Weekly Byte 2.25.09

Embedded Learning Courses
Tuesday was our third late start for the embedded coursework. Everyone seems to be moving along at an appropriate pace. We will have one more late start date on April 1st. This will be the last day we have time during the school day. Remember that all coursework must be completed by July 31st.
There were very few problems this time. I attribute that to the teachers trying the courses before the late start day. That way I was able to solve all of the problems but one, sorry Missy.

English Technology Day at Valley High School
On Tuesday Kristin, Sam and I attended the English Tech Day with teachers and tech coaches from around Westmoreland County. It was an awesome event where teachers were able to share some great lessons that integrate technology. The teachers then had the opportunity to work with other districts to create lessons that integrate technology based on PA English Standards. There were some great lessons shared.
All of the resources shared can be found at http://www.westcffenglish.ning.com
Check this site out it is awesome. Lots of lessons and feel free to post to a discussion board.
The other great resource that i thought was quality is http://www.readwritethink.org
This is a great source for students and teachers to learn about all types of writing.

There will be days like this around Westmoreland County for Social Studies, Math and Science. Check back to this blog regularly for future dates.

Tuesdays with Roger
I will be starting the Tuesdays with Roger trainings again beginning in March. March topics will be announced next week.

thanks and have a great day!
Coach Roger

Weekly Byte 2.19.09

Here are the websites that I demoed at the last faculty meeting.
www.toondoo.com
www.ed.voicethread.com
www.glogster.com/edu

Reminder
Tuesday Februray 24th we will have a late start. CFF teachers will be working on the embedded learning coursework. We will have one more last start on April 1st. Please log into your embedded learning account to make sure that your course is open and working. Please do this before Tuesday morning so that I can fix any problems before then.
Friday February 27th we will be holding a Flip the Switch event at the high school. Local politicians, school board members and central administration members have been invited to visit classrooms to witness first hand our us of technology. If you would like to have classroom visitors on this day please let me know asap and I will put you on the schedule.

I have been working with several teachers in the classroom with glogster, voicethread and toondoo. If you want help with these or any other tools in your classroom please just contact me to set up a time for me to help you.

New technology resources for your classroom
Google Docs is a powerful collaboration tool for you and your students. Google docs will allow you and your students to collaborate on documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. If you would like to see how you can use Google Docs to collaborate and improve student understanding and teamwork skills please let me know and we will set up a date and time to develop lessons for use in your classes.

Special Edition of the Weekly Byte 2.10.09

Hello again from lovely Hershey, PA!

Today's keynote speaker was Dan Pink. He is the author of several books most notably for educators would be A Whole New Mind. He gave an update of how society is changing and how we as educators should change how we teach and what we teach.
Notes from Dan Pink Session

I also attended a few sessions on Professional Development. I will be bringing many of the ideas back to FR to share in my Professional Development sessions.

New Tools to check out
Diigo, online bookmarking tool that allows you and your students to organize sites and share them.
Conference Notes and Discussions, this link will take you to the social network created for the conference. It provides tons of resources for all of the sessions this week. You only need to create a new account and you will have access to all the resources shared this week.
National Geographic Resources, this site provides quality videos and podcasts for your classroom.

Please take some time to check these resources out. Let me know if you need any help with any of them.
thanks and have a great day!

Special Edition of the Weekly Byte 2.7.09

Things are rolling right along here at the Pennsylvania Educational Technology Expo and Conference in Hershey, PA.
My first session focused on digital media in the classroom. Jason Ohler shared his method of digital storytelling using voice, video and music. Quite impressive but a little involved for the novice techie. Jason Ohler Website

My second session was taught by the Technology Director and Assistant Super from New Hope-Solebury School District. The title was "Technology Staff Development that Works!" The session spoke to the importance of the relationship between technology and curriculum. This district has a serious tech focus and the Professional Development is planned around teaching with technology. I would like to see this focus brought to FR to improve our curriculums.
Technology Newsletter

My third session, Google Beyond the Search, covered the many tools available for FREE in the Google Suite. You can use Google to share documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. Google Earth can be used to build uber-interactive web quests. Gmail, google maps, google calendar, and google reader are just a few more of the tools covered. Hopefully you will be seeing more of this later.
Google Wiki

Feel free to Skype me (Skype name:coachroger)Tuesday or Wednesday if you would like to ask any questions about the sessions. I will be on all day Tuesday and til noon on Wednesday.
thanks and have a great day!

Weekly Byte 2.3.09

Well after an awesome SuperBowl win by the number one team of all time, I am lucky enough to be at a two day training in Beaver. After braving the hour plus drive for two days I thought it would be good to give some feedback about what I learned at this training.

1. I was reminded how easy it is to create a mulitmedia presentation using Photo Story (this is loaded on the CFF COWS and teacher laptops.
2. What a great graphic organizer Inspiration is (on CFF laptops) and that you can access an online version of this program, Webspiration. Good tool to teach students how to organize thoughts.
3. www.podbean.com is a great tool to post audio and video files to allow student access. (more on this later)

I will be attending the Pennsylvania State Technology Conference next week. Stay tuned for updates from the conference (Feb 7-11). Check my blog for daily updates. I will also be bringing back to FR alot of new resources and ideas to share with you.

Important Dates:
February 24, late start for embedded learning. (make sure that login to your account before this day to make sure that you don't have any issues. i would like to solve any problems before this day so you can get 3 hours of good work)

February 27, Flip the Switch event. There will be local politicians, central administration, school board members in the senior high school for the morning. I will be asking some of you to be feature teachers, we will schedule a period where you will be using technology in your lesson.

thanks and have a great week! (the first person who emails me the phrase "i cant believe its not butter" wins a prize