Archive for the ‘Distance Learning’ Category
Grade 2 Goes Global – A collaborative project between the US, Austraila and S. Korea
Author: admin
The student’s in Ms. Cullinan’s grade 2 class took part in a very exciting project this school year. They made a connection with a class from Australia and another from South Korea. Ms. Cullinan organized the initial connection with a school in Australia through the EPALS network.
Here is a blurb about Epals taken directly from their site:
“Since 1996, ePals, the leading provider of school-safe collaborative learning products for K-12 students, teachers and parents, has been dedicated to helping learners from around the world connect and interact with each other online in a safe, educational environment. ePals connects teachers, students, parents and educators from around the world, enabling them to communicate and collaborate on academic and cultural projects and establish international friendships.
Our global community reaches more than 600.000 educators and millions of students in over 200 countries and territories. ePals technology enables these learners, who speak over 136 different languages, to connect, share, collaborate and learn.”
One of the features of Epals allows for a teacher to create email accounts for each of his or her students. The email accounts are managed and moderated by the teacher. Through a very easy to use interface, the teacher can read, modify and approve or deny all incoming and outgoing emails to each student account. This allows for a very safe and secure email session for each student.
Students are paired with a student in another country or school. Through the use of email exchanges students can discuss cultural and school differences, take part in a discussion regarding a global issue, discuss curriculum topics or book reviews. In some instances students take part in a multi-part collaborative project.
Ms. Cullinan and Mr. Walker worked together to create a web portal to coordinate the exchange between these two schools. A Wikispace wiki was created to serve this purpose. On the wiki each school created a page of general information, images and maps to identify their school. The wiki was also used to post digital stories that were created by each school to showcase where they live and their schools. Around the time of the creation of the wiki a third school from South Korea joined the project.
The project was a success. Students in each school were able to gain knowledge about the cultural differences of each country through personal contact with other students. The school year has ended before we could move the project forward. Future plans include video conferencing and group discussions on topics of interest.
Global collaboration between students is a key 21st century skill. It is requirement in the workforce today that employees are trained in collaborating with individuals of various cultures. We are living and working in a global society or as Thomas Friedman has written “The World is Flat”. By exposing our students to opportunities such as these we are broadening their knowledge of cultures and developing their ability to collaborate with others to share knowledge. The experience for our students and faculty is invaluable!
If you are interested in setting up a similar project for the next school year please contact me directly. I will be happy to help!
Posted in Digital Storytelling, Distance Learning, Video Conferencing | 
Tags: epals, Global Collaboration | 
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Take a Virtual Tour of the Louvre
Author: admin
The Louvre is offering virtual tours through the following website link
http://www.louvre.fr/llv/musee/visite_virtuelle.jsp?bmLocale=e.
Virtual tours are available for the following departments:
Students can navigate their way through the hallways. By right clicking you can zoom in on a display. This is an amazing opportunity to visit one of the most well-known museums in the world.
Enjoy!
Posted in Art, Curriculum, Distance Learning, Social Studies |
Tags: Art, museum, virtual tours |
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Skype With An Author or Subject Expert
Author: admin
In my latest edition of the Instructional Technology Newsletter I spoke about how SKYPE can be used as a free video conferencing solution for the classroom. Currently there are thousands of teachers around the world looking to connect and collaborate with other classes in the same or different country.
While the benefits and opportunities with this type of global collaboration are astounding, there are other ways that Skype can be used in the classroom. Skype can be used to connect with a subject area expert, author, professional, artist, or anyone that has an experience to share. Access to Skype and a web-cam is no longer a limitation for many individuals. Most laptops come equipped with a built in web-cam. Since Skype is free the barriers to entry are minimal!
Recently I read about a high school class in Colorado who recently read the book, “A Whole New Mind“, by Daniel Pink. The teacher sent an email to Mr. Pink requesting a short video conference with him. To the teachers surprise, Mr. Pink agreed. The students were able to speak with Mr. Pink live in their classroom. They were able to connect their thoughts regarding the book with feedback from the author.
This type of opportunity has never been so easy to make happen. By connecting with experts and authors around the world we are extending our classroom beyond the 4 four walls. Technology is allowing our students to be educated by individuals that they could only read about before.
Are you ready to globalize your classroom? Have you sent an email to an author or subject area expert? Because of the convenience of this technology you will be surprised how many people are willing to connect with you.
Here is a great place to start. Skype with an Author Network, is a wiki page that was created to provide access to Authors that are willing to Skype with classrooms for free. “The mission of the Skype an Author Network is to provide K-12 teachers and librarians with a way to connect authors, books, and young readers through virtual visits.”
If you are interested in using skype in your classroom for one of the above mentioned connections please do not hesitate to contact me. I will be happy to put it all together for you!
Enjoy!
Posted in Distance Learning, Literacy and Writing, Social Studies, Subject Areas, Video Conferencing |
Tags: authors, skype, Video Conference |
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Global Collaboration Resource- Around the World with 80 Schools
Author: admin
Have you considered connecting your classroom with another classroom around the world? Are you studying communities, temperature, time, weather or holidays? Can you think of some questions that your students could ask students in other locations to gather data on these topics?
What about literature. Would you be interested in discussing a book your class read with another class in the world? Wouldn’t it be interesting to get the perspective of the American Revolution from a school in England? Are you collecting data for a project? Could you ask questions of someone in a specific location to retrieve that data?Have you used Google Earth? Would it be engaging for your students to take a virtual field trip on Google Earth and then video conference with a school in that location?
There are endless possibilities with regards to video conferencing in the classroom. It has never been so easy either. Most schools around the world use a simple service called SKYPE. www.skype.com. Skype is a free video conferencing software that anyone can download. Once you create a username and download the software you are ready to connect to the world.
There is an online project called AROUND THE WORLD WITH 80 SCHOOLS that started this year. The goal of the project is that classes that chose to participate will attempt to connect their class with 80 other schools around the world. The project is very well organized. There is a wiki that provides all of the information necessary to get started. There is a spreadsheet available online that provides all of the contact information for schools that have decided to take part in this.
What i like about this project is the simplicity of this. Although connecting with 80 schools may seem overwhelming, they are recommending no more then 5 minute conversations. The wiki has a nice outline of ideas broken up by time. I copied some of it below.
Here is a suggested timeline:
- Hello (15 sec)
- Intro of School 1 (school/geographic location) (30 sec.)
- Intro of School 2 (school/geographic location) (30 sec.)
- School 1 shares (1 min)
- School 2 shares (1 min)
- Data collection Question (30 sec.)
- Goodbye (15 sec)
Take some time and read through the WIKI. There is some great information on there. If you are interested in starting to video conference in your classroom please let me know. I will be happy to assist the entire way through.
Enjoy!
Around the World with 80 Schools wiki ——aroundtheworldwith80schools – home.
Posted in Distance Learning, Elementary, Multimedia, Secondary Resources, Video Conferencing |
Tags: Distance Learning, Global Collaboration, skype, Video Conferencing |
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Connecting With Subject Area Experts
Author: admin
>Are you looking for a way to connect your content with real life experiences for students? Are your students struggling to see the relevance in reading a particular story or learning a particular critical thinking skill? Would you like to have a Nobel Laureate show your students how he or she uses the skills your are instructing?
The open source teaching project is an excellent tool to make real-world connections between your curriculum and the work done everyday by industry leading professionals.
A recent article in the THE JOURNAL stated this about the site:
“The open source teaching project is a Tennessee based program that helps students make real-life connections to academic content. It is a free digital resource that brings students up close with leading professionals across a variety of fields to help them see the real-world relevance of their studies.”
This program send interviewers to speak face to face with experts in a range of fields. The interviews are posted online and are free for anyone to access. They also include teacher resources, lesson plans and blogs.
One section of the site contains interviews with college admissions officers. Districts who have utilized these interviews in instruction have witnessed a distinct transition in the way students organize and prepare college admissions materials after taking part in these lessons.
A majority of the interviews are audio only. However, they are in the process of adding video components as well. Included on the site are the questions that are asked for each area of expertise. I found this to be a valuable resource. With the technology we have available in Jefferson we could easily conduct some of our own interviews. We are also setup to host video conferencing sessions. These questions would be useful for those projects.
I encourage you to take a look at this resource. If you are interested in putting together a lesson using these tools I would be happy to assist. If you would like to organize your own video conference or interview with a subject area expert please let me know. I am always here to assist.
Enjoy this new resource!
