Sample content for Samsung Galaxy Tablet

Sample Content

Introducing: ME! (Elementary,3-5)

In this project, students will use the Galaxy 8/10.1 tab, S Pen and the app,Pic Collage to create a poster introducing themselves to their classmates.  This would make a good beginning of the year project that helps familiarize students with the Samsung Galaxy tablet, S Pen, and various productivity and photo apps. 

Students will begin by using the camera on their tablet to take photos to illustrate the answers to  some prompts about their families, their home and their lives, such as:

My parents are

My brothers and sisters are

My pets are

This is my house, and my room

My favorite thing to eat is

My favorite thing to do with my family is

Something you might not know about me is

Once photos have been collected, students can use Pic Collage and the S Pen to size and place photos in the collage.  Each photo can be annotated using the text input tool.  Students can also use the S Pen and oSkitch to draw on photos before they are imported into Pic Collage.

Typeit!

 On of the complaints I hear from foreign language teachers  from time to time is about typing accents and special characters.  Our SWIFT page is one example where you can't type them.  This website, Typeit, allows you to type special characters until your little heart is content and without keyboard combinations!  Once you have said what you need to say in French or Spanish, you cut and paste your text into your Swift page, word doc, or what have you.  Very cool!

 

Not only would this be useful for teachers and students doing their day to day homework, but it would also be handy for kids quoting a foreign author in a paper.  Or, for writing to parents.  

 

Thanks, yet again, to Free Tech 4 Teachers.

Universal Leonardo

This site, Universal Leonardo, is a beautiful way to explore the many, many accomplishments of Leonardo da Vinci. The site was originally set up as an adjunct to a museum exhibition, which is now closed. You can explore his paintings, drawings, and his writings. One of the features I liked best was the magnifier that appears with his drawings and paintings. With it, you can more closely examine his work.

This would be a terrific way to introduce students to the breadth and depth of Leonardo's works and curiosity. It would also be a good place to send students as they are studying the Italian Renaissance as it not only has works by da Vinci, but some of his peers as well.

A New Way to Lecture

Today's post is about a nifty handout I found thanks to Kathy Schrock's "Sites of the School Days" email.  The publication, called "A New Way to Lecture, Using Web 2.0 to Create Interactive Lectures With Your Students." It describes 14 Web 2 tools that  can be used instead of PowerPoint (that's so '90's!).  Some, like Prezi, Glogster and Animoto, I have used.  Others like Weebly and Sliderocket I haven't seen before and I can't wait to play with them!  The brochure is embedded below.

Open publication - Free publishing

Get Smart!

Summer time is always such a busy time for teachers--despite what the general public thinks we do during our summers "off." Most of us take classes, work on curriculum and/or do a lot of lesson planning. Many of the NWS classrooms either have or will be getting SmartBoards during the summer, so I thought it would be useful to put together a list of online SmartBoard tutorials that you can use to get yourself prepared for next fall. (Sheesh!)

The following is a list of 9 sources that can help you get ready for the fall and using a Smartboard.  Whether you're an experienced user or a total novice, you'll find lots of new ideas in these sites.  And why 9?  It just seemed less daunting than 10.  

1. Download the SmartBoard Notebook 10 software (Windows) (Mac) to your home computer so that you can play with it. Because we have the boards, you are licensed to install this software on your home machine. BE FOREWARNED: it is a huge, gigantic, gynormous download and will take a good, long while to download.

2.  Two-minute tutorials This is a fairly lengthy list of quick tutorials from Smart on single tasks.  Creating objects, using the Gallery, using the page sorter and the like are part of this page plus a list of the official Smart workshops and what they cover.
http://exchange.smarttech.com/forum.html?url=/default.aspx
3. Teacher Tube Smartboard Videos This is a listing of the Teacher Tube how-to videos that people have posted.  One a novice user might find useful is "50 Things We Love About Smartboards."

4.  Teachers Love Smartboards is a nice site with some ideas about integrating the boards into your practice. They have some for-fee tutorials, but they also have several complimentary ones for you to try, as well.

5.  Florida Diagnostic and Learning Services has a nice list of tutorials, some from the Smart site, others developed by independent users.  There are several articles about how to use your board to improve student engagement, many templates and lesson plans.

6.  Get Smart with Smartboards is a website and podcast series.  Harvey and Jim, the series hosts, have done a series of podcasts in which they talk about how they use the boards in their classrooms and then they provide the resources they have discussed on the website.  The podcasts are useful and entertaining.

7.  Wichita Public Schools Smart website has hundreds of lesson examples, sortable by level or subject.  There are lots and lots of ideas here.

8.  Smartboard Lounge Loads of tutorials, templates and lesson ideas.  This site is also home  to Smartboard 101 and :60 second tech.

9.  The SmartExchange is a forum for teachers who use SmartBoards, sponsored by Smart.  Lesson ideas, how-to's and troubleshooting are just a few of the things you'll find on the forum.

Presenting...Something Other Than PowerPoint

Hi, everyone!

For this session, I will be teaching mostly from this page. It's just easier to have everything in one place, plus it's a sneaky way to get people to read this blog.

The first non-PowerPoint resource we will be using is Prezi.

Presenting...Something Other Than PowerPoint on Prezi

Let's look at MovieMaker, Photostory.
Wallwisher is a tool more for discussions, but we should look at it, as well.
Tilt-Shift Maker is an interesting way to use photographs in your presentations and lectures.

Web 2--An Endless Source of Entertainment and Education

Mostly, this post is going to be about links, links, links.  There is so much out there on the Interactive Internet for both productivity and time-wasting, that I'm mainly interested in showing you different things you can use and then letting you just play with them.

To narrow this session down, I began by asking myself what Web 2 tools I use most and which ones I just would not want to give up.  Then, my phone buzzed and it was a new message from Twitter.  Hmm....that's a really good place to start.

Twitter is a microblog site.  Basically, you can send and receive messages of not more than 140 characters, or the same length as a text message.  Whohoo, you say.  Why do I need one more way to get text messages when I can barely keep up with the ones my kids send me?  Professional Development.  Put another way, Twitter is a really, really effective way to grow your Personal Learning Network.  I know very few of my Twitterverse face to face, but they are all people I learn from, some on a daily basis. Let's take a look...

A term you will be hearing more and more often is "cloud computing."  No there's isn't some nefarious plan by Gates and Jobs to turn the ionosphere into a giant mainframe.  Cloud computing refers to internet-based applications and storage.  Google Docs are a great example of computing in the cloud.  This blog is a great example of computing in the cloud.  I don't have to have anything installed on my computer to create content and what I do create gets saved somewhere in the cloud.  Another really nice example is Windows Live, something you may have noticed is being integrated into Hotmail. 

And, now for something completely different:  Matzoh Ball

For your edification, or to figure out what your children are saying in their texts to you NetLingo 


Here's a paperless way to publish student work in journal form;  Youblisher

One for the "Wow" factor and a terrific illustration of how technology can make the distant become immediate.  Panoramic tour of the Sistine Chapel.

There's been a lot of talk about the various Google toys.  One that hasn't gotten a lot of press but is a nice survey/collaboration tool is Google Moderator I've created a Moderator discussion that I'd love to have your feedback on.

Other Interactive Internet sites you might find useful:
Flikr  Photo sharing social network.  Can be searched by copyright permissions.

Snagfilms Watch documentaries for free.  Very high-quality films, many foreign.

SafeShareTV  Enter the URL of a YouTube video you want to share and watch it without all the advertising.You can also crop out inappropriate content.


Scriblink Online interactive whiteboard.  Great way to collaborate, and that's not just for classrooms.

Voo2do Shareable to-do list.  Assign tasks, add tasks, delete them when they are complete.

Art for Smarties

It's been a while since I posted anything. I'm not really sure why, but I just haven't. Life in the lab has been busy, I guess.

Today's resource is a really, really fun one: Art applications that would work really well for an Interactive White Board. The links are from a blog I just discovered, The Whiteboard Blog. Today's post has 12 links to fun and useful art applications. These would be terrific for use with an IWB but, they're just plain fun anyway. One of them, This is Sand I have actually posted to my online activities page. The kids are fascinated by the Falling Sand game and are always looking for new versions to play.

Another one of the links from The Whiteboard Blog goes to Bomomo, an abstract art creator. There's something hypnotic about controlling the bouncing balls to create pretty pictures!

March 29 Professional Development Survey

Please take a couple of minutes and fill out our survey.  Thank you, everyone!

Visualizing The World

While reading the "Horizon 2010" report, I came across a reference to Worldmapper.  Worldmapper is a "visualization too that redraws maps based on the data being displayed.  For instance, on a world map showing population, countries with more people swell while those with fewer people shrink." (Horizon 2010  report, New Media Consortium and Educause Learning Initiative, 2009.)

 

I poked around on the website and, it's pretty interesting.  For example, the map depicting deaths caused by infectious and parasitic diseases, Africa and the Indian subcontinent are giant bulges and Europe and North America appear almost emaciated.  These maps are very interesting and could be the source of some enlightening discussions with your classes.

For Francoise (and others!)

At the social networking session on Friday's prof dev day, one of our administrators asked if there was a Reader's Digest for web 2 applications. I responded that it's people who do what I do: surf the web, play with the toys and read, read, read all day. However, what I didn't tell him was that I have a couple of resources that do function a bit like the Reader's Digest for me. The many times aforementioned Free Tech For Teachers (source of today's post), Wes Fryer's "Moving at the Speed of Creativity" and "Digitzd"are among my favorites.

So, to today's topic, Youpublisher.  Youpublisher is a free, online service that turns your pdf's into online magazines.  Very cool, and a fantastic way for students to publish their work.   Francoise, one of our French teachers, has her French IV students do a literary magazine, and we usually find a way to put it up on the web so parents can see it.  This takes it one step farther!  Even better, she can embed the code into her SWIFT page and parents can read the publication right there. 

Come to think of it, our Journalism teacher was asking about something similar just the other day!

Copyright and Fair Use

Thanks, again, to Free Tech For Teachers and it's wonderful author Richard Byrne (@rmbyrne on Twitter) for bringing to my attention a very good presentation on copyright for educators done by Wes Fryer.  I've embedded it below, but here are a couple of suggestions to add to your RSS feed, and/or your Twitterpeeps: If you don't subscribe to Free Tech or Wes' blog, At the Speed of Creativity you are missing out of some really good resources.  Wes' slideshare presentation runs close to an hour, but it well worth listening to.

Copyright for Educators

View more documents from Wesley Fryer.

Whitepaper: Educational Networking

Steve Hargadon, a consultant for Elluminate, has been in my PLN for a couple of years now.  He started the Classroom 2.0 Ning to get teachers networking and using a social network for their own learning.  Now, he has produced a whitepaper called, "Educational Networking:  The important role Web 2.0 will play in education."  In it, he argues that technology reall hasn't changed education up to this point, but with the advent of the interactive web and social networking, we are beginning to finally see the changes that people in education had been expecting to happen when computers first entered the classroom.  It's a quick, but informative read!

Educational Networking: The Important Role Web 2.0 Will Play in Education

Alice in Web 2.0 Land

I love the web!  I love the fantastic things that people create and share on the web!  I love the fact that my PLN isn't limited any longer to the people I have face to face contact with. 

So, why the love letter to the Intertubes, you might ask?  This brilliant take off on Lewis Carroll's poem, "Jabberwocky," that's why.  This comes from Steve Wheeler's blog, "Learning with 'e's"  and is a list of a bunch of Web 2 tools woven into poetry.  Amazing!

Who said learning has to be dull?

Some of my favorite moments in the classroom are the ones when students are excitedly engaged in a task and they don't even realize they're learning.  I recently collaborted on a project with one of the Middle School humanities teachers about the Trujillo regime in the Dominican Repbulic and the murder of the Mirabal sisters by his regime.  My favorite overheard conversation happened last week when one of the students was trying to see the issue from the standpoint of the Trujillo government, and she said, "I see why he would think the Mirabals were bad but I hate myself for saying it!" Magic!

So, today's post is a site that I think teachers and students will have fun with.  Using the customizable templates on ClassTools.net students or teachers can create online, interactive games for just about any lesson you can think of.  One of our Spanish teachers thought the drag and drop Dustbin Game would be a perfect way to practice vocabulary.  It would be even better on her SmartBoard!

For Robert

Yesterday, I sent out this link to our science department.  It's to a very nice online game from the Minnesota Museum of Science about human cellular biology.  This morning, Robert, one of the science teachers here emailed to say that they had just finished their cell unit last week.  A day or two late and apparently a dollar short!  I told him I would put the link up on the blog so that next year when he vaguely remembered that there was some sort of website that I sent out, I could say, "Yeah, I think I saved it somewhere."

Here it is! http://www.smm.org/tissues/index.php

Hittin' 'em Where They Live- Constitution Study Aids

Teaching is a funny business.  On one hand, you want to be a professional and be thought of as a trusted source.  On the other hand, you want to be able to convey information in a form that is meaningful for your students.  Some teachers are young enough to even be credible while talking to the kids in "their language."  Some, like me, would just look silly to the kids.

Having said that, I still think it's useful to sometimes let the kids create projects using the language and forms that are meaningful to them.  I'm not a giant rap fan, but the format does have its' uses, as in this "Bill of Rights Rap."  Our seniors just completed a unit where they had to memorize all of the articles of the Constitution and be able to apply them in certain situations.  Next, they move on to the Bill of Rights.  This video could serve as a useful study guide, in a format that they can easily memorize!


Other useful study tools would be the online games from the US Supreme Court.  These games, apparently, have been a pet project of  Sandra Day O'Connor, former Supreme Court Justice.  Our middle schoolers really love "Do I Have A Right?"

Thanks to Oswego98 for sharing the rapon Twitter and rmbyrne for sharing it on Free Technology For Teachers

The Art of the Inaugural Speeches

I've written about Wordle, a word cloud generator, before.  I think it's a great tool, and one that students can be very engaged in using.  Thanks to TechnologyInEd for tweeting this!

This word cloud gallery, from Governing Dynamo is a collection if Presidential images and word clouds made from each President's inaugural speeches.  One activity that came to mind as I played with this would be to have students look at the word clouds of the speeches of a particular president or era and have them generate a list of issues they think were important at that time.  Once they've come up with a list of issues to research, they could create presentations (using Prezi, Animoto, Glogster or any of about a thousand other tools!) to give to their classmates about what they have discovered.  A much more engaging way to learn about, say, the presidency of William Henry Harrison, or the events immediately preceeding the Civfil War than to simply listen to a lecture. 


A caution about Wordle:  There is some inappropriate content on the site which students may come across.  I would give the kids a link to a specific word cloud you want them to look at or to the cloud generator.  I would not have them search it on their own.

Animated Bayeaux Tapestry

Ok, I admit it, I love history and always have.  That's probably why I was a history teacher until I got this job.  I'll admit it, I love educational technology, too, and when you can find the two together, it's bliss.  Today's offering is the Bayeaux Tapestry, animated, from Open Culture's YouTube Channel.  The story picks up about half way through the tapestry at the appearance of Halley's Comet and just before the Norman Invasion.  My family went to Hastings several years ago, which gives the whole thing a totally different perspective. Enjoy!

Death to Dull Powerpoints!

A colleague came to the lab yesterday to tell me about this really fantastic presentation he had seen another of our colleague give in class.  The presenter had used a tool I'd read about, called Prezi.  Prezi lets you create slides, zoom in on key points, emphasize ideas, and animate your text.  Here's one I did.  To run it, click the left and right arrows or hover over the word "More" and select "Autoplay."




Frequently, people complain about having to sit through PowerPoints presentations.  None of us likes to have a presenter read, word for word, the text on the slide.  Yawn.  Just let me read it--I can read faster than you can speak! 

I always use the 6-6 rule.  No more than 6 bullet points per slide, and no more than 6 words per point.  This forces me to summarize succinctly and it requires me to know my material well.  Guy Kawasaki, a venture capitalist, has the 10-20-30 rule.  I'll let him tell you about it.