The Venturous Edge

I’ve moved my blog to http://www.theventurousedge.com.  Come on over!

My daughter came home from school yesterday and said that part of her homework was to go to http://www.freerice.com.  I watched as she did, and I was very impressed with this site. 

Participants are given a vocabulary word with four possible definitions.  If they click on the correct definition, they have just donated 20 grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Program. 

Very cool, and rather addictive, too!  Check it out!

Participating in a workshop–$0

A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to participate in a digital storytelling workshop presented at Region 16 ESC where I work as an Instructional Technology Specialist.  I had invited David Jakes back to present 2 two-day sessions for secondary language arts teachers, but I wanted in on the fun, too. 

The first time Dave came to Amarillo, he presented one-day sessions, and we created Mastercard type commercials about a personal story…you know the ones I mean…priceless.  It was fun and a great introduction to digital storytelling, and it gave me just enough of a taste to want more.  I wanted to really experience the whole process. 

During the introductions for the workshop, we were asked why we had come.  My answer, besides the fact that I was the facilitator for the workshop, was that I thought the process would be good for my 11-year-old daughter, Brynne.  She loves to write, she is very creative, and she faces some challenges that the process might help her think through.  I’d seen some of the examples Dave had shown of student work, and I believe that the voice this process gives to students is amazing. 

Writing your first digital story–$0

When I began my own story, I had no idea what the topic would be, but I wanted to keep it light.  I had plenty of cute kid stories from my two daughters and things they had said or done over the years.  Which one would it be?  Oh, yeah…the birthmark story.  That was a funny one involving Brynne.  Well, at least it started out funny…

After writing the narrative, we were challenged to “find the story within the story”.  I was having a difficult time writing an ending to my narrative, and I asked Dave to read it.  As soon as he looked up from reading, before he had a chance to respond, tears welled up and I blurted out, “You know, what I really want [my daughter, Brynne] to understand is that I’m always there for her.”  So much for keeping it light.  Dave said, “That’s your story…” 

That was the turning point. The writing, storyboarding, finding images and music, etc., all took on new meaning for me then.  I needed to tell this story…it was something I needed to share with her…writing about it became a cathartic experience for me. 

Showing it to your kids–$0

When I got home after the last day of the workshop, both of my daughters asked how my day had been, and what I had done…very unusual for tweens and teens in the first place, as every parent knows.  I told them briefly about the past four days, and that I had created a digital story. 

They both asked if they could see it.  Wow…I wasn’t sure if I was ready! I hoped it would open up communication with Brynne, but I was nervous about showing it to her, especially with her sister Berkeley watching as well.  Deciding to take the chance while the door had been opened, I set up my computer on the kitchen island, and while it was booting I told Brynne I wanted to talk to her first. 

“I want you to know that this story is about our relationship, and there are some things in it that may be difficult for you to see and hear.  It is important to me that you see it, though.  We can talk about any of it you want to after we watch it.”

“OK, Mom.”

So with Brynne leaning against me on the kitchen barstool, as close to sitting on my lap as a tall, lanky 11-year-old can get, and with my 13-year old daughter, Berkeley, standing behind us both, looking over my shoulder, we watched:

After it was over, Berkeley said something like “That’s cool, Mom” and left for her room. 

Brynne, however, who hadn’t made a peep during the video, said “Let’s watch it again.”  She clicked play and kept her hand on the mouse.  We watched until after a particular point in the story when she clicked pause and said, “What did that word mean?”  I answered, and she clicked play again. 

This was repeated several times:   pause, “What did you mean by that?”, answer, play;  pause,  “Why did you say that?”, answer, play.

She made no responses to any of my answers, just clicked play.  I was sweating bullets by the end of the video, because her back was to me and I couldn’t see her face.  After what seemed an eternity but was probably actually only about 10 minutes, it was finally over, and I said, “So, how does that make you feel?”

She turned around and looked at me with an ear-to-ear grin, “Happy, Mom…really, really happy!” and gave me a bone-crushing bear hug.

But wait…that’s not the end of the story…

Making a breakthrough…PRICELESS

Before I go on, I have to explain that one of the challenges we face with Brynne is what my husband calls her outer locus of control.   The Wikipedia reference I’ve given here as well as many others online define outer locus of control as a person blaming their failures on luck instead of recognizing their own ability to control situations.  In Brynne’s case it has less to do with luck than with other people or circumstances.  She is NEVER responsible for anything bad that happens to her.

Now, back to the story:

“I want to make a digital story, Mom!”
“OK, I’ll help you!”

We opened the word processor on my laptop, and I gave her the list of writing prompts Dave had given us in the workshop. When she got to the one that said, “If I had to do it over again…”, she said, “This is the one I want to use, but I want to call it ‘If I could go back in time and change just one thing’.

She then proceeded to tell me a story about an argument she and her sister had gotten into last summer.  Apparently, it went beyond words to physical, and her sister hit her.  She then punched her sister in the nose and made it bleed!  They thought Berkeley’s nose had been broken!  (At this point, I’m not sure whether to thank God they kept it from me, or whether I need to quit my job to stay home with them in the summers when school is out!) 

I tried to stay calm, and I said, “OK, Brynne, what would you change about that day?”

She said, “Well, there are several things I could have done.  I could have walked out of the room when I got mad instead of arguing.  I could have let Berkeley have her way.  I could have talked calmly instead of yelling and hitting Berkeley.  I can’t even remember what the fight was about, but nothing was so important that I should have done what I did.”

Dumbfounded, I stood there thinking, “Am I really hearing this?  Is Brynne accepting responsibility for her actions?  Have aliens abducted my child, and what have they done with my daughter?”  Seriously, though…I didn’t know how to react! 

When I finally could speak, I said, “Brynne that would be a great story…let’s get started.  By the way, I am so proud of you for telling me about this and for recognizing the responsible thing to do.  Thanks!”

We have started the story, but we haven’t finished it.  Vacations, church camp, and life have gotten in the way.  But the important thing is that the lines of communication have been opened.

Articles on blogging as an educational tool:

• http://coe.sdsu.edu/eet/articles/bloggingtech/index.htm
• http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2007/05/02/35blogs.h26.html

Some student blog sites: 

• http://www.classblogmeister.com/
• http://learnerblogs.org
• http://www.21classes.com

Examples of student blogs:

(See Real District Blogging Examples)

Examples of educator blogs:

• For parent/student information
  http://www.mabryonline.org/blogs/
• For administration
  http://ghsprincipal.edublogs.org/
• For professional development: 
  http://speedofcreativity.org
  http://www.davidwarlick.com/2cents
  http://www.dangerouslyirrelevant.com
  http://www.readwriteweb.com

My favorite site for setting up teacher blogs:  http://www.edublogs.org

Here I am, back at TCEA one year after creating this, my first blog, and there are only 6 (this makes 7) posts.  What can I say…I have no excuse. I was so fired up when I created this that I was SURE I’d be making weekly, if not daily, contributions to the blogosphere, but I guess real life got in the way.

That’s not to say that I haven’t learned a LOT from and about blogging in the past year.  I have become a blog-lurking junky.  I have subscribed to several educational blogs that I read religiously.  In fact, I use Bloglines to subscribe to my favorites, and I installed the Bloglines Notifier so I  can read them as soon as their authors update them! 

This has been an amazing year in the advance of technology in education…or at least I’m more aware of the advances.  Social bookmark sites such as del.icio.us have changed the way we share resources; flickr has changed the way we share photos; wikis such as pbwiki  have changed the way we collaborate; not to mention video sharing and podcasting!  Wow! 

Some days I feel like a sponge, just soaking up as much knowledge as I can.  Other days, I feel like the sponge is saturated.  But every day, I am amazed by the huge community of teachers and learners, adults and children, who are taking part in this vast world which has become known by some as Web 2.0.

So, here I am, back at TCEA a year later, making a new commitment to be more than a lurker; to become a contributor.  We’ll see how it goes. 

I’m sitting in Five Easy Steps to District-wide Blogging Tools, presented by Miguel Guhlin and teachers from San Antonio ISD showing examples of student blogging. This is so exciting, and I can hardly wait to go back and share with the teachers of Region 16.

Miguel brought teachers with him who already have classroom blogs in place to show real examples. The first example is of Paul Gates’ Second Grade class at Madison Elementary in San Antonio. According to Paul kids are asking to write during free time so they can work on their blogs!!

The campus instructional technologists also shared their experiences with blogging at each of their campuses, and one idea is the use of poems and creating diagrams using Kidspiration which are posted with the blog. Students enjoy reading and commenting on each other’s work as well as writing their own blogs.

The district is experimenting with various platforms, working slowly to make blogging an effective tool. Right now WordPress and b2Evolution are the two that have risen to the top for San Antonio ISD.

Right now, the blogging is at the K-8 level, but the team is in the process of finding the best combination of safety and rights management to include grades 9-12.

Now we’re getting ready to start on the technical side of setting up a blog, and I am going to close so I can really pay close attention.

The Swish workshop I facilitated this morning was great. Swish is a program which creates .swf (Flash) animation files, and it is so much easier to use than Flash!  Also, their education discount is unbelievable…80% off the retail price!
It’s been awhile since I used Swish, and I had forgotten how user friendly and powerful it is. I’m going to have to practice lots more in preparation for the workshop I’m teaching next month.

I faciliated the Podcasting 101 workshop yesterday presented by Dr. Tim Tyson, principal of Mabry Middle School. Wow! That was such a fun and amazing session! Again, the educational possibilities are endless.

The students of Mabry MS create and publish their own podcasts, which are available on iTunes for the parents and students to download and play. According to Dr. Tyson, students actually voluntarily spend much more time on their writing, revising for a polished product! As he said during the training, when is the last time you had a student ask you to let them make more revisions and improvements to a writing assignment??

Now I have to figure out the tools to translate all of this to PC, because the workshop was done entirely on Macs using iLife06. It may not be easy, because that suite made the process so seamless, but I’m sure we’ll figure it out.

I’m posting my first entry in this blog using my Palm Treo 650. If you are reading this, it worked!