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Archive for May, 2010

Ending on a High Note – Keep Singing!

Posted by Kathy Adkins on May 21st, 2010 1 Comment

With the last day of school approaching, teachers are extremely busy wrapping up the year posting grades, updating records, cleaning and inventorying classroom items and completing checklists.  Many have the opportunity of ending on a high note with graduation celebrations and end of the year classroom celebrations. What will be your end on a high note? Now is a time to reflect on accomplishments and be grateful for a great year of learning and staying positive toward the future. With job roles changing due to budget cuts, it is still awesome to be an educator.  As you move from being a NITS, New Instructional Technology Specialist to an ITS, remember that you will continue to manage the vision and purpose, learn on the fly, show managerial courage and drive for results. Take time to end on high note by brainstorming all the wonderful things that were accomplished to engage teachers and students in 21st century learning.  Try Edistorm, a new brainstorming application (Edison + Brainstorm) and share your thoughts. Celebrate by ending on a high note!

“Keep a smile on your face and a song in your heart!”- Dr. Dennis Whittle, former principal, always a teacher!

Five for Friday – Some Musical Resources – Keep Singing!

Wild Music – A traveling expedition about sounds and songs of life. Create music with animal sounds as well as test your memory.

Creating Music – A creative online music site to compose music, play a musical performance and interact with puzzles and games showcasing pitch, and rhythm.

CitySounds – A great site where you can listen to the latest sounds from cities across the globe. There is a latest chart which shares recently updated cities as well as individual city pages with more tracks, genre and stats.

Moodturn – Relax and enjoy music and backgrounds to fit your mood. Themes include the rainforest, garden, rain, and beach just to name a few. Use the tabs on the side to select moods and backgrounds. What is your mood?

Science (and more) to Music – An incredible site with lots of connections for music based teaching with science, math and more!

Photo Courtesy of  stock.xchng: http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1108048

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Creativity – Permission and Encouragement

Posted by Kathy Adkins on May 14th, 2010 5 Comments

We are always striving to be creative as we design instructional material for the classroom and professional learning for our teachers. Creativity, at the top of Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy as a HOTS (higher order thinking skill), embraces keywords such as producing, inventing, programming, filming, animating, blogging, mixing, remixing, videocasting, podcasting, and building and creating mashups just to name a few.  At this week’s #edchat, conversation was centered on how to promote creativity in the classroom. As educators we share and fuel the flame of creativity by modeling and coaching and providing examples. Do we give too many examples and templates to follow? Can we take risks, give choice and support our students creativity? A great animated short, “Let the Creative Beast Out,” gives two really simple steps to be creative:

1) Give permission to come out and play! We have more time for this now that the bubble tests have been completed, but can we begin change and give permissions throughout the school year?
2) Encouragement – Praise and positive comments gets things rocking and rolling and it is such an esteem booster. Great esteem boosts learning potential. You are an encourager for students, teachers and administrators.

There are so many fabulous and talented educators and students in our schools across the globe. Let’s all try to give more permissions to come out and play with encouragement along the way. Please let out the creative beast!

Let Out the Creative BeastView more presentations from Betsy Streeter.

Four for Friday – Educators Opening the Door of Creativity

Web 2.0 Projects – A Celebration of Student Projects – East Middle School’s media specialist and teachers share creative projects using a Livebinder.

Creativity Lies in Content Creation - Eric Sheninger, principal at New Milford High School, New Jersey, celebrates the creativity of students inspired by their Applied Music Theory teacher, Joe Andolino, and cellphones. Eric states, “Give teachers the tools, freedom, and support to be innovative and they will develop learning activities that allow students to demonstrate mastery of concepts in a creative fashion.”

Sketchup in a High School History Class – Hartford High School teacher, Michael Hathorn, started teaching his students about local history while they used Google SketchUp to model their home town of Hartford, Vermont. View more about this awesome project at their website.

Tech Summit Amazes Teachers and Students – Julie LaChance, a high school technology facilitator, shares what she calls a Technology Art Gallery. With students and teachers assisting, over 30 projects were displayed over two days so classes could visit the media center to view the creativity. The Amazing Digestive System, is just one project shared on You Tube.

Image Source: http://visualblooms.wikispaces.com/

Posted in Inspire

Appreciation – You Are A Candle!

Posted by Kathy Adkins on May 7th, 2010 No Comments

Lots of praise and thank yous were passed out this week for National Teacher Appreciation Week, May 3-7. Of course there was a National Teacher Appreciation Day, May 4. As Instructional Technology Specialist, a teacher of teachers, we enjoy this week of gratitude but our best reward comes daily from observing teachers and students engaged and learning in new ways. The smiles and laughter  in the classroom keep us focused and driving for more opportunities. With that said, let me take this time to thank you for all you do for your staff and students everyday.  You are a candle!

You are a candle – “A good teacher is like a candle – it consumes itself to light the way for others.” ~Author Unknown

A Few  for Friday – Do Something Different!

To stay sharp in our role, it is a great thing to do something totally different with your family and friends. Getting your mind off work and exploring new venues can be refreshing. Here are a few ideas for your travels.

Georgia State Parks – Enjoy the beauty that is around us by visiting one of our state parks. Be sure to check the specials area for upcoming events! Have you been to Cloudland Canyon? Check out the Georgia State Parks GeoChallenge that begins this weekend!

Groupon Atlanta – This site offers one ridiculously huge coupon each day on the best things to do see, eat and buy in Atlanta. Coupons range from photography lessons, opportunity to feel the NASCAR speed by taking laps at Atlanta Motor Speedway, to great prices on tickets to the Atlanta Symphony. If you are traveling to another city this summer, check out their daily coupons to grab deals while traveling.  Coupons are based on participation, so participate!

Alive After Five Roswell- Enjoy free live music in historic downtown Roswell. The activities take place on the third Thursday of the month with 2010 activities beginning May 20th. Many cities across the country offer this event. Be sure to also check out Go Wild Roswell – A celebration about nature and the great outdoors, May 20 – June 6th.

Photo Courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/officebox/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

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