Last week Ryan and I attended the OTA Sessions in Sioux Falls. Focused on social media, the event brought together people from the arts, creative fields like advertising and marketing, and businesses and non-profits that are increasingly using Facebook and blogs. A speaker who captured our attention was computer scientist, artist, and storyteller Jonathan Harris. [...]

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I am so excited to let everyone know that on April 1, 2010 you will see a new look for Verizon Thinkfinity. The new design for http://thinkfinity.org includes a change from MyThinkfinity to Thinkfinity Community. The new name really fits this new social networking environment. Thinkfinity has blended the best of web2.o tools such as [...]

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I was introduced to a new blog today Teach Paperless: Seeking Social Solutions to the Mysteries of 21st Century Teaching and Learning by Shelly Blake-Plock. She is challenging teachers to commit now to going paperless on Earth Day, April 22nd and so far she has over 825 teachers committed to not using any paper for [...]

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Our second day of collaboration was once again a great learning experience. The focus was on processes for meetings and conflict along with roles within a team.
We were able to watch a data team work through a five step process of looking at student data throughout the school year.
1. Collect and Chart Data
2. Analyze Strengths [...]

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Roar into National Wildlife Week with Thinkfinity! 
Just in time for the National Wildlife Week, Verizon Thinkfinity has launched a new feature highlighting free educational resources to bring the excitement of the animal kingdom to the classroom.  
Students will love learning about animals as they turn investigator and conduct animal research in Animal Inquiry and Observation. [...]

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Susan Sparks has been a great facilitator thus far for our Creating Collaborative Teams seminar. Today our goals were focus, structure and relationships.
Focus for team meetings, team expectations and team goals.
Structure: Identifying the differences between a group and a team from the start today. Many times in schools we look at teams and groups in [...]

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Tyler Krehbiel – Technology Coordinator; SW/WC Service Cooperative team shared a number of great resources that are available online for free.  Let the kids figure out the tech–you can focus on the teaching.  But where to find opensource software?  Beyond the usual search engines, or his excellent suggestions below, try osalt.com, sourceforge.net, or codeplex.com.

Audacity–excellent and [...]

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Jen Hegna from Byron School District (MN) gave a great overview at the SW/WC Tech Conference today of what Google Apps can provide to students and schools–you can view her presentation here.  Implementing in January 2010, they started with staff first and will roll out to students in May.  Some reasons they moved to Apps [...]

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A colleague shared this information with me and I can’t help but pass it on to you. Lewis and Clark Were Here is the title of an expedition by Maureen Oliver and Tony Fernandez in which they will be following the Lewis and Clark trail from the Pacific Northwest to St. Louis. They anticipate that [...]

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