With so many bloggers contributing to my personal learning network, it’s difficult to nominate only one per category for the 2008 Edublog Awards. I’ve based my nominations on recent posts by the following bloggers/groups:

• Best Individual Blog: Creating Lifetime Learners – Mathew Needleman continues to inspire me with easy-to-use strategies (and arguments) for bringing multi-modal/multi-media writing into the classroom.
• Best Group Blog: YouthVoices – The credit for this dynamic project that engages a growing student community goes to Paul Allison and Susan Ettenheim.
• Best Resource Sharing Blog: The Edublogger – Sue Waters‘ constant flow of resources, tutorials, and support has made a difference for many an Edublogger!
• Best Teacher Blog: Educating Alice - Monica Edinger’s passion for literature (long-time association with Newberry Awards) and commitment to allowing young students to “do” history as opposed to just studying history is evident in the opinions, resources, and thought-provoking topics posted to her blog.
• Best Librarian Blog: NeverEndingSearch – Some of my favorite tools (i.e., zamzar.com), I’ve discovered through Joyce Valenza’s posts.
• Best Technology Support Blog: Around the Corner – When Miguel Guhlin blogs about a tool (i.e., Diigo, VoiceThread), he generally creates detailed tutorials that include the quirky little things you might need to know about. Great resources for workshops!
• Best Use of Audio – YA! Casts – Robert Rozema’s innovative Web 2.0 projects are grounded in research and a great resource for making visible to administrators of pre-service teacher cohorts the case for going beyond MS Office in the technology component.
• Best Use of Video – Common Craft Shows – Lee LeFever continues to provide educators with the perfect video introductions to 21st century tools.
• Best Use of a Social Networking Site: Classroom 2.0 – Steve Hargadon deserves some major recognition for introducing the ning as a dynamic, community-building resource for educators.
• Best Use of Virtual World: Literary Worlds – Western University of Michigan English professor Allen Webb has developed an amazing virtual world in which participants wake up in the environment of a selected novel (right off the high school required reads’ shelf).
• Best Class Blog: Kids Book Blog – 5th and 6th graders from Elk Grove, California, are collaborating to provide their readers with a rich source of book recommendations and reviews.

I love being part of the ACE group, which always offers a Monday hands-on tech session at NCTE. Each year, I walk away with a deeper understanding of what 21st century teaching is all about.

Rich Rice opened the workshop with a session on K-16 Educational Blogging and Podcasting.

My NWP colleague Troy Hicks led the second session: Writing with Wikis. Troy opened the session by asking “what’s the matter with wikis?” Some participant ideas:

• danger of overriding work(and we went live with a flurry of posting – and overriding each other)
• tough to keep organized

His second question: “What’s good about wikis?” Participants’ thoughts:

• small group projects, e.g., poetry project
• collaborative essays
• allowing students to incorporate information in different ways
• creating policy documents

If you are looking for ways to make visible to teachers the power and possibilities of collaborative writing, take a tour of the many projects Troy has shared through this wiki. I love his Project Write: Book Discussions. The author links take readers to wikipedia-like resources pages. What a great model!

Allen Web led the third session, opening with a small rant on the design of 21st century computer labs, which look amazingly similar to 19th and 20th century “labs.” Small but revolutionary idea! I’ve asked Allen to send me a photo of the lab he has designed, where laptops are placed on small tables that can easily be moved to accommodate whatever project students might be working on. I now understand why the use of technology in classrooms with access to a few laptops always seems so much more powerful than what I typically see happening in elementary – secondary computer labs.

My favorite link on Allen’s LitArchives site = Civil Liberties Online Resources. Not on his LitArchives site, but very exciting is his Literary Worlds project. At a glance, more impressive than read/write projects I’ve viewed in Second Life!

I led the 4th session with an introduction to VoiceThread.

The 5th session was my first time to participate in one of Carl Young’s workshops. Oh my, some great ideas and resources for teaching the realities of digital identities! Given that few K-12 students have received much instruction, either from home or school, on the ethical use of the Internet, Carl’s suggestion to those whose digital identities may already be questionable as potential employees, grant recipients, etc., to get out there and create a positive web identity. Love Carl’s resources and samples posted to Being Proactive!

Ewa McGrail, who organized this year’s ACE event, ended the day with a great activity and resources for teaching copyright and fair use. I’m really glad she’s posted the handout, since we ran short on time.

Interested in becoming a member of ACE? Contact Ewa. Next year’s NCTE ACE workshop will be in Philidelphia, one of my favorite cities:-).

*Image from Library of Congress American Memory Project – http://tinyurl.com/6nzl3k.

It was my privilege to join Monica Edinger and William Teale for an early Sunday morning NCTE session, Ports of Entry.

I’ve known Monica – and stood in awe of her work – for close to ten years, so I don’t know why the level to which she promotes questioning, creating, and sharing with her 4th grade students still amazes me. For a glimpse into her Web 2.0 journey, start with her presentation and then take a tour of Edinger House, her classroom blog.

William Teale added another layer to our presentation by pointing out that, although Monica and I have been exploring and experimenting with new tech tools for over a decade, many teacher are still intimidated by technology and the time commitment required for meaningful integration into the curriculum. Bill showcased two online projects: ePals and in2books. Although I was vaguely familiar with both ePals and in2books, I did not realize these two programs are both under the umbrella of ePals, a once fee-based program that is now free and very dynamic. The power of ePals is that a teacher with limited tech proficiency can easily enroll his/her students not only for online pen pal “demographics dances” (bill’s words), but can also connect them to powerful lessons and projects that promote global awareness and social action on such vital topics as water.

The in2books project provides free books to Title 1 schools, grades 3-5, and connects students with an adult pen pal (carefully screened by the organization!) for the purpose engaging students in reading and writing and promoting a love of books. Here’s a link to an NBC spotlight on the program – http://www.in2books.com/videos/video5.html.

OK, and the good news about our 8:30 a.m.-on-a-Sunday session was that our participants outnumbered the three of us, were impressively awake, and seemed to share our enthusiasm for Web 2.0 in the elementary classroom

This morning I updated the Intro to EB Manual FAQs section with the explanation below – and the hope that my fellow Edubloggers will join me as an EB Supporter:

Last week a colleague asked me about the links to “Content Ads” that popped up when she accessed – for the first time – the Kids Book Blog (an EB site run by 5th and 6th graders at Joseph Sims Elementary School). Since I had never seen ads on any of my EB blogs or in any of my teacher trainings, I contacted Sue Waters, The Edublogger, for an explanation. Thanks to Sue and after doing a little reading in the EB Forum, I now understand that there is a very good reason for the Content Ads, and that, most likely, few of our blog readers will ever see them.

Let’s start with the reasons for Content Ads:
• Remember back in October when James Farmer was upgrading EB servers? As always, the brief disruption in access to our blogs resulted in more “goodies” being added to our EB toolkit. This last upgrade, however, has exceeded James’ budget. And that’s not a good thing. But being able to count on continued membership in the EB community of educators is a very good thing – far outweighing the occasional appearance of Content Ads on our blogs.
• Only first-time visitors to your blog(s), who are not logged into Edublogs, would see the ads. On their second and subsequent visits, no ads would appear. In fact, very few people would see ads at all, but enough search engine visitors might in order to help Edublogs cover the bills and continue to grow and develop.

Let’s look at why I had never seen Content Ads:
• For the last year, I’ve been an EB Supporter, which means that for a mere $25 per year (less than the cost of one Starbucks latte per month), I not only have extra space, a few more widgets, etc., but I also never have ads appearing on my blog.

Let’s look at why you probably do not see Content Ads on your EB blog(s):
• You will not see ads on any blog you are logged in to or have visited more than once.
• No one who has bookmarked your blog(s) or types in your URL will see any ads.
• No one logged into Edublogs will ever see any ads

Let’s look at the best solution for eliminating ads from your blog(s) and supporting the EB community:
• Become an Edublogs Supporter:-)
• Tell your fellow Edubloggers about the benefits of becoming an Edublogs Supporter:-)

I’ve blogged about Mathew Needleman before. Since attending his CUE 08 presentation, I’ve been following his blog and have even written videoconferencing sessions with Mathew into my district’s current EETT grant. But if you haven’t had the pleasure of meeting face-to-face with Mathew in real time or virtual time – or even if you have – you now have the opportunity to watch the amazing video he created for his recent K12Online Conference presentation Film School for Video Podcasters!

Mathew’s explanation of the storyboarding process will make you rethink those storyboarding templates (that I’ve been giving students). I also have a much better understanding of the Rule of Thirds now. He touched quickly on lighting too, an area I haven’t a clue about setting up, so I’m hoping maybe Mathew has an upcoming session on that topic.

What a strong case for media literacy in the elementary curriculum! Just wish I had joined Mathew live for his K12Online Conference session. Next year for sure!

One of my favorite sessions at last summer’s NECC conference was the Web 2.0 Smack Down, led by Vicki Davis. I think without a doubt the “key chain” tip for providing teachers with some 1×1 assistance following group workshops was a favorite. I was blogging the Smack Down live from the session, and somehow missed Kevin Honeycutt’s name or a link to credit him for his contribution to the Smack Down.

Last week, I received a friend request, via Plurk, from KevinH. In the process of accepting his friend request, I discovered his Art Snacks site. Oh my, what a gold mine for teachers and students! For a starter, Kevin’s video tutorials provide wonderful, easy-to-follow drawing lessons. Check out some some “art snacks” and see for yourself, like this lesson on how to draw a fire ant:

Find more videos like this on Art Snacks

Oh happy day…

Note: Image from www.sacbee.com

If you are a fan of “open source, collaborative, and web-based compilation” models, then you’re going to like what CK-12 is putting online. This non-profit organization is dedicated to the idea that every K-12 student in the United States and worldwide deserves “access to the highest quality and lowest cost textbooks and course materials.”

A main goal of the CK-12 organization is to offer excellent and freely accessible textbooks to supplement (replace?) expensive textbooks, which often are filled with “eye candy” to the point of being visually distracting to students. With the CK12’s FlexBooks, teachers can customize content and chapters to meet individual needs of their students.

In a nutshell CK-12 is a Wikipedia approach to textbooks, drawing on reviewers and experts in specific math and science fields, who understand the value of putting teachers in charge of enhancing, changing, and customizing a “flexible output.”

The site has been up for about a year and already offers an impressive amount of content. I just took a side trip into one of the geometry texts and explored an informative chapter on The Geometry of Art and am planning on spending this rainy afternoon wondering through more of the texts.

I am impressed and heartened by CK-12’s commitment that the “content generated by CK-12 and the CK-12 community will serve both as source material for a student’s learning and provide an adaptive environment that scaffolds the learner’s journey as he or she masters a standards-based body of knowledge, while allowing for passion-based learning.”