Thing 13: Locating and Subscribing to Podcasts

What a great way to gather information in this information technology driven world.

I chose to subscribe to NPR Education Podcast:
http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast/podcast_detail.php?siteId=17350298

I very excited to explore other podcasting resources. One that I began playing around in is PodOmatic - a website where you can create, find, and share podcasts. I'm sure there are other sources available.

I've had iTunes downloaded on my computer, but haven't played around with it until Thing 13! I am looking forward to playing with these tools more this summer.

Thing 12: Learn About Podcasting

Podcasting is a great tool for the creative expression of knowledge preferred by today's students, and provides an exciting way for students and educators to explore and discover educational content. When students create a podcast for class, they not only learn the content in a creative way, they learn 21st-century communications skills at the same time.

Podcasting allows educators to take their students beyond traditional assignments by letting them use voice recordings, photos, movies, and sound effects to share their knowledge. I like many of the classroom uses; students who draft and perform scripts as a writing assignment, create a visual progress report for an ongoing project, or submit a recorded version of a science presentation.

I specifically like that podcasting is a great way for educators to deliver content to their students. They can distribute homework assignments, record book narration for beginning readers to read along with, or create foreign language lessons that students can review at their own pace. For educators and administrators, podcasting is an effective tool for professional development, as well as for communicating with parents about classroom activities and school announcements.

Thing 11: Create a Wiki

I've been meaning to create a wiki regarding 9th Grade Diversity training, now I've got one started:

http://9thgradediversity.wikispaces.com/

I think this will be a great resource for the schools that are scheduled to participate. I want this to be a site where school leaders can go and get information. I also want them to leave their feedback on how it is going. Another page for me to add is "What_Next?" This will give schools a place to share what type of planning and activities they will do to make the training sustainable. This will be a great tool for the schools to see what other schools are doing and get ideas!

This is so much more of a collaborating tool than a blog, which is "mine" and people can comment. One of the greatest obstacles for this training has been parental consent and staff awareness. Another page in this wiki will give all participants the opportunity to edit a parental consent letter to make get the best information to parents for student participation.

I'm very eager to share this with schools that participated in the training this year, to better prepare schools participating next year!

Thing 10: Learn about Wikis

I have seen many great wiki sites. What a great tool for collaboration. My son's class used a wiki to report on books the students were reading at school. My son, who is a reluctant reader, became totally involved in the project! He started reading more, so he could post his comments on the class wiki site. It was a complete 180! I no longer had to push and beg him to read, he was so excited to share his opinions and ideas - all I had to do was sit back and watch his excitement evolve!

I love it when presenters give you a wiki site with all their links. I recently participated in a webcast with Wesley Fryer, his wiki for the presentation Quick Victories

Another one I've booked marked from a conference in 2007 - Connecting and Collaborating

For the past year, I've been working with 16 schools on 9th grade diversity training. A wiki will be a great way for me to collaborate with the building teams and improve my communication for the next 20 schools schedule for training in 2008-09.

Thing 9 - Online Line Image Generator

I tried Image Generator to create my image. I found it challenging as the directions were not very clear, but I managed to figure it out. I think student would have a great time using these generators for classroom and home projects. I could see a Mother's Day or Father's Day gift using a parents picture and adding it to a Glamour or Sport magazine cover!

The other option Big Huge Labs appeared to be easier to use with much less advertising. Students are very creative and these tools are great resources! I'll have to spend more time playing with both of these.

The photo is of my kids in a cave they "Discovered" on a hike to a waterfall. I can see them both wanting to take more pictures and play with them using these tools. I may need to buy them both digital cameras, so they won't fight over mine!

Thing 8 - Have Some Flickr Fun

These are great mashups! It was fun trying them out, I think students would feel the same way. I can see my own son having a great time with his spelling list if he could practice typing them into spelling with Flickr and printing out the images. The mashup tools are engaging and could be used to enhance student projects and reports.

I posted a comment regarding how do you find the mashups, as they are created by third party programmers. It would be smart of Flickr to offer a Mashup page with links to such great resources.

Thanks for showing these new tools to us!