Other Districts using iPads

Roslyn School District has developed a teacher and administrator forum to share ideas about using iPads in the classroom. This short video tells about their project and why they are currently using iPads.
Here's the link to the Forum.

Down the road a bit...

Here are some examples of where we want to go within our 5 year Innovative proposal  to integrate interactive and collaborative learning activities with 21st Century skills and technology.

We'll be doing specific research on interactive boards, what they can do, how much they cost, best use for our students, etc, but I wanted to take a peek at these videos to get an idea of what these interactive boards can do....how would you use one in your classroom?

Promethian Boards
Smart Boards
Mimio  for whiteboards

You can also search  "how to use Smartboards" in You tube to get all sorts of ideas on how these interactive digital whiteboards are in use in classrooms today.

Passing the iPad during Staff Development Day

In order to get our feet wet, why not start passing the iPads during Staff  Development Days?

Each grade level sat together, and using ABCNotes (Interactive Sticky Notes) on an iPad per grade table, created implementation timelines for our Caring Schools Community, Steps to Respect, and Protected Classes curriculum. Many of our teachers used an iPad for the first time!

We'll also be using the grade level  iPads to give feedback on our Single School Plan and  reflections regarding our student performance data analysis. And at future meetings they can be used to record reflections, brainstorm ideas for discussion or sharing for different agenda topics.

Multiple screens of notes can be synchronized so all the iPads' notes merge and show the total collection on each iPad, and they can be sent by email in a list format, still identifying each individual post-it within the list. With a single click you can also snap a picture of the screen that is saved as a jpg in the gallery to see the actual post-it representation.

I just love this simple app! I started using mine daily last year with hourly agendas projected on the wall so each of my classes could view the activities that would occur during their weekly Media Center visit, which I then added teaching comments to and forwarded to my iPad journal which serves as a digital lesson planner.

This year, with an iPad on every table, imagine the brainstorming and sharing of ideas that will happen as we build collaborative intelligence! Can't wait for the school year to start!

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What's the cultural literacy of this fall's college freshmen?

Beloit College publishes an online list each fall so that faculty have a clear view of their students' life knowledge and cultural literacy when entering their classes.
Take a peek....think about our students:
Here's the 2011 list:

2012 Grads (incoming freshman)List

The Mindset List for the Class of 2015

Andre the Giant, River Phoenix, Frank Zappa, Arthur Ashe and the Commodore 64 have always been dead.
Their classmates could include Taylor Momsen, Angus Jones, Howard Stern's daughter Ashley, and the Dilley Sextuplets.

1. There has always been an Internet ramp onto the information highway.
2. Ferris Bueller and Sloane Peterson could be their parents.
3. States and Velcro parents have always been requiring that they wear their bike helmets.
4. The only significant labor disputes in their lifetimes have been in major league sports.
5. There have always been at least two women on the Supreme Court, and women have always commanded U.S. Navy ships.
6. They “swipe” cards, not merchandise.
7. As they’ve grown up on websites and cell phones, adult experts have constantly fretted about their alleged deficits of empathy and concentration.
8. Their school’s “blackboards” have always been getting smarter.
9. “Don’t touch that dial!”….what dial?
10. American tax forms have always been available in Spanish.
11. More Americans have always traveled to Latin America than to Europe.
12. Amazon has never been just a river in South America.
13. Refer to LBJ, and they might assume you're talking about LeBron James.
14. All their lives, Whitney Houston has always been declaring “I Will Always Love You.”
15. O.J. Simpson has always been looking for the killers of Nicole Simpson and Ronald Goldman.
16. Women have never been too old to have children.
17. Japan has always been importing rice.
18. Jim Carey has always been bigger than a pet detective.
19. We have never asked, and they have never had to tell.
20. Life has always been like a box of chocolates.
21. They’ve always gone to school with Mohammed and Jesus.
22. John Wayne Bobbitt has always slept with one eye open.
23. There has never been an official Communist Party in Russia.
24. “Yadda, yadda, yadda” has always come in handy to make long stories short.
25. Video games have always had ratings.
26. Chicken soup has always been soul food.
27. The Rocky Horror Picture Show has always been available on TV.
28. Jimmy Carter has always been a smiling elderly man who shows up on TV to promote fair elections and disaster relief.
29. Arnold Palmer has always been a drink.
30. Dial-up is soooooooooo last century!
31. Women have always been kissing women on television.
32. Their older siblings have told them about the days when Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake and Christina Aguilera were Mouseketeers.
33. Faux Christmas trees have always outsold real ones.
34. They’ve always been able to dismiss boring old ideas with “been there, done that, gotten the T-shirt.”
35. The bloody conflict between the government and a religious cult has always made Waco sound a little whacko.
36. Unlike their older siblings, they spent bedtime on their backs until they learned to roll over.
37. Music has always been available via free downloads.
38. Grown-ups have always been arguing about health care policy.
39. Moderate amounts of red wine and baby aspirin have always been thought good for the heart.
40. Sears has never sold anything out of a Big Book that could also serve as a doorstop.
41. The United States has always been shedding fur.
42. Electric cars have always been humming in relative silence on the road.
43. No longer known for just gambling and quickie divorces, Nevada has always been one of the fastest growing states in the Union.
44. They’re the first generation to grow up hearing about the dangerous overuse of antibiotics.
45. They pressured their parents to take them to Taco Bell or Burger King to get free pogs.
46. Russian courts have always had juries.
47. No state has ever failed to observe Martin Luther King Day.
48. While they’ve been playing outside, their parents have always worried about nasty new bugs borne by birds and mosquitoes.
49. Public schools have always made space available for advertising.
50. Some of them have been inspired to actually cook by watching the Food Channel.
51. Fidel Castro’s daughter and granddaughter have always lived in the United States.
52. Their parents have always been able to create a will and other legal documents online.
53. Charter schools have always been an alternative.
54. They’ve grown up with George Stephanopoulos as the Dick Clark of political analysts.
55. New kids have always been known as NKOTB.
56. They’ve always wanted to be like Shaq or Kobe: Michael Who?
57. They’ve often broken up with their significant others via texting, Facebook, or MySpace.
58. Their parents sort of remember Woolworths as this store that used to be downtown. 
59. Kim Jong-il has always been bluffing, but the West has always had to take him seriously.
60. Frasier, Sam, Woody and Rebecca have never Cheerfully frequented a bar in Boston during primetime.
61. Major League Baseball has never had fewer than three divisions and never lacked a wild card entry in the playoffs.
62. Nurses have always been in short supply.
63. They won’t go near a retailer that lacks a website.
64. Altar girls have never been a big deal.
65. When they were 3, their parents may have battled other parents in toy stores to buy them a Tickle Me Elmo while they lasted.
66. It seems the United States has always been looking for an acceptable means of capital execution.
67. Folks in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City have always been able to energize with Pepsi Cola.
68. Andy Warhol is a museum in Pittsburgh.
69. They’ve grown up hearing about suspiciously vanishing frogs.
70. They’ve always had the privilege of talking with a chatterbot.
71. Refugees and prisoners have always been housed by the U.S. government at Guantanamo.
72. Women have always been Venusians; men, Martians.
73. McDonalds coffee has always been just a little too hot to handle.
74. “PC” has come to mean Personal Computer, not Political Correctness.
75. The New York Times and the Boston Globe have never been rival newspapers.

Copyright© 2011 Beloit College
Mindset List is a registered trademark

iPads are for Everybody!

The orangutans at the Milwaukee zoo are now discovering the iPad! I'll keep checking to see how their program advances along with our new "Pass the iPad" program at Bay Farm! I hear the orangutans are getting really  proficient at Angry Birds and Draw Free. Although I'm not sure that we will have Angry Birds on our iPads, I will check out Draw Free to see if it's a drawing program to consider. There are also a few interactive books the orangutans seem to go back to again and again. I wonder which titles they liked the  best?

Here's a link to one of the articles.....there will be lots of further animal studies using iPads to come for sure!