Yes, Renee', you have a country accent. If you don't believe it, listen to yourself on Ipadio.

I do not like the way I sound on video. I do not like the way I sound when I create Jing screencasts. I do not like the way I sound on Ipadio. I do not like green eggs and ham. Hah! I would like the snazzy British accent I hear when I call in to Ipadio. Could I have one of those please?

My podcast is a story I began last week with my Creative Writing kids. Can I just share how much I love that class? My kids are awesome. They would literally write for 90 minutes a day if I let them, except for sharing time. They can't wait to share with the rest of the class what they've written, and they insist that I write and share too. This class is really refreshing, and they have encouraged me to retune my creative voice.

We use the writing prompt book, The Writer's Book of Matches: 1001 Ways to Ignite Your Fiction. This book has the craziest prompts, some of which ARE NOT school appropriate, so please be aware. I give my kids four prompts from the book to choose from, and I always give some kind of writer's choice option each day to begin class. To see some of what the kids have come up with, visit my Creative Writing class site. They've posted stories three times, and we've participated in Writer's Workshop twice. We'll finish workshopping their second pieces Monday in class. The piece I read in my podcast was a prompt which had to include, "Despite her current appearance, and the fact that she was in police custody, he knew she was the one..."

Overwhelmed! Where to Begin?

Monday of this week was a fantastic learning experience for me! I learned so much; however, I do feel a little overwhelmed. I want to try everything I saw, but realistically, I do not have the time to experiment with all of the technology and implement what I saw into all the different classes that I teach, especially when I learned that a sixth class will be added to my already busy schedule. I have decided that I will try several of the new technologies and spend my summer deciding how I can incorporate even more for my classes next fall.

I was really impressed with Glogster, Voicethread, and Ipadio. Thanks, Sara Kajder, for a wonderful staff development day. My experimentation and implementation for this week was creating a Ning for my English IV class. Next week, I want them to create profiles for for their favorite Canterbury characters, and I thought this would be an awesome way for them to express their knowledge and understanding of character and characterization. In addition, they are going to begin work on a multimedia travel project in connection with The Canterbury Tales. I'll post more on how this turns out next week.

I've also taken some time to play with Jing. I was surprised at how easy screencasting is. I still hate the way my voice sounds when recorded, but the uses for this technology are endless. I had to train some teachers last week for our online SAT/ACT prep software, and by using Jing, I was able to create some how-to videos which really enhanced teachers understanding during the staff development. Not only did this tool help teachers prepare for the staff development, but this will also give them something to go back to when they feel lost or can not remember how to get where they need to go in TCA. I love it!

I love all this new technology! I only wish I had more time to learn and more time to implement what I'm learning in the classroom. Slowly but surely, I'm trying to get there.

"Save early, save often"

Last week provided me with a learning opportunity. In Sara Kajder's book Bringing the Outside In, she reminds her students as we all do all too often, "save early, save often." As I was creating a "model" project to aid my students in the creation of their first book talk commercials for AVID Literacy, my computer froze while I was previewing my finished commercial.

Frustrated and angry, I reopened PhotoStory, knowing all along what I would find. Most of my project was gone, several hours of hard work had just gone down the drain. To make matters worse, there was no way to recover and recreate the lost work before I would see my students later that afternoon. I was ready to have a meltdown, but I turned my catastrophe into a learning experience for me and an opportunity to teach my students to learn from my mistakes.

When class began, I opened my project and shared with my students how my failure to "save early, save often" had actually provided me with an opportunity to teach them how to use PhotoStory. As a result of my mistake, we were then able to walk through the entire creation process, from adding pictures and voiceover to adding music and creating a works cited page. Some students felt that PhotoStory was "easier" than MovieMaker, while others felt more comfortable using MovieMaker because it was what they knew. All in all, my students left class that Thursday feeling more confident that they could create their own commercials.

My "model" project would have shown students a nice finished product, but it would not have given them the same level of confidence that teaching them to create did. Modeling doesn't always mean showing them a perfect finished piece. Sometimes I forget this. Modeling means walking them through the process as well.

Tuesday came quickly, and most students came to class prepared to present their commercials. There were a few of the usual excuses for why a few were not prepared, but I was pleasantly surprised by those who presented. I've uploaded the commercials of students who wanted web publication. I'm having trouble adding one of the commercials, however. I'm not sure if her file is too large or what. Hopefully, I'll figure that out soon.

Moving On...

My kids have been blogging in English 101 for the last two weeks. They seem to really like the process and are doing a good job with the assignments. This has also cut down on the amount of valuable class time we would have previously spent going over and picking apart homework readings. This is certainly a plus.

I'm still working the kinks out of the blog posts for my Creative Writing class. They didn't really seem to get it the first time, especially the importance of the peer feedback. They were more than willing to share their original pieces, but they did not take much time to respond to each other's writing. We are practicing a workshop approach to revise and improve some of their original pieces this week, and their second blog post is due Friday. I think that after participating in workshop, they will have a better understanding and appreciation for peer feedback. At least, that's what I hope.

This week, I've tried some new things and am in the process of implementing more technology. I guess I'm taking baby steps, but I'm working on it. In addition to blog posts, I've asked my English 101 students to respond to some questions and each other for an upcoming Socratic Seminar. I'm using the same blog space that we use for our reader's responses, but hopefully, this will generate a more authentic conversation about the reading on which the seminar is based.

The project I'm really excited about was inspired by Sara Kadjer's Bringing the Outside In. While I would love to use the Digital Storytelling within my English 101 Narrative section, I am severely limited by the college's requirements and expectations for the course...This is an issue I will discuss in future blog, however. Back to the excitement...

I gave a benchmark test during the first week of my AVID Literacy class (HSAP Prep) using the USA Test Prep software. From the test results, I found that my students were weak in the areas of research and writing. However, all of my students appear to be avid readers, certainly a plus for me. As a result, I have decided to incorporate a "technology project" into the class which will use their reading advantage and attempt to improve some of their research and writing weaknesses.

I'm calling the activity a Book Talk Commercial. Students will use Windows Movie Maker or PhotoStory3 to create commercials based on the books they are reading for SSR in class. I'm in the process of creating a model project now using PhotoStory. Using Chapter Two of Kadjer's Bringing the Outside In as a guide, I'm focusing on the content rather than the technology. I have given students a planning guide already, and they must complete the content section of the project before beginning the construction of the commercial using the technology. To quote one of Kadjer's students, I don't want my students to learn "a technology," I want them to use "a technology to learn."

My goal is for students to encourage and sell their favorite SSR books to fellow students as we work toward not just success on a state assessment,but also long-term improvement in reading, writing, research, and communication skills. I'll let you know how it goes...