As the Kansas Discovery Leadership Council talks with educators across Kansas we learn that most teachers are not aware of the numerous tools provided for classroom integration. Therefore, we are going to start developing a series of blog posts focusing on specific tools offered within Discovery Education Streaming regardless of which version you can access. So, may the learning begin!
The focus of episode one is on the Writing Prompt Builder. The Writing Prompt Builder can be used for numerous activities or as preparation for the state writing assessment. The prompts can be used to address five different types of writing:
Analysis
Descriptive
Expository
Narrative
Persuasive
Writing Prompts can include a single image or video, a combination of two images or an image and video segment. This is a big change from the previous setup of only a single image. An additional function permitted in the prompts is the ability to take the embed code of a Web 2.0 tool and include it within a writing prompt. After creating a writing prompt teachers can take advantage of another new feature “My Classrooms”. This option provides teachers the ability to create class rosters permitting items to be assigned to the whole class or individually as a method for differentiated instruction. One piece of advice for those looking to use a writing prompt, there is NO ability to save it as a “draft” if class is about to expire before a student complete the project. Therefore, provide enough class time for a writing prompt to be completed. The Discovery Education team that is responsible for the design of the site and it’s tools have been made aware of the need for such an enhancement. We will have to wait until December’s update to know if an ability to save a writing prompt draft is available.
In concluding, we hope that you will consider investigating the Writing Prompt Builder as a way to assist in the development of your students’ ability to write. Please consider watching this 27 minute tutorial video on how to successfully use the Writing Prompt Builder. You will also find the PDF guide for Discovery Education’s Writing Prompt Builder attached to this post. Good luck and happy writing!
We have quite a few new STAR Educators in KS this week and the Leadership Council would like to welcome them all!
Loni Leforce
Nicole Friesen
Laurie Mercer
Sabrina Rauer
Byron Ruhter
Mark Unruh
Mark Walker
It is so great to see so many new people because that means you are all sharing the benefits of being a DEN member to fellow educators. Welcome to our new folks and everyone keep up the fantastic work you are all doing!
Do you like to add cool fonts to your projects? Take a look at this site for free fonts for your computer. http://www.1001freefonts.com/horror-fonts.php. Download either the Mac or Windows version and add a little visual excitement to your words!
Today the KS DEN Leadership Council sponsored a Day of Discovery in conjunction with the Discovery Education Virtual Conference at Brooks Middle School in Wichita, KS. Over 20 educators from Wichita, Mulvane, and Hutchinson school districts arrived ready for a great learning experience, and that’s exactly what they got. Not only were there face to face sessions including “Flip for 21st Century,” “50 Ways Plus,” “Building Better Builders,” “Wild, Wonderful, Web 2.0,” and “What’s New with DE?” but the virtual sessions were streaming live all day as an option. Below are the presentation resources for the face to face session.
Please welcome Danielle Pflug to the Kansas DEN STAR family.
If you have recently joined the Discovery Education Network and have not been highlighted contact us at ks.den.leaders@gmail.com. We will make sure you are introduced to the DEN community.
So obviously if you’re reading this post, you’ve visited at least one blog. Maybe you’ve even considered using a blog in your classroom, but you’re just not entirely sure how a blog works or how to properly implement a blog into your learning environment. Well fear no more! The folks at Teachers First have created a “Blog Basics for the Classroom” resource just for educators. This site starts readers at the very basics of “What is a blog,” gives several ideas of using a blog in an educational setting, and walks readers through the initial steps of laying the groundwork for a successful classroom/educational blog. The best part about this site is that it is teacher created and is continuing to be added to by educators, so the information and ideas are current and fresh.
Here are a few more things to consider before starting a blog in your classroom:
Internet safety - It is very important to not only teach Internet safety to your students when you first introduce the blog, but to model those techniques and to continue to re-teach them throughout the year.
Appropriate permission - If you are going to have students post or add comments to your blog, you’ll want to get parent permission as well as make sure your school/district allows this type of interaction with the Internet.
Student contract - If your students are going to be adding content to the blog, sending home a student contract isn’t a bad idea either. This way teacher, students, and parents are all aware of the expectations.
As a bonus, did you know that Discovery Education provides free blog hosting for all STAR Discovery Educators? Still not a STAR Discovery Educator? That’s OK - all the information you need to become a STAR is on the Discovery Education website and can be found HERE. So now that you’re armed with the knowledge and support, what are you waiting for - start blogging!
The Kansas DE Leadership Council has been asked to participate in the 2009 KSDE Fall Assessment Conference on October 27, 2009 in Topeka, Kansas. Mary Frazier, Dan Brown, Dean Mantz of the KS LC along with Andrew Walls from Discovery Eduction Assessment Team will be the presenters. All sessions are geared towards the use of Discovery Education products to enrich classroom instruction while addressing state standards. Activities and lessons shared also focus on differentiated instruction methods that assist in improving student learning as well as assessment scores.
Provided the Internet is cooperating, we will look to stream each session on uStream. If we can not stream please visit the “Cover It Live” page of our wiki and follow along. See you in Topeka!
10:00 - 11:00 “Building Blocks” for Successful Assessmentsby Mary Frazier USD #313 Buhler
Discovery’s Quiz Builder, Assignment Builder and the Writing Prompt Builder are the building blocks for differentiated instruction and visual literacy your classroom. The Teacher Center has many tools that will also engage students and enhance their learning. A quick overview of downloading videos, video segments, and student and teacher materials will be provided. You’ll see how to search for videos according to Kansas Standards.
11:15 - 12:15 - “Scientifically Sound” ways to increase achievement by Dan Brown USD #435 Abilene
We will demonstrate how an elementary classroom in Abilene uses DE Science. Students become experts in an area of Science by using DE Science. Next, they create a study guide. Finally their peers must complete the study guide by visiting and learning from the DE Science Unit. Students feel empowered while creating the study guide. They decide what is important for their peers to learn from the unit. Classmates enjoy completing the study guide by exploring media files on DE Science. Learning is a lot of fun using DE Science.
1:15 - 2:15 “Discovery Assessment” by Andrew Walls Discovery Assessment Team
Progress Zone allows educators to create, share, and administer custom diagnostic probes using a bank of more than 50,000 unique assessment items. It is the first web-based formative assessment service that recommends standards-aligned video clips for targeted remediation. Monitor student progress throughout the year with teacher-created diagnostic probes tied to your state’s curriculum standards and automatically linked to appropriate, fun, and engaging Discovery Education streaming video clips.Progress Zone empowers teachers to impact student achievement through the use of research-based tools that monitor what students are learning, identify concepts that may need additional attention, and provide digital media that helps educators improve student understanding through the power of visual learning.
2:30 - 3:15 “Amazing Makeover” by Dean Mantz - USD #376 Sterling
We will provide an overview of all the newly developed “treasures” for educators that is available at www.discoveryeducation.com which does not even take a login for access. After introducing those features we will strengthen your ability to successfully integrate Discovery Education Streaming by covering the “Amazing Makeover” that took place this summer. Some of the new enhancements include: grid view results, short video previews, Web 2.0 sharing, and best of all global classroom management.
Wouldn’t it be great if your blog would read the posts aloud to your students? Or if your wiki would read activity directions to your students? Or maybe if your students could narrate a story that will be posted on your class blog, wiki, or website? Well you can do this and much more with a new tool from the Voki folks. It’s called AudioPal - http://www.audiopal.com/editor.html.
Basically when you get to the AudioPal site you can either record, type, or phone in your message. When typing you can choose from a number of voices to read the text and you get up to 600 characters with this option. Then you simply enter your email address and you receive an email with a link to the embed code. From there you simply embed the code where ever you’d like it to be.
As a bonus, did you know that when using the Builder Tools you can put those embed codes into your Builders? That means you could put an AudioPal right in your directions by clicking the “HTML” icon and pasting the code right in the text window. Talk about differentiating!
This week alone we have had four new STAR Discovery Educators join us and the KS Leadership Council wants to make sure you all know about it. The newest educators to become DE STAR Educators from Kansas are:
Christi Honse
Chris Kemp
Kerry Lumpkins
Jolie Plumlee
Please join the LC in welcoming them and thanking them for sharing!
The DEN LC would like to extend a warm welcome to the following new Discovery STAR educators that have joined us in the last few weeks.
Matt Kelly
Scott Kinderknecht
Heath Peine
Austin Sander
Chris Kemp
Kerry Lumpkins
Jolie Plumlee
Christi Honse
Eileen Heden
Via RSS
Please welcome Danielle Pflug to the Kansas DEN STAR family.
So obviously if you’re reading this post, you’ve visited at least one blog. Maybe you’ve even considered using a blog in your classroom, but you’re just not entirely sure how a blog works or how to properly implement a blog into your learning environment. Well fear no more! The folks at Teachers First have created a “
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