The StarW Journal

Text of an email sent Friday night to the StarW teachers...

Hi Ladies,

I looked at the calendar for the rest of the year. I have only one or two conflicts on Thursdays and there are a few scheduled school closings that preclude Thursdays. Here's what things look like on my calendar. We can always add or remove a day here and there or move a Thursday if necessary. We can talk about the conflicts as we get closer to them.

Kristen is in the midst of changing email addresses. Please pass this and other coming messages on to her.

Sept. 30 - ETTC training day
Oct. 2, 9, 16, 23, 30 - Mentoring
Nov. 6 is NJEA - No visit this week
Nov. 13, 20 - Mentoring
Nov. 27 - Thanksgiving. No visit this week
Dec. 4, 11, 18 - Mentoring
Jan. 8, 15, 22 - Mentoring
Jan. 27 - ETTC training day
Jan 29 - I have previous committment on the 29th. No visit this day.
Feb. 5 - I will be in Texas this whole week
Feb. 12, 19, 26 - Mentoring
Mar. 4, 11, 18, 25 - Mentoring
Apr. 1 - Mentoring
Apr. 8 - You have early dismissal. No visit this week
Apr. 22, 29 - Mentoring
May 6, 13, 20, 27 - Mentoring

I believe this schedule is a few days over what the grant will fund, but some of these may be testing for you or other conflicts. So this offers some flexibility.

See you Tuesday.

Art

Arrived at Dr. MLK Complex, checked in individually with all of the teachers, and made arrangements to meet with them during their prep periods. One common theme surfaced immediately. They were all having problems with the technology. Even though getting the technology functioning is not the best use of my time, it is critical for teachers to have dependable hardware when they need it. Many of the problems were easy to fix as long as I could get beyond the FoolProof security software. A good part of the morning was devoted to getting things up and running. With a few minor exceptions, things are functioning. Printing freezeups seem to be frequent problems because of the spoolers. When I fixed those problems, I showed the teachers how to power down the systems and spooler to clear all memory.

I met with Claudette and talked about the network configuration. She provided me with the password and I was able to get most of the systems up and running. There were a few problems that were related to network settings. Claudette showed which settings were causing the problem and we were able to address those issues quickly.

One immediate problem is the fact that the computers do not have floppy drives, nor are there network folders for students to save work. Saving in the my document folders is not a good solution, because there is no easy way to back them up, everyone has access to them, and students must return to the same machine to work on them. I'm not sure how we can work around the problem, but I'm going to investigate.

We met during preps and got some logistics out of the way. I'll be coming in on Thursdays instead of Fridays. The teachers felt that was a better day for them.

Some immediate needed that were expressed were:
1) A list of resouces to send students to
2) The creation of a long term, web based activity that students can go to for extra credit
3) Access to favorites so that they can create bookmarks for students. (Possible topic for workshop)

We discussed keeping journals using blogs. They liked the idea. We will make Blogs for Journals and a blog for each class. They can be workarounds for issues 1 & 3 above.

We talked about the training on Tues and on 10/10.
1) Blogs
2) Explore resources and use Excel to create a database
3) Introduce 3DWriter
4) Introduce Hot Potato - This may be the topic of 10/10 training. They can use the software to create activities to go with ICDL and resources they gather 9/30.

Next Thursday when I visit, I will work with all of the students to give them an introduction to computers and the Internet. I'll meet with 3rd grades in the morning adn 4th in the afternoon. I made arrangements with Claudette for a projector.

StarW To Do List for Friday, 9/26/06

In preparation for my visit to Dr. MLK Complex tomorrow, I have put together a To Do list.

Get E-mail addresses

Set visit dates

Look at long term Technology in Context diagram

Address and discuss immediate use of resources vs long term StarW goals


Show blog as a tool for journal writing and possible use with students.
      If teachers want to do it, set up accounts during the day.

Look at StarW curriculum
      Discuss StarW curriculum in light of whole language approach

Possible topics for integrating into Reading/Writing workshops
      Explore and evaluate resources gathered by mentor
      Build personal and group resource database with Excel
      Teacher made web site - (3DWriter training during prep period)
      Posting of projects, assignments, and rubrics for dissemination

Creating authentic projects as per StarW grant
      Web-and-Flow
      Fingertips to the Floor
      Classroom exchanges
      Neighborhood Geography a la Barbara Soto

Web tools for collecting data

Hot Potato software

Blogs

Journal from 9/14/03 - 9/22/03

9/14/03

Loaded Kid Pix and Kidspiration on my computer. Played with both of them and went thought the Kidspiration tutorial. Located and printed a tutorial for Kid Pix.

9/15-9/18 - See email exchanges for details

9/18/03 - Both cars are going in for repairs and hurricane Isabella is threatening for Friday. Had to cancel and reschedule my mentoring visit for next Friday.

Sent the following email in lieu of the cancellation:

Greetings Ladies,


I'd like to let you know what I've been up to, take some time to share with you what I had hoped to do tomorrow, and give you some things to think about for when we meet together on my next visit. 


I'm going to throw a lot at you in this message for two reasons.  First, when I take on a project such as this, I immerse myself in it.  I can do that, because I have a commodity that many people do not, namely time. However, you don't have that luxury and with me coming once a week, we want to make the best use of the time I am there.  I'll be making good use of the time I'm not there.  Second, as a technology mentor and someone who has been working with building online learning communities since 1983, I would be not doing my job if I did not make use of online communications and other technology tools in my mentoring. 


Here we go.


- Tomorrow I was hoping to work out some logistics with you about how I should check in with you and how we are going to work together.  There are 8 of you and one of me.  No matter how much I try to act like an octopus, I still only have two hands.


- Until we get some projects going, if there are times that there are not specific requests from you, I don't want to be spending time in the teacher's room on my own.  As long as you are comfortable with it,  I would like to be spending time in your classes observing what you are doing.  This will give me a better feel for your curriculum and how we can use technology to meet your specific needs.


- I'm hoping that part of the game plan will be to make best use of some of your common prep time for small group mentoring.  Think about that and we can discuss it when we meet.


- As part of my "immersion", I expect, at least in these early days, to be putting in about one day a week in prep for the one day that I am there. Hence, the more specific you can be about your needs and expectations, the better I can plan and prepare.


Back in 1998 I was asked to do an Internet workshop for Cape May librarians.  When I asked my contact what they wanted, she gave me a wonderful answer.  She said, "It's difficult to tell you what we want, because we don't know what we need."  That told me a great deal. 


While you are not in that position, by virtue of the training you have had, you may well feel that you are suffering from a kind of information overload.  You have a lot of new skills, but may not be sure how they all fit together to build improve reading and writing.  You may not be sure where it all fits and how you will fit it all in, in the time you have. 


We'll don't feel bad.  One of the goals here is to get you to the point where you are aiming at a specific reading or writing standard or skill and will know instinctively how technology can help you and your students achieve it faster or better.  Hopefully, with the right kind of practice, that's what we will be achieving over time.   


I say, "the right kind of practice", because the saying of Practice Makes Perfect is wrong.  Practice makes proficient.  If you practice poor technique, you will gain proficiency in that poor technique.  The correct saying should be that "Perfect Practice Makes Perfect." 


- Whenever we plan, do, or evaluate an activity we should have specific curricular goals and mind and be asking ourselves how the technology we are using will help us reach those goals.  As a classroom teacher, I know that my total focus was on the kids and I didn't have the time and fortunately didn't have the need to be gathering the kind of evidence that is now required under No Child Left Behind.  One of our challenges is going to be figuring out how technology can help us in that area.  The Palms and the Dana AlphaSmarts can help us in that regard. 


- As I left last week, I can away with a sense of some of what you want.  There was a need for using Kidspiration. Some folks were working on PowerPoint projects and might need help.  But we didn't decide who, what, and when.


Some folks expressed a need to get some good web sites for children to visit and during my short visit with the 4th grade, you mentioned that you use somewhat of a team approach and that you needed sites other than just reading.


- I've been busy playing with Kidspiration, locating the best possible reading and writing resources, creating a temporary home for us http://oii.org/starw on the web site of the Online Internet Institute, an educational non-profit that of which I am the technology director, and building a resource/ tool for us to use and share with the world.


- I mentioned to the 4th grade teachers that the real power of the Internet is the people and the networking.  The longer you are online and the more active you are, the greater the potential for tapping into that power.  After I left you folks I began to do some research and to plug my human network.  


Here's  what I did. You needed good web resources so I just asked 15,000 close friends to help me.  I belong to an Internet mailing list called LM_Net.  It's a community of about 15,000 library media specialist.  Explained my situation, asked for their help by writing to me privately, and told them that I would post a compilation of what they send me back to the list.  This the acceptable way to ask for help on a mailing list.


They came through. http://www.oii.org/starw/resources.htm However, what we have little more than many excellent starting places.  We now have to determine what resources we can use, how, and when to use them. That's a task we can talk about when we meet and tackle in part through the upcoming training sessions. 


- While I was researching writing sites, I came across single page that had a list of a few hundred writing prompts. http://www.canteach.ca/elementary/prompts.html It was nice, but would be difficult to use effectively. I had an idea of how it might be useful to you folks, other StarW schools, or anyone. Wrote to the folks who ran the web site and told them that I would like to use their prompts to create a Random Writing Prompt Generator.  I explained what I wanted to do, asked permission to use their list and told them that I would give them credit for supplying the text.  They gladly agreed and asked that I send them the finished link so that they could link from their site back to it. Here's what I made for you and anyone else.  http://www.oii.org/starw/prompts/prompts.shtml


Again, this is an example of how technology can save time and result in collaborations that make products that are greater than the sum of their parts.  I could never have come up with that list of prompts myself.  They didn't have the idea, the resources, or the skills to turn it into an interactive activity. We made the connection in cyberspace and in a matter of about an hour their list was the Random Writing Prompt Generator.


Finally, while I was in Janine's class I took some digital pictures of her class doing Math Rap.  We don't have a specific use for them yet, but if we did, wouldn't it be great if she could see them and share them with her class before we got together again?  Well, she can.  While it would be illegal to post them to a school web site without the written permission of parents, I could mail them to her, but there is an even better way.  I created a password protected area of the OII web site and posted the pictures there with no text.  This is perfectly legal because it is not a school web site and it is not public. Right after I sent this message, I'll send you the URL, user name, and password to use to get in.  I don't want to put it here, because this will become part of my journal and will be seen by others. 


Incidentally, this password protected area can be used for anything else that we want to be able to all access privately.


If this message was hand delivered, I don't have or didn't get your email address.  Please send it to me so that I can put you on the StarW mailing list.


I think that's enough for now.  ;->


Take care,

Art


9/19/03 - Just remembered Hot Potato Software to allow teachers to create lessons and quizzes for the classroom. http://www.hotpotato.com

Some examples of literacy lessons http://www.bridgendgfl.net/resources/Hot_Potatoes/lessons/literacy/index.htm

Examples of student created quizzes http://www.bridgendgfl.net/resources/Hot_Potatoes/lessons/quizzes%20made%20by%20children/index.htm

Tutorials & Resources http://web.uvic.ca/hrd/hotpot/tutorials.htm

9/20/03 - Begin to brainstorm and build an Inspiration map of the different activities we can do and services I can offer so that we can prioitize them and plan training. Build a survey that StarW schools can use for this purpose.

9/21/03 - Sent email to teachers to see if they needed any help for Back to School Night. If so, I could come in on Wed.

Journal from 9/8/03 - 9/13/03

9/8/03

Met with Dina, Marilyn, & Phil about first steps. Will meet teacher at MLK Center on Friday to get the lay of the land, see the classroom setups and explore where we are going.

Dina to get StarW Reading Curriculum tomorrow.

Have to get information about Lodi test to understand the assessment the teachers took.

Students will have AlphaSmarts, teachers have laptops and will get Palm training. Looking to make a Palm-AlphaSmart connection for tech use.

Seven computers in a classroom. Software: Office, Kidspiration, Kidpix, Hyperstudio. Each pair shares a cart with projector, scanner, digital camera, and video camera.

When doing things with teachers, I need to keep in mind the need to collect data for evalutation.

Went home to look for Palm applications that teachers can use.

http://www.freewarepalm.com/games/prizewheel.shtml Can use to select random students, numbers, etc.

http://www.goknow.com/Products/PiCoMap/ Concept mapping that can be beamed to any infrared enabled printer

http://www.goknow.com/Products/Cooties/ Use as vision building for student use of Palms for collaborative work

http://www.tomsnyder.com/subscriptions - Signed up for a demo of Tom Snyder's Reading for Meaning program (Class ID: wolinsky, Class Password: wolinsky) Login standard. This would be a good site to explore for possible use with teachers and students.

9/9/03

Researching improving reading through technology. Short of specific CAI programs, there is little material. The emphasis is on teachers and the basal text along with support material. This would include the technology support. The key is focusing on the curricular objective and determining how technology can enhance the lesson. ie. use of graphic organizers, email, word processing, multimedia production, WebQuests, etc.

Tom Snyder's Reading for Meaning would only be good if schools had classroom sets of books used in the lessons.

Check to see what kind of subscription databases are available.

Use the web to do reading for current events etc.

Show Tom March's Best WebQuests http://www.bestwebquests.com/
Show the following to see if this type of activity, based on a book they are reading, would be a good goal.
Light in the Forest http://www.bestwebquests.com/bwq/wqdetail.asp?siteid=98
A Tale to be Told http://www.bestwebquests.com/bwq/wqdetail.asp?siteid=59

9/11/03

Just rememberd seeing the International Children's Digital Library project at Computers in Libraries Conference. It is PERFECT for the StarW grant. It is a 5-year research project that uses children 7-11 as a major part of the design of the interface. It draws from the best of children's literature from around the world. There are many ways it can be incorporated in to the MLK curriculum. Installed the software on my two machines, explored the site, and got familiar with interface.

The Java version has high end system requirements of Java Plug-in 1.41, fast processor, broadband connection, and 256 Meg memory (128 min) If Java version isn't an option, there is a basic web interface.

Spoke with Anu today and suggested we get Stafford and AC StarW classes together . Will bring up to Marilyn tomorrow. Jamie Supenaro is the Stafford mentor. I have worked with her and she is good.

Brian and JC will be building a 3D-animation program as part of their Astronomy unit. They cut their teeth last year by developing the Pinelands Adventure in 2D.

Show teachers the Bugs Adventure as a possible collaborative project for small groups. Could be an end product of a WebQuest

9/12/03

Met with all of the teachers and began to get the lay of the land. Spent

the afternoon in Mrs. Riggins' class getting acclimated to the world of

3rd grade.


One of the activities the students did was a math rap activity.

I took digital pictures as they did the rap and it gave me an idea that

students could come up with their own rap that could be presented to other

classes as a writing activity.


Based on my day with Mrs. Riggins, if I don't have specific requests when

I visit, I think it's a good idea for me to make my base of operations for

the day in a different teacher's classroom. This will give me a better

feel for the type of activities that will best fit the curriculum.


Below are some links to sites I researched during lunch based on requests

from the teachers.


http://illuminations.nctm.org/mathlets NCTM Illuminated applets


http://www.webmath.com/ Shows how to do math problems. Can be used by

students to check work.


http://www.aaamath.com/index.html

Hundreds of pages of Basic Math Skills.

Interactive Practice on every page.

An Explanation of the math topic on each page.

Several Challenge Games on every page.

Math Problems are randomly created.


http://www.auntymath.com/ Math word problems that kids can submit the

answers to.


-------------------------------------------------


http://www.nwrel.org/assessment/lessonplans.asp?odelay=2&d=2 NWREL Reading Skills Lessong


http://www.aesopfables.com/ 655 Aesop's Fables




http://ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/ Guide to Grammar and Writing


http://pbskids.org/lions/index.html Between the Lions - A PBS award

winning site.


http://www.funbrain.com/ Interactive games - OK, but not outstanding


It looks like Friday is going to be a good day for me to visit. That will

give me the weekend to get things together and send an early week email

with resources, ideas, etc.


After coming home, I did a little searching and came up was a site that had a few hundred writing prompts in different categories. http://www.canteach.ca/elementary/prompts.htm I turned the straight text file into interactive web pages that allow the students to click on a category for a writing prompt and the system will generate at random prompt from the list.


This this is not something that is likely to be available to other StarW schools. It requires administrative access to the server. As mentor I have no access to the ETTC server and it would take days to accompish through ETTC. However, as the Technology Director of the Online Internet Institute, http://www.oii.org I have access to the administrative level of our server any time of the day or night and I can host the pages there.


The creation of the site, the editing of scripts and random lists, and the server work took about four hours, but from here on in the creation of any kind of similar activity can be done in minutes.


The idea of a random generator is something that the teachers can keep in mind, because all that it requires is the generating of a list of items to be randomized and a few minutes to edit the script and post it to the web.


I planted the seed for one type of online activity that can be customized specifically for their classes. I'll water it a little and see what it grows.


I've compiled all of these links and others on a resouces page at http://www.oii.org/starw/resources.htm



9/13/03

I mentioned to the 4th grade teachers that the real power of the Internet is the people and the networking. I tapped into that power last night by sending a message for help to the LM_Net mailing list. Who better to suggest good reading resources than 15,000 library media specialist. Since I am an active contributer, the responses began coming in right away and I'm adding them to the StarW resources page at OII.

Starting my Blog Journal

This is a web-log, more commonly known as a blog. Blogs are beginning to take hold as a popular way to publish information directy to the web any time from anywhere you may have an Internet connection.

The first entries will be material that I have copied and pasted from the 3DWriting journal that I have been using for the first few weeks of the project. I will archive them here and hereafter I will be posting directly to the blog.