Today's meeting with Toby

Toby met with us (our Biology PLC including Bret, Warren and Dave from the C4T class) during our early release time and we discussed the idea of Toby coming into our Sophomore level Biology classes this fall and helping us in terms of planning and implementation of our 1st unit (or 2 - over the 1st 6 weeks).  His help will also be in the areas of 21st century skills, the inclusion of various technologies, and the use of standards based assessment (Even though we incorporate some of this now, we will attempt to do this in a much more systematic fashion).  I think we are all excited about this and I am hopeful to be able to also use these things in my Adjusted classes.  Time is always an issue, but I guess it will always be.

EdCamp Columbus

I wasn't sure what to expect before arriving & to be honest, I wasn't too optimistic after the first 15 - 30 minutes. But I was VERY pleasantly surprised with the day. In each of the 4 sessions, there were excellent leaders and great response from those attending. My 4 sessions centered on, respectively, how gaming can be used in education, the use of ebooks, how to incorporate moodle and how to take advantage of google tools in the class. The suggestions and methods were literally flying across the rooms. Some "nuggets" I gathered included zerobio, wikiseat, knewton, ck12.org, as well as additional facets from google and moodle. I hope I will be able to make the time to follow up and become better acquainted with these. We'll see

C4T Day

We are currently in the middle of our second workday at Burbank. I feel the morning session has been very profitable - sharing in small groups has allowed me to be exposed to many good ideas - including timetoast (a timeline tool), using googledocs for "silent group discussions" and blurb.com to create a book online. The format has been very appropriate (small group sharing). Hopefully I will be able to add to this list in a bit. Back to the 3rd time around......Back after lunch - other ideas that sounds good that I heard during our "smackdown" includes glogster.com, mentortext and the"power of skype".

Today's Frustrations

As I prepare to wrap up my 2nd C4T unit, I am running into some snags. I realize this is "part of the plan", but it is discouraging nonetheless. We are using the old laptops in AP Biology today and we are attempting to upload annotated (highlighted and sticky noted) articles that are related to each student's research paper topic (connected to biotechnology). The problems we are running in to include: the diigo server being "down" (or at least not connecting to our outdated computers); the current version ogf firefox not being compatible with diigo (we were able to circumvent this with the diigolet function on safari); the difficulty of making all comments and sticky notes public (at least for our group); having some annotated articles disappearing on student computers (but still being available on the teacher computer); the inability to comment on another student's workwithout the appearance that it is now the commenter's post; and that's just the ones I can think of at this point in time. Things did seem to work a bit better 6th period compared to 4th, but it is still quite a work in progress. Perhaps with Toby's help on Wednesday, I can straighten some of this out - hopefully.

Last day of 1st semester

The semester is quickly coming to a close and I feel time is moving too fast for me to continue by learning related to C4T. Teaching a new prep for the second straight year - particularly one that has so many demands (Adjusted Biology) is certainly rewarding, but also quite time consuming. I am trying to use technology (sometimes recent, sometimes more "old fashioned") to help my students master difficult concepts - with some success. I am hopeful some of the upcoming activities (the January 23rd and the March 3rd group functions) will help me continue to engage and challenge my students in a productive way.

November Workshop Posting

Shown below are the answers to one question from each category as requested in order to reflect on our learning during our November c4t workshop.

What happened?
Summarize your learning from today's workshop:
During our workshop I was introduced to the accurate definition of a podcast (refining my preconceived notion). As I had no idea as how to create a podcast (or more precisely, one chapter of a podcast), I utilized the resources available in order to put together a 3 minute (actually 3 minutes and 1 second!) example describing a unit that was taught in one of my classes (more specifically - a Biome project which was completed in Adjusted Biology). These resources included what was covered in class before we began (such as a brief introduction to Garageband), online resources, assistance from colleagues and from the coaches. By early afternoon, I had completed the task; and on the way I was able to learn how to use garageband to record my voice as well as include a musical introduction and finale, and interject sound effects. I also learned how to vary the sound intensity of a musical clip (actually 2 ways - depending on the desired effect) and I learned how to include pictures - although I did not choose to do this with my particular recording. Finally, I was able to learn a few other things by listening to some of my colleagues' efforts (such as how to incorporate sounds from the internet - not simply from garage band).

How did you feel today?
At first - a bit confused; then - a bit frustrated; then - both frustrated and almost embarrassed (of course everyone else will do better than me). By early afternoon, I began to feel better and, with help, I started to feel a small sense of accomplishment. I tried to stay positive as this methodology is quite similar to how I teach sometimes. I see similar reactions with my students. I believe what you learn does tend to stick with you a little better this way.

What impact might this have on the teaching and learning in your classroom?
What support do you need in the future?
I combined 2 questions here. I feel this could be a good resource for students - perhaps I could make a periodic podcast for my AP Bio students to emphasize the important ideas in a unit, and/or to allow students to hear about what they missed during an absence (could download to a smartphone perhaps and listen while on the move). I don't see this as a tool for my students to use at this time (my 1st year teaching adjusted - I am concerned with more of the basics at this point; and I need to cover a lot of content and lab work in AP). As far as support goes, I am (as we all are I'm sure) concerned with the amount of time this would take to prepare a worthwhile recording on a regular basis. I am sure it would become easier the more I do this, but with all the other requirements of the job it can become overwhelming. I do not know what the answer would be as my workload is not going to decrease in the future. I guess the best way to handle this is to jump in and give it a try and see how it impacts the remainder of my work /time.

Current Frustrations

I am sitting at Burbank awaiting our first during school year work day. We were required to bring a unit which incorporated technology