Vita Learn NW January 16 Minutes to Meeting

I'm attaching the PDF, and DOC file that have the "formatted"  minutes of this meeting.  Lots of great discussion.  I want to call your attention to two new forums  post that we hope you will contribute to that emerged from this meeting.


1)  Postponed discussion to be started online


Updating Web Publishing Practices Discussion

How has the increase availability of Web 2.0 tools impacted your practices, policies, and procedures regarding content hosting on the WWW.  Many schools have in the process of modifying old Web 1.0 policies and procedures to reflect the realities of Web 2.0 in Education.  Where is your school at in the process? Share and support your colleagues by sharing your process, documents, etc online and come to Vita Learn NW February meeting to finish the discussion we start here.


http://vtcite.org/node/2604


Questions:  We started asking participants to not only share what's new; but to also share what questions they want to explore further. What topics do they have questions about and encourage folks to continue the discussion online to those questions.  Click here to see the questions and contribute to a discussion about these topics.


http://vtcite.org/node/2603


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*  Omission:  from Minutes:  Door prize was won by Rob Gervais from Franklin North East


------------  see below for PDF (formatted) version of these minutes -----


 


Minutes of Vita Learn Meeting



Location:  Milton


January 16, 2009


 


I.                    Introduction

II.                 Share Time

Round table where users share what's new and pose a question to the group of something they are seeking more discussion on.


1.                              Lisa  from Essex

Laptop class (week 2)

 Dialogue around Disrupting Class book


 Collecting RFP for Transforming Design Center  where teachers are asked “If you could do anything you want, what would it be”


 Big issues with Linux:  Very Problematic.


Q: How to do Linux in the classroom?

2.                              Jan:  Middlebury

     Working on teaching safety, security, ethicshaving 7

th

graders teacher younger kids / created her own lessons            Q: Wants to  network with other tech integration specialist 


3.       Amy Burlington



12 teachers joined us for laptop iniative included course)


elementary pilot  VCAT using standards based report card


Q  How to work with Web 2.0 for under age 13

4.       Rob:  FNESU


Electronic Portfolio  E-Perl

1

st

graders (60 second program)

Teachers are using it for writing (build in prompts)3

rd

elementary school roll out

Introduce teachers/ Practice with kids


Q Would like to talk about federal monitoring


 


 


5.       Kathy:  Burlinton


 


Snap  Grades  / Google Docs / Book Discussion Group online/ Global Classroom


Q how are people are managing the support end of the Web 2.0 tool




6.       Charlie:  Williston



Introduce blogs and wikis through different methods


PD teacher to teacher;  district level PD; inservice day;  400 teachers took 20 workshops


Weekly report;  added blogs as a communication piece


30 – 40% of teachers using blogs


Shelfari and other applications; 


now they have your own blog


Use wikis for parent teachers  conference times


Parents are logging in / Parent comments


Having kids communicate with Emails


Grade 3 – 4 have more access than we thought


Mind Benders


blogs and wikis really make a change


Google  Apps /Google


Parents have the ability, but are not checking in to see what kids are doing.


blogger; word press/ all external hosting


new web page


introduce Blogger as part of what Google does


moving away from applications that run on the network


30 Flip Cameras handed at a faculty meeting


PD  (learning these things is a personal item; not always a course)

Life long learner


Q What are folks doing re: netbooks;


7.       Ellen:  Shelburne



Flip cameras

1

st

grade teachers have students make movies with the flip

Lots of blogs, wikis, Moodle for forums for kids

4

th

graders

try novel talks experience on Moodle  (hosted in district)


Parents:  I didn't know he was doing this


learning about blogs and wikis was a good introduction to Moodle

Q curriculum mapping and DI focus at school. How do other schools do it?



8.       Lauren:  ANESU



Tech Tasks Assessment


Are we being contrained by old Tech Assessment


How is the Tech Tasks allowing student to know the curriculum


Oppposite of backward design/  Do the project and we'll figure out how to assess it

3 of our elementary schools playing with EPALS

Q: What about the state technology plan?


9.       Hector: ADL Essex



Google Calendar


Photostory


Moodle being used a lot


Issue  with Moodle is connection (in afternoon it shuts down)


Internet Safety Night


Surveymonkey  data matches


has a powerpoint;  not a lot has changed


Elmo being used more and more


take pictures of work;  not just scan


show and preserve the word kids are doing (art)


big push on Netbooks


going for one set of 25 in school this year


every single six grader with a netboook


 

10.    David:  Essex



audio recording with younger kids iis a perfect match


doing more and more with audio recording


Scratch:  test case for our schools really serious about moving forward


needs to fit curriculum seamlessly but meets ISTE curriculum


JING works well with Scratch


listen to them talk about what they went through


we teach and develop very traditional curriculum


using new tools;  but modify them to fit old curriculum


 


 


Q:  We are sharing, but not doing it very well.  How do we do it better?


11.   Jean:  Chittenden East



Every teacher must post homework on web page


Lots of Moodle Use


challenge:  everything must be reliable


lots of Elmos in the classroom


bandwidth slowed down


 

Q What are your policies are personal devices?


12.     Sorry... I have these notes with no name (someone representing Mt. Mansfield)



we are outgrowing our wireless network at Mt. Mansfield


MAC security flaw let kids crack wireless system


wants to be able to allocate 20% of bandwidth


using VCAT for standard based report card


every sophomore had to do a video for midterm exam

Q: How do you support increased activity when more teachers adopt  technology?


13.    Nancy:  Fairfax



Working in (grade 2 – 8)


Has a a void in high school


Using Jing for mini lesson


after school computer club (Scratch and gamemaker or video project)


I-talc installed on laptop cart


 

Q How to handle the fact that the high school kids damage laptops?



Some suggestions from group:


stop paying for it

carts assigned to a team

you must have kids sign the sheetat end of day computer lab monitor

netbook cart



14.    Paul:  Burlington


Paul Burlington

 


Internet Safety


Mentioned Rochester study recent


lots of web 2.0 (concerns  and process work)


copyright fair use creating faq


wet paint wiki page


future meeting on copy (dynamic landscape presentation)


Referred to Tony Wagner (specific to schools – New tech high school)

21

st

century SETA, COSN  cost proposal for new admin to create a 21

st

century classroom

document cam/smartboard/ 1:1


addition tech support and teacher coach


52 billion dollars


admin is ask for  for cost proposal


how do we fund and support reliabily


 


Q:  What are your experiences with netbooks? What are their place in our schools?


 




15.    Craig  - FCSU


Supporting 2 schools and Central Office



Q:  People who have my jobs have different standards of measurements


how can we change the measurement to be we are all  supporting “student learning”

How do we assign level of priority  to projects?


 


 


Suggestions from Group


Inviting people to wiki tto contribute


end of year slideshow – shared it with tech department


this is what happens as a result of our hard work and efforts


weekly meeting with tech educator

start with kudos; improve communication and do praise and trust building



16.    Steve Webster South Burlington


 


still same problem with cover the curriculum and try to integrate technology


resistance in curriculum; we are not going deeep enough


 

starting to revise our Power GE and new NETS and 21

st

skill

Smartboard installation;  unexpected cost


Schoolfusion: web based publishing system for schools


 

21

st

century teaching learning is to identify the ways we enhance student learning

Infrastructure committee looks at their recommendation


split the work into  two  groups that (overlap)


 

Atlas rubicon  for curriculum mapping


Q how we dealing with reliance on outside services?

i.e. Sketchcast is gone


How do we deal with reliable things that are going to be around


Google Pages is now gone


Who is maintaining their own blog and services?


What about the competitors to Flip Videos?





17.   Lucie:  St. Albans City School


 

Tux Paint  1

st

graders

Flip Uses


delicious for PD


Inspiration


Research strategies (structure and scaffold)

7

th

and 8

th

graders Google Apps


Q: What are your policies for using Web 2.0 tools? Does anyone differentiate using web 2.0 tools for process work vs. publishing marketing quality final work?




18.    Ed:  Milton



Q: How do we keep up


What's good?  How do we deal with “I don't have time


 

19.    Tim:  CSSU



 


 


 


 


 


 


Tech Integration assigned to  math committee;  literacy committee;


tip:  serve on the committee


teachers have to find  the value


tech assessment for 5 years.


we about to abandon that


it served a purpose;  we want to move on


 


 


III .  Updates


 


A. Vtcite Summer Projects:  100 people applied


Selected 30 teams


online course modules


1 week in summer


 


B. Dynamic Landscape proposals being collected.

May 15

th

at Champlain college

 


C. Two small 1 day social studies conference (hands on)


Web 2.0 in social studies


Castleton and Montpelier


looking for presenters


small stipend


late March and early April


Targetting: social studies network


 


JD. anuary 30  Tech GE Forum.  Still a few spots left.


 


E. April 10:  Open  source conference at Lake Morey


presentation see Bryant Patten


 

F. Pizza conference is being planned for techies.



Vtcite 1:1 work 

Lego conference was held in Woodstock


IV.  Presentations


A. David Davidson presented the Westford Trail Project

See attached Handouts. 

Excellent example of using GPS and Google Earth

 

B. Lauren Parren  

Presented a Social Studies project using PB Wiki with 3 History Classes collaborating

Email Lauren for access to it:  ushistory10.pbwiki.com/

 


Discussion on Updating Web  Publishing Practices Postponed to Next Time

Participants encouraged to use VTCITE to Discuss




 How has the increase availability of Web 2.0 tools impacted your


 practices, policies, and procedures regarding content hosting on the


 WWW.  Many schools have in the process of modifying old Web 1.0


 policies and procedures to reflect the realities of Web 2.0 in


Education.  Where is your school at in the process? Come prepared to


 share and support your colleagues by sharing your process.



VI.   News from State Department

Shared via: Email from Peter Drescher


1.  State Technology Plan.

It is very close, in fact, I could release it today but want one more edit from our editor on it. 

People should see it next week via School IT, Ed Tech list and the DOE website.


It will have a full piece around Local technology Plans and it should be in good shape for a month long comment period from the field.


 


 


2.   Technology GE's discussion meeting on Jan. 30. 


 


Capitol Plaza in Montpelier.  Currently I have about 27 folks... I am actively recruiting more from the South and far Northeast.


 


A number of you are coming, I may ask for some to give up spots as Chittenden County is a little over-represented. I'll let you know specifically via email next week. I need some from the South.  If folks know people in the South, encourage them please.   Looking forward to the discussion.  Ed, you probably could say a few words around things you and I have discussed. 


 


3.   Recent Tobacco/IID grants..


Official announcements on those are coming out today, Friday, the 16th.  Some good applications, very difficult to choose and it was a taxing review because of the quality and quantity.  This effort represented a great way to maximize dollars available from both State and Federal resources to impact technology programs within some content at schools.  In this case, the efforts being made by tobacco prevention education and the impact those efforts have on the health of our students.  I am trying to leverage funding as much as I can so that we can add to our limited Title IID competitive funding. 


 


4. A little early on this.. but maybe some good news on the financial front for Title IID!  Part of the Stimulus package proposed by the Obama Administration includes significant money for Title IID and Education Technology.  Too soon to tell what that means, but this is a good sign!   I have a DC call next week and may know more after that, though we'll need to let President Obama get on his feet before we see significant change....


 


5.   I put something out on School IT recently about Internet Safety and the new ruling on that ... I'll repost that again on Friday as it first went out early in January.


 


6.  LNV has had some very successful high profile events lately, Bernie Sanders talking to students from nine schools, many more CILC programs being accessed, and some good professional development being shared school to school.  Take advantage of this resource if you have the LNV at your site.  If you have the camera, but need help getting set up, contact Arlyn Bruccoli. 


 


 

VIII.  Next meeting Essex town February 13

th


 



Vtcite; does not do well with keeping formatting, but here is the text

AttachmentSize
vita_learn_nw Jan 16 Minutes.doc44.5 KB
vita_learn_nw Jan 16 Minutes .pdf29.63 KB