Hello! My name is Hildi Mitchell and I am working at Abbotsford Virtual School. This year I am working part-time as the learning assistance for K to 12 and part-time as the kindergarten to grade two teacher. Currently, I am taking courses in an SFU grad diploma program - Teaching to Diversity. In one of my field studies I am looking to find ways to use my website to increase communication with my students in order to enhance student learning. With Gary's help, I have incorporated a YellBox in my website as a vehicle for students to respond to questions that I have posted on the YellBox. I would like to find other technology tools that would provide more opportunities for student-teacher and student to student interactions to support student learning and to provide a greater sense of community for students.

PS. I can't find my previous posting. How long does a posting remain?

My research question

I am an ESL teacher at Dormick Park Elementary. My research question is: Can I increase home-school communication through a multi media web page? This with include digital audio screen casts, using ilife programs. Check out the website at abbynet.sd34.bc.ca/dormickpark/doresl

Kathleen Weinkam

THEY ARE SINGING LIVE....YAHOO!!!!!!!!!...oh, and my research question too

I cannot remember if I posted my research question yet. I think I did, but if not here goes.

"Are classroom websites an effective tool for French Immersion students to help maintain and/or expand second language skills by offering extended possibilities to use the French language after school hours?"

Actually, I also have this question too.

"Are classroom websites an effective communication tool between the school and the home?"

So there you are....my research questions!

These questions are no doubt very important, but what is preoccupying my mind these days is my website and what I posted last week. I am so thrilled that I successfully recorded and posted 2 mp3 files of my students singing in French. I've always wanted to do something like this because I always felt that parents were missing out on seeing/hearing for themselves concrete evidence of their children's progress. The kids were soooo excited when I told them they were singing live on the Internet. Most of them went home and checked it out for themselves. That's great news because I am feeling like my answers above are now being answered.

Hmmmmm! What else should I put on my website........?

My question

My question is: What can I add to my class website to entice parents who do not usually use it, to start signing in more often?

My field study will focus on furthering communication with the parents in my class. I have already made a website giving the parents an idea of what French sounds like by using audio. Even though I found it was an effective communication tool with the parents, I found that it had many problems.
1. The children who needed to use it, did not have parents at home that would take the time to sit with their child or sign their child in.
2. Some children did not have computers/internet at home.
3. Some lost interest and stopped using it by the middle of the year.I did find that I had more parents coming into my class, feeling comfortable enough to ask me questions or just talk about subjects that were not school related. Since I have done this project on websites, I would like to find other ways that I can use technology to communicate with the parents or simply to intice them to use the website more.
Some ideas I have are:
-adding photos to make parents want to sign in.
-Nanos to record their voice and play on the website.
-comic life to further writing skills.

A few questtions before I get started

I am hoping to record some stories in Punjabi from dual language books.
My Q?
Am I able to use stories in English from the web that already exist and translate them?? and then add some comprehension questions??
If yes, then how do I get permission ??
For example if I want to translate a story from
http://www.kindersite.org/Directory/DirectoryFrame.htm
(sorry I forgot how to make this an active link)
There is so much that already exists on the web with animated pictures and I am hoping not to reinvent the wheel!!

stories in Punjabi

My Question
Will stories and samples of comprehension questions, in Punjabi on the school website help improve the comfort level for caregivers of Punjabi speaking students?

My question

Finally came up with my question! Will the school web site help to improve communication between home and the school?

Finally-- the Question

I'm finally adding my big question--it's this:
How can implementing technology enhance student creativity and feelings of success?

It's been a great time since my last blog. The kids in my class are very keen on learning, and especially so when it relates to technology. We've been doing a fair amount of Ginny's artworks lessons lately. If you haven't done any of them, they're a lot of fun. The Mondrian one is a great place to start, and the Ted Harrison one is a lot of fun. The image here is one from Ginny's site.

Click here for a link to Ginny's artworks lessons

For some kids, it's really freeing to be creative and artistic when they may not have the manual skills that drawing entails. And, computer-wise, we're learning all that great vocabulary and techie skills that will let them soar in a little while. A couple of kids are working on making imovies right now, and they've recorded their voices reading stories they've written, created their own songs in garageband, and are about to add their imagery. I'm just starting off with a few kids as we are soon upgrading our computers at school, and I didn't want kids to get frustrated with technical glitches. The kids that complete this part will then be sort of like peer-tutors to help out the other kids soon. It's pretty cool getting kids to help kids, and it's pretty empowering for them to be able to do so. Right now, things are good!

I went to the iLife session presented by Gary, Tom and James today and it was great. I was wondering how others are doing with posting kids' podcasts. It'd be neat so see some cool things kids are doing.

Rick's Post

Hi! My name is Rick Dool and I teach at the beautiful New Abby Middle. I am a grade 6 teacher. I teach Math, Science, and PE. Our school is in its first year of the IBMYP . Partially because of this, and partially because I want to find a way to provide my students with more awareness of other cultures, I am becoming part of this blog community. My project is going to be to team with a classroom from a different culture to discuss their way of life. I would like this to be in blog format but I may need to start with email. My intention is to draw awareness (both ways) of different cultural struggles and differences within our world. I look forward to being a part of this.

TLN Workshops

Click here view the workshop descriptions and registration page.

November 14

There's just time for a quick check in before I head off to the iphoto workshop today. I have made a little headway in my project. I have managed to get on the staff meeting agenda and have permission to do a little tech presentation each time. Yesterday was my first one. I introduced (again) our social bookmarking site on Delicious to the staff and showed them some of what what already on it and gave an impassioned plea for them to start adding their own bookmarks. I had some positive feedback afterwards so that is encouraging. The problem is the same for most people. The staff does not think they have the time to try/do/use technology more than they already do. Any suggestions for how I can start changing minds? Please comment! I'd love to get some fresh suggestions.

I thought I hated MACs

I think I'm in love with MAC computers again. In the past 12 hours, I was able to create a lovely website on iWeb (I actually transferred lots from my old site into my new one and added some neat features). Creating websites is not new to me, as I've always been able to create simple websites using FirstClass. However this time around, I've created ones where people can click on and hear my voice on MP3 files. I'm sooooo excited because my students now have an excellent tool they can use in the comfort of their own homes. They now have the ability to read along with me after hours. I also added a blog feature, but am confused as to how students and/or parents can respond to it. I did include a comment feature but for some reason when I go to my website, it is not working. I must have missed a step in setting up that feature. Hey Gary....if you are reading this message, I need your help...please, pretty please...with many thanks :-).

I'm enjoying using my MAC computer again. If I can figure out how to iron out the bugs, I'll be happier.

Ok, my goal for the next few days is to figure out how to include a game in my site (i.e. memory game).

Until next time.....

Louise
CDGMS

iLife in Studio Arts Photography Class

Technology Learning Network Project Proposal:
Studio Arts Photography 11 at Bateman has students who will be completing College Accreditation/ High School Articulation programs, competing in District Scholarships and completing Advanced Placement courses. I plan to use iLife (iTunes, iPod, iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD, Garage Band) to creating projects for presentations and teach Studio Arts: Photo 12 students these programs for presentations of their portfolios to Open Houses, organizing for the American College Board Studio Art Design portfolio exam, UCFV college instructors portfolio reviews and district scholarship adjudicators. These programs are all measures of student achievements in dual equivalency, advanced placement courses, and district scholarship competitions.

Apple Ipod has great sites for art history lessons from itunes podcasts, have a bunch downloaded will see how/ if the students learn from them

Listened to interesting podcast on virtual and embodied persona Cyberpunk Counterculture by Greg Niemeyer
found on http://edcommunity.apple.com/ali/story.php?itemID=11435 great site for university-level lectures

Photos and Video on Nanos

Does anyone know why certain photos won't show on an iPod Nano? They are saved as jpg's, just like all the rest of my photos, but they won't show on the screen.

Also, does anyone know how to convert video into a format that iPod will recognize? For instance, a movie made on a PC in Movie Maker? I can't get my Nano to recognize the type of file for import.

Any suggestions would be most welcome, as I have not found the Apple help site to be helpful at all!! ;-)