Apr 03

ManACE TIN: A $5 P.D. Investment on Apr. 18

DS106, How To, Info, LwICT, Professional Development, Social Networking, Tip No Comments »

In today’s economy people are always looking to invest wisely. This same strategy applies equally to K-12 teachers who must get the best possible return on their educational investments. In other words, if you invest some of your time, talent, or treasure, do you substantially gain in your educational pay-out.

As a K-12 teacher, would you be willing to invest $5.00, together with two hours of your time, to gain the following:

  • Opportunity to hear three, 20-30 minute, presentations from educators who share innovative ideas and strategies for engaging students
  • Chance to meet and learn from like-minded K-12 educators who utilize technology to enhance their teaching
  • Classroom-based activities that you or a colleague might be able to adapt for your own students
  • Supper of pizza, salad, and refreshments

If you feel that the $5.00 investment, together with two hours of your time, is a fair trade, then I recommend that you attend the Manitoba Association for Computing Educators (ManACE) Technology Information Night (TIN) on Wednesday, April 18, 2012. This event will be held at Sargent Park School at 1070 Dominion Street from 5:30 pm – 7:30 pm. If you are unable to attend, please pass this information along to other educators who may be interested. Better yet, print this full-size poster from the link at the end, and place it in your staff room to share this amazing learning opportunity with others.

This PD opportunity is open to all as there is no need to be a ManACE member. All that is required is that one register on-line to help organizers plan appropriately. Show up at the doors with your $5.00 and be prepared to be provided with both educational possibilities and pizza.

The following three interesting presentations will be shared:

Building Broader Minds with ‘Bee-Bots’
Presented by: Kathy Routhier, Winnipeg School Division
Many educators have begun to explore the use of robotics with students of all ages. Some robot hardware & software packages can be expensive to implement in classrooms. Others can come with too steep of a learning curve to appeal to younger students. But not Bee-Bots! Find out how Bee-Bots can challenge your student’s problem-solving and inquiry skills.

Teaching in a BYOD Environment
Presented by: Roy Norris, Louis Riel School Division
How would classroom teaching and learning change if your students were told they could “Bring Your Own Device”? What if this wasn’t just an opportunity – it was an expectation? What would you do differently as a teacher to provide meaningful opportunities for your students to leverage the power of the devices they bring to school with them? This presentation, by a Grade 9 teacher involved with Dakota Collegiate’s BYOD program, will address some of the opportunities & challenges encountered as Dakota Collegiate has broken new ground with their BYOD initiative this year.

“DS106″ – The ABC’s of Digital Storytelling
Presented by: Brian Metcalfe, Life-Long-Learner
Are you interested in powerful, creative ideas and activities to enhance your day-to-day teaching? If so, you need to learn more about a free, 15 week digital storytelling MOOC (massive, open online course) known as DS106. Participants, who enroll in this first year university course, are expected to engage in the learning process through creating, commenting and reflecting within their own blog. However, through sharing first-hand experiences and providing highlights of daily creative challenges and assignments in photography, audio and video formats, it is hoped that the audience will see the potential for adapting many of these creative projects to engage their own K-12 students.

Remember to register and attend. I’m sure that after participating in this Technology Information Night, you will leave knowing that your small investment has yielded a practical, and powerful pay-out.

Take care & keep smiling :-)

Resources:

ManACE Memos – “Another ManACE TIN – April 18th in Winnipeg”
http://manacememos.blogspot.ca/2012/03/another-manace-tin-april-18th-in.htm

ManACE TIN Posters (in PDF format):
- Large Colour Poster (11″ x 17″) & Small Colour Poster (8.5″ x 11″)

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Apr 01

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2012-04-01

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Apr 01

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2012-04-01

Social Networking No Comments »
  • Thanks @stimson I will RT “Duckling Leap” video URL without auto shortening to prevent hiccups – http://t.co/eS8YE4vN #
  • Related “Duckling Leap” alternate video from CBS at: http://t.co/pIX6uEIX #
  • RT @dkuropatwa: Education as Platform: The MOOC Experience and what we can do to make it better http://t.co/3VqHrORt via @zite #DS106 #
  • “A Parent’s Guide to 21st-Century Learning” – free from Edutopia – http://t.co/Ht7V8xm5 #
  • Just pledged to Kickstart #Ds106 – a small investment for a BIG BENEFIT in open, creative learning & sharing – http://t.co/zgUgC23o #
  • Congrats to #DS106 community for raising funds needed in less than 24 hours! Perhaps “ABC” mantra should be Always Be Cheering! #

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Mar 30

Teacher Feature #17 – Preparation for Future

DS106, Teacher Feature No Comments »

The following quotation by Dan Pink on “student preparation” resonates with me. What helped to bring this message into focus was my current engagement in the DS106 Digital Storytelling course. It has been said that people learn best when they step outside their comfort zone. For me, the DS106 MOOC (massive, open, online course) was a totally different environment which lacked the learning tools to which I had become familiar.


Teacher Feature #17 – Dan Pink – March, 2012

Let me share with you a fictional, but somewhat realistic, one-sided thought process that possibly might have occurred as I started to embark on this new DS106 learning adventure:

Where is my course overview printout? Where are the texts and reference books written by learned individuals who are promoting a new or different learning strategy? What software will I need to purchase? Where can I find up-to-date technology-related manuals? Where is/are my specific subject area curriculum guide(s) so that I can make certain where activities and/or strategies might best be integrated? Where are my yellow highlighters and sticky notes that I need to help me identify important ideas or concepts?

Let me get this straight. I have just registered for this University course and I don’t have to buy any textbooks or reference books. Neither do you provide access to the latest, step-by-step hand-outs or notes that exactly match the version of software that I will be required to utilize.

Do you honestly think I can learn anything without my familiar tools?

I can’t believe that you think that all I’ll need is a computer hooked up to the Internet, my personal “life-long-learners.com” blog and perhaps a Twitter account.

What more experienced teachers might first note is a lack of traditional structure. However, I witnessed today’s students (albeit many were first year university students) thrive in such an environment. They were given opportunities to learn through communication and sharing of ideas and resources. I observed online, almost as much student-to-student “chatter” as compared with the more traditional instructor-to-student dialogue. Furthermore, students were challenged to find meaningful online tutorials and resources that they needed, when they needed them, and to write reflective blog posts that provided additional tips and strategies for their colleagues. Providing several alternative assignments empowered students to engage in activities that were of interest. Constructive feedback and encouragement motivated these 21st century learners to perform in new and creative ways.

Many of these same DS106 strategies may apply to our K-12 classrooms in the following ways:

  • Encourage students to become involved in their own learning and the design of an assessment rubric.
  • Consider reducing the number of purely factual “fill in the blank” assignments and increase projects that require higher order thinking skills.
  • Look for alternatives to the traditional essay. Perhaps a student might demonstrate his/her understanding with a digital story, a diorama, a model, a podcast, etc.
  • Encourage students to use Creative Commons licensed pictures and music to enhance video projects.
  • Reduce individual assignments and examine how collaborative team projects might work. Investigate and adopt a WebQuest as an innovative and engaging activity to encourage students to work in a team environment. Better yet, ask your students to find and rate WebQuests that might best enhance a particular unit of study,
  • Consider utilizing Darren Kuropatwa’s “scribe post” process to engage senior years’ students in note-taking and sharing.
  • Engage students in projects of their own choosing. Ask older students to submit assignment types that they feel best review the unit of study. Perhaps the class might assign a 1-5 star rating system as to each assignment’s difficulty level. Over the years, educators may collect a number of different assignments that provide students with a variety of different ways to demonstrate their understanding.
  • Encourage students to become better digital citizens. Look to Chris Harbeck’s innovative middle years’ techniques that are shared in his “Embracing Citizenship” blog.
  • Students are “more connected” than we give them credit. Perhaps students will become more engaged if we accept projects based on using technology and sharing resources that they have access to at home.

As educators we can agree that it is impossible to predict what kind of jobs our students will have. However, the following is quite certain. Regardless of their job definition, graduates will have to be able to communicate their ideas, they will have to be able to collaborate and work in a team environment, and they will have to be able to learn on their own.

To better prepare our students for “their future”, we must adapt our teaching styles accordingly. As Bob Dylan sang “The Times They Are a-Changin’” and we, as educators. need to adapt and encourage students to become life-long-learners.

Take care & keep smiling :-)

Larger Image: Brian Metcalfe’s Teacher Feature “photostream”
http://www.flickr.com/photos/life-long-learners

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Mar 25

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2012-03-25

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Mar 20

Food for Thought: “A Story of Appreciation”

DS106, Food for Thought, Reflection No Comments »

I believe in serendipity. Just after I had uploaded my DS106 video describing how I would spend my last “Three Hours to Live”, I received the following poignant email. It was sent by Roger Braden, who currently is working for Foster Parents Plan (Plan) in Pakistan, to my sister Lynda. She in turn, forwarded this important, and timely, story to me.

One young academically excellent person went to apply for a managerial position in a big company.

He passed the first interview; the director did the last interview, made the last decision.

The director discovered from the Curriculum Vitae that the youth’s academic achievements were excellent all the way, from the secondary school until the postgraduate research, never had a year when he did not score.

The director asked, “Did you obtain any scholarships in school?” The youth answered “none”.

The director asked, “Was it your father who paid for your school fees?” The youth answered, “My father passed away when I was one year old, it was my mother who paid for my school fees.”

The director asked, “Where did your mother work?” The youth answered, “My mother worked as clothes cleaner.”

The director requested the youth to show his hands. The youth showed a pair of hands that were smooth and perfect.

The director asked, “Have you ever helped your mother wash the clothes before?” The youth answered, “Never, my mother always wanted me to study and read more books.”  Furthermore, my mother can wash clothes faster than me.

The director said, “I have a request. When you go back today, go and clean your mother’s hands, and then see me tomorrow morning.”

The youth felt that his chance of landing the job were high. When he went back, he happily requested his mother to let him clean her hands. His mother felt strange, happy but with mixed feelings, she showed her hands to the kid.

The youth cleaned his mother’s hands slowly. His tear fell as he did that. It was the first time he noticed that his mother’s hands were so wrinkled, and there were so many bruises in her hands. Some bruises were so painful that his mother shivered when they were cleaned with water.

This was the first time the youth realized that it was this pair of hands that washed the clothes everyday to enable him to pay the school fee. The bruises in the mother’s hands were the price that the mother had to pay for his graduation, academic excellence and his future.

After finishing the cleaning of his mother hands, the youth quietly washed all the remaining clothes for his mother.

That night, mother and son talked for a very long time.

Next morning, the youth went to the director’s office.

The Director noticed the tears in the youth’s eyes, and asked: “Can you tell me what have you done and learned yesterday in your house?”

The youth answered, “I cleaned my mother’s hand, and also finished cleaning all the remaining clothes”.

The Director asked, “Please tell me your feelings.”

The youth said,

Number 1: I know now what appreciation is. Without my mother, there would not be as successful today.

Number 2: By working together and helping my mother, only I now realize how difficult and tough it is to get something done.

Number 3: I have come to appreciate the importance and value of family relationships.

The director said, “This is what I am looking for to be my manager. I want to recruit a person who can appreciate the help of others, a person who knows the sufferings of others to get things done, and a person who would not put money as his only goal in life. You are hired.”

Later on, this young person worked very hard, and received the respect of his subordinates. Every employee worked diligently and as a team. The company’s performance improved tremendously.

Epilogue:

A child, who has been protected and habitually given whatever he wanted, would develop “entitlement mentality” and would always put himself first. He would be ignorant of his parent’s efforts.

When he starts work, he assumes that every person must listen to him, and when he becomes a manager, he would never know the sufferings of his employees and would always blame others.

For this kind of people, who may be good academically, may be successful for a while, but eventually would not feel sense of achievement. He will grumble and be full of hatred and fight for more. If we are this kind of protective parents, are we really showing love or are we destroying the kid instead?

Lessons:

You can let your kid live in a big house, give him a car, eat a good meal, learn piano, watch a big screen TV. But when you are cutting grass, please let them experience it. After a meal, let them wash their plates and bowls together with their brothers and sisters. Tell them to travel by public bus.

It is not because you do not have money for a car or to hire a maid, but it is because you want to love them in a right way. You want them to understand, no matter how rich their parents are, one day their hair will grow gray, same as the mother of that young person.

The most important thing is your kid learns how to appreciate the effort and experience the difficulty and learns the ability to work with others to get things done.

This email’s arrival could not have been better timed as I was reflecting on what my mother and father have done to support me over the years. True, the story has been perhaps written or translated by someone who does not speak English as their first language, but the message is still extremely powerful and thought-provoking.

Undoubtedly, we should all take time to acknowledge all that our parents and close friends have done for us.

Take care & keep smiling :-)

Thanks to Roger Braden & Lynda Metcalfe for sharing and forwarding this “Story of Appreciation”.

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Mar 20

What would you do in your last three hours?

DS106, Food for Thought, Reflection No Comments »

Each morning I am confronted with a task that causes me to look at things in a new way. I can either visit “The Daily Create” entry on DS106 web site or I can check my incoming Twitter feed to see what new challenge is posted. Last week, our 69th Daily Create caused me to do some serious thinking:

If you has 3 more hours to live,
what would you do,
where would you go,
and why?

Certainly I had become used to “The Daily Create” (TDC) tasks which engaged me in creating and sharing visual images (Flickr), audio files (SoundCloud), and now video creations (YouTube). In fact, some of TDC tasks listed below have stretched my imagination and caused me to explore new and different ways to express myself or “tell my own story”:

  • Create an audio of two sounds not normally heard together. (TDC6)
  • Compose a photograph that include a “finished product” and at least one of the “raw materials”. (TDC13)
  • Record a video of yourself telling a joke. (TDC19)
  • Take a picture of confusion. (TDC33)
  • Using your voice as the only instrument, create a recoding of a verse and/or chorus from your favorite song. (TDC44)

True, some of The Daily Creates were so challenging that I was unable to attempt them or complete the task to my satisfaction and upload it by midnight on the day that it was posted. However, it was the above “3 hour bucket list” that caused me to do some real soul-searching as I prepared and uploaded my “Three Hours to Live” video.

 

Teachable Moment
 When I reviewed my DS106 colleagues videos describing what they would do in their last three hours of their lives, it became quite clear that most, like me, expressed a common theme of wanting to spend this important time with family and/or close friends.

It was at this point I realized that most of us wanted to tell our family and fiends how much they meant to us, how grateful we were for their on-going support, and how much we loved them. Undoubtedly, it was very important that each of us make a conscious effort to tell our family and friends NOW just how important they are to us. Let’s not wait until the end of their, or our life, to do so because we may not have that opportunity or be able to express ourselves appropriately.

I remember attending a funeral with my father who suggested it was so much better to praise and thank the individual while s/he was living rather than offer flowery eulogies at the actual service.

So I suggested in my video that this “Three Hours to Live” Daily Create task provided us with a “very important Teachable Moment”. We, who valued our family and close friends, were provided with a timely incentive and opportunity to thank these individuals now rather than later.

 
I urge our readers to take time out of your busy schedules and make a effort to connect and thank those who mean so much to you. You’ll feel much better and so will your deserving recipients.

Take care & keep smiling :-)

Credits:
-   Flickr – Creative Commons image “egg_timer”
by openDemocracy – http://www.flickr.com/photos/ifijay/6871951719/

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Mar 19

Blog Balance and “Bridge of the River Kwai”

DS106, How To, Tip 2 Comments »

Background and Balance
As I write today’s analysis of certain scenes in a favourite movie, I am worrying about “blog balance”. This is a condition that I continue to wrestle with as I progress on my learning journey with the online digital storytelling course DS106. In past, I have posted articles that I felt were of interest to students and teacher in K-12 classrooms. True some activities might have been immediately applicable and some readers might have said “Yes … I can use that resource or strategy with my students next week”. Others may have been shared more for information and the content may not have direct impact and or adaption by teachers. However, as I progress through the 8th week of my 15 week DS106 course and move into the video production segment, I worry that my required blog reflections may have little impact on most K-12 educators unless they are teaching a film study course.

In past, I have warned readers that my required DS106 assignments and reflective blog posts would make my learning more transparent. However, I still worry about “blog balance” since I want to try and ensure that there is some information that might apply to K-12 educators in the vast majority of my posts. I believe that I may have a possible solution. When I am writing a post that focuses heavily on a DS106 assignment which I feel may not have as wide appeal to my K-12 readers, I will try to provide some additional relevance to K-12 educators my inserting a “Teachable Moment” into the blog. This way readers who are not interested in the details of my DS106 reflection can look for my “light bulb” icon and quickly read the related “Teachable Moment” information which may be more meaningful or applicable to them and their students. Undoubtedly in today’s post where I look, through a new lense with a much more critical eye, at one of my favourite movies, I will attempt to provide better blog balance by inserting a later “Teachable Moment” in this lengthy post.

Bridge of the River Kwai
In past I have watched movies for their entertainment value and, I must admit, rather superficially. More recently, I have enjoyed looking at the “Extra Features” often included in DVD movie rentals. For example, while listening/viewing the director’s comments about certain scenes (together with the number of “takes”), seeing the attention to detail on an actor’s uniform to make it appear authentic, or watching how a certain special effect was created, all helped me to better appreciate the amount of work and detail that happened “behind the scenes” in the making of a particular movie.

In my DS106 video pre-production assignment, I have been challenged to pick a favourite movie, identify key scenes, and analyze the movie using some of the elements identified by Roger Ebert.

The movie that I selected was “The Bridge on the River Kwai” which won seven Oscars in 1957. Although fictionalized to some extent, this movie is based on historical reality in which British POWs were forced by their Japanese captors in 1942-43 to build a bridge on the “Death Railway” to link Bangkok, Thailand to Rangoon, Burma.

Undoubtedly the acting between the two adversaries, Colonel Nicholson (Alec Guinness), – the senior officer of the British POWs and Colonel Saito (Sessue Hayakawa) – the POW camp commandant, was superb. Add to this the musical theme of the River Kwai March (sometimes referred to as the Colonel Bogey March) and you have a powerful movie that I remember every time I hear someone whistling this unforgettable tune.

It is obvious that “The Bridge of the River Kwai” fits quite nicely into the War or Adventure genre but the Drama between the two protagonists should not be overlooked.

DS106 has revealed so many new aspects of storytelling to me. I must admit that the following quote from Roger Ebert’s “How to Read a Movie” has caused me to view movies in an entirely new manner:

In simplistic terms: Right is more positive, left more negative. Movement to the right seems more favorable; to the left, less so. The future seems to live on the right, the past on the left. The top is dominant over the bottom. The foreground is stronger than the background. Symmetrical compositions seem at rest. Diagonals in a composition seem to “move” in the direction of the sharpest angle they form, even though of course they may not move at all. Therefore, a composition could lead us into a background that becomes dominant over a foreground. Tilt shots of course put everything on a diagonal, implying the world is out of balance. I have the impression that more tilts are down to the right than to the left, perhaps suggesting the characters are sliding perilously into their futures. Left tilts to me suggest helplessness, sadness, resignation. Few tilts feel positive. Movement is dominant over things that are still. A POV above a character’s eyeline reduces him; below the eyeline, enhances him. Extreme high angle shots make characters into pawns; low angles make them into gods. Brighter areas tend to be dominant over darker areas, but far from always: Within the context, you can seek the “dominant contrast,” which is the area we are drawn toward. Sometimes it will be darker, further back, lower, and so on. It can be as effective to go against intrinsic weightings as to follow them.

I admit that the above quotation, caused me to look at the following YouTube video excerpt of “The Bridge of the River Kwai” through a new lense:

 Bridge on The River Kwai – 1957 – Clip 1

As the whistling British POWs march into camp, they travel from the right to the left side across the picture. This subtly indicates that they are moving towards a much more negative environment demonstrated by the harsh treatment of the soldiers by the Japanese. A box or platform is brought out for Colonel Saito to address the POWs and this repeated action throughout the movie allows the camera angles to point down on the insignificant POWs while looking up on the superior commandant who controls the prisoners’ very existence.

Teachable Moment
 I realize that, at present, not all educators have access, due to school or Divisional filtering, to YouTube videos to enhance their teaching. However, this “Teachable Moment” tip will save time when attempting to efficiently cue YouTube videos for viewing at home and/or school.

For example, the previous “Bridge on The River Kwai” (Clip 1) contains 6 minutes and 34 seconds of video. However, if you wished to focus only on Colonel Saito’s address to the POWs, you might want the YouTube movie to start at the 4 minute and 25 second mark.

This can easily be accomplished by adding the “&t” time (in minutes and seconds) parameter to the YouTube video URL. The above clip can be found on YouTube at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcIehms6u5M If this entry was copied and pasted into one’s browser, the video would begin at the regular default start position of 0 minutes and 0 seconds. However, if “&t=4m25s” (without quotes) is added to the end of the above URL so that the new address is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcIehms6u5M&t=4m25s then the video display will automatically start 4 minutes and 25 seconds into the particular YouTube video.

For those who find this to be too technical, I recommend you view the easy-to-use web interface found at: “Cut to the Chase at YouTube Time“.

To help readers better understand this process, I will demonstrate linking to a specific YouTube video starting time throughout the remainder of this blog post.

I trust that this tip provides some balance for my K-12 educators to offset this rather lengthy DS106 video assignment post.

 

This DS106 assignment introduced me to the term “trope”. As a former Mathematics and Computer Science educator, I must admit that I was unfamiliar with this term and was unaware that movies use a host of tropes or “metaphors” to convey their messages. Using the TV Tropes as a reference, I have identified the following tropes in “The Bridge on the River Kwai” and provide appropriate links to YouTube videos to illustrate their use:

To the reader who has read to the ending of this rather lengthy post, I congratulate you.

Take care & keep smiling :-)

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Mar 18

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2012-03-18

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Mar 16

Tagxedo: A Time-Saving Teacher’s Tool

Application or Web App, Freebie, How To, Info, LwICT, Tip No Comments »

Teachers are always looking for resources that can aid them in the teaching process or engage students in their own leaning. Some may be familiar with a free web-based tool called Wordle which can be used to create generate “word cloud” images from text that the user supplies. Although many educators and students have embraced the use of Wordle, one of its big limitations was that users coluld not easily print their word cloud creations. In early January, I created a “DS106 word cloud“, and like many of my colleagues, I had to use a screen capture process to save my Wordle creation as an image or to print out the design.

However, today I wish to share with readers a new word cloud tool, called Tagxedo, which has a built-in print feature as well as other options that will excite educators. This free web application is unique because it can create complex portraits like the one of Steve Jobs. I encourage readers to click on the thumbnail at right to see the detail and words used to describe this industry game-changer. However, rather than focus on the advanced portrait feature, I will share ways this product might be used, with a minimum of time and effort, by students or teachers.  The Tagxedo web site describes this application as follows:

Tagxedo turns words — famous speeches, news articles, slogans and themes, even your love letters — into a visually stunning word cloud, words individually sized appropriately to highlight the frequencies of occurrence within the body of text.

Tagxedo which is pronounced as [tag-SEE-doh] can, like Wordle, create simple displays in which word sizes are based on the frequency of the words provided in a list or web site address. However, teachers and students will appreciate the added features of this educational tool in that users can display Tagxedo word clouds in different shapes, colors, themes and may save and/or print the result in different sizes.

As a way to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day on March 17th, I chose to have Tagxedo display words in the shape of a four-leaf clover or shamrock. Rather than enter a list of words, I selected Manitoba Education’s “Literacy with ICT Across the Curriculum” web site and entered this URL, “http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/k12/tech/lict/show_me/continuum.html” (without quotes), as input.

Imagine the impact that teachers and students might have using shapes such as following:

  • Treble Clef: outline formed by a variety of different musical terms;
  • Shark: outline shaped by the different predator types;
  • Check Mark: outline formed by all students that have completed  a certain activity or project;
  • Bus:  boundary delimited by the names of all the students in one’s class who travel by bus to school;
  • Bird: display of migratory or endangered birds help  shape this image; and
  • Tree: outline defined by coniferous tree names.

In order for teachers to fully utilize Tagxedo, I recommend that they investigate these web sites:

So what are you waiting for? Go play with Tagxedo and see how it might be used in your classroom.

Take care & keep smiling :-)

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