Mentoring Via Internet

I entered my Wednesday night class eager to find out who I will be mentoring for the next few weeks. Of course as a form of torture, Dean doesn't tell us until the end of class. After an anxious two hours, I heard my two teachers name called out: Stephanie Olson, and Seth Dickens. As I knew before hand, one is provincial and the other is international. What a great way to compare and contrast cultures and experiences I will have with them both. The moment I arrived home, I contacted my teachers, eager to begin. Seth Dickens is from Italy, so due to the time difference, we may be playing e-mail tag for a while before beginning. I heard from Stephanie Olson the next morning. She teaches a grade 5/6 split from Moose Jaw. All of Stephanie's students already have blogs set up on blogger, so I took a gander at all 26 students to become familiar with them. I probably had the biggest smile on my face as I did this. I proudly showed my students off to my family and, expressing my excitement.
Tonight, I created my first video blog, using my laptop web cam. This is just a small meet and greet for the Moose Jaw class.
This one goes out to you guys:




Changing Disabilities

For our tech task assignment #7, it was required we watch a video from the K12 Online Conference 2008. The video I chose was called "Changing Disabilities". They focus on the McGiver approach of changing disabilities into possibilites. (I thought this aspect of the presentation was the funniest!)
They mainly focused on a site called voice thread. It's kind of like elluminate. You can present things online and you can comment varying from typing it into the chat, recording it on a microphone or video, or telephoning.
These teachers presented it in their kindergarten class, and most specifically, children with disabilities. They talked about 3 students with different problems, and how the site had help them advance and improve in school. My favorite was about Lindsay. Lindsay was overly sensitive to loud noises, which made school pretty uncomfortable for her. When she attended school, she didn't talk (selective mutism). So when it came to knowing where Lindsay was in reading, her teachers didn't know because they have never heard her talk, let alone read. The solution? Her teacher scanned the pages of a book and uploaded them onto voice thread. She showed Lindsay how she could record herself, and left the room. A few minutes later, Lindsay presented her work and her teacher got to know that Lindsay could read, and she was a remarkable reader.
This is just one example of how voice thread could really help out, and the rest of the video is just as interesting. I never thought of the advantage technology could offer with people with disabilities. It's actually quite incredible! I really loved the idea of voice thread and almost find it easier, and more visually engaging, than elluminate (no offence Dean).
Anyways, if you're interested in more about voice thread, just click my hyper link and they have a audio/visual recording on what it is. It's great.