Jane Krauss's Comments

and thanks for your comment...

hi jane, yes tolweb is still going. it is a phylogentic database - there are pages on the database structure you can check out, and you can even download it. there is no set way for students to use it computationally. you can check out learning.tolweb.org for some learning aspects.

Thank you Jane. I will utilize the features here ASAP. Dancing as fast as I can on other projects...this site was recommended to me by a colleague. I like the looks of it!

Best,
Larry

Hi Jane,

I think I talked to you on the education.ning network, but I can't remember anymore...My name is Marco Morales; I am a 20 year old college student from Olin College of Engineering. I am a part of a group of 6 Olin College students (we're in Needham,MA, and engineering students) who has taken a year off to work on an education related project. I've until recently only been active on the education.ning.com website. For the project I'm working on talking to teachers who strive to integrate technology into the classroom is always interesting, since most of the teachers we have actually sat down and talked to tend to be teachers who aren't as active in terms of new tools and how to use them in the classroom. Our project is called AlightLearning, and this is our "short" project description:

Under the assumption that within ten years, the landscape of modern education will have fully integrated what we now define as new classroom media: video, online collaboration, open source curriculum and other web tools, we hope to pioneer a web software tool that acts as a platform for this new media, bringing the power of the web and its tools to students, teachers and parents in a secure, comfortable and innovative environment. Our goal is to have our free software at a pilot middle school by April 15th, 2008, continuing to develop and coordinate with our users to create a product that other schools want to pilot and use at their schools, while allowing individual teachers to implement this tool in their own classroom.

Our project, titled Alight Learning, is currently trying to win an idea competition on Ideablob.com You can find us at http://ideablob.com/3975. We would love your support in the form of a vote within the next couple days, but more importantly we'd love your feedback and comments. Our description on Ideablob is short, and even the one above hardly gets many of the issues we would like to take a stab at solving, but at least it's a start. We also have more written in the comments/advise section on the ideablob website.

Feel free to email me back, check out alightlearning.com, anything you like!

Thanks,

Marco Morales
marcotuts@gmail.com

No chance that I'll be going to any more conferences this year, Jane. Money is already tight in my district and it looks like its only going to get worse. I'll look forward to the second edition.

Jane, I am reading your book, Reinventing PBL, and it is excellent. I picked up a copy at the Mass CUE technology conference last month. I am recommending it to other technology specialist and to teachers interested in PBL. You do an excellent job balancing the pedagogy with the technology tools.

Just a quick follow-up, in case you are interested:
Adina's Deck won an award at the Eugene International Film Festival for Best Short Film in the Young Audience catagory! Thank you Eugene!
Also, we are showing Episode One, and it will be the World Premiere of Episodes Two and Three, this Saturday in Modesto. We expect 400 to 500 to attend. You can see teasers for the two new films at the Adina's Deck myspace site:
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=193616683

Hello,
FYI, Adina's Deck will be shown at the Regal Cinemas at 2 PM Sunday October 5th, in theater 12. I noticed from the festival schedule that they will also be showing the "Making of Adina's Deck" documentary, which goes into the school-site research prior to production. See http://www.eugenefilmfest.org/ for more information and details of the Eugene Film Festival. I wish I could be there.

Hi Jane,
I would love to hear more about your university course on project-based learning with technology. Are you speaking anywhere soon? Thanks! dobrien@viedu.org

Hi Jane,
Thank you for your reply. The Eugene International Film Festival presents about 70 films throughout the three-day event. They sell an all-festival pass, but they also sell individual tickets for $8. I'm not sure when Adina's Deck will be shown, but you may be able to contact someone from their website: http://www.eugenefilmfest.org/ The schedule has not been posted.
The film's creators, Debbie Heimowitz and Jason azicri, plan to attend. I have attended several film festivals and found them all to ve very interesting and usually a lot of fun. I wish I could be in Eugene but I have another commitment in Chicago during that time. Thank you for your offer to place posters, but there just aren't any for that event.

Thanks again,
Tony V.

Hello Jane,
I noticed you are in Eugene, and I was wondering if you planned to attend the Eugene International Film Festival Oct 3-5. If you do go, you may be interested in the film series, Adina's Deck ( www.adinasdeck.com ) which is perfect for the increasingly more tech-savvy middle school students. The films are short, entertaining and extremely "watchable" and are educational for kids, teachers and parents. Episode 1, the cyber bully pilot episode, won best student film at the International Family Film Festival. Episode 2 is the Case of the Online Crush, and touches on the dangers of online predators. Episode 3 in the Case of the Plagiarized Paper the deals with the consequences of cheating. The writers, directors, and lead cast members participate in live discussions when they have attended dozens school assemblies and film festivals. They are booked to appear at many more locations this school year. Like in Episode 1, the story-lines of Episodes 2 and 3 create a lot of "who-done-it" suspense, with plot twists that are sure to promote a lot of discussion on these real, timely topics.
The students really get into the discussion topics, and want to know what the characters will do next. Adina's Deck is a valuable and socially important tool.

Loved reading you page. :)

Hi Jane,
Haven't checked this for a while...sorry! I am located in Bellingham with a view of the San Juans! Don't know anyone out there. Have you touched base with Susan Brooks-Young? She lives on the islands and is really connected with classrooms. She might have a lead. Good luck!

Hi Jane,
I bought your book, Amazon says it’s on the way. I can’t wait. Thank you for allowing me to participate in your group today. I learned things about Terry that I didn’t know before. Our classes held several video conferences, we blogged regularly, we participated in the Landmark Games and we will join the Monster Project this September. It is amazing, when you realize that we only began January 2. We also participated in Voices of the World. We are the only school in Bridgeport (the largest city in Connecticut) that blogs or does any of these projects. For awhile I was the only class. I now have one other teacher who has joined in.

I get out to Oregon at least once or twice a year. My daughter is already making plans for us to beat our times in next years Butte to Butte. I will definitely look you up when I get out there.
I’d like to pick your brain after I read your book. I hope you don’t mind.

Regards,
Bob Greenberg
(203) 375-6312
greenbergbob@sbcglobal.net
Skype bobg007
Twitter bobgreenberg

Hi Jane,
I'm a friend of Terry Smith's. I teach in Bridgeport, CT. We've been collaborating with Terry's class. Our blog is http://thebrainwaves.us. Small world, my daughter lives in Springfield, my son-n-law graduated from the Univ. of Oregon. I just returned from two weeks at Hayward field for the Olympic Trials. We also ran the Butte to Butte on July 4th. I'll be joining your session tomorrow.

Hey Jane-
I just sent you a friend request. Daniel Rezac. I'm a teacher 2.0 in Chicago working on my master's and need some questions answered about curriculum development. I see that you are a PBL queen, so maybe you'd let me interview you for my field study? Any help would be great!
Thanks
Daniel Rezac
twitter: drezac

Hi Jane,

Thanks for the welcome! I am a technology teacher in Northern Canada. I am interested in open source and educational software. I am also actively working on the open source project called Nikamo. Nikamo is used for teaching human languages and was originally designed to help preserve aboriginal languages. I am also looking to network with others who may be interested in language teaching and language preservation.

-Kevin

Jane, Just saw your message about my photos and would be happy to post some to the group. Coincidentally--I just heard you on either EdTechTalk or WOW a week or two ago, and then your book came in an order, so talk about kismet!

Thanks, Jane!