Welcome to Beijing Learning Summit 2009 and to my presentation “21st Century Teaching: Where’s Your Portfolio?”

I flew in from Japan last night really excited to be here. I’m passing around my information so that you can take look at how I have spent the last 2.5 years working with ICT and Yokohama International School. I currently work as the Elementary ICT Facilitator and work closely with the IB PYP Curriculum Coordinator, teachers, and students. Please feel free to see my Job Description and Resume on this blog.

My presentation today will focus on how you as an educator can create and maintain a presence online.

“Educators often help students prepare portfolios for goal-setting and to record progression in learning. But who is helping the teachers do the same? Are teacher portfolios a necessary part of teaching? For educators in international schools, a teacher portfolio may be the best way to consolidate teaching materials and reflect on their work as they travel the world. In this presentation we will relate and discuss student to teacher portfolios, how to get started or make your teacher porfolio better, and what things to be conscious of when sharing your work with an audience that extends beyond the classroom.

“More than a presenter, I would like to think myself as a facilitator so I would like to hear your feedback and discussion points throughout the session. I do not know much about working in China but I would like to know more about what social media or Web 2.0 can be used in the schools. Please share as much as you can and I will too. We have 1.5 hours together so I’m looking forward to getting to know everyone

Grade 2 went a zoo called Zoorasia in Yokohama. Photos were taken during the day and an MP3 recorder was used to record the children’s voices. I helped combine ICT skills for the classroom teacher by first joining the Grade 2 on field trips, recording voices, and using photos taken by classroom teachers during the day and then producing a video, photos, and audio clip in Animoto for the class. From that experience and 1:1 training sessions with the teacher, the classroom teacher produced the following podcast & Animoto on her own!

Gr2Zoos

Assistant, homeroom, single-subject teachers are invited to attend this workshop on Thursday, September 24 from 3:15-4:00 in KG (Kindergarten classroom).

If you cannot make it, please be sure to have at least one person from your grade level or subject area to attend. If no one can attend from your grade level or subject area, please get in touch with the Elementary ICT Facilitator.

There will be 4 topics addressed in 45 minutes. This blog post is to provide reading to prepare for the session and/or use this post to update you about ICT in the elementary. The session will be hands-on, so please bring your laptop.

Topics covered on Thursday, September 24

1. New IT Support ticketing system

Some of you may already know of the new online ticketing system the IT Department is using. This change took place this summer and we are encouraging all staff and students who have a FirstClass email account to use this system. We have also have parents using our system.

Prior to this online ticketing system we were using emails that went into a shared online work space using FirstClass. This system did not allow us to delegate tasks effectively in our department and did not allow us to gain any statistics about our response record nor allow us to track repeated queries about IT troubleshooting issues to improve our service.

We are hoping that this system will help record and delegate support queries effectively within our department and help track queries so they will be promptly answered via email or in person. The only way to improve the system, like many online services, is that the end user (ie. staff, students, parents) use our system.

2. Color Printing and File Size

If you are printing graphic filled documents from Microsoft Word or Pages, it is important that you check the file size before sending the print job to a printer. If you are at home sending a file that is 1MB or more you will notice right away because you are likely to get a printer error. Sending large print jobs to school color printers seem less obvious that a printer error occurred but, unfortunately, school printers are not invincible. Also, by trying to print a large file from an alternate printer will only jam another printer.

There are several ways to check the file size. The easiest way is to select the file that is saved on your computer then go to the File Menu and select Get Info (ie. Apple + I). Files more than 1MB are huge.

So what is going on in your document that is making your file so large? Text never takes that much room on a file, but pictures do. There are a few things to be conscious of and consider before inserting a picture into your document:

• When taking a photo is your resolution optimal for yearbook photo quality or for something to insert in a document? In other words, have you changed the settings on your camera so that it is the optimal resolution to use in a document?
• When downloading an image from a web site check the file size.
• After checking all the file sizes of the images from iPhoto or using ‘Get Info’, do they add up to less than 1MB?

If your photo is already in iPhoto, you simply go to the File Menu and select Export. You change the settings so that it is between 250 pixels, which is the optimal size to upload to a web page, or up to 450 pixels, which is an optimal size for a Powerpoint or Keynote slide. If you are more familiar with Adobe Photoshop, there is also an option to change the file size there.

3. Text Edit: Alternative application to Microsoft Word

Waiting more than a few minutes for Microsoft Word to open? Microsoft Word takes some time to load and so does Pages. If you are looking for a word-processing application and you are losing precious time waiting for Word or Pages to open, use Text Edit as an alternative. Granted, Text Edit is not a fancy application and does not replace Word or Pages as layout gurus. Text Edit is a simpler word-processing application that takes 10 seconds to open. During the PD days on Monday and Tuesday, I put a Text Edit shortcut on the left side of Microsoft Word on the dock of each iBook used in the elementary. The original application comes with every Mac OS X and can be found in the Applications folder.

4. Register for Vimeo as a grade-level or subject area & register for Animoto for an individual educator account.

Currently, teachers and parents are having trouble accessing the media on the classroom portals. Vimeo, similar to YouTube, and Animoto, similar to creating a slideshow using iPhoto or iMovie, have been used by teachers and accessed by parents at YIS. Teachers and parents have been able to access Vimeo and Animoto videos easily that the school is encouraging you to use these two free Web 2.0 services. Note: Free Vimeo accounts have advertisements and free Animoto educator accounts do not.

Vimeo accounts exist in the ELC, Grade 1, and Grade 2 as shared accounts. Please share these accounts with you classroom assistants if you have not already. Click here to register for a Vimeo account for your grade level or subject area. You will need to pick an email address of one person in your team who would be willing to touch base with you about successful video uploads and updates from Vimeo. Note on choosing a name: ELC has picked ‘yiselc’ and Grade 1 something like ‘yisgr1′ or ‘yisgrade1′ for their accounts.

We will also be applying for the Animoto educator account will give you the option to create full-length videos rather than the 30-second limit that comes with regular free accounts. Click here to begin the application for the Animoto educator account. They may accept your application immediately but it took 3 tries for me, but well worth it!

Shohei and I will be following up with your grade level and subject areas to ensure that you were successful in registering for Vimeo accounts as a grade-level or subject area, and individually for Animoto accounts.

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Note: All photos taken and voices recorded with an iPhone.

国際英研センターが行うSpring Campで参加した生徒は湘南国際村で３泊４日の合宿を過し、その時の写真と体験が以下のビデオで見れます。

Details of production
Grade 2 students were recording audiobooks in class so after being invited to the Ghibli Museum, I really wanted to record voices for this trip. The students sketched their experiences all day. The teacher took pictures of their sketches. The students’ voices were recorded prior, during, and after the trip. The Podcast includes voices during and after the trip.

Shanel uploaded photos to Animoto and I worked on stringing the audio recordings to make a Podcast. After several attempts to edit the photo selection in Animoto and shorten the Podcast, the audio was uploaded to Animoto. See her blog entry.

Animoto allows the user to post to Facebook and export to YouTube. The video was exported to the Yokohama International School YouTube Channel. Please enjoy the video below.

Dedicated to my students who produced the work and the Eiken Assistants who helped me in the classroom every day. Thanks S1, I enjoyed every moment of the week.

Notes on the production: Photos taken with a cell phone and arranged with Animoto. Soundtrack was chosen because this song was played every day for the students during their music class.