Eight technology educators from Memphis City Schools won first place at the Rich Media Impact Awards in Scholastic Achievement. The awards ceremony was held in Wisconsin. This year’s awards were sponsored by Sonic Foundry.
Sonic Foundry Announces Winners for Fourth Annual Rich Media Impact Awards at User Conference via kwout
You can check out some of their personal blogs about their achievement at these sites: Scott Holcomb, Jeff Baxter, and Felicia Fowler.
You can see more of what the Memphis City Schools tech gurus do with video here.
The National Endowment for the Humanities is sponsoring a program called Picturing America. Schools accepted into the program will receive reproductions of 40 famous paintings by American artists that cover a broad spectrum of history and culture for our country. In addition, lesson plans are provided to use the artwork as a launching point for student reflection. I strongly urge all TN DEN members to apply! Just click the link above.
But what about those of us that don’t get accepted? Is there a way for us to participate in a similar program? Of course there is! In fact, I can think of 2 immediately.
First, there are images of famous works of art in the Discovery streaming image catalog. Using the Writing Prompt Builder, teachers can use these images to create a student dialog of reflection.
Second, teachers can upload images of artwork to VoiceThread and have students make written or verbal comments there as well. A nice touch to VoiceThread is the ability to “draw” on the image you comment on. If there is a specific part of the picture students are drawn to, they can demonstrate that by circling it as they comment.
What about you? What ideas do you have for using famous art in the classroom?
Samsung began a contest in April that offers a grand prize of $200,000 in merchandise. Half of that is in Samsung hardware. The other half is in Microsoft software. There are also six First Place winners that will receive $30,000 in Samsung and Microsoft merchandise. The contest ends July 22nd.
What do you have to do? Write a 100 word essay that addresses the question, "What is the single most significant benefit that technology can provide in the classroom?" You can submit your entry online here.
This contest is open to students (under 13 must provide a parent’s email), teachers, administrators…basically anyone with an email address. You can enter one time for every email address you have. Between my wife and me, we have eight. (Of course, I can create up to 100 on my website, but who can write that many essays?).
I have emailed all teachers and administrators at my school to encourage them to enter. While I would love for our school to wind up with any prize from this contest, I would also like to see a DEN member write the winning essay. Why? You get a new laptop, dude!
Take a few minutes and read the rules (the criteria for judging are very clear), and then fill out the form. Good luck!
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