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Matt’s Monday Media Tips 9/26 A Picture is Worth a 1000 Words You probably already know that your access to Discovery Education STREAMING and Discovery Education SCIENCE provides you access to thousands of images, clip art and sound effects (28,000+ images and clip art and 3,000+sound effects). If you knew that - kudos! If not - what a great Monday Morning surprise! But let’s take it up a notch. How do you think these images and resources could assist you when you start to plan lessons using the Common Core Standards? How about ELA, History, Math or Science lessons? If that question has you scratching your head, leaving your computer screen for another cup of coffee, or throwing your hands up and sending you back to a warm comfy bed - don’t worry - I’ve got a few ideas to share with you! Today we’re going to explore how we can combine Discovery Education images and sound effects and more with a few Web 2.0 tools to work on: Comprehension and Collaboration • Integrate and evaluate information presented in diverse media and formats, including visually, quantitatively, and orally. • Evaluate a speaker’s point of view, reasoning, and use of evidence and rhetoric. Presentation of Knowledge and Ideas Common Core Standards ELA
• Present information, findings, and supporting evidence such that listeners can follow the line of reasoning and the organization, development, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience.
What is a DEN Star Member?
• Make strategic use of digital media and visual displays of data to express information and enhance understanding of presentations. • Adapt speech to a variety of contexts and communicative tasks, demonstrating command of formal English when indicated or appropriate. Craft and Structure •
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Interpret words and phrases as they are used in a text, including determining technical, connotative, and figurative meanings, and analyze how specific word choices shape meaning or tone. Analyze the structure of texts, including how specific sentences, paragraphs, and larger portions of the text (e.g., a section, chapter, scene, or stanza).
Of course we want to foster a sharing community so please feel free to send your tips, tricks and/or stories to matt_monjan@discovery.com so that I can highlight you in the next edition!
Discovery Education Webinar Schedule Dates
Time (EST)
Link
9/27
7pm 8pm
Jumping in the Digital Stream
9/27
7pm 8pm
Blogging Basics: Getting the most of our DE Blog
9/28
7pm 8pm
Discovery Education Science TECHBOOK Best Practices from the Classroom: Journals and Notetaking (Great for Science too)
9/29
7pm 8pm
Effective Evaulation with the Techbook Assessment Manager (Great for Science too)
9/29
7pm 8pm
Back to School with Discovery Education: Maximizing Student Engagement Using Discovery Education
Speaking of sharing - check out this week’s Educator Spotlight!
Educator Spotlight! Check out what DEN Star Molly Hay, principal of Spring Creek Primary School, is doing with her staff! Molly’s started a DEN (Discovery Educator Network) Club at her school. The club will meet monthly to share ideas and best practices with each other. Molly will be providing PD hours and even Discovery door prizes! All meetings are going to be limited to an hour and will be at her Springcreek Computer Lab. And I love Molly’s challenge to her staff, “You don’t have to commit to all meetings - but I bet if you come once, you will not want to miss another one.”
Let’s get started Getting to the core with word clouds You’ve seen them before, lots of words (some bigger than others) on screen, paper, billboard, etc. There’s actually a word cloud about the DEN on page two. Go ahead and scroll up/back and check it out ...I’ll wait here for you. Welcome back :) Word clouds can be used in a variety of ways. For example you can use a Word Cloud to: •
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Work on predicting. Copy and paste text (DE STREAMING articles song lyrics, and/or speech transcripts) into a word cloud generator and then ask your students what they think the subject matter, big idea, or theme could be. Jump quickly to the main idea. The bigger a word appears on your screen the more frequently it was used in the text. This can be a great indicator of the importance of that word or theme. Try searching for “Kennedy” and then “Audio” in your media drop down box. Then click on the “Related Materials” tab. Cut and paste the transcript into a word cloud generator to see which words appear. Use a word cloud to reinforce vocabulary or work on new words. Bolster your students knowledge by entering in key vocabulary terms and then asking students to identify which words are new to them. Then challenge them to create their own word clouds that can help explain the term. Analyze a famous poem or literary work bonus points if you can have your students
represent their own poems in a graphic form - using a word cloud •
Embed your word cloud into PowerPoint and link words to additional slides. On each corresponding slide have students find and embed a sound effect, image, or video that complements a term/word.
Two great word cloud generators include www.wordle.net and www.tagxedo.com. They both work the same but tagxedo actually let’s you create different shapes for your word cloud!
Creating a story with PhotoPeach Move over PhotoStory 3. Take a hike iPhoto. I’ve got an even easier tool to use than you guys. I love PhotoPeach.com. PhotoPeach is web-based which means; 1.
It can be used on any type of computer (Mac, PC, Netbook)
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You can start on on computer and finish on another (i.e. start in a lab and finish at home).
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You can embed into other digital places - blogs, web pages, wikis, etc.
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Others can comment on your work
Where can I access this fabulous tool you ask?
Going outside-the-box with Museum Box Ok if you’re moving from left to right - as most readers in the US do - then you’ll see that I’m kind of scaffolding a bit here. Museum Box (http://museumbox.e2bn.org/)is a unique and very cool way to present your information in a 3D and dynamic way. This site provides the tools for you to build up an argument or description of an event, person or historical period by placing items in a virtual box. What items, for example, would you put in a box to describe your life; the life of a Victorian Servant or Roman soldier; or to show that slavery was wrong and unnecessary?
Go to www.photopeach.com and create a free account. Once you do you’ll be prompted to upload pictures to their site. As mentioned on page one - you have access to thousands of high-quality imagery inside Discovery Education. You are definitely encouraged to use them!
You can upload your Discovery Education images, video, text files, PDFs, sounds and links. Or you can use their library of material.
Once you have uploaded your pictures create a title, select a song, and submit your story. Your story will play. However you can enhance your story with captions and quizzes!
• Enhancing vocabulary lessons - vocab box
To add them click on the orange button and then click on the “Edit Caption &Photos” link. There you will be able to add words under each photo that you select. If you click on Quiz you can even add a multiple choice question to your story. Here’s a link to a story that I created with elementary students in Miami-Dade County Public Schools. We were working on Mood as well as descriptive language. I picked out the images and had the students work in groups to create the sentences and story. They had to use the vocabulary that they were working on that week. They also chose the music - they had a great time with that part!
You can also use a box for all sorts of things like:
• Delivering a book report - book box • Examining a period in history - industrial revolution box