The other day, I shared some lyrics I was writing for our school Talent Show. Each year, a bunch of staff members get together and perform. I re-wrote the words to Jason Mraz’s “I’m Yours” to become “I’m So Bored” to offer up some solidarity to our students now in the midst of many hours of state testing.
We performed last night. Here we are (that’s me, with the soprano sax):
If you want to read the lyrics I wrote, here they are.
Peace (in protest),
Kevin
Welcome to this week’s Day in a Sentence — which is turned on its head to become Day in a Question.
I’m using Sketchcast this week for my introduction. Sketchcast was around for a while, then offline, and now (thanks to a reminder from Larry), it seems to be back. The site allows you to create a virtual whiteboard video of sorts. (Although it does seem to be quirky still, as an earlier version with audio failed to play. So, this one is a “silent movie.”)
Anyway, your job is to boil down your week into a single question (an essential question, if you will), add it as a comment to this blog post and I will gather and publish all of our reflective queries over the weekend.
Peace (in sketches),
Kevin
This is the second in my series of using Writer figurines for stopmotion movies (see post about the first movie). In this one, they are about to head out on an adventure with the National Writing Project. The little writing dudes (and dudette) are being shipped to various NWP sites over the summer as a “spy mission” to learn more about the work of the NWP’s Summer Institutes and they will be reporting back via a blog.
President Obama is also in this one, and I am sure he is proud to be involved (hahaha)
Peace (in movies),
Kevin
I have written about the ToonDoo comic site before, but they are now experimenting with a beta version for students. It is a closed-off classroom site and this morning, I got my administrative information and I am in the process of setting things up for my students to use. I imagine it will be a fee-based system later, but I love the many aspects of ToonDoo and see many possibilities.
Here is my classroom ToonDoo site — http://tiger.toondoospaces.com/ — and as I progress with it, I will report out on how it is going.
One of the things I like about ToonDoo, besides its simplicity, is that it is more than just a comic creation site. You can alter photographs, create your own crop of characters, re-edit your comic (or a friend’s comic), and think about art and writing together in new ways. ToonDoo is not the only site doing this, of course, so you may want to explore around a bit. My complaint with ToonDoo has always been that I did not want kids to be able to search around the public forums for adult comics (not that I ever found anything inappropriate, but still …) and this walled-off community for just the classroom seems like a good answer.
![\Toon\](http://static.toondoo.com/public/d/o/g/dogtrax/toons/cool-cartoon-764900.png "\Toon\")
Peace (on the virtual funny page),
Kevin
Linux is the open source software platform that continues to make inroads in the computing worlds. And many schools are now considering it as a no-cost alternative to Windows or Apple, too.
A site called Intrawebz (I am not sure if that is name of the publisher or the name of the site) has apparently put together some comics that explain the Linux operating system and the first issue about Ubuntu is available as a free ebook download. The second edition costs a few bucks, but there seems to be a way to bulk order for the classroom at some discount.
I am hoping to review the books for The Graphic Classroom in the future, but if you interest is piqued, go download the ebook yourself.
Peace (in comics),
Kevin
I had my students upload some of their illustrations from their developing digital picture books on cell mitosis into a class Box.net account and then I grabbed the pictures and put them into Animoto for a neat little music video. I love the characters they are developing (and see if you can spot the “fork in the road” that will force a cell character to divide – ie, mitosis — and take both paths on their adventure).
Peace (in the class),
Kevin
PS — It occurs to me that I should also be promoting the new book collection that I helped to edit with some distinguished professors. It is called The New Writing: Technology, Change and Assessment in the 21st Century Classroom (by Teachers College Press and NWP) and it looks at writing, technology and assessment in the classrooms Kindergarten through college. I mention it here because the chapter I wrote is all about the digital picture book project.
We got ourselves a new dog. Some of you may remember that we put down our old dog, Bella, about 18 months ago and we have pined for a new one since then. So, we “rescued” this lab/hound mix and he is such a sweetheart. His name is “Duke” and he is about 9 months old. The boys just love him and he is loving them right back.
Peace (in dogs),
Kevin
PS — this is my submission to the Photofridays project for this week. Come join us!
My students are hard at work on their digital science picture books (a fictional journey adventure story with the theme of cell mitosis) and here are some observations from yesterday:
I am going to try to collect some of the digital artwork being done and create an animoto video montage — should be fun.
Peace (in the books),
Kevin
Ken (aka, Blogger in Middle Earth) is taking the reins of Day in a Sentence this week, so please considering heading across the world to Ken’s blog and adding your thoughts. His theme this week is Day in a Comic, which could means a funny reflective sentence or, literally, a Day in a Comic.
So, of course, I went the comic strip route, using ToonDoo for mine.
![\My Day in a Sentence\](http://static.toondoo.com/public/d/o/g/dogtrax/toons/cool-cartoon-751643.png "\My Day in a Sentence\")
Peace (in sharing),
Kevin
I found this interesting resource: Comics created by the Government for their own purposes, such as information against the drug trade and health issues (makes for a possible discussion about rhetoric and genre, doesn’t it?). The ones I looked at seemed kind of odd and boring, but you never know what might be there. And just the fact that someone has collected them here …. the wonder of the online world, right?
My friend, Chris (of The Graphic Classroom), just published his master’s thesis that looks at using comics for reading in the elementary level. I have to go through it and absorb his ideas, but the conclusion he reaches for his particular study seems to be that his use of comics did not impact the reading of his students. I imagine that must be disappointing for him, even if there were other benefits for him as a new teacher.
And finally, here is today’s Boolean Squared, which was inspired by a rather dull and lifeless Professional Development session I was in a few months back in which the presenter droned on and on, and I noticed a few of my students smiling through the room’s windows at all of us. It was a perfect Boolean moment.
