Footprints in the Digital Age

Push vs. Pull Learning a must read!

Where are all the self-directed learners?

Watch the full episode. See more Digital Media - New Learners Of The 21st Century.

How ICT Came To Be: Epic Moments in Communication

Sustaining the Inquiry Cycle: Digital Literacy Reframed

Digital literacy in primary school site presentation 2010

View more presentations from Leo Casey

Read Across America: Honoring Our Heroes

Sun Valley Elementary honored their local heroes last week as they celebrated the Read Across America Campaign which is an initiative on reading created by the National Education Association (NEA).  Students got the opportunity to visit with Indian Trail Mayor John Quinn, the Monroe Police Department, the Monroe Fire Department, Captain Max Harrer US Navy Retired, and Major Mark Owens US Marines.  Students also celebrated Spirit Week by wearing wacky hats, socks, and hair.  They also wore red and wore their clothes inside out in honor of this special week.  Teachers created posters of their favorite books and hung them outside the cafeteria so that everyone could enjoy them. Here is a video celebrating their favorite books.

Robert Burns Prezi

Robert Burns on Prezi

Here is an updated introduction Prezi on Robert Burns that I made.  Make sure your sound is turned up when viewing.  If you click the photos with "360" in the corner a panoramic site will open.

Brazilian Adilson Dezerto Visits Sun Valley Elementary

Me & Brazilian Adilson Dezerto

Tonda Helms’ first grade students pose with Brazilian Adilson Dezerto.

While at Sun Valley Elementary, Dezerto introduced students to common

Portuguese words and discussed the five different geographical regions of Brazil.

Sun Valley Elementary has partnered with English Second Language (ESL) students at two local universities (Queens University and The University of North Carolina at Charlotte).

Adilson Dezerto, a native Brazilian and a member of ESL, joined the movement to embrace Sun Valley Elementary School by talking with its first grade students. While at the school, Dezerto discussed how his nation’s primary language is Portuguese. He also discussed his country’s food (comida), school (escola), geography (geografia), and favorite sport soccer (futebol). As a resident from São Paulo, Dezerto also discussed the four other geographic regions of Brazil and what made them unique. “Students were excited to learn the capital of Brazil was Brasília, and that they will host the 2014 FIFA World Cup,” said SVES Spanish teacher Marina Sadow.

Through an initiative titled Children Connecting the World, SVES has hosted a variety of international programs including Prince Khalid of Saudi Arabia, the National Trust of Scotland, and more recently the Saudi Students Organization at UNCC, who performed a short play for SVES third grade students.  This presentation had an unexpected Skype phone call from Prince Khalid of Saudi Arabia. Using an iPhone, students visited with Prince Khalid as he watched the Saudi Students Organization perform.

My Top 5 Educational Video Sources

TeacherTube located at: http://www.teachertube.com/ is an online community for sharing instructional teacher videos.  Videos can be used for students and adults.

The Khan Academy located at: http://www.khanacademy.org/ is an open source project designed by Salman Khan to become the classroom of the world.  It has over 1,400 videos on YouTube that coves math, science, language arts, etc.

YouTube EDU located at: http://www.youtube.com/education?b=400 is a collaborative effort from leading colleges and universities.  Content includes but is not limited to: math, science, language arts.

WatchKnow located at: http://www.watchknow.org/ has a very directory of videos for children.  The site is easy to navigate for children and adults. 

Ted: Ideas worth Spreading located at: http://www.ted.com/ offers excellent free lectures from extraordinary people!  Topics focus on global issues, arts, business, and technology to name a few.  

This is a video that I made to help celebrate Africa.  

These are original photos of authentic African reproductions.  

The audio (Waka Waka: This Time for Africa by: Shakira) was purchased using iTunes.

ALA Learning Wiki

http://alalearning.wetpaint.com/

This is a great site for media coordinators to review when trying to keep up with different trends in their field.

Saudi Arabian Prince Talks Again With SVES

Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal, the nephew of the Saudi Arabian King Abdullah King of Saudi Arabia, video-conferenced via Skype into Sun Valley Elementary’s media center onto an iPhone, addressing questions from students and talking about his country.

During the chat at Sun Valley Elementary, Prince Khalid watched a presentation by the Saudi Students Organization at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte that was brought to the school by Children Connecting the World.

Members of the Saudi Students Organization that participated are:  Abdulrahman Saad Alajlan, Ahmed Abdullah Aljohani, Majed Saad Alharthi, Amani Mohammed Alharthi, Ahmed Saleh Alghamdi, Eman Abdullah Kabbas, Ahmed Khalid Alghamdi, and Feras Yaseen Al-Khalil.

Students Learning with Diigo

Students Learning with Diigo at:  https://sites.google.com/site/team8project9440/

This site offers educators a portal to post and share information about using Diigo.

Prezi Rubric

A Prezi Rubric found in Prezi at:  http://prezi.com/icv0isttisg8/prezi-rubric/. 

50 Plus Ideas for Using Document Cameras

Document Cameras in the Classroom at:  http://www.edtechnetwork.com/document_cameras.html is an excellent resource that gives ideas on the different educational benefits of using a document camera. 

Creative Commons

Sun Valley Elementary Media Center by Kevin Vickers is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

I chose to use a Creative Commons license with my website that I created with my school's media center because of some of the photos that I have created are original.  The American Library Association creates original READ posters but not in digital format.  So, I thought that I would celebrate the same ALA READ campaign using photos of "neighborhood celebrities" and use the Creative Commons license to help identify my willingness to collaborate with others.  This way they would know that it was okay to use my original works without feeling the need to contact me.

The Hung Gar Kung Fu Academy Helps Sun Valley Elementary Celebrate Chinese New Year 2011

The Hung Gar Kung Fu Academy preformed at Sun Valley Elementary School Friday, February 4, 2011 in honor of Chinese New Year that started February 3 and will last for ten days. While at Sun Valley Elementary, the Academy preformed for third grade students in the school's media center. The rest of the school watched on their school broadcast channel.

Third grade students and guests enjoyed a Traditional Chinese Lion Dance which included a drum, cymbals, three different Lions and a Buhdda dancer. Students across the school were captivated by the Academy's preformance. Many found it interesting to learn that a female lion has more fur than a male lion.

At the end of the preformance, Sifu Rick Panico discussed how a traditional Chinese New Year was celebrated and how Kung Fu is tied into all the celebrations due to the Lion Dance. After Red Chinese New Year Envelopes were passed out, students also enjoyed fortune cookies. Questions were asked at the end of the preformance. 

As a media coordinator, this was a fun presentation to put together for our school.  It was also exciting to see the different lion dancers in our media center.  What a great way for our students to connect books with this type of preformance!

SignUp Genius

SignUp Genius is a great web 2.0 tool that allows you to sign up for parties and volunteers.  We have used this program several times with a lot of success!  It is a great way to communicate and organize events when you want to speak to several people at the same time.  Once participants schedule either a time or what they will bring for a party, others will be notified via e-mail and the website is updated to avoid duplications.

SignUp Genius Screen Shot 

http://www.signupgenius.com/ 

Jan 25 - Robert Burns Day

Kirsty Pattison, Director of Education at the Burns Museum in Alloway, Scotland, shared a presentation using Skype with Sun Valley Elementary.  Students learned about where Robert Burns lived, Brig a Doon (bridge over the river Doon), his poetry, and how he supported America during their war with England. 

Our presentation began with Andrea Jones, Pipe Major with Loch Norman Pipe Band, playing the bagpipes.  This was quickly followed by a lively performance of Loch Lomond by our music department and five fourth grade students.  Later, fifth grade students recited the poem The Sair Finger by Walter Wingate and the song Ye Banks and Braces O'Bonnie Doon by Robert Burns.  After Ms. Pattison’s presentation, students left hearing the bagpipes by Ms. Jones.

Our cafeteria gave the students a “taste of Scotland” by preparing a Scottish lunch of Shepherd’s Pie, steamed cabbage, and scones.  Art, Music, Spanish, and our Media Center also prepared students for the Robert Burns program today by integrating lessons.

This entire presentation was preformed for our 5th grade team in our media center and shared school wide using our broadcast channel.  

A few screen shots of our Robert Burns Celebration.

ePals

I am very new to the international school arena (e.g. pen pals, etc.).  Recently our school system has required all schools to become more globally aware.  Using our system’s “Global Schools Criteria” sheet, schools are ranked on their level of global awareness.  The points range from 25 to 75 or more.  It is our school’s goal to become an International School which means we must earn more than 75 points on this scale.  One of the criteria involves our school procuring different international sister schools.  I have to admit, this whole process has really made me think hard about how to do such a thing.  At first I tried good “old fashioned” contacts which resulted in good interviews but left us high and dry with finding different sister schools.  This process continued until I came across ePals. 

ePals is a great portal for international schools to meet, develop lesson plans, or simply just get to know people from around the world.  They encourage using the ePals e-mail that is very secure and monitors for inappropriate material.  You can also simply write letters back and forth.  Our school’s goal is to use e-mail and Skype whenever we get the chance. 

If you are interested in ePals, they can be located at:  http://www.epals.com/

ePals: Global Community Home Page

Epals tutorial 2

Sing with Olive

Sing with Olive sold by: Swag Soft LLP has designed an educational App that will help children explore nursery rhymes and “fix” language-related problems they come across in a fun a musical way.  Designed by the writers of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Dora the Explorer your child is bound to have fun manipulating this exciting App that work on:  iPhone, iPad, iPod, and iPhones. This App only costs $0.99 for iPod and iPhone.  An HD version is available for iPad for $2.99. To view in iTunes and purchase go to:  http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/sing-with-olive/id394351677?mt=8#.

Kindergarten NCSCOS:  2.02 Demonstrate familiarity with a variety of types of books and selections (e.g., picture books, caption books, short informational texts, nursery rhymes, word plays/finger plays, puppet plays, reenactments of familiar stories).

http://www.ncpublicschools.org/curriculum/languagearts/scos/2004/15gradek

iPhone Screenshots

Information and photos:  http://www.lunchboxreviews.com/app/sing-with-olive

Video Links:

Part 1/2 Letter C Olive and the Rhyme Rescue Crew 

Part 2/2 Letter C Olive and the Rhyme Rescue Crew

Do you know the differenece between digital literacy and ICT?

“Literacy includes the ability to read and interpret media (text, sound, images), to reproduce data and images through digital manipulation, and to evaluate and apply new knowledge gained from digital environments.”  (Educause Quarterly)

“When people think of the term ‘literacy,’ what generally springs to mind is reading and writing, speaking and listening . . . Similarly, the term ‘text’ is beginning to be understood as any form of expression or communication in fixed and tangible form[s].” (Digital and Media Literacy a Plan of Action pp. 16-17)

Information Communications Technology focuses on “materials” (e.g. software, hardware, and Internet).  (Frontline: Digital Nation)

Digital literacy is more of a verb whereas ICT is more of a noun.  ICT takes a human to make netiquette decisions when collaborating using web 2.0 tools that are quickly evolving into web 3.0 environments or Semantic Web.  Whatever the case, humans are the final decision makers and that is where digital literacy comes in.    

ICT supports digital literacy by providing 21^st Century resources to stakeholders who want to expand and explore their forms of expression and communication skills.

ICT directly impacts all content areas in our NCSCOS by empowering students with resources that they find interesting while expanding their expression and communication skills.  This becomes clearer as you notice the shift from print to non-print and production/presentation resources typically found in classrooms across the country.  (http://www.ncpublicschools.org/curriculum/)  This is also evident as you view the “21^st Century Tools” in the ICT Literacy Maps.

Digital literacy does not replace information literacy.  Digital literacy is a subset of information literacy.  Digital may be web-based, video or audio-based where informational can be from anywhere.  Some educators may prefer the term “digital” to information because it may sound more in tuned with 21^st Century standards.  For example, “[t]o fulfill the promise of digital citizenship, Americans must acquire multimedia communication skills.”  One or two educators cannot champion this movement.  It requires full participation by all stakeholders.  (Digital and Media Literacy a Plan of Action p. vii) 

Digital literacy and ICT are important for teachers and students because, “[t]o be effective in the 21st century, citizens and workers must be able to exhibit a range of functional and critical thinking skills related to information, media and technology.” (Partnership for 21^st Century Skills)