Close Reading: A Presentation

Last year, in our school district, I facilitated a series of PD sessions with colleagues around ELA and the Common Core, and we spent one long session on understanding and using Close Reading strategies. This is the prezi that I created and shared with my colleagues, and I am digging it up as part of […]

All in for Audio at DS106

What have I been up to this past week with the Headless DS106? Other than watching my son create freeze-frame zombie scenes all around the first floor of our house with his Lego collection (Seriously, they are everywhere, and none of them have heads right now, and they all look like they are about to […]

Gone Headless — The Rap

Someone over in DS106 had created a rap for the Headless Course a few weeks ago, and I decided to give it a try, too. I’ve made the audio file of the Gone Headless song shareable and downloadable, so feel free to remix it and mess with it and do what you want with it. […]

So Long, National Gallery of Writing

I suppose this was inevitable and not at all unexpected. But the National Council of Teachers of English is closing the virtual doors on the National Gallery of Writing. This online repository of writing (to date, there are more than 33,000 pieces of writing) was established for the first National Day on Writing back in […]

This is What Happens when You (me) Hack the NYTimes Frontpage

As much as I can, I am trying out the Daily Creates at the DS106 site. Each day, someone posts an interesting hack/remix/create idea and you do it if you can. No pressure. Yesterday, the Daily Create asked for folks to recreate a Tabloid newspaper with news about DS106. I used Mozilla’s XRay Goggles and […]

Experimenting with Badges for Learning

This week, the heart of a Twitter Chat discussion with the Making Learning Connected MOOC folks centered on the use of badges in education. I am still mixed and I freely admit that I feel a bit confused on the topic. On one hand, I see the value of validating and recognizing student expertise and […]

Of Teaching Partnerships and Digital Literacies Word Walls

I am very fortunate. I have an incredible teaching partner in our Digital Literacies workshop for English Language Leaners high school students this summer. While I have been mostly focused on the digital part of our program (leading activities around hacking, remixing, digital identities and video game design), my colleague – Maria Cahillane — has […]

CLMOOC Facilitator Reflection: Priming the Space

(Note: This is part of a series of reflective postsĀ  by the facilitators of the Making Learning Connected MOOC. Eventually, all of our posts will be pulled together into a single resource as a way to share what we learned and to provide a map for others who want to Remix the MOOC. – Kevin) […]

Sometimes, We Just Need a Learning Walk

I spent much of my day yesterday trying to wrap my head around how to begin the collective work of not just reflecting on the wonderful Making Learning Connected MOOC experience but also how to work collaboratively with others on our facilitation team to make our learning visible. We want to leave a trail for […]

Hacking PacMan in Gamestar Mechanic

One of the first activities I have students do in Gamestar Mechanic as we move into video game design is to “hack” a traditional video game and make it their own. This all ties into some of the earlier work in our digital literacies workshop for high school students about the hacking and remixing culture. […]