CEMaT Ed Tech Connection

It was announced at the 2008 National Educational Computing Conference in San Antonio last week that Apple will now offer K-12 institutions the ability to distribute audio and video content through iTunes U. Eight states, including Michigan, will serve as pilot content providers. Michigan Department of Education’s corner of iTunes U is called MI Learning. (Search for MI Learning in iTunes.) At the time of this post, MDE has uploaded about 100 free pieces of educational media for public consumption from 5 main providers of content. MDE plans for offer stipends to local educators to develop content. The focus will be on Michigan history although other content areas are welcome.

In an interview, Michigan Department of Education’s Director of Educational Technology and Data Coordination, Bruce Umpstead said these rich media assets for teachers, students and parents, “make education more relevant to where the students are at today.”

According to Director Umpstead, iTunes is blocked by most school districts due to the possibility of questionable content and downloading large amounts of data not related to curriculum that have the ability to clog schools’ networks.  So, why go through iTunes to distribute media? Director Umpstead citied these reasons:
•    To get educational media into the hands of students, engage them as lifelong, 24 hour learners, outside of classrooms
•    For parents to understand that the hardware their children use (computers, mp3 players, etc.) can be used as learning tools to access relevant educational content. When parents start to ask districts about using these technologies, districts start to listen.
•    For teachers to post media
•    Apple (iTunes) has a big share in the distribution of digital media

Unfortunately, at this time a glance at the 100 or so pieces of media on MI Learning shows that many of items are not geared toward students. Only about 30% focus on curriculum (Marketing).

Michigan Department of Education has partnered with MACUL on the project. Judy Paxton is the part time coordinator. She can be contacted at jpaxton@macul.org

Related links:
Listen to the Inside Michigan Education interview with Bruce Umpstead
Related article in the THE Journal (note: site supported by many ads)

PBS Frontline just aired an important episode called Growing Up Online.  It explores how the Internet is “transforming the experience of childhood” for some youths.  If you missed it, you can view the entire program online (high bandwidth needed) at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/kidsonline/
In addition to the episode, the site also offers extended interviews with experts, links to helpful resources, a chance for viewers to post their ideas to a discussion board (a fascinating read) and more.  The Growing Up Online Teachers’ Guide should be ready for people to access in February.

What are the implications of the topics explored in the episode for Lenawee County residents?

21st Century fundraising

Are you seeking funds in order to buy camcorders and tripods for that new, cross-curricular unit your grade level or subject area team recently developed? Consider writing a student-project proposal and posting it to the Donors Choose web site where the motto is, “Teachers ask. You choose. Students learn.” The site, somewhat like Kiva, creates a place and process that connects public school teachers who need resources to improve student learning with donors who want to give financial help. As of this writing, there are only 6 teachers from Michigan with proposals online at Donors Choose seeking to fund projects that ask for between $378 and $799.

Interested? There are 2 main criteria that submissions (proposals) at DonorsChoose.org must meet:

1. All requested resources must be used by students or directly provide a student experience.
2. The proposal cannot foster discrimination or proselytize a religious or political viewpoint.

According to the Donors Choose site, most successfully funded proposals are under $400. Proposals stay online for 8 months, and if a proposal does not get fully funded, the listing expires. For more information, see the Donors Choose Help page.

Please note: Lenawee ISD is not affiliated with DonorsChoose.org in any way. This blog posting is simply spreading the word about an opportunity.

The National Educational Computing Conference put together each year by ISTE recently took place in Atlanta, GA. ISTE has posted tons of great media online from NECC 2007 that you can access for free. Check out the wealth of info and share with other educators:

Video webcasts of various sessions
Highly recommend if you only have time for 1 or 2:

• Thinkfinity (formerly MarcoPolo) overview of free interactive web resources
• Closing keynote w/ Dr. Tim Tyson and students from Mabry Middle School, GA (start at 8:00 min.)

Podcasts
(When I try to play these audio files through the Apple Learning web site, they are making my browsers, Firefox and IE, crash. Try accessing them from iTunes > search: conference connections) Highly recommended: Ian Jukes, Mitchel Resnick

Links to people who blogged NECC 2007

Lastly, you can search for presenters’ handouts

Enjoy! ~ Greg

The 2007 MACUL conference was a success. There were many attendees from Lenawee County, including a strong contingent from Onsted. There were many fine presentations from some big names in educational technology such as Patrick Crispen, Leslie Fisher, Annette Lamb, Will Richardson, and Macomb County’s Jim Wenzloff. Click on each of their names to access the presentation material related to the conference.

Perhaps the best way to get a sense of what some of the sessions offered is to check out the MACUL Conference blog which was written on the spot by reputable conference attendees with blogs of their own.  They worked hard throughout the conference to capture information that we could all use and access later. Thanks!!

We see time and time again how streaming video can be used for professional development and lifelong learning. Here’s just one more example ~

Wayne County RESA has released the 17 minute video Telling the Story: Early Childhood Social & Emotional Development on the MIStreamNet site from Michigan’s REMC. Anyone with enough bandwidth can
Download this video. Bonus idea: share it with parents in your community!

If you are a person who is really getting in to reading various blogs or listening to podcasts, it may be hard to keep up. Perhaps it is time to start looking at using the power of technology to send updates on all of those blogs and podcasts and whatnot to one place - an RSS feed reader. Here’s a quick description of RSS from Trey Martindale as written on his blog Teachable Moment -

Essentially, it is a new way to get information. It is an automated service that retrieves what you request, and then arranges the content so that you can peruse it at your leisure (and who doesn’t love leisurely perusing?). RSS is akin to having a cadre of personal librarians at your beck and call. And these librarians never tire from scampering around the Net, collecting all the news, updates, articles, search results, podcasts, multimedia, and other stuff you request. Here’s one more analogy–it’s like having your own completely personalized newspaper, brought to your doorstep daily (or hourly, for that matter).

RSS feed readers let you subscribe to RSS feeds from sites that you may frequent. Some RSS feed readers cost money and some are free. One popular, free RSS feed reader is Bloglines. If you are interested in setting up a free Bloglines account and subscribing to some RSS feeds, here’s a pdf handout from the 2006 MACUL conference and a Lenawee ISD Web 2.0 workshop to help you: Creating a Bloglines account and subscribing to an RSS feed

Here’s another resource from Will Richardson, who writes the blog Weblogg-ed the read/write web in the classroom, formerly with Hunterdon HS in NJ - RSS: A Quick Start Guide for Educators

Attention Mac users with iLife ‘06 software: MACUL members may recall Atomic Learning for their high-quality screen capture web-based tutorials. From now until September 15, 2006, Atomic Learning is offering free access to their tutorials on using the iLife suite of software for podcast and vodcast creation.  Enjoy!

Issues surrounding “social networking” web sites and how online predators have used them to lure and hurt youth have frequently been in the headlines lately. While youth of today may be Internet savvy, they are not necessarily savvy about relationships and the minds and methods of those who may seek to harm them. There is no substitute for the implementation of a sound Internet Safety curriculum scaled to reach students of all ages, like i-SAFE mentioned below. Many other reputable resources for Internet safety are also listed.

INTERNET SAFETY RESOURCES FOR ADULTS

Internet Keep Safe Coalition
http://ikeepsafe.org/

Resources for educators, parents, and grandparents (and students, see below) including tips, videos, and activities from a coalition of government leaders, crime prevention organizations, law enforcement agencies, foundations and corporate sponsors.

i-SAFE
http://www.isafe.org/

i-SAFE America Inc. is a federally designated non-profit Internet safety foundation founded in 1998. i-SAFE offers free, age-appropriate, proactive curriculum to schools. Click here to register and begin i-LEARN, online training to become certified in i-SAFE. Completing the training (about 2 hours) grants individuals access to the Internet safety curriculum which educators can implement with students.

NetSmartz
http://www.netsmartz.org/

Many interactive resources for students, parents, educators, & law enforcement. “Real-Life Stories” page includes videos and animations from the perspectives of kids with related activity cards and news articles. “NetSmartz was created by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children^® (NCMEC) and Boys & Girls Clubs of America (BGCA).”

North Carolina Department of Justice Video
http://www.ncsbi.gov/icac/icac_parents_safetyvideo.jsp

Page features a video titled Internet Safety: What You Don’t Know Can Hurt Your Child that can be streamed to a computer. The larger site also includes much useful information.

Parent’s Guide to Internet Safety
http://www.fbi.gov/publications/pguide/pguidee.htm

Credible info and tips from the US Department of Justice FBI publications.

Web Wise Kids
http://www.wiredwithwisdom.org/

A nonprofit organization located in Southern California that offers software for purchase: Missing (an interactive Internet safety game for grades 6 - 9) Wired With Wisdom (“designed to give parents the confidence and skills they need to manage their family’s Internet environment”) & Mirror Image (“detective-style computer game that teaches teens to be safe in online chat rooms by challenging players to outsmart a cyber stalker”)

WiredSafety
www.wiredsafety.org

“WiredSafety provides help, information and education to Internet and mobile device users of all ages… We operate Teenangels, WiredKids, Cyber Law Enforcement and Internet Super Heroes, as well as WiredSafety.org and were founded by Internet lawyer, Parry Aftab.”

INTERNET SAFETY SITES FOR STUDENTS

Don’t Believe the Type (for teens)
http://tcs.cybertipline.com/

Site for teens to learn about Internet dangers (of chat rooms, social networking, peer-to-peer services, etc), situations to avoid, & how to “surf safer.” Includes an online game for teens to practice called “ID the Creep.” Also has a section for parents/guardians. created by CyberTipline

I Keep Safe
http://ikeepsafe.org/

Find the video and storybook for elementary aged children showing FauxPaw the techno-cat learning about Internet safety.

Internet Superheroes
http://www.internetsuperheroes.org/
“Information about Cyberbullying, Flaming and Cyberstalking, for Kids, Tweens, Teens, Parents, Educators and Law Enforcement… A program of www.wiredsafety.org .” (see above)

NetSmartzKids (elementary)
http://www.netsmartzkids.org/indexfl.htm

Flashy site designed to help elementary students to learn about being safe online. Includes lots of games and activities about topics like: privacy, password use, opening files, Instant Messaging, abbreviations, etc.

NetSmartz Workshop Teens
http://www.netsmartz.org/netteens.htm

Links to news articles, videos and animations on Internet exploitation, cyberbullying, real-life stories, and Don’t Believe the Type

WiredKids
http://www.wiredkids.org/

Portal to the many sites of WiredKids including WiredSafety and Teenangels.org – teens helping adults with online safety.

~ G. Marten. LISD Cood. of Distance Learning