Self Grading Forms

Well, this is my last post  for this class.  I have learned quite a bit. Thank you Dr. Pierce..  I am actually thinking about maybe trying to form a group a school to get together once a month just to talk about technology we use in our classroom.

Today we created a self grading online quiz.  It was very simple to do.  We just create an =If statement.  If statements determine whether a condition is met or not.  If you are a geek and want to know more...Click Here    Here is an easy tutorial I used to double check what I was doing.  I wanted to point out to my fans (Mom and Jenn) than an even easier way to do this(bypassing the IF statement) is to use Flubaroo.  Flubaroo is an add-on that you can attach to a Google sheet.  It asks you a couple of questions and Viola, your quiz is corrrected. It also alerts you to students that received a low grade and also questions that you asked but your students did poorly on.  IE: maybe it was a teacher error.

For my project, I made a simple quiz of Microsoft shortcuts.  I highly recommend you make a multiple choice test or some kind of test where they have to choose an answer.  I purposely did not do this for this test and you can see that if a student did not answer exactly as you told the program to do it is marked incorrect. Which means you need to go check your spreadsheet and fix any grades.  You can see a couple of kids got the question correct but were marked wrong

Check out my spreadsheet

Below is a sample with the same quiz but using Flubaroo. First you install Flubaroo then click     Add-ons --> Flubaroo--> Grade Assignment....EZ PZ

Here is what the Flubaroo spreadsheet looks like:

Here is my cool Quiz.  If you don't get a 100% you need to take my computer course

Numbers 1.7

Today we were given a scenario in which a professor wanted to know whether he should keep the prerequisite of a course.  In our case, the null hypothesis, which is the commonly held view, is students needed to take College Algebra before taking an Introductory Statistics course.  The alternative hypothesis, which is always opposite the null, would be that College Algebra is not needed as a prerequisite. We were provided pass/fail figures of students that took College algebra and those who didn't.   We then entered our data into the online Chi-squared calculator to analyze data.  In this case the Null was confirmed. Students should be required to take the prerequisite

A scenario that I could use in my computer class would be: Is it necessary for students to do the 3 sets of training sessions I require them to complete before taking a Microsoft Office Specialist test. 

This project is most closely related to ISTE-2  design and develop digital learning experiences and assessments.  We learned how to assess data which could lead us to best classroom practices.

Using Google Forms

Google Forms is a less known feature in our Google Drive.  Many people like to use it to gather data or create surveys.  I have used Google Forms quite a bit in the past to collect data from our football team and also to collect data from my classes.  I find it to be a great way to collect names, addresses, emails, cell phone numbers etc.  I also have used it to give small quizzes in my classroom.  After our last assignment, I plan to use this feature more.  Google Forms has also improved over the years by adding features like charts and graphs that weren't available in the old version.  This lesson also taught me how to use features that I have never used before including: like check boxes, drop down menus and linear scale questions.  In my opinion, Google Forms is much more intuitive and flexible to use than Survey Monkey.

Getting people to take the survey is a snap.  You can send your participants a link, post a link on your website, or even embed it in your website.  One of the great features of emailing it is, you have the option to just email the survey, there is not link to click, just fill out the survey that is embedded in the email and Voila, you are done

Click Explore

Google Forms allows you to review the results two different ways.  #1 you can have Forms create a spreadsheet for you which you can share with others.  I am doing a program evaluation paper for Dr Lukacs for RST 672 and was able to share the spreadsheet I had with my principal.   If you are looking at spreadsheet you can click on Explore on the bottom right

Spreadsheet

Or #2 You can just click on responses at the top of your initial survey that you made.  This provides you with ready made charts like the one located on the right hand side of the page.

Another feature i like is that Forms time stamps all responses.  This way I can tell if new responses came in after I have previously looked at the data

Here is a link to my spreadsheet  BTW Make sure to get get a "shareable link so others can see it. Below is my embedded survey. I generally would just share or provide a link but I wanted to show of my Google Forms wizardry.

Quizzing Works Part 2

Today we explored new quizzing options for our classroom and boy am I glad I did.  In a previous post, I blogged about how I love to use  ClassFlow for my classroom.  I also like to use Google Forms for surveys and an occasional short quiz.  Truth be told, I use Google Forms for football A LOT.  Check it out, if you would like to see a sample.

Some of the sites I checked out for this project include: Kahoot, Socrative, QuizStar and ExamTime.
However, the program I liked the best and was easiest to use was TestMoz.  It was super easy to use. I created my quiz in about 5 minutes.  Positives include: No password needed.  You can create multiple answer types and it is self-correcting.  There are some negatives as the user can not collect data about the quiz and if you forget your test code you can't recover your quiz. There is a $20 payment option if you would like these features.

Reading the 25 Principles of Learning article was a good reminder of many of the things I am already doing in my classroom.  However, the article about frequent quizzing was very interesting.  I have usually given quizzes at the end of a unit and check for understanding in an informal way while I am teaching the material.  Using frequent quizzing gives me another informal (and proven effective way) to #1 check for understanding and #2 increase learning capacity.  Check out this quote: Multiple tests slow forgetting better than a single test. Learners also benefit if they use test results as a guide for their own learning. 

This project is most closely related to ISTE-2  design and develop digital learning experiences and assessments

Audacity Project Music Through My Life

Today we made a podcast with Audacity.  Audacity is a free open source software platform that allows you to record and edit sounds.  The program is very straight forward to use but not as intuitive (at least for me) to use.  I got the hang of it after a while of fumbling around with it. Part of the reason why I had trouble with the program is that I am a linear person. Audacity allows you to overlay sounds on top of one another.  Listening to my podcast you will be able to tell I got better editing as the podcast went along.  I also had trouble modulating the sound of my voice.  There are plenty of online tutorials that were very helpful. I recommend watching the tutorials BEFORE you start using the program.  In my younger days, I fancied myself as a radio jock. This podcast is about the music I grew up with, what I thought about it, and how it shaped me as I grew.  It was fun doing the project but I found I was wasting time listening to the songs instead of doing my work:)

           MY PODCAST

Quizzing Works

I do not use too many tools that quiz my students using multiple choice methods.  In the past, I have used Kahoot! and found it easy and fun to use. I have actually made quizzes for my grandchildren who were then able to take the "quiz" using Poppy's cell phone.

What I have found and LOVE is to use is a program called ClassFlow.  ClassFlow is a great tool and can be used in a number of ways.  The program allows you to basically deliver a whiteboard to each student on their desktop.  The student can then either type, draw, or insert a picture onto the whiteboard and deliver back to the teachers computer which is projected onto the Promethium board.  I like to use this technique as a bell ringer or to check for understanding during a lecture.  This also helps to make the lecture more interactive.  Here is a link to a recent assignment.  I have the questions already pre-made before the class starts, but it is very easy to create a question on the fly and deliver it to the students.  If you look at the link, some questions require the students to get pictures from the Internet and some require text. Every student now must have some sort of engagement.  ClassFlow does have an app, but I find, when given the choice to use an app or a desktop for in school work, students like using the larger desktop

Hmmmm. I wonder if everyone is engaged.

I also like to use ClassFlow for current events.  Every student summarizes a current event, submits it to the teachers computer and Viola it is up on the Promethium board.  I, as a teacher, can pick which ever current event I choose to talk about.



Another way I like to check for understanding is to create blog posts.  (Thanks EDU 585) check them out here. Gordon Leadership Blog and  Gordon Law Blog

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

Today we learned how to create an Infographic.   An infographic is a visual representation of information, data or knowledge.  It is designed to present information quickly and clearly.  Anybody who looks at Twitter or Facebook is accustomed to seeing infograpghics in their feed. I usually see them in the context of college football teams trying to promote themselves or a player on their team.
Here is one from Boston College on the right




Infograpghics also can and should be used in an academic setting.  Here is an infographic I made of a scholarly article written by Dr Pierce.  I created the infographic using Canva.  Canva is a "freemium" model platform that allows you to make infographics among other items such as brochures or flyers. Although I am not sure that an infographic can or should replace a scholarly article, it does allow the student to get a quick peek at the "highlights" of the article. Perhaps encouraging the student to read further.  If not, at least he was able to garner some information from something he might have never read before.

On a side note, I plan to use infographics in a couple of classes.  I am doing a Business Law unit on different types of crimes and it might be fun to create an infographic on different types of crimes.

I also teach a Desktop Multimedia class so they also will be getting a dose of Canva too

Numbers 1.6 Online T-Test Calculator

Today we learned how to use an online test calculator to analyze student data.  We were given 4th grade reading results from all 50 states.  We compared Hispanic reading levels to African-American reading levels in 2013.  According to the statistics, the mean score for Hispanic 4th graders was 208.97 while the mean score for African-American 4th graders was 204.67.  I put all the Hispanic scores in group 1 and all the African-American scores in group 2.  Using the online T-Test calculator, I was able to formulate the mean, standard deviation, and standard error for both groups.  More importantly, I was able to obtain a P value of .00184 which showed that our numbers correlate. The online calculator was much easier to use than Excel or Google sheets.  However, I am glad that we learned how to use them as no we know what is happening "behind the scenes"

This project is most closely related to ISTE-2  design and develop digital learning experiences and assessments.  We learned how to assess data which could lead us to best classroom practices.

Numbers 1.5 Dependent and Independent Variables

Today we learned about dependent and independent variables. We were given a scenario where students first took a pre-survey and then sat through an information session about the Ebola Virus and then took a post-survey.  From the face of it, it would seem that students should be able to better perform on the post-survey than the pre-survey. Well, let's take a look at some statistics.  First we need to identify the variables.  An independent variable is the factor that causes change.  In this case, the independent variable was the intervention or the lesson the students were given.  The dependent variable is the item that changes.  In this case, it would be the test scores of the students

Click to see the data set and equations used to formulate the TTest

Looking at our statistics, you can see that the TTest scores (in yellow) are very high.  This would signal that there was not a significant difference between test scores. Over 100 surveys were given which is enough for a valid test.  In fact, looking at the averages for each test question, you could see that in some cases the scores actually decreased.  A teacher looking at these scores would have to reflect on how this material was presented to the class. 

This project is most closely related to ISTE-2  design and develop digital learning experiences and assessments.  We learned how to assess data which could lead us to best classroom practices.

Making Animated GIF Files

Instead of making my Prezi presentation for class, I have decided to teach myself how to make animated GIF files.  Generally speaking, an animated GIF is a graphic image on a web page that moves.  Usually when we see them on the web, they are very funny.  As a teacher, I like to use them as part of an anticipatory set.  GIF files are generally 2-5 seconds long but can be as long as you want. (provided you have the right software).  Lets get one thing out of the way , as stupid as it sounds, the man who created them says it is pronounced as JIF

There are many free sites to create GIF's. I used www.makeagif.com.  This site allows you to create GIF's from images, webcams, YouTube videos, or your own video files.  Of course, they have upgrades available for a price.  Here are some cool GIF's that other teachers have used..Feel free to steal





Here is an animated GIF that I made using MakeaGif.com that I will use on my Business Law blog when we introduce court trials

YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH

Of course as anyone who reads this blog, I would want to use it for football.  I was a little disappointed in the quality of the video. Also I would want to know if there is a mechanism to slow down the graphic.  That will be an assignment for GIF's 2.0

The project is most closely matches ISTE- 1 Facilitate  and inspire student learning and creativity

Business Law Field Trip to DC

Surprise, Surprise!
As part of our Foundations of Law Unit, today we are taking a field trip to Washington DC.  Everyone must carry their smart phone with them at all times and be partnered with at least one buddy. I have shared an interactive Google Map with each one of you.  We will be dropped off at Union Station  (Star on your map) .  We will all meet back there at 4:30 PM SHARP. Set an alarm on your cell phone at 3:45.  This is the time to be heading back to Union Station. You will be given passes for the DC Circulator  You and your partner will be on your own but must stay on the RED LINE.  We will meet at the Air and Space Museum at 12:30 for lunch. This is designated with a coffee cup on your map.  You must check in with me at least once an hour with a selfie of you and your partner INSIDE a museum.  You do not have to visit every museum BUT you must visit the Supreme Court and the National Archives to see the Declaration of Independence.  Along with the selfies, you must create TWO blog comments on our class website. (Dr. Pierce, we really do have one, check it out) The first is due before lunch, the second is due before we arrive at school.
Enjoy your trip.  Young business lawyers are expected to represent themselves, our school and your family with class and dignity.  Let's not test the DC court system.  LOL


Creating a Google Map is most closely is aligned with ISTE-3 design and develop digital learning age experiences and assessments

Screencast-O-Matic update

So, I really liked the Screencast-O-Matic program and I am thinking that I would LOVE for my students to create their own Excel "lessons" for each other in my Microsoft Office class (we call it CIS for those of you keeping score).  The program is free but it has to be installed on the network as I do not have admin rights to the computers in my class.  For any of you that work for a government agency, you KNOW how hard that can be.  I spoke to our TRT assistant (Technology Resource Teacher) and she said well, you have to put in a trouble ticket and we will see what we can do.  As a dutiful soldier, I placed my trouble ticket in and VOILA, it seems that we have Snagit which is the $50 upgrade of Jing (which I reviewed on Jan 27) already in the "system".  All you have to do is get the IT guy to map it to my computers. My thought was "why didn't anyone ever tell us about this".  Well, I actually didn't think that, but if you know me, you can imagine.  I actually spent more time thinking and researching options and work arounds than it took to have the software installed on EVERY computer in my classroom

Hypothesis Testing

Today we learned how to formulate and test a hypothesis by using the tools in our Excel tools data pack.  People often look at data to create decisions.  As I have mentioned in previous posts, you have to be careful entering data into your model.  Today, we are looking to see that we are making correct correlations in data that we are analyzing.   In our sample, we looked at data that suggested  females read at a greater level than males in the 8th grade.  By using a T-Test, we are able to discern whether this data is statistically significant or likely a measurement error. The T-test basically measures the edges of a bell curve.  The larger or "thicker" the edges of the bell curve, the more likely a chance of measurement error or in other words, reproducing the same results using the same test.  We decided to test a 95% confidence level which is acceptable for education research.  This means that we are at least 95% certain that are assumptions are not due to measurement error.  For our exercise we compared the scores of our Black, White and Hispanic 8th grade readers.  We found that all our data was NOT due to measurement error

T Test Results

This project is most closely related to ISTE-2  design and develop digital learning experiences and assessments.  We learned how to assess data which could lead us to best classroom practices.

BatchGeo

Today we learned how to use BatchGeo.  I have used BatchGeo before to map out routes for our football coaches when I was a recruiting staffer at Boston College.  The coaches really liked it.  I could see using this in a history class.  Let's create Lewis and Clark's journey across the West.  How about the voyages of Magellan around the world?  That would be cool.   Like any other software program, it is only good as the data provided.  When I first ran my map, I noticed that my information was missing from the map.  Why was that?  Well, it appeared that I entered my zip code incorrectly. When I entered it in "correctly" 02368 the 0 was still missing.  WHY?  Well,  Google Sheets read that only as a number so it lopped off my leading 0.  Excel will do the same thing unless you format it as a zip code.  I checked to see if Sheets would allow us to do that, but I couldn't find it, so I changed the zip code to text format.  I also noticed that someone from Washington was missing.  I know that that zip code does not begin with a zero.  They probably forgot a 9.  as the old saying goes, you are only as good as your weakest link.  For the one or two of you that actually read my blog (Jenn), here are the directions from Dr. Pierce my professor

My advice is to "Be Careful" and back test anytime you are "computing" something.  My question is, why do I always seem to be "over charged" rather than "under charged" when ever a billing mistake is made HMMM

The project is most closely matches ISTE- 1 Facilitate  and inspire student learning and creativity.  It would be cool for students to create their own maps

Pecha Kucha

Today I learned how to make a Pecha Kucha.  Pecha Kucha (literally "chit chat" in Japanese) is the art of creating a concise PowerPoint presentation.  Each Pecha Kucha is 20 slides long and 20 seconds in length. Pecha Kucha forces presenters to "get to the point" on each slide as they only have 20 seconds to present it.  It also forces the presenter to be more creative.  The idea is to get rid of bullet points and boring slides. They are our enemy

Here is an interesting video on how Pecha Kucha changed a man's life.

I found this project to be much more difficult than I anticipated.  #1 I tried to make my slides as visually interesting as possible.  Where I probably could have typed up something in 20 minutes, it took me a couple of hours to get all my media in order. #2 I found the 20 seconds per slide very restrictive, meaning that I could have easily done the show in the allotted 6:40 however, I would have liked to spend less time on some slides and more on the others.  All in all, the assignment did force us to think and become more creative.  I don't think that I would use this restrictive format for a class that I would teach. I will take the message of being more creative in my slides to heart.

Creating a Pecha Kucha is most closely is aligned with ISTE-3 design and develop digital learning age experiences and assessments

Screencast-O-Matic

Screencast-O-Matic is a cool program that takes you a step beyond Jing. Screencast-O-Matic allows you to create a  video of your computer screen and instantly (well, it takes a minute or two) allows you to post it to YouTube.  Screencast-O-Matic is much easier and more intuitive to use than Jing in my opinion.  Just using it for a short period of time, my first thought was "hey, I wonder if I can take a screen shot of my Jing".  I would love to be able to have the Jing pointer tools while I am creating video.

Here are some tips to most effectively use video in the classroom.  Videos should  be shorter in nature, generally 4 to no more than 6 minutes long.  If you are going to be "in the video" you should be sitting essentially having an informal conversation with the class injecting your personality into the video. Content of your video should be dynamic. There is no need to just read PowerPoint slides as the students could just read them on their own and would prefer to do so.  It has been found that students would prefer you to speak fast (about 250 wpm) but stop for with pauses so students can catch up and digest their material.  Keep in mind that students prefer to watch their videos on a computer and some will open up a second computer to take notes or follow along if a PowerPoint is available to look at

This lesson most closely is aligned with ISTE-3 design and develop digal learning age experiences and assessments  

Prezume by Prezi

According to the Prezi website,  Prezi is a presentation software program that uses motion, zoom, and spatial relationships to bring your ideas to life.  I have used Prezi templates before in the past but wanted to see  if I could incorporate this into our resume/cover letter unit we are required to teach.  A prezume is a template in Prezi that allows you to create a resume using Prezi, thus forming a "Prezume". You can choose from three different templates.  I have always found Prezi to be not very intuitive.  Doing this exercise proved not to be any different as I fumbled my way through it.  Although Prezi allows you to create sort of a "buzz" with your presentation, I have generally found that presenters using Prezi had more "sizzle than steak" in their presentation.   That being said, I could see myself using a Prezume template while teaching our resume/cover letter unit.  I think the students would probably enjoy making them after we first created  our resume in a Word document.   I am interested in learning about other presentation software programs that might be more intuitive to use than Prezi.  
This lesson most closely is aligned with ISTE-1  Facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity.  Prezi does allow students to be more creative in their presentations

Descriptive Statistics 1.3

Today we used Excel to examine a set of 8th grade reading statistics.  The reading scores were broken down by state, sex, and race.  We installed an Excel Data Analysis Toolpak to our spreadsheet in order to more efficiently calculate various statistics that included range, min, max, standard deviation and mean.  In our sample, the girls had a higher reading average score than the boys.  Since the standard error was so low, it is safe to assume that the females are reading better than the males. It is possible that there is potential gender influence in our reading performance.

Virginia ranked 24th, a little above the national average (266.5) with a score of 267.6.  There were 28 states (including DC) listed below us.  Curiously, The DoD schools ranked 2nd in the nation in their reading results.  One would have to assume that the students in those schools have representatives from each state.  Why would the DoD schools be so far above the average?  That would be a question the might prompt further research  Click on the chart to see the cumulative data

We need to see what the DoD is doing right!

This assignment most closely relates to ISTE standard 5-Engage in professional growth and leadership.  This lesson allowed us to evaluate statistics but even more importantly allowed the the opportunity to ask critical questions that might include further study

SAMR Model

The SAMR model is a way to look at how technology can affect the outcomes of learning.  The most interesting part of the video for me was when the presenter talked about creating learning spaces so the entire world is a place of learning for students
.

Substitution- New technologies just simply replace the old technologies of what we were doing.  For instance, I am using Jing to capture images from my computer to insert into presentations.  It does not really impact the learning of my students.  It just makes my life easier as an educator

Augmentation- This step enhances how the students carry out tasks.  These make tasks the students must complete more efficient.  Augmentation also creates small learning improvements.  I use ClassFlow.com to check for understanding in my class.  All students respond to a question that is projected onto my Promethean board. The answers show up on the Promethean board for everyone to see.    Students can now see if they are on the right track. It also allows me to assess where each student is in their understanding of a concept

Modification-  This allows students to accomplish goals that they would not have been able to accomplish before.  Important aspects have been modified.  For instance, I could have the students create a Jing screencast demonstrating mastery of a subject.  They would in effect be teaching one another which leads to greater learning.

Redefinition- Technology replaces part or all of the old task with new tasks that are created with new technologies allowing students to accomplish goals they never could have before.  An example of this I use in my Desktop Publishing classroom is to have the students create a public service video using digital cameras, PhotoShop and MovieMaker.

The first two levels of our model, Substitution and Augmentation are used to enhance learning.  The second two levels, Modification and Redefinition are intended to transform student learning.

Just a comment, we have not spoken about teachers being leaders of technology in the school setting.  Where does this fit into or does it belong in our model?.  Teachers like learning from teachers. This can definitely have an impact on learning.  I have already showed a couple of my peers the power of Jing and they love it!

Having More Excel Fun 1.2

Today we learned learned how to use the IF function in Excel.  This allows us to set if/then rules within Excel.  I already had an idea on how to use this function but wanted explore it some more and I am glad I did.  A few things popped up during my use.  #1 you should always go back and check to see if your formulas are working correctly.  My guess is that Dr. Pierce set this project up because he knew where the mistakes were going to happen because many of the grades fell right on the cut off line.  One time I forgot to put an = sign in and then one time I set a value 1 point too high.  Going back and checking, I saw that 2 students had a grade of 82 but 1 had a B and the other had a C.  How could this be?? After thinking about it for a minute, I remembered that Dr Pierce said to only show whole grades so Excel automatically rounded the grades for us.  The student with the C actually had a 81.8 average.  This, IMO, exposes a problem using a computer to do our grades.  In real life, unless their was an unusual circumstance, I would have awarded this student a B or at least altered my formula for similar scenarios

Class Grade Book

I decided since I already knew a little about the IF function  to conditionally format the grade book so that anyone that had better than a B average would be highlighted in green.

This most closely uses ISTE standard 3- transferring current knowledge to new technologies.  I would also say that we could use this to communicate information to students and parents

Picasso Head

Today we made a Picasso head.   The site was very intuitive and while I was creating my work of art I was wondering how I might incorporate this in my class.  I thought that this might be a good "get to know you" activity.  I was also thinking that maybe you could have the kids make anything BUT a face.  Could we create something that somehow could connect to my Law or maybe leadership class.  It would be interesting to see what our students came up with.  I really didn't have any problems with the site that I couldn't figure out in a couple of seconds.  --New check in alert--  A problem I had with this assignment was that Picasso asked me to save and email the portrait to myself.  I never got the portrait, so I had to go back in and recreate my project (not a big deal).  Anyway, this time I just did a screen capture w/ Jing to make sure I got it.  View my Picasso





This would most closely match ISTE Standard 1-Inspire student learning and creativity

Jing Screencast

Today, I used Jing to create a digital movie without using a camera.  Jing is very intuitive to use and after fumbling with it 3 or 4 times I was able to create a usable lesson for my classroom.  One of the more difficult tasks we do in my Microsoft Office class is to create a mail merge.  We generally create individualized party invitations and address labels for our project.

Using Jing screencast was very easy.  Once you open the program you select the piece of screen you want to share.  After doing this once, my advice to you would be to select a larger piece of the screen that you think you will need.  Also, collect your thoughts before you start.  There is a 5 minute time limit for the movie.

Jing has 3 prongs.  The first prong lets you capture the portion of the screen you want to use.  The second prong is your history.  Its sort of like a folder with all screencasts in one spot.  I am hoping that we will be allowed to create folders with in the history prong.  The third prong allows you to exit Jing, get help and to set your preferences. The screen capture was saved to my pictures as an SWF file and to the history section of Jing.  I was able to upload it and in return received a URL that I can now share with anyone.

I think I might start making some of these for my wife so she doesn't keep on asking me the same question over and over again. I could never be an adult educator

Mail Merge Screencast










ISTE Standards 2 and 3.  We created a digital learning experience for our student AND also modeled modeled digital age work in a professional environment

Jing Image

Today we learned how to use Jing.  Jing  is a computer service that lets you capture basic video animation and still images and share them on the web.  It also allows you to annotate on the image you have created.  The great thing about Jing is that is allows you to capture AND annotate at the same time.  For the past few years, I have been using Greenshot to capture my images. Greenshot does not allow you to annotate and share from the same spot.  So when using Greenshot, I would capture my image, put it into a Word document and then insert shapes and text boxes to make my point. That's a lot of work!  The only negative I see with Jing (right now) is that the editing tools are somewhat limited.  Jing offered an upgrade but it was $50.  I am actually thinking about purchasing it or maybe exploring another similar screenshot service.  I am not sure if I mentioned this is in another post but I wrote a fairly popular (at least in some circles) book about football Jerry's Book.  I also speak at clinics and this would be a simple tool to enhance some of my presentations.  I am actually going to Ocean City, MD to speak this weekend.  Check out my coaching website

Here would be a sample of what I might present at a clinic

Here is my Screencast link











ISTE Standards 2 and 3.  We created a digital learning experience for our student AND also modeled modeled digital age work in a professional environment

Learning Excel

I have to say I had an advantage with this lesson.  I am lucky enough to teach a basic Microsoft Office course at my high school. We learn Word, Access, Excel and PowerPoint.  I love teaching the class because the students learn skills today that they can apply tomorrow.  My students earn certification from Microsoft if they can pass a standardized test. That being said, I really don't know a lot of the skills beyond what I teach my students.  I never had to copy formulas across different sheets so that was interesting to learn.  I don't anticipate that I will be creating excel spreadsheets to create grades for my students.  This is all done (and is required) in our grading software at school.  I am not sure if I mentioned this in previous posts, but I am a football coach at my school and use Excel to help me break down our opponents tendencies.

You can see on 3rd and 1 and 2 they ran the ball 6 times and threw it once.  They went left 4 times and right 3 times.  They went to the field 5 times and to the boundary 2 times. You get the idea

Link to my spreadsheet


ISTE 5  Engage in professional growth.  I expanded my knowledge of Microsoft Excel.  I am looking forward to learning how to use  VLOOKUP

Social Bookmarking using Diigo

I can't believe I never knew that a site like Diigo existed.  I am not a first adopter but I somewhat pride myself to at least know what is going on.  I enjoy reading and learning via a variety of media: books, on my computer, and on my smart phone.  As it happens, I just installed Pocket as a chrome extension a couple of weeks ago to save and tag websites that have interested me. Previously, I just bookmarked and tagged them.  The problem, to me, was I never could create notes for each website. I enjoy showing Ted movies to my class, but I never could really remember some of the fine points of the video so I would have to go back and either watch or read it again.  (most Ted videos have a transcript associated with it)  Now, I will be able to just highlight the relevant ideas I want to share with my class from each script.  I have also used Keep.Google.com  to organize some of my thoughts. This is a great tool for list making but doesn't really do the job I needed it to do for websites.  Diigo will also help me keep track of things that interest me in my personal life. Interestingly, it seems that I have started using Twitter as a news gathering place for me.  I have been reading interesting articles that friends and acquaintances retweet.  I am also able to follow a variety of news outlets that interest me on Twitter.  News, sports, education, technology, money etc.  Its like having my own personal newspaper on my phone.  Now I will be able to see and read what other people have thought about a particular website they have visited

Here is a screenshot of my books mark bar.  What a mess!

As you can see, I have only some of my TED talks here.  What do they contain? How are they similar?  Can a couple be part of a unit?  You get the idea
















Here is a sample of what Pocket looks like

You can see I have a football site, a site for my business law class, and a TED talk.  I am able to tag them but I still do not know what is inside.







Another great aspect of Diigo is to not only be able to highlight and save annotations from a website, but SHARE them with like minded people.

Here is a sample of my new Diigo account.  You can see I have the webite, an annotation and a note a created for myself..Pretty cool

I think this activity most closely matches ISTE Standard 1 (Facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity) because this will help us facilitate learning in our classroom.  Students will be able to collaborate on different ideas.  I feel learning is done best when students can help and discuss ideas with each other

Creating Jeopardy in a blizzard

I have decided to use my time during the blizzard to get ahead in my schoolwork

I created a Jeopardy Game for my upcoming Business Law class







I have used Jeopardy games before in the past but used a PowerPoint template as its platform.  This is sooo much easier to use.  I always like to have my students make the game in teams of two or three and then I select a game for the whole class to play.  This program is going to make my life easier as I generally had to spend about 50% of my time teaching and helping the kids use the PowerPoint program.  Now, I will be able to spend more of my time helping the students think of better "answers" for their Jeopardy games.  I would like to know  how to make the game more visually attractive for the kids.  It would be fun to be able to insert Daily Doubles and maybe embed a video like they do on TV.

I plan to share my link with other Business Law teachers in our county.  They will have to change the last column as I have made that specific to my high school.

Word Clouds

Today I learned a new way to use word clouds and their many different applications.  I have only used Wordle in my classes and was having trouble with it because, as Dr. Pierce said, it doesn't play well with Chrome. I like having my students use word clouds at the beginning of the semester in order for me to get to know them and for them to get to know each other.  I hang the word clouds on our classroom walls.  Here is an example of one of my students word clouds.

I decided, for my project, to create a word cloud for the Microsoft Office competencies my students need to master to be professionally certified in Word. 

The Word clouds make it very easy to see that we will be doing a lot of inserting, creating, formatting and modifying of text.  I will be teaching a unit on ethics next semester in my Business Law class.  I plan to have my students copy and paste text into a word cloud program in order to see which words appear most.  I also will be still be doing our "Get to Know You" word cloud.

I would like to know how other teachers use word clouds in their classroom.


I guess I am a history teacher in a business teacher's suit.  Here is the Gettysburg Address.  I just couldn't resist

Learning Styles

Hypothesis:
I am a read/write and kinesthetic learner.  I learn best when I read then write about what I have learned.  As a young child, I have loved reading.  I vividly remember reading the World Book Encyclopedia when I was a kid.  I think that was before the term "nerd" was invented. Interestingly, for some reason, I used to hate writing.  Now that I am an adult, I enjoy writing and have written a book that is popular in football land.  Jerry's Book.  I also learn kinesthectically, watching video, using case study, practice and application.  My teaching/coaching model has always been: see it, say it, do it, teach it.

Analyze:
The results of my test matched my hypothesis I scored read/write 10, kinesthetic 8, aural 6, and visual 4.  I think the hypothesis that suggests we should teach to learning styles, is widely accepted because it is sometimes true. A broken clock is right twice a day.  As the article states, we like to categorize and put things  in boxes.  That being said, I think the point is that we need to vary our instruction to meet the needs of our students.  For instance, my survey showed, that being a visual learner ranked last for me.  Although this might be true, I still CAN learn using visual methods.

Pasher suggests that we need carefully controlled true experiments with identical outcome measures for all students.  We need educational and training scientists to conduct this research.

Students do have learning preferences, I think it is up to us as educators to find what works best for our students. "Students do not care how much you know until they know how much you care"  is an old cliche. This is not a learning style and I do not know how you would scientifically measure it but I do know it can be effective

Top Free Tools

I looked through many of the blogs and really could not find any tools that I use.  There was one blog that I do follow and that was Edutopia.com

Tools That I use:
Teacherweb.com ($40)  I have been using TeacherWed on a daily basis for over 10 years.  Since I teach 5 different preps, its a great way to keep my classes organized from year to year

Classflow.com.  I use this almost on a daily basis to check understanding within the class.  The kids seem to like it

PollEverwhere.com  I like to use this to gather information about what I am about to teach.  I also like to use this for a bellringer

Forms.google.com I like to use this at the beginning of the year to gather home information like emails and cell phone numbers that are often incorrect or outdated in the school database

Ed.ted.com  Ted Ed has wonderful lessons connected to Ted videos that are created by other teachers. The platform also makes it easy to modify a current lesson or create your own from scratch.

Blogs I follow:
Edutopia.com

Google for Education


You can create your on reading list of blogs right in your blogger account

Just Click on the add button and copy/paste your URL in and voila it puts all the blogs you want to read in one place

Blogger 2

1. Who is the audience and community? What is being presented? How might comments be used, who can/should/ comment?

Our audience and community for this blog is two-fold:

The first audience is all the other students in our class. We are taking a collective journey together learning how to use technology, not for technology sake, but to use it as a tool in our classroom. I always like to say, I have learned more from other teachers than I have ever learned in a classroom environment.

Second, I will be using the blog to crystallize technology ideas that I have in my head. I am currently using technology to check for understanding in my class, but it seems haphazard. I am also planning on showing my blog to other teachers in my building that I know are always looking for technology ideas.

We will be presenting what we have learned and reflected upon to each other. I am guessing that Dr. Pierce, as our professor, will be using our blogs to access and guide our understanding and usage of technology.

I am hoping, as a learning community, that we will all be commenting on each others websites. I am thinking about actually showing my website to my classes at some point and maybe have them comment on it from a student's perspective.

What I found most intriguing about the article was the comments about loneliness, and feeling connected. I belong to a couple of football forums and know that blogs can create community of others from around the world.

2. 

Please discuss how these activities fit into 4 domains of blogging in the first article. How does ‘reflect’ and ‘share’ fit into  the blogging domains from #1?

We read, write and reflect for ourselves. We try to deepen our understanding about the subject we are trying to learn or teach. In my opinion, writing could include other media examples. Sometimes, it is easier just to show a two minute video or a infographic about a subject to convey a thought.

Comments to me, are the KEY in a successful blog. if used correctly, it is here that you can receive constructive criticism, different ways of looking at a problem and different ways to move forward

Classroom: My leadership class is required to write a daily learning log. Some are great while others are not so well written. I am wondering if we blog our learning logs, #1 can the blogs remain anonymous to others students but not to me. I am thinking that I could have my students just blog under their student number. Will the students still share their personal experiences in public even if anonymously.

#2 will the students "copy" their feelings from other students into their personal log

It's interesting to me that I have come back and edited both of my blog posts after I "finished" blogging. Both times, thoughts have "popped" into my head while doing other things

Jerry Gordon Intro

Hi Folks,

My name is Jerry Gordon.  I am a business teacher at Broad Run HS in Ashburn VA.
I teach a variety of courses. Check out my class agenda

I am also a football coach there and maintain a football website

I had a little trouble starting my blog because my Google interface was a little different than Dr.Pierce's.  I was able to fumble around with it for a little bit to figure it out.    I have used Google Docs before (spreadsheets, forms, slides)  so if anyone needs some help, either comment on my blog or you can email me at jgordon0508@yahoo.com

I want to use this in my leadership class and would like to know if students can respond to each other via blog posts