Archive for April, 2009:


NETA09 Podcasts and A fun Star Wars Remix Video

This evening I learned about the YouTube video “Star Wars: Retold (by someone who hasn’t seen it)” by listening to Justin Karkow’s “Digital Storytelling Frame by Frame” presentation on the 2009 Nebraska Educational Technology Association Podcast channel. As a big Star Wars fan, I found this remix quite amusing and fun. Nice use of Final

(Read More…)

Help Needed! WordPress commenting isn’t working (WordPress database error Duplicate entry)

Published by in blogs on April 29th, 2009

Ah, these are the moments I wish I had my own IT staff. If you’re a WordPress or mySQL guru perhaps you can help me! I am running WordPress on my main blog (“Moving at the Speed of Creativity”) and the blog has stopped accepting comments for some reason, as of Monday night (April 27,

(Read More…)

Visualizing Twitter

I created the following image using Twitter Mosaic and stitched the images together from separate screen captures using SeaShore. This is rather overwhelming, particularly when I consider how FEW educators (overall) are utilizing social networking tools like Twitter currently. Thanks to everyone in my Twitter PLN who replied to my inquiry / tweet today about

(Read More…)

Day 2 of SMART Notebook training at CSD

These are my notes from day 2 for “Level 2″ training on SMART Notebook 10 at CSD in St Louis, Missouri. Colleen Schafer from Buffalo, NY, is again our wonderful instructor. These are my notes from the training, MY OWN COMMENTS AND REFLECTIONS ARE IN ALL CAPS. (My notes from day 1 are also available.)

(Read More…)

Visualizing Progress

The theme for Liz Kolb’s “Picture on the Fly” challenge / contest (which started today) is “progress.” This was my submission: This image fits nicely into a theme of “progress” aligning with the SMART Notebook 10 workshop I’ve been attending this week at CSD in St Louis. I didn’t submit a second photograph, but if

(Read More…)

AT&T billing finally figured out I don’t work for them anymore

This is a slightly HUGE increase bill in my monthly home phone bill: From $1.17 per month to $215.65! I resigned from AT&T (as a state “education advocate”) back in July of 2008. As an employee, I received free local phone service with all the optional services / bells and whistles. Because we live outside

(Read More…)

Day 1 of SMART Notebook training at CSD

I’m attending and participating in a two day workshop at CSD in Saint Louis on SMART Notebook version 10. This post includes my notes from day 1. I’ve used SMARTboards for several years and actually use one each week (at least on Sundays) but am only scratching the surface for how the SMARTboard can be

(Read More…)

Podcast313: Top 10 Reasons to Be a StoryChaser

Storychasing is using digital recording devices to create, archive and share digital stories on the web. Story Chasers, Inc. is a new nonprofit, educational organization incorporated in the state of Oklahoma which presents the Celebrate Oklahoma Voices oral history project in partnership with a variety of other Oklahoma organizations. In this podcast, recorded on the

(Read More…)

Ideas for proactively planning for a school crisis with message mapping

These are my notes on Jay Garant‘s opening session “27 Words-9 Seconds-3 Messages: Message Mapping” at the Oklahoma School Public Relations Association conference on 23 April 2009 at Quartz Mountain Resort. MY THOUGHTS AND COMMENTS ARE IN ALL CAPS. Jay Garant is the Coordinator of Business and Community Partnerships for Fairfax County Public Schools -

(Read More…)

Advice and wisdom on school public relations

These are a few notes I jotted down on my iPhone using EverNote during our opening “networking” activity at the Oklahoma School Public Relations Association conference today at Quartz Mountain. This was the format: Everyone was given a slip of paper with a number and seven different numbers in a random order, which corresponded to

(Read More…)

Advice for a higher education digital learning advocacy presentation

A friend of mine and higher education professor I greatly respect, Dr. Cyndi Danner-Kuhn, is sharing a presentation in two weeks at the Dean’s Leadership Symposium at the University of Missouri for other professors. She asked me for some ideas and suggestions for her presentation. These are my thoughts. photo credit: vectorfunk Focus on content

(Read More…)

Go Green! Go Electric! (A Film on the Fly! Earth Day Video)

Today I took two of my children to Tulsa, Oklahoma, to the Miles Automotive Group where we learned about electric vehicles and shot our Film on the Fly / Earth Day cell phone video, “Go Green! Go Electric!” The description for this video which we included on YouTube was: The children have the answer! Tomorrow

(Read More…)

Misrepresenting Internet Danger Stats to Boost Sales

The CNN article, “Parents, police monitoring kids’ cell phones” references several commercial services being utilized by parents in an attempt to monitor and control their children’s activities and interactions via cell phones. Referenced services include “My Mobile Watchdog” and “Mobile Spy.” The marketing teaser for “Mobile Spy” is: Need to silently record SMS (text message)

(Read More…)

The Last Extinction and Science learning with NOVA

My son and I really enjoy watching NOVA specials on our home DVR. We haven’t done this in awhile, but last week we made some time to watch the episode titled, “The Last Extinction.” For some reason our DVR cut the episode off early, so we were delighted to find that the entire program is

(Read More…)

A Slidecast on Designing School 2.0

I’ve added a mp3 audio recording to my previously posted Slideshare of my eTechOhio09 keynote, “Reinventing Education for the 21st Century (Designing School 2.0.)” I used the provided, web-based syncrhonization tools on SlideShare to sync my slides with the audio, so this presentation is now available as a “Slidecast.” Reinventing Education for the 21st Century

(Read More…)

Podcast312: Reinventing Education for the 21st Century (Designing School 2.0)

This podcast is a recording of my opening keynote session at the 2009 eTechOhio conference, held in Columbus, Ohio, on February 2, 2009. This is the audio-only mp3 version, a video podcast version is available on the eTechOhio09 portal in iTunesU Ohio. Check the podcast shownotes for a direct link to iTunes. The official conference

(Read More…)

Film on the Fly – Earth Day Contest Starts Monday!

Don’t forget to register for the next “Film on the Fly” cell phone / mobile phone digital storytelling contest! It’s free to participate and the fun begins this coming Monday, April 20th, at 9:00 AM PDT. Complete this Google form to sign up. Participants will receive the contest prompt via SMS, and have 48 hours

(Read More…)

Storm Stories from Texas and Oklahoma

Today’s severe weather in Lubbock, Texas, (where we’re visiting currently) reminded me of storm stories which have been recently shared in our Celebrate Oklahoma Voices digital storytelling and oral history project. This is a photo I snapped today of storm clouds in Lubbock, just after a tornado warning expired in the SW part of town.

(Read More…)

Episode 1 of the International Cooking Show

When I visited New Zealand at the end of February 2009 for the Learning@School conference, I met Mr W00dy and we came up with a rather creative project idea. It seems we both have young daughters who love cooking, and would like to share their cooking with others. Why not start an International Cooking Show,

(Read More…)

Key for posting video embeds to WordPress – Disable visual editing

I figured out a mystery which had troubled me for some time: Why can I readily post embedded videos to my personal blog (this one) using MarsEdit, but when my children try to do the same thing to our family learning blog (Learning Signs) the video embed code gets stripped out? The answer, it turns

(Read More…)

© Creative Commons License