Project -- Providing Some Focus

My work on the Visual Presentation Toolkit (a google site) has not only helped me to practice using many tools we looked at in this class (youtube playlists, drawing, forms), but is also helping me get mentally ready and excited for the school year.  I have some more work to finish up before I think the site is ready for kids, but it is getting close. I have spent a lot of time watching videos and looking at websites on design and specific apps.  Whenever I am looking at a possible site or tutorial , I think about the range of learners in 4th through 6th grades and how useful the resource will be to the kids in that range.  There are plenty of google tool tutorials, but I am struggling to find ones that are both kid friendly and current on certain tools -- like Google sites.  So while the site is getting close to completion,  I want to create a few screencasts for tutorials on some of the apps I am featuring and how we will use them at school.  

Visual Presentation Toolkit

I am a little daunted by and also really enjoying my new project.  I have been focusing on the resources that will be housed in this toolkit.  I have spent a bit of time being reminded that the internet is full of wonderful resources, total junk, and everything in between.  In other words -- I have been watching a lot of videos.  Some of the resources I am including are a little old for my students (for example the Google for Work videos, but I think they are worth including as they are well made and include some useful information that I think is visually accessible.  I have struggled to find upper elementary friendly resources that also include audio.  I am reluctant to include too many resources that are heavily text-based, as I think such sites will be challenging for a portion of EMES learners.  I am getting ready to start making some video tutorials and plan to use different apps for that work so as to practice using them and be able to show kids some of the different tools in action.  My Visual Presentation Toolkit home page now includes a Lego Movie Maker video.

Whirlwind Romance with a New Project

I have gathered resources and drafted prompts to use as part of my Turtle of Oman literature project.   I will definitely be seeing that project work again -- later this year -- but as I read more about personalized learning I just didn't feel that my literature project was Mr. Right after all.  For the last few days I have been flirting with a new project and I just decided to jump in.  My new project is a Visual Presentation Toolkit. One part of my work with EMES learners  -- both in library class and as part of tech integration work in the classroom -- is supporting their creation of visual presentations to express their ideas.  EMES students create book trailers, persuasive presentations, informational presentations, PSAs, and more.  In any class there are students with more technology experience than others and it is always a challenge in opening up lots of options to allow for student choice and still being able to support all learners with the basics of understanding and respecting copyright, manipulating text, adding audio, etc.  Creating a toolkit will allow me to support more personalization of the learning experience as students will be able to choose to access on-demand tutorials and resources or access direct group instruction.  Students who are absent or would like a reminder will also be able to use the toolkit.  As part of this work I want use Google forms for exit tickets to be able to quickly check-in to see where learners are on their project work.