DeLea's NCaect Notes

NCaect Conference Collection

 Thursday - 10:45 How do you get staff to connect, share, explore?

• Katie Christo and Donna Murphy talked about how the 10 instructional technologist of Burke County schools planned a two-day Summer Tech Conference for Burke county teachers .  Using the Wiki they presented information, built a website and had the teachers to evaluate the workshops they offered. 
• Some of the topice they covered were - digital cameras, moodle, google earth, interactive websites, moviemakes, photostory 3, podcasting, DE Streaming, WordPress, iTunes, LearnNC and others.
• They had no handouts for the teachers but they were given 1.2 credits for attending or 2.0 credits if they did a blog.
• The teachers could choose 5 different 50-minute sessions a day.
• They had no budget to do the 2-day conference and realized they should have provided drinks and snacks.
• Provided a FAQ page on the wiki following the conference for the teachers.
• They are providing an open lab this summer to allow teachers time to work on the new skills before leaving the conference.

Will improve the wiki this year to include descriptions of each session offered and have already sent out information to all teachers, secretaries, administrators, to see what interest they have for the sessions being offered.

They plan every session without levels and will include everyone in the sessions for novices, to experts except for Google Earth (1 and 2) and games (1 and 2).

They have Technology Wednesday Thursdays - offering one technology workshop each day for one-hour throughout the school year for teachers.

Thursday - 11:45 Changing the Face of K-12 Course Sepcific Websites Using Moodle

Richard Hartshorne - rhartsho@uncc.edu    UNC at Charlotte Instructional Systems Technology

What is Moodle - a learning management system.  Open source management system that enables the delivery of learning content and resources.

Designed to facilitate online courses or to supplement face-to-face instruction.

http://globalclassroom.us to host Moodle sites for free.  Also host Moodle on the district servers for more flexibility.

http://moodle.org/    Can download. 

Functionality of Moodle -

Forums - have transcripts of all forums

Content managing of resources

Quizzes

Blogs - can track all the blogs

Wikis

Database activities

Surveys - have some pre-made surveys on Moodle

Chat - have transcripts of all chats

Glossaries - students can add to the glossaries and can track the students who added content

Peer Assessment

Multi-language support

Tons of Developer Plug-Ins at http://moodle.org/mod/data/view.php?id=6009

Can pull in other tools like Skype

Moodle vs. a traditional course site -

Dynamic vs. Static

Active vs. Passive

Collaborative vs. Individual

New technologies vs. Old Technologies

Secure vs. Open Access

Limited tech skills necessary vs. web authoring skills necessary

Pedagogial Benefits

Constructivist/social approach

Flexible - multiple instructional strategies to be implemented

Modular in nature

Interoperability - if you have something created in Blackboard it can be imported into Moodle

Oversite/Supervision - chat, logs, etc.

Motivating to students

Parental Information (grades, participation) - parents can also view

Instuctional Strategies - skipped

Issues to Consider

Server often required

Digital Divide

Accessibility

Technology related issues

Moodle Site

Click on Teacher Registration section to set up an account

Ready to build your site - http://www.nc.globalclassroom.us

**Define your settings for the course you build on Moodle**

Blocks are found on the right of the screen that describes the course to the students - learning objectives, activities, etc.

Select topics - weeks for each topic.  Basically building the course following the Moodle template.

Can upload files to the Moodle site.  Can hyperlink to the files.

Can add activites and upload multiple files.

Involved template but seems user friendly.

Thursday - 2:00 - Education with Vision: Using Video in Education

Convergence of Video in Education

http://twitter.com/sharpeteacher - Twitter

Marty_Sharoe@catawba.k12.nc.us    http://www.cataba.k12.nc.us/pages not complete

Video production enables media leteracy, HOTS, project based learning, real world relevancy and a deeper connection to the curriculum.

"Tough Choices for Tough Times" Marc Tucker

http://www.tec.con/index.php/talks/view/id/66  Sir Ken Robinson on Creativity - annual conference

Software

MovieMaker and/or PhotoStory 3 - Windows

iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD - Mac

Screencasting - digital recording of computer screen output, video screen capture.

CamStudio - http://camstudio.org - free

Jing Project - http://www.jingproject.com - beta

Screenflow - http://www.varasoft.com/products/screenflow - mac and not free

Video News Production at schools using teleprompters, video and audio mixers. 

Wirecast gives you video mixing abilities - can download for free for 3- days.  Cost $400.00  For PC and Mac.  PC version doesn't give you an external display.  Gives you live titles.  Exports as a movie file, a webcast for meetings, sports events, etc.

Wirecast has options to broadcast or can ustream.com.

VoiceThreads - create a video using pictures.  - free to teachers to create unlimited accounts - not free student accounts.  $60.00 a year for unlimited student accounts.  As a teacher you decide what students can see and do on VoiceThread.

VoiceThread will give the teacher the code to post the thread on the teacher's webpage.

Thursday - 3:15 - Twitter, Ning and Yugma - Oh My!: Web 2.0 Tools

Received handout.  Will make copies for everyone.

Bloggin platforms for the classroom

21 classes http://www.21classes.com

From David Warlick - Class Blogmeister - http://classblogmeister.com/

Edublogs now has a student piece in the blog - one per student - new.

Wikis

A collaborative process that can be used for grade level curriculum planning.

Embed live video in Wiki

pdwiki - is good. 

Wikibooks

Wikijunior

RSS Readers

Pull in favorite blogs, wikis, googlereader, and others to one site.

LearnNC has a new blog.

Social Bookmarking

Del.icio.us can tag a favorite site with multiple tags. 

Other website were discussed.

Collaboration Tools

Skype allows you to talk to people through the computer.  Can video chat.  Doesn't cost anything.

Yugma - free - 2.7-364-812 - allows you to see what's happening on another person's desktop. 

UStream - being used to video sessions at the conference.  Use a good webcam for clarity.

SlideShare - will save your presentation and with Internet connection you can pull up your presentation.

Social Networking

Twitter - microbloggin site - cross between instand messaging and blogging.  Keep your entry down to 140 characters.  Set up a network, a group of people you want to follow and they follow you.  A professional network. 

Thursday - 4:15 - Leading Distance Learning in the LEA

How does NCVPS help meet the LEAs requirements?

NCVPS has a new strategis plan online that is aligned to the State Board goals with specific goals and measures.

NCVPS has a Wave pilot program with regional response teams

NCVPS now has a leadership development plan - strategic 7 - superintendent, assistant superintendent, principal, tech person, guidance counselor, CTE director, member of the school.

The Strategic 7 are key and need to communicate in a way that's meaningful to the students.

Focused on raising achievement

Supporting students

Empowering the teachers

Creating 21st centrury systems

Monitored by reporting to the State board of education

Three regions - additional positions at NCVPS

Principal of the region - mountains, piedmont, coastal.  Added a student service coordinator in these regions.

Credit recovery person in each region.

Working on English I and Algebra I credit recovery right now.

Pilot - 10 districts - three in eastern, three in central, three in western and catawba.

Wave 1 Results / Goals

To define best practices

Integrate 21st centruy processes by restructuring textbook funds and integrate more Web 2.0 tools 

 Define key student support issues - DLA roles and responsibilities, provide key info for DLAs

Create a sustainable model to lead 21st century transformation.

Dr. Setser Comments in the session are below

Talked with the pilot districts to learn from them.

Where are you now, next, or Future Ready?

Florida has the longest serving program of 11,000 students.  This summer will offer 17 courses.

Georgia has first online teacher certification.

Michigan has online graduation requirement.

Catalog of white papers on the NCVPS website.

We are not future ready in NC.

Exit standard EOC courses are up 20% in spring.

Electives, AP and EOC courses are up.

Learn & Earn online - college courses.  Less than 18% of students graduate with a college degree.

He who thinks he leads, but has not followers, is only talking a walk. - Leadership Proverb

Now

Cumberland county had evening web academy.

Vance county has advanced instructional technology center

Next

Catawba now offers courses at 6:00am and up to 8:00pm

Future Ready

Virtual campus policy - be present on campus or the virtual campus.  Why is that not an option for the students?

Looking at other states who offer this to the students to see what they have done.

Lead Differently Digitally.

Middle schools want foreign language - VPS has Spanish and Algebra I online. 

Think differently in how we serve students.

Campus policy - inside and outside the school, doing internships, working, etc. to meet the needs of the students.

Want to reduce tests and make tests online. 

Leadership Academy - put online coureses for them.

Kentucky - bought iTouch lab, put all assessment online, beam the test to be graded.

eBooks

NPR says by the year 2012, by allowing proper filtering and controls, with discussions NCVPS could teach in more online ways.

Now - have a jack of all trades for distance learning advisors in schools now.  Some schools are now looking at asking the state to lobby for an online instructional facilitator for the schools.

Wave 2

VPS provided lots of training for the pilots.

VPS looks at some of the services we offer now

New website is 2.0

Producing podcasts, video clips to educate parents and the community about VPS.

Testing web 2.0 in the pilot schools now.

Publishing weekly - framing the discussion with a podcast from Dr. Setser.

Web 2.0 eLeaning in Catawba - a way to talk and share files.

LEAs need to decide what they want to allow in to the schools using web 2.0

Wiki concept

Way to capture what's going on in the pilot schools.  Send email to be placed on the private wiki.

WetPaint - experimenting with this in Blackboard

Wave 2 - schools need to go through the Strategic 7 training first. 

We are not Future Ready but are moving from Now to Next.

Email student support coordinator for your region to have access to the Wiki.

Friday - 8:15 - Building Teacher Webpages With Microsoft Sharepoint

Webpages

Blogs 

Wikis

Podcasting Vodcasting from the document library

RSS feed

Student Learning Gateway - can push assignments down to the students

There is a free version and a paid version

Can limit what teachers have access to in the Sharepoint

wysiwyg - don't need to know html code

Can be set up to save as draft, submit for approval or publish

Teachers would need to be given publish rights to have that option.

Easily upload pictures from the computer to Sharepoint.  Can resize the picture within Sharpoint before uploading.

Can attach files, links, events to the calendar.

Would like to know what is offered in the free version and what is offered in the paid version since WSFCS is using the free version.   

Friday - 9:15 - 11:00 - EduBloggers.com - Gathering

Left my notes at home and cannot complete this section

Thursday Luncheon & Vendors on Friday

Thursday - Enjoyed the luncheon learning about Prescriptive Instruction - not sure how this program would be similar or better to what many of the elementary schools are already doing to assist students in reading and math.

Friday - Visited with several vendors

Discovery Education Streaming and learned about new updates.

NEO 2 used for keyboarding skills and now has several software packages.

SMART Board

AR - now has an online subscription that would include all updates and added test packets

Websites of Interest

Quotes

Takeaways

What would I like to learn more about immediately?

Would like to learn more about web 2.0, wiki and sharepoint.

Cool Stuff (equipment, software, free things)

New upgrades for DE Streaming

Online subscription for AR