Hey all, feel free to drop me a line with some good ideas for how to integrate EVERY SINGLE CLASS in my school. I teach grades 5-8 in a charter school and in the hopes that I can blur the lines between "school" and the "real world," I want to have separate projects, but no separation of classes next year--students would move from room to room, working on assignments, but they'd not be moving from room to room every 42 minutes (or 90, or whatever).

I know this is ambitious, but if you do this already, even if it's on a smaller scale, I want to pick your brain!

Hi Ginger. I so wanted to take a peek at your website but when i clicked on the link, I was faced with the authorization page from apple.

I was so excited to have you post on my page. Thank you for the great comments! I love the theme. Much grander colours than mine. (smile)

Are you going to the MTI conference in Bonner Springs in July? We should get together. I'm thinking about teaching a session called "Web 2.0 and the Digital Classroom". We have a great line-up!

So many things on my plate sometimes causes me to not always post as I swiftly fly by.

I simply have enjoyed reading the cover.

Cheers!

Hi Karla--

I do plan to attend the MTI conference, but I'm not sure if my proposal was accepted. When do we find out? I agree we should get together either for lunch, dinner after one of the days, or just in the hallway, if that's all we can do!!

This network has been JUST what I've been looking for!! I also hope that soon you'll be able to see our website... ;-)

G

Hi Ginger -

this looks very interesting. I wanted to mention quietly that I'm very concerned about G/T getting left behind because our aging teaching population is not tech current. HOW do we entice them - not to just learn new software but to connect software to learning goals.

What do you think?

R.

Reva--This is a serious concern of mine. I'm SO afraid for our kids in the future. This topic is what Classroom 2.0 is about--how to get tech-reluctant people to buy in. Look around. Check out Kevin Honeycutt's info and tell him ur a real-life friend of mine. http://classroom20.ning.com/profile/kevinh

Good Luck!

Thanks so much for skyping with us this morning. It was so exciting! I have so many ideas for using this web 2.0 tool with our students b/c of this first experience. Thanks again. :D

Thanks so much for your insight and experience. I really enjoyed our conversation this afternoon. I hope that we can have many more, and I would love to start collaborating on curriculum and ideas. I hope that my accusation about you knowing more than you let on wasn't too abrasive for you. Thanks again. E-mail me anytime at benwilkoff@gmail.com

Ginger,

Thanks for the nudge. Have you encountered Curriki.com? It is a virtual community of educators who, among many other things, contribute project-based lessons and units for use. Of course, the expectation is that if you use, you contribute. Curriki has developed an uniform template that makes it easy!

As our charter school develops, my hope is that we set up a statewide network of charter school educators and kids to support each other.

If you want me to share more of the resources I've been collecting for the charter school teachers to access, let me know.

Cool kids' projects! I will tell Ben..maybe his band will be ready. : )

I was thinking about your invitation to meet with you in person (a blog post that you did a month or so back) because I am in Kansas City this week, and I will be heading back through western Kansas next Saturday. Is there any way that we (you, Keven, and I) could meet that day? Is there anywhere along I-70 that we could meet (or close to it, anyway)?

I will have my Wife and Daughter with me on our visit, so it really can't be for that long. I would really love to get together, however, for an hour or so at a restaurant with WiFi so that we can spend some time brainstorming (and getting to know one another in person, I guess). Let me know if anything like that sounds possible on Saturday. We are still trying to figure out when to head out of KC, so let me know what works for you and Kevin (I still haven't heard from him yet, but I am also not fully plugged in like I normally am at home). Talk to you soon.

Hi Ginger,
Thanks. I'm looking forward to working with people in the group. I have a lot of projects that could work out to great collaborative ventures.

Hi Ginger. Thank you for posting the info regarding the World Teen Concerts for Global Cooling ... I am such a believer in that kind of project. I used to be a US coordinator for a global concert called the "One World Beat" ... Do you know if the World Teen Concerts wants to do something on the Second Life Teen Grid?

Anyway, .. all the best,

Ricart

Thanks, Ginger. I'll check out the person you suggested. Peggy Sheehy also had some great project ideas on her page.

Thank you for your invitation Ginger: it arrived when I was just about to invite you ;-)
Best
Claude

Hi Ginger!

here's the scoop. In Ohio, we have a network called OLN which provides support for tech innovation etc. At my campus I created a learning community called Web Teaching and Academic Support Services (WEBTAS) which is designed to organize everyone who is doing web2.0 stuff so we can teach/help/support each other. To fund the group, I wrote a grant (from OLN) to have monies for professional development and software.

With this grant as a starting point, I can write additional grants...

Basically, the goal is to fund projects that the university won't. We have a great deal of innovators at my campus.

I set up the webtas ning community for us to use as a work space. We made it invitation only, but pretty much invite others to come in--we just didn't know at first if we wanted a flood of people coming into our workspace.

I am going to use ning for my classes as places to build community since I teach online. I will limit access to my students. Since they are adults--I do not have the challenges that you face--but maybe you can take a look at some other community tools like "Whyville (second life for kids) or Carmun (social networking for studious people) as alternatives--maybe.

Ginger;
How many projects do your students complete in a school year? Thanks, Todd

Ginger -- Thank you so much for your feedback regarding my survey. It should be working right now.

It's great to learn about this..... I'm going to have fun!

Hello, I realy enjoyed your class on project based learning. Maybe or classes can work together on something this year.

Well....I just didn't find the right time, I guess. :) I would LOVE to meet with you to find out about the "good free tools" and how to make keyboarding actually rewarding or somewhat meaningful for the kids. Like you already know, this will be my first year teaching CONNECT and only my second year teaching period...so I am up for some major ideas! :) I am not as technology savvy as I would like to be so I am desperately trying to learn and experiment this summer to get some good ideas before the year starts. I am focusing on just typing, basics of Microsoft Office, Internet Research and safety, etc... for first quarter. Second quarter or the end of first quarter I would REALLY like to start in with some COOL PROJECTS! I picked up a lot from the conference....especially from you and Kevin. For example, I had no clue about Classroom 2.0., Google Tools (sketchup, earth, etc...), the downloads to convert files to what you need them to be, Utube....the list goes on and on. I am overwhelmed a bit, but mainly excited! I have so much I want to learn and USE! Let me know how and when to meet with you is best! I am a fast learner, and I love to hear new ideas and suggestions! Thanks so much.

That sounds so great, Ginger. Thanks so much!

Amy

Thanks - I am excited to learn all the ins-and-outs! I am ready to get a community going so that I can get some ideas for a metric unit plan.
I enjoyed your energy and would love to visit your classroom some time!

Sounds great. I will just plan on coming to TPLC. I will be in contact with you to set up a date and time.

Thanks,

Katie

Ginger, I really enjoyed your session at MTI. I do live in Clay Center and I work in Manhattan. I wish you could have stayed in our session, I think you could have added alot of ideas.

I have a question, When do you find time to do everything with technology?

Jay

Hi Ginger,

Just wanted to touch base with you. How's it all going? Are you still interested in getting our kids to work together on some virtual field trips? We are nearly at the end of our third term (2 weeks till hols!) and then we start again on Oct 8th I think. So, that would give us time to put together a bit of a plan if you like.
Hope all is well!
Jess

Let's aim for sometime over the weekend - I'll put some ideas down in words by then! :-)
looking forward to it.

Ginger

My version of the Friday podcast is online:

http://web.mac.com/timholt/Byte_Speed/Pod_Speed/Pod_Speed.html

Enjoy.

Tim

Stopped in to say hello and check out your page. I really haven't decided what to post at mine yet. Maybe I'll post about my Foundations of Physics social network. Any suggestions?

Hiya Ginger! Long time no see. Miss ya! Find me on twitter so I can tweet you... CSouthard

Greetings! .. From Kansas !

here's what I added to my blog.
WOW!!!! PROJECT BASED LEARNING ROCKS. We had our first project based lesson and I don't know why we teach any other way. I had to make them leave the class room they were so involved. AND GET THIS, this was the first time EVER not one child asked me "Mr. Jackson can we have free time and go on the internet before the end of class?" It's like a constant chant I here over and over and over all during computer class I have nightmares about it. Anyway, these kids worked until I forced them out of the class.
So I'm sure you want to know well did they learn any thing? When class started I showed them how to use the help in word 2003. A few weeks prior we learnded internet search techniques (finding filetype:, intitle:, using "", and a few others.) The week before we looked at the "DID YOU KNOW" video ---THANKS Sylvia Martinez --- You guys can look it up on you tube. As a class, we discussed it and began talking about how to get their parents involed. Our goal is to produce a letter that they can give to there parents. The core was to start networking, find out who can help us and if not do they know someone who can.
The first assignment was
1. Break up into groups of 3 or 4, and list your names and grade below.
a. ____________________________________
b. _____________________________________
c. _____________________________________
d. _____________________________________
2. Each of you will choose a job to fulfill. All of you will give input on the letter.
a. Researcher, this person will have to lookup things on the internet or in microsoft word help. If your team doesn't know how to do it you put your research skills to work and figure it out.
i. _________________________________
b. This person will do the typingand work close with the designer.
i. _________________________________
c. Designer, this person will have to decide what style the letter will be in and if or not to add clip art ect.
i. ___________________________________
d. 2nd researcher if needed looked up statistics on the benefits of computers in the class room and whatever else researcher 1 coulnd get to.
i. ___________________________________
3. Explain how you contributed to the team effort.
a. Researcher 1 what did you lookup on the internet or in Microsoft word help? How did you use this information?

b. Designer what did you add to improve your letter (photos, clipart, or templates)? Where did you find it? And why did you choose it?

c. Typist was spell check helpful? How helpful where the changes your designer made? What did you learn form your researchers?

4. Explain how you contributed to the team effort.
a. Researcher 2 what did you lookup on the internet or in Microsoft word help?After the "DID YOU KNOW" video We had came up with a general outline that had to be in the parent letter. So everyone on the team had to contribute some extra information to add into the letter and present it to the typist.

The first 5 or 10 min of class they asked me how do I do this or how do I do that. And I just directed them to there researcher. They taught themselves intermedate and advanced word skills in the process. Next week before we get started, each team will select someone to reteach a few skills they learned in Word. I will keep u posted please give me any advise you may have. The ship has sailed from here we sink or swim. Thanks guys for all of your help

I can use all the help I can get. I want to figure a way to match what we are doing with the Kansas State school Standards. The way I am doing it know is Having the kids reteach the class what they have learnded keeping a record of it and trying to match things up. Ways to assess what they have learned would help. Just anything. I'm just taking what you inspired me to do and putting it to the test. What I learned about PBL I learned in that hour or so I spent with you. THANKS.

Yep that's Dean.

Hi Ginger,
Do you have a network I could sign in on with my class, to "tour around" and see what's happening? These are fourth and fifth graders. They'll be responsible and respectful. I'd like to have them see what you're doing with technology, and especially with global collaboration. Would you be ok with my using a class signin "Connie Weber's Class" to do this?
Let me know what you think, or any questions you may have.
Connie

Thanks for your response, Ginger. Part of my post was tongue-in-cheek and, hopefully, that came through. I was thinking exactly what you said--using wikis to archive learning for bigger projects--then you said (wrote) it .

I haven't seen anything other than "plain, informational wiki's" and, while I have decent technology skill sets (I can code a bit and set up networks/databases) the supposed "ease" of wikis is lost on me. I create one page and then think "now what?". Still working it out...I appreciate your insight. I'm going to get a Music Technology Wiki going with an 8th grade class of mine before the year is out. ONCE I learn from all of you wiki veterans. :)ATG

Dear Lewman, I'm new to this site. It's wonderful as i know. as u are online now can we chat in skype govinda.prasad panty or msn g_panthy@hotmail.com plz. add me i'm here online now