PLN+Ten

= = PLN 10: Kelsey, Erika, Erin F.

=EdTech Integration Mind Maps (6/23/11)=


 * How can instruction be enhanced or improved through the use of technology?**


 * Choose one of the 10 ideas presented in the "[|Getting Started]" article and diagram an action plan/flow chart, detailing how to build upon the idea chosen by the group.**

=e-Room Investigations (6/23/11)=

[] Mrs. Sol's Class:
 * Not only is Mrs. Sol's website very visually stimulating, it is thorough, bright, interactive, easy to navigate, and she provides numerous resources for her students, parents, and visitors. This may bew in large part because she is working from a virtual academy; however, it seems very doable for a classroom teacher, and it's really inspiring and motivating! PS. She has a link to an awesome blog!

**﻿Teaching Digital Natives Venn-Diagram (6/27/11) ** This Venn Diagram compares and contrasts both postive and negative attributes to teaching digital natives.

Teaching Digital Natives Venn-Diagram (6/27/11) by Erin This diagram below shows the positives and negatives of growing up and being a digital native.



PLN 10 Differentiation 7/7/2011

Objective 3: Students will be able to create a work of art and explain how the use of essential elements shaped an idea, mood or feeling found in the work.


 * Students || Content || Process || Product || Environment ||
 * Sherry || Provide magazines, paintColored pieces of paperInternet-set up to view museum websites to show examples of artwork that portrays the feelings || Can have a choice of materials to use in order to create a project that portrays a mood or emotion. This student can present their project to the class and explain orally why they chose to make the project in the way they did. || Create a project using any of the materials available to her. || Freedom to work with others ||
 * Jack || Provide books to inspire ideas || Student can decide whether he wants to orally share his project or write a paragraph to describe his project. || Creating a work of art with natural material (clay) that he can use his hands with || Freedom to choose to work with one other person or alone ||
 * Phillip || Act out his definition/explanation of this artwork || Explain through a dance/theatric performance || Dramatization || Freedom to work in a small group or alone ||

﻿Project Based Learning 7/13/2011 //**We Chose: MONSTER EXCHANGE **// [] We chose this project because...
 * geared towards primary grades
 * incorporates read, writing, and the arts
 * a lot of collaboration involved; takes the work outside of the classroom either class to class or school to school
 * teaches the importance of clear communication

Higher level thinking skills included...
 * comprehension
 * application
 * analysis

Technology is integrated into the project...
 * type writing
 * <span style="color: #008000; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">create monsters using online technology
 * <span style="color: #008000; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">email writing and pictures back and forth
 * <span style="color: #008000; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">create online forum to view descriptions/images
 * <span style="color: #008000; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">could add text to voice to read descriptions

<span style="color: #008000; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">The project could be improved by...
 * <span style="color: #008000; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">overall, we love it!
 * <span style="color: #008000; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">but....in browsing through we feel that teachers or students need to make sure more redrawn pictures are posted, only some are...
 * <span style="color: #008000; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 120%;">the site has a lot of stuff labeled as "under construction" could be frustrating for a class trying to join this project--however, we were thinking that classes could create their own forum/website/blog to do the same project!

<span style="color: #008080; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype','Book Antiqua',Palatino,serif; font-size: 160%;">Differentiation using Web 2.0 7/15/2011 Erika Sauder Philip Web 2.0 Tool: Wetoku [|http://wetoku.com] The tool I chose for Philip to complete and satisfy the art objective was Wetoku. Wetoku is a site similar to Skype, in that a person is able to either record a video, conduct an interview, or share/embed a video or interview. Wetoku is a great tool because unlike Skype, a student would be able to record and the most important feature, save his or her work. This would be crucial for a student project because I would want the student to be able to share their work. Especially for an art project, which is the objective our students must meet. It would also be a great tool for upper elementary students because they could upload to a class blog, and chat with other classes or experts locally and globally. I also think an important feature that this Web 2.0 tool offers is that you can adjust privacy settings. This would be crucial because there are options for publically sharing via Wetoku, Twitter, Facebook, etc. If you wanted to have it be strictly for school, you can adjust the privacy settings, you could require students to only upload a fictional photograph for their profile, and create password protected shows.

Our group's objective stated that students will be able to create a work of art and explain how the use of essential elements shaped an idea, mood or feeling found in the work. My student that I am focusing on for differentiation is Philip. Philip is hyperactive and likes to dance around the room when class periods come to an end. He is a very quick learner and seems to get things just from listening. In addition, he is a natural leader, he likes to excel and his reading and writing skills are both above grade level. In creating an art project where students were to create art and explain how the elements shaped a mood or feeling, I felt that if, and only if Philip did not want to use hands on art mediums/manipluatives (i.e. paint, pastels, collage, natural elements, pencils, markers, crayons, etc.) then I would want to remind students that art does not take one form on a piece of paper; art is music, sculpture, movement, dramatics, etc. Because Philip is hyperactive and likes to move around, I am assuming that he might enjoy creating a form of art in the form of movement that captures a mood or feeling. I felt that Wetoku would provide Philip with the opportunity to record himself acting out the feeling/emotion and then describing it. Although I feel like he could do this in front of the class because he is a natural leader. However, if he were feeling shy one day or was going through something emotionally, I feel that this program and activity definitely differentiates the product, but also differentiates the process, as every student or many students will be completing the same art project in any manner that speaks to them.

A great pairing...Philip will love being "on TV!" ~Mrs. L.

Erin Funkhouser Tech Class 7/15/11

I chose the student “Sherry”. Sherry is outgoing and likes to be asked to do things. Sherry loves to read, but has a hard time comprehending the information. Books don’t always hold her attention. The objective that we chose to work on is objective 3- create a work of art and explain how to use essential elements shaped on idea, mood or feeling found in the work.

I thought that the web 2.0 tool Voicethread would work for Sherry because you can adapt it to many things. The assignment would be for Sherry to create a slide show using photos that portray a mood or feeling. Sherry would have a lot of flexibility and she could use her “wild imagination”. I thought we could work on her reading comprehension because other students or other web viewers could post comments or write about her project that she created. This would hold her interest because all the comments would pertain to her. I would have to work out the details on how to make the project secure so that people that we didn’t know wouldn’t be able to write inappropriate comments.

This would be differentiated instruction because the process would be different than the other students. Sherry would be able to use a computer and manipulate the pictures online rather than cutting and pasting with a hard copy. She could focus solely on expressing her mood and feelings through pictures and she wouldn’t have to get hung up on reading and comprehension. Depending on the time that this project takes, we could work in adding comments, words, phrases and sentences into the slide show. This web 2.0 tool is very versatile in that way.

Below is a link to a poetry video done on Voicethread as an example. []

media type="file" key="Color Poetry Tech Class Project.swf" width="360" height="270"

Your ideas for differentiation via VT are excellent; all that is missing is a description of the VoiceThread interface. ~Mrs. L.

Kelsey Nelson Jack Web 2.0 Tool: Wordle http://www.wordle.net/

About Wordle: Wordle is a Web 2.0 application that allows students to create “word clouds.” These clouds display words in a creative fashion across a blank page. Students choose the text they want included on their page and then Wordle displays their information. For example, students can choose words or text about a specific topic, they can record descriptive words, or they could even save vocabulary words to help them study. Once their words are entered, Wordle automatically creates a new page, which displays their text; most common words used in the text, and any specific words they chose. Students can manually change the layout and format of the words on the generated page; they can change the text font, color, and shape, and they can choose the order in which their words are presented. This program allows students to create a work of art by altering the previously mentioned elements in order to create a specific mood or feeling, and to explain a specific topic. This program could be used by kindergarten through college students to express and display information.

Differentiating Content: Jack struggles in reading and writing, but strives with hands-on activities. He loves the outdoors, especially hunting and fishing, and seems to know everything about these sports. To differentiate the assignment in order to best reach Jack I will use the Web 2.0 application, Wordle. In the assignment I will differentiate the content by allowing him to choose any area of interest (most likely hunting or fishing) that he would like to create a Wordle page about. I will also differentiate the content by creating an opportunity for him to practice writing and reading strategies. He can use descriptive writing words to portray his chosen topic, and can read his completed Wordle to a partner, to me, or aloud to the class if he would like. This application will allow Jack to create a piece of artwork about something that interests him using the computer, something that is hands-on. It also allows him to successfully complete the given objective by altering different elements to his text in order to change the mood and feeling of his piece. In addition, Jack is practicing using descriptive words to create his piece of art and to explain his specific topic, an area he needs improvement in.



An interesting idea, using Wordle to differentiate content. Be sure you can tie his activities to the content being learned by others! ~Mrs. L.

Wordles! These are our wordles highlighting the five myths presented in the first article. 7/19/2011 Erin Funkhouser



<span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: Impact,Charcoal,sans-serif; font-size: 210%;">Erika Sauder Kelsey Nelson



<span style="color: #800080; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 190%;">Technology Implementations in Schools: Key Factors to Consider <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: Georgia,serif; font-size: 130%;">July 25, 2011
 * **Organization and School Structures**
 * 1) With a strong school structure there is more autonomy among teachers
 * 2) Administration plays a valuable role; helps build a school culture where teachers work together towards a share vision
 * 3) When technology implementation is supported by the entire school community, teachers are more likely to attempt the implementation in their classroom
 * Examples:
 * The principal at one school encouraged professional development--teachers would go and implement the things they learned (successful model)
 * Technology workshop for teachers put on by other teachers in the school and the administration
 * If everyone in the school is not on board, especially administration technology will not be implemented. Therefore, teachers could make a proposal or presentation to administrators highlighting the benefits, or implement the technology in their classroom and invite an administrator to observe the technology and see first hand one way it can be used.

<span style="color: #808000; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; font-size: 160%;">Educational Technology Resources July 29, 2011

Ties Magazine: The Magazine of Design and Technology Education http://tiesmagazine.org/ This magazine supports technology education and the integration of math and science in the K-12 classroom.
 * Magazines and Publications (Print and Online)**

@http://www.readingrockets.org/ @http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/home.jsp @http://kathyschrock.net/cooking/ All of the above listed sites provide not only educational technology resources but vast other resources that are extremely useful for teachers and since we are all creative, intelligent professionals, we can incorporate or not incorporate technology into our classrooms.
 * Teacher Tools**
 * Reading Rocket-A resource for helping struggling readers
 * Scholastic-Book, Book Clubs and ideas for lessons
 * The icing on the Cake-Online tools for classroom use (a smorgasbord of ideas)

Lesson Planet http://www.lessonplanet.com/lesson-plans/virtual-field-trip This website has great virtual field trips which would be nice since Google Earth is so unpredictable. However, after 10 days you will have to pay.
 * Lesson Plan Repositories**