Thing #3 - Like Skype

Nice assortment of articles to learn more about Skype. The Skype User's Manual will be helpful in getting this technology going at school, and it has some terrific ideas for implementing it in the classroom.

No problems downloading the software. I'm not sure if this was on my computer before I downloaded the software, but when I went to look at the list of district librarians, I noticed that there is now an icon that looks like this that enables the user to quickly add the contact to their Skype contact list. Interesting...

I envision the Skype video image projected on a large screen or ACTIVboard for a classroom to enjoy while interacting and/or interviewing an expert in a particular curriculum-related field or an author or an illustrator, and, as suggested in the Skype User's Manual, a language class talking to students in another country whose spoken language is the one they are studying. Also, neat idea about choirs or orchestras or bands mutually performing for students in another city or state or country.

Just think, Dr. B. could Skype our monthly meetings; however, breaks would be boring, no Marchand chocolate cake, no socializing with friends...never mind!

Thing #2 - Wordle, WordSift, Vokis, VoiceThread, and Bookr

Wordle and WordSift
I have used Wordle with my elementary students as an All about Me, describing an animal or famous person they had researched, and as reflection about what they learned during the school year. The biggest problem with this software is the many tedious steps you have to go through to save the Wordle if you want to use it in another software program like Photo Story, embed it in a blog, or if you just want to print it. My students love experimenting with the layout, font, and color options.

WordSift embodies student connectivity and The Networked Student concepts well. I tried the Preamble to the Constitution and came up with this image:

I like the way it links the tag cloud to an interactive visual thesaurus with a speaker option for hearing word pronunciations, a language option for translating into Spanish, Google image and video searches, and sample sentences for context use. The few unexpected and inappropriate images from the results of the Google image and software searches was the only drawback I found to using this software with elementary students.

How could students use this tool? Write a poem or short story or report and WordSift it to discover hidden meanings, new meanings, or more in-depth information and images about the topic. WordSift an article or excerpt from a book and go through the word layers and image/video links to discover new meanings or insights.

Vokis
Vokis are colorful, entertaining, eye-catching, interactive, got your attention fun. A few ways they could be used:

• to introduce and/or give directions on a web site or email


• as a vehicle for commenting on a wiki


• by students to create a short “All About Me” at the beginning of a school year or a "Who am I?" or "What am I?" like the following Uncle Sam example
  
  
  Get a Voki now!

VoiceThread
VoiceThread is my new favorite software. I created a VoiceThread called Sculpting Chicago as an activity for a PGP lesson on sculpture for my PGP group. I'm still not sure how to create logins for students, but I will keep playing with the site.

The VoiceThread site has a Digital Library for sharing teaching ideas. One involved the librarian posting covers of the state award books, briefly book talking each book, and having students leave their voicethread opinions of the books as they read them. Perfect for our Bluebonnet/Lone Star/Taysha lists!

Bookr
The concept is terrific, however, I was VERY disappointed when discovering that personal images couldn’t be used. I even tried uploading images into Flickr and searching by tag name, but without success.

I searched the word cloud in the Bookrarchive of previously saved examples and found a creative use for Bookr called Book of Colors.

I like the interactive feature that calls for not only the understanding of the color word, but the use of discrimination skills to find the object of that color word.

Another sample called American Symbols.

Bookr can be used in place of Power Point or Photo Story, which would leave out the time-consuming transition, custom motion, narration, and music choices, when class time is limited and new or similar software for creating student products is preferred.

Thing #1 - The Networked Student

We’re back! The Common Craft guys are back! The kickball captains have donned swimsuits and life preservers! Woo-hoo!

Librarians will most definitely play a role in “helping students navigate the future” and continue to help our students become lifelong learners. Joyce Valenza put it well in her article “On the Librarian: What’s the point…?, “if you are not an expert in new information and communication tools, you are NOT a media specialist for today.”

As teacher librarians, our charge in all of this is:

1. learning the 2.0 technologies (thanks Kickball Captains/Lifeguards!)
2. teaching/modeling for students and teachers how to use these technologies in collaboration with the classroom teachers and curriculum expectations, while teaching these 3 things - a research model such as the Big6, web site evaluation, and the ethical use of electronic information
3. giving students the freedom to create their learning environment using the 2.0 technology tools
4. having the technology hardware (and GEEK support!) for accessing and using these 2.0 tools.
   

Video/TeacherTube/MovieMaker

A catchy video from TeacherTube for 2nd graders when studying the water cycle. Had no trouble putting this in my blog. Cannot figure out how to import it into MovieMaker. If and when I do, I will post a comment. I did figure out how to import pictures into MovieMaker, but still need lots of playtime to manipulate the pictures. Playtime is at a premium this time of the school year. Sure would like to continue our Table Play during our fall and winter district librarians' meetings!

PhotoStory

My PGP students have loved using PhotoStory for their research products. It lends itself to a great deal of creativity and fun! All are having trouble uploading today. Still waiting on mine.

Hooray! It finally loaded!! I discovered that I was trying to upload the PhotoStory wp3 file instead of the wmv file. I'm guessing that most of us were making that mistake when all had so much trouble.

Audio Manipulation

Once I got the headset working, I had fun creating audio files. Decided to save a short rendition of "The Washington Waddle" that I used to sing to my kids at bath time. It's a fun song that makes me laugh and relieves STRESS...
Major frustration when using the 2.0 Sandbox Wiki...my whole table tried uploading their audio files with NO LUCK. I will try uploading this tonight. I refuse to give up! I want to be successful with this! I want to feel like I can help my teachers by really knowing what I am talking about.
Okay, it's loaded on the Sandbox Wiki. Have no idea how to link it to this blog. Vaughn? Liz?

Image Manipulation

Had never used images in Discovery Education. Great resource. Loved using Flicker Creative Commons. Found pictures of my favorite bird...the hummer. Glad to find out how to add text and manipulate the hummer images in PPT. Made this motivational poster. Went over the time allotted, so my stress level is rising..