Multiple User Google Accounts

For anyone with more than one Google account who's tired of logging out and in again, and uses Firefox - I have the addon for you! (Two actually)

First install the Grease Monkey Firefox add-on Grease Monkey "Allows you to customize the way a webpage displays using small bits of JavaScript" but it's certainly more geared to the technically minded. The good thing is many people have made scripts to share like:

Second go to userscripts.org and install it. Once you are logged into your Google Account, where it had once said Sign Out, it now has a pull down to easily switch between different accounts.


For anyone not familiar with Google Apps here's a previous post about what's offered.

Stimulating Survery

One of the blogs I read is Scott McLeod's Dangerously Irrelevant and he recently posted an Edublogger's survey Which I recommend for anyone with a blog, the thing is . . . once I did the survey, I realized how much I've enjoyed blogging and how much I miss doing it. I keep putting it on the back burner whenever something else comes up. And so, I've made a New Year's resolution (the first ever I think) to start being more diligent about posting, ok, here goes . . .

The Tech Curve - Episode 5

The Tech Curve

Episode 5

(If you cannot see the video below, please unblock BESS)

SHOW NOTES

Google Presentations now Embeddable

Google Presentations now can be embedded into web pages, blogs or where ever. It was just a matter of time for this feature, like YouTube videos, or other gadgets. And now it's here!

Analog television

Even though this seems like an unlikely subject for the new year, I had someone tell me that over the holiday break that they had been in a nameless electronics box store and "the guy there told me I would have to by a new T.V. this year because everything's going digital and my old one isn't going to work."

First off, not true. Of course the salesperson there is going to tell you whatever you need to hear to get you to buy that new, big screen 50' plasma TV with optional cup holders.
What is really going to happen can be found here: http://dtv2009.gov

'Tis the Season

The Tech Curve - Episode 4

The Tech Curve
Episode 4

SHOW NOTES

Ideal Situation

David Warlick had a great post on his blog that I commented on. As I typed, my comment ran further and further so I thought I'd post it here.

David's original statement

I tell them that teachers need:

• Time to plan, collaborate, research, assess and adapt, build, and innovate (I tell them 3 to 4 hours a day — everyday).
• Classrooms that are equipped for learning in an abundant information environment, rather than an information-scarce environment (This means wifi, a laptop in every teacher and learner’s hand, one or more projectors in each classroom, and access to the emerging technologies that channel contemporary literacy).
• Permission to safely innovate and facility to engage in professional conversations about the changes needed for relevant education.

MY RESPONSE

I've been thinking about this for some time now and as I read so many bloggers who point out the need for educators to work/adapt/learn in this digital age, I wonder if we engaged in a thought experiment to imagine the ideal situation. What would it look like?

Using the points you made:

1) Time.
Nothing new can be added to a teachers plate (there's no room.) New must replace something they're already doing, especially 'techie' stuff because it's usually hard enough to learn as it is. So, if a teacher starts a class blog, have it replace the class newsletter, Skyping peers to conference about students? PLC time, etc. This may seem obvious, but often they still do both.

2) Equipment.
The ideal setup here can be as varied as the teachers using it, but what I'd like to think of as the base: Computer + Internet + Projector. Or access to the like. Arguments could be made that one needs a camera or smartboard or a laptop vs desktop, etc. but I would be ecstatic if those three components were as standard as a chalkboard in every classroom.

3) Administrators.
Possibly the deal breaker. With an administration supportive and invested in these changes, teachers can and will be more likely to embrace them and impress everyone with their ingenuity. With out it, they're out on a limb.

4) Assessment.
My own addition, BUT if as a teacher you have the time, ample equipment and administrators on board, yet cannot showcase student work in a way that is meaningful to them and their parents, the rest becomes meaningless.
Assessment needs to be created collaboratively by all those who use them.(see #1) Work must be digitized and web based for access to all.(see #2) The system must be universally supported so no teacher is left out on a limb.(see #3)

The assessment system must provide feedback to the students, parents and teachers about actual student work, not a subjective score placed on the work by someone.

Is all this possible? I think so.

Tech Sherpas

The students I work with were recently recognized in a national newspaper (The Christian Science Monitor) and I couldn't be more proud.

Stemming from a comment I made in Edutopia (link) earlier this year, a reporter came up and spent the day. It was a fun experience for the kids and the article was a nice way to show some of stuff we're doing in the district.

Photo: Mary Knox Merrill

Article: http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1129/p13s02-legn.html

Audio Interviews: http://www.csmonitor.com/slideshows/2007/techSherpas


(The article was later sent to www.dailygood.org - interesting how stuff spreads.)

Into the Woodwork

First off, this is not a, "Sorry I haven't been blogging as much as I'd like to lately because of X, Y, or Z." post (even though I haven't)

I've always felt that the blogging platform is, in many ways, a digital rendition of an old school teaching style. One voice kicking out ideas or thoughts to a 'class' of readers. Of course there are comments and the asynchronous nature of the whole thing, but ultimately, even with all the differences they're much the same.


Not that there is anything wrong with that. There's something of blogger soul searching going on around the ole' RSS reader (Death of a blogger) these days, that some are asking why blog when we have Twitter or Ustream or ____ (Next Web 2.0 tool to be filled in tomorrow.) Tools that are more immediate and those needs better. I guess my reply would be, if this format aides ones own thought process and helps others to boot? It's a win-win.

'Nuff said on that, so why the pictures of lions and antelopes in this post? Well, creatures like these are pretty standard around the school halls of MSAD #48. We are fortunate enough to have one of the only taxidermy programs anywhere (that I know of) and host some incredible exhibits throughout the district. These have ranged from the lions you see here, to polar bears, giraffe heads, numerous deer like animals and an assortment of birds. All amazing and many taken for granted.

I rarely think about these lions as I walk by them and I chuckle whenever I'm with someone who starts as they see them for the first time. For me the pair have become part of the woodwork. One of the questions I've been asked by visitors is, "How do you stop the students from bothering them?" And I realized that for the most part, students barely see them as well.

It occurred to me that if we can do that for lions and bears, we can do that for the technology as well. I'm seeing the signs more and more that this is happening, but we'll know it's really a success when it had become part of the woodwork.

The Tech Curve - Episode 3

While still getting the bugs out of the process, I'm happy to see how the kids are progressing with their comfort level on a live show.

SHOW NOTES

GeekEd! Podcast

My brother Keith teaches the Integrated Technology classes at the middle schools in MSAD #48 for grades 5-8 . Some of his comments were covered recently on the GeekEd! podcast Episode 89.


I had the opportunity to chat with the GeekEd! team last April in Episode 68.

The Tech Curve Episode 1 - The Mac Book

Some of the students in my broadcasting class are creating a weekly technology help show for students and teachers. This was the first outing and I think went very well!

ACTEM Conference - Will Richardson's Follow Up Session

The Search

A book I finished recently that seems to keep coming up in conversataion is
The Search by John Battelle. It not only covers Google extensively, (up to 2005) but starts where search begins and discusses the two elements of search that are so obvious to us now, but where not at its inceptio: Discovery and Recovery.

Think about it, on the web we know the amount of info is too much to categorize, so we use search to find what we're looking for, while on our own machines we recover work (usually called Find) and pull up something we have already done. These two model are converging now with Google's Web History feature. (www.google.com/history) They record every site you've been on. Privacy issues are a huge concern with this ability to track your 'click stream.' But I have to admit - it's very useful. When I want to find that page I didn't bookmark or otherwise note, this is the easiest way to go back in time and recover it.

All these implications are discussed in The Search. It gets a little heavy with the geek speak at times, but overall a great read (listen) on something that we all use everyday.

ACTEM 2007 Conference - Will Richardson

Will Richardson's keynote presentation at the 2007 ACTEM state conference.



To view the video in full screen [Link]. (Please note the quality level is set for web streaming, for a higher quality video or DVD please contact kkelley@msad48.org) Download the video for an iPod. For more information on how to put video on an iPod click here.

Bob Sprankle also podcast an audio only version of the keynote here.

Videos

The folks at Digital Ethnography do it again! After the terrific video The Machine is Us/ing from Kansas State University. Here's two new videos:

A Vision of Students Today

and Information R/evolution

Post ACTEM Conference

This year's ACTEM conference is over I've been mulling over how to recap. Will Richardson did a spot on keynote (our broadcasting students recorded it and will be posting as soon as we're back on Monday.) And I got to see the Bit-by-Bit team in action. What a treat. I also did a session of my own on the Virtual Classroom (That I embarrassingly didn't realize I was going to be doing.) I hope the participants got something from it. As soon as it was over, I started thinking of all that I should have said. Oh well.



Student following the projected webpage from Will Richardson's Keynote on his iPhone.

Overall it was a great time for Maine educators, but I still have that lingering feeling of the 'preaching to the choir' phenomenon. The sticking question for me was, "Ok, how do we get those educators not here that are not interested - well, interested?" The response of, "They just have to be." doesn't satisfy me. Obviously they don't 'have to be' because they aren't. How much of what's shared at this conference gets back to the kids. I mean really back to the kids. How many of us go back on Monday, jazzed by what we learned, and are able to get that through to those who are decidedly not on the 'Tech Scene?' Certainly every bit helps and I really do feel there were some amazing ideas being tossed around, but I like to know that the connection is being made beyond the Civic Center. I guess for me, I'll pull out my recurring mantra of, 'Have the students do it.' Meaning, have students participate in the experience, make them be part of the solution and bring others along in the process.

ACTEM Conference

The ACTEM Conference is coming next week, October 11th and 12th, and I'm bringing some of our broadcasting students to record the keynote speaker Will Richardson as well as many of the sessions as we can.

I'll also have the students interviewing participants much like we did at Alan November's Building Learning Communities conference this summer. That was a fantastic experience where our students rubbed elbows and interview many of the movers and shakers of the educational technology community like Marcos Torres, Marc Prensky, Chris Lehmann, etc. (Check out some of the interviews here.)

Also, here's the keynote presentations from the 2006 ACTEM conference.

Angus King Award Presentation




David Warlick Keynote Presentation

K12 Online Conference 2007

The K12 Online Conference 2007 is almost here. It runs from October 8th to the 27th. Go to k12onlineconference.org for more details. Here's a quick explanation from the website:

"The K-12 Online Conference invites participation from educators around the world interested in innovative ways Web 2.0 tools and technologies can be used to improve learning. This FREE conference run by volunteers and open to everyone."

You can click here for a flyer or listen to a terrific interview by Bob Sprankle, Cheryl Oakes and Alice Barr with a couple of the conferences organizers, Wes Fryer and Darren Kuropatwa.
Check out podcast #24 at: www.bobsprankle.com