Finding out about edZone

The Spring issue of DataBus, a periodical of the California Educational Technology Professionals Association had an article by Alan Phillips of the Imperial County Office of Education about the California K12 High Speed Network that indicated that this California project would try to "encourage educators to utilize the latest web technology and tools, while simultaneously addressing concerns about appropriate content and providing access with risks minimized." They would accomplish this by providing platforms for blogs, wikis, podcasting and other web 2.0 tools and then only allowing access to those "verified as a member of California's K-12 educational system." Seemed like a great idea but why not adult educators too?

I sent off an email to John Fleischman, Director of Technology Services for the Sacramento County Office of Education and Executive Director of OTAN (Outreach and Technical Assistance Network) figuring he'd know the full story and inquired about adult educator access. He assured me that adult educators ARE already included in the group of eligible educators, and that adult education is one of the categories for all of the different products available. For example, if you want to find images or blogs posted or created by adult educators, you can search "adult education" to find them.

I spent about an hour exploring the various options available at the present time and while I don't yet have a complete handle on all of them, I can say that they are relatively easy to figure out and could function especially well for teachers who work in districts where more mainstream web 2.0 tools are blocked.

You can find more information at http://www.k12hsn.org/edzone/ My new blog there is at http://www.k12hsn.org/edzone/blogs.php/barrybakin/2008/05/19/trying-out-a-new-tool/
If you click on "adult education" in the list of "channels" on the right, you'll see some of my other attempts at using the tools listed. Click on the "My edZone" link to get to the California K12 High Speed Network homepage to log in to an existing account or create a new one.

Trying out MyStudiyo.com

I read a tip by Darcie Priester (a Classroom 2.0 member) about this website which allows you to create a quiz and embed it in your own blog or website. It's called Mystudyio and here is my first attempt at creating a simple quiz relating to a reading selection my students are assigned.

Inspired by CATESOL 2008

I always try to implement at least one idea that I've seen at a conference within the first week after my return to the classroom. Sometimes it's more! The idea that I'm trying out came to me after attending the session on using PowerPoint presented by Beth Bogage and Jim Brice of San Diego Community College. Their workshop focused on having students prepare PowerPoint presentations enhanced by their own narration. Now I've been having students make PowerPoint presentations for several years, but they've usually involved preparing slides to accompany oral presentation of research they've carried out in class. Inspired by Beth and Jim, I've decided to have the students make two versions of their PowerPoint presentations from now on: one without narration to accompany their "in-front-of-class" presentations, and one with narration that can "stand alone" so anybody viewing the presentation will see the slides and hear the students explaining their research. Beth and Jim also suggested that students be encouraged to speak extemporaneously (as opposed to reading) and I've instructed the students to do that as much as possible. So far, the idea seems to have been well-received, and I'm getting my first student projects with narration to check. You can see the first one by clicking here, and the second one that was completed by clicking here.


Thank you Beth and Jim for your presentation!

CATESOL 2008

I'm sitting here at the Pearson Longman booth with Naomi Sato and Carol Swanson teaching them how to make a blog post. I'm going to show them about wikis too! Visit my wiki for students at http://coasttocoast.pbwiki.com

Developments over at Pageflakes

Many of you know that I use Pageflakes for my class homepage on all of my classroom computers. Whenever any of my students open a browser on any of the classroom computers, the homepage is a Pageflakes "Pagecast" where they get daily assignments and links to the websites I want them to use regularly.

Pageflakes co-founder Ole Brandenburg informs me that they're working on an adult content filter that would be the default setting for any Pagecast which would prevent content that would be considered inappropriate in most educational settings from appearing in any pageflake. I think that would be a great improvement and increase the use of Pageflakes by teachers and schools.

The link above for Pageflakes takes you to the teacher version of Pageflakes (there's also a general version) which already has one feature that makes it more appropriate for an educational setting: a teacher version only links to other teacher versions, so the possibility of being exposed to inappropriate content inadvertently is already lessened.

Hello from TESOL 2008 in NYC

I'm pleased to report that my Pre-Conference Institute was well attended and well-received and that I've already been introduced to a new website that might be of interest to ESL teachers who like using Internet resources with their students. This website allows one to link to a YouTube or Google video and create a multiple choice quiz based on that video. It has promise, but of course, the major drawback is that most of the video sites are blocked by most school districts now including my own! It should work with TeacherTube but I haven't had a chance to test it yet. It's called ESLvideo and is at http://www.eslvideo.com if you want to experiment with it. Like I said, it has promise but will not be completely workable for many settings and contexts.

What's Up Tigerlilly for ESL students-Bombay TV

Here's a great idea by way of Larry Ferlazzo's "Best Ways" series! Bombay TV is a site where your students(and you too!) can have great fun with English. Basically, you caption real movie clips from Indian movies with your own comic lines. It's great fun for native and non-native speakers alike! Click on the link to see a sample:

http://www.grapheine.com/bombaytv/index.php?module=see&lang=uk&code=6a1cb268756d2c45c8d11cf7626fa1e5

A blog of note

David Warlick spoke in his blog about a blog and teacher he finds inspirational, so I thought I'd take a look at the blog. Konrad Glogowski is a PhD candidate at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto and writes about his experiences and the development of his ideas about blogging with his students. I was especially struck by how his ideas about his own role as "teacher" have changed as he continues to have his students work with blogs. Konrad's blog is well worth visiting.

A small success!

So I've been putting the daily assignment on the class web page for at least one semester now and the students have gotten into the habit of coming into the classroom and going straight to the computers to look at it. Usually they copy the assignment directly into their notebooks and start working on their own as others arrive. I also have numerous activities posted that can be done at any time. It has always been my intention that students be able to access and do the activities from home if they have an Internet connection as a means of keeping students involved in classroom activities even when they're absent. This morning, Alejandro arrived and handed me two assignments that he did from home, even though he has been absent for 3 days. Not only had he printed out all of the daily assignments, he had printed out the actual tasks and made his own "worksheets" to fill in. Needless to say, I was very pleased to see that at least one of my students made use of the opportunity to access the class from home even though he was not feeling well.

Using Garage Band to burn vocabulary CDs

Reading teacher Delondra Williams reports about using Garage Band to create vocabulary CDs for her students on her so very readable and interesting blog Adventures of an Urban Reading Teacher. She reports that her adult students were "really pleased" to get them. PC users can use the free Audacity program to do the same thing.

Recruiting for new teachers on Second Life

Turns out that the Kansas Department of Education has launched an effort to recruit teachers online via Second Life, the virtual world created by Linden Labs. According to their blog at http://kansasteachingjobs.blogspot.com/ The Kansas Recruitment and Retention Program will be hosting the first statewide virtual career fair for individuals interested in learning more about teaching in Kansas."

Do you think that teachers recruited through a virtual career fair on Second Life might be more likely to consider using technology in their teaching?

Thanksgiving Alternate Reading

A few years ago, an article about a historical group in southern California attempting to recreate interest in a Thanksgiving event that preceded the one of the Pilgrims was published in the Los Angeles Times. I've used it ever since in my ESL classes and it's been very successful on several levels: a straight forward reading activity, a cultural lesson about Thanksgiving, and also a springboard for a discussion about who creates the "history" that we learn about in school.

Basically, the article describes a group of European immigrants/colonists who came to the "new world" to start a new life, experienced a very difficult journey, and when finally successful, held a feast of Thanksgiving. All of this was recorded in official journals and took place 23 years before the feast of the Pilgrims. Why don't we know about this group and how come we don't celebrate them as the group holding the "first" Thanksgiving? The answer lies in the fact that this group was led by a Spanish conquistador who led them through the Mexican desert to what is now El Paso, the official records were archived in Spain, and the Spanish history of the southwestern United States did not figure into the traditions of the English colonies. The story is that of Juan de Onate, an important figure in the Spanish development of the southwest, and the colonists that came with him.

I've posted the LA Times article at http://esl.adultinstruction.org/ActivityWorksheets.htm and you can find more information about Juan de Onate by googling him or at a Wikipedia article at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_de_O%C3%B1ate (One interesting tidbit-he was married to the great granddaughter of the Aztec Emperor Moctezuma. Another is that apparently he gained a reputation later in life of being cruel and ruthless in his dealings with the indigenous people including one episode involving the amputation of the left foot of 80 surviving Acoma men after the killing of more than 800 villagers who resisted the Spanish military.)

The brutal later history of Juan de Onate not withstanding, the account of this other "First Thanksgiving" is quite fascinating and makes for a good comparison between the circumstances of the other Thanksgiving that most of us grew up learning about in school.

First video uploaded to Teacher Tube

I've obviously seen a few videos on Teacher Tube but I finally was able to successfully create one using Camtasia Studio software and upload it myself. This is a short training tutorial about how to create a link from one wiki page to another wiki page using pbwiki.




To view the same video directly on the Teacher Tube website click here!

The uploading process to Teacher Tube was quite easy. Recording using the Camtasia software was also easy. Figuring out how to export the video was more confusing and I'm still not sure if I selected the best settings for optimal file transfer and viewing on the website. I still need to experiment with that!

Experimenting with Sketchcast

Using a Wiki for a collaborative Project

Turns out that a former DACE teacher, Jennifer Gundy, is now teaching in Vermont. I found that out when I sent her an email inviting her to attend this year's series of technology workshops that I present. She wrote back saying the trip would be a bit much! I suggested that we work on a collaborative project using a Wiki as the means for posting and displaying student work. After a brief introduction to how easy it is to edit a Wiki we came up with some topics that our students would feel comfortable writing about and also have an interest in reading about. Both groups would write about the cities where they're living now, the places where they come from, and tourist destinations in both the United States and their home countries. They've been working on the pages for about two weeks and I think the whole project is going very well. You can see the results so far at http://coasttocoast.pbwiki.com remembering that this is a work in progress. The goal is to for student's to practice their English and learn some collaborative and technical skills at the same time.

Homework for OTAN online course

This is the homework assignment for the participants of OTAN's online course on blogging for October 5, 2007.

1 Continue to develop your new blog!

2 Post at least two new postings including at least one image to your new blog on a topic that interests you. Try inserting a link to a website as part of a post.

3 Visit my blog at http://www.tech4esl.blogspot.com and try to post a comment! (If you're reading this, you're already here! so just post your comment!) Include the URL of your new blog in your comment. This blog is “moderated” so your comments won’t automatically appear. I have to approve comments first.
4 Post a comment on one of the blogs created today by a participant in the workshop!

Minor Frustrations: Vent! (People given the task of designing things who have never actually done that thing)

To its credit, the school district opened up a new computer lab at the main headquarters building where I work. A brand new room with 40 computers. When I first heard about it, I was quite excited because I've been delivering my trainings using laptops in a conference room. Using the laptops means a lot of setting up including rearranging tables and laying out electrical cords and powerstrips for the adapters since the batteries on the laptops don't carry a sufficient charge anymore. The conference room also feels very crowded when there are more than 15 participants. The computer training room must be reserved in advance and there's a bit of a procedure for that, but nothing insurmountable.

In any case, I walked into the room for the first time a few weeks ago when I first heard about it to see what the accomodations were like. It's a beautiful room of course and it even has a side alcove with a kitchen area that can be used for breaks. So what's the rant? I look up and there isn't an LCD projector hanging from the ceiling, nor a screen to project anything on. Just a couple of white boards hanging at the front of the room! Can any of you imagine creating a computer training room in the year 2007 without an LCD projector and screen? Of course not! But you weren't asked for suggestions when somebody decided that having a training room would be a good thing. Now it's not like there aren't other training rooms in the headquarters. Other departments have created small rooms for their use where they do training, just as I have done using laptops. And in every single one, there's an LCD projector hanging from the ceiling! It's just the brand spankin' new one that doesn't have one...

Now that I've given my first training in the room (yesterday) I have a few added comments. The rows of tables are too close together so that the presenter has a hard time walking between them when people are actually sitting down and using the computers. The tables themselves are arranged in long rows of 8 stations across with no center aisle and one end of the tables pushed up all the way against the wall so that the electrical and internet connections go directly from the wall to the computers without an aisle. For the presenter, this means that to take a look at a computer screen or to provide assistance means walking all the way to the other end of the row to the aisle and then returning the same way. Did I mention the rows are too close together already? So not only do you have to walk all of that distance you have to keep bumping people and saying "excuse me" the whole way!

Finally, the computers themselves are "old-style" large CPUs sitting right on top of the tables taking up space and blocking the line of sight.

Is using the room easier to make use of than setting up laptops on a conference table and running electrical cords? Yes it is, but not by a lot. Could it have been designed to be much much better? Yes again. I did get a chance to talk to the guy who was in charge of design and installation. He did say that there are plans to go back and install a screen and an LCD projector but that hasn't happened yet. I haven't had a chance to talk with him about the aisle issue or having the rows of tables too close together. I don't know what can be done about that at this point without re-doing all of the cabling. Nowadays, it seems like the installation method involves tying down every bit of cable without an inch of slack. Even if I wanted to move the tables (they're on wheels) there's no leeway to be had. I had a hard time moving a keyboard more than a few inches away from the monitor much less trying to move an entire row of tables...

Would it have hurt to try to find any of the individuals in the school district who provide training in lab situations and ask what makes a good training room?

Trying out VoiceThread

VoiceThread is a new site that allows you to connect your voice to images to make presentations. Obviously there are a lot of implications for language teaching. I have started to experiment of course. Here is my first presentation. Unfortunately, not a single microphone appears to be working correctly where I am doing this so at this point it's only text accompanying the photos. I'll try again when I'm "back at the office!" See it at http://voicethread.com/view.php?b=8547

What did we do in class today? Watch a video and find out!

I've started a new experiment using short videos to tell absent students what the rest of us did in class on any given day. I now have a webcam and I've been making very short video clips announcing the assignments. I upload the video file to my wikipage and then put a link to the wikipage on my class pageflakes home page. I'm not sure that's the most efficient way to do this yet, but it seems to be workable. I'm going to introduce the class pageflakes page to my new group of students tomorrow. I'll keep you posted about their feedback. In the meantime, feel free to check out the first two video clips. You'll find the link in the left column under the calendar "flake."

Web Cam?

I decided that it was time to move from text and photo-based blogs only to being able to include a video if I wanted to. I purchased a Logitech "Quickcam" and this is my first video...