Cool Cat Teacher Blog is at coolcatteacher.com

I'm going to attempt to host my first full skypecast and we have an ambitious agenda. This is the culmination of amazing week of wikis at our k12wiki.wikispaces.com . The pages were absolutely amazing and I'm going to feature them in the upcoming weeks. I hope you'll join us tonight at our 8 PM EST Skypecast. Here is the information and the agenda. I will say that less than 5 points separated our top five scoring wikis! It was very competitive! The winners will be in your classroom! Here is the plan: SkypeCast at 8 PM EST tonight, Monday, October 30th! 1 - Go to ( https://skypecasts.skype.com/skypecasts/skypecast/detailed.html?id_talk=45270 ) on Monday, October 30, at 8 pm EST. (I will be there at 7:40 to test things out.) 2- Sign in. 3 - If you have trouble - send a text message via skype to coolcatteacher for help. (Before the show starts, after it starts, it will be too late!) Agenda for the Skypecast Monday For K12 wiki participants: I have included t...

Wow! Nineteen year old blogger-prodigy Brian Benzinger over at Solution Watch has done an amazing three part series on Web 2.0 in the classroom. READ IT!! It is an essential must read and must share set of articles. I have read each of them and highlighted the article's content and my biggest "take aways" for you. Back to School with the Class of Web 2.0, Part 1 Oh my goodness, You have to read this one! It would take a student to start as he did, with the students. (I think us teachers tend to start the process with us, however, true education is something that happens WITHIN a student not TO a student.) He reviews student organizers. I am going to have computer science test and review the following: Stu.dicio.us (student organizer and social notetaking tool), Gradefix (homework tracker), and mynoteIT (note taking.) He also profiles teacher and club management options, including some course management options that may be great for those of us not wanting to un...

Do you wrestle publicly? I have been this week. I’ve been grappling with issues, new ideas, new tools, and a very exciting wiki project. I wrestle with the questions that plague educators everywhere. I wrestle with my good fortune. (And its public because I blog about it!) You see, I am a teacher but also have the good (or not so good) fortune to also be the technology administrator and I control my own filter. Bud Hunt had a profound comment in the midst of his keynote this week. He was talking about an engaging discussion that he and his students were having about the problem of school violence. As they wrestled with thoughts about how to solve the problem, they began to “ask the Internet.” Immediately when they typed in “school violence” it triggered the filter. Bud says, “It is frustrating to teach information management when you can’t find answers. Driving into a filter is like driving into a brick wall, it stifles interest in continuing the journey.” I have control o...

It is easy to fell overwhelmed and unimportant. It is easy to say, "that's not my problem" or "that's not my student" or "that's none of my business" when we see problems. But it has dire consequences. For anyone who entertains the thought of being indifferent about the importance of educating our youth, tell them this story. You see, the very nature of things can be disturbed by cold indifference. On March 29, 1948 , everyone living within earshot of Niagara Falls squinted into the winter sunshine as they craned their necks to hear .... nothing. Nothing, because heavy winds had pushed the ice fields of Lake Erie to block the entrance of the Niagara River near Buffalo, NY. The river had stopped. Against the natural order and every law of nature, icy, cold obstacles stopped the natural order of things. It resumed only when the ice shifted. I would challenge you to consider that many of our educational problems stem from cold indifference. ...

We've entered Phase 3 I must say that this project is getting very exciting! With over 30 educators from almost every continent, the wiki work is heating up! I had over 64 edits in my bloglines after I retired last night at 10:30! Some of the work is amazing! As I and the moderators of each area worked to create the "critical questions" for this project we asked ourselves several questions: What are some topics that will require even the most highly educated teacher to do a little digging on the Internet? (We want to give the experience of learning via wiki.) What questions, if they were answered in a meaningful format, would most help other educators in this emerging Web 2.0 world? What questions do we think are most important for helping students succeed? I was so excited when we finished the questions and the participants started posting, I actually did a few leaps for joy at my desk! This is a great project! I am giving you a copy of what I"ve posted on the w...

Just some notes for you. (I've been spending so much time in the K12 conference that I'll be posting more about that later.) I've been using this conference as an opportunity for me to introduce Web 2.0 in depth to my 10th grade class and basic RSS to 9th. Here are the tools I've used: Vyew - Desktop sharing and chatting. We've used this in 10th grade along with skype to test conferencing. It is pretty stable. I discussed the opportunities such programs have in light of our World is Flat discussions that we've been having. It creates a great discussion for how customer service can be around the world but help a person on their own computer. Netvibes - I used to teach bloglines , however this summer, I began to use NetVibes. It is just easier for beginners to understand. When they really "get" RSS, they thank me. I had over half the class come in and tell me thank you. Airset - This is my indispensible calendar tool. I showed my students h...

The K12 online conference has officially begun. I've already had two teachers sign up for the live wiki project. To say I'm nervous is an understatement! After this wild weekend after having my 11 tips for supervising your child online picked up by Lifehacker and the typical scathing remarks that accompany such a link from such an amazing blog. (Gee, I've never been called a pessimist before! My husband says I'm too optimistic. And a few other evil things that I did not print in the comments.) I guess I'm feeling a little, well, unsure. On the conference blog, I sit amidst a list of incredible presenters with amazing things to say, I wonder, (as I am sure all presenters do) "Will anyone know how I poured my heart, soul, and gutts into this presentation for the conference?" "Will they make fun of my audio gaffs as I learned to do video as I made the presentation?" "Will anyone join in the K12 live wiki project?" I do have sev...

The first podcast of Women of Web 2.0 is now posted at EdTech Talk . We discuss some neat things, from keyboarding to the fact the children of famous people are now tarnishing the rep of "dear old Dad" with their blogs or myspace presence. This was our agenda: Welcome and sharing of our mission statement Introduction of each of us, how we got into Web 2.0. What Web 2.0 tools each of us have implemented. Benefits of implanting Web 2.0 in the classroom. The Dangers of NOT implementing Web 2.0 in the classroom. What is Women of Web 2.0 and who is included? Q & A Nice surprises include a discussion with Sus from Denmark about the efficacy of using translation services on your blog and a short sidetrack into keyboarding discussions. (I think this is the hidden enemy of everything we are doing with technology and most are strangely silent. This is another case of some people assuming that kids just intrisicly "know" how to do these things.) I've been leery o...

OK. It has taken me two days to download and to get my computer to open David Warlick's Keynote for the Online K12 Conference . I have almost given up, but finally figured it out! Windows Media Player nor Real player nor QuickTime will view MP4 files without a codec installed. A Codec is like a translation service. So, here is how you do that. (It took me 30 minutes to figure it out.) 1 - Go to http://www.free-codecs.net/FFDShow_download.htm 2 - Download the FFDShow program and go with the defaults. (Unless you have a video editor and know what you're doing.) 3 - Extract and Install the program which will install the codec. 4 - Open your preferred video player and then Go to File --> Open and Open up David's Movie that you have already downloaded onto your computer! This should do it! I will also say that I had to try to download the presentation at least three times, but it just downloaded lickety split for me a moment a go. I hope you enjoy it and I'm about to...

The K12 conference is just a little over a week away but the preconference keynote was delivered today. For those of you who don't know about this amazing opportunity, many of our Web 2.0 leaders have organized the first ever online K12 conference. I am going to be presenter in the Week in the Classroom area (Monday, October 23) and produced a 28 minute educational video with show notes about how I wiki in the classroom. Here are some dates and times to be aware of. 1) Graduate School Credit If you want to participate in the online K12 conference for graduate school credit , you need to line it up now! Three graduate school credits are being issued for your participation! What a great opportunity! Sign up now! 2) Get ready to listen David Warlick, the man who got me started in a "new life," delivered a fireside chat tonight via Elluminate with the very energetic Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach moderating! (Whew is she an amazing dynamo!) He also posted an amazing keynote tha...

Google For Educators Google has some new tools for us to use to use Google in the classroom. Actually Google is part of my Socratic teaching method already. As I peruse it, I'll let you know what I find. Google Teacher Academy If you live in Northern California, you should apply for the Google Teacher Academy ( http://www.edgateway.net/cs/google/print/docs/754 ) The applications are due October 22 and you need to create a one minute video. This is going to be a pilot program! Go for it! Google Says: The November 7th, 2006, pilot program is available only to K-12 educators working in Northern California. This includes classroom teachers, curriculum specialists, technology leaders, administrators, and professional trainers. The event is FREE, but participants must provide their own travel. For the pilot program, we only have room for 50 experienced educators. An application is required to participate, and Google will select educators into the program based on their professiona...