A+ for Energy (Grant Money)

Jen and Sandi, Aug 2009

Probably the second most asked question I get (the first is where did you learn all this tech stuff) is how did you get all of this technology for your classroom.  The short answer is that I apply for anything and everything, and this program has been especially generous for Hythe Regional School.

For 3 years now HRS has been awarded $10 000 each year as part of the BP Energy Education Program, A+ for Energy program for sucessful energy projects.  You can see the winning project applications here.  Projects included junior high Science, Social Studies and Language Arts.

Each project allowed students to have an interesting and engaging learning experience and allowed the school to buy some technology to complete the project.  In year 1 SMARTboards, year 2 laptops and in year 3 more laptops, audio and video recorders.



Jen May 2010


This years deadline is April 6, 2011with the application submitted completely online.  Think up some crazy and creative energy projects and let myself, Sandi or Debbie know if we can help you out.

Enabling Education Through Technology Symposium

Last week I had the chance to attend this symposium with a couple hundred of my IT and ET colleagues.  It was a great event to network, learn and reflect on what we are doing in each of our districts. 


Some of the things that I took away from this event:


1) Microsoft's Productivity and Future Vision



Is this what you see in the future?  When, how far away are we? I know I leaned over to IT Darcy a number of times and asked him when I could get this in our classrooms!
2) Digital Citizenship: Tania Sterling (@taniasterling) was great.  She shared this LiveBinder full of resources for digital citizenship in our schools. There were two ideas that I want to run with

• Family Acceptable Use Agreement - Parents and students all sign them, but do they really know what they mean?  I want to make a serious effort in engaging our parents in this conversation and education.
• Students involved in PD - students may be our best resource as we navigate 21st century skills.  It's time to enable and encourage them to become leaders.  During upcoming PD sessions I would like to use students as facilitators.

3) Google - Only Google could fill a room with a sessions that starts at 7:45am!!  The cloud seems to be the direction that PWSD is taking, although we still need to decide between Google Apps and Live@Edu, hopefully soon!

• Google is in process of totally revamping Google Presentation, otherwise know as the ugly step child of Google Docs
• Their motto is "Don't be Evil" when they look at doing things
• 20% on innovation, that is the rule for all Google employees.  Each week one days is spent on something that is not work, can you imagine?
• Will it stay free for education?  Each mail box cost approximately $1 to create and maintain.  Google charges business $50, keeping it free for education.

4) What are you most excited about in Alberta Education? (I will admit this was easier to answer before the budget announcement Thursday afternoon but...) I am most excited about the never ending possibilities there are in education right now.  It is truly an exciting time to be involved in teaching and learning as it continues to evolve.  More exciting are the amazing people that I get to work with and connect with.  It is not dull and I feel like I have an amazing support system no matter what happens!

Word Work in a Balanced Literacy Jr. High Classroom

This is a first in a series taking a look inside a balanced literacy junior high classroom.















Special thanks to literacy coordinators Jenny McAusland and Rowena Stewart for spearheading this project.!

Math @ Admin Meeting

So much fun to watch our administrators work through a math problem designed by our AISI math team!

The Problem: Using some Peter Liljedahl's ideas, Corry tweeked a math problem for the admin group to tackle.  See the entire problem here.

The Hook: "I have a dilemma that I would like you to help me solve. I LOVE red wine and like to drink a bottle each night."

Random Groupings: Using SMART's random group generators, all admin and central office staff were put into groups and set loose on the windows to work on the problem.

The Answer: I don't think we ever got one answer, but there was lots of discussions, assumptions, arguing and laughter.  Email Corry if you want to know for sure.

Peter Liljedahl is presenting at Mighty Peace Teacher's Convention, you will not want to miss!

Sessions include: all sessions in CP202 in GP Comp High School

• Numeracy Tasks (K-3) Session E - Fri 9-10:15 and Session G 12:10 - 1:25
• Numeracy Tasks (4-6) Session F - 10:35 - 11:50 and Session H - 1:45-3
• Numeracy Tasks (7-9), Session A - Thur 9-10:15
• Numeracy Tasks (10-12), Session B - Thur 10:35 - 11:50
• Assessment for a new Mathematics (7-9), Session C, Thur 12:10 - 1:25
• Assessment for a new Mathematics  (10-12), Session D, Thur 1:45- 3

 

4 ways to create a fake Facebook page

Creating a fake Facebook page for a story character or historical character is an excellent way for students to demonstrate deep understanding.  They have to be able to articulate the connections and relationships this person has, what they would say, who would they say it to, what images would they share or not share.  It becomes an immense critical thinking activity.

There are a number of different ways to do this!

1) A Word Template: I created this last year when I wanted a simple way to create a Facebook page for feudal Japan. I hosted the template in Moodle and students opened it from there to work on.

2) My Fake Wall: This website allow you to create a page that will be saved with a unique URL.  It does require students to create a login with an email address.

3) Google Doc Template: This Presentation template has 4 slides.  Wall, Info, Photos and Video that you can change with your own information.

4) SMART Notebook Template: Another template, this time in Notebook.  I like this one because a lot of the items are locked, so they cannot be moved or deleted.  Also check out the attachments, there is a handy little word document to guide the assignment.

How can you see using this in your classroom?

Tweet, tweet with #pwsd

Wow!  I was blown away with the amount of tweets at our district day on Friday.  We had tweets from every session, from people at home and from central office.  Thanks to all of you for making the day such a success!

@CiscoSystems

Thanks to Cisco systems for donating the 2 Flip cameras and the jacket that were used in the Twitter draw!


Right now I have 74 #pwsd tweeps in my twitter list, please follow and let me know if I missed anyone.



How did I pick the winners?

The first thing I did was create a Tweetdoc of all of the #pwsd tweets for the day.  Once I had the document that had all our tweets I used a random number generator to pick the winners.

Rob S from BHRS @hackerob

Darren R from HRS @drob222

Barb B from TPS @gpwonderwoman

Now my #pwsd tweeps, I have something in the works, maybe another little twitter give away.  So tweet away

• Websites to share?
• What went well in class?
• Need some help?
• Share some resources!

Let's keep #pwsd going!

Cultivating a Digital Classroom (Part 3 of 3)

This group rocks!


Becky, Daniel, Terrina, Lyla, Stacey, Anna, Marion, Shawn, Natalie, Darcy, Sharolyn, Adair & Sarah

 Our three day cohort came to an end on Friday, here you can find Part 1 and Part 2.

Friday started out with a reconnection with our PLN. Revisiting Twitter, update your profile and tweet.  Connect with professionally relevant Facebook pages and look into RSS again.



Anna and Marion's Pecha Kucha

 Our second activity was a Pecha Kucha.  Usually this is 20 slides advancing every 20 seconds presentation.  Since we were pressed for time, we used 10 slides advancing every 10 seconds around the topic "Teaching and Learning in the 21st Century" 

Digital Classroom - Pecha Kucha

View more presentations from jenclevette.

All groups did a fabulous job with the very short amount of time that I allotted them!  We then used a Moodle forum to reflect how we could use this technique in the classroom.



The Savanna Ladies!



Until lunch everyone had time to work on projects.  Some worked in Moodle creating courses, other explored Web 2.0 tools or fought with Word trying to make forms work.  Work was done and laughs were shared.

Adair, Becky, Daniel and Natalie working on their Google Preso!

Before we broke for lunch each person was given some digital scavenger hunt clues.  Such things as old technology, new technology, fun, jump, and the funniest thing you could find.  The assignment was to go out and take pictures with what you had.  Phone, iPod, camera or borrowed camera.  When we got back from lunch we collaborated on this Google Presentation.

This group had the "best" scavenger hunt pictures,
can you find them?

 We experienced first hand the positives (I can add the pictures and you do the captions) and negatives (who deleted my slide!) of working on a collaborative document. 
We also had to figure out how to get images off devices and re size and flip them for the presentation.
A short discussion on blogging and the day was over!

My intention was to end the day with this video



But all groups were far to busy trying to get all their last tweets in to be entered into the draw for the Flip Cameras  :0

Thanks so much to my fabulous group.  They were challenging and engaged, fun and a great colleagues to learn and reflect with.