Explore STEM Careers at Discovery

Discovery Education is a company fueled by innovation, full of forward-thinkers who are passionate about harnessing the power of media and technology to better address and empower today’s 21st century learners. For #GivingTuesday, Discovery Education will hold a livestream event for students nationwide to hear from our company’s best and brightest employees. Students will have the opportunity to experience first-hand some of the unexpected and exciting careers that are powered by science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). On Tuesday, December 3rd from 11am to 1pm EST, students will meet 4 revolutionary STEM professionals—a Mobile App Developer, Social Media & Communications Executive, a Producer & Editor, and a Graphic Designer. These 4 individuals will answer questions and share insights that will inspire curiosity about the vast array of career options that are available to students who pursue STEM. Discovery Education’s App Developer is an innovator who used his knowledge of STEM to create one of the nation’s first fully digital and interactive digital textbooks, now used by hundreds of thousands of students nationwide. Our Director of Communications is a STEM storyteller, collaborating with social media and print publications to engage the public in the important work being done by education leaders on the ground. Discovery Education’s lead Graphic Designer weaves the “A” into STEM, creating remarkable imagery and visuals using advanced computer software programs. Our Producer & Editor records and edits our incredible footage with advanced technology to create engaging programming that makes STEM come to life in the classroom. This virtual experience to engage classrooms throughout the United States, inspiring thousands of students to dive in and discover exciting career paths that STEM subjects can lead to. Hope you can join us! You can register for the livestream at the link below: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/explore-stem-careers-at-discovery-tickets-9446036349

Create Student or Teacher Lessons at Educreations

Here’s another way for students to submit work from the iPads without having student email accounts.

Today’s site has been around for awhile and is quite easy to use.  It won’t work for submitting a long typed paper but would be quite good for digital storytelling in lower grades.

The site/APP is called Educreations.  It’s like Explain Everything, but free!  Here are the basics:

• Teachers can create a free account and create classes that are assigned a unique code.
• The students can join that class on the iPad by using the assigned code and creating a username instead of an email.
• Students can create lessons by taking pictures on the ipad and importing them, importing pictures from a website, drawing on the pictures, adding written or text notations, and adding voice recording.  So a student can use a diagram or picture to explain a concept or story both orally and with added notations.
• When the project is saved, it will be available for the teacher to see on his/her computer.  
• If every student in the class created an explanation of the life-cycle of a butterfly, they would all show up in the teachers folder that can be viewed by the teacher on any computer at school or at home. No worrisome transfer of files from iPad to computer or opening 20 emails with attached files.
• Teachers can create lessons or explanations which are available to the students when they sign in.
• See how a teacher used this to explain an anatomy lesson: http://www.educreations.com/lesson/view/agonist-antagonist-muscle-pairings/375924/
• Students could do the same thing on the iPads.

 Check out their page at:  http://www.educreations.com/
 

BYOT @ Rome High School

Recently, Rome High tried a "Bring Your Own Technology Day".  Please click on the comment link below and let us know how it went!  What were your expectations?  Did it go well?  How did the students respond?  Do you have suggestions for further BYOT's?

Have You Used Google Drive Lately?

Although I have been recommending Google Docs/Drive for a long time, I sometimes forget that some people are not aware of some of the possibilities of Google Drive.  Not only can you create and store documents in the “cloud”, you can also share documents and collaborate with others.  I’ve said that before, but after having my Google senses stimulated at last week’s technology conference, I’ve decided to share a demonstration file with you.  I have created a “shared” document that can be accessed by anyone (even without a gmail account) by going to the following link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1AHBMddT-yul2jySO22bYjAxYV9VA-zT9VwvEKdqYeeI/edit?usp=sharing

or I can shorten that link by going to Google's URL-shortening website, http://goo.gl  and pasting in the longer link to create the shorter link here: http://goo.gl/osC9e9

Goo.gl will also create a QR code for that site, which you can access by scanning with any QR code scanner on your iPad:

Once you reach the site, anyone can edit it for all to see.  You can even see people typing on the page in real time.  Please give it a try and let me know who gets there by typing your name on the page.

There are some obvious problems with this method: Students can edit or delete other’s comments and everything is anonymous when done this way.  However, if we get school-wide gmail (which is a possibility) you could share your documents to student-specific gmail accounts and they would have to login to edit.  But even anonymously, you might find this useful in a computer lab situation where you can monitor students as they work.  For students you might find it useful to create a shared spreadsheet with labelled rows or columns to keep students from overwriting other’s data.

Another option (that works better with the iPads) to have students input and see each other’s work is to create a Google Form (like this survey on texting that I sent last year, http://goo.gl/woRPn3 ).  Then you can “share” the resulting spreadsheet in the “view only” mode so that students can see, but can’t change other’s information.

You can see (but not edit) the results of the “texting” survey I conducted last year by clicking this shared link: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Ask4aQhNXxIEdDJ4SDZHZ1E4OUNYcWFmNFgxbTE3SlE&usp=sharing

I created the Form.  You submitted the info.  Google compiled it into the spreadsheet.

Are you still asking for information on paper and then typing it into the computer?  That’s so “Old School” !!!

“Google it”, doesn’t just mean “search for it” any more!!!