Preparing for an Emergency Closing

On Wednesday, October 28th, the principal of our high school and I planned an experience for our weekly faculty meeting. We wanted to simulate the conditions that we may experience if faced with an emergency closure, either for H1N1, fire, tornado, or other reason to do so. At noon, the following email message was sent to our high school faculty: Upper School Colleagues, Our meeting today will begin at 3:30 as planned but we will not convene as a group in the conference room until 4:10.  Please look for an email message at 2:30 that explains what we will be […]

Explorer Hall of Fame – Google Earth and World History

Explorer Hall of FameThis year, our ninth and tenth grade history teachers are revamping and reshuffling their curricula. Because they are changing the content and the way that they are delivering the material, they are also rethinking each of the units that they are teaching. Later in the year, the sophomores will be working on a term paper. Tim Curren (tcurren@nscds.org), our World History II teacher, wanted to create an assignment that would re-introduce students and provide students an opportunity to practice the the skills that they will need to complete for the term paper, researching, note taking using NoodleBib, […]

Blowing a Trumpet for a Colleague – Student Blogging in the Classroom

As a technology mentor, we exert a tremendous amount of energy not only helping faculty and students learn the skills necessary to complete the current projects, but we also devote time to seeding faculty with new ideas and approaches that we know will help them accomplish their educational goals. More recently, these approaches and ideas include the incorporation of of a variety of Web 2.0 tools including wikis, blogs, podcasts which enable faculty and students the opportunities to share with a larger audience. Earlier in the year, I helped one of our French teachers, Beatrice McKenna (bmckenna@nscds.org), and her students […]

Podcast – danah boyd’s Social Media and Youth Culture: What Every Parent Should Know

On Wednesday, October 7th, the Family Awareness Network sponsored a presentation by danah boyd, entitled Social Media and Youth Culture: What Every Parent Should Know. ms. boyd has graciously allowed me to post this podcast for others to be able to access. In this presentation, danah talks about how society has changed from one which children have the opportunity to roam with others out in the neighborhood to one which children are isolated, occasionally socializing in organized play-dates, organized sports, and often over-scheduled. Children just want to connect and socialize with each other. Into this void, youth are increasingly turning […]

K12 Online Conference Announces 2009 Presenters

For the past three years, the K12 Online Conference would kick off the conference by releasing the the conference keynote on the second Monday of October. This year the conference is moving and will be releasing the opening keynote during the week of November 30th. This year’s keynote will be presented by Kim Cofino, who has outlined what her presentation will be. The beginning the week of December 7th and December 14th, there will be 51 different presenters from around the world who will be making their presentations available for viewing. The complete list of presenters can be accessed on […]