CyberCamp 08 » Virtual Campus

Six Months…Really?

manni14 — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 05:37:38 +0000

Wow…December already? We decided that November or December would be a great check-in time to bring everyone up to date with our projects. I know that everyone has been slammed since school started. Hopefully you will all be able to take a few moments and give us an update on your Cybercamp project. It has only taken me a month to post since Bud’s reminder in November. There were such incredible ideas and products born during Cybercamp — I’d love to hear what worked, what didn’t work, and all about the great things you are doing.

I am pleased with the progress and results of the Google Apps Education implementation for the Wired classes. There has been a lot of lessons learned on the scope of use in the classroom — and time for reflection, changes, and improvements will come after semester ends. Four classes were set up on the Google Apps domain, with student email addresses and access to Google Docs, Google Sites, and all the Wired resources on the Virtual Campus site. You are welcome to view the final product on the Wired Classroom site. Just send an email for the password: MyraG (at) shsfalcons (dot) com.

Students have been using Google Docs for reflections, sharing work with project teams, and sharing work with their teacher. They have produced presentations for career exploration projects and group/individual Google sites for their exploration of Digital Citizenship topics. I’ll share a sampling of those projects at the end of the semester. The final project will be to pull all their work together on an eFolio — they will use a Google Site to feature their work from Wired, and other classes in 2008-09, on the online document. Their reflections for the semester, career presentation, and a link to their Digital Citizenship project will be linked or embedded in their eFolio. They will be able to personalize their site (hopefully using all the tools they learned in their digital safety research) to make it their own and, optimally, use as a repository for their best work during high school.

Google Apps Education was piloted with the 9th-grade Wired classes, but we are planning on opening up the framework to any teacher wishing to use the collaborative environment. But, oh, there is still so much to learn and all kinds of applications yet to be discovered. Anyone have any time to loan?

I look forward to CyberCamp 2009 (is that on the calendar?). The time to work, network and learn with other CyberCampers, and the mentoring from Bud and Jerry was so valuable.

WiP#12 – Joanne

manni14 — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 22:03:27 +0000

This is the twelfth WiP presentation from CyberCamp. In this presentation, Joanne shares some of her thinking and research about her school’s website and websites in general. Here’s the link to the archive of the chat from the session. Joanne’s portion begins approximately two-thirds of the way down the page.

Interesting Day at CyberCamp

manni14 — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 20:56:14 +0000

Enjoyed today’s presentations very much! Jerry’s ideas were cool and inspiring for the use of Virtual CAmpus and Voicethread. I think Voicethread could be a natural for his digital photography class and other art classes as well. Students will be able to comment on their work and on classmates works as well. It’s collaborative, fun, and a great learning and teaching tool. Enjoyed the conversations around websites as Joanne searches for what will work best for her school.

Despite a few sound glitches, the conversation with the authors went fine. One part of the conversation that I really liked was the changing idea of professional practice, that many educational professionals are having an “internal shift” of what is needed in this area and they are creating that change themselves rather than waiting for their district or administration to begin the change. Hmmm… interesting.

Well, that’s it for now. See you tomorrow at the final day of CyberCamp!

Roller Coaster-Are you on for the ride?

manni14 — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 21:12:16 +0000

Life really is a roller coaster. Yesterday I felt like one of those prairie dogs I see smooshed by the side of the road when I’m driving, but today I was frolicking in the fields. O.k. not quite frolicking. I worked on a sample powerpoint presentation (log in as a guest and click on sample powerpoint presentation) that my students will create at the beginning of the school year. Students will be charting their progress on school-wide tests in reading, math, science, and social studies, and setting goals for each of these content areas. They will also chart their CSAP scores. All of this will be shown at conferences. I also discovered why my links went dead yesterday. On the virtual campus it helps to think ahead when you want to link to a document or file. You need to go into files and create a folder to put this in and then you upload the file or document into that folder, choose that document and save. I did it a bit backwards, so it was like I had moved and forgot to tell everyone where to find me. All is fixed now.

WiP #3 – Michelle

Bud Hunt — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 19:10:43 +0000

This is the third WiP presentation from CyberCamp. In her presentation, Michelle discusses her work to build a research course for 8th graders using an installation of Moodle. Here’s the link to the archive of the chat from the session.

WiP #1 – Sue

Bud Hunt — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 19:58:02 +0000

This is the first WiP presentation from CyberCamp. In her presentation, Sue talks about her work as a teacher librarian and how she’s using technology, specifically blogs and Moodle, to promote reading and talking and learning. Here’s the link to the archive of the chat from the session.