Wednesday, March 31, 2010

The Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation

The Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation

Thinking about becoming a Science, Technology, Engineering or Math Teacher (STEM). Here is a fellowship program that will help you to reach your goals. This program is available at six major universities in the state of Michigan.

21 Things at REMC 10

The REMC 10 Link to 21 Things

This 21 Things for the 21st Century Project is Based on the National Educational Technology Standards for Teachers.

Here is the Link to 21 Things

This is at great site to work on learning new skills to help you in the classroom to engauge student in learning. This project was created by 21st Century Educators that are associated with CCRESA, IISD, MISD, SRESD. It is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

The purpose of this resource is to provide ”Just in Time” training through an online interface for K-12 educators based on the National Educational Technology Standards for Teachers (NETS-T). These standards are the basic technology skills every educator should possess. In the process, educators will develop their own skills and discover what students need in order to meet the NETS for Students, as well as the new MMC Online Experience requirement. Participants who fulfill all of the requirements have the opportunity to earn SBCEU’s. To learn more about the session, look under the tab “The 21 Things”. We hope you take advantage of this unique opportunity.

I have really enjoyed working with Bob Frost of the REMC 10 on this project and look forward to seeing the work that is created out of this group of inovative educators.


For more information goto this site.
21things.weebly.com/.

Hybrid Doctoral Degree (Ph.D.) in Educational Psychology and Educational Technology at MSU

Michigan State University to offer a Hybrid Doctoral Degree (Ph.D.) in Educational Psychology and Educational Technology

Here is how MSU describe the program at MSU.

The nationally-ranked Educational Psychology and Educational Technology (EPET) hybrid Ph.D. program is a new substantially online option in the educational technology emphasis area. In response to growing demand for educational leaders who understand how technology, especially online learning, is transforming the world of education, this blended program is designed for experienced education professionals in schools, higher education, and research institutions who want to earn a Ph.D. while continuing in their current positions.

The goal of the program is to develop the next generation of educational leaders who understand the need to create new technologically sound pedagogies grounded in innovative research and practice.

Students will develop a deep understanding of how theories of learning and development can inform the design of future learning environments. Graduates of this program are prepared to assume leadership roles in K-12 school systems, virtual schools, and community colleges that require rigorous preparation in research and evaluation of learning with technology.

The EPET hybrid doctoral program welcomes applicants from a wide variety of disciplinary backgrounds, educational and technology experiences, and social, economic, and cultural backgrounds. Students will complete courses in educational psychology, educational technology, and qualitative and quantitative research methods taught by MSU's internationally renowned faculty designed to develop essential analytic skills needed to be an effective educational leader in an age of data-driven decision making and accountability.

The hybrid EPET Ph.D. is a four- to five-year program of study completed substantially online. Please note that the hybrid program begins in the summer of the first year. Students will take three courses each summer typically consisting of a two-week face to face campus session followed by four to five weeks online. Students will also take one online course during the regular fall and spring semesters. The mandatory university residency requirement is fulfilled by the Year III summer session followed by attendance on campus for the Fall term of Year III. Graduate assistantships / fellowships may be available for the fall on campus term. A complete schedule of courses can be found here.

The EPET program is one of 5 doctoral programs in the Department of Counseling, Educational Psychology, and Special Education (CEPSE). Faculty in other doctoral programs, especially School Psychology, Special Education, and Measurement and Quantitative Methods, share interests and research work with EPET faculty and students and frequently serve on EPET students’ Guidance Committees. EPET students benefit from coursework and interactions with faculty in many other Departments, inside and outside of the College of Education, including Educational Administration (especially the Higher, Adult, and Lifelong Education program [HALE]); Teacher Education; Writing, Rhetoric, and American Cultures; The Division of Science and Mathematics Education, Psychology; Telecommunications, Information Studies, and Media; and others.

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Project Based Learning (PBL)

Project Based Learning (PBL): This video is on how to set-up the frame work and what it would look like to engaging students in a new learning model.

The state of Maine and it's One to one laptop computers and engaging students in there own personal learning.

The state of Maine and it's One to one laptop computers and engaging students in there own personal learning.



In 2002, the state of Maine equipped every middle-school student with a computer. Today the man who launched the program underscores the importance of supporting technology initiatives with teacher development.

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Bloom's Taxonomy Blooms Digitally, Andrew Churches

Bloom's Taxonomy Blooms Digitally, Andrew Churches

Posted using ShareThis

Albert Bandura - Social Cognitive theory

Albert Bandura is arguably the most eminent living psychologist. His Social Cognitive theory has influenced many areas of inquiry: education, health sciences, social policy and psychotherapy among others. This film presents Dr. Bandura and footage from some of his best-known research such as the BoBo doll experiment, treatment for snake phobias and the use of television dramas to convey positive social messages. Dr. Bandura is a genial host for the film that also includes much footage from abroad showing the universality of his concepts including the analysis of personal efficacy and the social roots of moral behavior. (2003 38 minutes) (This is a 4-minute sample clip from the film) The film is part of the acclaimed GIANTS OF PSYCHOLOGY series from Davidson Films, Inc. that also introduces college students to the work and lives of Mary Ainsworth, John Dewey, Erik Erikson, Maria Montessori, Jean Piaget, B. F. Skinner and Lev Vygotsk



B.F. Skinner

Behaviorism
This theory asserts that behavior can be explained entirely in terms of observable responses to environmental stimuli. Influenced by the conditioned-reflex experiments of Pavlov, behaviorism was introduced in 1913 by J.B. Watson, who, denying both the value of introspection and the concept of consciousness, emphasized stimulus-response laboratory techniques. B.F. Skinner concerned himself exclusively with the relationship of observable responses to stimuli and rewards, and one result was the concept of mastery learning, which was applied in the 1950’s as “teaching machines”.

Piaget, Constructivism, and Theories of Cognitive Development by Warren Buckleitner, Ph.D.

This is a great video on educational psychology and children learning.

The research and writings of Jean Piaget (1896-1980), the Swiss psychologist, have had an enormous impact on the field of cognitive development. Piaget’s observations and theories have helped us better understand the way children think and learn. Piaget’s theories can be divided into two parts: his description of a set of discreet stages through which children proceed, and his explanation of a set of processes that help move a child from one stage to the next. A basic understanding of Piaget’s theories can help the software designer create more developmentally appropriate software. Note that students of educational psychology have successful refuted some of Piagetian theory. However, the big ideas are valuable and commonly used in the design of educational activities.



From: Child Development 101 for the Developers of Interactive Media
First edition, 1996. Revised January 6, 2006 by Ellen Wolock, Ed.D, Ann Orr, Ed.D. and Warren Buckleitner, Ph.D.
© 2006 Active Learning Associates. All rights reserved.

Warren Buckleitner

 Warren Buckleitner 
Brief bio: Warren Buckleitner, Ph.D. established Children's Technology Review following 10 years of research at the High/Scope Educational Research Foundation. In 1995, he was awarded the SIIA's Codie Award for "Best Software Reviewer," the only journalist to ever receive a Codie award. From 1997-2003 he coordinated the Bologna New Media Prize, a global award program for children's interactive media. He is an former advisor to Consumer Reports WebWatch and has taught at elementary and college levels. He is also a regular contributor to the New York Times.

Monday, March 22, 2010

Alan November in 3 skills needed by all students

Three skills that all students need
1. Information processing - Handling Massive amounts of data
2. People skills working with people all over the world global Skills
3.Self directed people





Harvey  School  Alan  November  communications  computer  science

Sunday, March 21, 2010

Nature by Numbers and the Golden Ratio of Life

Here is a short video on nature by numbers and how nature is full of the golden ratio. I think high school students may enjoy watching this 4 min. video and stimulate some question of why we find this repeating patterns in some many different places in nature.

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Fair Use of materials in the classroom

This is a short video on Fair Use and what this means to you as an educator in using materials in your classroom to make a point about an educational topic. Are you using material and staying within fair use of copy write materials?


Fair Uses PDF

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Robert Wright on optimism. How cooperation (eventually) trumps conflict

 Author Robert Wright explains "non-zero-sumness" -- the network of linked fortunes and cooperation that has guided our evolution to this point -- and how we can use it to help save humanity today. Wright thinks the crises the human species now faces are moral in nature, and that our salvation lies in the intelligent pursuit of self-interest. In his book Nonzero, Wright argues that life depends on a non-zero-sum dynamic. While a zero-sum game depends on a winner and loser, all parties in a non-zero-sum gam.

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Will the Ipod change your classroom?

Will the Ipod change your classroom? I think that Personal technology devices will play a large role in K12 education. How many studnets do you know that have their own TI-83 calculator? Most all of them do, I think this is the trend that we are seeing and will see even more in the future. They will take the form of this,
Ipods
DS Nintendo
PSP
Smart Phones
Mini Laptops

Ipod is a Personal Learning Device (PLD)

Now we have to figure out how to use them for student learning and instead of taking them away we need to figure out how to use them in a responsible way.
















Thursday, March 11, 2010

MACUL Conference 2010 (Grand Rapids)

Well I  made to Grand Rapids. There are many new and exciting technology being featured here at MACUL. The superintendent for the State of Michigan was the Keynote this morning. The white boards are in trouble here as there is many other cheaper solutions then them being shown here today. I will write more tonight about the neat new tools out there to help with K12 educational technology.

Look at Epson projection units they have a unit call the 450WI and it has interactive board technology built into them and no need for a white board with electronics built in that can go bad and could be difficult to ship in to repair.

There was many sessions on Google docs and how we can us this cloud computing technology to change our students learning by increasing collaboration projects.

Danielle Letter again put on a great presentation on how to engage student in learning with an interactive session on Who am I where students learn to open up to a world of learning out side of there normal learning location and to interact with student in a different classroom any where in the world. She is the new leader of TWICE the organization in Michigan that exemplifies how we can use distant learning to connect our children to the world of learning.

The other big take away is this for me, there were many sessions on social tool interaction. These were Facebook, Cell phones as personal learning tools, it was YouTube and many other videos. We at most schools are blocking this type of activity but we need to look at why we are doing this if it show great potential to engage students in learning. I believe that we are blocking many of these things because we don't want to be managers of our classrooms and the learning environment. I propose that if we actively engage student in learning they will not get off task as much and they will police them self's. If you walk past a master teacher classroom you don't see them with a big stick just waiting for a student to step out of line. Instead you see a dynamic leader of education inspiring students a guide on the side with student fully engaged in what the learning activity is.

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Teacher Research in the United States.

I would like to make an observation here from the map information in the right hand collum of this bolg. On a weekly bases I see more people from the United State coming to this Educational Techology blog. I think this could show a trend of techers in the United State are working harder than teacher in the rest of the world to find what the right answers are in educating our young people. What do you think it means?

Microsoft Courier inteface demo

Microsoft Courier inteface demo looks to be a tool that I think young people would like. It is a new approach at how they think and abstratct ideas and multitask. Watch this demo show it to some students and let them see what they think of this new tool would work for them? A new inovative tool for learning.

Monday, March 8, 2010

Virtual Reality VR Tool with the WII remote Johnny Lee has done it again

You have to see this video it is unbelievable. Johnny lee has some amazing new technology setup. This will change virtual reality technology world. This has great potential for many people even people that are blind in one eye as it creates an illusion of depth of field. You have to watch this video.

Do You Give Zeros?

Do you give students a zero when they don't turn in homework or a project. Read this I have read this now a couple of times from different resources and it makes sense to me. what do you think about the practice of handing out a zero.

Do You Give Zeros?

Sunday, March 7, 2010

Soft Assessments

So what do I mean by soft assessments? This is an assessment that can be made up of data that is an opinion and not factual information. An example of this type of question might be do you like peas or carrots? It doesn't really mater, it is only what you like it is your opinion. You think that you don't have time to find out what your students like in your teaching styles it will take to long to give a questionnaire and then tabulate it. Well then turn to an online survey tool. The power of computers is in compiling and tabulating and analyzing data quickly. Here is a short video over view of Zoomerang survey tool.

Zoomerang Pro Flash Demo - Online Survey Software - Zoomerang

Saturday, March 6, 2010

Ten Big Ideas Of School Leadership

During his senior year of college, he taught math to 26 inmates, none of whom had finished high school. What he faced was 26 examples of the failure of American education. What he did not realize is the profound effect this would have on his career as a school leader. After teaching for five years, he became a principal because he felt that he could help underserved kids better in that role. Here is his ten ideas that he learned about in the 30 years since he was a principal.

1.Your School Must Be For All Kids 100 Percent of the Time

2.Create a Vision, Write It Down, and Start Implementing It

3.It's the People, Stupid

4.Paddles in the Water

5.Find Time to Think During the Day

6.Take Responsibility for the Good and the Bad

7.You Have the Ultimate Responsibility

8.Have a Bias for Yes

9.Consensus is Overrated

10.Large Change Needs to be Done Quickly

Mike McCarthy is the principal of Helen King Middle School in Portland, Maine.
This article was also published in the April 2010 issue of Edutopia magazine as "Mike McCarthy's Ten Big Ideas Of School Leadership".

Full article is at http://www.edutopia.org/maine-project-learning-ideas-school-leadership

Death of the white board reason number two

You are going to read a tone that I don't often project in this blog. Wow this is a play on words and I was not even trying to-do it this time. "Project" Epson projection unit, oh well. I am Geeked today, I ran into the Promo for the Epson on the 450Wi projector. This is a short throw projection unit, that is just the start of it though. It also has the ability to be an interactive white board without another device, like a Smart board or a Mimio. A little while back I wrote an article on "The Death of the White Board" I would like to see about getting one to put into my district. If I read the promo on this unit and if I see this right, I think it will eliminate the need of smart board’s type of technology. I think I see in the future no need for the smart interactive white boards in the classrooms as this technology will replace them. I think their is also many other alternatives coming quickly. It is as the book, "Disrupting Class" On how Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns as written by Curtis W. Johnson, Michael B. Horn, Clayton Christensen. This looks to be one of the Disruptive innovations. When I first saw another tech use a Wii remote at a cost of less then $150 to create a interactive white board learning tool as good as any of the $1500 + white boards, I know right then that the white board companies were in trouble. It looks like Epson is leading this charge. I would love to be a leader school in creating a room with one of these units to show other k12 schools this strategy. I have the perfect teacher for this he has used Mimeo interactive boards units and smart boards for a while now. He is also a master teacher and knows how to transform learning with these technologies already. So I am excited and I don't get excited to often any more.
Epson 450Wi

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Building Background Knowledge Through Wide Reading: A Five-Step Process

Robert Marzano

A few weeks back, I was talking about reading fluency and reading for understanding. I refered to how the two are not the same thing at all. Research says that if a student can read fluently that they have a better chance of understanding what they are reading. But if you want to make sure, then you need to use a best teaching practice to reinforce reading for understanding. This PD training video is just one technique that could be used to develop these skills.