January 23

Article: Striking a Balance: Digital Tools and Distraction in School

With the passage of our district’s bond package, we’re looking at one-to-one initiatives beginning.  Let’s consider how we can teach appropriate use (since we’ve yet to begin that process).  Teaching methods may need to change and I think everyone needs to begin thinking about how your classroom would function if every student had a device.

Striking a Balance: Digital Tools and Distraction in School | Edutopia.

 

Here’s a companion article: With_Tech_Tools_How_Should_Teachers_Tackle_Multitasking_In_Class

September 3

How to have a great school year

Here’s a real short article on “The secret to making it a great school year”. The gist of it is, take time at the end of each day to reflect on what went WELL that day. Apparently our minds will focus more on what went wrong, rather than what goes well. Think of 3 things that went well and what YOUR role was in making it happen. Over time this should develop some emotional fortitude and energy.
Or at least that’s what the article is proposing.
http://www.edutopia.org/blog/great-school-year-secrets-elena-aguilar

February 3

Sting 24 FWISD Technology Conference

The FWISD Technology Conference went well and I made it through my sessions ok; here’s the presentation I gave. (It may be slow to load)

  

I have a wiki with the information from the session and other resources.  I hope to continue working with this topic and continue refining that wiki page.
If you missed the conference, here’s the page that has all the presenter materials from the conference for you to look at.

September 27

Sting 22 – Back in the Groove

We are well underway with the new school year.  It’s been a busy start, which is a good thing!  Lots of books are getting checked out and classes are coming in to do research.  My two favorite things 🙂

You may notice some students with a Playaway.  These are relatively new, but are suddenly much more popular with the freshman this year.  A Playaway is an audiobook that comes pre-packaged in an mp3-like device.  You just plug in your headphone and press play.  Much easier than dealing with mulitple cds.  We have about 55 of these, primarily young adult fiction titles.  We also have several Spanish language learning Playaways for those of you that would like to learn some Spanish.

eBooks are becoming more prevalant and our library has begun a collection of titles; in particular, we have several of the core novels.  Currently, we’re using Follett as our only vendor.  Visit the library page, go to the catalog and search “ebooks”.  You can read the ebooks online or check them out to read on the Follett software.  (Don’t check them out unless you really need to; you have to check them in yourself or it’s out for the full checkout period) A new platform for our ebooks will be coming next semester, so we’re not pushing them as much as we could to avoid confusion.  See me for more information and assistance.

We’ve begun the implementation of Google Apps here on campus. Many students, through CTE classes, have already received some training and have accessed their gmail accounts.  Consider integrating Google Docs and allowing student to email you assignments or “share” them to assist in the paper and toner shortage.  If you would like to see your classes set up with Google Apps, see Mrs. Thomas, Mrs. Hulcher, or myself.  We’d like to get all students set up with this.

TenMarks a free online Math program with video tutorials. Covers Algebra I, II and Geometry.

SPENT an online financial activity for students. explanation here

TopicMarks summarizes text documents

Virtual Field Trips: http://www.simplek12.com/virtualfieldtrips 

Checking for Plagiarism:
Make Use Of has an article with some info on these
Doc Cop http://www.doccop.com
Dupli Checker http://www.duplichecker.com/
Plagiarism Checker http://www.plagiarismchecker.com/
Article Checker http://www.articlechecker.com/
Plagiarism Detect http://www.plagiarismdetect.com/
Turnitin https://turnitin.com

January 18

Sting 21: trying new resources- easier than that exercising resoution!

A New Year, New Resources!

from Free Technology for Teachers:
11 Social Studies resources to try in 2011
11 Language Arts resources to try in 2011
11 Science resources to try in 2011

11 Mathematics resources to try in 2011
11 Health & Phys Ed resources to try in 2011
Architect Studio 3D

Webcams.travel webcams from around the world- make foreign locations real to students by letting them see real-time video.

Top 25 financial infographics from Mint.com

America asks what’s next in 2011– “a six minute video that looks back over the history of the United States, the current challenges facing the US, and then has some experts make predictions about the future of the United States.” (pause it, let it buffer, then play it)

ShopWell – personalized nutritional shopping information based on you.

Mapping America! census data in an interactive map

History for Music Lovers– a youtube group, song parody/remix on historical topics

Using Super Bowl Ads in the Classroom

SnagLearning educational videos and films

FreeOCR– web-based scan-to-text converter (convert your pdfs to editable text) that’s a bit rough, but perhaps useable.

Green Home Guide from the U.S. Green Building Council

MixBook– create photo books, cards, calendars online. Mixbooks also allows group collaboration; students could create a photo book together on a particular topic.  Great alternative product.

Council on Foreign Relations- interactive guides to contemporary issues

50+ sites with free stock photography

Book Trailers for All  Book trailers are a great way to get students interested in a book.  They’re also a great option for student products and could be applied to a variety of content areas and topics.

December 1

Sting 20 “Let’s Get Digital, Dig- it- al”

Digital Magazines

Many magazines are creating digital editions, exact copies of the print magazine that you can view online using a one of several different viewers/players, such as  Zinio (you can get a free trial subscription there).

Digital magazines are a great resource in conjunction with the interactive whiteboards.  See if there’s one that might provide supplementary material for your content.

Sign up for 1 free digital subscription at http://goreadgreen.com/ If you’re savvy, you can figure out a way to sign up for more than one subscription.

yudu– Read digital magazines for free AND create your own.  Decatur High School in Georgia has created one titled “Carpe Diem”.  Categories range from Animals & Pets to Film & Animation to Travel & Events.

coverleaf – Looks like you can preview digital editions of magazines and subscribe to them.  There are some free magazines in there, and subscribers to the print editions seem to be able to subscribe to the digital for free. (Maybe here’s where the promethean board comes in if theres a curriculum-related magazine you use)

Here are some magazines with digital editions available for free to read online:

hospitality design

hospitality upgrade

Architect

landscape architecture digital preview of the April 2010 edition; digital subscription available)

arts and architecture not a digital edition, but I thought it worthwhile- you can view pages (in pdf) of issues from January 1945- to 1969.  The covers are totally mod cool! You can buy a tshirt with selected cover designs.

conduit not really a ”digital magazine’ but kinda cool. Let me know when you figure out what it is.

wend outdoorsy stuff.

popsci Popsci makes its archives searchable via Google Books.

Which leads us to Google Books, offering some magazines in their entirety.  I’m not sure what exactly you call this format that google is using; it is “digital” in a sense, but they’re also scanned in, not produced to be digital(?)
Go to http://books.google.com/. To search only magazines with full view, click on advanced search. In advanced search, click on Full view only and Magazines (highlighted below) and put in your search terms. For a short intro from Google, click here.

google books search box

google book advanced search

Have an online or digital magazine you like? Add it to the comments!

If you’re wondering, the title of this post is a shout-out to all you Olivia Newton-John fans 🙂

September 24

Sting 19: School Spirit is Alive and Well!


south hills scorpion banner

me_nerdy
FASTEST SLIDE RULE SLINGER IN THE WEST
Known to out-calculate the entire math department

people kept asking me why I didn’t dress up for nerd day?!
okay, just because I felt comfortable in that clothing…

Books are being checked out!  It’s awesome! Ask your students what they’re reading; whether they are reading or not, it provides encouragement either by way of appreciating that they are reading OR by reinforcing the idea that reading for pleasure is a normal, and somewhat expected, part of personal growth. (IMHO)

Join the SHHS Library Group on Facebook!

Student lists have been consolidated into a google spreadsheet.  Check your email for the link.

Bing $100,000 contest: Our School Needs “How would you finish the sentence ‘Our school needs…?’ Write an essay. Snap some pictures. Film a video. Rally your class and get creative and get ready!” Science Lab, computer lab,… what could we use?  If anyone wants to send in an entry, let me know if I can help!

SHHS Electronic resources– I’ve placed a pink sheet listing the databases we subscribe to and username & passwords.  If you need any help understanding what they are for and/or how to use them, I’d be ecstatic to talk about it! (We librarians have a thing for databases)

The Week in Rap (you’ll have to watch at home)
The Week in Rap

LINKS:
Sweet Search 2Day “a daily curated assortment of the best content on the Web for history, language arts, science, news, culture and other topics.”
Fun and Games with Google Books
5 Tools for keeping track of your passwords having difficulty keeping track of all your passwords? Check out these tools to stay organized.  Or you could, like me, use pretty much the same password for everything… but then, I’m in big trouble when that one password gets out!
Nine elements of digital citizenship “digital citizenship can be defined as the norms of appropriate, responsible behavior with regard to technology use.”  This is what students need to know to effectively live in a digital world, yet it’s not a part of what we teach them in school.  In particular, what is said about Digital Literacy:

“Digital Literacy: process of teaching and learning about technology and the use of technology.

While schools have made great progress in the area of technology infusion, much remains to be done. A renewed focus must be made on what technologies must be taught as well as how it should be used. New technologies are finding their way into the work place that are not being used in schools (e.g., videoconferencing, online sharing spaces such as wikis). In addition, workers in many different occupations need immediate information (just-in-time information). This process requires sophisticated searching and processing skills (i.e., information literacy). Learners must be taught how to learn in a digital society. In other words, learners must be taught to learn anything, anytime, anywhere. Business, military, and medicine are excellent examples of how technology is being used differently in the 21st century. As new technologies emerge, learners need to learn how to use that technology quickly and appropriately. Digital Citizenship involves educating people in a new way— these individuals need a high degree of information literacy skills.”

Discovery Education Science Fair Central: includes an idea finder, project timeline, virtual lab, parent resources, videos on the different aspects of creating a project, and more

On Display Now:

Street Lit / Hip-Hop Fiction

street lit display

Comedy

comedy display

Sports

sports fiction display

Tayshas List

IMG_0018

September 1

The Library and I have gained weight and we’re now on Facebook

From the comments I’ve received, the library is bigger (due to the rearrangement) and more attractive.  I, on the other hand, … Thank you for the positive response on the new look.! A big shout-out to our fearless leader for her support and trust in my interior design skills!  More is yet to come.  Part of my goal for the library is, in fact, to make it attractive and welcoming.  That is one of the ways we get students in; hopefully they’ll pick up some reading material while they’re here.  These days the library is much more than books- we’re a multi-media / multi-tasking center of activity – and the librarian does more than just shelve books and shush loud talkers.   I hope you will join me as we seek to transform in ways that will enrich the 21st century learning experience.
As part of our facelift, we’ve started a group on Facebook for the library.  Just search for SHHS Library and “Like” it! On the group page we can share news about reading and resources, create discussions, and post photos and videos.  I’ve already started a discussion about summer reading so feel free to join in. I’ll be seeking student participation so feel free to let them know about it.

The library is open for business, even though we are still putting things back together.  I look forward to working with you to coordinate research activities for our students.  I’m here to support you, so let me know how I can do that. There’s an online form to request library or computer lab time; instructions are below.

Accessing Library Services Online: go to http://schools.fwisd.org/southhills (www.fwisd.org -Schools – High Schools – South Hills) Click on the Staff Only link

find it fast links 2

On the left, you will see Documents, where there will be a Library- Staff Reference Material folder (Notice, also, the other times available to you)

documents

Here you will find important information, some regarding frequently asked questions.

Library Folder

On the right of the main page, you will see Calendars and other things

calendars and such

September is Library Card Sign-Up Month download a letter size poster with Dwayne Wade from the American Library Association page

HandbookInterested in citation styles? I know you are! Desk copies of MLA books are available for teachers with a class size of ten or more students. There are two ways to submit a request. By mail, please use school letterhead, stating the name of the course, the approximate enrollment, and your name, complete address, and telephone number; address your request to Marcia Henry at the Modern Language Association, 26 Broadway, 3rd floor, New York, NY 10004-1789. You may also submit your request online using the desk copy request form.
**Apple iPad Drawing for MLA Handbook Adoptions (have to order a class set)