courses/EN/Planets/index.html

4. DropBox

One of the major changes of how I use computers is that I no longer depend on one single computer to access my information. I use Google Docs for most of my word processing. Recently, (thanks to @aforgrave) I have begun to use DropBox to store my files and easily access them on any computer. I find it unbelievable that this application is free. I can create and save ANY file type. This is especially good for use of Smartboard program (notebook).

Use with students: I have begun to use this feature with students to share pictures. Flicker and Picasa also allows mass sharing of pictures, but with evernote I can drop entire folders easily and quickly and share the folder.

3.  PBS kids, Interactive Whiteboard Games:

Every now and then, I am asked to cover a primary classroom and I don’t always have a prepared lesson. I have found this site very useful to engage students and work on essential literacy skills using the Smartboard.

4. Destination Reading:

Most products that I use are Free. Although this product DOES have a license fee,  it  is worth mentioning. This is an interactive Reading Program that explicitly teaches a variety of reading strategies from early primary to late intermediate. I specifically use the program and skills addressed to differentiate for my students reading levels and abilities. The license was less than $50 for the year and was well worth it. The activities are engaging and interactive and can easily adapted to use as whole group, small group or individual instruction. I highly suggest you explore this product.

5. Wikispaces:

This is not a new feature, but for my students, it has become a new way to share, upload and present information. I strongly recommend teachers to encorporate this free, webbased application into their classroom.

• Use to post exemplars, rubrics, examples of work, links.
• Students create the content
• It is always a work in progress
• Project based.
• Students edit each others work

Examples of a Wikispaces that my studetns have recently worked on for a culminating project found here:

* You will notice that there are all sorts of levels of work here. A great reflection for students. This application always students to see where they want to go with a project. Helps those students that need that extra “push”.

Classroom Olympics Wikipaces

Classroom Science Wikipaces

Ancient Civilizations Wikispaces – 100% Student Created

Student Created Wiksipace

6. Learning.com

Learning.com is a Digital Learning Environment that allows me to completely individualize a student program based on needs. I can access hundreds of pre-made interactive lessons that are based on STEM solutions or I can create my own (similar to Moodle). I use the program to differentiate my reading lessons and math lessons as well as use it for my ESL students.

An incredible resource that builds student confidence and allows me to teach explicit skills when necessary. This is DEFINATELY worth taking a look at.

Tags: destination reading, diigo, evernote, learning.com, PBSkids