Cool Web 2.0 Tools That Save Time and Money

Every now and then I run across some really cool Web 2.0 tools that not only are interesting, but save time and sometimes money.  That is the case with a free Web 2.0 scientific calculator that I have embedded below.




Web 2.0 scientific calculator

As you can see, a teacher can either embed the calculator widget into a class blog, or a link can be created to access the web based calculator for students to bookmark to use where ever they may be.

Check it out! Web 2.0 Scientific Calculator

Another interesting widget is from Wolfram Alpha.

If you know the name of the element, and really know how to spell it, you can enter it into this Wolfram Alpha widget and find out molecular weight, substance, boiling point and solubility. Below is the information for quartz.

molecular weight | 60.0843 g\/mol\nphase | solid (at STP)\nmelting point | 1427 °C\nboiling point | 2230 °C\ndensity | 2.634 g\/cm^3\nsolubility | insoluble in water



This next widget from Answers.com is really neat. When you embed it into your blog, users can double click on any word and see the spelling, definition and hear how it is pronounced.

What you do is install this into your blog and users can double click on any word and get the definition and spelling of the word. Plus more...try it by double clicking on any word in this post. When you click on 'more' you will be taken to the Answer.com website and there is more information related to that word.





Wouldn't it be neat to have vocabulary lists on your blog that students could double click on and see the definition, learn if it is a noun or verb, and sometimes hear how the word is pronounced?

8th Grade Vocab List Sample (double click on the words)

accord
barter
benign
clad
clarify
commemorate
feasible
heritage
legendary
stance
staple
transition

Stop Think Click

School safety is something we all think about.  There are reasons why doors are locked, visitors have to check in at the office, and students have to have parent permission to sign out in the main office and before they can leave school.  Procedures in place at Jacobson Elementary and at the BK Junior Senior High School are designed to keep students safe.

Personal safety is something we learn about in school at a young age.  We all know the "stop, drop and roll",  move in single file out into the hallway and cover our heads during a tornado warning, and where to go in case of a fire.  We are also taught about 'Stranger Danger' and being Drug Free.

What about staying safe and being responsible when using the internet? 

Social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace, and others have come under scrutiny in the news this past year or so for privacy setting issues, young people posting less than flattering pictures, and cyberbullying.  There are bulletins circulating the internet about trojans, virus and malware/spyware that can shut down your computer - even steal your identity.

Just as we need to teach children to be safe in their physical environments, we also need to teach them to be safe and responsible in their use of cyberspace.  It is sometimes difficult to make the correlation between physical space and the informal space of sitting in front of a computer screen being the same thing. 

We can think of it this way... 

Cyberspace is like a huge city. There are libraries, schools, museums, places to have fun, and plenty of opportunities to meet wonderful people from all walks of life. But, like any community, there are also some people and areas that you ought to avoid and others that you should approach only with caution. [1]

Be smart - Share With Care

The following is from the Net Cetera Outreach Kit - OnGuard Online, Stop Think Click series.

Your online actions can have real-world consequences. The pictures you post and the words you write can affect the people in your life. Think before you post and share.

What you post could have a bigger "audience" than you think. Even if you use privacy settings, it's impossible to completely control who sees your social networking profile, pictures, videos or texts. Before you click "send," think about how you will feel if your family, teachers, coaches or neighbors find it.

Once you post information online, you can't take it back. You may think that you've deleted information from a site—or that you will delete it later. Know that older versions may exist on other people's computers. That means your posts could live somewhere permanently.

Get someone's okay before you share photos or videos they're in. Online photo albums are great for storing and sharing pictures of special events, and camera phones make it easy to capture every moment. Stop and think about your own privacy—and other people's—before you share photos and videos online. It can be embarrassing, unfair and even unsafe to send or post photos and videos without getting permission from the people in them.

Thinking about possible consequences before making a decision to post or not to post is part of being a responsible user of the internet.   While this sounds like doom and gloom, there is a bright spot - something to look forward to.  Just as there can be negative consequences to posting certain things online, there are also positive things that can happen when you choose correctly and responsibly.

A positive Digital Footprint.... we will talk more about this in future posts.



[1] Teen Safety on the Information Highway was jointly produced by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and The MASTER Teacher®.

Communication

Communication is imperative between school and parents. Communication leads to partnerships between schools and community in order to provide students with the best education possible. With new web based tools, getting the message out is getting easier and actually a lot more fun!

Last week, the teacher professional development centered on learning how to create blogs. For about five years now, staff have blogged from a module on our website, but it was very limiting - basically only text and a few pictures or links could be added. And there is no interaction or two-way communication available within the scope of our informational website.

With the introduction to Blogger, staff are now able to communicate with parents, guardians and community members using a broader scope of tools. These tools that they are being introduced to are known as Web 2.0 tools. The difference between the blog area on our website and the new Blogger is measured by interactivity.

Teachers can include calendars, pictures, videos, embed educational games and can even have a discussion board on their blog. Parents can subscribe or follow each teacher's blog and receive email updates when there is a new post. Surveys can be included into an update and parents can interact with that within the teacher's classroom blog.

Classroom assignments can be uploaded to the blog for students to view and download if needed. Neat website links related to a project or chapter in a textbook can be entered and utilized by students to enhance learning and understanding of a certain standard and benchmark related to what is being taught in the classroom.

Even our administrators are getting in on the blogging action. Superintendent Marshall Lewis has created a blog; Mike Thompson - Jacobson Elementary Principal and Eric Dockstader - Junior Senior High Principal have blogs too. The Bronco Photo Blog has been very popular with parents, grandparents as well as relatives stationed overseas!   Amazing!

Keep an eye out for updated links on our BK Home page as well as Blog Feeds on the blogs listed above.  More will be added soon and if you would like to receive alerts of when new posts have been created, subscribe by entering your email address in the area provided!

Welcome to the Belmond-Klemme Community School District Technology Blog!

We are embracing Web 2.0 applications and this technology blog is just the beginning of our electronic communications to all stakeholders keeping everyone updated as to what is going on with tech at BK Schools.

Soon, our staff will also be blogging, creating wikis that allow for student interactivity digitally in the classroom, and communicating via RSS feeds to parents,guardians and community members.  Keep watch as Belmond-Klemme makes a transition to more Web 2.0 tools - which is so very important for our students.




Our students and future graduates are experiencing a very different world, albeit a visual and sedentary one, that continues to evolve into a global society with the emergence of new social, political, and business models brought about because of technology.  It is predicted that 80% percent of the jobs that will be available to our current kindergarten students don’t exist today.  These same kindergarten students will have four different careers and nine different jobs in their lifetime.

According to a report from the National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching for the 21st Century, 60% of all new jobs in the early 21st century will require skills that are possessed by only 20% of the current workforce, and over 80% of the 23 million jobs that will be created in the next 10 years will require some post-secondary education.  Our future graduates will be expected to collaborate globally with colleagues from all over the world.

This generation of students is the first to grow up with this new digital technology. Marc Prensky so clearly states in his article, “Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants,” computers, video games, digital music players, video cams, cell phones, MP3 players, etc. are second nature to them. Today the average college grad has spent less than 5,000 hours of their lives reading, but over 10,000 hours playing video games and 20,000 hours watching TV.  Today’s students think and process information fundamentally differently then we do. They speak an entirely new “internet” language utilizing  blogs, wikis, podcasts and online jargon.  They are use to downloading music, resourcing a library on their laptops, and being “connected” 24/7 through “IMing” and text messaging.  Networking is a way of life.

As educators we are living in a different world with new challenges and new opportunities and we must figure out how to respond.  We must rely on our experience to re-envision our classrooms and prepare our students for the 21st century with different kinds of collaboration.




We need to teach them to learn for understanding, not knowledge.  We need to give them many opportunities to apply knowledge, to problem solve, to create and become passionate and fearless learners.

Our schools need to be equipped to teach with the technology tools that our students use in their everyday lives. Our strategic plan must reflect our changing world and help students to compete in this new interactive web world. These technologies are user friendly in a way that technologies have not been in the past -  anyone can become a lifelong learner.

Shift Control (Houston, We have a problem)

Sorry, I know the title is a little cheeky, but I just couldn't resist. Just watched Apollo 13.

Today was a good day. We (BK's Business Teacher, Diena Mennenga and Teacher Librarian, Theresa Reiter) attended the AEA's 'Shift Control" Session - day 1.

This morning we were introduced to National Teacher of the Year who is from Iowa and teaches in Johnson - Sarah Brown Wessling. A very innovative, tech savvy teacher! She presented to us some of the tools she uses in her classroom and gave all of us some very good ideas to work on for ours.

Below is the video from CNN (on YouTube) with President Obama recognizing her with this honor. Pretty cool!




In the afternoon we attended "Tech Bootcamp" conducted by Castle's Nick Sauer facilitating and Dr. Scott McLeod on the sidelines. It was very difficult for me to contain my excitement when I looked around the room. You see, I have an inner geek that is just struggling to get out, but not everyone understands. I compare it to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, but in a good way. Not a good vs. evil, but rather like the light in someone's eyes when they get it, and the glassy eyed look when they don't understand my passion for technology.

Anyway, getting back to the room. While looking around, I saw a diverse group of people as far as age, and tech abilities. However, each and everyone was totally attuned to Nick and Scott as they introduced all of us to the nuances of how to blog, subscribe to information on our Google Readers, and other techie things including Apple's iPad. Scott McLeod has a nifty little pen/highlighter stylus type utensil that works with the iPad that I am hoping to look at closer tomorrow or on Friday.

All of this keeps churning in my head.. how can we excite our teachers back at BK to use these tools? How can we as a group show them what all of this can be used for and how it will impact instruction and student learning ending up in student success? How can we get past the 'this takes so much time' statements? It does take time, but once it is done, it will be easier.

Everyone wears so many hats, but in my mind that shouldn't be an excuse to not do it. I don't think that BK can wait or take things too slow. The National Teacher of the Year, Sarah Brown Wessling's students are incredible examples of what we as instructors can do to inspire our students!

Did You Know?

At the Tech Bootcamp with Dr. McLeod!

This is going to be very interesting.  I like the fact that we are all here and can see what the struggles are and what happens when there is sweet success!  :-)