School-based PLCs v. NWP-KSU PLC - IMHO (In My Humble Opinion)

Last school year (2011-2012) at Hannah Gibbons-STEM School (Cleveland Metropolitan Schools), I participated in a PLC that focused on STEM (Science Technology Engineering Math) learning.  The work of Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe in Understanding by Design was our selected text.  Participation was lackluster, at best.  Few people took the time to even scan the readings, much less actually read the selections.  My principal led the discussions, and despite his attempts to engage people, many were very reluctant to participate.  Teachers were paid for professional development if they chose to come.  It was very disappointing to me, as a part of the leadership team.  When I asked people privately about their impressions and lack of participation, I often got the answer that they just didn't have time to read.

NWP-KSU PLCs that I've participated in have been much more successful and beneficial to me.  The discussions were the best part for me.  I truly believe that TCs are a group of teachers that are willing to take risks and share their learning with others.  The "safe writing space" created by the NWP model seems to carry beyond SI.  I feel that TCs have already been "vetted" by way of their application / interview/ SI experiences.  (Unfortunately can't say the say for all of my CMSD colleagues.)  NWP-KSU PLCs always seem to have a sense of shared responsibility.

We will try the STEM PLC again this year.  I hope we have more participants who are willing to "do the work" and "take some risks".

Harris - Web 2.0 Tool Box: Xtranormal.com (part 2)

Harris - Web 2.0 Tool Box: Xtranormal.com (part 2): "The xtranormal videos by baldeagleization are very funny. This one has a teacher and an administrator talking about working collaborativel..."

NWP-KSU Writing Technologies for 21st Century Learners

So glad to have you with us for this workshop. Each afternoon you will be asked to make a contribution to this blog to promote the goals of our writing community.

Please don't hesitate to ask questions of Patrick or me. We are here to help.

Happy writing and learning! Ann Thompson

The Longest Poem in the World!!!! (Thank you, Twitter)

"The Longest Poem in the World" is composed by aggregating real-time public twitter updates and selecting those that rhyme. It is constantly growing at ~4000 verses / day."

http://www.longestpoemintheworld.com/

You can see more verses by clicking the three dots at the bottom (• • •)

50 Ways to Use Twitter in the Classroom

okay, okay...this is mostly aimed at college teaching, but NWP-KSU TCs are great at adapting ideas to fit their own needs.

"50 Ways to use Twitter in the College Classroom"
http://www.onlinecolleges.net/2009/06/08/50-ways-to-use-twitter-in-the-college-classroom/

Global Wiki Book Project for Students

Below is a call for student participation in a global wiki book project entitled _In Our Word: Portraits of Communities across the Globe_. If you are interested in having your students participate in this book project, please contact the administrators listed at the end of this call.

_______________________________________________________________
Letter of Invitation to WiTTIE (Wiki Templates to Transform Instructional Environments) Project
Dear Friends,
We are planning an exciting new international collaboration and we hope you would like to be a part of it.

We are creating a new online book, In Our Word: Portraits of Communities across the Globe. This will be a collaborative text written by students and hosted on the Internet using Wiki software so that students from all over the world can contribute. Our vision for the book is this: We will solicit classes from around the world to participate. Each class will create a chapter in the book describing their community. Within this chapter, students working alone or in small groups will write articles/entries about different aspects of their community such as the following:
· What we do for fun
· Where we live
· What we like to eat
· How we get around
· Where we shop
· What our parents do
· Our sports
The articles would include information that other students, in different parts of the world, might want to know. We would encourage students to include their own original photographs/videos.

The topics could be selected by the instructors to align with topics of the course, or students could be free to select topics of their choosing. Most preferably, the class as a whole could brainstorm a list of topics that students from another country would be most interested in hearing about.

Besides posting information about their own communities, we would hope that students would also engage in the following:
· Reviewing and rating each other’s articles (within and between classes)
· Looking for similarities and differences between their own communities and other communities around the world
· Building relationships with other classes

We have plans for a second phase of the project where students would write a second chapter describing the needs and assets of their communities. By posting and sharing this information with other students world-wide, classes could create partnerships based on mutual benefit.

Purpose of the project:
· -To provide a world-wide genuine audience for students’ writing
· -To promote cultural exchange of ideas and information in the interest of fostering more harmonious cultural relations through shared understanding
· -To establish connections between classes across the globe for further collaboration projects.

We have created a very basic template for the book using the Wikibooks platform and we invite you to have a look: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/In_Our_World. We will be creating a sample chapter over the summer and should have this ready by the beginning of August.

We have received a grant from the MacArthur Foundation through the Digital Media and Learning Competition that will allow us to develop our own Wiki application hosted at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, VA, USA. It will also allow us to create rubrics and rating templates so students can easily upload content, review and assess each others’ work, and teachers can monitor individual and class performance. The idea is to make this project technologically easy for students and teachers so you can focus on the content!

Project Particulars: The project will begin at the start of the fall 2009 semester (August 24th, 2009). We will provide free training and support to participating teachers and students. This first edition will be in English so the students should know or be studying English.

Students of any age can participate. If you are interested in participating, please let us know by replying to this email.

We hope you’ll join us on this international learning adventure. We look forward to hearing from you.
Jennifer Kidd, Ph.D.
Lecturer, Department of Teaching and Learning
Old Dominion University
Norfolk, VA 23529
jkidd@odu.edu

We Are All Writers Now

An article, cited by noted pundit Andrew Sullivan, written by Anne Trubek from Oberlin College.
http://www.moreintelligentlife.com/content/anne-trubek/we-are-all-writers-now

Nice to see a local writing instructor being cited on the "national" level!