RAP 2009

Well, the RAP (Read Around the Planet) 2009 season is coming to a close. We still have a few more connections going on over the next few days, but the majority of our connections are now over.

This year we had about 40 RAP connections. This is a slight increase over last year, which I’m excited about. And while I would have to go back and pull records from last year to be positive, I’m pretty sure that the number of schools participating also increased. Which I’m really excited about.

This year we connected with schools from all over the US, Canada and even Costa Rica! Classroom stories, original plays, and book adaptations were shared among the classrooms. In addition, our students  learned about other regions of the world from the classrooms they interacted with.

Unfortunately I wasn’t able to watch many of the connections, but one of the ones that I did get to watch was just great. It was a primary level pairing, I think with Kindergarten classes on both sides. I believe the partner school was from Michigan. They did an awesome job of getting our class involved. For each child in our class, they cheered, “Friend, friend from over the way, who has come to play today?” Then they inserted the “friends” name. “Julie, Julie, from over the way. What do you want to play today?” The the student on our side would respond with something all students on both sides would do, jumping jacks, clapping, whatever. All the students seemed to have a great time with this.

I think this would be a fun activity to adapt to incorporate the use of patterns, math problems, spelling words, or just to get to know the other class.

I can’t wait until next year!

 

Lessons Learned Part 1

Over the last month, we have had several different types of connections. And have connected with many different places. As a result, I have learned a lot about videoconferencing. Here are some of the things I have learned.

Visuals
For the African-American Fact or Fiction conferences, it was a requirement that they have a visual of their clue so that they other class could easily write it down, or at least that was the thought behind it.

One of the things I learned is that this requirement leaves a lot to the imagination. We had visuals that ran the gamet in quality. Some were typed, some handwritten, some on flip charts and others in powerpoint. Also, the mode of displaying these were diverse. Some were hand held, others set on a stationery object, some used the document camera, while others were on the computer.

What I found that works the best are the following:

• Typed in a LARGE font size, 72 pt or larger.
• Using a stationery object is prefered. Either some kind of stand that the visual can be placed on or using a document camera.
• List only one clue per visual. A list of the clue is too hard to read.
• In all of the above cases, it is important to ZOOM in so that the clue can be seen clearly. This should be done with a preset so as not to make the remote site sea sick.
• While PowerPoint works, there is a tendency to put too much on it so the font size is not big enough. Also, people tend to leave it on the presentation and we never get to see the students.
• And more of a “techie” thing than a instructional thing, but I’m not a big fan of Duo Video or H.239. I’ve only seen it work really well in one situation. Most of the time, it just seems to mess things up, and the other side can’t always see it. I would much rather just change the input for the main video.

Here are some examples. You can decided for yourself what you think works well. Click on a thumbnail for a larger version.

Audio
The placement of the mic is essential. Most people place the mic in the center of the room thinking that this is the best location. However, the mic that we have, actually has a “front” and “back”. If the student is in front of the mic, they are heard fine. If the student is behind the mic, their audio is muffled and sometimes barely audible.

The best place for the mic is on a chair or table towards the front of the room, facing all of the students. In most cases, this is sufficient for most students to be heard when talking in a normal voice. However, if a student is soft spoken, they may need to be moved closer to the front of the room.

Changes for next year for the Fact or Fiction program
This was the first year for this program and as such I think it went really well. But there are a few things that I think could be improved upon.

• Make sure the person being featured is communicated beforehand so that the classroom teachers is able to gather appropriate resources and credible research links.
• Give examples of good clues. The best clues seemed to be date related or truly based on fact. Just the way some of the clues were written, left the answer up for debate.
• Ban the use of wikipedia. While you can get a lot of good information there, you can’t count that it is always accurate.

If you participated in this project, I would love to hear your feedback.

 

African-American History Month Activities

February was quite a full month for us in the area of videoconferencing. We did three different types of connections in celebration of African-American History Month.

African-American Fact or Fiction
I got the Fact or Fiction idea from a classroom teacher and then adapted it to the Mystery Quest model. Each class researched a famous African-American. They then came up with 7 statements about that person. The statements could be true or false. Those statements were then presented to the remote class, who was then given time to research the statements to determine if they were Fact or Fiction. Answers were then revealed. The agenda we used is below.

Videoconferencing agenda (60 minutes):

• 5 minutes: Class introductions – This can be a class cheer, a school song, or a simple “hello”.
• 10 minutes: Class A presents their famous person and their 7 statements.
• 10 minutes: Class B presents their person and their 7 statements.
• 20 minutes: Classes research the statements given to them to determine if the statements are Fact or Fiction.
• 10 minutes: Reveal – Class A asks Class B “Fact or Fiction?” for each statement. Repeat with Class B.
• 5 minutes: Goodbyes

This was the first year for this project. We had 8 district schools and 2 out of state schools participate in 5 conferences over two days. We all had a great time and I hope to continue this project next year.

African-American History Exchange
This project is a simple exchange project where classes can share anything they are doing to celebrate African-American History Month. Projects ranged from presenting famous African-Americans and having the other class guess to sharing of poetry and African-American Jazz artists.

This was the second year for this project. We had 7 district classes and 3 out of state classes participate in 5 conferences throughout the day. A little smaller than last year, but I think it is due to the number of choices they had this year.

I’m not sure I will continue this one next year. It is easier for the teachers to prepare, but I think the African-American Fact or Fiction has more curriculum rigor. But I guess if people are willing to participate, I shouldn’t knock it, right?

A New View of Black History
This videoconferencing  was presented by the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth, Texas. It focused on the art of William H. Johnson and “explored the lifestyles, struggles, and spirituality of African-Americans in the United States during the early twentieth century.” (taken from the Amon Carter program description.)

We connected three schools at a time for the conference for a total of 12 schools participating throughout the day. The conferences were apapted for K-2 and 3-6 audiences. Nancy Strickland, the presenter, did an awesome job of facilitation a multi-site conference and kept all the schools engaged. They also sent out awesome support materials. The teachers loved this conference.

 

100 days of school

On February 10th, Dallas ISD celebrated the 100th day of school. If you have ever been around a primary classroom (grades PK-2), you know this is a big deal. Classes have songs, cheers, art projects, etc., all revolving around the 100th day of school and the concept of the number 100.

For the second year in a row, we have shared our 100 days of school activities among schools. This year 28 classrooms from 17 different school participated in 12 different videoconferences.

Activities ranged from sharing collections of 100 things, stories of “If I had $100″, art projects, and even 100 jumping jacks. A great time was had by all. We hope to have you participate with us next year.

Here are a few pictures of things that were shared.

 

A Visit with Mrs. Claus

Today we were transported to the North Pole. “A Visit with Mrs. Claus” was sponsored by ESC 3. Mrs. Claus read to the classes and answered questions about Santa, herself and the reindeer. Even though we didn’t have any interactive classes, the students were mesmerized.

Some of my favorite questions from the day:

Q: How do reindeer fly? A: We sprinkle magic dust on their hay.

Q: What does Santa Claus eat? A: Mostly cookies, but I make him eat his vegetables, too.

Q: What time do you and Santa get up? A: We don’t sleep much this time of year. Usually only a couple of hours a night.*

And my favorite question of the day…

Q: Why is Rudolf’s nose red? A: We feed him “Hot Tamales”. The hot tamales makes his tongue red, then when he licks his nose, it turns it red and starts to glow.

*Funny story for my Twitter friends. When I tweeted this question, I received an answer from @MrsSantaClaus on Twitter! She says they get up at 4:30 am. I just though it was hilarious that she answered my question.

 

The Mitten presented by the Indy Zoo

We just finished six session with the Indianapolis Zoo and their session of The Mitten. It was fabulous!

They started each session with a roll call, confirming each site could see and hear OK, and giving the mic expectations (it was a multi-site conference.) Once the program started, they gave some brief background of the story and of Ukraine customs, which is where the story takes place. They then read the story to the students, keeping them engaged the whole time. Then after the story they take a closer look at each animal, some with live models. They did an excellent job of keeping the students engaged and keeping all sites involved.

It was a great experience for all involved and definitely one we will repeat next year. I highly recommend it!

 

Our Planet Earth

So my second conference for the day was “Our planet Earth” presented by NASA. This involved a 1st grade class at one of my schools. It was pretty good, and the kids were really engaged.

The presenter asked, “If you were an alien and you
landed on earth, how would you describe it?”

 

 

 

 

 ”What if you landed here?”

 

 

 

 

 

He then went through several different pictures of different places on Earth and had the kids describe them. It was interesting to see that some of the kids really seemed to have no reference for some of the environments that he showed.

This is why I think using video conferencing in the classroom is so important. It broadens the minds of our students and helps them to realize that there is a world outside of their classroom, their house, and their city. Maybe by exposing them to other places, they will begin to dream of one day visiting those places. And isn’t that part of our jobs as educators? To help our students dream about things they might one day accomplish? To open their eyes to new opportunities? I certainly hope so.

 

Videoconference for Hope

Article submitted by Deborah Mayville

On Wednesday, November 5, 2008, the Student Council members of Jerry Junkins Elementary school participated in a video conferenc with students from Guatemala along with 30 other countries around the globe. Change for Children based in Alberta, Canada founded the event, VC for HOPE, in which global fundraisers would help rebuild schools of coastal communities in Guatemala that were distroyed by fundraisers would help rebuild schools of coastal communities in Guatemala that were destroyed by Hurricane Stan in 2005. This year’s goal is to raise enough money to build a four classroom school house that will house 360 students to be taught in their indigenous Mayan language.

Jerry Junkins’ students are hosting a campus wide fundraiser called the Great Turkey Race. The objective is for students to buy feathers for a quarter to cover their grade-level turkey. The team with the most feathers will get to conference with the students of Guatemala on December 3, to present the entire collection of donations.

Being that Junkins is the only school participating from Texas, we invite any and all campuses to help with donations. This remarkable cause will create new memories for the unfortunate students in Guatemala as well as give our students the gift of education.

 

 

Monster Exchange in pictures!

As I said in my previous posts, this year we did the Monster Exchange totally in district with 38 classrooms participating. In case you are unfamiliar with the Monster Exchange here is a quick overview. Classroom A creates a monster and writes a description of it. They send their monster description to Classroom B. Classroom B tries to recreate the monster based on the description. Classroom B has also created a monster, written a description, and shared it with Classroom A. The videoconference is the culmination of the project where the two classrooms compare the original monsters with the recreations.

This project has many curricular connections. The most obvious are art and descriptive writing. But many classes also integrate math with using shapes and measurements in their descriptions.

During the live conference, I tried to reinforce the descriptions of the monsters. With the older students, 3rd and 4th graders, we discussed what information they could have included in their description to help their partner class get closer to the original. This really got them thinking about the details of their monster and how to communicate it’s different features. I would extend this by finishing up with a guessing game. I would have two or three students from each site describe their Halloween costume and the other site would try to guess what they were going to be. The kids seem to enjoy this as much as making the monsters.

With the younger students, PK-2, we would discuss the similarities and differences between their monsters. Again, I really tried to reinforce the use of descriptive language and details. I also finished these conferences with having students describe what they were going to be for Halloween, without the guessing game.

Everytime, I do this activity, I am amazed at how close the recreations are to the original. See for yourself…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To see more monster examples, go to the Monster Exchange 2008 gallery. Please note, this only a representative of the monsters created. I did not have pictures of all of the conferences. If you have pictures you would like me to add to the gallery, please feel free to email them to me. I must have a release form for any picture that includes a student.

 

Monster Exchange 2008

Well, this year we embarked on doing the Monster Exchange in district. Last year we had some schools participate with other districts, but this is the first year that we did it with only DISD schools. It is also the first year that I organized it and ran it myself.

So over the last three days, we have had 19 connections involving 38 classrooms. I was pretty pleased with this, especially since we had a major staff turnover (layoffs and transfers) in our district only two weeks ago. This definitely affected many of our pairings. I had teachers dropping out as late as Tuesday of this week. It made life quite interesting. I really hope that the last minute scrambling had to do with what was happening in our district and is not a normal part of the process.

Things have gone pretty smoothly. I used our wiki, http://disdvideoconferencing.pbwiki.com, for the sign up. My campus cart managers, and some teachers themselves, could sign up for the time that they wanted. This worked pretty well. I then followed up with emails confirming the pairings. The email also contained the timeline for the project.

The timeline was probably the biggest problem I had…no one stuck to it. What do you do with the teachers that wait until the last minute to send their description? Do you set a hard and fast deadline that if they don’t meet, they are dropped from the project? Or is there a less drastic alternative?  Before I run similar projects this is one thing I will have to think through.

Today, were the only two big snafus I had all week. One classroom somehow got the wrong description. So they recreated a monster that in no way resembled their partner’s. Oops! We made the best of it. I also had a class that had technical difficulties and we were unable to make the connection. So I got to entertain their partner. That’s why you always have plan B!

Overall, things have worked pretty well and I’ll definitely do it again next year.  I’ll have an update and pictures posted early next week.

Happy Halloween!!