This Kid is Alright

This is the third year of the EduCon conference (http://www.educon22.org/), one of the more interesting phenomenons that I can think of in recent times. The genesis of this conference was built from an idea and brainstorm and has it has grown into a sold-out, 500 physical attendee conference. Once again, there is a buzz as members of the edublogger/twittersphere are descending on Philadelphia for three days of conversations and brainstorming. This is the third year that I will not be able to physically attend. During the first year, I was unable to attend primarily due to my obligations to my […]

What’s The Buzz – Tell Me What’s Happening, pt. 1

Why should you want to know? Don’t you mind about the future? Don’t you try to think ahead? Save tomorrow for tomorrow, think about today instead. What’s the buzz, tell me what is happening I could give you facts and figures. Even give you plans and forecasts from What’s the Buzz, Jesus Christ Superstar by Andrew Lloyd Weber  and Tim Rice It is already a trending topic. There are more conversations and rumors swirling about the announcement that is going to be made tomorrow, at 12:00 noon CST ( – 6:00 GMT). Just like 26 years ago, everyone is whipping  themselves […]

VoiceThread as an Assessment Tool

Over the past 18 months, I have been collaborating with two of our history teachers, Frank Dachille and Tim Curren, with their project to revamp our 9th and 10th History courses. This year, rather than creating a written assessment  culminating the 9th grade curriculum, Frank wanted to create an assessment where student recorded their response to one of thirteen essential questions. During our brainstorming, I showed him VoiceThread, which I believed would meet 85% of his original goals. After playing with an example project, Frank enthusiastically embraced VoiceThread to use for his assessment. For this, students had to create their […]

Test-Driving Collaborative Workstation

We are in the midst of planning for a potential renovation of our high school, beginning as early as this upcoming June. I have been asked to sit in many meetings with the architects discussing what the new learning studios will potentially look like. One of the solutions that they have proposed is implementing Steelcase’s media:scape (see picture on right) workstations in a collaborative  learning studio and in project spaces which are adjacent to three learning studios on one of our floors. This system works by pulling a “puck” which connects to the video out port of your computer system. By hitting […]

Observations on My Use of Technology

Yesterday, while working at home, a realization crystallized for me. For 80% of what I do, I am working within two applications, my web browser and a twitter client. Nothing more, nothing less. This has occurred more significantly since we migrated to Google Apps for Education. Occasionally, I will also use other applications. I do use a podcast client, Juice, connected to my iTunes library to fill my iPod with content. I do use Adobe PhotoShop once in awhile for photo manipulation. I use Audacity for audio editing. And yes, I am not able to break my Microsoft Office habit […]