More on MOOCs

I'm on it

First thing this Monday morning the Tech teacher reserves the LibLab for Wednesday afternoon so that students can conduct research comparing hull designs of ships:

"Can the Technology class Period I (1:01-1:40 pm) use the library and computer lab for research on boats on Wednesday, March 14 and Monday, March 19, 2012? The expectation is that they would compare and contrast two types of boats, write two one hundred word paragraphs with pictures of the boats, a bibliography of the informaton and to print the reports. Thank you".

So I create a YouTube playlist about buoyancy principles, boat terminology, hull types, and hull engineering principles for speed, trim, and maneuverability. I embed this playlist on the library page.

By 9:30 I have shared this with the teacher so that students can learn these principle online at home, in study hall or class by Wednesday when they can apply that knowledge to comparing dhows, tankers, frigates and canoes for the actual assigned task.

Khan on Khan

 Salman Khan gives an overview of his online learning site; its simple model, its thought-through structure, its impact on flipped classrooms, its helpful analytics, and its future.

Take 2

Half flip

Hoping to get the OK to post this handbill. It has a TinyURL tear-off to take students to our library site where they can link directly to instructional videos at Clintondale HS.

Looking ahead

So I'm spending my week looking into content curating.  I do that already, of course, but this is about efficiently sifting through the glut of online articles in order to archive and share them with colleagues in a digestible way. The prospect of being fluent in that process of review, selection, and distribution seems crucial to the road ahead, even the road we're on right now.

Last night I got myself a Zite account and began selecting topics, reviewing and focusing the range of articles, and trial-posting them to Twitter and unique emails. I am skeptical about narrowing the returns too much, but I see the advantages if I'm on the trail for a colleague's unit of instruction.

I also will be trying to build some "stacks" within my Delicious social bookmarking site. Stacks provide a dressy format for archiving content (my content curatng stack)within a particular topic. I'll  need to invoke my Google Reader as a place to read content more fully before acting on it, too.

Getting on board with all of this will be integral to a further challenge; building eTextbooks with my colleagues. The idea of applying my library skills with my design skills to create custom books for our students, or any students, is an exciting prospect to me.