my wish for education

For this post to make any sense, you'll need to watch this video first. Go ahead, I think it's worth the four minutes. 

I remember the exact moment I first watched this little gem from Hank Green of Vlogbrothers fame. I was sitting in a lime green wing-back chair in Union Station during the lunch break of day 1 of the HECC conference. I'd just finished eating the first ever REAL SANDWICH I've ever received in one of those normally lack-luster boxed lunches you get when you attend such conferences. Was it the best sandwich I've ever eaten in my life? Hardly, but it was one glorious, transcendent, totally unexpected thing: gluten free. Having been actually, medically necessarily gluten-free since I was two, I'm very used one of two outcomes in a mass boxed lunch situation like this: 1. No idea what gluten-free is or 2. The same lunch everyone else got, minus the sandwich plus an extra apple or bag of chips. This was neither of those things. This was a pretty basic turkey and cheese with lettuce and tomato. But. It. Was. On. Real. Bread. That I could eat! AND there was a slice of flourless chocolate cake. I mean, come on!! 

So I was both happy and full and then I watched this video and was struck with a question: what would it be like if our students had moments of such unbridled excitement and enthusiasm in our classrooms? What kind of space would we need to build? What kind of culture would be need to nurture? Really good questions. Not sure that I have really good answers. Yet.

Need more excitement in your life? Here's my new favorite video:

#googlecardboard

I feel like Google Cardboard has been in the air this week. It keeps popping up on Twitter and in my Feedly reader in many blogs I follow. It was even on NPR on my way home from work one night this week!

It started with the new of Google Expeditions, the new program to bring virtual field trips to classrooms all around the country. I admit I get a little jealous when I see the posts of students and teachers alike mesmerized by the 360 degree view they have of a previously inaccessible-to-them part of the world. You can find out more about the Expeditions Pioneer Program here: https://www.google.com/edu/expeditions. 

Then I heard an interesting piece on All Things Considered on NPR about how the New York Times is using their capacity for old-school media distribution to send Google Cardboard viewers to their print subscribers so they can view the new VR content they are creating. They have one story already released, with more to come. You can listen to the whole story or read the transcript here: http://n.pr/1PGVAcA. 

Tech Times gave me yet another reason to want to move to New Zealand (other than the obvious reason that then I'd live in Middle Earth) - boxes of Kellogg's Nutri-Grain cereal come with DIY cardboard viewers! http://bit.ly/1PGXOZu. All you need are scissors, a butter knife, and tape (and an empty box of cereal) and you can build your own. Talk about buying cereal for the prize inside!

And then there was a great post on the EdTechTeam Google+ community page from Molly Schroeder on how students can use Google Street View to create something called photospheres that can then be viewed using Cardboard - so cool!

She also shared the fantastic resource embedded below, with LOTS of ways to get started with Cardboard in the classroom. Check out her presentation page here: http://bit.ly/1PGXx90. 


I can't wait to see where #googlecardboard pops up next!

Woo hoo!

There's a little bit of a funny story to this AWESOME badge (and why there isn't a Level 1 badge to match...yet!). I signed up to take the Level 1 exam at the beginning of October, since I'd made a promise to the Twitterverse that my professional goal for October was to become a Level 1 Google Educator. 

But then, I happened to pick that one afternoon last week when there was a wee little glitch with the Google. You may remember from the apocalyptic tweets that were blowing up Twitter that day. I guess it just goes to show how phenomenally consistent Google is with being not-down that it sends the digital world into a frenzy when there's a blip on the radar. 

Anyhoo, I wasn't able to finish my exam that day (and currently have a big fat fail on my exam record, which my type A side is having a bit of an issue processing, truth be told). I was actually kinda bummed because I though the scenario part of the exam was really pretty fun! 

So I thought, what the heck, let's go for Level 2 and a little less than three hours later, one super shiny badge to post for all the internet to see. 

I'll keep you posted on how Level 1 goes...

a blog in beta

This blog has been sitting in my Blogger account for at least a couple of months now. And I come back to write the dreaded 'first post' too many times to admit to in public. But then this morning I stumbled upon a a TEDTalk on YouTube (as you do when trolling your Twitter feed on a chilly morning in October when the rest of the school district is on fall break and the office feels especially empty) and realized that I needed to change my thinking.

The TedTalk was from TEDx BurnsvilleED and the speaker was Molly Schroder and really wasn't all that new (2013). But her challenge to acknowledge that we live in beta really stuck a cord. As a former teacher librarian and now tech trainer, I firmly believe that there is no end to learning. I've said many times that the day I'm not willing to learn is the day I need to leave the education field. So why did I feel it so necessary to have some polished, shiny, fully formed blog to send out into the void?

So here it is internet, a blog in beta. Because I'm in beta. Learning as I go, failing fast, iterating and improving.