I have mentioned before the wonders of Dropbox, a free, quick, safe, and simple download that places a tiny open box icon on your menu bar. Inside this box, you can save files, folders, pictures, etc. that can be accessed from any computer. The file list in Dropbox look like any file menu on your computer.

I use Dropbox to safely store all the docs I frequently work on and may need to access at home. I know that if my computer crashes, those files will be saved. At home, I loaded Dropbox on my computer there. Voila! All my files are there. Any changes I make to them at work or at home are saved. I have also gone out of town, used a computer in a hotel business center, and accessed dropbox.com. From there, I got to all my files. I can do the same in my classroom.

One caveat: It is best to save any material that would fall under FERPA rules on one of the college servers rather than Dropbox.

Here is the link to MakeUseOf’s manual for everything Dropbox.

Try it–you’ll like it! http://tinyurl.com/34gz9vz

It is almost mid-semester and a great time to take advantage of a tried and true method of gaining feedback from our students about our teaching.

The purposes of a mid-semester student evaluation are three-fold:

1. To gain important insights about our teaching from the perspective of our students
2. To facilitate student understanding of evaluation criteria related to our particular course
3. To encourage students to take evaluations seriously

Steps in the process:

1. Make enough copies of an end-of-course evaluation form (or create your own with the same questions) for distribution to your class just prior to midterm.
2. Collaborate with a trusted colleague. Have your colleague administer this evaluation to your students; you administer those of your colleague.
3. Prior to administration, explain to students that you value their perspective on the effectiveness of the class and request that students respond thoughtfully. Ask students for constructive feedback that provides both positives and suggestions for improvement. Be sure that students understand that their individual responses will be anonymous and will have no impact on course grading.
4. Take time during the next class or one soon after evaluation to discuss the results with your students. What is going well? What are suggestions for improvement? How will these be addressed?

The evaluation and follow-up class discussion are opportunities

1. to reflect on your teaching and grow as an educator
2. to discuss meaningful adaptations with the class
3. to clarify/explain purposes behind methods/materials/activities that are essential to the class and should remain unchanged
4. to recognize and address the needs of the various learner types in the class
5. to promote a “community of learners” climate in your classroom

http://tinyurl.com/2ebe3h4

This link is from Faculty Focus, September 29, 2010

DID I MISS ANYTHING
by Tom Wayman
from http://www.library.utornonto.ca/canpoetry/wayman/poem5.htm

Originally from: The Astonishing Weight of the Dead.
Vancouver: Polestar, 1994.

DID I MISS ANYTHING?

Question frequently asked by
students after missing a class

Nothing. When we realized you weren’t here
we sat with our hands folded on our desks
in silence, for the full two hours

Everything. I gave an exam worth
40 per cent of the grade for this term
and assigned some reading due today
on which I’m about to hand out a quiz
worth 50 per cent

Nothing. None of the content of this course
has value or meaning
Take as many days off as you like:
any activities we undertake as a class
I assure you will not matter either to you or me
and are without purpose

Everything. A few minutes after we began last time
a shaft of light descended and an angel
or other heavenly being appeared
and revealed to us what each woman or man must do
to attain divine wisdom in this life and
the hereafter
This is the last time the class will meet
before we disperse to bring this good news to all people
on earth

Nothing. When you are not present
how could something significant occur?

Everything. Contained in this classroom
is a microcosm of human existence
assembled for you to query and examine and ponder
This is not the only place such an opportunity has been
gathered

but it was one place

And you weren’t here

Wordia Brings Words to Life in Video

Wordia is a free visual, video dictionary. Wordia features a selection of user-submitted and professionally created videos explaining the meaning of a word. The videos focus on the everyday use of words while the text accompanying each video provides the dictionary definition of the word. The video below explains the word literacy.

Applications for Education
Wordia is now offering an education section of their service. Wordia Schools provides a private area for students to share videos that they have created for the vocabulary covered in your curriculum. Wordia Schools is free, you can take a tour and sign up here.

Here are some related resources that may be of interest to you:
Visuwords – Online Graphical Dictionary
Lexipedia – Webbed Word Connections
Snappy Words – A Visual Dictionary and Thesaurus

Bring It to Class: Unpacking Pop Culture in Literacy Learning (Grades 4 through 12)

by Margaret Hagood, Donna Alvermann, and Alison Heron-Hruby

ERIC Abstract:

Students’ backpacks bulge not just with oversize textbooks, but with paperbacks, graphic novels, street lit, and electronics such as iPods and handheld video games. This book is about unpacking those texts to explore previously unexamined assumptions regarding their usefulness to classroom learning. With a strong theoretical grounding and many practical examples, the authors speak to both skeptical instructors who favor traditional canonical literature and to technology enthusiasts who already use popular music or video in their classrooms. Each chapter includes teacher, administrator, media specialist, librarian, and student voices; classroom activities; adaptable lessons; and professional study-group questions. “Bring It to Class” features: (1) A researched rationale for using pop culture in middle school and secondary classrooms as well as school libraries and media centers; (2) Field-tested teaching approaches that will connect adolescents with school-based learning and motivate their literacy practices in and out of class; and (3) An easy-to-use format that includes classroom vignettes, sample lessons, and a glossary of key terms.

1. Planet Science: online interactive science games

2. BBC Climate Change: decision-making

3. Clim’way: create plans to reach climate goals

4. Web Earth Online: Coping with today’s environment as an animal

5. Earth Day Games

6. Recycle City

7. World Wildlife Fund: list of more games

8. Ecokids: collection of environmental games

9. Adventures of Vermi the Worm: vermicomposting and other waste management ideas

10. Environmental Education on the Internet: huge list of games

There are so many great videos on this site for K-12 students, it is difficult to choose just a couple of examples for you to see here. This site is great for our teacher ed candidates and for parents. What a great resource for the classroom. Check it out and you will be hooked.

The beauty of a panorama can never be described in words; it has been to be seen to be believed. In an extremely crowded world, panoramic spots are few and far between. Oh yes, you can see an entire city laid out in front of you from the top of a skyscraper. But nothing beats watching the natural ones. For instance, the one from Yavapai Point at Grand Canyon is a natural wonder. Check these out and share with your students. A great addition to Google Earth.

360Cities: 360Cities.net has a good collection of panoramic vista from around the world. Most of the panoramic shots are geo-referenced and interactive. You can start off from the Editor’s picks or go to their World panorama map and the Photographer map for travelling to a spot from a world map. You can watch the panoramas in full screen and navigate on it with the controls provided. The sweep of the eye is also represented on a Google map alongside.

If you have Google Earth installed, you can literally travel to spots around the world and view panoramas using a downloadable KML file.
But right now, I am checking out what they advertise as the world’s largest 360 panorama – an 18 Gigapixel shot of Prague.

Panoramas.dk: The panorama website is the work of Hans Nyberg, a photographer and an enthusiast of immersive panoramic images. As he says, an interactive VR panorama cannot be seen in a book or on a printed image. It has to be experienced on a computer screen. The site also has links to other great resources for learning more about the art of VR photography. The site has a huge collection of panoramas from around the world. You can even check out Obama’s Nobel Prize speech or panoramic photos from Tour de France.

Gigapan: The Gigapan panorama website is all about gigapixel panoramic images from around the world. What’s interesting is that GigaPan was developed by Carnegie Mellon University in collaboration with NASA Ames Intelligent Robotics Group, with support from Google.

The panorama website also has a community formed around the common passion for panoramic photography. You can join for free. Use their uploader to share your panorama shots with the general community. You can search through the collection using the search box, or go for the orange filters at the top that are marked as – Most Popular, Most Recent, Tags, and Conversations. You can view a lot of the panoramas on Google Earth using the link given just below the snaps. The site does not give a full screen view, but Google Earth does.

ARounder: Immerse yourself in panoramic vistas of cities, museums, parks, local cafes and stores, cathedrals, and more. ARounder is an online travel magazine and a neat panorama website with a smaller collection than the ones before it. But it is neatly arranged according to region. And there are two outer-worldly places on the moon and Mars too for the space buffs. You can click a location and take a wide-eyed virtual tour through the place. You can also get ARounder’s free iPhone app for some virtual sightseeing while on the move.

I am not going to Tahiti; instead let me do a bit of virtual roaming across the landscape of Mars for a change.

Panoguide: Panoguide is a free central stock of information and community discussion on panoramic photography. Their About page says that the panorama website is also a how-to on techniques for creating panoramic images using a conventional camera and “stitching” the images together on a computer. Click on the tab that says Gallery and dive into their collection that’s arranged around country names. You can also use the Google Map for a point and click approach.

ViewAt: Select the wide variety of locations from the dropdown or on the map and you are there with two clicks. You can watch the default panorama or go for the high resolution image. The site’s forum is also a spot to visit if you are interested in panoramas and photography.

Panedia: Panedia is a combination of Panoramic & Encyclopedia. It is actually a professional services site for ‘georeferenced photography using immersive panoramic technologies’. The site has a small collection of panoramic photos, all on Australia. Every panorama has hotpsots which are clickable links to more panoramas. If you like the Australian outdoors you can check out their small demo collection.

1001 Wonders: This is a panorama tour of the sites that are listed on the World Heritage List compiled by UNESCO. Presently, 263 places are being showcased on the website. The ultimate goal is to panophotograph 1001 sites.