The TWAIN blog

Can I tell you how excited I am about TCEA this year?

This is my 11th year attending this conference. My dad was one of the founders of the organization back when there were a handful of people meeting in a tiny conference room. They weren’t technology directors. There wasn’t technology yet in the classrooms. These were people in different districts who thought the concept of the computer could be of use in schools.

I remember my dad going to the conference and bringing back all sorts of toys and pens from all the different vendors that my brothers would fight over. I remember one hammer-headed pencil from a company that I took to school only to have it stolen during lunch. I still have a coffee mug he received from Apple Computers back in 1985 and it sits close to my desk at work.

When I started teaching, I would drive down to Austin and stay with friends so I could go to the conference. I would take a sick day and pay my own way to get there. I would mostly spend the evenings out on the town and attend a few sessions. I would spend most of my time in the vendor area looking for something cool to take back to school to share with my students.

Most of the time at the conference, I would tag along behind my dad only because I didn’t know anyone except the people he worked with in his career. For years, I would attend the conference to be introduced as “Bill Adkins’ son”. No name. Just that title. And people who knew my dad shared how much they respected him and enjoyed his company.

A few years ago, my dad retired from education. He attended the conference a few times and the roles reversed a bit. He was introduced as “Joel Adkins’ dad” to a few of my friends. I think he might have enjoyed this a little bit more than I did – though I enjoyed it very much!

His last year of attendance marked the 25th anniversary of TCEA and his 25th time to go to the conference. I remember him telling me at that conference that it would be his last. I told him that I would get him to the next one somehow. Sure enough, I received the Instructional Technology Specialist award and I invited him to attend the banquet for all honorees. I came through on my promise.

A lot has changed with technology over the years. Education has changed in some ways and stayed the same in other ways. The conference gets bigger each year with more attendees and more offerings of training.

I look forward to this conference more and more each year because of what it represents for those of us on the frontlines. It’s a time for us to refocus, refresh, and connect with others in the same boat all over the state and now the world. Twitter is great for posting those quick little bits of info and questions but there’s nothing like like seeing that person in real life for the first, second, or next time.

This year, I am taking 10 staff from my district to this conference. Over half of them have informed me that they have never attended a conference before; much less professional development that takes place over several continuous days.

I am excited about not only visiting with old friends from all over the world, but for the week after the conference listening to what these newbies will experience. I am looking forward to them sharing what they saw, experienced, grabbed (free pens!), and heard.

Blogging is a new concept for them. The wiki is something I started them on when I arrived and they are still figuring it out. Most of the district doesn’t understand YouTube or the relevance of why I unblocked it (for staff only). Some of our computers at the campus level don’t even have Microsoft Office on them.

And all this seems foreign to some who will read this.

But to me, it is the most exciting thing about my job. I am so excited for them to go! After 11 years, I can get jaded about a conference or session and how it “wasn’t anything new”. For this crew, the entire experience of a conference of this magnitude is new. And that is the start of their history with TCEA.

If you are going, give me a shoutout! You can find me via Loopt, Facebook, Twitter, this blog, and just by finding me in the crowd. I would love to see you and shake your hands!

See you in Austin!

President Obama’s website Change.gov is now Whitehouse.gov. I am following their posts on Twitter and they posted this video link to share how their TIGR team is working to make government more transparent.

Interesting to hear them say they are working to make the federal agencies “more effective”.

What’s even more interesting? They are allowing people to post comments that are both positive and negative about their services. They are taking recommendations. They are making the entire process…more effective.

Web 2.0 tools greatly emphasized here!!

Watch, learn, and respond.

A coworker shared this link with me from New York Times writer, David Pogue.

Pogue is one of my favorite podcasters because he shows off new technology in such a quick and humorous way. I highly recommend you visit iTunes to subscribe to his podcasts.’

The article is titled “Twittering Tips for Beginners” and it comes from David’s column in the NYT for January 15, 2009.

In his brief outline of the program, David provides some tips for the new user:

1) Don’t just go to the site. Use an app to monitor your Tweets (and yes, he explains what Tweets are!) or feed them to your phone.

2) There are public and private Tweets.

3) Don’t feel you must respond to every Tweet. Nor do you have to subscribe to everyone.

4) Don’t Tweet about what you are doing right now! Use this resource to post interesting questions, links, articles, discussions. People don’t care about the mundane experiences you are experiencing because they are experiencing their own. (Amen!)

He also relates some insight into how Twitter has been used for even some basic troubleshooting help on a computer.

It is a good article and it can be helpful to explain to the use of Twitter to a broader audience than just technology geeks. A good addition to this may be to also share the Common Craft video on Twitter.

A session I attended during the Tech Forum was on ESL/ELL resources. I admit, I have not made myself aware of ESL/ELL resources due to the populations I have mostly worked with in previous districts. I was really looking forward to learning about tools for this population in our schools.

The presentation was done by representatives from two districts: Carrollton-Farmer’s Branch ISD and Austin ISD. The first presenter was Arturo Guajardo from Austin ISD. His wiki has lots of great resources on it and he said he would post more notes there for this topic later.

Tools they use: Ipods for connecting kids to streaming video, audio, and images. They even created lab “iSafes” that hold 7 iPods, 7 cords, and 7 headphone sets in a safe. They drilled their own holes and used a cord-squid to make it a portable station a teacher can lock down at their desk. Very cool.

Arturo showed a variety of strategies used with ESL/ELL learners and he focused on three top ones: Background Knowledge, Academic Language, and Sense of Self.

Background Knowledge is important for learners to add knowledge onto what they already know – layering their knowledge. He referenced using United Streaming, Archive.org, Safari Montage, etc. type resources to find videos for students about their culture and background. Let them create a media project of their own background. Use these resources to build a connection between the past history and future learning.

More FREE resources:
ITunes language learning podcasts – more and more each day.

Librivox – You can download FREE audio books in public domain along with the text. Great for letting kids see the words and hear them read at their own pace on iPod. More and more classic books making their way to public domain.

StoryNory – Free Audio stories told by Natasha (a british woman). Said it was funny to hear ELL students learning to speak in a british dialect. Great stories read in a clear voice on the site.

Lit2Go – Part of the state of Florida’s Educational Technology Clearinghouse – this site offers MP3 stories and poems along with text files so you can follow along.

Breaking News English – is a site dedicated to English lessons on breaking news and current events.

Voice of America’s News site has a page also dedicated to lessons for English learners on news and current events.

Other sites include free tools where they students can create projects:

VoiceThread – students can upload images and share voice audio and video commentary.

A fun idea shown was to have students take pictures to make visual definitions of words. An example of the word “encroach” had a students walking on grass behind a sign that said “stay off the grass”.

Jumpcut – free online video editor.

Gcast for hosting podcasts made in Audacity or even by telephone. You create or edit your audio in Audacity/Garage Band and then upload to Gcast which also make feed code.

Kerpoof – comic creator online and can toggle between languages.

Picnik – a site for uploading and editing photos but you can add some fun things on to the pics as well. Recommend getting a Picnik and Flickr account to tie together.

Great information:
“ELLs will learn new content and language when they have a positive sense of self.” Build community within the class to show that none of them are alone in their learning.

A friend in the room suggested I look into Edmodo which is a microblogging site (like Twitter) but just for educators and students.

Arturo also showed Kathy Cassidy’s 1st Grade class blog which is a REAL example of a teacher using Web2.0 tools and global connections on her site: http://classblogmeister.com/blog.php?blogger_id=1337

Someone else mentioned that Inspiration has a new web version that is free called MyWebSpiration.com. I recommend Bubbl.us or Gliffy.com. All are used for visual concept-mapping. All are also free too.

Carrolton-Farmer’s Branch ISD’s web resource site shows how they are implementing an iPod and podcasting program district-wide. All teachers receive a video iPod. The great thing about their presentation was that they showed how they are doing it and point us to the resources on the website. Again, this is another PC-based district using iPods and Apple tools in their Windows environment. Great resources for first-time podcasters: http://cfbstaff.cfbisd.edu/beyond4walls/

Technorati Tags: TLTechForum TLTechForumSW8

This isn’t about seniors in high school. This post is about seniors from the Greatest Generation or the Silent Generation who are now senior citizens. I am happy to report that I have been asked to provide some community education lessons for our residents here in town. What an exciting idea!! I really would like to get them involved in some Web 2.0 and cloud computing resources they can use at home.

What would be some ideal tools they could use? What types of course offerings could you offer to such a diverse group of people? I really would like some input into this topic! I can think of many resources (iTunes, NING, document clouds, etc.) that I would consider for this type of presentation. Can you share others?