About CForum

October 6, 2006

Location:
Wasatch School District Office
101 East 200 North
Heber City, Utah

Welcome and Introductions - Margo Shirley

Gadget of the Month - Kelly Dumont (shared by Margo Shirley)

Podcast Highlight: The Daily Giz Whiz - Kathy Webb
Mad's maddest writer, Dick DeBartolo, digs into his massive gadget collection for the gadget of the day. Released every weekday. This program is co-hosted by Leo Laporte. http://www.twit.tv/dgw

Over the Shoulder - Kathy Webb

UTIPS Updates - Julie Quinn

    • Training Manuals and how to use the Science pre-tests can be found http://www.usoe.org/eval/info_UTIPS.asp
    • New eDesk 2.0 is ready for installation .... biggest changes are in the Student Management area.
    • We had a discussion about the future of UTIPS and formative discussion.

Student-centered Teaching Strategies - Margo Shirley

    • Kagan Online - Kagan has many tools and resources and teaching strategies that trainders can use and model during their workshops and then teachers can turn around and use them in their classroom.
      Kagain Online sales Smart Cards that describe these strategies, such as Thinking Questions, Multiple Intelligences Structures, Think-Pair-Share, Teambuilding, Cooperative Learning Structures, Graphic Organizers, Classbuilding

    • You can buy fun Timers and Spinners from Kagan Online - or here is a free online timer: http://www.vickiblackwell.com/timer.html

    • eMints 4 Utah - this web site has resources and strategies you can use even if you are not an eMints teacher

 

Theme: Information Seeking Strategies

    • Big6 Resources
    • 2.1 Determine the range of possible sources (brainstorm)
      This means that you need to make a list of all the possible sources of information that will help you answer the questions you wrote in Task Definition. Consider library books, encyclopedias, and web sites to which your library subscribes (ask your librarian!), people who are experts in your subject, observation of your subject, free web sites and survey.
    • 2.2 Evaluate the different possible sources to determine priorities (select the best sources)
      Now, look carefully at your list. Which ones are actually available to you and are easy for you to use? Circle these. If there are some that you need help using, ask your teacher, librarian, mom or dad.

Information Seeking Strategies Lesson Plans - Karen Krier

 

ReadWriteThink - New Interactives

    • Bio-Cube for grades 3-12 allows students to summarize a person's life after reading a biography or autobiography — or before writing one themselves. A companion planning sheet (pdf) helps learners condense the information they will transfer to the Bio-Cube.
    • With the new Book Cover Creator, a K-12 resource, students will be able to create or recreate book covers — and choose the front only, the front and back or a full dust jacket. This tool can be used to create a new cover for a favorite book or help with a critical analysis of the components of a dust jacket. Student planning sheets are available for every cover option.
    • Character Trading Cards for grades 3-8 provides students the opportunity to create trading cards by answering a set of questions about a story's setting and a selected character's appearance, thoughts, feelings, personality and character development. This student interactive accompanies several ReadWriteThink lessons, including Planning Story Characters Using Interactive Trading Cards.
    • Using Mystery Cube for grades 3-12, students identify the elements of mystery stories, practice using vocabulary from the mystery genre, sort and summarize information. Specific prompts ask students to describe the setting, clues, crime or mystery, as well as the victim, detective and solution of mysteries they are reading or writing. A planning sheet (pdf) helps them get started by organizing the information.
    • The Postcard Creator, a new student interactive for K-12, helps students learn to identify all the typical parts of a postcard, and then generate their own postcard messages by typing information into templates. After printing their texts, students can illustrate the front of their postcards in a variety of ways, including drawing, collage and stickers.
    • The Fractured Fairy Tales interactive tool gives students a choice of three fairy tales to read. They are then guided to choose a variety of changes, which they use to compose a fractured fairy tale to print off and illustrate. Useful for teaching point of view, setting, plot, as well as fairy tale conventions such as they lived happily ever after, this tool encourages students to use their imaginations and the writing process at the same time.

 

Pioneer Library - how to quickly find the best info / tips and tricks - Ann Howden

Ann had us complete a hands-on activity using the Pioneer Library databases. She defined specific tasks for each database. She showed an eMedia "Write Now" video that asked, "If money were no object, what country would you live in?

    • Find out some details about your country using CultureGram's Comparison Table
    • Find one current article about your country using EBSCOHost's College / University search option. Read an article and record the most interesting fact.
    • Find a map of your country using SIRS Discoverer. What is the most significant geographic feature and the capital city?
    • Find at least one historic reference using WorldBook online. Record information on at least one important person, place and event.

     

What is new at Pioneer Online Library - Rick Cline

    • EBSCO's Visual Search powered by Grokker
      Visual Search represents an exciting and unique search method, in addition to the Basic and Advanced Search screens, featuring richly colorful, graphical presentations of citations sorted by topics.
    • Utah's Local Newspapers by County
    • eMedia update
      • eMedia - over 1,000 media items
      • New front page

Google - sharing search strategies - Rick Gaisford

    • Google 201: Advanced Googolgy by Patrict Douglas Crispen - netsquirrel.com
      • The more specific the better, use quotes to search for phrases, use + and -
      • If you search for more than one keyword at a time Google will automatically search for pages that contain ALL of your keywords - so search for phrases with quotes.
      • Use OR (in all caps) between keywords.
      • Capitalization doesn't matter.
      • Google used to only accept 10 keywords at a time - now it is up to 32 keywords.
      • To search a SPECIFIC web site - not the whole Internet use "site:URL search term" ( site:http:www.usoe.org "rick gaisford" )
    • Tips and Tricks for making your web site more Google friendly - Karen Krier
    • Search Engine Basics:
      • Search engines run automated programs, called "robots" or "spiders", that use the hyperlink structure to of the web to "crawl" the pages and documents on the WWW.
      • Once a page has been crawled, the content is "indexed".
      • When a request for information comes into the search engine, the engine retrieves from its index all of the files that match the query.
      • Once the search engine has determined which results are a match for the query, the engine's algorithm runs calculations on each of the results to determine which is most relevant to the given query.
    • Evaluating Page Rank
      • Free Download: Google Toolbar - PageRank tells you how Google's algorithms assess the importance of the page you're viewing.
      • Alexa Traffic Rankings - in addition to traffic rankings, this site shows, web stats, related links, and sites linking to your page.
    • Optimization
      • #1 - Include Meta-data HTML page title for each landing page
      • Meta-data Description tag: CNN example
        • meta name="Description" content="CNN.com delivers the latest breaking news and information on the latest top stories, weather, business, entertainment, politics, and more. For in-depth coverage, CNN.com provides special reports, video, audio, photo galleries, and interactive guides."
      • 50% in Ultraseek, less weight given by Google
      • Meta-data Keywords tag: PBS example
        • meta name="keywords" content="PBS, Public Broadcasting Service,television, PBS Online, public television, neighborhoods, CPB, Sesame Street, NPR, FRONTLINE, NOVA, Ernie, Bert, Big Bird, NewsHour, Jim Lehrer, This Old House, Barney, Arthur, Teletubbies, American Experience, Zoom, Cringely"
      • 50% in Ultraseek, ignored by Google, include common misspellings
      • META Scanner
        This web tool will scan your META Tags and will report your usage, and make suggestions on how to optimize your usage.
      • Search Engine Watch
        From how search engines work to submission tips. Extremely useful for promoting ratings and hits. Subscribe to Search Engine Watch, a monthly email report.
      • SEOmoz
        A Search Engine Optimization Resource

eDesk2 New Features - http://www.edesk2.org/

    • LOGIN BUTTON: that gives a "please wait" message until the page is fully loaded
    • “File It!” Feature: for adding bookmarks, similar to EDesk
    • Slide Show: If you have a folder with only images, you can create an simple online slide show. Also has an autoplay option.
    • Personal THEMES and optional system themes
    • Show Link in Email that can be cut-n-pasted
    • Random number of questions from a test that will be shown to a student (think TIPS Exam)
    • Ability to ADJUST FONT SIZE while taking a test...
    • MEDIA>>NEW>>UPLOAD screen
      • Dynamic interface allows for smoother uploading of files
      • includes an "auto resize" option that will resize images larger than 500 pixels
    • WYSIWYG editor added to:
      • SlideShow
      • Blogs
      • Mypage message *
    • Add IMAGES TO A BLOG, including a title banner.
    • "VIEW" Password option for folders and tests
    • Anonymous upload for folders... students can turn in assignments online
    • TEST>>SEARCH: allow searching for tests by keyword/author
    • "Report This Question" option
      • Teacher's view of the test... will NOT allow the same person to report a question more than once
      • Also from the Student view... but requires a teacher username to do it.
    • MATH EQUATION EDITOR for doing math symbols... Caution: Mac + Camino/Firefox will NOT work.
    • Calendar Improvements
    • Student management improved
      • Student information can be imported from text file
      • Student are in dependant of the teachers account allowing a student to be assigned to many teachers
      • Ability to group students into classes o Reports can be filtered by class

UEN Updates

    • 2006 - 2007 Utah Educator Resource Guide - at your school near the end of October.
    • New web resources:
    • UEN Professional Development - hosting "Faculty Lounge" - Thursdays from 3:30 - 4:00.
      Live online interactive "over-the-shoulder". If you can't attend the live session you can view the record file.
    • The Intel program will be terminated in 2007.

News from TCC - Jim Langston

USOE Updates

    • Free Sketch-Up 5.0 state licenses - Rick Gaisford

Future meeting dates:

    • November 3, 2006 - Nebo Learning Center
    • December 1, 2006 - Jordan School District
    • January 5, 2007 - Utah Education Network
    • February 2, 2007- Tooele School District
    • April 13 or 20, 2007 - Davis School District

Utah State Office of Education - USOE     Utah Education Network - UEN     Utah Coalition for Educational Technology - UCET

For questions or comments contact us.