Podcasting in Ed Tech Meeting

We are divided into groups and creating Podcasts using Garage Band. We had a lot of fun with Wade. He decided he wanted out podcast to be about brownies, so our group each talked about our favorite brownies. That Wade is crazy! This was a fun activity.

I learned about ducking. It's not just for hunting or shooting anymore.

Grant Reading at Qwest

It was a very interesting day. I learned a lot of great ideas from the proposals that we read and listened to the group read. We approved funding of $50,000 to be used in technology integration. I really liked some of the grants, but others were a bit weak. We would have liked to fund more. We were unable to fund the whole amount requested for one of the grants. The diverse personalities were also interesting for me to see. It is interesting that even though we are all educators, we all have very different opinions and experiences. What one group found fund-"worthy", other groups thought they were not that special.

I hope to be included next year. I think having this year's experience will be helpful.

Second Grader Creating Shapes

This video is of a second grade student creating shapes using Pages. The students had to draw the shapes, then manipulate the words to match the shapes. We were unable to create a hexagon in the time allowed, so we stopped with the triangle.

C-Forum January

LAN School Demo-good for working with lab activities.
SIRS Data base
Pros and Cons good for secondary.
You can play the audio files which will read the file for you.
Good Online Graphic Organizer. Saves to the SIRS server.
You can email it to your email address after you save it.
There is a 2-hr credit course from UEN on Pioneer Library. It is completely online.

NetSafe
netsafeutah.org

eMedia
Phase 1:
new rollout of:
Blackboard
replace the existing system
New logos
Blackboard integration
new browsing strategies
catalogs
content
Basic functionality is retained.
Can still browse by Utah core
Reading Rainbow-available in snip-its and also in the full episodes
Phase 2:
PBS' Digital Learning Library and other digital repositories.
Safari is best for macs and Firefox for PCs
No longer a Download Now. Right/click then save as.

Thinkfinity
ArtsEdge
Making connections with arts and core curriculum
Use various art forms in the regular curriculum
Explore is hands-on interactives
Always highlight the current day in the arts, a Look, lesson, learn activities.

The photography activity is very good.
There are few interactives but not that many
Comparing Cinderella Stories- you would need to read the different stories.

USOE Update
Utah will be applying for Race to the Top
Every district will get somewhere from $50k-$2.5m per year
Qwest Grant Reading next Friday
Idaho is trying to build a UEN.
They have funding from the state and a foundation to begin.
They are beginning with videoconferencing.
They don't have a good backbone like we have.
They are using Title II D money.
They need help with Grant Proposals
February 16 /webinar/ instructions, etc.
Will come back together the first part of March to
see who gets the funding
Rick needs 20 readers.

Video Conferencing

I've been spending the better part of the past two days looking
at good resources for Videoconferencing. I have found the COSI
and CILC are the best so far. While NASA has some good ones,
I believe that these other sites offer more of a variety for our younger
students, and of course, a wider variety of curriculum topics.

AverPens

My plan is to teach at least one lower grade and one upper grade class about AverPens.
I will develop and help facilitate a lesson to integrate AverPens.

Wikispaces

I am teaching a session at UCET on Wikispaces.

iMovie/Podcasting

This podcast was my first at comparing both Garage Band and iMovie. iMovie was MUCH easier for this type of podcast. I used the illustrations that the students made along with their podcast recordings. In putting the illustrations with the audio files, it was much easier to use iMovie than Garage Band due to the length of each podcast track and matching it with the illustrations. The study of Ancient Egyptian cultures and customs is part of the sixth grade core.