Monthly Archives: August 2007

Four Slides and the End

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So I didn’t win anything with the Four Slides contest, but that wasn’t the point (right?). It was an interesting experience just to narrow down who you are into four little pieces, and I will use my slideshow with my students.

Still, some of the entries were pretty creative and interesting (and people spent way more time than I did, that’s for sure). I like the entire montage effect and the different approaches that people took. Very cool. (Mine looks kinda blah compared to the rest)

Check it out at the Dy/Dan site when you get a moment.

Peace (in four pieces),
Kevin

OnPoEvMo: What to do with Words, August 2007

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My tank is a bit on empty right now — it might be the slew of things I know I need to get done and get together before the start of school or it might just be that I have written myself out and need to rejuvevate the brain.

Still, the poems come.

Here is one I wrote as I thought about how to write a poem when you don’t have anything to write about (meta-poetry?).

What to do with Words
August 2007
Listen to the Poem

They say this “writing a poem” thing is just too difficult to do
so I just wait for the words,
kick back and hope for the best
and sometimes this slacker tendency actually works —
the words come fluttering by, on an arc before the eyes,
and patience here is the key —
don’t grab too soon
or you will be stuck with a net that has holes in it
with nothing gained, and everything lost,
while the best words will have gotten away.
The most obvious ones are often the least creative creatures
since they situate themselves so easily in front of your eyes —
no, the ones you want are crafty and sly,
and nuanced and covered in something like quicksilver —
the timing is everything if you want to find truth
so it helps to just stop thinking
just stop yourself cold right where you are before your brain
gets you in trouble,
and then, there before you, if the time is right
if the forces are converging
if the words are feeling frisky
the poem’s pieces will hover and take shape,
although what it all means as you take these gifts in the palm of your hand
and feel the warmth of words, well, that, my friend, that
is a complete mystery even to me.

Peace (in words),
Kevin

Book – the word

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Charles Hodgson, over the Podictionary, has uncovered and made visible the origins of the word “book” in a recent podcast and it is fascinating (as his information almost always is).

For example:

“When the word book first appears in the written record the dates are pretty early in Old English. This means that book itself was a book. What I mean by that is that although you think of a book as something with pages bound between covers, the earliest Old English meaning of book was anything at all written down, so the act of writing down the word book itself created a book.“

Go to Podictionary and listen for yourself. Or listen here.

Peace (with words),
Kevin

Four Slides and the Truth (kind of)

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I was following Alice’s blog site, when she mentioned a “contest” over at the dy/dan blog in which people are asked to create a no-frills elevator pitch using slides (no video, no audio, no animation, etc). After reading through Alice’s variations of work, I decided to craft one myself, thinking of my students as my audience. Four slides …. not much room to work and forces you to get to the essence of your message.

But here it is:

[slideshare id=88903&doc=just-who-am-i-anyway3325&w=425]

Peace (in four pieces),
Kevin

Professional Writing Retreat, part two

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This is a continuation of yesterday’s post. Using some pics, I created a little slideshow movie for folks who attended the Professional Writing Institute this past weekend. I also used my SuperDuperMusicLooper program to make some music for the movie, as I continue to check out the possibilities and limitations of that program.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-596529446926397614" width="400" height="326" wmode="transparent" /]

Peace (on the Long Island Sound),
Kevin

Writing by the Oceanside

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I got back yesterday, late afternoon, after three days by the Connecticut oceanside as part of a Professional Writing Retreat and it was just a fantastic experience. The house that the dozen or so of us stayed in was right on the water and the view across Long Island Sound was splendid (if a bit hot).


The retreat provided me with valuable to time to work on the first draft of my chapter for a book about technology and writing. I am focusing on a digital science book project, and although there were struggles along the way (aren’t there always?), I feel as if I made real and substantial progress. I know I need to add some more about assessment and standards, and go through a do quite a bit of trimming to what I wrote (11 pages), but I feel as if it is on the right path.

See — I really was working hard!

As part of my role as co-editor of our WMWP Online Newsletter, I also interviewed other retreat participants about what they were writing about and how the writing process was working for them, and then created a podcast of the interviews.

The topics under development for articles ranged from examining personal beliefs about teaching, ways for administrators and teachers to share leadership opportunities, the development of an after-school writing program in an urban city where kids are starved for creative writing, the ecology of a classroom and the impact on student motivation, and the use of technology to inform student writing skills.

Listen to the podcast

Peace (by the ocean),
Kevin

Stories for Kids

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When you have little kids, and an aversion to television (as we do in my house), it is helpful to engross them in stories and children story sites on the Net are something we turn to every now and then. This site — called Storybee — was launched recently by a family who lives not far from us ( a few towns over) and it is loaded with great MP3 files of engaging storytellers doing what they do best — drawing you into a story.

Another great site for stories is called Kiddie Records Weekly, and it revamps and shared old vinyl story records that are now part of the public domain. Some of the stories are very outdated but my kids get a kick out of listening to them from time to time.

For example, during the height of baseball season, we listened to Casey at Bat and then, during all the news about Jackie Robinson, we listened to a story that had the real Jackie Robinson in the story, talking. They could hear his voice and that was a thrill for them!

Peace (in stories),
Kevin

Public Wants Tech in Schools

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An article in e-School News Online reports on a survey of several thousand people which concluded:

“The majority of respondents said technology is an important factor in connecting schools to their communities, as well as in leveling the playing field among more and less affluent schools by providing equal access to educational content.”

In addition:

“According to the survey, 59 percent of Americans agree that “information technology is a vital tool that can help educate our students by providing access to video and other dynamic content” and that more should be done to incorporate technology into the learning process.

Americans also recognize that understanding science and technology is important to success in the 21st-century workforce, the poll suggests: 69 percent of Americans believe that science and math courses should be made mandatory for grades 7 through 12. “

The flip side is that respondents were not in any agreement on how this kind of technology education should be delivered, nor did people see teaching technology at odds with the push for more standardized testing.

Some links from the article:

Video of panel discussion
http://www.463.com/Clients/Cisco/

Cisco Education
http://www.cisco.com/web/strategy/education/index.html

Consortium for School Networking
http://www.cosn.org

International Society for Technology in Education
http://www.iste.org

Peace (with tech),
Kevin