obama hope poster - Google Image Search

obama hope poster - Google Image Search

Randomness: The Story

I have noticed in this very special Minarets class, there is an obsession with the random, the nonsequiter, the illogical. So, with that in mind, I have have made this assignment entitled Randomness. Your job is to write one continuous story as a class. You may write as much or as little as you like; you can be as random as you like. The only rule is that you have to respond, or transition from, the last person's entry. So, if the person who wrote directly before you, created a character who works in a pickle factory, you must start your writing talking about him, before you introduce any new randomness.

After we revise this class story, we will be posting it in the class blog...so make it good...:)

ScrapBlog Example

Lesson Plan: Building Reading Comprehension Through Think-Alouds

Good lesson on reading comprehension for 7& 8 graders.
ReadWriteThink: Lesson Plan: Building Reading Comprehension Through Think-Alouds

Team Building Games

Ice Breaker games for the 7th and 8th graders.
Team Building Games

The Laptops Are Coming! The Laptops Are Coming! - Volume 22 No. 4 - Summer 2008 - Rethinking Schools Online

A cautionary tale. Interesting...not sure that I agree.
The Laptops Are Coming! The Laptops Are Coming! - Volume 22 No. 4 - Summer 2008 - Rethinking Schools Online

Guide to Grammar and Writing

This is a great source for grammar! THanks Jon!
Guide to Grammar and Writing

The Reconstructors Solve Medical Mysteries - Rice University

What fun science games!. Would be great for biology

The Reconstructors Solve Medical Mysteries - Rice University

Filamentality

Create your own online learning activity
AT&T Knowledge Network Explorer

Poetry 180 - Home Page

Read a poem a day - One for every day of school this year.
Poetry 180 - Home Page

quarterlife

quarterlife

ReadWriteThink: Student Materials: Persuasion Map

Online tool for outlining a persuasive argument

ReadWriteThink: Student Materials: Persuasion Map

Kingdomality - The Benevolent Ruler

Take the Kingdomality Test to find out what role you might play in a corproate environment - or in a classroom...
This last paragraph describes me to a T. Scary! Might be worthwhile for students to take, just to pinpoint how they will interact with the school group.
Kingdomality - The Benevolent Ruler

California CareerZone

This shows my "work values" or what I look for in a career. Another good survey for the kids. THis would promote good discussion in our career tech class.
California CareerZone

California CareerZone

Jobs Sected for me based on my results. Good Program to use in the Career Tech Project Period.
California CareerZone

California CareerZone

My Results:
California CareerZone

Think.com

Free platform to safely create interactive projects with students around the world. Sponsored by The Oracle Foundation. Check it out! ThinkQuest (See contest below) is now a part of Think.com

Help

ThinkQuest

Why not a Global audience and a contest to motivate our students to produce project based websites? Wow! Minarets should participate in this!

ThinkQuest

Dangerously Irrelevant: Contest - 140-character book reviews

Thank you jon corripo for this idea! It is a contest for the best 140 character book review done on Twitter. I think it would be a fun exercise to condence a review to basically 140 letters. It would encourage students to focus in on only the most important plot points in the book. Yet, some of the examples shown at the bottom of the page show that the limited text encourages most writers to abandon basic English grammar. This will not do:)

Dangerously Irrelevant: Contest - 140-character book reviews

Learning the where of it all by using literature to teach geography | Social Studies Review | Find Articles at BNET

Learning the where of it all by using literature to teach geography | Social Studies Review | Find Articles at BNET

Challenge 2000 Project-Based Learning & Multimedia Web Site

Challenge 2000 Project-Based Learning & Multimedia Web Site

To the New Minarets Faculty:

Message: "'Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change
the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.' -- Margaret Mead"

PBL-Online Video Library

This is a page within the Buck Institute Site, which is dedicated to helping educators understand and implement project Based Learning Techniques. I like this particular page because it shows videos of teachers planning projects, and students collaborating on and then evaluating each PBL experience. This is the web page that really made me understand PBL because I could see it in action. Watching these short clips will at least make you want to video tape our planning sessions. Each blue link is a video - click the player you want.

PBL-Online Video Library

BrainConnection.com Library - Play: Illusions

BrainConnection.com Library - Play: Illusions

The Lexile Framework for Reading

www.lexile.com

This website can create a special reading list based on their lexile score and interests. As a teacher I can also put in the interests of history and fiction, indicate the lexile score of 9th grade - 850 to 1165 - and out pops a printable list of books for the student to choose from! It even has a function that allows students to seaarch their local library for those titles on their list.

The Lexile Framework for Reading: "Currently, every student in the state of California receives a California Reading List (CRL) Number with his or her STAR test results. The CRL Number is based on The Lexile Framework for Reading, and is a Lexile zone score. For example, a CRL of 7 indicates a Lexile zone of 700L to 799L"

Techlearning > > Differentiating Reading Levels > June 27, 2008: "Lexile, which measures comprehension, or semantic difficulty, and sentence length, or syntactic complexity, of books, newspapers, is used by over 450 publishers. The Lexile scale measures from 80L for beginning readers to 1700L for advanced readers.

Video Chats with People in other countries

No Strings Attached

Video of "Veterans of Past American Wars Project"

This is perfect for us! We could teach this history/English project lesson just as it is, or add elements of math and science somehow.

No Strings Attached

Video on Students Designing their Own Store!!

This lesson idea could be revamped to provide a visual representation of any business plan

No Strings Attached

Video on Making Poetry Movies

No Strings Attached

Inspiration Video ~ Concept Mapping

No Strings Attached

Teaching Garageband Video

No Strings Attached

Lit to Go: MP3 Stories and Poems

Student can listen and read downloaded stories at the same time! Cool.


Lit to Go: MP3 Stories and Poems

Looking forward to collaborating!

I am so looking forward to getting started! All I google these days is educational tech stuff and Project Based Learning! I have so many thoughts for possible interdisciplinary class projects. Yet, before the Minarets faculty meet for the first time, I am hesitant to structure any curriculum, because I want to be totally open to all new ideas coming from other members of the team. I'm hoping we will really work together in both designing curriculum and facilitating the class. I would love it if every single project incorporated all content areas, including history, even though we don't have a history teacher this year. I love history, (My father is a retired history professor), so this really lets me think of my end of it as humanities more than English, which opens up more possibilities. I think research will be a major focus, and I'm thinking of ways to motivate students to come up with ideas they want to research. One idea I had was to have each student pick a recommended historical novel to read independently, then find one historical element to research for a mixed media presentation on both the novel, and this area of historical research.They should include some type of geography research requirement as well, about the setting of the novel. Of course Math and Science should be in here too...as you can see I need to start collaborating with you as soon as possible:)
Check out the interesting article below:
Techlearning > > Teaching Students How to do Online Research > July 1, 2003

First Post

This is fun. I have set up a blogger page before, but I lost interest because I didn't have a clear reason for the communication. That is interesting in terms of what motivated learners - students must have a focused and real reason to communicate. I am thinking this blog might work instead of a website, especially if I can put pictures and videos on it!

The Goal

I hope to use the internet to compliment my teaching, starting with a website or blog to communicate my syllabus, and eventually moving toward having an online form of every assignment, project and announcement. I would like my blog to be personable and fun. Something that motivates students. I want to put fun stuff on here, and keep changing it, so students will be motivated to check it. I would like each student to make a blog of their own, with photo and avatar. They could use it to publish their work...it might even be an early form of an e-portfolio. All the teachers could have a blog, linked together somehow.
I tried Edublog and it clued me in to a lot more web 2.0 options that you can link or "widget", but for me, it was harder for a first-time blogger to figure out, and I like that Blogger is on so many websites reminding me to put content on my blog. It seems easier to use Blogger for now.