Tuesday, May 8, 2012

IT Summit 2012 Cool Tools Duel by Dean Shareski and Alec Couros

Here is a link to last year's duel: IT Summit 2011 Cool Tools Duel 2011

Cool Tools Duel by Dean Shareski and Alec Couros

View the results of the Duel voting here: Results

Tool #1:Both tools for screencasting
Dean: Screencast-o-matic- www.screencast-o-matic.com
Alec: Present.me- http://present.me/


Tool #2: 
Dean: Language Immersion for Google Chrome (translate on the screen)- In Chrome (browser) Web Store (Search Language Immersion and install in your browser)
Alec: Remind101.com (text message without sharing numbers) - www.remind101.com 


Tool #3:
Dean: Trigger - Put the internet to work for you - http://ifttt.com/
Alec: Download YouTube videos- To get the script go to- http://bierber.ly/62e7


Tool #4:
Dean: Hire people for $5 to do things for you on fiverr - fiverr.com
Alec: Way to share media quickly - Dropmark- http://dropmark.com/


Tool #5:
Dean: Infographics: easel.ly - http://www.easel.ly/
Alec: Storify (Create social media stories) - storify.com


Tool #6:
Dean: Classdojo - Class management tool - http://teach.classdojo.com
Alec: Otixo - Bring tools all into one place - https://app.otixo.com


Tool #7:
Dean: iPad - Actionmovie FX - iTunes Store link
Alec: Google+ - Hangout feature and can make your hangout public by enabling a hangout on air using your YouTube channel (a way to broadcast your conversation)

Tool#8:
Dean: iPiccy - online photo editing tool including online photos - ipiccy.com
Alec: Egg Timer - e.ggtimer.com

School as Real Life - Session by Diane Laufenberg at Sask IT Summit 2012

Diane Laufenberg, Teacher
Science Leadership Academy
Philadelphia, PA
http://www.scienceleadership.org/ 
http://laufenberg.wordpress.com/


Great Web 2.0 Tool for student planning and creating diagrams and flowcharts: http://www.lucidchart.com/


Laufenberg spoke about authentic learning and taking advantage of real-life opportunities to engage her learners such as election day or public meetings. The students gather authentic documents (primary source documents) and footage that they then publish to their blogs and these artifacts are discussed in class.
Her students reflect on the learning process on their blogs. Their reflections really reflect the thought process and the difficulties or obstacles the students may have had to overcome to complete their project. Giving students the opportunity to have an authentic audience and challenge students to rise to the occasion can provide real student engagement. Tapping into student creativity and allow them to demonstrate their work in manner that allows them to articulate their learning can be very powerful.

Chris Lehmann and Diana Laufenberg - Building School 2.0 - TuesdayMorning at Sask. IT Summit 2012

Science Leadership Academy
Philadelphia, PA
http://www.scienceleadership.org/






This high school is a student centered, community supported, with a focus on collaboration. Students are encouraged to pursue their passions. They spend every Wednesday working on a project of their choice.


Teacher collaboration at its best where three subject teachers stream their classes live and work on an integrated delivery of the curriculum.


They are understanding-driven and centered on project-based classrooms. They end up doing 80 projects during their secondary career at the Academy and they are all presented.


Technology isn't the focus of the students' learning, it is a tool they use to support their learning.


All of the teachers' units are published online so their classrooms are very transparent. Everything is inquiry-driven centered around an essential question that is woven through all subjects for that grade level. This is all done through common lesson planning.


Assessment is done through three types of tools. Common rubric, narrative and standards-based. Students self-assess and then sit in groups and assess each other. By the time the teacher assesses the learning, they have already had a number of focused conversations to reflect on their learning.

Monday, May 7, 2012

Integrating QR Codes and Video Across the Curriculum, 2012 IT Summit Presentation

Here is my presentation that I gave at the 2012 Saskatchewan IT Summit.

Update: to be able to read QR codes on a PC desktop or PC laptop using your webcam, try QuickMark QR Code Reader.

Integrating qr codes and video
View more presentations from Joanna Sanders.

Alec Couros - IT Summit 2012 Monday Keynote

Alec Couros - The Power of Networks: Why it Matters in Education

@courosa
http://educationaltechnology.ca/couros/
Power of Networks
View more presentations from Alec Couros
It is importance of being a critical thinker in the digital age. Ideas can spread through society like viruses. Meme is a virus or an idea that spreads through a culture or society. Example - the video hoax about how to charge an ipod with an onion.
Meme can be used politically. Once you create one, you can get people to come back to the original story by sharing versions of it or by spreading the word through social media through sharing, liking on Facebook and retweeting something. Are you endorsing something by liking it? What is the impact of recommending a link to your friends on Facebook by liking something on Facebook or YouTube.

Digital Identity - Google Chrome commercial - A Dad writing emails to his daughter.
The average digital birth of children happens at about 6 months because people share information about their children, sometimes before they are even born through photos, video and social media postings. The best idea is to overload Google with good stuff so that anyone that searches your name will have only good things to read about you.

Network Literacy - understanding how networks function is the most important literacy of the 21st Century. How did Obama get elected? There are a lot of great places to participate, such as using hashtags in Twitter to be part of different conversations. Social and crowdsourced information can influence where you stay or where you eat.

The rise of the networked individual. We have evolved from little boxes in our classrooms, to connecting to others in our school or city and now we are connected to people around the world. We are connected now to a person than to a house. (Phoning a cell phone rather than a land-line).

You are the hub for all of your learning. It used to be the role of the classroom but now it is the responsibility of the individual to be in charge of your own learning. Classrooms are there to help guide us and ensure we know how to navigate the individualized learning path.