Transforming Learning with Innovative Uses of Technology

This morning I read, “The Digital Promise: Transforming Learning with Innovative Uses of Technology” by Jeanne Wellings and Michael H. Levine–a white paper that I highly recommend reading if you are looking for rationale to support the integration of technology and edtech PD within your school.

To summarize, the article points out that when technology is skillfully integrated into school curricula, the benefits are many:

• Technology supports student achievement. (ISTE 2008)
• Technology builds 21st century skills. (ISTE 2008)
• Technology engages students in learning and content creation. (America’s Digital Schools, 2006)
• Technology increases access to education, virtual communities, and expertise. (ISTE 2008)
• Technology fosters inclusion. (Apple Inc. 2009)
• Technology helps prevent dropouts. (Smink & Reimer, 2005)
• Technology facilitates differentiated instruction. (Apple Inc. 2009)
• Technology empowers learning and research in critical STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) fields. (CEO Forum, 2001)
• Technology strengthens career and technical education. (Apple Inc. 2009)

And, if that is not enough to make you want to brush up your school technology plan, think about this and ask yourself how comfortable you are with media:

A Kaiser Family Foundation study, “Generation M: Media in the Lives of 8-18 Year Olds,” confirms the immersion of American children in contemporary media. The average child spends over six and a half hours per day engaged with various types of media,  television, movies, music, electronic games, and computers. Over one week this equates to a full-time job with a few hours of overtime (Rideout, Roberts, and Foehr, 2005).

Wow! To find specific examples of resources and innovative things you can do as an educator to promote student learning via creative and engaging uses of technology, check out the blue call-out boxes throughout the report!

For more practical and easy-to-read research on the impact of technology and digital media on children’s learning, visit the Joan Ganz Conney Center. You won’t be disappointed!

Anna

@bon_education

Internet Copyright: Be in the Know!

I just posted the blog entry below on the Curriki blog and suspect that the LIP community will find it of use as well. To see the original post, click here.

Recently on Twitter, I posted a link to “Copyright and Open Content: What do you know?”—a lesson by Curriki member Karen Fasimpaur. Not only did the link get RTed seemingly hundreds of times, but it also got a record number of clicks indicating that Internet Copyright is a topic of interest to members of the Curriki and edutweeter community alike.

As I am sure many of you have discovered in the past few years, being able to mix and mash digital content in new and interesting ways is a definite requisite of the 21^st Century. So, before you or your students post another report, blog or multimedia presentation online, make sure you know the answers to the following questions:

1) If you have drawn a picture, written a song, or taken a photo, you own the copyright (even if you don’t put a © symbol on it).

• True or false?

2) What do you have to do legally to use a copyrighted work in something you’re going to post to the Internet?

• Copy and paste it.
• Cite the source.
• Get the creator’s permission.
• Nothing

3) You can use any picture on the Internet legally in something you’re going to publish.

• True or false?

4) How long does copyright last?

• 10 years
• 50 years
• the life of the creator
• the life of the creator + 70 years

5) You can’t legally use anything copyrighted without contacting the creator and getting permission.

• True or false?

Check your answers here and check out Karen’s fabulously useful lesson on how to teach students about copyrights and open content here (assessment included!). Make sure to download this one-page overview of open licenses for future reference as well!

When it comes to Internet Copyright, it only takes a few minutes to learn your rights and responsibilities. Start learning now! And when you finish going through this lesson, click on over to the Creative Commons website to find a license for your next digital masterpiece!

Oh, and just in case you were wondering, Karen’s lesson is licensed under the Creative Commons Attributions 3.0 license.

Thanks Karen!

Anna

@bon_education

Ideas for Before/During/After Reading!

“I Love to Read” Image by Carlos Porto

I recently came across a fabulous article by Jim Burke on Reading Rockets titled, “103 Things to Do Before/During/After Reading“. Given that I am about to lead several workshops on reading and digital literacy for parents at the Magrudy’s Education Resource Center, Jim’s article will surely be on my recommended reading list for moms and dads.

Upon clicking the above link, you will notice Jim’s article was originally written in 1998. While that might seem like ions ago to some, rest assured, the recommendations are still 100% relevant. That said, I thought it would be useful to create a supplement to Jim’s article that includes a few ideas on how recent software and web applications can be used to get kids excited and thinking about what they read Before/During/After a book!

Take a look at the ideas below and feel free to add your own in the comments section of this post!

“Postcard: Write to a friend, the author, or to a character about this book.”

• Select one student to be a character in the book you are reading and to write a blog post from that character’s point of view. Other students can then submit questions and ideas to the character via the comments section of the post. To learn how to set up a blog for this project, click here.

“Mapmaker: Draw a map of the book’s setting.”

• Have students create a Google Lit Trip–using Google Earth to document and map the settings within the book at hand. To learn how to use this tool, click here.

“Trailer: Movie previews always offer a quick sequence of the best moments that make us want to watch it – storyboard or narrate the scenes for your trailer. Focus on verbs.”

• Create a movie trailer in the form of a digital story using tools like VoiceThread or iMovie. For tips on how to get started, click here.

“Collage: Create an individual or class collage around themes or characters in the book.”

• Use Wordle to create a digital word collage around key themes, characters or vocabulary in the book.

“Draw! Translate chapters into storyboards and cartoons; draw the most important scene in the chapter and explain its importance and action.”

• Create a digital comic strip book summary using tools like Make Beliefs Comix.

“Dear Diary: Keep a diary as if you were a character in the story. Write down events that happen during the story and reflect on how they affected the character and why.”

• Have students create delightfully illustrated diary entries using the online collaborative storytelling tool Storybird.

“Haiku/Limerick: Create one about a character.”

• Use Twitter to share poems with parents and classmates.

“Notes and Quotes: Draw a line down the middle of the page. On one side write down important quotes, on the other comment on and analyze the quotes.”

• Create a collaborative “wiki-style” notes and quotes page using Google’s collaborative document tools. Feel free to host online book discussions using the live chat functions within the collaborative document applications.

Of course there is nothing wrong with a good ol’ fashion book review assignment, but why not share the reviews with other kids around the world? Check out the Spaghetti Book Club: Book Reviews By Kids For Kids.

Happy Reading!

Anna

Twitter: @bon_education

Website: Bon Education

In American a Kid Drops Out of High School Every 9 Seconds…

Imagine if they didn’t.

And so goes the opening statement of the above documentary. I have to wonder what the dropout statistics are for India, Sri Lanka, the UAE…

Visit the homepage of the above documentary and you’ll learn:

This is the compelling question behind award-winning filmmaker Mary Mazzio’s newest project Ten9Eight, a thought provoking film which tells the inspirational stories of several inner city teens (of differing race, religion and ethnicity) from Harlem to Compton and all points in between, as they compete in an annual business plan competition run by the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE).

I hope this film makes it out of the States and to other countries that face the challenge of high dropouts, keeping schools relevant and keeping the classroom inspiring! As President Obama recently stated:

I am calling on our nation’s governors and state education chiefs to develop standards and assessments that don’t simply measure whether students can fill in a bubble on a test, but whether they possess 21st century skills like problem-solving & critical thinking, entrepreneurship and creativity.

To see where Ten9Eight is showing this fall, click here.

Just imagine…

Anna

@bon_education

UAE Educators Speak Out!

Recently I asked Bon Digital Learning Academy graduates and educators across the UAE what their favorite education technology tools and websites are. See what they had to say below:

1) Maram, Grade 9 English teacher, Nad Al Hamr School, Dubai, UAE

• Reading A-Z: “I like it because it supplies me with a lot of different kinds of leveled books, short stories, vocabulary, grammar, phonics and lesson plans. I let my students read stories related to the themes I teach and I use the worksheets and quizzes supplied on the website.”

2) Kim, Teacher Development Specialist, Shamsa Bint Majid Preparatory and Secondary School, Umm Al Quwain, UAE

• LearnEnglishKids (British Council): “I can easily find stories from this site for middle school students.  The stories are of different levels and cater to differentiation, which is really important since all our classes are of mixed abilities. These stories are animated and teachers can pause at any point to allow students to interact through questioning.  Moreover, students can read and hear the words being read at the same time. I normally use stories from here as a launching pad to teach new vocabulary items,grammar, LSRW skills and also visual literacy… The story on Eid Al Fitr … has a task where student can write about their favourite day and post their writing online.”

3) Rob, Instructional Leadership Coordinator, Al Deya Middle School, Umm Al Quwain, UAE.

• “My popular choice is, of course TEDtalks–a primo site with amazing material for teachers to listen to and learn from.  Much of it is far too difficult for our students (but perhaps the translations might help too.) I also like utilizing YouTube for material to take into class.  but we have to be careful, especially here with selection of ‘appropriate’ materials…As Chair of TESOL.org’s Social Responsibility Interest Section, I frequently post websites for my colleagues on our elist.  Two recently posted sites include Amazing Women Rock and ePals Team Earth.

4) Asma, Special Education Consultant, Dubai, UAE

• The International Reading Association and Read Write Think: “Both sites are loaded with information on how to promote, support and encourage literacy and reading across age groups.  They provide evidence-based practical tools for parents & teachers, lesson plans, and many more resources that are sure to be very helpful at home and in the classroom!”

5) Kevin, Grade 4 Primary Years Teacher/Education Consultant, GEMS World Academy/KDSL

• MyMaths.co.uk: “Mymaths provides educators and students with online mathematics games, tasks, and homework. I have used the variety of online lessons and games during math workshop to engage my learners and as a source of differentiation where students selected mymaths.co.uk for their learning contracts.”

6) Robin, Ph.D., Professor, Director of Graduate Studies, Zayed University

• TeacherTube: “This site has a variety of features, from lesson plans to videos of classrooms at work.  I find the videos particularly helpful in letting student teachers see particular strategies in practice before they try them in their practicum classroom. The sight also includes a variety of podcasts.  Teachers can also contribute their own materials to share with educators around the globe.”

What are your favorite education websites? Share your thoughts and feedback in the comments section of this post! And, thanks to the educators above for sharing their favorite education websites with the Literacy is Priceless/Bon Education community!

Sincerely,

Anna

Founder, Bon Education (home of the Bon Digital Learning Academy)

Finding and Adding High Quality LEGAL Images to Your Blog or Website

NEW YORK – SEPTEMBER 14: Nelly Furtado reads a book to a group of children during the Jumpstart Read for The Record 2009 launch event at the Borough of Manhattan Community College on September 14, 2009 in New York City. (Photo by Donald Bowers/Getty Images for Jumpstart)

Today while reviewing the WordPress.com blog for the latest and greatest updates, I came across a post titled, “Free Access to Premium Images“… Wow! What a find!

Finding free high quality legal images for blog posts and websites can be a challenge, especially if you live in a part of the world where websites like Flickr are many times not available. That is why I often rely on my own images, free stock photos or WikiMedia Commons for images to spice up my writing and online blog reports.

Thanks to an update on the WordPress.com blog, I now have another source to rely on for high quality free and legal photos: PicApp. As the site About page states:

We have over 20 million premium images, editorial and creative, covering any imaginable category—from news, sports, to celebrity, travel fashion and more.

Our content partners include Getty Images, Corbis, Splash News, Pacific Coast News, Newscom, Image Source and more. We support the largest blog platforms: WordPress, Blogger, TypePad and more.

Eager to see what PicApp has to offer, this morning I created an account (which took only 10 seconds!) and started exploring for pictures of my favorite actors, topics and more. A quick search for “reading” revealed loads of photos of famous and not-so-famous people doing what we know is so important to do–reading!

Next time you are need of images that are legal to post on your blog/website, stop by PicApp! To see how to use site, watch the video below! To learn what you can and cannot do with the images, click here.

Anna

Twitter: @bon_education

done

Make the world a better place!

What idea do you believe will help the most people?

I recently learned about Google’s 10 to the 100th initiative:

Last fall we launched Project 10^100, a call for ideas to change the world by helping as many people as possible. Your response was overwhelming. Thousands of people from more than 170 countries submitted more than 150,000 (or around 10^5.2) ideas, from general investment suggestions to specific implementation proposals. As we reviewed these submissions, we started noticing lots of similar ideas related to certain broad topics, and decided that combining the best aspects of these individual proposals would produce the most innovative approaches to solving some very pressing problems.

The result is the list you see below of 16 “big ideas,” each inspired by numerous individual submissions. Which ones should we make happen? You tell us. Your vote for one of these ideas will help our advisory board choose up to 5 projects to fund, at which point we’ll launch an RFP process to identify the organization(s) that are best suited to implementing them.

As a huge supporter of open education resources, I voted for idea #7 “Make educational content available online for free”. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if every child or adult that wished to learn something could find high quality educational materials online or on their mobile to pursue their passions for free?! Furthermore, wouldn’t it be wonderful if those resources were organized in a way such that they were easy to find and immediately useful…

To cast your vote, click here. (Note: Voting ends October 8, 2009.)

To free knowledge!

Anna

P.S. I just posted a poll on the top right side of this blog. I would greatly appreciate your feedback. Thanks for reading Literacy is Priceless.

Digital Storytelling in a Nutshell

I just published a blog on Curriki that I think Literacy is Priceless readers will find useful. To see the original post, click here. Or, continue reading below. -Anna

If you are looking for a project to build your students’ communication and digital literacy skills, why not have them participate in a digital storytelling project?! As this excellent introduction to digital storytelling by Curriki member Robin Surland points out:

Digital storytelling consists of a series of still images or video images, combined with a narrated soundtrack to tell a story. Many times an additional music track is added to invoke emotions.

Once, you’ve reviewed Robin’s excellent backgrounder, you’ll be ready to take a look at the link Curriki member Anne Leftwich posted here that provides in-depth information on how to create a digital story. Thanks Anne!

Need help visualizing the process before you get started? Here’s “How to make a Digital Story” in a nutshell:

• Determine what personal experience you wish to present in your story. If you need a bit of help selecting a topic, try filling out this worksheet on the seven basic elements of a digital story by Indiana University.
• Select images that you wish to display in your story. Beyond your own digital photos, Flickr (creative commons licensed images) and OpenStockPhotography are useful places to find images to accompany your narration. Indiana University has a nice template that will help you storyboard your ideas.
• Draft a 3-5 minute script to accompany your images.
• Select music (optional). ccMixer and Open Source Audio are two places where you can find large quantities of open music. Make sure that the track you select allows you to share and remix the original music. For example, click on the cc box featured on the left hand side of this audio. You should be directed to this page that tells you exactly what you can and cannot do with the track.
• Note: If you find this whole copyright thing confusing (i.e., What images and music from the Internet are you allowed to use legally in your digital story?), the Creative Commons website has lots of great advise. The Wanna Work Together video is particularly helpful.
• Pull it all together! Create a final storyboard that clearly shows how your images, script and music will all fit together. Indiana University has provided a useful template for this.
• Select which software you are going to use to create your digital story. Here is a list of possibilies. Voicethread is another nice tool for this. To learn how to use Voicethread, watch this YouTube tutorial.
• Produce your digital story!
• Share it with others! (The fun part!)
• Create a digital storytelling assignment for your students and share your lesson plan with others in the Curriki community here.

For more detailed information on digital storytelling, take a look at the Digital Storytelling Cookbook from the Center for Digital Storytelling. Or, take a moment to watch the YouTube video above (created by Stanford’s Teacher Education Program).

Have fun and feel free to share additional digital storytelling resources in the comments section of this post.

Anna

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On October 8, 2009 Celebrate Literacy and Early Education with Millions Around the World

I recently received an email from Jumpstart about the wonderful literacy event above. See what Kisha has to say below and make sure to open a book with your children and the children of others on October 8th (as well as the rest of the year as well)!

To Reading!

Anna

Hey there,

Just from reading your site, I can tell you know the importance of developing
solid reading skills and improving reading comprehension in classrooms and
schools.

Please join Jumpstart’s Read For The Record on October 8th, 2009 and
celebrate the joy of reading with children. I’d truly appreciate you sharing
this message with your readers, by posting this PSA from Weeds’ star
Mary-Louise Parker on your website.

Read for the Record
www.readfortherecord.org

Link to Mary-Louise Parker Jumpstart PSA:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8agDSSiiDAA

Thanks in advance,
Kisha

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Open Education Resources of Note

“The advent of the Web brings the ability to disseminate high-quality materials at almost no cost, leveling the playing field…We’re changing the culture of how we think about knowledge and how it should be shared and who are the owners of knowledge.“ Cathy Casserly, Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching

This week we put together a list of our favorite Open Education Resources on the Bon Education website.

For those of you that are new to OERs…

Wikipedia defines OERs as “educational materials and resources offered freely and openly for anyone to use and under some licenses to re-mix, improve and redistribute.”

Our OER page contains:

• A definition and explanation of OERs
• Links and descriptions of great OERs (by grade level)
• Stories about how people around the world are using OERs
• Information on OERs and copyrights
• Quotes from major education movers and shakers on the impact of OERs and technology in general on education

Take a look! We hope you will enjoy the resources and information presented! Let us know if there are any resources that you think should be added to the list.

Anna

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Participation Requested: One Click Can Make a Huge Difference!

Dear Literacy is Priceless Readers,

I am writing to request your click (or rather your vote) here.

As many of you know, I am quite involved in a number of open education projects in various countries–in a nutshell projects that provide free curricula and technology resources to teachers and students across the globe.

One of the organizations I work with is Curriki–a 75K+ member community of educators that are committed to using and sharing education ideas and resources with education stakeholders across the globe. For example, Curriki has a project that is currently providing free Arabic language math and science resources to teachers in Yemen, a project to provide free curricula to teachers across Indonesia, along with various partnerships and projects in India, Bahrain, Europe, the US, etc.

Curriki is applying to get funding from the former Google Exec Paul Buchheit to build a full K-12 free curricula that can be used by any teacher in any school district anywhere in the world. In order to be considered for funding, Curriki needs a number of people to vote here (the whole process should take 1 minute max).

To learn more about the initiative and why Curriki would like to receive funding, check out this blog post.

Thanks!

Anna

PS If you happen to use twitter or if you blog, feel free to retweet and/or post this:

Your vote can help fund the development of free and open curricula! Please vote here: http://tinyurl.com/m2xn5h Feel free to RT! #OER

Widgets for the Literacy Enthusiasts

Reading Rockets had a number of very interesting reading widgets for parents and literacy enthusiasts! Check them out here.

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Audiobooks on the Go…

Over the last month and a half I’ve been to Dubai, Fujairah, Abu Dhabi, Muscat, Amsterdam, San Juan PR, San Germán PR, Charlotte NC, NY NY, Washington DC and Fairfax County VA logging dozens of hours in planes, cars and buses, not to mention several back issues of Wired Magazine, Julie and Julia, bits of Over Promise and Over Deliver, Match Me If You Can (audio) and the beginning of The Pillars of the Earth (audio). If it weren’t for my trusted iPod and large purse (which fits my laptop plus a book), my travels to and from schools to universities to family would have been very LOOOONG!

Luckily Audible and iTunes have a wonderful selection of audiobooks that can be downloaded from just about any country or airport savvy enough to grace its customers with free wifi (I know, if I had an iPhone I wouldn’t always be on a desperate hunt for hotspots! One gadget at a time!). Regardless, if you dine on audiobooks at the rate I do, you are likely to put on a few pound in the credit department!

Fortunately, Lit2Go might be just be the audiobook lovers version of Weight Watchers–Dine on what you want, but in portions that you won’t regret later. Who could pass up a delightfully free and high quality The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn audio/text? Or, a gratis afternoon of Jane Eyre?!

The site states:

Lit2Go is a free online collection of stories and poems in Mp3 (audiobook) format. You can:

• Download the files to your Mp3 player and listen on the go,
• Listen to the Mp3 files on your computer,
• View the text on a webpage and read along as you listen,
• Print out the stories and poems to make your own book.

Happy audiobook searching by author, title, keyword or reading level!

Anna

PS Thanks to Jim Moulton for point out this resources and many others in his Edutopia article, “How to Become More Tech Savvy This Summer“. The photo above was taken by Jon Rawlinson.

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Free Technology Tools for Literacy Teachers (NECC Unplugged)

This summer I’ve decided to take a mini break from Dubai’s 120 degree heat to spend some time doing technology trainings in the Caribbean and US. At the moment I am at the National Education Computing Conference in DC and with the 80 degree heat, I must say, it feels like winter!

If you are at NECC and have an interest in free literacy tools for your classroom, make sure to stop by NECC Unplugged at 11:30am EST (Wednesday, July 1). If you can’t make it to DC, you can sign into Elluminate and watch online (for more details on this, click here). I’ve posted my presentation on Slideshare and below. Feel free to take a look! Afterward, make sure to spend some time playing with FreeReading, Curriki and the other open education resources mentioned below!

Cheers,

Anna

PS To follow live coverage of NECC (through tomorrow), take a look at Curriki’s tweets with the tag #NECC09. We’ve been busy tweeting a number of links to literacy and technology tools for the classroom, as well as articles on open education.

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Rap, Hip Hop, Vocabulary, History and More… Word up!

Ever since I met the two founders of Flocabulary (Blake and Alex) in 2007, I’ve been a huge fan of the guys, their company and their mission.

Flocabulary helps teachers use hip hop and rap music to teach their students ELA, social studies. math and science. The Flocabulary site states:

The idea for Flocabulary first came to founder/lyricist Blake Harrison in high school. A good student who still struggled to memorize facts for tests, he wondered why it was so easy to remember lines to his favorite rap songs but so difficult to memorize academic information. Blake realized that if a rapper released an album that defined SAT vocab words, students would have a fun and effective way to study for the SAT…

Curious? Take a look at the video above and make sure to visit Flocabulary’s website after!

Word Up!

Anna

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