Literacy: Adolescent Literacy, literacy resources for parents, teachers, and students.  Including classroom strategies list and research articles.

College/Career: Interactive 3D and maps-based college search site at Egiate.com

College/Career: Google offers scholarships for minority and special needs students.

Science: University of Utah has developed an interactive website for learning and teaching genetics with animations and simulations.

Science: The journey of Darwin online.

Social Studies: Interactive website on the Lincoln Memorial.

Social Studies: You can now find and read full text legal opinions from U.S. federal and state district, appellate and supreme courts at Google Scholar.  Link

Teaching: Outline your classroom floorplan with Classroom Architect.  For those who don’t use Easy Grade Pro.

Teaching: Good video created by the Art Institute of Chicago preparing students for a museum visit.  Link (YouTube)

Research: 100 Google Tricks that will save you time in School

Research: Search images and see their interrelatedness to each with Google Swirl.

Learning: WatchKnow — Videos for Kids to Learn from – Scouring the web for the best of YouTube and other video sites

Learning: Word Ahead — Vocabulary Videos.  Another way to learn vocabulary.

Learning: A list of 20 virtual field trips for students.

Technology: Why is the My Computer Running so slow?  This question comes up all the time from computer users.  Here’s a list of popular software to help clean up your computer and get it running smoothly again.

Technology: Google OS – the next big thing from Google.  Good video for beginners to understand operating systems, browsers, and the future of computing.

Technology: The three easiest ways to blog.  Posterous.com, Tumblr.com and now TypePad Micro. And a review of all three.

Creativity: Guide to Tapping into the World of Comics

Reference: World Clock – a clock that tells what’s happening over the passage of time.

Art: Artnatomy: Anatonical basis of facial expression learning tool.

For Fun: Autocompleteme.com shows the bizarre searches of Google users.

Twitter hyperventilation. So much talk about Twitter in the news these days.  Sure, most of it is hype.  It’s been popular for some time and now it’s been caught in the media’s attention and everyone has an opinion.  It’s another online tool / resource and nothing more. It’s great for following updates of specific people and groups, but like any service, not every one is using Twitter and can only follow people who are into promoting their “brand.”  There is something a little egotistical about Twitter in that you have to feel like you have something worth saying that the general public would care to follow.

Articles I’ve seen just this month:

Twitter Handbook for Teachers

How to Demo Twitter

100 Tools for the Twittering Teacher

Six Ways You Should Be Using Twitter

To Tweet or Not to Tweet

Do Only Twits Tweet?

Finding free images online without using Google Images is always a challenge.  A nice post of possible places to go to find photographs to use in different projects.  Link

Morguefile.com is good for photographs.

Also finding free music to use in video creation and projects.  Music Archive might be an alternative.  Link.  The problem with free music and image databases is the quality of the photographs and music requires lots of searching to find anything worth using.  I like to buy those 30 CD clipart and photograph packages when they are in a bargain bin as opposed to trying to find anything worthwhile online.

Software picks:

Top Five Malware Removal Tools. I usually use Spybot Search and Destroy.  If I have to use Hijack This, it usually means I have a serious problem, and a time consuming effort to remove it is probably necessary.

You can read tons of magazines online at Zinio.com.  I like the resource, but I can’t imagine reading magazines online in the same way I can’t read novels online.  The web has always been for short reading spurts.  Nothing more.

Best ways to download videos from YouTube:

Very simple solution.  Use PWNTube. Link

All in One-Video-Bookmarklet.  Link

Ten tried and tested internet tools for teachers. Good blog post of Web 2.0 tools for teachers.  I confess I only have used Diigo and WordPress.  I like the possibilities using Edmodo, a way of communicating with classes, posting notes, calendars.  Looks more promising the Google Groups, and no installation required in Moodle.  Some of the tools look promising, and I plan to investigate more later.

Google Timeline is a nice way of viewing news about a particular topic.  Try using a name of a famous person or sports team and see every story in timeline view.  Link

Also worth checking out:

Here Be Dragons: An Introduction to Critical Thinking.

Firefox Add-ons: Prefer to use discretion when adding Firefox extension due to the loading time of Firefox.  Here’s a list of the top 10 extensions.  Can’t say these would be on my list.

IPhone Information: Dictionary.com now defines and pronounces words on IPhone OS.  This is a nice feature.  There are words I still mispronounce like “queue” and “distribute.”  Link.

Also, I’m real excited about the possibilities of Read It Later adding content to the IPhone OS, allowing you to archive interesting articles and then sync them for reading offline.  Since I have a Touch, I sometimes want to read when I’m not near a wifi connection.  Great solution if it works.  I might also try out Evernote for this as well.  Link

Free! Free! Free: Finding music for students to use in their videos is always a challenge with the strict licensing laws.  Our film teacher has the students write to the recording industry for permission to use popular songs in their movies, and they get rejected or receive no reply.  The new Free Music Archive might offer an alternative for finding music to use.

I’m also planning to try using annotated pages using Diigo.  Check out a sample page here annotated.  Annotated article about Ask the Dust, a great book.  Will also have to try out Glogster.

Two quick tips for the IPhone/IPod Touch I learned on accident: Hold down top button and click home button and it will take a snapshot of what’s on the screen and saves them into your Photo folder.  If you double click the home button, it pulls up the last played song, video or podcast.  Funny how I stumble upon these things (sure wasn’t in the instruction manual, or if it was, I didn’t read it.)

For Viewing:

Film School for Video Podcasters.  Link.

For Discussion:

Should colleges host email for their students?  Read

Google Book Search is offering 1.5 million books accessible on an IPhone or Android device.

I primarily use Google Docs as my primary online word processor.  A new one is on the scene called Shutterborg.  Great for students who want to have their documents wherever they go and avoid having to pay for Office.

StumbleUpon is a popular service for finding out about cool new websites.  Sign up and press the Stumble Upon button and you will find some new websites based on your interests.

Another book is banned.  This time Bless Me Ultima.   If parents were a little more aware (if they read more), I’m sure more books would get axed from the curriculum.

Mystery readers: Interesting idea for SSR. Though I think most teachers prefer no PA announcements.  But it’s a nice idea anyhow.

GoAnimate.com allows you to create simple animations.  You can embed these on your webpages if you can make anything worth sharing with your students.

Real world math lessons using Google Earth.

For fun: Paul Smith is planning to travel across country on the kindness of Twitter users.

Software picks: Texter and Fences.  Texter looks useful for creating simple macros for commonly repeated text strings like signatures or code excerpts. I haven’t used this one yet, but I think it has a clear value.  Fences is another Stardock product that I’m using for organizing icons on the desktop.  Avoids that cluttered desktop I fear so much.

GMail now supports offline access for your email messages. I can now use it as the ultimate filing cabinet.  Now, I don’t even need to be connected to the Internet.  Also, a nice article about 10 good things about offline GMail.

Wikipedia is in the news, and they are considering restricting the ability to edit entries.  It’s very surprising that they have no limitations on editing already well-written sections.  And Britannica is going the opposite, opening up pages for editing.  Competition in this space is good for all of us!

I can’t live without Internet access, but apparently I’m an exception.  Two thirds of Americans without broadband don’t want it.  I would have to question this–probably they don’t want to pay for it.  Sadly, they are probably cable subscribers.  What’s better: television or Internet?

And quickly:

Be careful student bloggers.  Another freedom of speech controversy.

Shocking your brain can help you learn stuff faster.  Read more.

There are clearly consequences to the social nature of the web.  It’s been quiet on the MySpace front, but in case you thought it was all positive.  Read more.

So I hear I can file my taxes online for free?  Is this real?

Some things I plan to check out:

Create your own social issue game using nonprofit tool.

Start-up uses online games to teach math.

Two comprehension resources online.

For $5, get a special Garageband lesson online from real musicians.  Hmm, I’ve always wanted to take the time and learn this one.  I have seen students pick it up rather quickly.  Figured out how to import created tunes into IMovie last week.

Another online survey tool.  Survs.  Only used Google Forms so far.

Software pick: Find last changed files on your computer.

And just for fun:

Napping Expert Guide

What Obama should say in his inaugural address.

I placed a teacher guide on the basics of using the Lincoln website in your box. I have also created four basic 2-min screencasts for: logging in, updating your profile, setting up classes, and adding homework. Since there is no professional development scheduled in January, I wanted to make sure you had as many resources as possible to get started. I have also attached the guide here. Also when you log in as a teacher, there is a 6 page documentation with demonstrations.

Stop by any time and I’m more than willing to help you get started.

I’d like to thank everyone who submitted the feedback concerning professional development in technology.

I will draft out a schedule of workshops for after the holiday. I plan to offer them on Wednesdays, either during your conference period or after school. I fully understand the difficulty attending any additional training, so I will try something new this year to accommodate your schedules. I will be putting the training online (including video screencasts) to review at your convenience.

One of the most challenging things about offering professional development in technology is that many of the best, most engaging technologies today have odd sounding names (blogs, wikis, podcasts, social bookmarking, etc) and are unlikely to attract an audience. I will offer the usual training in “old school” technologies like Word, PowerPoint and Easy Grade Pro. and offer exposure to many of the new possibilities online. I assure you that I only recommend tools or services that are worth your time.

I’d like to invite you to view this week’s offering:
1. Using Moodle, an online course development tool
2. Using online discussion groups through Moodle.

I will be using Moodle for the technology professional development course, so you can get a sense of its usefulness.

To log in:

Go to: Technology for the 21st Century Teacher

Click on your name in the right hand corner of the screen to change your password.

Using Discussion Forums:

Once you enter the course, I have posted two discussion topics under Discussion Forum. Please respond if you feel the urge.

1. Topic #1: Last year during the online CAHSEE challenge, I heard some people were concerned that only Asian students had the top scores. Is this something we should be concerned with this year?

2. Topic #2: How might we move forward with technology at Lincoln?

Using Moodle to create an online course:

I have also posted 8 screencasts on setting up an online course of your own: (how to create a discussion group, embed video, post documents, customize, and more)

I will still offer face-to-face meetings on Wednesday, but I believe the online component will provide a useful complement to these trainings as well as a future place to refer back to.

Have a nice Thanksgiving,

Mike Skramstad, Technology Coordinator
Abraham Lincoln High School

http://www.lincolnhs.org

(323) 441-4600

Student Tutoring Referrals. If you haven’t started to refer your students to tutoring, please start now.  The website address is here or go the Lincoln website and click on Teachers–>Referrals.  Check your mail and email for your login information.  It keeps track of how many times your students have reported to tutoring.

Conferences: Two technology conferences you should be aware of:

K-12 Online Conference 2008. It started Monday and all content is posted online.  You can view videos and podcasts at your leisure on all current technologies in education.  You can participate while it happens or months later.

CUELA Conference. Computer Using Educators.  This will take place at Virgil Middle School and has a conference cost of $45.  I’m sure there is money if you want to go.

Grant Updates. Subscribe to weekly updates on grants for education and teachers.

Websites Worth Checking Out:

Wordle.  Create word clouds regarding any web page or document.  I’d like to see someone find an application for this interesting web tool.

eToolbox.  Great resource of all Web 2.0 tools (blogs, wikis, podcasts, online videos, etc) for teachers and students.  Why reinvent the wheel when teachers are creating awesome resources like this?  One of the greatest videos is The Machine is Us/ing Us.  Check it out.

Timerine.com. Create timelines online with your students.  Another tool I see potential in a history or English class.

Dabbleboard Online. Haven’t played with this one, but looks worth a look. Online white boards for diagraming and doodling and collaboration.

Yale Online Classes.  Yale has a number of college level courses online including syllabi and lectures.  This might be of interest to you and your students.  I definitely will check this out, especially the American novel class and the Fundamentals of Physics.

Cool Downloads:

ZoomIt and CoolTimer.  With LCD projectors in many of your classrooms, we can create timers for tasks and show it on-screen.  Great for class management.

MindMapping software.  We often talk about mind maps in writing assignments.  You can cluster and create a mind map together as a class, print out a copy and then distribute copies to your students.  I have a license for a similar product if this trial is insufficient.

More later.

Blog Entry to Read. Top Ten Tech Tools. What are other educators using in terms of technology.  How many can you say you use?

Computer Labs. All three computer labs and video editing lab are available for use.  Room 208, Room 209, and Room 102 (Math lab).  You can sign up for the Math Lab by sending an email to Miriam Cardoza and the other two labs in Room 209 or by sending me an email (mskramst@lausd.net).  The Online schedule is available here and on the LHS website under Technology–>Lab Schedule.

Student Emails. I placed a list of student emails in your box in case you were wondering what that list meant.  Be sure to read the information on the form, so you know who has turned in an acceptable use form for Internet and having an email.

Check out how Ms. Barbour used Google Documents to edit her students’ essays online.  I’ll tell you how her students were blown away by this!  Sample

Mr. Leys’ had his students create lincolnspaces pages (mySpace by with an academic twist)!

Toners. Toners are here!  If you have a Lexmark E120 printer, bring the old cartridge to Room 209 and we will swap it out for you.  Also, if printing is a priority to you, be sure you plan ahead and order toner for your printer in advance.  Money is not always available to purchase toner at the minute you run out.  So you must submit orders in advance, so when the day comes, you will be ready.  I only order toner for the Lexmark E120 and the lab printers.  I have plenty of extra toners for Lexmark E312L and Kyocera Laser.

Security. Security of laptops and equipment.  We have had few incidents of theft in the last couple years.  The best way to prevent theft is to secure your laptops and projectors with a theft deterrent lock.  It’s not necessarily your students who will steal your equipment, but someone using your room when you are not there.  If you store your items in a closet or back room, be sure to secure the items behind a padlock or locked them up in a cabinet.  Many people have keys to storage areas and closets.

Until next time,

Skramstad