New Promethean Board

A few weeks ago I was presenting "Putting the 'You' in YouTube" at a national ed tech conference, when I went to reach into my purse. Much to my surprise, I almost grabbed a scorpion! Yikes!

Despite Being Slightly Panicked, I Managed To Snap A Photo

I carefully whisked it out the door and two women who happened to be standing by the doorway kindly helped me dispose of it. About ten minutes later I realized I should probably go apologize to those women since I had never even bet them, went charging at them with a scorpion and then disappeared. So I introduced myself, apologized, thanked them and chatted for a few minutes. It turns out they were vendors at the conference, and urged me to send them my contact information. Long story short, after answering some questions and sending them links to some of my presos, my blog and my YouTube channel they said they were eager to help me with technology in the classroom. I have since met with them a couple times and today our Promethean Board was delivered! 

In their words a Promethean Board is similar to a Smart Board but MUCH better! So far, I have to agree and I love the built in projector on top so our shadows don't block the board. Someone from the company is coming to do a few lessons with us next week and I can't wait to learn more about it! The students were VERY excited about this new classroom addition!

New York Times Article Mentioning This Class

YouTube Subtracts Racy and Raucous to Add a Teaching Tool

Fresh & Easy Night

This Wednesday, Sonoran Sky will be at the Fresh & Easy store at Scottsdale and Shea between 4-8pm for a PTO fundraising event.

My class worked with Mrs. Baumkirchner's Kindergarten class to write some commercial scripts and create the videos. We really enjoyed being the older, wiser buddies in this project!

Speaking of the PTO, watch the video below to see just one of the many ways the PTO has supported the school.

Family Movie Night

Have you heard about Family Movie Night? It's tonight, on the field and the movie begins at 6:30pm. Gates open at 5:30pm. The movie being shown is Mr. Poppers Penguins (rated PG).

My class worked closely with Mrs. Arn's 4th grade class to fully produce two commercials for the PTO. Roles included scriptwriting, acting, directing, editing and finalizing the production. The students did a terrific job!

Khan Academy

Although it has been around for several years, I really only learned about the Khan Academy this past summer. I've taken several courses to learn how to use it effectively and started implementing it in the classroom this week.
Students are able to login using their pvLearners account (because it is a Google Apps for Education Account) and have added me as a coach. The Khan Academy is an amazing resource that is going to make differentiation in (and out of) the classroom easier, and allow students more freedom to work at their own pace. After a few days of using it, I am VERY excited!
There is lots of information available regarding the Khan Academy, and I do not feel like I can possibly cram it all into one blog post. Ask your kids about it, try it out for yourself and take a peek at them using it in the classroom.

KPHO Appearance

Functional Writing with Bubble Gum

We had a lot of fun last week learning about writing instructions, specifically the steps to blow a bubble using bubble gum.

According to the students, the best part of the lesson was they all got to chew a piece of gum while writing their final draft. Yes, you read that right - chewing gum in school! The students were quite shocked!

The results of this writing activity were excellent! We learned about using details, transition words and also sentence structure and conventions. The improvements between the first draft and the final draft were vast!

Part of my "YouTube Star Teacher" requirements are to film, produce and upload videos that other teachers could potentially use. I've started recording a few lessons here and there to add to my channel. This lesson was a fun one so I thought I would try to make a brief video about it. The results can be seen here!

"Welcome to Christmas Morning..."

Standing Outside the Google Kirkland Offices.

Those were the first words I heard after being formally escorted into a meeting room at the Google offices in Kirkland, Washington at the first ever YouTube Teacher Studio. Displayed at each of the 15 chairs surrounding the table was a YouTube Flip HD video camera, a GorillaPod and a Bamboo tablet. 

YouTube Swag

Throughout this amazing day, our small class of 15 educators from around the world were treated to a several top-notch presentations and workshops. The first session was with history teacher James Sanders. He discussed various ways to incorporate YouTube effectively into a classroom and gave us lots of ideas regarding YouTube playlists, searching techniques and video quizzes.

The next session was with high school chemistry teacher and adjunct professor of education from the University of San Francisco, Ramsey Musallam.  His expertise is in screencasting and the power of capturing direct instruction using an approach known as flip teaching. Ramsey demonstrated how to make screencasts and showed us examples of how he incorporates them into his curriculum. Later we got some hands on experience using our new Bamboo tablets, a product I had not ever tried before, and also practiced screencasting. I really enjoyed the Bamboo tablet and need to practice with it before school starts. It will be an innovative addition to my classroom!

The best presentation of the day (in my opinion) was given by the inspirational and engaging Jim Sill, a TV and movie industry veteran who now works as a high school video production teacher. He exposed us the basics of video production and engaged us in a fascinating discussion about effective videos and digital storytelling. He showed us examples of good and bad videos and discussed their different components. Later we practiced by making and analyzing short videos using our brand new Flip Cams. 

The YouTube Teacher Studio was an incredible experience and it was nice to get a chance to discuss with like-minded educators how we are already using video in our classrooms and brainstorm effective ways we could potentially incorporate YouTube. 
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After this intensive day (plus some follow up a few days later and several things I can't disclose due to the NDA) I am thrilled to be able to call myself by the official title, "YouTube Star Teacher" - one of only fifteen worldwide at this point!