Edtechapalooza

ISTE 10 Birds of A Feather Session ~ Great people, great ideas, great apps shared!

jepcke — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 20:54:29 +0000

A BIG thanks to all those who attended the IEAR Birds of a Feather session at ISTE in Denver. The turnout was tremendous and the event a success due to all of us sharing apps and ideas. Scott Meech, founder of IEAR and educator extraordinaire (and all around good guy) and I have already discussed how next year we will LiveBlog, create a Google Doc, or create a backchannel for the apps shared. For this year, we will have to rely on my note-taking skills for what was shared in the session. Please feel free to add to this list with apps I may have missed, to correct my information, or add comments.

Simple note
Finger Piano $1.99
Discovery Education Geography $4.99
LanSchool
iCell Goodreader .99 (allows you to open attachments and google docs)
Mobile Air Mouse (allows you to control your computer with your iPod) $1.99
Mathsnacks free animation of concepts 4-8
Dragon Dictation
Iplay and learn free?
Easy Relax free?
Freeappaday.com
Edutecher.com
Video science free
iBanner
QuickOffice HD
Louvre Museum free
Vincent Van Gogh museum app
Toy Story
So What: Three Little Pigs
Abc dinosaur book
Touch Goal
PenduGeo free
Mag Canvas
Draw
Sound Shaker free
Doodle Buddy (poop stamp)
Kidphone
Iwritewords
3D brain
Newton cradle
Trace
Alien Equation .99
abc tracer and more 1.99 full app
Garfield cyberbullying app

Again, thanks to all who came and especially those who shared.

Cross posted on IEAR Ning

Interested in connecting with other educators using iPods, iPads, etc in education? Join the i Education Apps Review Ning. Or check out the i Education Apps Review blog for reviews of education apps.

Professional Generosity

jepcke — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 16:45:32 +0000

I love that term, professional generosity. I first saw it as the tagline, “Practicing Professional Generosity”, on Lucy Gray’s blog and that phrase has stuck with me ever since. It reminds us to “pay it forward” with regard to our knowledge, expertise, and experience. A PLN is a global example of this, in my opinion, but I had a wonderful experience with professional generosity much closer to home.

On Twitter, about a month or so ago, a local ed-tech colleague was looking for some inexpensive summer professional development for her staff. With budget cuts hitting all of us I thought I would follow this thread and see what I could learn and use for my district. Next thing I know we created a Google Doc of people in the area that would be willing to travel to nearby districts and offer PD with the expectation of benefitting from someone else’s expertise at another time in their district. Basically, I come help you out, someone helps me out, and so it goes…Pay it Forward! I have participated in this kind of situation before, but was excited to see a collection of people willing to participate.

We were on the receiving end of this idea yesterday. Erica Roberts came to teach our tech staff how to use iMovie 09. Now this is not earth-shattering, change the world stuff, but it is something we all have been “meaning to learn” but have never quite found the time to do so. Erica spent about 3 hours working with our tech staff modeling, guiding, helping, and converting us (from iMovie HD users) to the point where we can open the program, know what is going on, and even instruct and troubleshoot with students. My tech staff found Erica to be highly knowledgeable and easy to work with. In short, they loved the training and loved her!

For me, the biggest take-away was how amazing it was that Erica probably spent more in gas to drive to my district than I did on her Panera lunch. And for what? To share her time, talent, and expertise with a group of folks who needed it. Is there the expectation that Erica and her colleagues will be on the receiving end of some of this professional generosity? Maybe. But I don’t think that was Erica’s true motivation.

We are very lucky to have a deep pool of ed tech talent in my area. But think about how this could be done via Skype. Charlene Chausis recently shared an experience with me where she invited Katie Morrow to Skype into Charlene’s high school to work with her teachers. I have used Skype to connect classrooms, but hadn’t thought about using it as a PD tool in this way.

A big THANKS to Erica and to all the teachers and ed tech folks in my PLN who exercise professional generosity every day.

2010 SET Conference Reading/Writing and Technology Links

jepcke — Sat, 01 May 2010 04:18:05 +0000

Sites shared during my Connecting Reading and Writing with Technology presentation:

Wordle: http://www.wordle.net/create
Wallwisher: http://www.wallwisher.com/
VoiceThread (education site): http://ed.voicethread.com
Readability Bookmarklet: http://lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability/
Glogster EDU: http://edu.glogster.com/
Blabberize: http://blabberize.com/
Storybird: http://storybird.com/
iPod Resource Links

Link to presentation: http://www.slideshare.net/jepcke/set-2010-readingwriting-and-technology

Philosophy of Education

jepcke — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 22:57:15 +0000

Recently I had to write my philosophy of education; something I have not done since my undergrad days many, MANY years ago. I wish I had a copy of what I wrote while an undergrad. Certainly I must have changed considerably although the way we teach has changed less.

Here are my thoughts. What do you agree with? Anything I missed?

An ideal classroom is a community of learners with the teacher as lead learner. Each classroom should provide a safe environment where risk-taking is encouraged. Children need to discover that it is acceptable to struggle sometimes, that it is okay for things to be difficult sometimes, that it is all right not to understand sometimes for it is from our mistakes that we learn the most. Students must learn more than facts; they should learn how to learn in an environment that is differentiated with regard to content, product, and process. Students will learn best when their learning experiences are authentic and include hands-on learning and manipulatives as often as possible. Parents are integral partners in their child’s learning and should be included as valued members within the classroom community.

Schools must consider the “whole child”. This includes their social, emotional, and physical aspects, as well as the arts. All children can learn and school needs to meet their individual needs through differentiation and teaching to the multiple intelligences. Children need to feel successful, be encouraged to push themselves, and have positive experiences in school. Providing choice for students when appropriate involves students in their own learning and empowers them. Children need to feel a sense of self worth to be successful learners and successful members of society.

Learning should be joyous; laughter should be heard in every classroom. School should provide experiences that might not otherwise be possible. Learning is a lifelong journey and children of all ages need to experience wonder, success, and challenge.

The Online Addiction

jepcke — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 17:12:52 +0000

This morning I came across a post on Beth Still’s Nebraska Change Agent blog titled, Finding Balance. Beth writes about her commitment to finding balance between her online time and spending quality time with her family. This is a struggle many (all?) of us face. Here is my response to Beth’s post on how I am trying to ‘unplug and reconnect’.

Beth,

You describe a struggle many of us face. Not only is there work to be done (I’ve got my office in my lap!) but I often justify that I am fulfilling my lifelong learning goals by being connected.

It may seem silly, but I find the need to schedule time for relaxation and family/friends. I am trying to flip that and schedule time for online work/access. This will become more important as I have just begun a yearlong, rigorous online A&S certification program.

I have long since turned off my email sounds and taken the twitter pop-ups preference off. This has helped immensely. I check email at intervals, rather than constantly. During the school year this will change a bit due to the nature of my job, but when I am home, I am pledging to be more ‘present’.

I am also not constantly walking around with my phone in my pocket at home. I actually leave it upstairs for hours at a time! There are days where I just can’t turn on Twitter due to limited time. I know I am missing out on some great things, but I also know my PLN is always there; I don’t need to know or read everything.

As for my Reader, I am spending more time reading ‘offline’ when I have the time: on an airplane, waiting at the dentist, etc. Blogs, Readers, email, Facebook, they can all wait. Family and friends cannot.

Gotta run. I’m out the door to walk the dogs. It’s a beautiful day!