NECC 2007: Day Two

Podcasting Panel: I was on a panel today with Apple Distinguished Educators: Dr. Larry Anderson, Julene Reed, Dr. Tim Tyson, Lucy Gray and Dan Schmitt. Steve Dembo of Discovery Education was also on our panel…thanks for the shout out on your blog. We had a huge turn out and the presentation was absolutely wonderful. I felt so invigorated to be with this esteemed group of educators and to share with the audience the many advantages of podcasting in education. It was a great session! For those of you who need more information or want to ask questions, please email me at cathy@cre8tivmindz.com.

Check out our wiki: Podcasting For Beginners. You can also check out this blog for more info on our presentation: School Ideas Blog.

Additionally, I would like to thank Janvette Dickerson (my girl), Katheryn Weaver, Meredith Kaultman for being ssssoooooo supportive. It means more than you will ever know! A special thanks to Carol Anne McGuire of Rock Our World! She is truly an inspirational person in my life and has helped me to see the light at very dark tunnel…I don’t know how to ever truly thank you for what you did for me today…I love you!

NECC 2007: Top 9 Booths (so far)…

1. APPLE BOOTH: As a new Apple Distinguished Educator I quickly made my way to the Apple booth and to my delight I met/and reacquainted myself with the following ADEs and pioneers of this Digital Age: Dr. Carl Owens, Dan Schmit, Christopher Klein, Marco Torres, Gayle Berthiaume, Dr. Larry Anderson, and Lori Roe. I also met Barbara Reid from Apple (I have been waiting a long time to meet you Barbara and Maxx Judd, responsible for heading the ADE department! All of the ADEs and Apple employees were in rare form as usual, on hand to assist any passer-by with solutions on how to create compelling digital masterpieces through Apple hardware and software solutions! Please go by…they are offering classes that are great! You may even meet a wonderfully talented person like Ted Lai, ADE and co-author of iLife 06 in the Classroom.
2. THINKFINITY.ORG BOOTH: Thinkfinity.org was just AMAZING…check out my podcast with one of the reps, Al Browne. I am continually surprised the amount of free open source material available to educators. With a Math and Science Initiative going on in our district the web resources Thinkfinity provides are going to be an assest: Illuminations and Science NetLinks and much, much more. Please visit their website for more fabulous information. And I received a huge bottle of hand sanitizer with a hook on it…thanks!
3. TURNING TECHNOLOGIES BOOTH: Turning Point is a student response system that has 30,000 state aligned questions loaded, the ability to create custom tests and the gradebook too…The bomb! These cute little electronic response cards (about the width of a thin calculator, but as tall as a credit card) allow students to answer questions, assessments, etc. with PowerPoint! NO Promethean Activotes necessary! It is only like $695 for a class set of 24. Please check out their booth…they have this little Pirate show thing…it is cool and I am definitely going to try and buy a set for the eLearning team.
4. PODIUM BOOTH: For all of ya’ll trying to make the Windows PC district convert to Macs…Podium at least makes training podcasting on a PC a little less painless. Again…bombful! This gets the EXPLOSIVE AWARD tonight. Podium makes it so easy to podcast there should be no excuses…click to record, drag a picture, type a script in the script field, enter the name of the episode and one click to upload to the FTP location of your choice or click to send the feed to email…HOT! Check their booth out…they are giving away a 30 day free trial and it is cheap.
5. EXPO BOOTH: Um this has got to be giving the other 2…you know who they are a run for the MUUNNNAAAAYYYY! The Mimio Interactive is just all that and then SOME! I thoroughly enjoyed my one-on-one presentation from Barrie Smith. This cute little device does it all! You can create a Whiteboard experience anywhere…even on the screen you use to project! Again, the price is sweet and it is portable. Again, we are going to be ordering Barrie! Watch out for us!
6. INTEL BOOTH: This booth was full of info for me! I am trying to model Chicago Public Schools and they have a very close relationship with Intel. They have a wonderful 21st Century curriculum which is tied to the Partnership for 21st Century Skills and the NETS. I signed up today to become a Master Teacher so that I can bring this great resource to our district. And please hold on to your hats…who have I been trying to meet foreva? That is right, Sharnell Jackson, Chief eLearning Officer for the Chicago Public School System. She walked right past me at the Intel booth looking stellar and refined. I was just ecstatic…hopefully she didn’t think I was crazy. Please check out their site: www.intel.com/education
7. IMBEE BOOTH: Imbee.com is the only social network, collaboration, and publishing site designed specifically for young users (their words). Students can build Internet, writing and publishing skills in a fun and SECURE and easy-to-use environment (still their words). And the great part is it is FREE (my words). And they gave away a cute little vinyl coin purse.
8. THINKQUEST BOOTH: Free, free, free, free, free…need I say more? Free websites for students and they can even upload digital media…oooohhhh it is no wonder I did not pass out today from all of this excitement. Go to www.thinkquest.org
9. TECHNOLOGY & LEARNING BOOTH: I just love this magazine…it is full of awesome resources. I was able to pick up a free copy and subscribe to more great issues…go by and fill out your subscription card and pick up a freebie.

* Additionally I visited neTtrekker, Discovery (finally met Sara Fischer and Michael Ensign), Blackboard, and many others. I will have my top 5 on tomorrow…watch for them!

NECC 2007: Day One

OOOOOOhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh I am in hog heaven today! I am having the time of life and it just keeps getting better. OK, I am going to breakdown my day starting with my first Concurrent Session at 8:30 A.M.:

1. “Online Learning Tools 2007: Inspiring Examples, Expanding Opportunities, Promising Technology” with Maureen Yoder, Lesley University. I did not stay the entire time, but I was able to pick up a few tips and had a Cre8tiv Mind moment! I learned more about Second Life which I really have been interested in. If you are not familiar with it, please click on the link and check it out. It is a 3D environment where students can create avatars and visit different places…I will explain more later. She gave a great example: what if Sally Ride could meet Amelia Earhart in a virtual place…what would they say to each other?
2. “Building An Educational Portal: A Single Stop for Learning Resources” with Thom Dunks from the Santa Cruz County Office of Education. He discussed the software they use called: uPortal for building site. Open Source Java-based software. They have 2 Java programmers helping with the coding. This is a red flag as you may not be able to use uPortal without a Java programmer.Thom is director of Technology Services (12 in department) for the district.Why an Educational Portal?
   Research projects – most students will start with Google, but will it truly give us access to information the way they need it? Students may have the ability to decipher information from web addresses (.com, .edu, .org). Portal can also include subscription services such as unitedstreaming for videos and many other options that would not be available on a general Google search. Thom gave example of a Google search for Martin Luther King Jr., finding sites that seemed to be appropriate but he found is a white supremacy site! This is not the kind of information we want our students to have to sift through for information. Instead of this, teachers can add a bookmark for their students when necessary for projects…or in our district…just neTrekk it!Tour of Santa Cruz portal
   Good list of resources available and more information is posted on the NECC session listing. Login is available for free viewing of the Santa Cruz portal until the end of September, 2007. Go to www.santacruz.k12.ca.us > Click on ed1Stop > username: tdunk > password: edcruzEntire site is single-access, meaning one login gets users in to all services, with only a couple of exceptions (netTrekker, Gaggle, and RxNetWriter).

   Curriculum Resources tab includes services such as unitedstreaming, DigitalMath and NASA. Some are free and some are paid subscriptions. Research and Reference tab links to Grolier’s Encyclopedia, Dictionary, and links to free pictures, texts and AP multimedia resources. Teacher Resources tab is mostly California-based information, but the idea is to give teachers a resource for using technology and other standards information, etc. Administrator Resources tab for administrators also good for technology leaders with links to ISTE and information about CARET. TICAL link also has many great tools and resources. Parent Resources includes internet safety information, homework help links, and special needs information.

   Stage 2: students will have their own tab with information about courses, homework, and other information. They will use a regional server through the portal to Moodle. They originally used Blackboard but it was cost-prohibitive, so they’ve chosen Moodle as an Open Source solution.

   Stage 3: devoted to building professional learning opportunities: RSS, blogging, etc.

   Q: Talking about students “using teacher passwords” to access bookmarks. How does this work? A: Teacher logins are private, but they maintain bookmarks under a main “password’ that students can use, directly linked to the students’ logins.

   NOT a heavily encrypted password site, so should not be linking SIS or webmail passwords to this portal.

3. “Special Focus Playground: Second Life & Virtual Worlds”: I was able to explore several different stations that showd how to create an avatar, navigate through Second Life, use it as professional development as well as how to use it with students. Students would be able to explore different places like NASA space rockets, the Discovery Network and even ISTE’s Virtual Island. This was an awesome display of Second Life! There is even a Moodle for Second Lifers called “SLOODLE”. Jennifer Wagner was very knowledgeable about Second Life. Email her if you want to talk to an expert: technospud@gmail.com and/or visit her websites at: www.technospud.com, www.technospudprojects.com, www.womenofweb2.com
4. “Implementing a Statewide 21st Century Skills Initiative”: This session was the best by far. I was already familiar with the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, but this session just made the notion even more appealing!  I have a lot more to say, but my eyes are burning…stay tuned

And last, but certainly not least was the Apple Leadership Soiree!  I felt so privileged just to be in attendance.  My husband and I met and conversed with some of the most profound people ever…just to name a few: Don and Maria Henderson, Kathi Fox, Karen Castor, Lucy Gray, Julene Reed (my girl!), Carol Anne and Bobby McGuire,  Kyle Peck, Marty Park, Jeanne Biddle, Camilla Gagliolo, Ted Lai, Gordon Shupe, Katherine Neil, Cheryl Lee, and Patricio from Apple in Mexico (forgive me for not remembering your last name…it is late Patricio and I should already be sleep) and of course…Ms. Adair Caperton!  The energy in this room was electric and I was just happy to be…there…and an ADE!  The decision-makers will never know what being a part of this special group of educators has done for my life.  I am just on cloud 9!

iSummit

I have had a blast for the past 2 days at the 2007 iSummit Conference in Atlanta, Georgia at the Atlanta Girls School. I trained many private school (1:1 schools) educators how to use iMovie and Pages. We had a great time and I look forward to working with many of them as the year progresses.

I also met many wonderful people: Kevin Kneisley, fellow ADE Class of 2007, Henry Patel from Study Wiz, Otto Benavides, ADE, Elaine Wrenn, ADE and many more. If you attended one of my sessions and you are interested in contacting me my email address is cathy@cre8tivmindz.com I look forward to hearing from some of you and seeing you at NECC 2007! I will post my training sheet up to this blog within a few days (you know I have to get through the weekend festivities first

Alabama Education Technology Conference

AETC was great and I had the best time.   I was able to hang out with Adair Caperton and Mark Williams as well as meet some new faces (Mike and Vickie).  Macs are very new to Alabama so the interest was definitely there!  I was able to do a session on “Podcasting” with Adair and one on “Digital Kids, Digital Tools“. This session was about integrating 21st Century technology tools into the curriculum.  I showed the attendees many great tools from the iLife Suite, Google Education tools, Moodle, Wikis, Blogs, Flickr, Slide, Digication, and much more.  I am will post all links under the Resources tab.

Inspiration

My husband created a new blog (click on 2 Makes 1 for more info). Look at what he said about me…this made my life!

APS Insider

Today I was featured in the May issue of INSIDER, the APS employee newsletter. Check me out!

Podcast Expo

If you were not aware…there is a podcast conference called Podcast and New Media Expo…I just have to go!  Click the image for more info.

iPod Training

Orem, UT – May 10, 2007 – Vistacast LLC, and Makau Corporation, your next-generation training partner and your iPod training expert, today, announced the vLearning iPod Training System (ViTS) as the first enterprise software solution that enables courses developers and training administrators to put full courses in the iPod. These courses are complete with screens that lead a learner to watch video content, take quizzes and report results to a learning management system for measurement and accreditation. The training administrator has complete access to metrics information for each learner authorized in the iPod.

“While, many companies are utilizing Apple’s iPod device for training, they are not able to track and report the training.” Jose J. Carrasquillo, Vistacast President/CEO continued, “Vistacast products are the only tools available for enterprise training that will deliver the training to the targeted iPod and ensure learner tracking of metrics that measure outcomes and performance levels among all of their employees even if they are not connected to the Internet.”  Click here for more info.

School Night at the Apple Store

Mrs. Alford’s Third Grade class at Parkside Elementary showcased their digital projects at the Perimeter Mall Apple Store on May 15, 2007. The viewing was phenomenal! The students were so excited and they took great pride in presenting their work. The projects ranged from Global Warming to a comic book created in Comic Life on Creative Writing. Kudos to Mrs. Alford and her wonderful class of digital artists!