The Language Arts Teachers' Community RSS feed

Gotta Keep Reading - Ocoee Middle School - Jason Everett

Jason Everett — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 06:00:00 GMT

Thanks for posting this to Facebook Shannon!

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Gotta Keep Reading - Ocoee Middle School

Check out this video- based off the flashmob Oprah/Black Eyed Peas show!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6D9jiEYxzs

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Language Arts 2.0 Worshop today! - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 19:21:52 GMT

Check out our agenda and notes from today's workshop at http://tr.im/langartsfeb2010!

Feel free to leave comments here to add to our discussion today! Here are the highlights:

Blogging
Mimio boards
Senior Projects
Sharing time - Share favorite lessons, activities, and websites!

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Basic Clickers Workshop ~ March 24, 2010 - Carol Smith

Carol Smith — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 06:00:00 GMT

Basic Clickers Workshop ~ March 24, 2010 ~ 9:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m. ~ ESU 10 ~ Kearney

One of the hottest items in instructional technology is the use of “clickers” or audience response systems. Students use remotes to answer questions before, during, and after a lesson thereby allowing teachers to get instant feedback about student understanding. Dustin Frank will lead a workshop for eInstruction clickers using the Classroom Performance System (CPS). If you are using eInstruction clickers or want to learn more about what they can do, this workshop is for you! To register go to https://odie.esu10.org/

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CAPspace Project: Poetry Pals - Jason Everett

Jason Everett — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 06:00:00 GMT

Contact John Stritt (jstritt@esu10.org) if you have questions about the connections, etc.

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Title: Poetry Pals:

Status: Open

URL: http://projects.twice.cc/?l=collaboration&id=645

Connections: H.323

Grades: 11, 12

Subjects: Language Arts/English

Dates: March 1 - April 30

Description: Creative Writing teacher with one class of 11th and 12th graders seeks to work with one other teacher and class of students to share poetry. Would like to initially meet via Videoconference and then have students exchange ideas and poetry via email during March. We would culminate the project in a Poetry Slam in April via videoconference. Videoconferences would take place from 12:45 - 1:50 PM EST.

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2010 Olympic Games Project - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 06:00:00 GMT

This looks like a REALLY fun project to do with your students! If you have wanted to try blogging with students or some other collaborative, global projects, this is the one for you! Check out this project web site! Even if you only want to try a portion of this, I think it would be worth your time. This is for students from k-7th grade and it was started by a 2nd grade teacher! Check it out and let me know if you want help!

http://sites.google.com/site/misschatz/home

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Web Sites for you! - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 06:00:00 GMT

Here are a few web sites that I thought you would like.

Good general lesson plan sites - http://tr.im/KjRO
Science Fair site - http://www.sciencebob.com/sciencefair/index.php
You Tube URL Tricks - http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/10-youtube-url-tricks-you-should-know-about/
ReTool Yourself (professional development ideas) - http://www.techlearning.com/blogs/25886
100 Web Tools for Collaboration - http://www.techlearning.com/blogs/26378

This last link is a video from a student demonstrating how her 7th grade science class is being run. This looked like a very engaging science class!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YEls3tq5wIY&feature=youtu.be&a

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Classroom Instruction That Works Webinars - Carol Smith

Carol Smith — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 19:51:53 GMT

In this series we are featuring nine webinars on Marzano's instructional strategies. Each webinar will focus on the how to use specific instructional strategies in your classroom as well as technology tips and tricks to integrate along the way!

Each webinar is a one-hour session from 4-5PM. A day or so before the webinar, you will receive an email with instructions and the website for the webinar.

There is no driving or weather worries, all you need is a computer! Choose just one webinar to attend or choose them all! These are great refreshers if you attended Classroom Instruction That Works this last summer! Even if you don't know anything about these instructional strategies, please join us and find out all the easy ways of engaging and reaching your students.

Summarizing and Note Taking - January 19, 2010
Reinforcing Effort/Receiving Feedback - February 2, 2010
Homework and Practice - February 16, 2010
Non-Linguistic Representation - March 2, 2010
Cooperative Learning - March 23, 2010
Setting Objectives/Providing Feedback - April 6, 2010
Generating and Testing Hypothesis - April 20, 2010
Ques, Questions, and Advanced Organizers - May 4, 2010

Register on ODIE at https://odie.esu10.org/

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Great Example of Tech Integration and Self-Directed Learning - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 06:00:00 GMT

I just read this article and found it fabulous! Check it out! http://www.techlearning.com/blogs/25762 This article is about some engaged, 24/7, self-directed learning! See for yourself!

How can you take these same lessons for elementary students and apply them to your classes? How can you engage your students so they are guiding their own learning by their own interests? Who do you need to involve to make your classroom look like his? Please share your comments here!

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First Sunday's at Rowe Sanctuary! - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 06:00:00 GMT

Looking for something other than shopping this Sunday? Come on out and join us for our December First Sunday @ Rowe starting at 1:30 p.m. http://rowesanctuary.org/first%20sundays.htm

With native grasses and fallen leaves rustling in the breeze and the symphony from flocks of birds streaming south, late fall is a great time to explore Rowe Sanctuary. This month’s program will take advantage of this natural music by offering a workshop called ‘The Music of Nature - The Nature of Music’ presented by former UNK professor of music Annabell Zikmund, and Rowe Volunteers Susan Elmore and Jackie Flohr.

Other activities include nature hikes and marshmallow roasting on an open campfire!

For more information:
Keanna Leonard, Education Director
Audubon's Rowe Sanctuary
44450 Elm Island Rd
Gibbon, NE 68840
308-468-5282

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Shmoop! - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 06:00:00 GMT

If you haven't had a chance to check into Shmoop, it is a MUST over your weekend or holidays. Shmoop is a very unique web resource for literature, history, and music teachers. I recently received an email from them. When I saw it, i thought it would be a GREAT idea for a language arts thanksgiving lesson plan! I have included it below. See what you think! This might be a fun activity to do cross-curricular with the social studies teacher! Then go to Shmoop and see all the other great resources that they have! I think you will really like it. You will probably need to get an account and you can sign up for their mailing list from there. Don't forget to share your lesson with the rest of the group here on the community!

Shmoop's Top 20 Thanksgiving Dinner Guests from Literature & History
Food, friends, naps, and good conversation. What could be better than that? Thanksgiving is a time to give thanks with the people we love. We at Shmoop have decided to invite our best friends to our Turkey Day feast - we're grateful for them, after all.

Now, we just have to figure out who is going to sit next to whom:

Top Five Best Dinner Guest Pairings

These dinner guests will get along like - you know - peas and carrots, ice cream and pie, Aunt Nene's green jello and marshmallows (how the heck does she get those marshmallows to float, anyway?)...

1. Scout Finch and Huck Finn:
Watch a childhood crush develop as Scout and Huck share exploits, plan adventures, and show each other their slingshots. When nobody's looking, they'll steal the silverware, find treasures in the hole of a neighbor's tree, and meet up with Jim on the river.

2. Holden Caulfield and Hamlet:
These two sensitive, maladjusted young men should have enough in common to keep them talking the whole night. Both privileged? Check. Both lovesick? Check! Both despise liars and phonies? Check! Both going to tackle the world's hypocrisy head-on? Checkmate!... Whenever they can get around to it, anyway.

3. Grendel and Luna Lovegood:
Letting Grendel into the room is a fast way to kill a good dinner party, so don't seat him next to anyone faint-of-heart or vegetarian. The un-fazeable Luna Lovegood will make Grendel feel right at home by asking him all about mythical monsters and swapping tales of run-ins with humankind. And if Luna's magic wand can't keep Grendel in check, maybe her radish earrings will.

4. Porphyria's Lover and Madame DeFarge:
Porphyria's Lover is a passionate, poetic, thinky-feely kind of guy who likes long walks on the beach and staying up all night to admire the corpse of a strangled girlfriend. None of your other guests will want to get near him, so throw him in a corner and use Madame DeFarge as a buffer zone. Her attitude? Bring it!

5. Alice and The Walrus:
Who has a better resume for spending an evening with The Walrus? Alice has extensive singing-walrus experience from traveling through the Looking-Glass, and with her mind so radically opened by her adventures in Wonderland, she'll be the only guest who has any idea what "cu-cu-cachoo" means.

Top Five Worst Dinner Guest Pairings

Only the brave host would seat these duos together. If the mashed potatoes start flying, don't say that we didn't warn you...

1. Edgar Allan Poe and Ulysses S. Grant:
Nothing is more embarrassing than watching friends and family getting blitzed at a dinner party. Poe liked his absinthe and Grant was a reported alcoholic, so if you want to give your other guests a fighting chance at the wine, make sure to stick these two at opposite ends of the table.

2. Jay Gatsby and The Giver:
Letting these two get on a roll is bound to make everyone depressed. Everything was better in the good old days, they'll tell you: the men had more hopeful futures, the women were more loving - heck, even the colors were brighter!

3. J. Alfred Prufrock and Teddy Roosevelt:
Blankets don't get much wetter than J. Alfred Prufrock, so be careful not to seat him next to a carouser like Teddy Roosevelt. Teddy was so famously high-energy that when he invited a foreign ambassador to join him for a day of sports, the ambassador is said to have collapsed from exhaustion.

4. Hedda Gabler and The Misfit:
Sometimes, having too much in common can be a bad thing. Hedda Gabler is bored, manipulative housewife who breaks up relationships, destroys careers, and encourages people to commit suicide for entertainment. Similarly, The Misfit is an escaped convict who murders an entire family along the roadside because he wants to do something mean before the police catch him. The last thing these two need, aside from cutlery, is an evening picking each other's brains.

5. Emily Dickinson and Boo Radley:
The only thing worse than a conversation gone wrong is no conversation at all. These two notorious recluses might not be the liveliest guests at the table. But, who knows, maybe they would hit it off after passing soap carvings and crumpled-up poems to each other under the table.

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Newsletter/Magazine Online - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 05:00:00 GMT

Yesterday at CTE 2.0, many were talking about doing the school newsletter/newspaper online. I have had this link for awhile and I know there is one teacher in our area that is using this. Here is the link to create your own online magazine http://www.openzine.com/aspx/HomePage.aspx. I don't know if there is an educational version to this but I wonder if you can't just set up the magazine and then students would only go to that site to edit rather than the main site. They may also offer an "educational version" of this if there are enough requests. I don't think it is a bad site just doing my initial scan. Check it out! Are there other sites out there that would work for doing the same thing? Does this have any other features that Word Press doesn't have?

Share your thoughts on this site! What does your school's web presence entail?

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Google, Books, and Printing Your Own Books - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 05:00:00 GMT

I just read this article and I found it interesting; thought you would like it. They are talking about how Google with On Demand Books can reprint books for you at a decent price. http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/09/18/google.books/index.html It is really pretty amazing what they can do with books these days and how accessible Google is making those books.

If you have never been to Google Books, you will have to try it! There are more and more books going out of print that are available online at http://books.google.com along with books that are still copyright protected that the author is making available on Google. While you are on that site, if you have a Google Account, you can keep a library of all your favorite books or maybe a library of the books you read with your students. Even if your book is still under copyright, there may be portions of your books on the site. There are other features available once you get into your library such as writing book reviews or "clipping" pieces from the book. Check it out and let us know how you might use this with students!

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Your FAV! - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 05:00:00 GMT

Tell us your favorite lesson, website, tech tool, or idea for your classroom!

29 Comments

ESU 10 Now Has GPS Units! - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 05:00:00 GMT

ESU 10 has purchased 15 Garmin eTrex Legend GPS units for teachers to checkout and use with their classroom! They can be checked out through ODIE!

More can be found in the description on the Media Library:
https://odie.esu10.org/library/MediaItemDetails.aspx?MediaItemID=54607

Also at: http://blog.esu10.org/gps Here you can find out more about the Global Positioning System devices as well as how-to's and instructional materials to go with the GPS's.

Let us know what you think! How will YOU use the GPS Devices with your students? Are you already doing a GPS project that you would like to share? Share this and other instructional materials here on this community!!!

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Wordpress Updates - Jason Everett

Jason Everett — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 05:00:00 GMT

WordPress Site for updates and information
Check out this website for current announcements, news, account requests, feature requests, training resources, and workshop information. Wordpress @ ESU 10 Blog Site

Mobile Support in WordPress @ ESU 10
Districts purchasing and supporting mobile computing now have the option of making their Wordpress site mobile accessible. Great for providing content to these mobile devices without having to sync them on an continual basis. Read more...

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Your Three Words - Ardith Davenport

Ardith Davenport — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 05:00:00 GMT

I would love to know what your three words are. Today, my three words are "I'm a grandmother!"

5 Comments

The Great Park Pursuit - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Fri, 08 May 2009 05:00:00 GMT

This would be a great adventure for families as well as classrooms! Check out http://www.negpp.org/! there is a challenge there to visit all of the 15 listed Nebraska state parks! If you want to participate, you must register there on the web site.

This might be a great summer project to continue to engage students in Nebraska Geography! Have your own Great Park Pursuit! Challenge your next group of students (any age would love this) to get to as many of Nebraska's parks this summer as they can. Once they get there, have them take a picture of the park sign and two more pictures from inside the park. They must then email those pictures to you, the teacher. You can create a map in Google Earth and mark their travels using the pictures they took! This would also make a great competition between class sections or maybe between conference schools! (They could even use their cell phones and send those pictures if your cell plan will handle that!)

Most importantly, encourage your students to get out and enjoy Nebraska's state parks!

http://www.negpp.org/

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Chapter study guides - Rod Havens

Rod Havens — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 05:00:00 GMT

OK folks, let me know what you think. Rather than the plain old paper and pen, chapter-by-chapter study guides for a novel, what would be the best resource to start doing this online? Blog? Wiki? Social network site? Specific web site suggestions welcome. Thanks!

5 Comments

Sharing Time! - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 05:00:00 GMT

This morning we shared many tech tools, web sites, lesson plans. Please share yours here so that our group has a link to your favorites! You can share by clicking on the "comment" button below!

13 Comments

365 Photos! - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 06:00:00 GMT

This looks like a great project and would be fun to do with your
students. The idea is to take a photo each day! You could gear this
toward a certain type of curriculum or theme if you wanted! The kids
would get into the routine of this and you would be pulling out that
camera more often! For more on this project go to:

http://photojojo.com/content/tutorials/project-365-take-a-photo-a-day/

Also see The 10 Most Stunning Photo Blogs - http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/the-10-most-stunning-photo-blogs/

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Class2Home - Jason Everett

Jason Everett — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 06:00:00 GMT

Fablevision's Stationery Studio is an extremely popular writing, handwriting, and word-processing program geared for children in kindergarten through fifth grade. It’s also popular among middle school students and grown ups too, using the program for letters, signs, cards, and writing projects.

Some schools may opt to mark up the price to help with PTO fundraising, or to subsidize the program for low-income families (i.e. free and reduced lunch program students) while others are free to resell at the same low price. Most schools participating in this or similar programs utilize a revolving account of some type in keeping with the financial requirements of the school district.

Are you interested? Please let us know at your earliest convenience!

How it Works:

If you’re interested in participating in Class2Home, please contact Carol Donahue, Director of Learning Solutions by email (carol@fablevision.com) or call 781.742.0306.
We will ship out in increments of 10, and require payment (purchase order or credit card) prior to shipping. The school is responsible for shipping charges.
The standard retail price of Stationery Studio (single license) is $69.95. The Class2Home version will be available for $10 each (set of 10 for $100.) plus shipping and includes the CD-ROM only. No book or box is included.
When promoting this program to your school community, it’s imperative that students and families understand the Stationery Studio Class2Home version is absolutely for home use only.
Schools are required to provide the name and address (and email if available) of each student family that purchases Stationery Studio for future software upgrades and upcoming downloadable templates. We also need to know if the student has access to a PC or MAC at home.
Please Note: This offer can be withdrawn or changed at FableVision’s discretion.

0 Comments

Grammar Comics - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 06:00:00 GMT

Just saw this site and I thought many of you might enjoy this. GrammarMan Comics! http://grammarmancomic.com

1 Comments

Google LIFE Photos - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 06:00:00 GMT

Google is hosting photos from LIFE! Search millions of photos from LIFE's archives from as early as the 1750s. Go to http://images.google.com/hosted/life or add "source:life" to any image search on Google.

Let us know what you think!

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Global Connections - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 06:00:00 GMT

Last summer at NECC in San Antonio, TX, we listened to the keynote on the second day and were inspired to go beyond what we were already doing in education. The keynote was a pair of teachers from Canada who were not necessarily comfortable with technology but they were burning out in their classrooms. They learned about Skype and about iEarn and were refreshed! Their classroom activities were renewed as was their spirit!

What they were talking about is the latest buzz word in education, global connections. Teachers are connecting with other classrooms around the world! The tool of choice seems to be Skype. Skype is a free download. With this program you can instant message but you can also make audio and video calls to another computer for FREE! You can also make audio calls to landlines and cellphones for a small fee. Skype is also a tool that you can use on any platform; Mac, PC, or Linux.

How do you find schools to share such a connection? One of the most important issues is having a purpose in your connection. You want to make sure this is a learning experience for students. Using iEarn, schools can find projects to participate in or post their own project. The projects come in all shapes and sizes. There are projects from the US and some from Pakistan.

What equipment will you need? You will need a computer with an Internet connection. You will also need speakers and a microphone. If you are going to do a video conference, you will need to have a camera. Many of the Mac's come with built-in cameras which work very well. Web cams are not very expensive and can be picked up at your local Wal-Mart, Target, or KMart. Keep in mind, you get what you pay for in a web cam. If you have a regular video camera, you can plug that in and use it as a web cam! That adds the zoom and pan actions into your video conference.

This is really an exciting tool for education. Even here at the ESU, we are using Skype to answer teacher questions and other tools such as Adobe Connect Pro to do workshops and trouble shoot technical issues. Go home today and try these ideas for yourself! Some of you may be able to try this right away with kids but many of us need to try it for ourselves first. It is a great tool to visit those grandkids or children. Use Skype to find a college friend and visit with them. See what YOU think...

Here is a link to the presentation I did yesterday for the Library/Media Specialists group on global connections! It contains more links to other sites such as iEarn! http://tinyurl.com/globetips

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Writing Novels with Students - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 06:00:00 GMT

I was just recently reading Nicole Badgely's blog http://lifeinadschool.blogspot.com/ and she was talking about writing in general. She found this site where kids are challenged to write a novel in 30-days. The site she is talking about is http://ywp.nanowrimo.org/. You will have to check it out and if you try it with students, let us know so we can read your novels!

1 Comments

Student Blogging - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 05:00:00 GMT

I found this article on our Technology Integration Specialist community from Lori Long at Gothenburg. Thought it might be of interest for the Language Arts Teachers.

ttp://www.thejournal.com/articles/23434

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Inspirational Quotes for the Beginning of 2nd Quarter - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 05:00:00 GMT

A Couple of quotes have caught my eye lately so I thought I would share those with you.

"Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world." -Nelson Mandella
"You must be the change you want to see in the world." -Mahatma Gandhi

Here are a few more for you to check out on Darren Draper's blog (as a side note, he is a great person to follow on Twitter):http://drapestakes.blogspot.com/2008/10/my-turn-inpirational-quotes.html

0 Comments

Share Your Favorite Tech Tool - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 19:55:30 GMT

Today we learned about many great tools. What are you using in your classroom? What are you using at home? In the comments, share your favorite tech tool with the group.

1 Comments

21st Century & You! - Deanna Stall

Deanna Stall — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 05:00:00 GMT

What do 21st Century Students look like?

You have seen them walking down the street in any town, big or small, with pockets full of gadgets and talking on their cell phones. All that technology that we adults can't even identify. These are the 21st Century students. These are the next generation of earners, families, and voters in the United States. As I was reading the article Syncing Up With the iKid: Connecting to the Twenty-First-Century Student by Josh McHugh in Edutopia, I was thinking about when I was a kid and boom-boxes were a hot item. Everyone had one and they were all shapes and sizes. But it was a little embarrassing on those Saturday nights when my parents would bring out the record albums to torture us with this outdated technology, not to mention the polka music they were playing. Thankfully, the Walkman came along and I could listen to what I wanted, when I wanted. That meant, no more polkas for me! It also meant that I missed out on the family time together and the opportunity to let my parents know that I didn't like their music. In reminiscing, I realized that is probably what today's kids think of the adults in their lives. They want the latest and greatest technology for reason's they aren't sure about; they want it personalized; of course, they want to be able to tell you that you are old and out of touch with the world; and they still want to be accepted and part of the family.

A group called Partnership for 21st Century Skills developed a vision of 21st century student success. Nine states have taken part in this initiative. Nebraska's Department of Education has been in talks about it as well. The skills, knowledge, and expertise students should master to succeed in work and life are outlined on their site.

Core Subjects & 21st Century Themes - The core subjects they have included are English, reading or language arts, world languages, arts, math, economics, science, geography, history government and civics. They also include that interdisciplinary themes of global awareness; financial, economic, business and entrepreneurial literacy; civic literacy; and health literacy.
Learning and Innovation Skills - These skills include creativity & innovation; critical thinking and problem solving; and communication and collaboration.
Information, Media and Technology Skills - Because of an abundant amount of information the skills students will need are information literacy, media literacy, and ICT literacy (Information, Communication and Technology)
Life and Career Skills - Employers will be looking for these skills in any area and in all their employees. They are looking for flexibility & adaptability; initiative & self-direction; social & cross-cultural skills; productivity & accountability; leadership & responsibility.

In order for us to get students to succeed with these skills, four things must be in place. First, standards and assessments are critical; that's not a problem in Nebraska. Second, curriculum and instruction should support these 21st century skills. Third, teachers need to be provided adequate professional development in these areas. And lastly, where students learn affects what they learn so learning environments which support 21st century skills is the final critical piece of the puzzle. Statistics say that students of today will have fourteen different jobs by the time they are 38 years old. It is vital that our students have these skills in place before they leave our schools. Did You Know 2.0 and A Vision of Students Today are great video representations of many statistics like these.

What do 21st Century Teachers look like?

Why upgrade to color televisions if the black and white worked just fine? Why get a cassette tape player when your eight-track player did the job? Well, ok, the eight-track may be a bad example. I bet you can come up with a few of your own examples. The world has upgraded in every way, shape, and form. 21st Century Teachers are going to look different as well. We must upgrade to provide a quality education for our students.

International Society of Technology Education (ISTE) created standards for educational technology for students and teachers. In June of 2007, ISTE unveiled the NETS-National Educational Technology Standards for Students. This last June, ISTE released the NETS for Teachers. In June of 2009, ISTE will complete the NETS for Admininstrators. You are probably thinking, "More standards? I'm going to scream!" Before you do that, let's think about what these standards are really asking us as teachers to do for our students. Here are some explanations and ideas you can try in your classroom to promote 21st century learning in your students.

Facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity - Many of you already do this every day with kids. The word facilitate is really a tough one to truly put into action. How do we let go of the reigns in our classroom and still control the behavior, student interaction, and learning while they are there? My kids always want to be responsible for the big stuff like mowing the yard instead of just doing the dishes. The same applies to students in the classroom. If you want kids to do something, they need to know it is important enough and that you trust them enough to be in charge of it. Allow students to be in charge of their own learning! Give them guidance so they know how to do the research and let them find all the resources they can. Let them create their own visual model of their understanding so you can see it too. You will be surprised at how deep the learning will be! If you don't know how to use the technology, ask someone to help you or be willing to let the kids figure it out on their own. Letting go of the reigns is an exhilarating feeling for you and your students!
Design & develop digital-age learning experiences and assessments - For weekend work, have students take pictures that represent your current vocabulary words and share those pictures with the whole class. Think they don't all have cameras? They will take the pictures with their cell phone or will borrow a camera. Have you ever had your students make a movie for your class? If you aren't ready for Final Cut Pro, have students use their digital cameras to take enough pictures to create a movie (kind of like making a cartoon). If you want to dive in a little deeper, try out Movie Maker on Windows or iMovie on the Mac to have students create commercials, public service announcements, or summary videos of classroom events.
Model digital-age work and learning - Most schools now have some sort of information system such as Power School so many of you are using that for keeping grades. Try adding one new tool to your repertoire this next school year. If you get stuck, ask a student! They will be glad to help you, and it is a great way to build that trusting relationship with students. Keep your bookmarks on Delicious or Diigo and then share them with your students. Take pictures of your class and post them on Flickr or Picasa. Save your Power Point slides as .jpg or .png and post them to Picasa so students can access them anytime.
Promote and model digital citizenship and responsibility - Talk to kids in every class about internet behavior. Preteaching is the best! Tell them ahead of time what they can expect on an assignment and then, how you expect them to complete it and how it will look. If they are doing research, teach students how to do responsible research on the internet. Take the next step and talk to them about the difficult stuff. Talk about the internet, social networks, and what might be out in the world. This is no different than talking about drugs, alcohol, or relationships. Even if kids hear it from their parents and then hear it again from you, keep talking!
Engage in professional growth and leadership - Going to workshops is always a good thing but we here at ESU 10 are very aware of the obstacles you face when trying to take time for professional development. What can you do then, if you are unable to take those days? For starters, find a small group of people you trust. They don't have to teach in the same curricular area that you do or even the same grade level. Gather your group frequently for short sharing sessions even if it is only 10 minutes a week maybe in the morning or after school. Start by sharing your favorite web sites, next teach each other how to use a web tool. Finally try longer training sessions for instructional strategies or applications. You might even try learning a new tool together with the help of online training such as Lynda.com. or Atomic Learning. Your new group (PLN - Personal Learning Network) will keep you going through the school year. ESU 10 also offers many workshops in Kearney. Those trainings can be brought to you and your school by our trainers at ESU 10! Please call or email if you are interested. We will also be implementing a new training delivery method in the form of a webinar. We have four planned for October and November covering Google tools. They are one-hour sessions after school. We hope this new technology will make it easier for you to get the training you need, when you need it. Additionally, there are online communities just for teachers! From the makers of ODIE, ESU 10 is developing communities for workshop participants and member schools. (More communities are in the works!) These communities will be used for collaboration, sharing resources & lessons. There are also web sites such as Classroom 2.0, a Ning site where teachers gather to collaborate and share. If you are really ready to dig in, try Twitter! Twitter is a microblogging site where you follow and are followed only by the people you give permission to. Read more about Twitter and how it is being used in a new article on Edutopia! Professional development is viral so pass it on and cheer each other on!

If you are wondering where you stand with your technology integration, ISTE has created a classroom observation tool that can be downloaded. You will need to sign up for a free account. Use this tool when making lesson plans or observing teachers. The last two pages of the .pdf might trigger some other great lesson ideas for your classes.

21st century kids may look a little different than we did at that age but they didn't get there by themselves on purpose. They are the result of a changing society. America and the world will continue to change, grow, and develop new technology. For our students to be ready for that change, ready to be proper citizens, run a government of which we can be proud, we must be willing to work toward these skills for ourselves first.

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