A Bit of Me on Glogster

We haven’t begun using Glogster.edu yet this year but we will soon. Last year, I became a Glogster Ambassador, which basically means that I am available to talk about how I use Glogster in the classroom and share out any resources that I might develop for teachers in workshops, etc. What I get out of that designation is a free upgraded account, which has been nice. (Note: Glogster.edu is dropping its number of free student accounts for teachers from 100 to 50 very soon).

The other day, we were asked to consider making a Glog about ourselves as they try to showcase some Glogster Ambassadors. So, here’s what I came up with (direct link to the Glog):

Peace (on the Glog),
Kevin

Presenting: The Resources of NWP’s Digital Is

nwp digitalis
About a year and a half ago, I went out to California for a meeting about a National Writing Project venture that was be entitled Digital Is. Supported in part by the MacArthur Foundation, the Digital Is concept involved a web portal to explorations of technology, writing and learning in ways that would go beyond the “how to do it” of typical websites.

Yesterday, the NPW Digital Is site launched to the public, and it is a wonderfully rich potpourri of teacher reflections on the “why” of technology as much as the “what we did” of technology. There are plenty of examples of student work, too, and discussions will hopefully revolve around our changing ideas of what writing means when it comes to multimodal composition and the classroom.

Elyse Eidman-Aadahl,who directs the national programs and site development for NWP and whose insights into technology and learning are worth their weight in gold, explains in her blog post on the site about the launching of Digital Is:

…  there’s no mistaking the impact of both the development of new digital tools for composing and of the internet as a global communications and collaboration space. What it means to write, to research, to publish, and to work together has changed dramatically in the last few decades.  As educators, we know our teaching must change too.

As a start, I want to point to a few “collections,” which are curated resources that are constructed around themes. This idea of collections is a great idea, as it pulls together projects and frames them in an importance concept or question by the curator.

So, check these curated collections out as a starting point:

The site is designed to keep growing and you don’t need to be part of the National Writing Project, either. I encourage you to take a tour of Digital Is, become a member and join the conversations around what writing and composition looks like in this midst of technological change, and where our teaching might be going in the years ahead.

Peace (in the sharing),
Kevin

Creative Writing with Invented Artifacts

This week, I intend to introduce a new book that we just bought this year: Regarding the Fountain by Kate Klise. It’s a short, fun book told with humor and in the style of using “artifacts” from the characters in the story — mostly memos, letters, and notes. I also considered Avi’s Nothing But the Truth, which is another powerful story told through emails, phone messages, etc., about a high school boy who hums along with the National Anthem, gets in trouble with his teacher and sparks a media frenzy. But, some of the language was a bit too much for my sixth graders, and the themes were more high school than elementary school. Still, it’s worth reading.

What I like about the concept of Regarding the Fountain is that I can really teach inference with my sixth graders, as you need to make connections between what is being shown and written, and what is not. And, of course, point of view is critical, too. What are characters not saying?

I am working on my own short story with artifacts, too, because when we are done with the book (it won’t take long to read), I want to have them try their hand at their own. It may be tricky and some of my young writers will be in a better place with their critical thinking skills than others. I know that I am struggling a bit with how to leave out important information so as to not give the story away too early.

Here’s what I have so far:

And if you have never heard of Regarding the Fountain, check out this glog review I did last year when I stumbled onto the book.

Peace (in the inferential thinking),
Kevin

Once Upon a Midnight Dreary …

This is a great video interpretation of The Raven, which seems appropriate on this All Hallow’s Eve. It’s just a close-up shot of the reader. Nothing more ….:

Peace (in the night),
Kevin

Whisper: A Stopmotion Shadow Video

This is interesting: using stopmotion with shadow puppet techniques. I like the video itself, but I really like the “behind the scenes” video even more because it shows us how they did what they did.





Peace (in the shadows),
Kevin

A Look at the Hudson Valley Writing Project

HVWP at 10 from Bonnie Kaplan on Vimeo.

Bonnie, my longtime friend and collaborator at the Hudson Valley Writing Project, has put together a fascinating look at her writing project’s history and where it is now, and where it is heading. It’s worth sharing because it tells the story of an organization of teachers using inquiry to make change in practice and in the classroom all under our NWP banner of “Teachers Teaching Teachers.”

Peace (in the sharing),
Kevin

The Tech Graveyard: A very short story

tech graveyard
I was wandering down a hallway in our school that I don’t normally go through when I noticed this line of carts, with overhead projectors, and it reminded me of some sort of Tech Graveyard. Our school is moving fast into interactive whiteboards, and I guess these overheads don’t quite need a place in our classrooms like they used to.

I found them a little …. lonely here, and wonder what they talk about when no one’s around …

“Sigh.”

“What now?”

“My bulb is burned out. And some kid pulled me out of the wall wrong, so I have a bent prong. This stinks, stuck here like this in this hallway.”

“Yeah. I know what you mean. The only thing I am handy for these days is as a light for tracing. A tracer! Is that what I have come to?”

“Did you see those smarty pants? The (sneering voice) Smart Boards. They think they’re all that.”

“Yep. I’d like to pull their plug, all right.”

Silence.

“See that kid? Coming down the hallway?”

“Which one? The one with the blue shirt? The one who’s skipping and humming to himself?”

“Yeah. Every day, he walks by here on the way to class, or the bathroom, or something,  and he doesn’t even look at us. It’s like we’re part of the wall. Shhh, here he comes.”

A moment passes.

“You see that? He … touched me. I saw him.”

“He ran his fingers in your dust. That’s not real touching.”

“It’s enough. He knew I was here. Hey, what’d he write on me anyway. I can’t see it.”

“Uh … let’s see … oh.”

“What?”

“He wrote, ‘I Was Here’.”

Another moment passes.

“Well, it’s not much, but it’s something. I was useful.”

“Uh oh.”

“What?”

“It’s that custodian guy, with his cleaner and rags.”

“No!”

“Yep. He’s gonna wipe you clean.”

“Noooooo!”

Well, that was amusing, for me.

Peace (in the discards),
Kevin

A New Logo for Western Mass Writing Project

The Western Massachusetts Writing Project
We’re moving (slowly) towards a redesign of our website for the Western Massachusetts Writing Project. We hope to be done before the end of the calendar year, and one of the projects that our site director took on was redesigning and updating our WMWP logo. For a long time, it was a gray-scale feather pen that seemed very antiquated.

So, this summer, we used a graphic consultant to come up with new designs and a few weeks, at our annual Best Practices event, we introduced the new logo to folks, who seemed to really like it. (One of the WMWP Leadership Team — it wasn’t me, honest — noted that we moved from a feather to an ink pen and maybe the next phase might be a computer mouse).

The logo and website design is part of an overall push for more inquiry into our site’s mission and how we can best put ourselves out there as a resource for teachers in the Pioneer Valley. Two years ago, we adopted a mission statement that is guiding us in all of our work:

The mission of the Western Massachusetts Writing Project, a local site of the National Writing Project, is to create a professional community where teachers and other educators feel welcomed to come together to deepen individual and collective experiences as writers and our understanding of teaching and learning in order to challenge and transform our practice. Our aim is to improve learning in our schools — urban, rural and suburban.

Professional development provided by the Western Massachusetts Writing Project values reflection and inquiry and is built on teacher knowledge, expertise, and leadership.

Central to our mission is the development of programs and opportunities that are accessible and relevant to teachers, students, and their families from diverse backgrounds, paying attention to issues of race, gender, language, class and culture and how these are linked to teaching and learning.

Peace (in the writing project work),
Kevin