Get YouTube Videos for Use in SAISD

YouTube is blocked at my school facility (for good reason,) but I've excess at home. A colleague has discovered a jewel. It's an inspirational short by Will Smith. Now, for my surely, simple question...How do we circumvent the filters allowing us to show/use this YouTube treasure for a beginning of the year motivation lesson with our students? By the by, the YouTube instructional clips on how to do this haven't helped.
Source: Email from the EDTECH email list (international listserv)

Several ways to accomplish this.

The first way is to find a conversion service that hasn't been blocked at work. You can find my list of services to use here. One of my favorites is the Zamzar.com (allowed in SAISD) conversion by URL. You just paste the address in and it makes the conversion for you, then emails you the download link when ready.

The second way is to find a video hosting provider that isn't blocked, such as Edublogs.tv. Since edublogs.tv handles video/audio for just education use, it's easy to make the argument to school district providers that it should be left unblocked. Too bad they don't handle photos/images at Edublogs.tv, and that would take care of Flickr/Picasa blocked sites!!

Ok, here's a few quick illustrated steps to get a video from YouTube to Edublogs.tv. I hadn't done it before, so I figured I'd take some screenshots along the way:

Step 1: Click the Grab YouTube button

Step 2: Paste in the URL for the YouTube video

Step 3: Confirm Information

Step 4: Confirmation Provided

Step 5: See Video

Step 6: What Success Looks Like

 

and you can use the embed code or just link to the video:

http://www.edublogs.tv/play.php?vid=367

Note that I've deleted the video already, so clicking the link won't work <smile>.

Image Search Tool

This came across in a tweet yesterday...I bookmarked it and thought it worthy of sharing:

 

COSN 2009 Conference Proposal - Thinkfinity

For fun this weekend, I whipped up this proposal for COSN Conference 2009 specific to Thinkfinity. If you'd like me to do this workshop for your campus or department, please let me know via email at "mguhlin@saisd.net". We'll set the class up in ePath for you!

This workshop is about 3 hours.

Title

5 Steps to Successful Professional Learning for Teachers

Summary

This presentation shares 5 strategies for enhancing the learning environment at both school and home for students, their parents, and teachers. Often, educators and students lack access to high quality online resources they can use. Thinkfinity.org--and affiliate organizations--provide no-cost, unlimited access to resources. Learn 5 ways on how you and your teachers can blend Thinkfinity resources to enhance teaching and learning at school and home.

Objectives

• Participants will explore 5 professional learning strategies to ensure successful technology integration for teachers.
• Participants will discuss how Thinkfinity.org and specific interactives it offers can expand what teachers and students can do at no additional cost.
• Participants will learn how to blend high quality web-based resources with social bookmarking tools like Diigo and/or Del.icio.us.

Description

Facilitating successful professional learning opportunities that result in transforming teaching and learning is difficult. In this session, the facilitators will share 5 research-derived strategies for structuring professional learning that is successful. The five strategies to be shared (adapted from the work of the TLT Group) are 1) Begin with a long-term focus on a few selected outcomes and the educational activities needed to improve them; 2) Choose technology that can contribute incrementally and cumulatively over time; 3) Emphasize forms of instructional material that most faculty members find quick and easy to create, adapt and share; 4) Track the progress of the strategy needed to stay on course; and 5) Tap into online learning communities to sustain professional learning. Recognizing that ensuring access to quality learning resources online is critical, as well as knowing how to interact with those resources, the facilitators will share Thinkfinity.com and how it can be utilized in a variety of learning settings, including small group, large group, and individual. Participants will also be introduced to social bookmarking tools--such as Delicious and Diigo--that enhance participants' ability to organize online learning resources.

New NCLB Reporting Requirements

UPDATE 05/20/2008: The Superintendent's Cabinet decided to wait until the 2008-2009 school year to complete the required 8th Grade Technology Literacy assessment. More information will be shared at that time.

UPDATE 05/30/2008: Letter released from TEA that outlines requirements.

The Texas Education Agency presented the new reporting requirement of November, 2008 for the first time in Austin on Friday, May 9, 2008. Three requirements outlined by No Child Left Behind (NCLB) will be reported on in November, 2008. These three requirements include conducting an assessment of...

1. Technology literacy for eighth grade students
2. Technology literacy for teachers, librarians and administrators; and
3. The number of computers available to students for instruction by Internet access type.

Since December, 2006, eighth graders have had to meet Technology Applications:TEKS graduation requirements. Data is required, auditable, must have supporting documentation and failure to provide it may negatively impact future funding per the Texas Education Agency and No Child Left Behind.

Out of 21 campuses that serve 8th graders, 10 MS/Academies do offer a Technology Applications course and 11 DO NOT. Of the eleven who do not, two stated that they were hoping to offer one next year. Schools are hard-pressed to find funding for a Technology Applications:TEKS Teacher, budget for the cost of an up to date computer lab, and make it happen. Schools that can may avail themselves of Instructional Technology Services' workshop and support.

The curriculum audit completed earlier this year (2008) reflects a lack of technology applications integration into core content instructions, even though it is required and the electronic textbook has been long available. This highlights a profound need for SAISD schools, students and teachers to ratchet up their support.

For schools, this means increased technology access (remember, 41% of our schools have obsolete technology and the computer to student ratio is as high as 1:12 at some campuses). For students, it means more learning opportunities that require technology as an integral part of success. For teachers, it means meeting the SBEC Technology Standards for All Educators.

8TH GRADE ASSESSMENT
It is urgent that we collect data for Requirement #1--the 8th grade assessment of technology literacy--prior to the end of the 2007–2008 school year. In one word, NOW.

I'm presenting a plan later today to Marcos Zorola, Assistant Superintendent, as to the best way to collect this data in the 2 weeks that remain to us this year. While this will undoubtedly put a strain on campuses, it is far better to accomplish the data collection now rather than wait to the new year and try to either assess a fresh crop of 8th graders or 9th graders.

The options include the following:

• Option #1: Learning.com. This is the best option in terms of quality because it is a solution already in use in Texas and is being reviews as part of the HB 2503 Technology Literacy Assessment Pilot being conducted by TEA. However, the cost of doing this now would be $14,000.
• Option #2: Use the Glencoe TechConnect TA:TEKS assessment. This is a free assessment that came with our state-adopted electronic textbook. A recent review of how many SAISD campuses had activated or logged into the textbook was at only 41%. Actual usage was much lower.
• Option #3: Setup an in-house District assessment using Moodle course management system. This is an inexpensive option but it is the equivalent of taking a pencil-n-paper questionnaire, and putting it online for data collection purposes. This kind of assessment is ineffective in assessing Technology Applications TEKS, but may be all that many school districts have.

Technology Literacy Assessments for students in grades 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 are in our future, so if you are a teacher in one of those grades, you are strongly encouraged to take advantage of available professional learning opportunities in the area of Educational/Instructional Technology through the District.

Consider this pilot is part of a first attempt to begin assessing your students'--and by extension, your--technology literacy:

House Bill (HB) 2503, 80th Texas Legislature, 2007, added the Texas Education Code (TEC), §39.0235, providing for the establishment of a pilot program in which participating school districts assess student technology proficiency. The project goal in accordance with HB 2503 is to develop and implement a statewide pilot program of an online technology assessment for a certain sample of Texas students. The Texas Education Agency (TEA) will conduct a two-year Technology Literacy Assessment Pilot Program. Eligible participants of this RFSOI are public school districts and charter schools.

The assessment tool for the pilot will be selected by TEA through a Request for Proposals process. Each school year, the assessment instrument shall be administered in a participating school district to each student in either fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, or ninth grade on each selected campus. The pilot will begin March 2008. Data collection for the pilot program may continue through December 31, 2009.

If you are a classroom teacher, librarian, or administrator, it is critical that you consider the State Board of Educator Certification (SBEC) Technology Standards for All Educators. These standards are the same as what is expected of the 8th graders.

To help campus teachers, librarians, and administrators, I encourage you to take advantage of the wealth of 100% ONLINE professional learning opportunities that will begin to be available this Summer, 2008 through ePath.

You can get an advance preview via this PDF dcoument. Page 1 includes a summary of available courses (and when they'll be available). These online professional learning opportunities include 63 courses (205 hours) of Gifted and Talented credit...that you can earn entirely online without attending a face to face class.

AudioCast: Tony Stead on Teaching Non-Fiction Writing

Above: Tony Stead (Email: tonystead@bigpond.com).

Tony Stead is an Australian educator who has taught in elementary schools and lectured at the University of Melbourne. He is the past president of the Melbourne Chapter of the Australian Reading Association and the author of many publications. His latest include Is That a Fact?: Teaching Nonfiction Writing and the video series Time For Nonfiction. which highlights his recent work with several teachers at the Manhattan New School.

What a fantastic opportunity! I'm now sitting here with a copy of both of Tony's books, and I'll be reading one of them this weekend.

The book you are about to read [Is That a Fact?] is destined to be the first, middle, and maybe even the last word on nonfiction writing for young, young children. It is certainly a text that you will return to over and over again as you do with a beloved cookbook.
Source: Tomie dePaola, Foreword of Is That a Fact? by Tony Stead

Over eighty- five percent of the reading and writing we do as adults is nonfiction, yet most of the reading and writing in K–3 classrooms is fiction or personal narrative. In Is That a Fact? Teaching Nonfiction Writing K-3, Tony Stead shows you how to open the door to the rich world of nonfiction writing that goes beyond "what I did" narratives and animal reports. And he convincingly demonstrates the importance of introducing nonfiction writing in the primary grades.

This morning--thanks to Jeanne Cantu (SAISD's Senior Coordinator for Reading/ELA) invitation for my team and I to come listen--I had the chance to listen to Australian Tony Stead share his thoughts about Teaching Non-Fiction. I also had the opportunity to chat with Roger Rosen, President of the Rosen Publishing Group. I took notes on everything they had to say. Rather than quote them here, I'm just going to share some of the high points. You can read the transcript of my notes online via the Share More! Wiki.

There are several options for listening, but you can get the full length podcast or listen to 2 separate parts.

Interview with Roger Rosen (6 megs)

Listen to Tony Stead's Presentation (22.6 megs)

Both Roger and Tony with a short intro from Miguel (24 megs)

Key Take-Aways:

1. We need to thrill our learners to be readers and writers.
2. To be successful in life, what kind of writing will help children in their life? If you're like me, you're writing persuasive writing.
3. In K-2 classrooms, 95% of writing experiences were with personal narrative and story
4. By 6th grade, children will have spent 84% of writer's workshop composing personal narratives, stories, and writing from prompts.
5. Kids wrote a brochure and dedicated it to everyone who is scared of bats. For the us, the use of technology to get online and find out about stuff. With every book, there's a web site. Kids went to batconservation.com. Bats Conservation said, "If you send us the information and produce it and send it to all 1000 of our members." Those kids were screaming with absolute joy. All day, all they want to do is write persuasive brochures. Our kids sit in those classrooms and do what they're told. They write and read without every understanding why.
6. How did you overcome barriers? Principals want people to teach to the test. How do you get them to take a leap of faith? Response: It was just one school to start with. Let's see what happens and then finding out you won't fail. Pilot the program. That's how the leap of faith happened. Denton ISD tracked the State test. We started with the interested group.
7. 73% of students read nonfiction at least 3 Reading Recovery levels below that of their fiction.
8. 15% of students read nonfiction 3 grade levels below their fiction.
9. By third grade, only 7% of students struggled with decoding nonfiction at their grade level. We teach decoding, how to get through text, but we spend little time helping them understand what the text is actually saying. ESL children can easily learn to decode but because it's a 2nd language, they don't have understanding of which words to use for concept. They can read at 28 level of Reading Recovery, but comprehension level of 4.
10. Students who were competent readers of nonfiction were also competent in reading fiction, but not vice versa.
11. Boys slow their reading down because they want to make meaning of non-fiction. They do what every child should do--they fight to read.
12. Children can read 3-4 levels above what they're benchmarked on topics they're interested in.
13. The way the TEKS are written, they are a big turn-off. They're not written in story format. Response: Tony qualified it by saying, "It's non-fiction that's not written in an non-engaging manner. If we go back to the old non-fiction--librarians hate me because I want to weed out from the 1950s to 1960s from science and social studies because it's out of date, non-engaging; need new fresh resources in there.
14. 96% of all read-alouds were with shared fiction. Kids aren't even hearing the language of non-fiction content until third grade.
15. This is about rethinking a strategy that teachers in the U.S. have been using for the last 10 year. This strategy is KWL. KWL Problem - I believe it's only effective for kids who already bring good background knowledge to the table. When you ask them what they know, that's all dependent on content understandings.
16. RAN Strategy...It's ok to approximate content knowledge. You don't have to be true.
17. A university lecturer came to visit me and I've been using the RAN at the university level. "This is the fabric for how we all think. Day 1, I asked my students...write an essay about how they think children learn to read. Over 6 weeks, they had to--in yellow--confirm what they knew, highlight in blue any misconceptions, write down any wonderings and at the end of the semester, they had to write down a new essay and share their wonderings and misconceptions and new facts.
18. When you ask about misconceptions in Science...I can live with a misconception about Pluto. But in Social Studies, biases and prejudices come up and I can't live with that.
19. We have to help kids take risks.

My Reflections

There are many connections between blogging and non-fiction writing. Aside from a publishing perspective, it's clear that students need to be reading current texts. Reading yesterday's information isn't going to cut it. Not only that, they also have to be engaged by visually appealing content. While much of that might very well be a book, it's obvious that mountains of non-fiction writing is already taking place online with blogs. Consider Mark Ahlness--a Seattle, WA teacher whose 3rd grade students are blogging AND using blogs as their source material for Sustained Silent Reading (SSR). Our students CAN produce non-fiction, and hear (via podcasts) and learn the language of non-fiction.

What do you think?

In writing, you are always composing, always working to make it better. Donald Graves writes (as cited in Atwell's In the Middle):

We'll spend a lifetime crafting our teaching in order to allow children to be the authors of their own texts.

This reminds me of Bolman and Deal's quote about the leader's responsibility, as written in Leading with Soul:

Leader's responsibility is to create conditions that promote authorship.

It's also that idea of CONSTANTLY writing, composing, and with the Read/Write web, publishing. These are powerful ideas for me, and the Read/Write Web tools that are available make it possible. When else could I have had access to panoply of resources? If I want to teach blogging, videos abound. If I want to teach podcasting, videos about how to do that and how to prepare educational podcasts by students (Bob Sprankle's Room 208 vodcast is precious) and/or teachers (e.g. Dorothy Burt's enhanced podcast at TeacherTube.com) are available. They are exactly what's needed.

In a world full of non-fiction, it's clear that personal voice adds a sense of depth (Is That a Fact? by Tony Stead) to writing. Tony cites Donald Graves in his book, Is that a fact? as saying:

Unfortunately, little nonfiction, beyond personal narrative, is practiced in classrooms. Children are content to tell their own stories, but the notion that someone can write about an idea and thereby affect the lives and thinking of others is rarely discussed.

For me, blogs provide the avenue to do this. It's such an obvious connection, I want to jump up and down in front of folks and share it with them. Tony offers the concept of baskets, including Title of Basket and Type of Non-Fiction that goes with that. He mentions that most of the non-fiction/fiction books in one classroom library--over 3000--were not appropriate. Here's what he writes:

3,000 books is a lot of material for one classroom. . .Margo [the teacher] told me that when she sorted her books she found that only 20 percent of them were nonfiction, and most of these were descriptive books about animals, only one aspect of nonfiction. What was more surprising was that of the relatively new nonfiction books she had, about 80 percent were at reading levels way above where the majority of her children were reading...Margo needed not only to purchase more nonfiction material but also to ensure that the texts chosen were matched to the needs and abilities of her children.

When I read Tony Stead's writing on types of non-fiction, I'm immediately drawn to the idea that, wouldn't it be great to classify student-generated writing in blogs by non-fiction areas? And, since audio is such a big part of oral comprehension for children reading non-fiction, wouldn't podcasts fit right in?

Eric Langhorst does a neat job of this with his Speaking of History Studycasts...

"One of the most effective uses of podcasts for my students was the creation of StudyCasts," Langhorst told Education World. "I began recording an audio review to help my students prepare for upcoming unit tests. With my portable MP3 player, I record an overview of the important material. I then transfer the audio, which lasts about 20 minutes, to my computer, and then upload the MP3 file to our classroom Web site. Students then are able to listen to the study review at home on their computers or download it to their personal MP3 players; they can review for the test anywhere."
Source: EducationWorld

While this is neat stuff, what about having students write the nonfiction and record their own podcasts for posting? Would that work? I know that book publishers are cringing, but there are so many writing non-fiction out here in the blogosphere, posting podcasts, it seems a "no-brainer" to harness that. But how to do it? Tags for non-fiction help, but we might have to use a standard. Why not use Tony's?

Contact info

• Roger Rosen's Email: rogerrosen@prodigy.net
• Tony Stead's Email: tonystead@bigpond.com

Level 5 Tech Use Isn't Drill-n-Kill

New technologies are changing how people interact with one another, facilitating speedy communications and collaborations at a distance. Traditional organizations--like K-12 schools--find themselves struggling with how to deal with the influx of personal technologies. These technologies come into our schools with our children, our teachers, community members, administrators, and visitors in the form of mobile phones, PDAs, iPods and more.

The simple answer is to ban them all. In my daughter's school--another large school district in San Antonio--mobile phone bans are in effect. Yet, every child carries one, as do the teachers. We have all watched too much Star Trek; our personal communicators give us an unprecedented freedom. Personal technologies are often perceived as distractions to what happens in the classroom, a way of deviating from the established route, scope and sequence that must be followed. Why? And, how can these technologies be used to enhance classroom activities?

Level 5 of the Levels of Technology Implementation focuses on the following:

Technology access is extended beyond the classroom. Classroom teachers actively elicit technology applications and networking from other schools, business enterprises, governmental agencies (e.g., contacting NASA to establish a link to an orbiting space shuttle via internet), research institutions, and universities to expand student experiences directed at problem-solving, issues resolution, and student activism surrounding a major theme/concept.

The complexity and sophistication of the technology-based tools used in the learning environment are now commensurate with (1) the diversity, inventiveness, and spontaneity of the teacher's experiential-based approach to teaching and learning and
(2) the students' level of complex thinking (e.g., analysis, synthesis, evaluation, creation) and in-depth understanding of the content experienced in the classroom.

In this kind of environment, technology access makes communication and collaboration BEYOND the classroom a reality. The challenge schools face today isn't how to STOP students from bringing personal communication devices to schools, but how to best adapt and absorb these technologies into what they do...those will be the schools that get it done.

Consider this adaptation of a quote from Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat:

The school that most quickly absorbs and adopts the latest technology dominates...[it becomes] a hub of connectivity for the many to work with the many, creating networks of young learners to identify problems, solve them and get behind solutions who are ready to mobilize the other students and the community in the right direction.

This is easily a vision for the future school. It's not dis-similar to community-based schools, except that now, the process is moved online. However, so long as we persist in focusing on achieving current curricular goals in old-fashioned learning that is bound by 4-walls, we prepare children to be dominated...Level 5 technology use that our children need in college--in support of our SAISD mission--isn't drill-n-kill.

Economically disadvantaged students, who often use the computer for remediation and basic skills, learn to do what the computer tells them, while more affluent students, who use it to learn programming and tool applications, learn to tell the computer what to do.

Those who cannot claim computers as their own tool for exploring the world never grasp the power of technology...They are controlled by technology as adults--just as drill-and-practice routines controlled them as students.
Source: Toward Digital Equity: Bridging the Divide in Education

Who can argue that our children need to control the technologies around them, or, be controlled by them? We have to work towards LEVEL 5 Technology Use in our schools.

LOTI Level 5 - Beyond the Walls

Source: http://www.jimcollins.com/lab/level5/index.html

"Is there something in the LOTI that's equivalent to Level 5?" asked my superintendent when we first met. I wasn't sure. I had no idea what "Level 5" meant. Now, I know he was referring to Level 5 leadership as discussed in Jim Collins' book, Good to Great. According to the web site cited above, Level 5 leaders...

...channel their ego needs away from themselves and into the larger goal of building a great company. It's not that Level 5 leaders have no ego or self-interest. Indeed, they are incredibly ambitious--but their ambition is first and foremost for the institution, not themselves.

As I review the table on page 2 of Collins' web site, I realize that I fall short as a leader. In particular, this point hits hard...the level 5 leader...

...Looks in the mirror, not out the window, to apportion responsibility for poor results, never blaming other people, external factors, or bad luck.

Looks out the window, not in the mirror, to apportion credit for the success of the company—to other people, external factors, and good luck.

These are powerful ideas or perspectives on leadership. But back to the original question. As I reflected on the Levels of Technology Implementation earlier this month at a presentation to another school district, I realized that the expectations for students and teachers has changed.

The expectation is no longer that we use technology as a tool for identifying and solving real life problems in the classroom. Why? As Dr. Don Knezek shared in his presentation at the ICTT 2007 Conference held September 15 at the UTSA Downtown campus (listen to it here as a podcast), classroom teaching can no longer be limited to classroom activities. Technology and learning that occurs has to EXTEND beyond the classroom. The refreshed ISTE National Education Technology Standards for Students expect students to interact with others and solve problems...at a distance! It's not enough to do a nice project in your classroom, you have to have students working with students from other countries.

As I was reflecting on the power of level 5 leaders, I realized that level 4 of the levels of technology implementation (LOTI 4) isn't good enough anymore.

In LOTI 4, technology is routinely used as a tool to identify and solve real life problems. But the truth is that it is often used within the 4 walls of a classroom. What's really needed, especially in light of the refreshed ISTE NETS-S, is LOTI 5. This is where technology access is extended BEYOND the classroom.

Now imagine that our district is still chugging along, pushing the same old productivity tools, offering adult learners workshops on how to use productivity tools, and Career and Technology Education (CATE) classes for students that focus on how-to. Are these classes valuable? No doubt. But are they what our teachers and students need for the long-run? No...they are not. Those are the "brutal facts."

So, I need to go back to my Superintendent and give him the news. Level 5 leadership--with its emphasis on superb results, high standards, personal responsibility, public success--fits hand in hand with LOTI 5.

LOTI 5 encompasses the use of Read/Write Web tools especially when they are used to achieve communication and collaboration at a distance. Why didn't I see this before?

Here's what Level 5 Technology Use--where technology extends learning BEYOND the classroom--should look like...

If you want to see the potential of what we can do with this stuff, take a look at what Julie Lindsay and Vicki Davis have created in their Flat Classroom Project. Julie, who is at the International School Dhaka in Bangladesh, and Vicki who is at Westwood High in Georgia, have collaborated on an amazing undertaking that will connect their kids in a study of the 10 Flattners from Thomas Friedman’s book The World is Flat. In small groups comprised of students from both schools, they’ll be taking the next few weeks to really dig into what’s happening in the two countries from a global perspective and report out in a variety of ways using Read/Write Web tools. In the end, if the grading rubric is any indication, these kids will know a heck of a lot more about their places in the world, the complexities of the age, and the ways in which these tools are changing the way we do business in more than one sense.

Pinch me, but is there all of a sudden a little string of interesting examples of Read/Write Web projects coming together? I know…this example in particular is the result of some amazing and intensive planning. (Did I mention the rubric?) But it makes clear what I think are the two most important aspects of using these tools…first, we have to stop seeing our classrooms as spaces with four walls. Teachers must be willing to be connectors. And second, in the context of those connections, we can give our students real, meaningful, relevant opportunities to teach the rest of us what they know. The fact that the work of these students will be published in its many forms to the world as a whole is just so radically removed from the ways most educators still look at what happens in the classroom. If we are simply content to shuffle paper back and forth only for the sake of slapping an assessment on the work, we are doing our students a grave disservice.

Go and listen to the voices of these kids.
Source: Will Richardson's Web-logged

Are you ready for LEVEL 5 Technology Use? If you are, join us at SAISD Connections or call us at 210-527-1400 for online collaborative learning projects!

Free VoiceThread Pro Account for YOU

Are you an educator? If so, then you can register for a free VoiceThread Pro account. Most people--if they're not educators--have to pay for a VoiceThread account. But you can get one at NO COST! BTW, they've prepared a special printable guide for educators.

Get your free account online at http://voicethread.com/

Even if you're running on a Windows 98 computer--no longer supported by the District--if you have a browser that can handle Flash, you can create a digital story with photos or exported Powerpoint slides, then upload your audio recording. You can create the audio recording in Audacity with a $10 microphone, or record it using a $64 Olympus WS-100 digital audio recorder, or any of the other "inexpensive" audio recorders out there.

If your students create a VoiceThread, you are hitting quite a few Technology Applications:TEKS, such as the following FOUNDATIONS level expectations:

At Grade 2 students are expected to...

• have a solid understanding of use and function of input devices. Imagine students using a digital camera to take photos, move those photos from the camera to the computer, then upload those to the VoiceThread site.
• ...publish and communicate ideas. They could certainly prepare a slideshow of information, and share that with a worldwide audience. Research shows that students writing and publishing for a real, authentic audience are more engaged in their work, and revise more frequently.
• ...use technology collect and distribute information. In the case of VoiceThread.com, students are able to collect comments from their audience members. This goes beyond publishing information to an audience that cannot respond, and allow the audience to leave audio/text comments.

At Grade 5, students are expected to...

• Use productivity tools to support personal productivity and facilitate learning within the curriculum. VoiceThread can certainly be used to facilitate learning, from students creating their own learning materials and producing them--following a production process from creation to analysis and review and publication--and then publishing on the web to receive feedback, either from peers or visitors.
• Have the ability to access information remotely and communicate with others to support independent learning.
• Have the ability to access a variety of media types to be used as resources to facilitate individualized learning.

At Grade 8, students are expected to...

• Have the ability to work in cooperative groups to complete projects utilizing technology and media resources to enhance the learning experience
• Design, develop, publish and present producs using technology resources that demonstrate and communicate curriculum concepts
• Research and evaluate the accuracy, relevance, appropriateness, comprehensiveness and bias of electronic information sources.

VoiceThread is a simple, free, online tool you can use whether you're on a Macintosh or Windows computer. I encourage you to explore it and get your own Pro account--at no cost.

Digital Storytelling with VoiceThread

Technology Applications:TEKS (TA:TEKS) teachers attending The Power of Comprehension workshop were some of the first teachers to see VoiceThreads, an exciting digital storytelling tool. The power of VoiceThread is that it can be used regardless of what type of computer you have since it is web-based. VoiceThread describes itself in this way:

A VoiceThread allows every child in a class to record audio commentary about the ideas and experiences that are important to them. Whether an event, a project, or a milestone, children can tell their story in their own voice, and then share it with the world.

For teachers, VoiceThreads offer a single vessel to capture and then share all the diverse personalities of an entire class. You will hear the pride and excitement in their voices as the students "publish" their work.A VoiceThread can be managed with little effort, creating an heirloom that can be shared by students, parents, and educators alike.
Read More

In addition to using VoiceThread for digital storytelling, you are able to use it for a variety of purposes. Some of those include (note the links to examples):

• Poem book: In this activity, participants share their favorite poems to create an audio poem book.
• Great Book Stories: According to Wes Fryer (SpeedofCreativity.org), The idea is basic: Narrate five pictures to share why you love a specific book, and why other people should read it. If you‚Äôre interested in contributing, please check out the site and the guidelines. The password to edit the wiki is ‚Äúshare‚Äù without quotation marks.
• Online Literature Circles: Wouldn't this be a neat way of having literature circles online? Still looking for examples.
• Social Studies/Geography Applications
• Using Moodle in Technology Applications Classrooms: This was created by TA:TEKS teachers as a way to explore VoiceThread while at the same time share ideas about using Moodle, an online discussion forum and teaching tool in their classroom. Note that someone Allanah King, a New Zealand teacher was able to leave an audio comment on one of the "slides."
• Teaching Chemistry Lecture
• A Book Review by the GED Book Club
• A student presentation regarding The Invisible Children

There are many more VoiceThreads available online, spanning a variety of media genres including poems, self-portraits, lectures, book reviews, multimedia presentations, and digital stories. Why not add your students

Want to use VoiceThread in your own classroom? Consider these resources to get you started:

• VoiceThread.com web site
• Printable guide for teachers
• The Connected Classroom Digital Storytelling with VoiceThread

The SAISD Office of Instructional Technology Services is happy to work with you and your students. Please feel free to contact Miguel Guhlin at mguhlin@saisd.net or by phone at 210-527-1400.

San Antonio Writing Project Presentation

Yesterday, Sylvia Martinez, Sue Harris, and I had the chance to present to teachers from around the region. I was the primary speaker, but I decided to invite Sylvia and Sue to share their specific experiences from a San Antonio ISD perspective. After I spoke, what a delight for the audience to hear the specific ideas expressed by Sylvia and Sue. Sue shared her experiences with the Under the Sea Digital Storytelling Camp held simultaneously at 3 campuses in San Antonio ISD. Syvlia shared how digital storytelling technologies are applicable to a wide range of content areas and simple enough for grade 2 and up students to use.

Of course, the focus was on sharing on digital storytelling in general and what SAISD teachers and students are doing in particular.

You can see the presentation below...I customized a presentation I normally use to introduce folks to digital storytelling. You can download all the materials (handouts) from both of these sites:

• MGuhlin's Digital Storytelling wiki (off-site link)
• Instructional Technology's Digital Storytelling

Are you interested in the teaching of writing? You're invited to the San Antonio Writing Project's Visitors Day taking place on Friday, July 6 from 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM in the Main Building (MB) 0.208 at the UTSA (1604 location). According to the flyer:

Come and visit with our new San Antonio area Teacher Consultants, as teacher demonstrations and pieces of writing are shared! Visitor parking will be available on the top floor of the Parking Garage located on the 1604 side of campus...view the flyer and map.

Some of the images in the presentation below didn't come across. Let me know if you'd like a copy of the PPT.