Are You a Wimpy Whiner?

As I stumble on some more resources from our conference I found this. It is the backchannel chat that occurred during David Warlick's opening keynote. If you are unfamiliar with conference backchannels, you can read my previous post here. Significant to note is that Karl Fisch was surprised that in a district apparently as progressive as ours, there were certain sites that were blocked. Additionally, some sites promised to be opened on the day of the conference were in fact unaccessible. I'm a little disappointed in that, although I have to say that the folks in IT worked very hard to ensure that would NOT happen.

(Interesting to note; proposed in UK that students actually study Twitter and other social networking sites.)

I'm particularly pleased to see the conversation take a turn to how teachers can begin to stop suffering in silence and seek a role in advocating for the very change they are seeking. It is always my contention that we should not "wimply whine." We must take a part in finding a solution. If you are unhappy with the level of security placed on your desktops at your schools, what are YOU doing about it?

image: David Warlick
literacy, redifine, warlick

Catching Up

Like a huge race that required months of training only to be run in minutes, our EdTech conference came and went. From the looks of things, and the feedback I received, it was a huge success. I'm looking forward to more conversations and post-conference polls to obtain more and specific feedback.

Due to my specific responsibilities during the day, I was unable to sit in on any of the sessions so I'm just now starting to poke around the Internet to see if I can find some of the sites and resources I heard mentioned in conversations. My first stop is where Jen Dorman frequently "live-blogs" many conference sessions when she can. She uses the free CoverItLive. Her live-blog of David Warlick's keynote, is where I'm going to spend the next few hours because she included some quotes, links to sites he recommended and brought in others to engage in some conversation about his keynote. It is here where I can get a sense of the Opening Session and learn a little as well.

Thanks Jen... I'm heading back over to you now!

Palm Beach County Ed Tech Conference 2009

Keynote/Featured Speakers
Originally uploaded by Lee Kolbert

Our annual tech conference is today and these are the featured speakers we brought in. Just take a look! How amazing is this, for our little district? Ok, not so little, but still!!

We've got (left to right) Steve Dembo, Kate Kemker, David Warlick, Karl Fisch, Mark Benno and Dean Shareski.

I'm so excited to have all of these incredibly, powerfully knowledgeable people in one venue and OUR venue yet!! If they were all sitting on a single panel, what would question/topic would you like to hear them discuss with each other?

Perhaps we could get some of them to jump in here as well.

(I will jump back in here later and add more details and hyperlinks.)

Creative Commons Group for VoiceThread

File this under, "I love This!"

I was on Twitter and saw a tweet from Wes Fryer alerting me to a new Flickr group created by Karen Montgomery. I love Flickr's group feature and I love VoiceThread so kudos to Karen for having the brilliant idea of putting them together. It's always a challenge finding content that is copyright friendly and Karen has given us a solution.

You can already choose to import directly from Flickr in VT, however at the moment, you can't import from a set that's not your own. You'll have to grab the link in Flickr then use the URL button in VT to import it.

About Creative Commons Licensed Photos for VoiceThread

Do you have animal photos, flower photos, photos of your hometown, exotic places you've visited or everyday objects that educators and students might love to share, remix and reuse? Submit your Creative Commons licensed, "Some Rights Reserved" photos to this group to help create a resource for students and educators using VoiceThread. Photos of any topic are welcome as long as they are G-rated and appropriate for all ages.

Check it out here!

VoiceThread's About To Hit Some High Notes

It's no secret that I love VoiceThread. I believe in the product, I believe in what can be done with it and I believe in how the owners engage in conversations with and want to listen to their customers to make the product better. I also happen to live near Ben so it's nice to have a direct pipeline to him and Steve. (Ben and Steve are the co-owners and founders of VoiceThread.) In my district we've been using VT quite a bit and we've been banging on the product pretty well lately. As with anything, the more you use it, the more you get to know it, see what works, and see what you need to make it work better for you. It helps that I've got Ben here to be my personal VT tech support, too.

As Spider Man said, "With great power comes great responsibility." In this case, the power is the knowledge. The responsibility is to share it. So, share I do. I'm active on Mark Carl's VoiceThread NING and I incorporate VT in my conference presentations. (Full disclosure: I don't work for nor do I receive any compensation from VoiceThread. I annoy them for free.) I find that many people contact me with questions about using VT with their students. Being an educator, there's nothing I love better than to light that fire and see someone get excited about what they've just learned. I'm always happy to help.

So, I was very excited when my phone rang at lunch yesterday and it was Ben Papell. He told me about some simple additions to their site and some new features coming soon:

VoiceThread now has a print manual. The first chapter on SHARING is in there and they'll be adding about 6 more chapters. There are some OK manuals out there; I've even created one myself, but this is really nice and to the point. You'd think for a self-proclaimed Geek, I'd be ashamed to want something I can print and refer to, but I have to say that I still like to have some printed directions in front of me once in awhile. I know teachers I work with will appreciate this too.

They also updated the look of their K-12 Education pricing page and I say, "Hallelujah!" I've been asking them to do this for awhile. If you ask 15 VoiceThread-using educators what the difference between a Pro Educator, Free Educator and Regular Free VT account is, you will probably get 10 different answers. It shouldn't be so difficult to figure what you're getting. I think the new layout is much clearer. It's important to me because I've heard teachers say they are frustrated with (what they think is) the teacher account because they can only create 3 threads. So, they give up. If educators are aware of what VT is offering them, they can take advantage of the great deal that the Free Educator account offers and truly not have to spend any money if they don't want to.

Did you know if you sign up for the plain old regular-free-to-anyone VT account, you are limited to only 3 VoiceThreads and 75MB of storage? But if you sign up for the Free Educator VT account you can now create an unlimited number of VTs and have 2GB of storage? I think previously, most people didn't know that. I'm not trying to sell anything here, but the Pro-Educator account is a lot better because now you get to create groups (have you seen the new groups feature?) and up to 10GB storage! Additionally, now you can work in the EdVT environment.

What's Coming for VoiceThread?
(Remember, you read it here first!)

1. Public cloning! You will be able to clone other people's VTs - if the original author sets permission, of course. This enables you to start from a "template" and work from there, or just take it "as is." You'll be able to take the VT with our without the comments. I think this is huge.
2. Large upcoming partnership(s) where users can pull content for their VoiceThreads! Right now you can pull content from your own library, Flickr, FaceBook or a URL but there are lots of organizations and sites with oodles of content, just waiting to be added into our threads. I'm really looking forward to this one...or two...
3. Ed Community - They will also be focusing on improving the Ed site. They're looking to make it more of a community for educators and students. They know they've not done a good job of that at all. Yet, we've all seen communities evolve on their own. There are tons of outstanding resources and examples to help educators use VoiceThread; yet not one of them resides on their site. They aren't looking to replace anything; they're actually looking to embrace those who have taken the time to create, communicate and share them. We can look forward to a sort of 'one stop shop' at EdVT.
   
   

How are we using VT?
In many of our schools, we are using the full class subscriptions. Our teachers have kicked it up a notch beyond what you can do with the free accounts, because all their students have legal accounts and everyone works in the EdVT environment. Running this small pilot in this manner has snatched the attention of many people who have never imagined lessons could include so much collaboration.

What's Next for Us?

The University of North Carolina has integrated VoiceThread with their teachers and students automatically authenticating into the system through their network. To be able to authenticate like that is a pretty big deal for us where we have over 170,000 students and 12,000 teachers. If we could penetrate just 10% of our teachers with a product like VT, that would be huge.

I'd love to see more of our teachers introduced to VT next year as a means for instruction during the year (rather than after testing is over - when all the good stuff comes along)? For now, I'm thrilled to see some instructional technologies, such as VT, making headway onto our radar. Our use of VT and global collaboration is starting some great conversations that will hopefully, give more of our teachers some Web 2.0 opportunities - should they want them.

What are your thoughts on all of this?

A Little Standardized Testing Humor

Finally, a standardized test that students would actually look forward to!

TEACHER:
"Today you will be eating a donut. Remove all materials from your desk except a No. 2 napkin. If you do not have a No. 2 napkin, please raise your hand and I’ll give one to you.

Hand out napkins to the students.

The glazed Krispy Kreme disk-shaped donut with a hole in the middle you are about to eat is a sweet donut; therefore, certain rules must be followed to protect the integrity of the glazed Krispy Kreme disk-shaped donut with a hole in the middle. You may not have any electronic or recording devices, such as cell phones, pagers, or electronic games, at your desk, even if you don’t use them. Possession of any electronic device that reproduces, transmits, calculates or records the glazed Krispy Kreme disk-shaped donut with a hole in the middle may be cause for invalidation.

Hand out the donuts to the students.

The only materials on your desk should be your No. 2 napkin and your glazed Krispy Kreme disk-shaped donut with a hole in the middle. Look at the hole in the middle of your donut. We need to be sure the hole is in the proper place and that there are no missing or upside down holes. Starting with the right side of your donut, check all the way around your donut until you get to the right side of your donut again. If there are any problems, raise your hand. If not, put the donut down and sit quietly.

Wait until all students are finished. If there are any defective donuts, eat them immediately.

Now you’re going to eat the glazed Krispy Kreme disk-shaped donut with a hole in the middle. You’ll have ten minutes to eat your donut completely. You must not use your feet to eat your donut, but you may use your hands, fingers, and mouths, if you find it helpful. Look at the back of your donut. You’ll see the back of your glazed Krispy Kreme disk-shaped donut with a hole in the middle. This is where you’ll put your teeth. Try to eat your whole donut. Please remember while eating your donut you MUST NOT:

• Eat anyone else’s donut
• Make loud slurping sounds
• Look at another person’s donut
• Have napkins other than No.2 napkins
• Have electronic or recording devices even if you do not use them.

Please raise your hand if you have any questions.
When you have finished your donut and licked your fingers, put your napkin in the trashcan. Then you must sit and stare at everyone until they are finished.
Please raise your hand if you have any questions.
Remember, you have 10 minutes to eat your donut. I will tell you when you have 2 minutes left.
You may begin eating."

Sent to me via email from a colleague. Source not identified.


One serious note: In Florida, our teachers are required to read scripts to their students exactly like the above. Deviating from the script can result in test invalidation. I'm curious if other states require their teachers to read scripts such as this, as well.

World Math Day: It All Adds Up

Be a part of something huge! Unite with students and schools from around the world to set a new world record! The challenge is to correctly answer more than 182,445,169 questions in 48 hours. Students play against each other in mental arithmetic games. Students are captivated by the fact that they are playing in real time. Each game lasts for 60 seconds, and students can play as many games as they wish. The questions are appropriately leveled for different ages and abilities.

Watch Jamie explain how it all works on this segment from PalmBeezeCAFE: