Notes from Millie D

If this worked properly. You should see a book called “Last Day Blues” from a service called LookyBook.

My children have Webkinz fever. My wife caught the fever and asked for one as a Mother’s Day gift and guess what…she got one. My family gave me an early Father’s Day gift, my very own Webkin!

Being the ever-loving father, I accepted the gift with all of the love one could have for his children. After thinking about it for a while I thought I would take a page from Maria Knee’s classroom and use my Webkin as an educational tool to work with my primary grade students.

But my Webkin doesn’t have a name. I need your help. I’m running a contest to come up with a name for the Webkin, which I’ve been told is the Webkin of the Month for June. I really appreciate your assistance but please be kind as this is a family friendly area.

If you have any uses of Webkinz in the classroom that have worked I would like to hear about those experiences as well.

tags technorati : webkinz, MariaKnee

Are you looking for quality sites that students can sharpen their skills over the summer months?  You may want to check out Arcademic Skill Builders. I found this site via eSchoolNews and it was nice to find “drill and kill” games that is not covered with banner ads or popups.  The games are flash based (which if you know the Safari trick gives you off line access) and games are either single or multiplayer (public or private access).  There is even a teacher’s manual for putting together an implementation plan in your classroom.

I strongly suggest you check out the variety in their games.  If you haven’t decided to check it out yet let me add that they’re linked to 4Teachers.  They’ve gone through a makeover (for the better) recently and it was worth the time to rediscover this great resource.

What are some of your favorite sites that you would suggest to parents?

The folks over at Common Craft have done it again.  This time they’ve created a nice video on podcasts.  Here it is

The usage of podcasts in education has only scratched the surface.  The potential is powerful.  Children can demonstrate their understanding of content through audio/video that can be shared with people around the world.  Teachers are able to learn best practices, virtually attend conferences/workshops, and build their professional knowledge.  I’m sure over the next few years podcasting will become a standard medium of classroom content.

My fifth graders are highly engaged and I thought I would take a minute and blog. My students are in Sandbox mode exploring Kerpoof. Right now they’re having fun just seeing what they can create but they are exploring, troubleshooting, collaborating (like I wrote up in my lesson plan). The next time I have them use it will be with the idea of creating a scene but it fun just to let them explore.

This week my twitter network has been buzzing about Diigo. I’ve got to admit it I checked it out over a year and half ago and dismissed it as I was del.icio.us fan. I figure there must be something new to bring people on board the Diigo train.

In my rediscovery of Diigo I realized that bookmarking is just a small piece of their services. People can share bookmarks with other users, bundle bookmarks with common tags, and tag recommendations. At this point you may be saying “okay what is special about this service?” Let’s start off with highlighting (no need for the Firefox plugin), comments & sticky notes on webpages, the mirroring of bookmarks with other social bookmarking services like del.icio.us, and a forum/bulletin board feature. I forgot to mention that you can twitter you’re bookmarks. Basically it takes social bookmarking and gave it steroids to give the user more functions within one service.

Here is the promotional video highlighting the diigo’s services.

Well done Diigo. I’ve given Diigo a lot of screentime and I’m finding more and more things to like about it. The great thing is that I feel like I’m hedging my bookmarks should del.icio.us or Diigo have a major outage (a.k.a. bloglines).

I’ve created a how to guide using Skitch and Google Docs for people if you want to learn how easy it is to use Diigo while maintaining another social bookmarking service like del.icio.us. You’re welcome to use it and share it with others.

Allowing Diigo to Play Nice with Del.icio.us

tags technorati : diigo socialbookmarking del.icio.us skitch googledocs

How are you addressing their needs?

Intel touts long-distance WiFi for rural areas - Engadget

Think about the cultural impact that could be made if we could get WiFi access into rural areas. Intel can make it happen for about $500. The device covers 60 miles with a data rate of 6.5 megabits per second.

In Maine we could use the existing MSLN network and put a device at each school. It would provide access to people who would never have the chance to access the Internet. It wouldn’t take money from other ISP because serious users are going to want faster data rates.

Sometimes you need to think big to make a change in society. Now let’s see what happens.

Through word of blog, Learning in Maine, I was turned onto a podcast called Wicked Decent Learning. After listening to one of their podcasts while shoveling snow (an uncommon occurance this winter I realize) I made sure I got the archives up to date and I’ve been listening to them ever since.

They are now 10 episodes into their journey and need your help…

Like the fair loon that swims with the best of them but has serious issues and looks awfully goofy when trying to get airborn, a new education podcast has taken flight in the podcast-o-sphere and the blog-o-sphere: Wicked Decent Learning. Created by two practicing educators, Wicked Decent Learning examines issues in education of importance to Maine and the world beyond. Each episode features a discussion as well as a number of integration suggestions related to technology, literacy and media. And, ayuh, we throw our fair share of western Maine shenanigans into the mix, too.

Wicked Decent Learning is available through iTunes as well as our blog, http://wickeddecentlearning.blogspot.com

Give them one episode and you too will make room on your hard drive for Wicked Decent Learning.

tags technorati : wickeddecentlearning podcast