Last Monday, my high school students couldn’t stop talking about the most recent Indiana Jones movie they had watched over the weekend. Normally, it would be one of those topics that I would have steer my students away from as we began our lesson, but this week I engaged it head on and integrated their opinions into my lesson. We discussed the shot styles and storyline of the film and a few students picked up ideas for their current assignment. What was I teaching, you ask? The Screen Education process from AFI, of course.
When I went through the AFI (American Film Institute) Screen Education course last year with several Star Discovery teachers, I knew it was something really cool, something I could use in a variety of ways and get kids excited about coming to school. This resource draws on the vast amounts of television and film that our students consume and allows teachers to apply knowledge drawn from media to core standard content. Over the last couple years, I’ve enjoyed using the AFI curriculum with my science students, who can’t seem to get enough of this stuff. They enjoy creating videos, even . . . (clear throat) educational ones. Currently, my classes are eagerly storyboarding a movie they’ll shoot next week - their own original episode of “Body Story” (a popular science series from BBC). Anyone else out there using Screen Ed to fight the end-of-the-year boredom?
This year, AFI added another component to the program; Screen Nation - where students and teachers can share their creations. Screen Nation is “a place where teen filmmakers can share their work, receive recognition and compete for prizes in ongoing challenges.” The Learn section features humorous tutorials from, Xander and Calvin, two young filmmakers who teach students the ins & outs of good filmmaking. Hopefully the recent episode I showed to my students on transitions will cut down the number of annoying zoom-outs and wipes in their current movie project.
Right now AFI has offered the first of many challenges. “Claim to Fame” gives students the opportunity to explore their hometown and see what makes it great. The challenge is to make a 5min. documentary video that includes interviews with at least 3 people. When you’re done, you upload it to ScreenNation. Deadline is June 30. Check out the pdf screen nation challenge1 as well as the video. What a great end-of-year project (not to mention principals love when students connection to community). And the winner will receive a Sony Handycam and tripod. Odds of winning right now are good - so what are you waiting for? What’s your town’s Claim to Fame?
Back in December, I was ‘bummed’ as my students would say, that I missed the Daniel Pink Webinar on how right-brainers will rule the world. I was busy grading papers for a deadline. Imagine that? Luckily, Webex has it’s own recording feature, sort of like TiVo for WebEx. All the guest webinars are archived online. Getting there is pretty simple: click the ‘About the DEN’ tab (which you can see at the top of this page). Then in the menus to the left, click ‘Webinar Archives’ and walaa! All the webinars are there. Here’s the direct link: http://community.discoveryeducation.com/about/webinar_archives
Other great archives you’ll find there include Adora Svitak - the 11yr. old story-writing prodigy. I think if I were choosing an academic decatholon team, she would be one of my first picks - she beats most of my high schoolers’ on vocabulary! While I was there, I was even able to find a little content to use in my lesson plan the next day - I played some of the Daniel Pink webinar for my AP Biology students who were studying the nervous system and the brain. I must say however, that while watching the webinars on your own time is surely convenient, the interaction you get with others when attending a live session makes the experience more meaningful. Even our ‘digital native’ students would be impressed at the speed of our chat boxes.
This also made me realize how important this feature of digital media is. I remember the days of going to the library only to find the video I wanted was already checked out. It’s a great model for our students to know how to archive and then retrieve information.
If you missed any of the Virtual Conference sessions this last weekend, check out this National blog post.
Posted on February 4, 2008 in
resources by Brett Harvey
We all have our favorite websites for learning. I’m talking about sites that provide useful tools, frequently Web 2.0 style. These are mostly things that we couldn’t even have imagined in a desktop environment a few years ago, let alone on the web. With thousands of great sites out there, and more coming every day, it’s tough to narrow down what works for you.
Larry Ferlazzo (not a DEN member :( but an Edublog award winner nonetheless) has done his version of list creation that seems to have gained some attention. Here is a link to his :
Check out some of the other links on the bottom of his page for other great ideas too.
This morning I recieved an FeedBlitz email with updates from the MD DEN blog. I was TOTALLY blown away with what I found. Aaron Smith, a DYNAMIC DEN member from back east, wrote about a gentleman by the name of Karl (from the Fisch Bowl Blog… a staff devt blog for his CO highschool) was asked to present to this faculty. His goal, "to get the staff to really think about what are students are going to need to be successful in the 21st century, and then how it might impact what they do in their own classrooms’. I remixed content from David Warlick, Thomas Friedman, Ian Jukes, Ray Kurzweil, and others, added some music and came up with the following presentation. If you want the music you’ll have to download both files…"
Why should you download this PPT… Because DID YOU KNOW THAT…
- The 25% of the population in China with the highest IQ’s is greater that the total population of North America… Translation for teachers: They have more honors kids that we have kids.
- China will soon become the number one English speaking country in the world!
- The U.S. Dept. of Labor estimates that today’s learner will have 10-14 jobs by the age of 38.
- The top 10 in demand jobs in 2010 did not exist in 2004. We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist! Using technologies that haven’t been invented in order to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet!
- In 2002 alone Nintendo invested more than $140 million in research and development!
I have to stop because I could go on and on…. So for more AMAZING FACTS and INFORMATION download this PPT and MP3 file right away. Then head over to his blog post and let him know what you think and/or post your comments here.
Download did_you_know.ppt
Download didyouknow.mp3
It never fails… every training I am at, teachers need more money to purchase more resources. Well, grants are where it’s at… go get it! It’s like little money trees… but you have to be willing to climb the branches. Some of them are much easier than you think!
So, I was on our CUE website (www.cue.org) today, checking out upcoming dates. (SAVE YOUR CALENDAR FOR MARCH 1-3… BEG YOUR ADMINISTRATORS NOW TO SEND YOU… AND IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN PRESENTING… THE DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS IS 9/4/06)
Okay… back to my point… I was browsing around and found a TERRIFIC link called the "Grant Wrangler" … a free program that searches out educational grants for K-12 schools. So go there now…. www.grantwrangler.com!
And sign up to become a CUE member if you haven’t… they have sooooo many great resources available to you!
We had a terrific webinar today… but the best part about it was not what I was sharing… but what YOU were sharing. The topic of our 30 minute tutorial was the free download Photostory. I shared how to use the program and then we spent some time discussing how we could use it in the classroom. Here’s what some feedback some of our attendees shared via email after the call. It’s long but worth the read! After, post a comment and let us know your thoughts on the educational applications of Photostory.
Mary Murphy: "Today we discussed different uses for Photostory in our webinar. One participant shared the idea of taking pictures of each student each month. Students create a summary of learnings by month. There was a discussion of having students choose clipart or photos to use and then adding text and narration. I shared that the narration feature is an excellent application for students with limited language skills such as ELL students or full inclusion students. Lastly, you shared that you can also scan in student work/artwork. We also discussed the importance of having parents fill out release forms giving permission for these projects."
Jutti Marsh: “Have students bring photos of themselves and their family, preferably showing their development from babyhood to the present. Scan photos and have the students create a autobiography using the photos, captions, and narration. An alternative would be to have them draw a series of pictures of important events in their lives, and photograph or scan in the drawings to use in their autobiography. Another activity students like: "I used to ___________, but now I ____________; comparing what they used to be like when they were younger and how they are different now that they are older. I can also see using Photostory to document processes such as science experiments. Social studies: download a series of photos or documents from a site such as the Library of Congress and create mini historical documentary. URL for Library of Congress: www.loc.gov/teachers An alternative would be to have students create their own "documents" and illustrations to use.”
Anne Higuchi: "As a teacher who has used unitedstreaming but has not been too active in DEN, I charged right in today and logged on to two chats. It was really as simple as all of Jannita’s letters have stated. Photostory was great. For those of us who have a Mac at school and the clone at home Photostory is terrific. It is a step simpler than iMovie but it is free. For my classroom , I am already planning how to use this with my EL students. Because of varied levels one can make a series of photos into a movie and have the different students each make their own narration. They can be responsible for the writing as well as the speaking at the level of their personal competency without having to always share amongst a group in the class. There was a lot of learning on this webinar as the group heard ideas from more than one teacher as well as varied grade levels. It certainly made a pleasant way of sharing."
Genny Kahlweiss: "The Photostory 3 webinar hosted by Jannita Demian on August 21 taught us about the "FREE" Microsoft downloaded software which can help you make projects with students in minutes. Yes, I said minutes, pull out that digital camera take pictures of your students the first day of school and have each student learn each others names by creating a Photostory by recess. Have each student say their names into the computer. Yes, you do need a microphone (purchase a USB mic at Walmart $10)(helpful hint). Then use this video at Back -to-School Night to Wow! the parents. Other ideas: Have students create quick Idiom stories or returning from a field trip have the students pick the pictures and tell what they saw on the trip and share with another class. Another teacher at the Webinar shared that she will make monthly theme memory shows. Thanks to everyone at the Webinar it was fun and that was great information in a short period of time. "
Susan Muller: “Some of the useful ideas I heard from our Photostory webinar and got a chance to write down are: 1) how easy it is for kids to use 2) using Photostory to create pieces for idioms, poetry, (auto)biography, interviews during teacher workshops or get to know you back to school presentations, and having students create a photo diary for their year in school. Great ideas! 3) Import shows into Moviemaker to enhance even further 4) purchase Quicktime Pro to change file format for upload to web.”
Another big thanks to Craig Cuddihy of KLVX for showing me a GREAT magazine/resource book called PC Teach It. According to their website, “PC Teach It is the premier project-based resource that brings technology alive for students and teachers! Both the print magazine and its companion website provide content applicable for students of all ages, with a concentration on the K4-6 grade levels. Lesson plans conform to the technology standards and performance indicators of ISTE.” KLVX was featured in their “Back to the Basics 2004/2005” issue.
Often times people hand me magazine, journals, etc to read and it gets placed in that “special” pile of “if only I had another 3 hours in the day” but I picked up this magazine and started flipping through this morning and wished that I had it when I was still in the classroom. It’s filled with dynamic ready to use lesson plans that incorporate the National Educational Technology Standards in collaboration with ISTE (yes… believe it or not… even technology has the dreaded “s” word…. STANDARDS!)
The site also contains a variety of quality hot links to other dynamic sites which include Discovery School (Kathy Schrock is one of their featured columnists… thanks to PA DEN Manager Lance, I get to meet her next week!). Knowing that one of my DEN members, Ray, is getting ready to write a grant, I found a great link to tips and tricks for grant writing and where to find more grants.
I could go on and on… but I’ll stop and let you go there now. Check it out… let me know what you think!
Posted on February 12, 2006 in
resources by dave kootman
Have you received your unitedstreaming Resource Guide?!? I asked that question today at 2 of my trainings. Mark, pulled a magazine off his table and asked “This one?” as he held up a copy of Cosmopolitan Magazine. J 
Which provided us all the great mid day laugh that was needed. Later that afternoon, I asked the same question and to my surprise one of Discovery’s newest DEN members Chris pulled out his copy. 
Now, depending on your mood and how long the day has been, Cosmo might be a good read, but if you are looking for more integration strategies, great articles, and stories for teachers just like yourself, then you may want to check out our resource guide. You can find the link to get a digital copy on the Discovery Educator homepage. This month one of our very own CA DEN members, Brian Talmadge, has an article titled “Integration Station: Igniting the Fire of Learning. Thanks Mark and Chris for making me smile keeping me on my toes today J I couldn’t wait to post these great pictures of you!
Post a comment to let us know which articles you enjoyed and any ideas for future themes or stories.
Posted on November 17, 2005 in
resources by dave kootman
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