District Literacy Committee Meeting & SHS LMSs use of TRAILS

After the Elementary District Literacy Committee meeting today I reflected on three things:

1.) I heard from reading teachers at the meeting that elementary students have a more difficult time summarizing material from a nonfiction text than a fiction text. Library media specialists are in a good position to help with the improvement of students' abilities in that area, since much of research deals with summarizing information taken from nonfiction sources.

2.) Ahhh! To have the data! Data-driven instruction based on DRA scores and a variety of other assessments leads to the creation of instructional strategies and differentiated instruction to improve reading and writing skills. As media specialists and technology teachers we need to create/use more assessments that provides data to guide instruction.

3.)....and speaking of DATA -- at this morning's meeting with Julia Roberts and Robin Stiles, LMSs at SHS, Natalie Carrignan, director of instructional technology, and I viewed the recent data collected from an online assessment they gave to 5 English classes. This was a trial run of an online Tool for Real-time Assessment of Information Literacy Skills (TRAILS -- http://www.trails-9.org/ ) which Robin and Julia will have all 9th graders take during an orientation session at the beginning of next year. The resulting data will be used to determine what areas of instruction might be needed for whole group instruction or for the creation of short video tutorials that will be created for individual viewing by students on specialized topics (such as intellectual property or boolean operators!)

Today Deb Perry, technology teacher at CMS, and I visited Suffern Middle School in New York, primarily to see students working in Second Life (on Ramapo Islands) with Peggy Sheehy, library media specialist. (If you do a search on Peggy Sheehy on this blog you will find links and more information about her in two other ITL posts.) We learned a great deal from our visit -- about student use of Second Life and so much more!

(Peggy Sheehy, LMS, working with a class in Second Life)

Early in the day we met:

• Dr. Robert MacNaughton, school superintendent
• Mrs. Judy Barbera, assistant superintendent for instruction
• Mr. James Yap, director of instructional technology and data
• Eleanor Schuster, library media specialist
  
• Brian Fox, principal
• Teresa Ivey, assistant principal
  

We learned that the superintendent's vision includes exploring new technologies that support his view of a "flattened world." This includes trusting Peggy's abilities to align curricular goals and objectives with the student work in Second Life.

James Yapp has provided considerable support and has worked with Peggy Sheehy to find solutions to any problems that had to be considered over the 4 years since Peggy introduced Second Life as a learning vehicle in the school.

We observed two groups of students working with Peggy Sheehy and Gayle Yodowitc, Family Consumer Science teacher, working on their private islands in Second Life. Students brushed up their avatars, sent an IM to become a member of a new group, and heard the plan for their upcoming work to prepare for a debate on" Should teens have credit cards?" Both teachers worked with students in Second Life, and it was clear that the work in Second Life was motivational and focused students on their debate research.

(Student preparing avatar for a debate.)

We learned about other technology initiatives in the library media center and the school. There are 3 class sets of computers available in the LMC - one MAC lab and one PC lab in the LMC, and one more MAC lab in a separate room in the LMC. A glass wall will soon be built around 2 of the computer areas in the LMC to make the labs more private, and another class set of computers is going around the more flexible area in the LMC where large group activites can take place with a Promethean board available. The former TV studio in the LMC is being rebuilt as a video conference center. The school is completely wireless with many laptops available.

There is a 40 week technology program for all students called Gateway to Learning: Gateway to Technology. Two former wood-working rooms now have full computer labs in them. 6h graders have 10 weeks of technology classes, with a class every day. 7th graders have 20 weeks of technology classes with a class every day, and 8th graders have 10 weeks of technology classes with a class every day. The focus is on critical and creative thinking and problem solving.

During our visit students were creating podcasts in Garageband with the 2nd library media specialist, Elenaor Schuster.

We also learned about Saywire,which is currently being implemented K-8. Saywire is a secure social/academic network. Peggy talked about her use of Quest Atlantis as another MUVE (multi-user virtual environment). We learned about Peggy's work with Bernajean Porter, author of the book DigiTales: The Art of Telling Digital Stories (who visited Suffern Middle School and worked with 75 students for 4 days last year). We viewed an amazing and powerful digital story that Peggy created in a DigiTales workshop, called All that Glitters.

This post does not cover all that we experienced and learned on this incredible site visit, but you get the idea! It was amazing. We plan to further synthesize our experience and determine if and how we can implement a student presence in a virtual environment.

Thanks to Peggy Sheehy and all the incredible staff who welcomed us to Suffern Middle School today!!!

Google Custom Search Engine

I know that many teachers have learned to create their own custom search engines (CSEs), but this post is for those teachers who haven't heard about this... or, those who want to find out how they have improved!
The Google Custom Search Engine has many applications. Teachers can create a search engine that will only search sites that have been pre-selected. Middle and high school students can create search engines to help others find information on their research topics.

With Google Custom Search Engine, you can:

* Create a CSE at any time and Google will give you a landing page with a unique URL. You also have the option of applying your own site's look and feel.
* Invite friends and colleagues to collaborate and contribute to your search engine, enhancing its usefulness to your community.
* Provide your own search refinements within results pages so it's easier for your users to find the information they're looking for.
* Easily add more sites to your search engine's index as you surf the web.
* New! You can create a CSE on the fly simply by cutting and pasting a few lines of code into your website's HTML. Your new automatically generated CSE will let people search the websites you've linked to, as well as the sites they link to. For instance, if you've created a directory, a blog roll, or a list of online resources, your CSE will enable your users to search across these sites and the sites they reference.
Google For Educators - Custom Search Engine (11 May 2009)
http://www.google.com/educators/p_cse.html

Look at Mrs. Gray's Sample

http://snipurl.com/hu3zh
If you create some custom search engines, please share them.

Blackboard Clinics

Today was my second Blackboard Clinic. I am spending a full day at each school to provide Blackboard assistance for interested teachers -- from setting up the basic menu (Teacher Info, Class Overview, Announcements and Assignments), to a wide variety of additional features, including (but not limited to) adding videos, images and html code. There are many new video tutorials on specific Blackboard features made by Natalie Carrignan, Director of Instructional Technology. These tutorials can be found under the BB tab after logging in.

The Blackboard Clinic Schedule:

• BMS - April 8th
• SHS - April 20th
• CES - April 29th
• GFS - May 6th
• KHS - May 7th
• CMS - May 13th
• SES - May 14th
• LLS - May 19th

To Schedule time: Click on this link
(E-mails are sent out approximately two weeks before the Clinic dates!)

ITL Department Meeting on Assessment

Today we had three 45 minute ITL department meetings == all focusing on assessment.

High School: Robin Stiles, Julia Roberts and Rob Rogers are working on a 9th grade pre-assessment for next year. They are currently looking at TRAILS (Tools for Real Assessment of Information Literacy Skills) as a model for an online assessment that will be given as the first orientation class next year.

Middle School: John Horrigan, Deb Perry, Rita Hennessey, Kathy Fleming and Lauren Bullock reviewed the 5th grade assessment process to determine what information, if any, they could get about their 6th graders. They asked questions about the report card data, and suggested that the actual tools used to measure ITL success would be a valuable addition to the grades. Portfolios, which contained examples of students' best work, were suggested as another method to pass on information to middle school teachers.

Elementary School: Sarah Spencer, Kelley Auringer, Aimee Anctil, Tara Doyle, Michael Brownstein, Rae Anne Locke and Ken Hine reviewed the data from the first 5th grade report card on technology and research grades, with the intention that they would talk about the grades at an upcoming 5th grade level meeting at each school. We discussed what might be done to improve the process. We talked about the process used at SES to define each person's responsiblities in the grading process around specific lessons. We talked about the units of study which made up some of the process and products that were graded (primarily the study of ancient Egypt). We heard about the use of e-portfolios at KHS, where students identified their best piece of work from their research project, and defended their choice. Fixed scheduling was mentioned as one way to ensure that all students at each grade level received the same ITL information from the library media specialist. We also discussed the possibility of LMSs fixing a 5th grade technology class in their schedule at least one time each month to ensure that at least 10 times a year there would be a collaborative session with each 5th grade class. There will be one more analsyis of the report card grades this year, to see how grades compare between February and June.

A List of Blogs for Teachers

Every week Kathy Schrock sends out an SOS (Site of the School Days) with ONE link to a potentially valuable educational site. If you don't get a weekly SOS from Kathy Schrock, and you would like to, register at Discovery Schools Kathy Schrock's Guide for Educators.

This week's link connects you to Educational Blogs You Should Be Investigating, a list of useful blogs organized around specific areas: technology integration, blogs for administrators, elementary teachers, pre-K teachers, kindergarten, 1st grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade, 4th grade, 5th grade, art, library media specialists, business education/photojournalism/graphic design, drama/theater, english/language arts/speech, ELL/ESL, FACS (family and consumer services), foreign language, industrial technology, math, music, PE/health, science, social studies, special education, study skills, and technology/computer apps.


After a short time reading some blogs of interest, I found several interesting resources and ideas, including:

• On Free Technology for Teachers --Quietube, "a handy little browser extension that removes all the clutter from YouTube allowing you to view only your selected video."
• On The School Superintendent Blog -- a post reflecting on the role of technology in the daily life of students with a Youtube video.
• On Science Notebooking -- pictures and descriptions of science "notebooking" in elementary classrooms.
• On Creating Lifelong Learners -- a list of links to royalty free images
• On if bees are true: reveries for teaching and learning -- a "media literacy lesson that matters" with references to Creative Commons and new definitions of Fair Use.
• On Mathematics Learning:Sharing Strategies of Teaching/Learning Mathematics -- strategies and games for learning times tables.
• On Strategies for Special Education & Inclusion Classrooms -- a review of literature heroes for students with disabilities.

SHS: Honors Western Religious Symposium Wiki

Eric Mongirdas and Rebecca Levine, Social Studies teachers at SHS, created a wiki for students in their Honors Western Humanities Classes to collaborate in a Socratic Seminar. This is the homepage of their wiki with some sample comments and collaborative discussions created by students.

Rebecca said this about the project: "This Wiki was a great tool to promote student discussion beyond the classroom walls. Students were able to discuss historical content critically at their leisure and without the constraints of limited class time. Furthermore, this tool empowered students who may shy away from class discussion to participate fully on their own time. As for added value, the Wiki was tremendous. Students used the material discussed online to formulate theses for midterm essays on the changing role of religion in the West. "

Welcome to the Honors Western 2008-2009
Religious Symposium Wiki!

The purpose of this Wiki is to communicate with your academic colleagues regarding Christianity and Western Humanities. It is our (Mr. Mongirdas and Mrs. Levine) intention that you collaborate across class periods on topics introduced in the curriculum.

Throughout the semester, we expect you to comment periodically on our Wiki. You will be assigned formally to comment on certain topics, but we encourage and expect you to visit the Wiki frequently and post your musings on class discussions & activities, homework, essays, outside reading, etc. We will be using the Socratic Seminar rubric to evaluate the depth and breadth of your comments.

Follow links below to engage in Socratic discourse about our units of study.
(These links do not go to the original wiki, but take you to some samples of students' comments with names removed.)

Rome Links

Medieval Links

Renaissance and Reformation Links