iLearn

>>The education magazine for Mac users<<

iLearn

www.ilearntechnology.com

AUG 2008 NO 1.

Teach

Learn

Create

Leopard What the new OS means for you and your classroom >> Photo Booth and Character Education Learn how this fun tool can enhance your character education program

New in iWork â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;08 Great new additions to Pages, Keynote, and Numbers

iPods in Education start your own Reading Buddies program

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Time Savers for you and your students

<< websites you should be using>> << podcasts to subscribe to>> <<Lesson Plans>>

iLearn Technology An edublog about integrating technology into the classroom http://ilearntechnology.com

iLearn Technology is an edublog written by technology specialist Kelly Tenkely. It is dedicated to providing classroom teachers with practical tips for integrating technology into the classroom daily. All of the resources are free to use and simple to implement.

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contents...

August 2008

3 Confessions from the Editor

23 Ten Great Timesavers

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Timesavers for you and your students

Leopard

What the new OS means to you and your classroom 11 Lesson Plan

25 Podcasts: Learn Something New Podcasts for professional development

Photo Booth and character education * Images from http://sxc.com and http://apple.com

16 iWork â&#x20AC;&#x2122;08

* Written and Edited by Technology Specialist Kelly Tenkely

Great new additions to Pages, Keynote, and Numbers

* http://ilearntechnology.com

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* http://tenkely.org * http://tenkely.org/Teachers

iPods in Education

How to start your own Reading Buddies program

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Websites You Should Know About

Free websites that will enhance any reading program

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CONFESSIONS

FROM THE

EDITOR

“Hi, my name is Kelly and I haven’t always been a Mac user.” Whew, it feels great to get that off my chest! I am ashamed to admit that I haven’t always been a Mac user. I grew up in schools where Macs lined the computer labs but somewhere along the way I made the switch to a PC...I know, what in the world was I thinking?!

After college I got a job as a k-5 computer teacher in a Mac lab. I was a computer user, genius by no stretch of the imagination. But as I was planning lessons for my students using an eMac with OS 9.1, I quickly realized that I could do everything faster and easier on the Mac. Not only that, it was intuitive for the students I was teaching too. Amidst the dawn of the iPod, iWork, iLife iPhone, and Leopard I became a Mac Evangelist. I can’t help myself, Apple truly provides superior products! Macs encourage independent exploration and creative thinking. It is with passion that I began this magazine with the hope that other educators could realize the true potential of Macs in the classroom. I hope that you are inspired to use Apple technology to the fullest.

Kelly Tenkely Follow me as I micro blog on Twitter: http://twitter.com/ktenkely

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Leopard With over 300 new features Mac OS X v. 10.5 is more than an upgrade, it is a life changing event...

Installing the Leopard operating system on your Mac is more than just an upgrade, it is an experience. Everything that you love about Macs has been enhanced exponentially with Leopard.

With new treats at every turn, Leopard is sure to keep you and your students exploring and playing. I know... you never knew teaching an operating system could be so much fun! With over 300 brand new features there just isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t enough real estate to do them all justice. Instead Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll highlight the biggies for your every day use and teaching. You can find a comprehensive list of all 300 features on page 10.

With Leopard you will find a new way for you and your students to view and keep track of your files and folders. The Finder and Desktop have been smartly reworked in 10.5. Never again will you have students needing your help to find a project that they mis-labeled. With Coverflow and quick previews they will be able to easily find those illusive projects themselves. Stacks will change the face of your Desktops forever. No more Desktops cluttered with student projects! Buckle your seat belts and prepare to be amazed. Introducing....Leopard! iLearn

Time Mach in

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Quick Look

Pg 7

Sharing Pg 6

Finder Pg 5

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Spotlight

View Options

Cover Flow

Leopard: Desktop and Finder Never has it been easier for you and your students to manage files and folders than with the new and improved Desktop and Finder.

View Options

Stacks

Cover Flow

Spotlight

Dock

Leopard introduces a fourth view option called Cover Flow.

Located above the Source Pane in any Finder window, views now include Icon View, List View, Column View, and Cover Flow.

Students can now quickly switch between the four views to meet their needs.

Stacks are a part of Leopards new and improved Dock. A Stack is a folder in the Dock that gives quick easy access to the folders contents.

Any folder can be dragged down to the Dock to create a stack. When clicked on, a Stack pops up as a fan or grid depending on how many items are in the folder. This could be the end of Desktop clutter!

If a picture is worth a thousand words think about what being able to preview your files in Finder will say!

Cover Flow is an awesome new way to flick through files and folders actually seeing what is in them with Quick Look. Students can preview documents in the folder without ever opening the application.

Misnamed files can hide no more!

Spotlight searching is easier than ever in Leopard. Now you can use Spotlight right from Finder in addition to its regular location at the top of the screen. With Leopards sharing capabilities, you can even use Spotlight to search for a document on any Mac in your network. What computer teacher wouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t benefit from that?!

Leopards Dock got a new spiffed up look complete with three dimensional design and reflections of icons and windows open nearby. The little black triangle alerting you to open applications has been replaced with a glowing orb.

While this wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t necessarily improve your daily work, it will certainly make you look better doing it!

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Sharing

Leopard steps up the sidebar in Finder and makes sharing files and applications between computers easier than ever.

Leopard allows for instant screen sharing right from Finder. Now you can start interactive screen sharing sessions with other Macs on your network. Any computer connected to the network automatically shows up in the Finder sidebar, this applies to Macs iLearn

and PCâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s. Sharing is as simple as selecting the Mac you want to share with in your sidebar and you are able to see and control the Mac as if you were right there working at it! The new Leopard sharing is ideal for the computer lab setting, or for classroom tech support.

As if instant screen sharing isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t enough, Leopard also brings us the ability to turn any folder on your Mac into a shared folder. Now students can save their work in a shared folder for easy grading access.

Templates can be saved in the shared folders for students to use.

The new sharing options of Leopard are bound to make your classroom computer activities run seamlessly.

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Quick Look was created for education...okay so maybe it wasn’t, but trust me it will feel like it was! Quick Look is like the Preview application only better because it opens up a preview right from Finder.

Quick Look provides a sneak peek at a document without having to run the application.

Amazing! This means that when your students have mislabeled a document they don’t have to wait for the parent application to open to check it out. Quick Look runs seamlessly with Cover Flow.

You will wonder how you have worked on a computer all of these years without this nifty little feature. You can even play a movie clip with Quick Look without actually launching an application! To get a Quick Look, simply hit the space bar while in Finder, up pops your document...and you didn’t even have to wait for an application to run. (You will have to find another time to get your bathroom breaks in.) You can also enable an option in the Finder toolbar for a Quick Look button. Quick Look is also

available in Mail for a quick look at attachments and in Time Machine for that document you accidentally deleted.

Quick Look already works well with Word and Excel documents but isn’t supporting the more robust programs like Adobe just yet. With any luck this update is on its way!

PDF pages or word documents with multiple pages can be viewed with Quick Look, the arrows let you view each page in the document.

Quick Look

Students will never open the wrong document again!

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Time Machine

Move over McFly, now we can all time travel...without breaking out the DeLorean!

Admit it, at some point in time you have wished for time travel to go back to the moment when the document you need right now still existed.

Your wish is granted, enter Time Machine.

Time Machine is the new automatic backup system built right into Leopard. It keeps an up-to-date copy of everything on your Mac(s). This is the solution to the panic ridden student who has iLearn

lost the 6 week project they have been working on, the Friday newsletter that has mysteriously disappeared but needs to go out today...Friday, and the gradebook that got muddled up somewhere along the way. In addition to Time Machines practicality, it looks pretty stinking cool! So how does it work?

After the initial backup of the entire contents of your computer, Time

Machine makes incremental backups copying just the files that have changed since the previous backup.

Since Time Machine backs up all of your system files, applications, accounts, preferences, music, photos, movies and documents it doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t just keep a spare copy of every file, it remembers exactly how your computer looked on a given day! Have a whole lab to backup?

Time Machine can backup to any USB or FireWire hard drive, another Mac running Leopard, a Leopard Server, or Xsan storage devices. You can even have the whole lab back up to a single folder on the drive with each Mac represented by a subfolder inside.

Making the switch from one Mac to another?

Yes, time machine can even make migration a simple task! Time travel anyone?

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300+ new features in Leopard...

To get a more in depth look of all of Leopardâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s features visit the source http://www.apple.com/macosx/ Address Book Now with Google Maps and Yahoo synchronization

iChat Photo Booth effects, recording, clear Fonts transcript, SMS Desktop Printable font book, forwarding, Apple Script Awesome new look, system font multiple logins, Unicode support, stacks, download protection, new backdrop effects, enhanced stack, spring loaded fonts, braille invisibility, tabbed application object dock, .Mac sync for support chat, screen model, read/write Dock items. sharing, animated property lists, script Front Row buddy icons, file system preferences, Dictionary Full screen digital transfer manager, and applications, Wikipedia in media, Apple TV new message views, and folder action Dictionary, Apple style interface, DVD custom buddy list support terms, grammar, playback, streaming order, disable spelling, iTunes content, alerts, applescript Automator pronunciation movie previews alerts, watch for my Simple workflows guides, Japanesename, more with start points, English Dictionary, Graphics and smileys, iChat improved interface, Japanese Language Media Theater, iChat hot UI record and support.

Core animation, key, auto start playback, workflow updated OpenGL, iChat, set default variables and DVD Player new core image IM application looping, new Better full screen filters, multicore actions interface, auto enhanced, EXIF Imaging zoom, float above color space support Improved camera Boot Camp other applications, support, enhanced Run Windows (XP image mode for iCal wireless capture or Vista) on your chapters and New clean look, with bluetooth, Mac, copy files bookmarks, time inline editing, auto network scanning between Mac OSX slider, chapter pick meeting times, support. and Windows, and thumbnails, time availability window, task bar short cut. skip, scratch disc delegation, reserve Instruments recovery, parental rooms and Analysis templates, Dashboard controls equipment, event record and replay, Turn any portion of dropbox, group create instruments, a webpage into a Finder scheduling, offline visual analysis widget with web New sidebar does calendaring, office clip, and movie more, cover flow, hours, default International widget back to my Mac, alarms, and turn off Russian, Polish, and instant screen all alarms Portuguese sharing, icon localization, preview, path bar, international font

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Dashcode Create your own Dashboard widgets

new folder options, folder sharing

support, spotlight language support, keyboard support, new input methods, Russian and Danish spell checker Mail Stationary, RSS, Data Detectors for dates, addresses, phone numbers, forward as attachment, duplicate a smart mailbox, improved search, rich formatting options, simple mail setup, Safari RSS integration, .Mac Sync for notes, ToDos, photo browser, custom stationary, Quick Look, Archive Mailbox Networking New Airport Menu, Self tuning TCP Parental Controls Simple Account setup, time limits and bed times, dynamic web filter, activity logging, remote control and monitor, web filter overrides, wikipedia content filter

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Photo Booth Control effects, video recording, slideshow, export movies, photo booth with burst mode, proof sheets, backdrops Preview New user interface, improved color adjustment, PDF manipulation, smooth zoom and scroll, improved PDF annotations, relevancy ranked PDF search, personalized annotations, additional image manipulation options, instant alpha background removal, more image printing options, auto levels, batch image operations, send images to iPhoto, GPS metadata support.

screen preview, multi select Safari Fastest web browser, enhanced find, movable tabs, tabbed bookmarks, merge all windows, full history search, reopen windows, preview controls for PDF, remove history items, desktop picture, warning before closing tabbed windows, resizable text fields, pull tab into new window

Windows SMB packet signing, Mac OSX security tech brief Spaces Organize activities into separate spaces, birds eye view, add and remove spaces, application binding, bump over to an adjacent space

Preferences, advanced account options, hot corner for sleep display, mouse controls for Expose, mouse controls for Dashboard

Terminal Improved international support, inspector, merge all windows, moveable tabs, save Spotlight window settings, Search shared pull tab into new Macs, advanced window, tabbed searches, dictionary windows, adjusting definitions in window settings, Spotlight, window groups Screen Savers calculations in Arabesque screen Spotlight, Spotlight TextEdit saver, shell screen application Autosave, saver, word of the launching, web OpenDocument and day screen saver, history search, Word 2007 formats, clock overlay on any search by filename, smart links, select screen saver, collage search system files line panel, print for pictures, mosaic header and footer, display for pictures System smart quotes, smart icon mode in open copy and paste Security and save panels, Tagging iLife media browser Time Machine downloaded in Open Panel, live Automatic backup, Printing applications, signed partition resizing in back up everything, Simplified printing, applications, Disk Utility, Help go back in time, quick print preview, application based menu search, guest automatic stop and printer support, firewall, stronger login accounts, resume, do not back authenticated encryption for disk grammar check, up list, browse printing, location images, enhanced scroll non-active other Time Machine aware printing, VPN client windows, empty disks, migration enhanced precision compatibility, trash button, eject assistant support, printing, CUPS v. sharing and all partitions manual backup, 1.3, printer drivers collaboration Quick Look before via software configuration, System restoring, restore sandboxing, Preferences your Mac, preserve Quick Look multiple user New parental access privileges Look inside any certificates, controls, simpler document without enhanced smart Network Universal Access launching card capabilities, Preferences New voice, braille application, full library interface, .Mac Sync display support, randomization, for System Braille panel, iLearn

Braille display input keys, NumPad commander, portable VoiceOver preferences, faster web and page navigation, hot spots, drag and drop support, integrated interactive tutorials, misspelled word detection, positional audio effects, highlight by word or sentence, new VoiceOver utility, improved application accessibility Unix Unix certification, DTrace, Cocoa Bridges, AutoFS, Wide area bonjour, Kerberized NFS, Directory utility, streaming IO, multicore optimized, scripting bridge, Ruby on Rails, 64-Bit application, Mac OSX security tech brief Xcode 3 Code Focus, improved performance editor, instant on debugging, interface builder with animations, message bubbles, objective C 2.0, organizer window, project snapshots, refractoring, research assistant 10

Technology

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Character Education A Lesson in Empathy Empathy is an important cornerstone in character education; developing empathy can help prevent negative social behaviors such as bullying, spitefulness, and alienation. It is a key social emotion and when developed brings an awareness of ones own emotions as well as those of others.

iLearn

Using Apple’s Photo Booth and Pages, students can make a “How are you feeling?” poster of emotions. These posters teach students to recognize what their own emotions look like and help them to recognize them in others. If you have older Macs without the built in iSight, you can use digital cameras in place of Photo Booth. The completed posters can be used for various character education lessons throughout the year and make for a nice year long

bulletin board in the classroom.

The Lesson in Empathy is perfect for kindergarten through eighth grades. As the students get older, more emotions are added to the “How are you feeling?” template. The final product is great for a classroom bulletin board, for use in other character education lessons, and as a family keepsake.

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Lesson Plan: Empathy

Teaching character education with Photo Booth and Pages Materials: • Pages template (k-2, 3-5, 6-8) • Photo Booth or digital camera • Color Printer ISTE Standards Met: • 1. Creativity and Innovation: Students demonstrate creative thinking, construct knowledge, and develop innovative products and processes using technology. Students: • a. apply existing knowledge to generate new ideas, products, or processes.

• b. create original works as a means of personal expression.

• 4. Critical Thinking, Problem Solving, and Decision Making: Students use critical thinking skills to plan and conduct research, manage projects, solve problems, and make informed decisions using appropriate digital tools and resources. Students: • b. plan and manage activities to develop a solution or complete a project.

• d. use multiple processes and diverse perspectives to explore alternative solutions • 6. Technology Operations and Concepts: Students demonstrate a sound understanding of technology concepts, systems, and operations. Students: • a. understand and use technology systems.

• b. select and use applications effectively and productively.

• d. transfer current knowledge to learning of new technologies.

Technology Skills: mouse manipulation, drag and drop, basics of Photo Booth and Pages Overview: Students will learn how to use Photo Booth and Pages while exploring empathy, emotions, and facial expressions.

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Introduction: Give students an overview of the lesson. Talk about different emotions, their meanings and what facial expressions might convey that emotion. Break out the funny faces, and have students demonstrate each emotion as a class.

Instructional Input: Students will open the Pages template and Photo Booth side-byside. Students will take pictures of themselves demonstrating each emotion using Photo Booth. After taking pictures, students will drag pictures from Photo Booth and drop into the appropriate spot on the Pages template.

Differentiation of Instruction: Use the correct template based on the age and developmental level of the students. Depending on the template used, this lesson would be appropriate for students in kindergarten through eighth grades. Students can extend the activity by choosing effects in Photo Booth that further convey each emotion, for example: sepia tone for an emotion like lonely.

Extension Activities: Students empathy posters can be laminated and used for various character education lessons throughout the year. For example, when going through role playing character education examples, students can use their posters and point to the emotions they think the characters would feel. The posters would also be ideal for conflict resolution with younger students as they learn to recognize others emotions and feelings about a situation. The posters can be sent home as a keepsake for parents and would make a particularly special mothers day present.

Assessment: Students will be assessed observationally during the project for understanding and process. Students will also be assessed on their final printed product.

A p p l e Learning Interchange Content ALI features educator created lessons and activities that boast movies, images, and podcasts. Find special collections from content providers. Search collections by topic or by the technology used.

Network Join ALIâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s social network for educators where you can meet with colleagues from around the world and find peers with a variety of content areas.

Collaborate Use ALIâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s web 2.0 tools to engage with others, create your own groups, share content, news, polls, and conversations.

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iWork 08’

New additions to Pages and Keynote and a newcomer to the iWork suite: Numbers!

iWork ’08 Overview

Pages ‘08 Perhaps the most ingenious word processor ever created, Pages makes every document you create look like you paid big money for it. With stationary, newsletters, resumes,

brochures, reports, proposals, business cards, whatever your word processor needs,

Pages ’08 has you covered.

It can be argued that Pages ’08 is much more than just a word processor, it is a graphics program with the ability to create some very impressive results.

Keynote

Creating amazing presentations that will wow your audience has never been so simple.

Perhaps my favorite addition to Pages ’08 is the contextual formatting tool bar. The tool bar is context sensitive so no matter what you ware working on, the tools you need to make your document shine are always within easy reach.

Pages now has automatic list formatting, unlike Microsoft Word, iLearn

capabilities, and customizable templates, creating spreadsheets has never been so much fun.

Spreadsheets have never looked so good. With intelligent tables, flexible workspace, stunning chart

something like a team newsletter).

Send the document around via email, collect suggested changes and decide which to keep and which to lose.

New in Pages ‘08 Pages is intuitive, simple to use, and produces stunning results. There are some new treats to be found in Pages ’08 that sweeten the word processor even more.

Numbers A newcomer to the iWork suite, Numbers introduces spreadsheets Apple style.

The white box that usually surrounds clipart?

Not here thanks to Instant Alphas magic disappearing act. You can delete any portion of a picture that you don’t want.

the list formatting is simple to make adjustments to and stop on your terms.

Instant Alpha is that graphic tool that has been missing from your life.

Easily remove backgrounds from photos or images with this magic new tool. Have you ever wanted to delete that annoying white box around your clipart? Instant Alpha makes it possible in one simple step!

Pages templates have always been incredible, in ’08 there are more templates to love. With more than 80 new templates you are on your way to creating great looking documents.

Change tracking tools make it simple for you to collaborate on a document with your teammates (say on

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Keynote

Numbers

Keynote ’08 has nine new presentation themes to choose from.

Apple designed themes never disappoint and are sure to have you

This newcomer completes the iWork suite with impressive spreadsheet capabilities.

Since every feature of Numbers is brand new, we’ll take a look at those tools that stand out.

impressing viewers in no time.

New text effects and transitions give movie quality to presentations. The new effects will dazzle you!

Like Pages, Keynote features the new Instant Alpha tool, removing unwanted portions of photos and images is as easy as clicking and dragging your problems away.

Keynote has a new feature called smart builds, just drop photos or images into a presentation, and Keynote will take care of the rest creating animations for you.

Now you can move objects along a path that you create or slowly scale an image with A to B animations.

Adding life and movement to your presentations makes them stand out like never before.

Apple introduces voice over recording in Keynote ’08.

Whether you are creating a presentation to run in your absence, or your students are creating a presentation for a class, voice over recording gives presentations an impressive edge.

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Within the same workspace, multiple resizable tables can be placed. Each will act like a fully functioning spreadsheet. Outstanding!

Numbers offers a flexible canvas space so you can move objects wherever you like. Add and layer comments, graphics, and photos to support your data.

You’ve never seen such good looking spreadsheets!

Add impressive 2D and 3D charts, photos, or maps and add text labels anywhere you like.

Numbers features an interactive print view that allows you to scale and arrange documents so they print exactly the way you expect them to.

Share your spreadsheets with others who haven’t yet discovered the superiority of iWork. Import and export Excel documents...you can share with anyone.

Like Pages and Keynote, Numbers has ready to use templates for home, school, and business complete with charts, formulas, and more.

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Reading Buddies “If I can’t learn the way you teach, can you teach the way I learn?”

-Carol Greig What is a Reading Buddy you wonder? Simply put, a Reading Buddy is an iPod Shuffle loaded with teacher created reading lessons. The Buddies go home with struggling readers accompanied by leveled books and simple reading activities. No one can teach our students as well as we can. The reading buddy program allows you to go home with your students, extending their learning day. Reading Buddies can help your struggling readers reach the benchmark and catch up to their peers.

Using Garage Band or Gabcast (http://gabcast.com) teachers can record guided reading lessons, reading the leveled books that are sent home with the Buddies.

Teachers can create custom Buddy packs to meet individual student needs. Packs might include vocabulary picture cards, fluency word flash cards, a leveled book or two, and the iPod shuffle. A recorded lesson could sound something like this, “Take out the green picture card. What picture do you see first? *pause iLearn

for student response* That’s right, a cat! Cat starts with the letter C. Cat, Cat. What is the next picture?” These short vocabulary or phonics activities would be followed by reading one of the leveled books. All of the podcasts can be saved and categorized so they are ready to load depending on individual student needs. Reading Buddies can help students with vocabulary, fluency, alphabetic principal, rhyming, phoneme segmentation, and literature.

The iPod Buddies have been an enormous success in the classroom with an average of 99% of Older students or parent volunteers can help students reaching with the Reading Buddy Program by recording the reading leveled readers as podcasts. benchmark by the 18

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iPods in Education end of the school year. Teachers who have introduced the Reading Buddy program into their classroom have had some surprising results, parents began requesting that their student be a part of the Reading Buddy program.

Teachers in schools where English was a second language for families started getting reports that parents were using the Reading Buddies after children had gone to sleep and were learning English as a result of listening to the Reading Buddies.

School District in Oregon. Her Reading Buddy program won the presidential award for reading and technology, it is easy to see why! You can learn more about Carol’s program at http://web4j1.lane.edu/~greig/ Mrs._Pitetti.html

The Reading Buddies program is a success on many levels. Students love being a part of the unique program.

The struggling reader no longer feels like they are ‘stuck’. The Buddies empower them to make great strides The Reading Buddy program requires in their reading and fluency. A some structure to make it successful. student who may have been reluctant Students are responsible for their to read at home is excited by the Reading Buddy. If the Buddy is lost prospect of using an iPod to learn or stolen the students family is with. Parents who listen to the responsible for replacing it. (See Reading Buddies podcast learn how Reading Buddy Rules for a list of to read with their child by modeling guidelines to get your program what the teacher does. Try out the started.)

Reading Buddies program in your classroom and see if you too get some Carol Greig, the creator of the amazing results.

Reading Buddies program, is a kindergarten teacher in the Eugene

Inside each Reading Buddy pack • iPod Shuffle (an iPod Nano would also be appropriate for the Reading Buddy program. Since the Nano has video capabilities, flash cards and pictures could be added to the podcasts.)

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• 2 or 3 leveled reader books specifically chosen for the individual student needs.

• Fluency word flash cards (again, based on individual student needs.)

• Phonics cards tailored to skills being learned in the classroom.

• A teacher created vocabulary BINGO card.

Reading Buddy Rules Having some guidelines set in place for your Reading Buddy program will ensure the longevity of your program.

• Reading Buddies will ONLY be used by the student they are assigned to.

• Reading Buddies are a special privilege, they need to be taken care of away from food and drink, direct sunlight, and anywhere they could get stepped on.

• Reading Buddies must return to school every (choose a day) to be loaded with new podcasts. If they do not return to school on the specified day, students may lose the privilege of being a part of the Reading Buddy program.

• If a Buddy is lost or stolen, the students family is responsible for replacement.

• Different color stickers for playing the BINGO game (When recording the vocabulary bingo contest be sure to say things like, “place the blue smiley face sticker on the word Cat” This allows you to assess progress when the pack comes back to school.)

• Child sized headphones • A pencil bag (or larger) to keep all Reading Buddy components in. iLearn

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Websites You Should Know About Free online resources that will enhance your reading program.

http://lookybook.com

http://bookadventure.com

Lookybook is a free site where students can go and view picture books in their entirety. These are quality picture books such as â&#x20AC;&#x153;Alphabeastsâ&#x20AC;? by Wallace Edwards.

After a book has been read, students can review the book, rate it, and share it on their own virtual bookshelf. The actual book can also be purchased from the site. New books are added each week to the Lookybook library.

Expand your classroom library exponentially for free with Lookybook. Best of all, when your students go home, they have access to all the same books! Reviewing and rating books after reading teaches students to share their reactions to a book and discuss with others.

Lookybook is also ideal for class reading, hook up your computer to a projector and all of your students can read along with you!

Book Adventure is a FREE reading motivation program for k-8 students.

Students can fill out a questionnaire to create a book list tailored to their reading preferences. Book Adventure pulls the book lists from over 7,000 recommended titles. The book lists give students vital information to help them find the book they are looking for when they hit the library with Author, Title, and ISBN #. After a student has read the book, they can login to their Book Adventure account and take a multiple choice quiz on the book they read. They earn points for their literary success that can be used in the Book Adventure prize library. Teachers who set up their students Book Adventure accounts can track their progress in an online gradebook.

Book Adventure automatically sends all student data to the teacher gradebook showing the students score on the quiz, how many times they took the quiz, and which books have been read. Because the program is online, students can participate at school and at home.

Integrate Lookybook into your Reading Buddies program, instead of sending leveled readers home, students can login to Lookybook for their read along. iLearn

http://reading.ecb.org

Into the Book teaches students learning strategies that help them make meaning during their reading.

The site is fun and interactive complete with introductory videos describing the strategy followed by an interactive activity to help the student practice the strategy. There are eight strategies to work on including prior knowledge, making connections, questioning, visualizing, inferring, summarizing, evaluating, synthesizing, and using the strategies together. Students can print or email their work for assessment. Teachers can find lesson plans for each strategy, a list of suggested books for each strategy, and downloads of songs, posters, bookmarks and more to use in the classroom.

Students will love practicing their reading with this fun, interactive site!

This is a great site to use as a center activity during the literacy block.

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http://starfall.com

http://childtopia.com http://readwritethink.org

Starfall is a complete reading/phonics program for students in grades k-2.

On or offline, Starfall has been designed to be fun, exciting, and build confidence in children learning to read. Starfall zeros in on phonemic awareness, systematic phonics, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension. Online students will find a number of interactive books, games, and videos. Each book focuses on a different skill to be gained and teaches the skill through song. Students can click on words to have them read to them phonetically.

The pictures in each online book are interactive, acting out key portions of the story. The games are coordinated with the skills being learned in the books. The videos teach students important concepts in a way that they can easily understand. Starfall has an amazing download center of free materials that coordinate with all of the online content. Downloads include leveled reading and writing journals, cut up take home books, reading awards, ABC printouts, phonics puzzle activities, and online book printouts. All of the Starfall printouts could be used in conjunction with the Reading Buddies Program. Starfall also has an online store where you can purchase high quality-low cost materials for your classroom including books, board games, stuffed animals, and more.

The Childtopia site was created for students in grades k-2. Students can complete a number of fun online activities that will teach them to write numbers, letters, and listening and reading comprehension skills.

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In the Listening Reading comprehension section, students can choose from 29 engaging stories.

Once a student has chosen a story they have two options, they can practice listening or reading comprehension. In listening comprehension the story is read to students. They are asked comprehension questions to check understanding throughout the story.

In reading comprehension, students read the story independently and answer questions throughout the story. Books can be read in several languages making this site ideal for English as a second language learners as well as students learning a second language.

Childtopia also has a collection of online learning worksheets in language, math, and skills. Students can practice skills they are learning in the classroom online. This is the perfect place for a change of pace from the traditional classroom practice worksheets.

Read Write Think is a website with an incredible collection of online student materials that support literacy learning in the k-12 classroom. The interactive learning tools can be used to supplement any of your literacy lessons and provide a students with an opportunity to use technology while developing those skills. There are 54 online activities that can fit a variety of needs in the classroom.

Activities include acrostic poems, alphabet organizers, bio-cube, character trading cards, circle plot diagram, comic creator, compare and contrast map, construct a word, crossword puzzles, essay map, letter generators, literary elements map, mystery cube, picture match, persuasion map, plot diagram, shape poems, story map, timeline, venn diagrams, word family sorts, and so much more!

Read Write Think also provides teachers with amazing ready to use lesson plans for using with each of the online activities. The lesson plans are separated by activity and grade level. Each activity has several corresponding lessons with a good range of age groups covered.

iLearn

Engaging and Comprehensive Training Learning to use Apple products for teaching and learning just got easier with Apple Media Series. Now K-12 educators and students can access engaging how-to videos and follow step-by-step guides to learn to use Apple products. Practicing a product’s features with the included media helps build skills quickly and enables success when integrating into curriculum and learning projects.

The Perfect Companions for iLife ’08 and iWork ’08 Apple Media Series: iLife ’08 for the Classroom provides just-in-time learning on the suite of tools that comes with every Mac: iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand for podcasting, iDVD, and iWeb. With these digital authoring tools, educators can design learning activities that empower students to create and share media-rich digital projects.

Apple Media Series: iWork ’08 for the Classroom offers comprehensive training for the compelling publishing and presentation tools in iWork ’08: Pages for producing professional looking documents, Numbers for creating spreadsheets, tables, and charts, and Keynote for developing high-quality presentations. Educators and students will be able to use these powerful productivity tools to better share and communicate information, ideas, and projects.

Learning iLife ’08 and iWork ’08 has never been easier, more effective, or more affordable.

Buy now on the Apple online store, or call 800-800-2775 to speak with an Apple Education representative.

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Ten Great Technology Timesavers Time is always a commodity, it seems to be even more so in the classroom setting.

These timesaving tips will have you and your students more efficient in no time!

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Shared classroom computers can be a nightmare of poorly named documents scattered throughout the desktop and document folders. To keep from spending time sorting through hundreds of documents, give each student a number.

Each time they save, they should use this number somewhere in the name. Then when they can’t find a document, all they have to do is type the number in Spotlight and all of their saved work will appear.

Set up bookmarks to frequently visited websites in the classroom. There is no reason for students to spend 10 minutes typing in a web address (I have seen this happen!)

Put frequently visited websites in Safari’s bookmark bar so that students can get to the important part...the learning!

Use tabs in Safari or Firefox when visiting multiple sites. Many times I see students (and teachers) visit a web page, navigate away from the page to find different information, only to return to the original page. Save time by opening up tabs, each tab is a new website, just click on the tabs to shuffle through the various sites.

Perform lightning fast searches. You don’t need to type in “www.google.com” every time you want to search a word or phrase. If you are on a website and you want to search for more information on something you saw on the website, just highlight the text and then hold down the control key while you click on it (same as right clicking). A pop up menu showing Google search will appear. Search on!

Set up your toolbars to fit your work habits. How often have you been frustrated because you have to go through 4 steps to get to a tool you use all the time? In iWork ’08, you can hold down the control key and click on the tool bar at the same time (or right click) and choose customize toolbar. Drag and drop the tools that you use most so that they are within 1 click reach.

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To create a bookmark for the bookmark bar, click on “bookmarks” in the menu bar and then “add a bookmark”. That is it!

To open a tab hold down the command key (the key with an apple on it) and the letter T while in Safari or Firefox.

iLearn

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Apple iPod Learning Lab Sync and charge multiple iPod players at one time!

Learning labs include: • 20 silver 80GB iPod Classic players • A Bretford PowerSync Cart for iPods • A Getting Started Guide for iPod and iTunes.

Or build your own custom Learning lab!

Visit http://apple.com/education/products for more details and pricing quotes

Features: Bretford Power Sync Cart for iPod • Sync up to 20 iPod or iPod nano players at once • Charge up to 40 iPod or iPod nano players at once.

• Two drawers, each with 20 padded compartments.

• Charging status light indicators on each compartment.

• Roll up doors and reprogrammable combination lock for theft protection.

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Are you constantly starting the day or class with the same programs? Have them open automatically upon start up so that they are ready to go when the kids are. To set up automatic open, click and hold down on an application in the dock. A pop up will give you the option to open upon login. This is also a helpful tip to keep your day running smoothly. Have your mail and calendar open automatically so they are ready when you are.

Learn the shortcuts.

In this case, keyboard shortcuts. Teaching your students a few key short cuts will be a life saver. My favorites are Quit (command key + Q), Save (command key + S), Undo (command key + Z), Copy (command key + C ), Paste (command key + V), Print (command key + P), and logout (command key + shift + Q). Be sure to teach undo right away, this will save you from a lot of panicked students who accidentally deleted the whole project!

Encourage students to memorize passwords. This may seem like an obvious one, but I can’t tell you how many times students have come to class asking me to look up their password “one last time” for them.

When creating a password, students should think of a phrase that is easy for them to remember such as: “Hannah Montana Rocks My Socks!” Thus the password becomes hmrms!. Often it is easier to remember a phrase than a word.

Place usernames and passwords to school subscriptions in an easy to find place. If your school subscribes to online services such as United Streaming or World Book Online, post the school username and password information in an easy to locate place.

Students have a hard enough time keeping track of their own passwords without trying to remember which username and password matches up with which site.

When assigning classroom jobs, don’t forget the technology.

Make sure you have a designated student for each technology task. These could include powering up/down. Keeping track of the projector remote (and making sure that it is off at the end of the day).

Cleaning off technology equipment (everyone’s hands have been touching the same mouse all day long, it needs to be disinfected!)

iLearn

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Podcasts: Learn Something New Podcasts are wonderful things, they connect you with others, teach you, are free to subscribe to on iTunes, and can be listened to at your convenience. Below are my favorite podcasts designed for educators exploring new issues of teaching, learning, and technology in education.

Kid Cast Podcasting in the Classroom: Learn more about how podcasting is changing the face of the classroom from author and educator Dan Schmit.

Get practical ideas for using podcasting in your classroom.

Grammar Girl: Learn short, friendly tips to improve writing from host Mignon Fogarty.

Grammar Girl covers grammar rules and word choice guidelines and makes even complex grammar rules simple with memory tricks to help you remember them. This podcast is a good one for you and your students.

Tech Chick Tips: Hosts Anna and Helen give great ideas and links for technology in the classroom. These educators know first hand the challenges and rewards of teaching 21st century students using 21st century skills.

New to iTunes

iTunes U Who says you need an expensive tuition bill to learn something from top universities? iTunes U (university) introduces learning on the go. It delivers 24/7 access to educational content from hundreds of top colleges, universities, and educationally focused organizations. It is available to everyone through iTunes. iTunes U is now also providing podcasts for k-12 education! Take a look and learn something new.

Intelligence is measured by your desire to learn