Media Center Naming Contest Results

   "The Park Center Learning Commons" is the new name of our learning space at Park Center Senior High, with the tag line, "The Nexus of the School." Special thanks to senior Tyler Linton for his winning submission, and to teacher Paul Shriver, who is receiving honorable mention for his submission of "The Nexus." We expect to generally refer to the space as "The Learning Commons." We're excited about the new name, and we're even more excited by the impending changes in the physical space, the virtual space, and how they are used.
   Along with a new name, the Learning Commons is getting a new look. Besides new carpet, we are installing four collaboration tables with large monitors on the ends that can display virtually any mobile device. We are adding 18 mobile device charging stations. There will be a new MakerSpace with a 3-D printer, 3-D scanner, large format flatbed scanner, a poster printer, and lots of things to create whatever people might need for projects. If our furniture request is granted, we will have a new lounge area with flexible seating to allow for reconfiguration according to the needs of the moment. Many books are being moved to the perimeter to open up more space in the large common area for these new stations.
   It's an exciting time at the nexus of our school, the Park Center Learning Commons!

Blogging for Mrs. Yang's EL 5 Class

Blogging 

For a basic understanding of what a blog is, go to: http://youtu.be/NjwUHXoi8lM If you feel pretty confident about what it is, continue to Part 1.

Part 1: 

Set up your own blog on Blogger.com & add your first post. You will need to log on using your school Google Apps account or a personal Google account. For example, for Mr. Hilgendorf, that address would be hilgendorfd@apps.district279.org. Your first post should include a video and a paragraph about it. Here are video instructions for setting up your blog. Once you've completed this step, email the URL of your blog address to: yangp@district279.org. This is how you turn in your work. Your address should be something like, "http://jakaribrown.blogspot.com." Do not use nick names.

Part 2: 

Embed a video on your blog according to Mrs. Yang's instructions. Example video: Some keywords for finding videos: collaboration, "24/7 education", "open learning", "web 2.0", "school 2.0", edtech, connectivity, social networks+schools, "personal learning networks, "education+think tanks", "21st century skills", "flat schools", "creative education", "new schools", "student centered learning", remix. Once you're done, it should look something like this:

Once you've found the video you want to embed, click on the "Insert a Video" icon in the menu bar of your blog:

Then upload your video from the Yang folder on the I drive. Save your changes and preview your blog post. If it looks good, publish it. That makes it public, so others can see it.

Part 3: 

Follow Mrs. Yang's Intro to EL 5 blog at http://el5introductions.blogspot.com/. Post a comment on her blog about whether you already knew how to blog, and if you did, where did you learn how to do it. To comment, click on the text of her post.

Challenge Task (Optional, but Fun!): 

Blogs are great for keeping up to date with other people, so for a challenge, you'll comment on and follow some of your peers' blogs, and will tag the posts you've created so far. First, choose at least five of your peers' blogs (we'll post a list of them in Mrs. Yang's Intro to EL5 blog), watch and comment on their video. Commenting on blogs allows us to ask questions of one another, make suggestions, or simply to reply to what has been written or posted. Once you've commented, you should then "follow" those blogs. Once someone has "followed" you, you can see their picture on your blog's sidebar. Then when you log into my blog and look at the Dashboard, you can see what's been updated on the blogs you're following. Cool, right? If you notice that someone's blog has not yet been "followed" by anyone but Mrs. Yang, you might choose to follow them.

Next,"tag" the posts you've created so far. Tagging allows you to use keywords to categorize your posts, which is really helpful if you blog regularly. To do this, just fill in words that help define the categories of your post in the "Labels" field, under the editing window for a given entry. Place commas between tags.

Finally, write a blog post telling us who you're "following" and also what tags you created for your first several posts. So, for the challenge: Comment on at least 5 people's blogs Follow Mrs. Yang on her blog AND the other blogs on which you commented. Use keywords to tag the posts you've created so far. Write a post about about who you're "following" and what tags you've used so far.

TL (Teacher-Librarian) News Night Clip, St. Patrick's Day, 2014

This is my part of a presentation, "Promoting Student Voice in the Library" from the TL News Night on March 17, 2014. The full presentation can be viewed here.

Park Center Legislator Video Project

Students and staff at Park Center Senior High collaborated to create a 10-minute video to highlight the school's successes in closing the educational gaps between white students and students of color. The video was shown to Minnesota State Legislators attending the district's annual meeting with them, which was held at Park Center on February 5th this year. Superintendent Kate Maguire, School Board members, and other stakeholders made presentations based on the district's legislative platform. The video is below. A less-finished channel 12 report about the project is also featured here.

Video created by students and staff above.

Channel 12 feature about the video production. 

Mobile Device Tips

The 23 Mobile Things Mobile Device Tips and Tricks tool (tool #2) was quite a lengthy one for me, but valuable. I am new to Android phones, so it was good to learn more about the settings, etc. However, I often found the instructions vague at the recommended site for my Samsung Galaxy S. It is worth the time to set up your mobile device how you want it, with all of the functions that Smart phones have to offer today. To find tips and tricks for yours, either go to the first link on this page or do a web search for your device or operating system type followed by "tips OR tricks."

Park Center Senior High Video Shows Ways to Decrease Racial Disparities

As a means for presenting information to visiting Minnesota State Legislators, a handful of Park Center Senior High students and staff collaborated to create this video that demonstrates ways that Park Center has increased the the graduation rate of black students to the highest degree of any high school with a population of over 50 students in the State. Credit is owed partially to compensatory and achievement and integeration funding passed by the State Legislature. I am proud to be a member of the community responsible for this decrease in racial disparities as well as part of the team to produce this video. The student involvement in the creation of this video was enormous. Students in the International Baccalaureate Film class and the TV Production class spent many hours filming and editing, under the guidance of teachers and school administrators. Check out the results for yourself! Park Center Senior High closing racially-based educational disparities.

23 Mobile Things 1: Setting up a blog

I am registering for the 23 Mobile Things program, sponsored by Minnesota's multitype libraries. The idea is to learn about 23 applications that can be used on mobile devices and to blog about them as you learn. The first "thing" is to start a blog. Since I recently started this new one, with the focus on creating ditties for student mnemonic content retention, I thought that I would include a link to the ditty that I wrote about the mission of the Minnesota Educational Media Organization (MEMO), whose name, by the way, is about to change to Information and Technology Educators of Minnesota (ITEM). Here is a link to that ditty.

Rebranding Dhaivyd

   I have stopped maintaining my blog oriented toward technology professional development for staff at my school, Park Center Senior High, as I've gone to another program for supporting staff in this endeavor. I realized that I needed a new venue for sharing my ideas, and have also been enjoying the concept - and beginning to enjoy the implementation - of a curriculum that is rich with musical mnemonics. My vision is to create musical ditties, and help students create ditties, that remind them of the core parts of lessons they are learning. Thus was born the alliterative title of this blog, "Dhaivyd, Ditty Dude."

    In November, 2013, I participated in two events associated with the American Association of School Librarians annual conference in Hartford, Connecticut which allowed me to express my musical propensities. The first was at David Loertscher's Treasure Mountain Research Retreat, in which I offered to give an improvisational summary of the event. The second was the same service for the first AASL Unconference, spearheaded by the illustrious Dr. Joyce Valenza. Here is a video rendition of the former, captured on the cell phone of Dawn R. Nelson.