Moodle Moment: Necklace Maker Analogy

Evan gives an overview of the "Necklace-Maker Analogy" when it comes to building online courses, whether for adults or for students.

OLLIE Participant Spotlight: Sandra Campie

Sandra Campie has taught elementary math and science and served as an AEA math and science

consultant for the past 13 years and is about to take her experiences as a teacher and math/science consultant online. She believes the future of education lies in personalizing student learning, and that online learning offers choices.

In January, she will be teaching Iowa Core Fraction Domain for Grades 3-5 for AEA PD Online. The course is focused on helping teachers develop a deep understanding of fractions and how to teach them.

To prepare for teaching online, Sandra has completed the OLLIE (Online Learning for Iowa Educators) online course series. The OLLIE courses allowed her to focus on her goal of developing an online course for math teachers while at the same time receiving technology support for online learning, course facilitation, and assessment of student learning in an online environment.

“Online teaching is ever changing and growing in knowledge about the online learner, “ Campie         said. “I feel like a pioneer because it is a new vehicle for learning. I learned so much about     facilitating, things I wish I had learned a long time ago.”

“Because of our distance physically from our students, connecting virtually is really, really important,” she continued. “I also learned that it is easier to facilitate self-assessment tools and automatic assessment feedback than face-to-face in a large group setting.”

“Educators who want to improve their ability to meet individual student needs and learning preferences in a blended or an online environment will benefit from the OLLIE series,” she concluded.

Thanks, Sandra, for being a pioneer in Iowa’s quest to improve online learning for learners across the state.

There's An APP for That!

There is always an “app” for everything it seems—too many to sort through. And it takes a lot of time to discover new apps, let alone learn how to use them well. How do you find apps that you use regularly?  My devices seem to have a ton of them—and a bunch that I hardly, if ever, use. But I also hate to remove them (yes, I am a saver—maybe on the verge of being a hoarder-LOL).

Here is the list of the Top 100 Apps for 2014. How many do you know about and use? This list was complied by Jane Hart from 1.038 votes from learning professionals from 61 countries worldwide.

Can you guess what the No 1 tool is for 6^th year running (before you look at the slideshow)?

Twitter. Interesting—I think some people are still trying to figure out how and why to use Twitter.

Check out her list—there are some new ones that I need to find out more about as I still have room on my devices for more “stuff”.

Top 100 Tools for Learning 2014 from Jane Hart

You may also be interested in reading her blog post called
The Web is 25 years old today – so how has it changed the way we learn?
Updated 26 August 2014.

What's your favorite app? Did it make the Top 100 list? 
 

Have a great Thanksgiving holiday with family and friends.

Peggy Steinbronn, Ed.D.

AEA PD Online Instructional Designer

www.aeapdonline.org 

Science Lab Safety Learning Opportunities for Students.

While the Student Personalized Learning System is still in pilot phase we are working to add content that supports the curriculum.  This system now has Science Lab Safety content that  teachers of school districts could assign any or all of them to their students.   Here is the current listing:

• Lab Safety: Chemistry
• Lab Safety: General Science
• Lab Safety: Biology

Soon to come Physical Science content

If you are interested contact a member of the AEA PD Online team to become a member of the pilot.

Moodle Moment: Diigo in Moodle

Our Moodle Moment takes a look at two uses of Diigo within Moodle: 1) as a collaborative annotation tool, and 2) as a group bookmarking tool.

The OLLIE lesson on Diigo can be found at http://bit.ly/olliediigo

Upcoming Courses (Dec. 1, 2014-Jan.15, 2015)

See below for a list of upcoming online professional learning opportunities. To register, click on the activity

number listed with each course. To conduct your own search for professional development classes, download the AEA PD Online app at myapp.is/aeapdonline or click here to go to the AEA PD Online catalog.

Google Sites

Register at 22012899991505

Course Dates: Dec.1, 2014-Jan.26, 2015
Credit(s): 2

Pinterest: Using Pins, Boards, and More in Your Classroom

Register at 22022299991507

Course Dates: Dec. 3, 2014-Dec. 30, 2014

Credit(s): 2

Developing Student-Directed Learning

Register at 22010499991501

Course Dates: Dec. 11, 2014-Jan. 22, 2015

Credit(s): 3 (renewal only)

iEvaluate

Register at 22017299991509

Course Dates: Jan. 5-Feb. 27, 2015

Credit(s): 2 (renewal only)

Iowa Core Fraction Domain

Register at 22023299991501

Course Dates: Jan. 5-Feb. 16, 2015

Credit(s): 2

Pinterest in the Classroom

Register at 22019999991511

Course Dates: Jan. 5-Feb. 1, 2015

Credit(s): 2

Using Iowa AEA Online Databases in the Social Studies Classroom

Register at 22006799991501

Course Dates: Jan. 5-Feb. 16, 2015

Credit(s): 3

Using the Chromebooks in the Language Arts Classroom

Register at 22022799991501

Course Dates: Jan. 5-Feb. 9, 2015

Credit(s): 2

MOLLIE: Blended Learning

Register at 22015099991504

Course Dates: Jan. 7-Feb. 10, 2015

Credit(s): 2

OLLIE: Technology for Online Instruction: Moodle

Register at 22005399991502

Course Dates: Jan. 7-Feb. 10, 2015

Credit(s): 2

Pinterest: Using Pins, Boards, and More in Your Classroom

Register at 22022299991504

Course Dates: Jan. 7-Feb. 3, 2015

Credit(s): 2

Building ELA Foundational Skills-The Voweletics Method

Register at 22016699991504

Course Dates: Jan. 12-Mar. 8, 2015

Credit(s): 2

iEvaluate

Register at 22017299991510

Course Dates: Jan. 12-Feb. 15, 2015

Credit(s): 2 (renewal only)

Introduction to Google Apps

Register at 22007899991505

Course Dates: Jan. 12-Feb. 15, 2015

Credit(s): 2

Total Participation Techniques

Register at 22020199991503

Course Dates: Jan. 12-Feb. 13, 2015

Credit(s): 2

What Great Teachers Do Differently

Register at 22020399991505

Course Dates: Jan. 12-Feb. 20, 2015

Credit(s): 3

OLLIE: Introduction to the Online Learner

Register at 22001399991505

Course Dates: Jan. 14-Feb. 3, 2015

Credit(s): 1

Free Webinar Blended Learning Solutions for Language Learning Success from eSchool News

Please join ESchool News for a Webinar on November 18th at 2PM ET on how to create effective digital and classroom-based solutions for ELL programs in any learning environment.

https://event.on24.com/eventRegistration/EventLobbyServlet?target=reg20.jsp&eventid=890727&sessionid=1&key=D9F334DA5A021AFB9DDE1F8F2B7F2EC2&sourcepage=register

AEA PD Online: Live!

AEA PD Online: Live! is a service of AEA PD Online and the Iowa Area Education

Agencies.  We bring to Iowa educators on-demand professional development in a variety of formats, including webinars, presentations, round-table discussions, and recorded live events.
Click here to see our calendar of upcoming events and registration links. In addition, AEA PD Online: Live! partners with many external providers of quality webinar series.  You can link to those partners in our event calendar.

If your group would like help in creating a webinar email us at rbrookhart@aeapdonline.org.

Games and Learning

I received an email newsletter from Merlot (a curated collection of free and open online teaching, learning, and faculty development services contributed and used by an international education community.) and in reading it, one link lead to another, to another link, and so on...

I arrived at a website with a very intriguing presentation made with Prezi. It was about games and learning--video type games and learning. It is worth taking a look, although it takes a few minutes to get through it--especially if you click on all the links and watch the embedded videos. But of course that is what made it so intriguing.

Playing to Learn by Maria Andersen.

What do you think? I think learning should have more fun in it. Research is telling us that learning happens when students are engaged and having fun. How can we do that without making the content seem trivial? How can it be done with authentic activities--so it doesn't seem contrived?

Want more on this topic? Then check out this article from THE Journal: Five Skills That Games Teach Better Than Textbooks, by Dian Schaffhauser, 11.05.2014 .

In the Spotlight

Have you seen Osmo? It is used with an iPad and lets you "play outside the iPad"--so to speak. The Osmo website describes how Osmo works:

"Osmo has a magical ability to turn physical objects and interactions into digital game elements. The technology that makes this possible is called Reflective Artificial Intelligence (AI), a phrase we created to describe the process that allows the iPad to make sense of what it sees. There are two main components of Reflective AI: the red Osmo reflector (a mirror), and the computer vision algorithms that process the data. Working together, the reflector and our computer vision software give the iPad the ability to integrate physical objects into our games in real time." (from http://blog.playosmo.com/)

Sounds complicated to me. But watch how kids interact with it:

Pretty awesome! I think it will go on my Christmas list this year. I hope my grandkids let me play it with them. :)

 Peggy Steinbronn, Ed.D.

AEA PD Online Instructional Designer

www.aeapdonline.org