September 2013
Lake Orion Community Schools
LOCS Technology and Media Newsletter Digital Fieldtrips With tight budgets, taking students on physical field trips is not always possible. Digital fieldtrips provide an alternative option that allows students to explore new places virtually. Check out the article “10 Digital Field Trips for the Modern Classroom” for some ideas. Apps for Common Core Skills Lots of iPad apps are out there to support subject specific content. However, much of what is emphasized in common core focuses on the ideas of collaboration and creation. This recent article from the Journal identifies 7 useful Apps to support Common Core Skills.
iOS Fun Story Creator Free app that helps you design story books utilizing photos, videos, text, and audio that can be shared with others. Story Creator TinkerBox This free app focuses on teaching basic physics and engineering concepts. This app has various modes including the Puzzle mode which requires students to utilize problem-solving skills and apply mechanical concepts to solve physics-based puzzles. Students can also invent machines in the Invent mode and are encouraged to email their inventions to the app’s developer to be considered for inclusion on the TinkerBox website.
Active Directory Migration Thanks to the efforts of all the building and district level technology staff, we have successfully migrated from our old Novell Network to the new Microsoft Active Directory Network. This was really a yeoman’s feat to accomplish and would not have been successful without the dedication and hard work of staff. Thank you so much to everyone who helped with this project! Also, a big thank you to all of the staff for their patience and understanding with the process! Changing network operating systems is one of the most impactful changes that can be made in the technology world. This change allows us to function with an updated system that aligns with all of the current operating systems and programs that the district network needs to interact with. Over the next few weeks, we will continue to tweak printer functions and folder access. We will also be sending information regarding the need to clean out data files housed on the network. Please continue to contact your building tech support for assistance by submitting a help desk ticket. Thank you again! Instructional Technology Professional Development Day – January 20, 2014 This year, half of the district professional development day scheduled for January 20, 2014, will be dedicated to in-house instructional technology professional development! LO Techno Dragon Teachers will provide this in-service based on your needs. Please look for a survey in late September/early October that the LO Techno Dragons will send out to gather the instructional technology needs of staff in order to plan for a productive and useful in-service session in January! FREE Professional Development Opportunities Learn It in 5 Learnitin5.com offers how-to videos for teaching or using technology in the classroom. These how-to videos focus on Web 2.0 strategies and are offered in increments of 5 minutes or less. This is a great resource for quick PD! STEMx Teaching Check out these free mini-courses for STEMx educators of middle and high school students provided by the HP Catalyst Academy. Examples of course topics include: cultivating creativity, science inquiry, mathematical curiosity, augmented reality apps, and digital literacy in the science classroom. Check out the full listing of upcoming courses at Catalyst-Academy.org Modern Lessons ModernLessons.com provides online courses geared towards helping educators “become more tech-savvy, engaged, and innovative”. To get started, visit their site Modernlessons.com and create your free account.
Infographics
Web Resources Infographic Creation for Assessing Learning Infographics are a visual representation of information and data that have become quite popular over the last couple of years. Several examples are sprinkled through out this edition of the technology newsletter. Having your students create an infographic could be a great tool for assessing learning. There are three basic components of every infographic to consider. 1. The Visual – color, graphics, icons 2. The Content – timeframes, statistics, and references 3. The Knowledge – facts and deductions Several free tools are available to help you and your students start creating infographics today. a. Easel.ly – This web-based tool utilizes a drag and drop format that interacts with six buttons: vhemes (visual themes and templates), objects, backgrounds, shapes, text, and upload. What’s nice about this site is that it has templates ready to go to help students get started. b. Infogr.am – This free tool allows students to choose from existing themes and enter new information. This tool allows you to directly publish to Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest. It also creates a URL that can be shared or embedded in a website. c. Piktochart – Another infographic creation resource that also uses a drag and drop format. This site allows the user more control over font colors and design. Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy is an update to the original Bloom’s taxonomy. This version takes into account new behaviors that have resulted from the use of new technologies. The focus of Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy is not on tools but rather on how to facilitate learning using technology. Below are two excellent resources to support the use of Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy. a. Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy by Educational Origami – provides quicksheets and pdfs for easy access. b. Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy: An easy way to integrate technology into daily teaching practice by Phillippa Cleaves – This prezi presentation provides links to web tools that are organized based on the various levels in Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy.
Link to the entire infographic 2
Web Resources
Infographics
Cyber Citizen Resources The beginning of the year is a great time to remind students about the importance of cyber safety and understanding how to make wise cyber citizen choices. Below are some great resources to incorporate in your lessons. a. ThinkB4U – ThinkB4U provides a series of web safety videos and tutorials based on cyber behavior at home, at school, and at the mall. Read the “About” section to help you get started. b. Choose What Happens Next – This series of linked videos is set up in a “choose your own adventure” style designed to provide tips on appropriate smart phone use. c. Teaching Copyright – This resource provides teachers with 5 comprehensive lessons on copyright to share with students. The lessons place an emphasis on student use of technology as it relates to copyright laws. Lessons include handouts, videos, and other helpful materials. Blogging with Audio and Video Blogging is an excellent way to have students share their ideas and stories. A great way to enhance writing is to incorporate audio and video components. There are some easy-to-use web-based tools to help students easily create blog posts that incorporate audio and video. a. Wideo.co – This site allows you to create short, animated videos right on the web. Select from a gallery of images and place them on a canvas. Audio can be uploaded to the project to enhance the video. b. Sound Cloud – This is a great site in which you can create your own audio recordings. This tool also has a mobile version for both Android and iOS. c. Narrable – This site provides an audio slideshow application in which you upload images and then can record sound for each image using either your computer microphone or by using your phone and calling a Narrable phone number. You can also upload audio files directly from your computer.
Physics Comic Books Want to get students more excited about learning physics? Check out free online comic books presented on the PhysicsCentral website. Free comics include the Spectra series which is aimed at attracting the interest of middle school students by featuring a middle school superhero that possesses special laser beam powers. Check it out here! Link to the entire infographic
Math Web Resources
Answer this if you are a Mathaholic! Race 2 Achieve: Project-Based Math Curriculum Designed for teaching higher level math content to high school students, and aligned to Common Core curriculum, Race 2 Achieve attempts to make math relevant through project-based learning around the topic of race cars. The curriculum focuses on how the NASCAR Hendrick Motorsports team incorporates concepts from Algebra 2 and Trigonometry in reallife situations. The program is free to the first 1,000 classrooms that signup. To sign-up click here! To learn more, visit the Race to Achieve website.
4x4+4x4+4-4x4=? 73% people failed to answer this! Link to website Golf: A SuperMath Game Golf: A SuperMath Game is a fun, interactive website that combines the game of golf with math concepts. Students have to carefully calculate angles and units of distance to try to beat par on each hole.
Math Across the Curriculum The Math Across the Curriculum website sponsored by The Center for Mathematics and Quantitative Education at Dartmouth College provides an electronic bookshelf of resources for teaching math across many other disciplines including art, history, literature, music, science, engineering, and much more.
KnowledgeWorks Forecast 3.0
A Glimpse into the Future of Learning
In the future...
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“School� will take many forms. Sometimes it will be self-organized.
Work will evolve so rapidly that continuous career readiness will become the norm.
For KnowledgeWorks’ full forecast on the future of learning, see Recombinant Education: Regenerating the Learning Ecosystem knowledgeworks.org/ strategic-foresight
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These changes point the way toward a diverse learning ecosystem in which learning adapts to each child instead of each child trying to adapt to school.
At the same time, geographic and virtual communities will take ownership of learning in new ways, blending it with other kinds of activity.
Those learning playlists might include public schools but could also include a wide variety of digitally-mediated or place-based learning experiences.
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Whatever the path, radical personalization will become the norm, with learning approaches and supports tailored to each learner.
Educators’ jobs will diversify as many new learning agent roles emerge to support learning.
A wide variety of digital networks, platforms, and content resources will help learners and learning agents connect Some of those tools and learn. will use rich data to provide insight into learning and suggest strategies for success.