Are you smarter than a 5th grader?

The past week I have come across different edubloggers talking about a fifth graders who writes a phenomenal blog. In a short amount of time the blog had received over 30,000 hits and is still growing today. Even though I have worked with fifth graders a number of years, I still find myself in awe and inspired by the outstanding work students do with and about technology. I find May of every school year to be bittersweet, as I am sure most educators do. The approach of summer and the end of another school year means helping fifth graders transition to middle school as sixth graders. We hand the students off to the middle schools and hope for the best. The author of the the “Twenty Five Days to Make a Difference” blog, Laura, I am sure will no doubt be successful in sixth grade and in any venture she undertakes.

In her blog, she shares how why she created her blog and is dedicated to helping those in need:

In December of 2007, I decided that the best way to remember my grandpa during the holiday season would be by living my life like he did, by making a difference and being a leader. I decided to honor my grandfather’s memory by trying to make a difference every day for twenty five days. I wanted to be able to do little things, like kids my age typically do, instead of HUGE things that are sometimes hard for kids like me. I decided to write about my adventures here, and I also created a challenge.

I challenged everyone who read my blog to TRY to do something every single day during the holiday season to make a SMALL difference in his or her world. I explained that whoever made the “most difference” in December would win a $25.00 donation to the charity of his or her choice on Christmas night. I SAVED ALL OF MY ALLOWANCE ($25) FOR THE MONTH OF DECEMBER, AND I WAS REALLY SURPRISED AND EXCITED WHEN SEVERAL PEOPLE GENEROUSLY OFFERED TO MATCH MY DONATION (OR MORE)!

You can continue reading the post to see who matched her donation and learn about her monthly donation contest to the charity of the reader’s choice. She is doing extraordinary things for readers around the world that would not be possible without the use of this technology communication tool.

I am quite certain that her fifth grade teacher is filled with pride over her accomplishments. Probably more proud than the blogger’s parents! I know I would be knowing that I had that type of impact and made such a difference in a young person’s life. As an educator that is our ultimate reward, paychecks of the heart.

After you check out this fifth grader’s blog ask yourself, “Am I smarter than a fifth grader?” In some instances, the answer may be ‘No!’.

Web 2.0 Tools and Applications

There are so many innovative and exciting web 2.0 tools out there that are in use by educators all over the world. I receive RSS feeds, Twitter feeds, social networking, social bookmarking, virtual worlds/communities, instant messages and emails about the awesome tools and I am having a hard time remembering all of the possibilities available.

So I started a wiki to serve as a repository for web 2.0 tools, applications, websites, blogs or any resource that you would like to list. Hopefully you will agree and add items to the wiki to help educators throughout the blogosphere. You can access the Web 2.0 Tools and Applications wiki here. Let me know if for some reason you are not able to access and annotate the pages. I will let you start things out and put in my 2¢ as time goes on.

A Rock-n-Rollin’ Wiki Webquest

A few minutes ago I was reading an email containing my daily Diigo update and a bookmark from my Project Based Learning Group that submitted the blog site, “Wikis for Everyone“. The post, “A Classroom Wiki Webquest“, caught my attention featuring a teacher conducting a wiki webquest with her students about rock and roll musicians.

“For their first project, they created a Webquest about the 1980’s rock and roll scene. “Students were required to research about music in the 1980s and design a rock exhibit for a rock and roll museum. Students worked in groups to create various products – feature articles, press releases, teaching and student guides, and museum calendars – explaining the exhibit highlights.”

This project led to a project on the 50 greatest rockers resulting in the creation of a project wiki. The “RockWriteListen” wiki is laid out well with an introduction to the project, a webquest and student products. This was so awesome to see the extent and detailed length the wiki was utlized to facilitate this project. Initially, instruction on how to use the wiki and communicate expectations to the students took place.

“There had to be an entire mini-lesson on what was an appropriate response in the discussion section. The experience was useful. Looking though the discussions you will find that a lot of the students had great insights to add. And this insight went beyond `great page, cool graphics.”

Laying the foundation with clear expectations communicated is essential to the success of any project and as elaborate as this project became it was a necessary component that had to be woven into the instruction of the content as well. The teacher featured commented how the students had to work together to complete the components of the webquest project. Eventually, the teacher structured the 50 greatest rockers project so that each student was responsible for editing his/her own page.

Using wikis to their fullest potential is like venturing into new territory. You blaze a trail and learn from trial and error of ways to better facilitate and structure group projects such as those mentioned in the post. The teacher commented that using the wiki really expanded the learning opportunities and she also participated in the learning process.

“As for photobuckets and other widgets, the students really showed me how to do that. Once one student started it, I asked how to do it, then taught other students. We were learning from each other – myself included.”

That comment really struck with me. Students look to us to know all of the answers to their every question. Many teachers feel insecure about saying that they don’t know the answer but this is real world learning. This teacher took a risk, her students took risks and an outstanding project resulted that focused on content but provide so many rich, real learning experiences that is greatly needed for the 21st century flattened world.

The Weblins are Coming! The Weblins are Coming!

If you haven’t already heard, beware the weblins are coming! What is a weblin you ask?

“…weblin makes you and others on the Web visible as small avatars. There are others on the same page you are on right now. Weblin opens a new and exciting world on every web site.”

The name of my avatar is “Koolkat” so if you see me around the web please send me a ‘wousle’. A wousle is weblin speak for a greeting or hello on the web. You can communicate with other weblins, move your animated avatar and send/receive a variety of weblin gifts.

I found the weblin concept very intriguing. I was just saying to myself that I wish there was a way to know if someone was online regardless of whether or not I had them as a contact on Yahoo Messenger or Skype so I ventured to the website to see what the weblins were all about. If you click on the image below you can see several weblins on the on my Koolkat My Weblin page.

Earlier today I received an email update from the Web 2.0 Teachers Ning about the Weblins Meet Up scheduled for May 21, 2008. You can read more about the Meet Up after you create your Weblin avatar. Be sure and wousle me or wave if you see me around!

Diigo in China

Last Monday morning you may have noticed some outages from social bookmarking tool, Diigo. That was due in part to the earthquake that shook China. At almost an 8.0 earthquake on the Richter scale, much devastation and loss of occurred. As an educator, I was particularly disturbed by one of the news reports that showed a young boy who survived several days and was being transported to the hospital after lying among the debris.

Many parents were shown waiting to hear the status from rescue workers searching among the debris of what was once a school full of lively students. With China’s one child policy, many parents have lost their one and only child. The father of the child that was rescued was elated and cried with joy while others wept that the boy was not their chid. I cannot even imagine what it must be like to be in that situation sitting on the sidelines desperately waiting for news on your child, hoping against hope that the news is good news that your child will soon be with you.

One of the Diigo founders, Maggie Tsai, reports on how the earthquake interrupted service and a meeting among the Diigo staff members living in the USA and China. Her report can be found at the Diigo blog. When asked how we could help she recommended donating to the Red Cross who is assisting with the disaster relief efforts.

She also included a link in our conversation within Diigo showing pictures from the area hit by the earthquake. This past weekend I saw a news story that showed a man was rescued from the mass of debris that had buried him for the past seven days. With the passing of each day, hopes of that this type of miraculous recovery quickly evaporates.

Just Call Me a Zealot!

The other day I received a bookmark in the update I receive from Diigo from one of the online groups I am a member of to the edublog entitled, “Betchablog” authored by Chris Betcher. I was reading the post, “You say that like it’s a bad thing“. He shared an anecdote from Will Richardson who was speaking at a conference that I found astonishing. As I reading the post, I made an assumption that most teachers would feel the way I did and would have responded as I would have regarding the student’s assignment below.

“In particular, one of the stories that seemed to rankle a few listeners, including my colleague, was the one about a student who was given a research task by his teacher and how he approached this task.
The student found very little information about the topic, not even on Wikipedia. What would you do if you were this student?

Here’s what he did. He created a Wikipedia entry using the limited information that he did know. Over the next few days and weeks, the Wikipedia entry on the topic was edited, amended, added-to and improved by many other people. All of their individual little bits of knowledge gradually built up the topic until there was quite a comprehensive article written about it. The student then used this article to submit for his research project.

Apparently, the student’s teacher discovered what had happened and the student was awarded an F – a failing grade.”

Prior to sharing this anecdote, Betcher shared a definition of a ‘zealot’ and went on to describe his views after sharing with his colleagues:

“One of my colleagues from school also attend the event, and when I got back to school the next day I asked how he enjoyed it. His reply was fairly lukewarm, with the comment that he thought a lot of the things Will was saying made him sound like a zealot. Google says that a zealot is a “fanatically committed person“, or “one who espouses a cause… in an immoderately partisan manner.”

I don’t think my colleague used the term zealot in a particularly positive sense – I’m sure it wasn’t meant as a compliment. Personally, if a zealot is a fanatically committed person then I think we need more zealots in education. I also have strong beliefs about the nature of school and learning and think that we need to act quickly and radically if schools are to maintain any sort of relevance in today’s world. I also think we need to be fairly drastic about making these changes, so I guess that makes me a zealot too.”

Similar to Betcher’s response, I too would not have given the student a failing grade. I would have commended him on his ingenuity and tenacity of seeking information on a topic that had been sparsely documented. I would have had a conversation with the student regarding the accuracy of the information received and ways to verify the validity of the information. If all of proved true and his sources were properly cited I would gladly have given him a superior grade.

If we want students to employ and utilize the many web 2.0 tools, we must model and support those strategies in the classroom. Misguided teachers or administrators that do not believe in their students or staff must be shown there are secure, safe ways to instruct students on using blogging, wikis, etc. If that makes me a zealot for tech integration, then please call me a zealot! In my world flattery gets you everywhere.

You can find the UStream recording from Will’s talk here, and his conference wiki here.

Moving on Up!

Please make the move with me by reading my edublog at http://kcaise.edublogs.org as I this will be my new blog home. I find the features easier to use and implement there as a newbie blogger.

Thank you for your continued support and reading my blog and please feel free to add a comment, leave a suggestion or just comment on something that caught your eye on my blog. I value everyone that has helped me start this blog and hope that you will make the trip with me and move on up to my edublog, “Kim’s Ventures in Educational Technology“.

K12 Online 2008

Just wanted to pass this along to everyone in case you missed it or hadn’t receive the information below. If you have questions, access one of the links to be taken to the conference wiki.

We are pleased to announce the call for proposals for the third annual “K12 Online Conference” for educators around the world interested in the use of web 2.0 tools in classrooms and professional practice. This year’s conference is scheduled for October 20-24 and October 27-31 of 2008, and will include a pre-conference keynote during the week of October 13. The conference theme for 2008 is “Amplifying Possibilities.” Participation in the conference (as in the past) is entirely free. Conference materials are published in English and available for worldwide distribution and use under a Creative Commons license. Some changes in the requirements for presentations are being made this year and are detailed below. The deadline for proposal submission is June 23, 2008. Selected presentations will be announced at NECC 2008 in San Antonio, Texas, USA on July 2.

OVERVIEW: As in past years, K12 Online 2008 will feature four “conference strands,” two each week. Two presentations will be published in each strand each day, Monday through Friday, so four new presentations will be available each day over the course of the two weeks. Including the pre-conference keynote, a total of 41 presentations will be published. Each twenty minute (or less) presentation will be shared online in a downloadable format and released simultaneously via the conference blog (www.k12onlineconference.org,) the conference Twitter account, and the conference audio and video podcast channels. All presentations will be archived online for posterity. A total of 82 past presentations are currently available from K12 Online 2006 and K12 Online 2007. If you are planning to submit a proposal, please review archived presentations from past years to determine what you might offer that is new and builds on previous work. A variety of live events will also be planned during and following the weeks of the conference.

Flip Flopping Blogs

So sorry folks but this may be a time warranting a ‘test of the emergency broadcast system’! I originally started blogging using edublogs a few years ago. Then I moved everything to this WordPress.com blog thinking I liked the features more. I came across my edublog and started looking at the updates made and changes in features. I think I will stick with this edublog and hopefully, you will make the transfer with me with little inconvenience to you. For now, I will be posting the much of the same on both blogs – that is unless an experienced blogger knows a better way to transfer readers enable my blogs’ Clustrmaps to light up with tons of red dots. Any suggestions on how to redirect readers to an alternate blog? I would love to hear them!

"This is a test – just a test – of the Emergency Broadcast System"

All of us have heard or seen the tests conducted by the emergency broadcast system and had there been an actual emergency when we would have been notified of how we were to proceed. I liken this to the approach of testing in Texas. I was reading the post entitled, “Severe Weather Testing Protocols” from the ‘Fractions Speak Louder than Nerds‘ blog. The district I was recently affiliated with was notorious for going overboard on the preparation of the building for the testing environment going to the extent of covering book cases, all posters – even motivational – as they had words on the posters or book spines and those words may help students with something on the test.

Personally, I don’t see that a poster saying, “Be true to yourself” or the 55 Rules of Ron Clark to be testing aids of any kind but hey, you do what you gotta do. Anything that can be prepared for is covered in the 150 page manual that contains the oath that you sign agreeing not to read the contents or commit any act that you shouldn’t or you will be notified of how to proceed as in the tests conducted by the emergency broadcast system.

The extent the educators go to that are mentioned in this fellow blogger’s post about protecting test booklets and materials is humorous. We laugh because we can relate to having to protect, monitor, count, check out, check in, lock up, pass out, collect, alphabetize and many other things that I didn’t name regarding the handling of the testing materials except looking at the test booklets.

If a student throws up or does the unforgivable thing of bending their answer document or even worse- spilling something on their booklet or answer document – all is lost and you are signing away your life on all kinds of forms to prove something bizarre happened and you weren’t just taking a peek at the content of the test. I know TEA loves to receive answer documents or booklets inside of a sealed ziplock bag with vomit or other unknown bodily fluids acting as an adhesive on the pages in the test booklet. I just hope the ziplock bag with the contaminated test materials was sealed before lunch…especially since it may be several weeks before TEA gets the special delivery of dried vomit on a test answer document. How fun is testing in Texas!?!