Strange quote to ponder during break...

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/r/ruben_blades.html

Could it be possible?  We live in a society where the search for information results in immediate gratification, with minimal verification of facts, triangulation or thinking.  We communicate via text and email and are beginning to lose the art of face-to-face communication.  Do you even think students would understand what it means to keep something between you, me and the fence post?  Or what it means to stand at a fence line to communicate with your neighbor?

Don't get me wrong, the instant communication is awesome.  I can send a text to a child and get a response within a minute; while this provides comfort for parents, could this contribute to the increase of anxiety school aged youth face today?  On the other hand, instantaneous information was essential this past week when we experienced an untimely death; Facebook provided immediate information and the medium to support each other across the miles. 

Just a few thoughts to ponder as we enjoy our break. 

Map Making - Take One

Miguel Helft's article in the New York times July 2007, talks about creating interactive maps on the , web that are similar to Wikipedia in that everyone can update the map.  As he talks about tracking graffiti, I think of how wonderful this would be to track potholes in Michigan.  I also pause to realize how out of touch I am with all of the technological advances:  this article was published in 2007!  So, in front of an audience of strangers I will make my first attempt at creating an interactive map.  The first decision is do I use my map to tell a story or simply as an exercise to demonstrate I can add pictures, locations, text, etc?

If I was in a science class, I could use the interactive map during an orienteering lesson.  If in a math classroom, it could be a launch on how to graph ordered pairs.  I've used the math example very low tech before, with chalk and a chalkboard, so I am curious how it will morph into a high tech activity.  The low tech activity was for students to take three minutes to write down directions from the school to their home.  They would try to fish out details with clarifying questions like "do you want north & south, or left and right" and I would simply respond describe it as best you can.  From there we would have someone read their description and I would draw their journey on the board.  After several were posted on the board, and simply because I ran out of room, I asked what we should do.  Of course they started with "erase the first one" and I always said, but we might need it later.  That led them to the idea of layering the maps and they discovered the need for a point of origin.  In this example, the school made sense, because that is where we started.  As we progressed, the need for direction came into play and they had to decide if they wanted to use North, South, East and West, or Left, Right, Up and Down.  Sooner or later "laziness is a virtue" kicked in and they didn't want to write all that, so they decided to use signs:  + for right or up and - for left or down. I could still launch with the students writing their story, then pairing the students to use only the written word to create a map.  This would challenge their writing skills, direction skills and their map making skills.

Mattawan Fire Fighter

Antwerp Sunshine Library, Mattawan

Mattawan Marching Band, Mattawan High School Football Field

Mattawan Little League, Mattawan, MI

So, now for the experiment.  Creating an account for Google Maps was easy!  There was a link to upload pictures, which was one of the tasks, so I clicked on it.  That took me to the Panoramio site. I uploaded pictures and added them to the map.  Now the dilemma:  how do I get these on MY map?   I only posted four locations to start, just in case it did not work.   I posted them here for your review.  As for the map assignment, I obviously did not read the directions in their entirety, so back I go. 
Trial Two can be found on GoogleMaps - Edington Take Two.  While I could not use the four pictures as I had hoped, if you click on the red line you will see an image for the fire house and if you click on the blue line you will link to a Youtube video of the marching band.  It was very clunky to do this, so I think I need more practice.  Thank you for your patience with me as I learn all of these new technological tricks!  For my final trick of the evening I am going to try to embed the map directly into this post:
View Edington Map - Take Two in a larger map

Commentary....

I did not realize the impact Pinterest had on education until I was observing the 100 day projects for my son's kindergarten classroom.  There were 100 piece puzzles, 100 legos, 100 pennies, which seemed normal for kindergarten.  Then there was a trifold poster board, with fifty crayons glued to the top and 50 matching colors to the bottom.  Then there was an extravagant design in the middle  It was awesome.  Then I bumped into the dad who helped with the project.  The design I admired  was created using a hair dryer to melt the crayons leaving wax splatters in random patters on the trifold canvas.  I was very impressed. The dad told me his wife found it on Pinterest.  I never even considered looking online for ideas for my child's kindergarten project.  I cannot imagine the impact Pinterest would have if I was in charge of a science fair this year!


Another area that technology is changing things is Facebook.  We just lost a student who graduated with my daughter.  Facebook has allowed people to say goodbye or express their love and appreciation for the young man online; like sending messages to heaven.  It is a true testament to his life and has to be comforting to his parents, if not right now, later when the shock of losing their 22 year old son subsides.

All of the unintentional advances made by technology is amazing!  I am excited to learn all that is available to me and use it intentionally to connect with students and promote their conceptual understanding of mathematics or physics.

The Power of a Word: Trigonometry

I've taught math for years and I do not know the number of times that the mere mention of the word Trigonometry would stop  math students in their tracks.  For me, the phrase podcast stopped me in my tracks.  I've put it on a pedestal, made it the keystone, and freeze every time I approach the topic.
When we started exploring podcasts, I found NPR audio tapes with written transcripts and videos from Morning Joe as podcasts with RSS feeds.  I was still baffled:  could a podcast simply be an audio or video embedded in a website?
I started by finding a basic definition of podcast using Wikipedia as a basis.  Wikipedia called a podcast "a type of digital media consisting of an episodic series of audio radio, video, PDF, or ePub files subscribed to and downloaded through web syndication or streamed online to a computer or mobile device."  Was I really that math student intimidated by the word Trigonometry? Did I allow my ignorance hinder my progress?  Was I already creating screencasts and videos and the only thing keeping me from the podcast was the creation of a serial, syndication and an audience?  
Honestly, this annoyed me.  I visited PodOmatic and created a free account and in less than four minutes I created a small podcast; rather, one 26 second episode.  That was it.  This user friendly site allowed me to record audio, pair it with a graphic and in 26 seconds.  My ignorance paralyzed me, and I allowed that happen.   Not knowing something is normal; not taking the initiative to educate yourself is the problem.  In the Wizard of Oz, Dorothy, the Tin Man, the Scarecrow and the Lion went to the Wizard for help.  Based on the knowledge they were provided, they believed he was the 'Great and Powerful Oz'.  Did that make them stupid; no, rather they were misinformed.  Once Toto removed the curtain, their ignorance was changed to knowledge:  the Wizard was just a man behind a curtain.  PodOmatic was my Toto and my first episode can be heard here.  It is a very plain audio file, but it is my first step.  The success is in the fact that I took the step.  Tomorrow is another day, and an opportunity for another step.  There is still fear involved, but curiosity is creeping into the picture.  What could happen if I used Snagit to create screencast videos and translated those into a PodOmatic episode?  My 'what ifs' will soon out weigh my doubts and I will be able to fully experiment with this new technology.  I am so thankful that I tried. 

Embedding other information: the experiment continues

Embedding different information into a blog is most interesting. I captured part of a Morning Joe show where Steven Colbert is mocking the "secret" golf match between the President & Tiger Woods.   I offer that this is different than uploading the Vimeo or Youtube video as I had to use a new screencapture software (Snagit) and capture just a tidbit of the video. 

Curious how difficult it would be to add a calendar to the blog?  https://www.google.com/calendar/render?tab=cc   Clearly, cutting and pasting the link will not do that for me.  My new goal is to figure out how to add an interactive calendar to my blog.  It would be neat if people could request meetings with me on the blog, thereby triggering an email where I could confirm or deny the appointment.  This should be similar to the workings of a mediated discussion board, but I do not know how to make one.  If anyone has any suggestions, I am open to help.  Otherwise I am going to try to read all I can about creating blogs this week and find a way to add the interactive calendar and other items to my blog experiment!

Podcasts for Teachers: Step One Receiving Info from a Podcast

Exploring podcasts is another new adventure for me, but this is one for which I have especially been  interested.  The trouble with the internet is that it is filled with infinite information, posted by everyone, and often verified by no one.  As a novice, I decided to stick to the big names that have been evaluated.  From there, I will venture forth to find the brilliant with less credentialing, which is a group to which I hope to belong some day!

My first stop on this journey was at National Public Radio and I found that they have a multitude of podcasts dedicated at Education:NPR.   The first story that intrigued me was African Americans Fly High with Math & Science which is a story about an individual deciding to go above and beyond his comfort zone, pushing himself, and committing to promote STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics).  To listen to the podcast, you click on the blue arrow and you can listen to his 10 minute story.  In the right margin suggestions appeared for additional stories that may peak my interest, and with all of the data gathering used by Google, it was no surprise that an article about cyber schools was right there.  This podcast discussed for-profit cyber schools falling short of their sales pitch.  I enjoyed the low-tech approach of the podcast:  these were real people with believable stories, paired with downloadable transcripts so one could easily draw quotes from the podcast at a future date.     I was unable to find an RSS feed for NPR, so I will continue my search.

Using iTunes it was very easy to find and subscribe to podcasts via RSS feeds.  Unfortunately, I am not sure how to share that information, so I will use a quick screen capture to show you my subscriptions:

I have selected to receive daily podcasts from Morning Joe, weekly from Washington Week Video, and a one time download of  50 Physics Lectures. 

 My next adventure will be to create my own podcast, but in my explorations this evening I found instructions on how to make my own podcast, which will be my adventure tomorrow evening! If you cannot wait to find out how I will make my own, click on the image of 'Making a Podcast', it is just a hyper link that will take you to the iTunes page on how to make your own podcast.

Embedded Media Experiment

How some students feel their teachers will react when they make a math mistake.

I will now be experimenting with embedding media into my blog.  The purpose of my taking Ed Tech classes is so that I can start an online math and physics tutoring business.  I am going to use some of the images created for that in this blog.  The first I'd like to add is a rendering a friend did, without any copyright infringement of Abby in NCIS.  The second picture was drawn by the same friend bu we don't think we can use it on a blog or on Facebook since it really blurs the lines of copyright issues. 

My next experiment will be embedding a video into this blog.  The video I am going to embed is one that I created for the a Start Garden Competition.  During the competition I realized that I needed to learn more about teaching and learning online which provided the impetus for me to take classes in Ed Tech.  The video I created is in Vimeo has a hyperlink http://vimeo.com/50445272, but that was not a fancy option with the embed function, so I will need to select one from YoutTube, too. 

Another challenge is to embed a Goodgle Map into this blog.  I've selected a satellite image to add a bit of pizazz to this page.  Using the task bar at the top only entered the image as a link, which is not very beautiful:  Google Map of WMU Kalamazoo Campus. So I decided to try something different.  I decided to use a screen capture of the satellite image and make that image a link to the actual site. I am more pleased with the image than I am the blue hyper link.

If I can think of anything else to add to this experiment, I will update it throughout the week.