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Showing posts with label Curriculum. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Curriculum. Show all posts

Thursday, April 26, 2012

1-to-1 Pedagogy: Curriculum for the 21st Century Classroom - Hot Topics Webinar

What is this 1-to-1 curriculum all about?

Dr. Ping Gao and I will have an opportunity to share our ideas about Curriculum for the 21st Century with you in a Webinar that we will be giving on April 26, 2012 at 4:00 CST.

We will be discussing the need to rethink how education should be framed and explore some tools for making the changes.

Here are some links to the resources we have shared.  If you don't find something important here that you think should be included, just add it in the comment section below.

Watch our hour-long webinar. We have participants from Oklahoma, Arizona and around Iowa.





Watch this Slide Show on SlideShare
Included Videos:
Included Resources:
  • Iowa Universal Constructs - The universal constructs identified following an analysis of the competencies and habits of mind needed for future successes in careers, college and citizenry.
  • Technology Integration Matrix  - Florida Technology Integration Matrix creates a 25-cell table that integrates 5 types of Meaningful Learning Environments (Jonassen et al) with 5 levels of Technology Integration (Apple Classroom of Tomorrow).  Filled with 100 short videos of best practice examples for Math, Science, Social Science and Language Arts.
  • TPACKing for a Wild Learning Trip - This is a link to a resource page that I created for my students when they were studying TPACK. It is filled with a plethora of resources about the Technological, Pedagogical and Content Knowledge (TPaCK) model.
  • Book: From Fear to Facebook  by Matt Levinson  Pub: ISTE
    Exceptional book where a school administrator chronicles his many adventures while directing a school into a 1-to-1 paradigm. Must read!!!
What ideas or accomplishments or resources would you like to share about 1:1 curriculum?  Please share them in the comments section below.

Z & G

Monday, April 05, 2010

Watch the Earth Shake and Twitter About It!!!!


Just heard about a 7.2 earthquake in Baja California through Twitter.  Can you believe that a friend was on a golf course in Palm Springs when she felt the shake. First thing she did was twitter this incident to her tweet-network. Next thing I knew, there were tweets from Palm Springs, San Diego and Orange County. One tweeter mentioned that he was following the LA County Fire Dept's tweets as they responded to earthquake news. (@lacfd) 

Anywho, I was looking for immediate information about the quake and I found the IRIS Seismic Monitor map. This is OUTSTANDING!!!!  Click on the map above (after you finish reading this posting and leave your comment) and it will take you to their live map of the latest seismic activity around the world. The color of the rings indicates the recency and the size of the rings indicate the magnitude. See the Big Red in the California region?

Click on these buttons to access informative educational resources:
Earthquake Headlines - takes you to the latest Google News about earthquakes;
Special Events - leads you to the Recent Earthquake Teachable Moments page on the IRIS site.
Education Links - links you to the IRIS page on their website that is filled with instructional resources.

This page is a lucky find. Do you see how you might use it in your teaching?
Share your thoughts with us.
Z














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Saturday, March 20, 2010

6-Word Stories - R Enough

6-word stories could be considered eXtreme short stories. It is said that Ernest Hemmingway once proclaimed his 6-word story, "For sale: baby shoes, never worn.", as his best work.

Wired Magazine asks sci-fi, fantasy and horror writers to write their own 6-word short stories.
Pete Berg launched a Six Word Stories blog in Dec, 2008. This is where he stores thousands of 6-word stories. He has these catagorized by subject and author. It is possible to submit your own and receive comments from the readers.
Visual six-word story group project on Flickr
Writing 6-word stories is not easy. You must first envision an event or tale that you want to tell. Then you whittle away the words it would take to convey your ideas about this story. Finally, you have the true essence of your dissertation.

Here is my first feeble attempt:

Blog posting today: six-word stories. - Dr. Z

What have you, can you, will you write in 6 words?
Have you used this in your classes? I met a teacher at my Google Teacher Certification class, but don't remember his name. He was doing some wonderous things with his students.

Please share your ideas on this.

Z


Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Creating Audio Spelling Tests Using MS Word


I just learned about an incredibly useful tool that is hidden in MS Word 2008 for the Mac. This is the Notebook Layout view. Looking at the image to the left, it doesn't look too special, but looks can be deceiving.

A friend of mine was looking for a way to create an audio recorded spelling list that students could use to test themselves on their spelling words. I thought that Word had this capability but I couldn't find it. Found my answer when I asked my technology guru, Rob Galloway. He suggested that I try the Notebook Layout view.

The Notebook Layout view for Mac Office is designed to work something like OneNote in the Windows world. It's greatest asset is that it includes a recording capability. This means that when you open a page to take notes, you can also turn on an audio recorder. The audio recorder records the speaker and then aligns it with your notes. That means that when you return to your notes, you can click anywhere on the page and it will playback the audio track of what the speaker was saying when you took those notes.

Pretty cool, eh? But that isn't why I am writing this posting.

I did a little experimenting and I realized that I could use this audio tool to create an auditory spelling list. The students would open the page that was designed for this week's spelling list. They would click on the Play button and then the voice would begin saying the spelling words for the student. The student could then type the words on the page and finally check them to see if they are correct. The student has complete control to pause in between words or go back to the beginning.

Another idea:
It would be an interesting idea to use this tool to create one of these pages for each of the spelling lists in a spelling book. You could then distribute these 30-page documents (one for each week's spelling list) to your students at the beginning of the school year and they could use this each week to test themselves. (I know that this is a low-end application for technology but fits into some curricula.)


I could try to explain how this works, but I probably wouldn't be too successful. Here is a Jing video that demonstrates how to do this.





What do you think? Do you use this Word OneNote-like capability? If so, what do you do?

Z
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Sunday, May 31, 2009

Iowa Core Curriculum - Dr. Nadene Davidson @ UNI

The Iowa Core Curriculum (ICC) is a curricular program that provides guidance for educators in "delivering challenging and meaningful content to students that prepares them for success in life." This curriculum identifies the "essential concepts and skills for K-12 grade in literacy (read, write, speak, listen, and think), mathematics, science and social studies. It also identifies 21st Century Skills (civic, employability, financial, health and technology) that people must master to be successful in life. More than just identifying the content area, the ICC is designed to develop deeper learning engages students by "emphasizing interesting, robust, and relevant learning experiences."

The ICC is intended to be more than just another curriculum that is written by a group of specialists and then placed on a shelf to collect dust. The Iowa Legislature enacted Senate File 2216 that requires all Iowa school districts and accredited nonpublic schools to implement the ICC by 7/1/2012 (grades 9 - 12) and 2014-15 (K-8th grades).

This Iowa Core Curriculum is well researched and forward looking. It is still in the process of being developed. The Intent is there but the content/requirements haven't been completed. The key to success in learning and using the ICC will be in developing your knowledgebase.

In Spring of 2009, I taught a Selections and Integration of Instructional Technology Materials course at the University of Northern Iowa. I knew that I couldn't didn't know enough about the Iowa Core Curriculum to benefit my students so I asked Dr. Nadene Davidson, the Interim Director of Department of Teaching, to share her vast knowledge of the subject. Dr. Davidson has been an active participant in developing the ICC so she was able to provide the necessary insight.

I have linked to Dr. Davidson's 1 hour 40-minute lecture for your enjoyment. She does a wonderful job of describing the background for the Iowa Core Curriculum, its structure and the process of implementation. This video requires Real Player to watch. (Dr. Davidson's presentation actually begins 4 minutes 37 seconds into the video.)

Please review this presentation and share your comments.

Z
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