Chk out the @Themeefy #ISTE2014 Pinterest board - great stuff here
NASA
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ojovivo

blake kathryn
dirt enthusiast
Stranger Things

pixel skylines
Sweet Seals For You, Always

Love Begins
styofa doing anything
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Claire Keane
sheepfilms
Lint Roller? I Barely Know Her

JBB: An Artblog!

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TVSTRANGERTHINGS
Misplaced Lens Cap
will byers stan first human second

if i look back, i am lost

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@themeefyfoundernotes
Chk out the @Themeefy #ISTE2014 Pinterest board - great stuff here
#Creative kids, in high school yesterday I saw this post #funny
Forgotten social networks #fridayfunday #socialmedia
Empathy as an #educational trait
"Smart people don’t start many bar fights. But stupid people don’t build many hydrogen bombs" - P. J. o'Rourke
Fact n fiction #student life #education
No, the Internet does not dumb down our kids
There has been much reporting and debate about the Internet and the consequential attention span deficiency, and the fact that this leads to a dumbing down of kids. Of course there are always arguments of merit on all sides of this debate. I think like all other advances in the world there is an amount of trepidation about how things are being done “today”, it’s what I call the “The way I used to be - angry old man syndrome" (an SNL sketch).
I know, I know, that is an unfair categorization albeit a funny one. Back to the argument at hand, a couple of days ago I read a nice and unbiased piece by @MarianneStenger titled "Is the Internet creating a more easily distracted generation of learners" - this piece went about delving into a Pew research report about research in a digital world. I’ve been meaning to discuss this topic (specific to younger - K12 learners) and reading this article prompted me to put my argument to paper.
Most folks using the Internet look at it as a consumption medium and not primarily as a creation medium. Surprisingly, the fact is that it provides the greatest opportunity to create and has spawned some of the largest companies in history that thrive on user creations & contributions - Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram… (you get the idea). So what gives? It’s the instructional model -educators and learning facilitators need to adjust their expectations and assignment structure to accommodate the new realities. When research entailed browsing material at the local library the process forced the kids to review a lot of material to complete assignments, this process in itself promoted reflection and exposure - today they can get multiple sources at the tap of their thumbs (the mouse is dead in a mobile world). This is the new reality so here are a few things that could work (this is focused more on K12 instruction),
student generated content as an integral part of curriculum (not just as occasional projects), forcing kids to learn as they create
assignments should not be about presenting links and digital assets, but there should be critical argument as to why a specific link or research material was used
assessment and grading should be on a continuum that looks at appropriate use of web stuff, quality of the critical argument, and presentation
All of this is subjective but I’d posit to say that trying to inculcate a generation of “creators” as opposed to “consumers” who leave the Web a better place than as found would nurture a generation of really smart folks. The caveat is that the onus is on educators and facilitators to adapt to the Web model rather than expecting kids to use dated processes when the newer ones are more intelligent.
Great #classroom project ideas from #mom
Last week I was conversing with a rockstar mom who had reached out to us about things she’d like to see on Themeefy.com. I was very intrigued and started conversing about digital creativity & how she was using Themeefy. I was amazed at some of the cool ideas she had and I jotted them below as they look like great ideas for classrooms and parents. In addition I went through our archive and dug out samples on each of the project idea.
1. Make kids build an “About Me” theme (every six months - they change quickly)
One of the best projects in her opinion was to have her kids build a “about me” theme. She told me and upon reflection this is very true, kids get asked this question “tell me about yourself” a lot but most people don’t reflect on themselves so asking kids to stop and create something about themselves is an invaluable way to let them self-reflect. Sure enough on searching our DB I found a classroom and teacher that had done just that, here is a wonderful sample.
2. “Travel & Places” theme - ask kids to create a Theme about where they live and about their town. Better yet have them build Themes about a vacation they are about to take or have taken. This mom had a great idea, she took pictures of a recent trip to DC and had her kid create a Theme with these pictures and describing what was unique about the monuments and places they visited. Here is a sample travel Theme.
3. “Interest Themes” - kids are always into something, pop culture, music, movies, etc. Have them select their own interest and create a Theme. On searching I located an entire class project with superhero Themes and selected an awesome one on Superwoman.
Wanted to share these ideas and entice our users to post and share more ideas with us at Facebook.com/themeefy or Twitter.com/themeefy. We look forward to great ideas.
The #MOOC revolution is overblown #edtech #edchat
Why Themeefy? To share information with your students & ask them to create their own learning material @Themeefy.com #makermodel #beyondtextbooks
My #edtech experiences 😜
Where #teacher & #student created content is part of #curriculum
The one phrase to rule them all
If you missed it the first time round, you’ll be glad we re-shared this set of unique projects! This is:
What we made together at MozFest 2013:
http://mozillafestival.org/blog/demoparty_2013/
V cool
edX Drops Plans to Connect MOOC Students With Employers. MOOCs best at unkept promises - Improve retention? No, Improve grades? No Help folks find jobs? Now No.
Curation is driven to think outside the portfolio, at the same time zooming in on the storification of learning going on inside it.
As its origins indicate (portare, “to carry,” and foglio, “sheet of paper”), the traditional portfolio shares Curation’s interest in getting your content into a...
#Student created content for #CommonCore success
User generated content has transformed how we consume digital content, easy to use content systems aggregate editorialized content and user generated content in an effective manner (YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc.). With the advent of the Common Core ELA standards there is an opportunity to make user (teacher/student) generated content a relevant piece of instruction.
Student digital research and media skills
The Common Core Standard (ELA) represents an opportunity to educate our youth to consume and produce in a digital world. The standards go beyond content and define opportunities for skill instruction. The writing strand of the standard specifically addresses the need for “digital research, argument, and presentation”, and the same requirement is widely adopted in several areas of the standard (for kids 6th grade to 12th grade). The figure below identifies the specifics of the standard.
Digital makes it easier to do
While the above standard may look like something new, the fact is that much of this “project” based approach to learning has been a part of most classroom instruction and being led by teachers for a long time. The difference is that the new standards involve the integration of digital technologies that make the “project based learning (PBL)” approach easier to implement and more relevant to career skills.
In sixty seconds the digital Web generates a tremendous amount of content and presents opportunity to drive great value to the requirement of the Common Core standard (defined above). New Web applications that are designed for research, argument, and presentation, make this process relatively painless. Themeefy (www.themeefy.com) is an example and there are other applications that could be used depending on what your goals are. A key factor in selecting tools is to make sure they don’t just aggregate Web content but provides an avenue for students to put thought and argument to the aggregation. Some Web applications have class management and teacher tools built-in so it should be easy to implement.
Your lesson plan should be more than enough for great digital project ideas. A novel idea is to provide a loose framework of a project and let your kids surprise you – here is an amazing teacher taking about her stellar students.
Value some key success measurement rubrics like,
Digital discovery & use of appropriate resources
Encourage and reward self generated original content, i.e. students take pictures or create video for the project
Presentation of the project,
Most important,
Justification of resource use, analysis of research, argument, and contextual thought
Student (teacher) generated content – a key part of instruction
Sharing student created projects and teacher generated lessons that are dynamic can become a valuable resource for instruction. A class library that grows over the course of the class year with content that is being generated in the classroom while students learn is a powerful way to achieve Common Core success. We often hear comments of how the Web is making us dumber, that would only be if we consume content blindly – when students aggregate Web content, enrich with their thoughts, make arguments, and share, I would argue that we are all a lot smarter.
Looking forward to driving innovation to the classroom and collaborating with SMART.