31 Day Comment Challenge Draws to a Close

I loved njtechteacher's reflections on the 31 day comment challenge started by Sue Waters (see their amazing wiki)

Ann says:

"This is something I tend to do as I read blogs and post comments. Blog comments fall into three categories for me: I respond with my feelings on a post, I write to congratulate someone on something they are doing, I am uncertain about what was written about and I leave a question. The use of Cocomment and co.mment both help me see when people respond. This had not always been my practice. It was, looking back, more of a hit and run process."

Commenting is something important to me and I believe has been essential to my own blog. (See How to comment like a King (or Queen)).

Commenting and realizing that you have a voice is so very important. So, as a tribute to Sue today and these amazing women who have coordinated the 31 Day comment challenge (Sue Waters, Silvia Tolisano, Michele Martin and Kim Cofino) -- I ask everyone leaving this post to find a blog (other than mine) and comment right now!

Let's end this well! (oh and mention that you're commenting b/c of the challenge -- it will help people to understand how far reaching this effort has been at building conversation in the edublogosphere.)

tag: comment challenge, blogging, Sue Waters, Silvia Tolisano, Michele Martin, Kim Cofino

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Try some Hunkin's Home Experiments this Summer

Good learning never stops. This summer, my children have time that they spend each day learning but I work really hard to make it fun!

I fell in love with Hunkin's Home Experiments and plan to have my children pick one and plan to do for the other two.

These are also great for school. What experiment sites do you like?

tag: science, experiment, learning, websites, education, teaching

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Sites that Caught My Eye Today 05/31/2008

• Unlimited calls to landlines – any time, day or night.

  International callers you can sign up for unlimited calls to landlines in 34 countries for like 6.95 a month (not us funds -- look at it for translation.) If you call other countries a lot, this is worth taking a look.

  tags: education, skype

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Sites that Caught My Eye Today 05/30/2008

• Samsung's Hope for Education - Win $200,000 for technology

  This is a cool grant requiring a 100 word essay about how technology benefits and helps education and is one I'll be doing in the fall -- it is only open to schools in the US but it is public and private -- check the website for rules and good luck.
  
  Info from their site:
  "Each year, Samsung's Hope for Education holds a contest where students from schools nationwide can write a 100-word essay about how technology benefits and helps education. In 2008, the top winner receives a grand prize of over $200,000 worth of Samsung technology, Microsoft software and cash grants from DIRECTV, as well as the SCHOOL CHOICE® educational television programming package. Entries are open now. Contest will run until August 31, 2008."

  tags: education, grants, edu_news, administrator, all_teachers

• Tales of an Inner-City Teacher: Crunch Time....

  I love the pictures on this blog showing the students using the computer, on the floor... everywhere, working on individual research projects. (Got to this blog to see the final products.) At first I said, "display boards?" but then I realized the amount of computer work required to create these display boards and I saw the age of the students and the number of computers in this classroom.
  
  This is a tremendous amount of work. Applause here from me to Kristi, another teacher blogger who I "met" from yesterday's post (hey go back to yesterdays and leave yours!)

  tags: edublog, education, edu_news, curriculum, all_teachers, bestpractices, edublogger

• Michel Foucault, Privacy, and Doubts about Web 2.0 | Connecting the Dots

  Fascinating ponderings by Mike Curtain about how many of us are relinquishing our own privacy. This is a very thought provoking post and yet another one I wouldn't have read, had he not linked to my blog post yesterday asking for bloggers to share their links.
  
  This is a very powerful blog post. Wow! I personally think there is a balance here, but also agree than many are not considering the privacy they are relinquishing when they post things that don't belong out there for everyone to see. Internet privacy is an illusion, it really is.

  tags: education, privacy, ad4dcss, digital_responsibilities

• Technology in the Classroom: Animoto

  Kudos to Brooksie, a new blogger that I found when she left her link on my blog today. Such a great resource. She's doing a nice job!

  tags: education, edublog

• - Animoto: Education -

  Brooksie over at CD Tech (http://gcedtech.blogspot.com/2008/04/animoto.html) showed me this. Brooksie left a message introducing me to her blog on yesterday's post and wow, I learned something new!
  
  Animoto will giv eyou a FREE code to make full length videos on animoto! This is a really cool free tool but we've been using the 30 second version! I didn't know we could use the full version for fREE! Wow! So cool

  tags: animoto, education, edu_newapp

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Incredible Motivational Videofrom some Teachers: What will you do today?

Phenomenal video! What a great way to summarize the learning in a professional development course for a school! What a great way to let the teachers at your school understand what all of this means.

These teachers made this video and guess what... now they will be blogged around the world. Pass them along by going to the original page and grabbing the "embed" code. Paste it on your blog in a post and add your thoughts. Viola!


via a tweet from http://twitter.com/carcher, Christine from Ramblings of a Technology Coordinator. Whoo hoo, Christine, you've got it going on! Amazing teachers! Wow!

What will you do today?

tag: education, teaching, inspiration, learning

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Thank you readers for putting me on this Edutopia List!

Wow, I am flabbergasted just to be included on this list by edutopia as part of their 2008 Readers Survey. It always makes me nervous to have my name listed alongside the great perpetual bloggers (Edublogs, David Warlick's 2 Cents Worth) since I'm such a newcomer. (2 1/2 years is nothing!) (Of course this list seems a bit mixed since Edublogs is a platform, I wonder if they meant to link to Sue Waters blog instead of the Edublogs homepage?)

So, thank you readers of Edutopia who put my name on this list. I am honored and grateful.

I wish I could say that I want to become more or be something spectacular but all I really am is me. I'm flawed, sometimes don't have enough time to blog, and I can't seem to keep the dishes washed and laundry done.

And yet blogging and teaching for me are inexorably intertwined and now neither of them could ever be separated from who I am.

Although I'm a blogger, teacher, Mom, wife and more, I'm really just so grateful for the opportunity to learn and be a part of such exciting times.

When I left Atlanta to move home to tiny Camilla, Georgia, I had one "friend" who said to me:

"If you had stayed in Atlanta, you could have been something really great. Now that you're moving to nowhere you are destined for anonymity."

I'm grateful for an internet that lets me speak out and be a part of something much bigger than myself. And now that I'm done with this post, I'm going to go back and read some more about the amazing new bloggers on the last post where I asked some of you to share your blogs with me! Some great comments are coming in.

Thanks!
tag: edublogging, edublog, edutopia, blogging

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8 Reasons Bloggers Hide Their Blog: A Call for You to share a link to your blog

I love making new friends but for some reason it seems very challenging to find new teacher blogs. As I've talked to teacher bloggers, these are some of the reasons I hear for teachers not sharing their links more openly.

Why I think More Teachers Don't Share Their Blog with Others

1. Humility. I think many teachers are naturally humble and perhaps don't share their blogs outright. They don't want to be misconstrued as just another teacher who is looking for a "ticket out" of the classroom. (I'm happy in the classroom but enjoy a few excursions a year.)
   
   
2. Inferiority. Or, teachers might just feel like their blog isn't good enough. "I'll wait until I'm better at it."
   
   No, you're fine now, jump in! Don't have an inferiority complex. I've gotten in trouble many a time for saying, "I'm just a teacher" and don't you make my mistake. You're not just a teacher -- you're a teacher, for goodness sakes and more teachers need to be heard. We need Science, History, Literature, and more teachers coming on. This needs to move past edtech and into mainstream education, now. Will you be THE blogger for literature or THE blogger for science. You could be... but ultimately I do this not to be THE blogger of anything but to be a blogger who makes a difference and helps other teachers.
   
   
3. Paranoia. Teachers organizations have come out against blogging. Somehow we are pariah's. Why? Be a professional, don't share confidential information and focus on best practices and you should be OK. Sort of a "I"ll dip my toe in the water and maybe no one will catch me."
   
   I've been open since day one with my administration, going so far as to set up an e-mail subscription and subscribing them to my blog! I want my school to read my blog. And we've gotten grants and opportunities for my classroom over the last year because of it!
   
   
4. Fear. Sort of like #3, but sometimes we're afraid of success. Success brings with it a lot of things... pressure to keep posting. Sometimes it will get one into unhealthy contemplations that make the blog overimportant. (Like being up at night trying to come up with THE post of the century.)
   
   
5. A Feeling of Being overwhelmed - When I started, I often wondered, "what can I add?" There's too much. I cannot do this. I don't have the time.
   
   Follow principles of good blogging, good commenting, and just add your thoughts. No blogger can replace the Wall Street Journal or professional media outlet. You're not the single-handed newsbreaker of education, you're adding your opinion.
   
   
6. Not wanting to be microanalyzed - This is a tough one. There are always those "Drive by commenters" who drive in, unload a few clips, and drive off. They have killed not a few great bloggers in the beginning.
   
   Early on I had people bug me about spelling, grammar, and all the mistakes I make naturally. Maybe I should hire an editor. Or maybe I should just be me and live with the fact I'm human. I love reading blogs because they are human.
   
   I appreciate the person who privately e-mails me about my mistakes so that I may correct it. I don't appreciate people who act unkindly and mean about a mistake. They seem to forget that what we dish out has a habit of being passed back around to us.
   
   
7. Not wanting to become embroiled in debate. This took some getting used to. Sometimes I'm drug into debates that I simply don't have time for and didn't ask for. I used to let them bother me. I guess two years has given me a thicker skin somewhat.
   
   Debates are part of life and really, your blog is as controversial as you make it. I've always found, however, that treating people on both sides of every disagreement with respect and modeling for our future leaders how to disagree is very important.
   
   When some bloggers treat others with disrespect or make mistakes and do not correct them, they go down a notch in my book. I'm so glad we're not carbon copies of one another... we are beautifully, wonderfully different.
   
   Every person on this planet deserves respect. I don't care if they are mowing your grass or sitting behind the desk in your mayor's office. People deserve respect because they are people and this is something that the blogosphere needs to work on.
   
   We can be part of the problem or part of the solution. I know few people better than teachers at mediating disputes! You can be part of the problem or part of the solution and apathy too is a problem. Learning how to disagree respectfully online is part of life, don't let that deter you from blogging or sharing your blog URL.
   
   
8. They don't see the point. "Why share my blog? Vicki or any of the other bloggers already have enough people vying for their attention."
   
   I disagree.. we have enough of the WRONG people vying for our attention. I WANT to hear from teachers... always. I want to hear from educators. I want to learn from people in the "trenches."
   
   I want to be an early encourager to newcomers like David Warlick, Jennifer Wagner, Wes Fryer, Miguel Guhlin, Ewan McIntosh, Darren Kuropatwa, Stephen Downes, and others did for me.
   
   I want to be the first commenter on new blogs. (Which is why I try to comment on those who link to me that I can tell are newcomers.) We all need some encouragement.
   

The point of sharing your link is to let others know that you're there and engage in conversation. Just do it. I'm asking you to share your blog.

Share Away
So, this summer, I would like to spend some time finding cool teacher blogs. I'd like to hear and find a few new voices and I'm sure others would too.

I know there are lots of places that list edubloggers, but I'm asking you to share your link here and share a few more things - use this template.

Share your link
-- unfortunately, in blogger comments, you must do this manually, but if you share your link, make it into a "live link." (Don't worry, if it doesn't work the first time, try again -- I won't be bothered by multiple entries.)

This graphic from my post 10 habits of bloggers that win, shares it.


Tell us a little bit about yourself
Who are you? Why do you teach? What do you teach? Where are you located? Not a complete bio, but the blurb you would tell someone if you had 20 seconds to introduce yourself.

Who are you writing for?
Who is your audience? Do you know? (If you don't, think about it.)

Why are you blogging?
What are your reasons for blogging? We all have reasons!

I'm ready to meet you! (Even if I already know your blog, feel free to share, others may want to meet you too.)

Here is my intro.

I'm Vicki Davis and I write the Cool Cat Teacher blog. I am a teacher at a small K12 private school in south Georgia USA and I believe passionately that teachers need encouragement, practical best practices in the classroom, and should be treated with nobility as the world's greatest calling! I believe that global collaborative projects are an essential part of learning. I believe that we all need to laugh and be inspired if we're going to make it through this high burnout profession.

I have two children of my three children with Learning disabilities who must be accommodated with technology and so I adamantly know and believe in the results I've seen with technology with my own children. I believe that children are amazing gifts from God and each one has something that they can do best. (I also know that LD often means children are wired more artistically and creatively and believe wholeheartedly in differentiated learning.) Children aren't production items in a manufacturing plant, but individualized, amazing packages of hope and opportunity and teachers have the ability to treat them well or do great harm.

My audience is educators and other teachers, however, I'm really geek too, so I find that technical type people read my blog too. I love dreaming and coming up with ideas but more importantly, reflecting practically on what I SEE in my classroom to be true based upon what people are saying.

I see a great disconnect sometimes between what experts SAY and what is really happening in the classroom (at least mine.) So, I blog to share my own perspectives and to learn from others. (I learn more than I give.)

I started blogging to learn "how to blog" so that I could teach it. I am still blogging because it has become part of who I am.

I don't know how many of these will come in, but I'll do my best to follow the links and say "hi." If you like, share your best blog post!

tag: blogging, David Warlick, Wes Fryer, Miguel Guhlin, Jennifer Wagner, Stephen Downes, Ewan McIntosh, Darren Kuropatwa

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Sites that Caught My Eye Today 05/29/2008

• Alfred Thompson the Cyberspace People Watcher: Online Activities Have Offline Consequences

  Great post by Alfred Thompson, "the" microsoft education blogger. I think he hits the nail on the head with this one. Great post!

  tags: ad4dcss, education, digital_responsibilities, cyberethics

• 17 Principles of Building Good Relationships With Bloggers

  Great article about how to build good relationships with bloggers. I wish the countless people I've never heard of who e-mail me to write about their product would read this one. It is about building relationships!

  tags: education, blog, edublogger, edublog

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HOrizon Teacher Summit 4-5 pm EDT 5/28/2008

Twitter is out AGAIN! So, I hate to do this, but here is another alert that really belongs in my twitter.

In 17 minutes we will be hosting the Teacher Summit in Elluminate. Please join us as the teachers reflect.

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Bringing the Power of Google Earth to the Browser

Announcement
May 28, 2008

Google deeply believes in the value of being open, so we’ve decided to expand the reach of Google Earth by bringing it to the browser. Today at Google I/O, we’re unveiling the Google Earth API and browser plug-in. As the latest member of our Maps API family, the Google Earth API allows web developers to quickly and easily turn their web pages into 3D map applications. They can now use the Earth as their canvas and apply their creative vision to a geographically rich, 3D environment, leveraging the same technologies we use in the desktop Google Earth client. For consumers this means that they will soon see Google Earth in many more places around the web – perhaps even their favorite web site.

More and more users are interested in seeing the world’s information in a geographic context, which has lead to the rise of the Geoweb, a collection of user-generated content (e.g. photos, videos and so on) associated with a given location. Its not just about sharing pictures of a family vacation anymore. Now people can visually convey the miles logged while traveling to Patagonia or the Seychelles Islands, for example.

The Google Maps API, with over 150,000 developer sites, and the Google Earth client, with over 400 million downloads, are both tremendously successful tools to help users visualize this Geoweb of content. Now that we have brought the Google Earth API to the developer community, we can only imagine what wonderfully creative new web applications will be developed.

Key features:

• Embed Google Earth inside any web page with only a few lines of code.
• Use the JavaScript API to enable rich Earth-based web applications.
• Manipulate KML and the 3D environment: create polygons, lines, placemarks, and more.
• Convert your existing Google Maps API site to 3D with as little as one line of code.
• View the thousands of existing 3D buildings, or add your own 3D models.
• Switch to Google Sky mode for high-res imagery of stars, planets, and galaxies.

Check out the LatLong blog for more details about today’s announcement.

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Flat Classroom Live presentation today w/ Julie and I

If you're online -- in about 19 minutes at approximately 11 am EDT, Julie Lindsay and I will be joining Steve Hargadon to do the Classroom Live presentation we've been planning to do for some time.

It is free and open and in elluminate. If you wish to join us, come on. If not, the recording will be available later. Hope to see you there.

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Sites that Caught My Eye Today 05/28/2008

• HotCity Wireless

  HotCity Wireless, a non-profit organization, has been established to promote the use of low-cost wireless technology as a media and tool for economic, social and educational advancement to underprivileged citizens in the Philippines.
  
  Organizations such as this that work to provide access should be encouraged. Wow!

  tags: education, ad4dcss, digital_access

• FireShot - Take screenshots of web pages with Firefox extension!

  Cool cool cool firefox extension that creates and edits screenshots of web pages. Soo cool!

  tags: education, geeks4, tools, edu_newapp

• WED home - World Environment Day

  World Environment Day - -share what you'redoing -- this is June 5th - it is for New Zealand but it is something I think that others may participate in.

  tags: education, environment

• A Living Archives

  A cool project for middle school students - Living archives is fascinating.

  tags: education, learning, history, flatclassroom, curriculum, edu_news

• Japan urges limiting kids' cell phones

  Japanese government becoming "involved" in the overuse of cell phones by japanese teenagers. This program emphasizes cell phone addiction.
  
  1/3 of japanese 6th graders and cell phones and 2/3rds of 9th graders have them. Interestingly, one panel wants to take texting off the phones?
  
  How about using texting iN school? How about letting them define words on it instead of using a dictionary? How about letting them use it in the classroom?
  
  Seems kind of like damming up the Mississippi - it may work for a while, but eventually, the dam is going to break.
  
  Yes, this is something to talk about and discuss... internet and cell phone addiction is a real issue with many kids I talk to reporting that they literally sleep with it under their pillow.
  
  However, just getting rid of texting, I don't think that is a good idea. As with anything in human history, every tool may be used for good or bad.

  tags: education, edu_trends, digitalcitizenship

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I M possible

We know not where the digital revolution may take us.

We do know the great inventors of history dreamed impossible dreams and took steps to make it happen... electricity, the light bulb, the telephone, the Internet...

virtual worlds, humanoid robots, 3 d virtual immersive worlds, intelligent agents. These things all seem impossible as do time travel, true interplanetary space travel, and colonizing other planets.

Yet impossible dreams lived by impossible dreamers and backed up by a lot of hard work often have a way of happening.

My impossible dreams?

That we could have a flat classroom project followed up by a face to face meeting of the award winning students. (Believe it or not, this is something Julie and I ARE working on now -- seeking ways to make this happen.)

True, sustainable, collaborative projects that run year round with students moving in and out of them as fits the curriculum and communicating with others.

Legacy projects in virtual worlds where students create things and future generations enjoy them. (Indeed this is happening now at places like Suffern Middle School.)

Using cell phones, 3d environments, and all of the technologies deemed "the enemy" by academia in useful, meaningful, ways in pursuit of a truly excellent academic curriculum and results.

Perhaps my biggest dreams personally have to do with authoring books that improve people's lives... not just this year but are passed down to others including my own children as a legacy of how to live life amidst the struggles, challenges, and problems. Life is not like a novel where something new happens around each corner, but rather it is often a struggle and a challenge, and often when one turns a corner there are empty corridors. (However, living life in service of my Savior is truly my greatest calling in life... and I'm thankful that is not an impossible dream. )

Although this youtube video is commercial for Honda, I really see in it something more.

I see many educators dreaming dreams that were impossible a few years a go... of joining with other classrooms and educators around the world with joint projects. Overcoming distance, time, space, cultural, and curricular barriers.

Go ahead... dream that impossible dream. But remember this... it seems impossible to others and that is fine.

The greatest hurdle you must overcome is the erasure of the "im" in your own mind and transformation of im-possible to possible.

i m possible

Through me... it is possible.

So, lets agree to let impossible stand for something else.

I say that

i m possible should stand for "I make possible."

How about you... what can you turn from "impossible" to "I make possible?"

tag: inspiration, education, learning

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Flat Classroom Conversation Live tomorrow 5/28/2008 - 11 am EDT

A special episode of Classroom 2.0 LIVE Conversations will "air" live 5/28/2008 at 8am Pacific / 11am Eastern / 3pm GMT. Julie Lindsay and and I will discuss our global collaborative programs, Flat Classrooms and the Horizon Project.

Here is Steve's announcement on Classroom 2.0 about this:

"In the two years that Julie and Vicki have been collaborating, their five global collaborative projects have included more than 20 classrooms and 500 students from a variety of cultures, backgrounds, and geographic locations. Their Flat Classroom project was featured in the latest edition of Thomas Friedman's book, The World is Flat, upon which it was based.

Julie joins us from Qatar, Vicki from Georgia, USA. There will be time for audience Q & A. To attend the Elluminate session, see the link at http://www.classroom20wiki.com/live+conversations/. Or use the direct login URL: https://sas.elluminate.com/m.jnlp?sid=1101&password=M.8DAFD346DA4B268DC185FED8466556 "

We're excited about the Flat Classroom workshop that Julie and I will be doing in St. Louis on July 8th and 9th -- there is still room if you wish to join us.

tag: classroom 2.0, flatclassroom, Vicki A Davis, Julie Lindsay, hz08

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Google App Engine to Announce Open Sign-ups, Pricing Plans, and New APIs at Google I/O

Announcement
May 27, 2008

Google Developer Conference Starts Wednesday in San Francisco; Highlights a Richer, Maturing Web Platform

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. (May 27, 2008) – Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) is getting ready to welcome more than 2900 developers to the Moscone Center in San Francisco for Google I/O™, the company’s largest developer event of the year. The event opens with a keynote speech on Wednesday, May 28, and runs through Thursday, May 29, with nearly 100 in-depth technical sessions about Google’s own developer products, and general web application development.

Google’s developer products are devoted to making it easier for developers to build for the web. In particular, Wednesday’s keynote speech will explore three areas of Google investment that – in close collaboration with the larger web community – aim to enable increasingly innovative and rich web applications:

• Making clouds of computing power more accessible to all developers
• Making the client – i.e., the browser – more capable and more powerful
• Ensuring the connectivity that enables the client and the cloud to work in harmony

"After years of competition among platforms, the web has won because it’s open, because it’s ubiquitous, and because there’s a passionate community working together to move it forward," said Vic Gundotra, vice president of engineering for developer products at Google. "Openness is great for developers and for users because it knocks down hurdles to building great applications, and because it speeds the next wave of innovation by letting good ideas be shared. The web doesn’t depend on any one API or tool or product, from Google or anyone else. What makes the real difference is the aggregate effect of us all working together, with open standards and open source."

Google App Engine: Making It Easy to Build, Maintain, and Scale Web Apps

Google App Engine™ enables developers to build their web apps on the same infrastructure that powers Google’s own applications. So developers eager to build highly scalable web apps will be especially pleased with the following piece of Google I/O news: Google App Engine is announcing open sign-ups. More than 150,000 developers have joined the product’s waiting list over the past 6 weeks; on Wednesday, Google App Engine will be available to everyone – no waiting required.

Google App Engine is also announcing its pricing plans (effective later this year) for purchasing additional computing resources; this is something developers have been asking for ever since the initial launch. The product will be free to get started, and in the current preview release apps will continue to be restricted to that free quota. Later this year, once the preview period has ended, developers can expect to pay:

• Free quota to get started: 500MB storage and enough CPU and bandwidth for about 5 million pageviews per month
• $0.10 – $0.12 per CPU core-hour
• $0.15 – $0.18 per GB-month of storage
• $0.11 – $0.13 per GB outgoing bandwidth
• $0.09 – $0.11 per GB incoming bandwidth

Lastly, and likewise in response to developer feedback, Google App Engine will provide two new APIs in the coming weeks. The image-manipulation API enables developers to scale, rotate, and crop images on the server, and the memcache API is a high-performance caching layer designed to make page rendering faster for developers.

More information about Google App Engine is available at code.google.com/appengine/.

Building more powerful, faster AJAX applications: Google Web Toolkit 1.5 Release Candidate

With Google Web Toolkit™, developers can develop and debug web applications in the familiar Java programming language, and then deploy them as highly optimized JavaScript. In doing so, developers sidestep common AJAX headaches like browser compatibility, and enjoy significant performance and productivity gains. Google Health is one recently launched application to use Google Web Toolkit.

Google Web Toolkit Release Candidate 1.5 will be available later this week and includes Java 5 language support so that developers can enjoy using the full capabilities of the Java 5 syntax. These capabilities include Java generics, enumerated types, annotations, auto-boxing, variable parameter lists, and more. The compiler in Google Web Toolkit 1.5 produces faster code than ever, delivering performance gains big enough for end users to notice; indeed, it is often the case that the compiler produces faster JavaScript than a person would write by hand in JavaScript. Google Web Toolkit 1.5 accomplishes this by performing deep inlining, better dead code elimination, and other forms of enhanced static analysis.

Google Web Toolkit also continues to provide a rich and growing set of libraries that help developers build world-class AJAX, including thoroughly-tested reusable libraries for implementing user interfaces, data structures, client/server communication, internationalization, testing, and accessibility. More information about Google Web Toolkit is available at code.google.com/webtoolkit/.

Innovation in the Open: At the Event

Google I/O will include a mix of practical, hands-on advice for building web apps as well as opportunities to learn about and discuss emerging trends. Sessions with top Google engineers will cover tools developed both inside and outside of Google. Topic areas will include:

• AJAX & JavaScript
• APIs & Tools
• Social
• Mobile
• Maps & Geo

More information about Google I/O is available at code.google.com/io/. Google will be accepting online registrations until the evening of May 27th and on-site the day of the event.

About Google Inc.

Google’s innovative search technologies connect millions of people around the world with information every day. Founded in 1998 by Stanford Ph.D. students Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google today is a top web property in all major global markets. Google’s targeted advertising program provides businesses of all sizes with measurable results, while enhancing the overall web experience for users. Google is headquartered in Silicon Valley with offices throughout the Americas, Europe and Asia. For more information, please visit www.google.com.

Media Contact:

Google Press Center
press@google.com
+1.650.930.3555

###

Google, Google I/O, Google App Engine, and Google Web Toolkit are trademarks of Google Inc. All other company and product names may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated.

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Sites that Caught My Eye Today 05/27/2008

• My Page - NECC 2008

  My NECC page including my current calendar and schedule.

  tags: NECC, education

• And the Walls Came Down: Viral Professional Development - NECC 2008

  Just started the discussion for the viral pd session at NECC over at the NECC 2008 Ning -- watching some interesting discussions take place -- join in and converse. If you have a session, you're asked to create a discussion -- I hope they'll show us our tags so that we can tag and find sessions easily.

  tags: necc, education, ad4dcss, virtualcollab, professionaldevelopment, edu_news

• Ning “the” Thing » CogDogBlog

  Interesting observations from Alan Levine about those of us who use Nings for our projects. It truly becomes "the" ning.

  tags: Ning, education, connectingpeople, virtualcollab

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Videos from Me on Horizon, Flat Classroom, and More

Every teacher knows that the end of the school year is usually as scary as hiding under the bed with Chucky the wonder doll coming after you!

I'm a bit behind over here, however, took some time to talk with my friend Alan Levine (aka CogDog) about some of the projects that we've done recently as well as the pros and cons. (Just proof that cats and dogs can work together ;-) I'd like to share the video with you and plan to be blogging quite a bit AFTER I can get my laundry done!

http://media.nmc.org/2008/05/vicki-davis-flatclassroom.mov
http://media.nmc.org/2008/05/vicki-davis-grassroots-video.mov
http://media.nmc.org/2008/05/vicki-davis-collaboration-webs.mov

Hope you're having a great memorial day!

I also find very interesting Alan's ruminations about "The Ning" -- he is right on, I think. For those of us who use Ning for class projects, The Ning and The Wiki are really The Thing -- the glue that holds us together and without which we could not function.
tag: Alan Levine, Ning, Horizon project, hz08, flat classroom

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Sites that Caught My Eye Today 05/25/2008

• Classroom Innovation - Sallie Hill - BRVGS

  A cool video from a teacher about how she is innovating in her classroom. This is an application for Google Teacher Academy and was made on Animoto and uploaded to Google Video. Great job!
  
  More applications for events and organizations are moving to the video format. Knowing how to produce compelling video will help your students get scholarships and you move ahead. Learn how to tell digital stories.
  
  Oh, and I'm so excited, it looks like I'll be at Google teacher academy in June -- it is going to be great!

  tags: education, technology, techintegrator, professionaldevelopment, edu_trends

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Sites that Caught My Eye Today 05/23/2008

• Fluid - Free Site Specific Browser for Mac OS X Leopard

  Mac users, I've heard this is a great tool.

  tags: techintegrator, technology, professionaldevelopment, education

• K12 Online Conference 2008 | K12Online08 Call for Proposals: Amplifying Possibilities

  Time for K12 online conference proposals:
  
  "We are pleased to announce the call for proposals for the third annual “K12 Online Conference” for educators around the world interested in the use of web 2.0 tools in classrooms and professional practice. This year’s conference is scheduled for October 20-24 and October 27-31 of 2008, and will include a pre-conference keynote during the week of October 13. The conference theme for 2008 is “Amplifying Possibilities.” Participation in the conference (as in the past) is entirely free. Conference materials are published in English and available for worldwide distribution and use under a Creative Commons license. Some changes in the requirements for presentations are being made this year and are detailed below. The deadline for proposal submission is June 23, 2008. Selected presentations will be announced at NECC 2008 in San Antonio, Texas, USA on July 2.

  tags: k12online, education, all_teachers, professionaldevelopment, edublog, techintegrator, administrator, curriculum, k12online08

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Doodle 4 Google Competition Winner Announced

Announcement
May 21, 2008

Grace Moon, a 6th grade student from Canyon Middle School, has been announced as the national winner of the Doodle 4 Google competition. The announcement was made by Marissa Mayer, VP of search products and user experience, at a celebration today in Mountain View, CA for the 40 regional winners of the competition and their families.

What is a doodle? Doodles are the quirky logo designs we often feature on the Google homepage to celebrate holidays, special events or birthdays of artists. This year, we launched a contest open to all K-12 students in the U.S. to imagine their own version of the Google logo, inspired by the theme "What If…?" Grace’s doodle was chosen from over 16,000 doodles submitted by students across the country, and was selected based on artistic merit, creativity, and expression of the theme.

The four national finalists (one from each grade group) were decided by an online public vote held May 12-18. Nearly 4 million votes were cast. The national winner was chosen by Marissa Mayer and Dennis Hwang, Google’s chief doodler.

The winning doodle is titled "Up in the Clouds" and "expresses a world in the sky," according to Grace. In addition to having her doodle on the Google homepage for a day, Grace will receive a $10,000 college scholarship, and a $25,000 technology grant for her school. The champion doodler has been drawing since she could hold a crayon. Grace enjoys art, but her favorite subject in school is math. She wants to combine both her loves and become an artist and scientist someday.

The three national finalists, listed below, will each receive a laptop computer. To see all the finalists’ doodles, go to www.google.com/doodle4google.

National Finalists

Grades K-3
Spencer Norton
Ashbrook Elementary School
Lumberton, NJ

Grades 7-9
Rebecca Olene
Pioneer Ridge Freshmen Center
Carver, Minnesota

Grades 10-12
Gabriel Kitzman
Elbert School Dist. #200
Kiowa, Colorado

The customization of the Google logo started in 1999, and these doodles are now designed almost exclusively by Google Webmaster Dennis Hwang, whose work is seen by millions every time he exhibits on the Google homepage. Dennis has creatively depicted worldwide events, anniversaries and holidays with doodles that incorporate the Google logo for the world to celebrate.

More information is available at: www.google.com/doodle4google.

Thanks to all of the other thousands of doodlers who participated in the competition. Your creativity inspires all of us!

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Student Summits Today and you're invited! 10:45 AM EST and 1:40 PM EST

Find more photos like this on Horizon Project 2008


These graphics are just some of the "jpeg" files that students will take with them into elluminate today for the Westwood student summits for the 2008 Horizon Project.

Each student will present in elluminate and may take with them one graphic file. This is the photo album on the Horizon Ning of these files that I'm compiling for the event.

Today we should be presenting from around 10:45 (class starts at 10:29 but it will take a moment to get in the room) until 11:15 and again from around 1:40 until 2:10. Each student will take a moment to discuss what they've learned and we will also take questions from the "audience."

This is free and open for participation using our elluminate room. Please feel free to join us and see what the students have to say.

How do I join?

1. Click on the elluminate link after 10:15 am EST.
2. Follow the instructions (sometimes your IT dept has to give you permission to install the java applet.)
3. If you want to ask questions, plug in your mike. (There is an audio set up wizard to help you do your settings under "tools.")

See you there! (Oh, and if you KNOW you're coming to either one and want to leave me a message here letting me know where you're from, the students would love for me to introduce you.)

tag: hz08, education, presentation, innovation, technology

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Sites that Caught My Eye Today 05/19/2008

• Reflection - Horizon Project 2008

  This 10th grade student has written an exceptional post-project reflection. I hope you'll take time to read it. Here is an excerpt:
  
  "There is no doubt that this technology is dangerous. It is apparent that few people, not adults, not teenagers, truly understand how collaboration, conduct, and manners affect the internet. This project has to teach others that as well. It is necessary to know how to handle yourself on the internet. That’s why Horizon Project is so important. We have to educate tomorrow’s leaders how to use new technology without abusing it. The highlight of this project is the education we are giving every single person who has been a part of the Horizon Project."

  tags: education, hz08, technology, digitalcitizenship, ad4dcss, digital_safety

• Ning Status

  This is where they post the status and maintenace downtimes for Ning, if you ever have an outage or a plant o demo it, you might want to check it out.

  tags: education, techintegrator, technology

• Horizon_0001 - Horizon Project 2008

  I am really enjoying Julie Lindsay's discussion about games in the classroom on this video. (Please forgive the student typo at the end.)

  tags: education, hz08

• The ROLE of a teacher Changes. . . - Horizon Project 2008

  Wow! This student says so much very eloquently about Don Tapscott's keynote:
  
  My tenth grader says in this blog post:
  
  "A teacher should, as Don Tapscott said, no longer be a transmitter of information, but a regulator of educational settings. Our teacher Mrs. Vicki could stand in from of the class room all day and lecture us on exactly what to do and how to do it. We would ace tests and learn a lot . . . for a while… However by next year about 65% of what we learned will be irrelevant due to technology changes and development. Instead, she gives us projects to complete that pose challenges to us that can repeat themselves. Such as giving us a project to make a video by using a program we are unfamiliar with. Though we may not ever make another video, it is inevitable that we face the challenge of having to use an unfamiliar program, ergo, we will be prepared to deal with this for the rest of our lives.
  
  So in conclusion, the role of a teacher is now: to regulate the educational environment; to introduce students to the realm of ambiguities; and to no longer evaluate our overall knowledge, but our constructive, creative, and adaptive capabilities."
  
  Wow! I am humbled and impressed at what students have to say when asked and challenged!

  tags: education, hz08, hz08_keynote, Don Tapscott

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My student's video on World Domination

I'm laughing so hard that I am crying. This student for the horizon project seemed not to be doing much filming. That is because she was literally taking over the county with this short 8 minute film.


Find more videos like this on Horizon Project 2008


Her point was to demonstrate the emotions of those who are using Youtube and grassroots video and how many times it can give false impressions of grandeur to those who become "youtube" stars. I am just amazed she did this film in 2 weeks!

During the course of this film she:

• Had a police officer "arrest" her friend (it was staged except her aunt didn't know and came driving up as the actress was leaving! It scared her!)
• Hypnotized her math teacher
• Included our headmaster (in the orange shirt halfway through)
• Used greenscreen
• Got her father to be on the film at the end.

She really did a nice job. We did encourage the students to use creativity to get their point across and one not knowing the topic might think this was just for fun, however, for those who know the topic, I think she conveyed the emotions of those using grassroots video quite well, albeit in a humorous fashion.

I just cannot believe she did it!

Now, I can honestly say that my projects have reached a new high (or low depending upon the way you look at it) -- with a staged arrest on film. I'm laughing!

tag: youtube, hz08, grassroots video, horizon project, filmmaking

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Sites that Caught My Eye Today 05/18/2008

• westwood » Will's eFoilo

  This is a very interesting way that the student chose to link his Google doc and quite inventive. He created an HTML page and embedded it in the page instead of making the Google Doc public. What a great way to do this.

  tags: education, Google

• westwood » Victoria's eFolio

  Another excellent efolio project from my student -- take a look at the Doodle For Google at the bottom and how she related the opportunity to speaking out for the crisis in Darfur. This is amazing work!

  tags: education, bestpractices, techintegrator, technology, professionaldevelopment

• Cyber Security - Digi Teen

  Seeing my students blog like this one on cyber security makes me realize that effective online communication and writing is important. I'm proud of my student bloggers and glad that we've made time to blog this year!

  tags: blogging, education, bestpractices, cybersafety, blog, ad4dcss

• NASCAR News

  I really am enjoying this student's blog about NASCAR -- she's one of mine and has done a great job -- look at the widgets on the right of this!

  tags: education, blogging

• digiteen » Digital Etiquette

  The page made by the digiteen students on digital etiquette. Although this page does not have the hyperlinks that it should have, it does have other great information.

  tags: digital_citizenship, ad4dcss, netiquette, education

• digiteen » WHS Middle School Action Planning Wiki

  The course planning wiki for the digiteen action project from my ninth graders for the middle school. They've done a nice job of planning and sharing the materials. I like their google presentation which has evolved significantly over the last three weeks.

  tags: education, digitalcitizenship, professionaldevelopment, curriculum, research, ad4dcss

• Are You Making Your Life Easier By Using A Personalized Start Page? | The Edublogger

  Great post from Sue Waters on how to use a personalized start page. Nice post.

  tags: education, edublog, edu_trends, techintegrator, professionaldevelopment, bestpractices, edublogger, all_teachers

• Who Taught My Kid That Four-Letter Word? at Remarkable Parents

  I love this blog post by parent Vicky Hennigan over at remarkable parents. She's done a great job talking about how kids adjust their expectations because they don't want to fail.

  tags: education, all_teachers

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The Nightmare of Social Networking (And of seeing yourself on film)

Besides the fact that I DON'T LIKE how I look in this film (I'm hitting the gym this summer), my student Jamie C. did a nice job with this film for horizon on Social Operating systems.



It was just featured on the home page by AFI Screen Nation (to enter the contest you have to be in the US, although any student anywhere may still submit videos. Who knows, a real Hollywood producer or actor may even leave you a message!)

He is trying to highlight the evolution from social networks to social operating systems and I think he's done a nice job. (Even if he did have to use me!)

This is an example of a film that was made in tools I would never have "prescribed" if I truly was a "prescriptive" computer science teacher. He used Paint (for animations,) PowerPoint (for jpgs), Movie Maker, Audacity (to remix Beethoven), and a webcam (to grab his teacher for a quick interview.)

Good job, Jamie! If you want to peruse more videos, drop by the Ning where they are being uploaded as fast as chickens fly away from a fox. If you want to join the Ning and comment, just let us know who you are, and join in the feedback process for the videos. Judging will start soon!

tag: hz08, social networking, social operating systems, afi, american film institute, afi screennation, student, education, filmmaking

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Sites that Caught My Eye Today 05/17/2008

• WorldWide Telescope

  New World Wide Telescope from Microsoft. Another alternative to Google Sky - it looks pretty cool.

  tags: astronomy, science, education, technology, edu_newapp, all_teachers, techintegrator

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Google to Offer Live Webcast of Factory Tour of Search Press Gathering

Announcement
May 16, 2008

Who: Google Inc.

What: Live webcast of Google’s upcoming Factory Tour of Search press event to be held at its Mountain View, Calif. headquarters.

When: Monday, May 19th, 9:30am – 12:00pm PDT

Where: www.google.com/press/podium.html

Why: Google to offer an insider’s perspective on Search and provide an update on Google Health. Speakers will include Product Management Directors R.J. Pittman, Carter Maslan, Johanna Wright, and VP of Search Products and User Experience, Marissa Mayer.

Contact:

Eitan Bencuya
press@google.com
+1.650.930.3555

About Google Inc.

Google’s innovative search technologies connect millions of people around the world with information every day. Founded in 1998 by Stanford Ph.D. students Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google today is a top web property in all major global markets. Google’s targeted advertising program, which is the largest and fastest growing in the industry, provides businesses of all sizes with measurable results, while enhancing the overall web experience for users. Google is headquartered in Silicon Valley with offices throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. For more information, visit www.google.com.

###

Google is a trademark of Google Inc. Other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

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Digiteen: Teaching Digital Citizenship - teens teaching ten year olds

Today was the fourth "class" in our digiteen project. In this project, students researched the nine aspects of digital citizenship and had to create an offline action project.

Some students chose to work with middle school students and others chose elementary age. Each group is responsible for 20 minutes of "training" and discussion with the age group they have selected.

Today was the second day of the fourth grade student training. Yesterday we talked about the ways they can access the Internet including the new smaller laptops for kids AND cell phones. They discussed how to report problems in webkins and the importance of being wary of public chat rooms and "checking out" offline before adding them online.

We also discussed xbox and wii live and safe ways to play online (by finding friends ahead of time.) Students cautioned the younger students about chatting via xbox live with headsets to strangers. (a completely unmonitored activity.)

Yesterday, they also discussed addictive behaviors and how much is too much? It is amazing to see the rapt attention and nodding heads from fourth graders with the ninth graders leading the discussions. It is also interesting to see the ninth graders step back and see their own behaviors differently.

My ninth graders were adults to the younger children. They were well educated and well spoken and they had what most of us teachers couldn't have in a million years... they were cool!

Today we talked about cell phones. How to pay attention to the people right in front of you and not ignore them because of texting. "People face to face should be in first place," was our saying I created for them.

It breaks my heart as we talk about this, though. Some kids said, "Well, my mom is always on the phone and never talks to me. She always talks on the phone instead of to me."

Again, think parents about putting your family in first place. (Guess I'd better cut this post short and spend time with hubby.)

We also talked about how the cell phone IS on the internet. The students told the younger ones that every photo or video being taken on a cell phone could be on the internet immediately.

To demonstrate this, I twittered from my cell phone and people from around the world responded. They asked Sue Waters in Australia about the sharks and were amazed at how the Internet connects.

Then, we did a gcast podcast that I recorded and posted live on the Internet (I took it back down afterwards.) They were amazed.

Our point: the cell phone IS the Internet.

The teacher was amazed but we were too when two students confessed to sending 500 text messages a day on the first day. The students ALL decided together that the best thing to do is to charge the phone in the kitchen away from the bedroom or to put it in a drawer in the kitchen.

It was fascinating to see the students recognize what was wrong and propose what should happen to fix it.

It is about taking time to pull students back and reflect upon what they are doing in order to decide if that is what they want. Sometimes talking in third person helps kids decide what they want to do with their first person.

Overall, it has been one of the best things we've done this year. We are going to do more of it next year, that is for sure. The teachers love it and I do too!

My students rock!

tag: digiteen, digital citizenship, ad4dcss, safety, cellular telephone, cell phone, addiction, children, education, safety

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Sites that Caught My Eye Today 05/15/2008

• AFI ScreenNation - Video Contest

  If you've made great video this year in class, it would be exciting to take your award winners and submit it for this contest. Students can win a sony handy cam. This would be a great reward for your best video projects this year. Just make sure you have permission.

  tags: education, techintegrator, edu_news, all_teachers, contest

• Connecting People Via The Network - Horizon Project 2008

  I enjoyed this video a lot from Ren at Goodland High School. I particularly liked the contrast of the computers at the beginning of the video. I think he did a nice job.

  tags: hz08, connectingpeople, education, innovation

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Google to Present at the Goldman Sachs Ninth Annual Internet Conference

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. – May 14, 2008 – Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) announced today that Nicholas Fox, Director of Business Product Management for Ads Quality and Bidding, and Neal Mohan, Director of Product Management for Ad Serving Platforms, will participate in a question-and-answer session at the Goldman Sachs Ninth Annual Internet Conference. The session is scheduled for 4:00 p.m. Eastern Time / 1:00 p.m. Pacific Time on Thursday, May 22, 2008.

To access the live audio webcast of the presentation, please visit investor.google.com/webcast.html.

About Google Inc.

Google’s innovative search technologies connect millions of people around the world with information every day. Founded in 1998 by Stanford Ph.D. students Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google today is a top web property in all major global markets. Google’s targeted advertising program provides businesses of all sizes with measurable results, while enhancing the overall web experience for users. Google is headquartered in Silicon Valley with offices throughout the Americas, Europe and Asia. For more information, visit www.google.com.

Contact:

Maria Shim
Investor Relations
650.253.7663
marias@google.com

###

Google is a registered trademark of Google Inc. All other company and product names may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated.

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Heartfelt posts from the Horizon

This week a student from the Horizon Project had a very heartfelt blog post. Every time we do these projects we have one or two teams who don't "engage" and a few students who just "goof off" and wander aimlessly. (This is where a good teacher comes in.)

The student says:

"If you are reading this right now, I thank you, because no one seems to understand the concept of communication. We have all these problems regarding completion, because people are wondering what they are supposed to be doing. Well, if you don't check the discussion on the wiki pages, or if you don't check your group, well, then it is awfully hard to know much of anything, now isn't it?

Because people are not taking the time to look into what they are supposed to be doing, or they are not taking time to contact their project managers, there is a little bit of a problem, in terms of horizon project completion. Project Managers and Assistant Project Managers can only do so much. Sub groups need to be taking the initiative, and they need to start working together to solve problems. No matter how much cyber urging the PM does, if you do not check your discussion on the wiki, or if you do not check your main page, than the group is doomed to failure.

Another problem that I am seeing across the board, is a problem with activity and motivation. A few students are working because their grade depends on this assignment. Others are contributing because they feel it is their duty, not to let others down. Others aren't contributing because they don't know what to do. Others aren't contributing because they don't have the tech, or do not have the grasp of English. Other's simply aren't . There is not much that someone can do to urge someone who has no interest in the project. You can't yell at them in person, you can't plead with them, you can't do anything. They simply disappear. They see that email notification of a post on their Ning, but they won't check it. They will see that their was a comment on a discussion board, but they won't check it. Follow up is key to the survival of this project, and the fact that people are in la la land, is not helping.

So now that I have talked about the problems that i have observed, specifically with the metatrend, computing in three dimensions, what do other people see? APMs at GBA are reporting similar problems, but how can we remedy them? Is there any one out there who will answer this question?"

Don't we see this in the real world all of the time? Here was my response.

This is something that we see in a project such as this and I talked about it in a blog post a few days a go. This is why the teacher is so important -- they have to reach over and give their students a nudge (if they're doing their job) -- but sometimes there are students who want to make excuses.

As I always tell my students who get frustrated with this - -and it happens in a good 30% of the groups in this sort of thing -- often you learn the most by having troubles happen. Anyone can succeed in a group where everyone is connecting. Anyone can succeed in a world where everyone is working and doing their best.

Truly, those who are world class succeed anyway. In the business world, one time I inherited a team of people to manage who didn't communicate, pretended they didn't know what to do (or maybe they really didn't) and didn't connect with their task. They showed up at work, took up space, took home a paycheck and added nothing to the bottom line. Nothing.

It was my job as their manager to 1) get their attention and 2) hold them accountable. That is the job of the teacher in this case. And yet we struggle that sometimes we as teachers are learning something new too! Some teachers are overwhelmed!

This is the largest project of its kind done to date.

The pioneers out West in the US had a difficult trail -- in fact, they had to make the trail. And when they found the best way to go, the trail out west became deep deep ruts for others to follow.

As we work through this, we are the pioneers. We are finding the best way to go. The best way to do things. You are a pioneer because you are taking the task to heart and you are openly and transparently discussing the struggle.

I applaud you with thunderous applause. I wish there was a way I could literally reach through the Internet to those who have not engaged in this project and "snatch a knot" as we say in South Georgia, but there is not.

I can, however, reach through the Internet and tell you that you "get it." The beautiful thing about wiki projects is that although a wiki could literally be a "C" wiki, that an outstanding student can still make an "A." And vice versa -- a student may be on a team that has an "A" wiki and still make an "F." Think about it, in the history of school, never before has their been such a tool to allow us to create team projects AND STILL reward individual effort towards that team goal.

I am here and will do what I can to help you in any way. Send me a private message to let me know what I can do and make sure that you submit your PM report each week (if you are a PM).

I'm sorry for your struggle and yet, I hope that you emerge as a strongly opinionated person about the importance of online engagement in collaborative teams.

Online activites have offline consequences and it is glaringly apparent that our global education system, except in a very few instances, is not conveying that. We see evidence in the news each night and evidence in this project.

Some would rather surf and pretend to work than to get the job done and engage. It is harder to engage. It is a struggle to do the right thing. It is tough to grapple with new subjects and draw conclusions. In education, we call this higher order thinking. Keep going -- keep reflecting -- keep being honest.

But also be aware, sometimes the greatest life lessons come from the most difficult of circumstances. Be the pioneer.

I've seen PM's in the past make last minute adjustments and agreements with the team members who are engaged and simply take over, reorganize and get it done anyway. Use your judgment.

We have Project Managers and Assistant Project Managers report weekly and teachers address each student privately who is on "the list" of those not engaged. Typically we reach 95% engagement -- now we have 250 students and perhaps at this point are 75% engaged. All students are on the wiki and ning and doing something, however, true "engagement" is obvious and lack of it even more so. And to students, anything less than 100% engagement on their team is unacceptable.

They get angry when even one student isn't doing their part.

I say, let them get angry. Let them understand what online collaboration means and emerge into the world knowing how to be successful. For, truly their success will come from their online collaboration abilities - it is an inevitable part of their future.

Should we give up because we cannot reach 100% engagement. Well, we haven't given up because every kid in the classroom doesn't pass. We work to improve, make it better and MAKE SURE that we are fair to those students who do put forth the effort.

tag: hz08, collaboration, education, flat classroom, horizon project, innovation

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Google to Present at the NASDAQ OMX 21st Investor Program

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. – May 13, 2008 – Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) announced today that Omid Kordestani, Senior Vice President of Global Sales and Operations, will participate in a question-and-answer session at the NASDAQ OMX 21st Investor Program in London. The session is scheduled for 9:45 a.m. Eastern Time / 6:45 a.m. Pacific Time on Tuesday, May 20, 2008.

To access the live audio webcast of the presentation, please visit investor.google.com/webcast.html.

About Google Inc.

Google’s innovative search technologies connect millions of people around the world with information every day. Founded in 1998 by Stanford Ph.D. students Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google today is a top web property in all major global markets. Google’s targeted advertising program provides businesses of all sizes with measurable results, while enhancing the overall web experience for users. Google is headquartered in Silicon Valley with offices throughout the Americas, Europe and Asia. For more information, visit www.google.com.

Contact:

Maria Shim
Investor Relations
650.253.7663
marias@google.com

###

Google is a registered trademark of Google Inc. All other company and product names may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated.

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My prayers are with you Tucker Beam: Building a Skype Bridge from School to hospital room

This story is so moving and amazing and was forwarded to me by my new friend Amanda Stone from the Hoover City School District. Tucker Beam is an eight year old in Amanda's Alabama town.

This is the story in Amanda's words:

"We declared May 9, 2008 Tucker Beam Day in Hoover, Alabama (South Shades Crest Elementary). We have been planning this event for some time....mom can not work during this time and we do not want her to worry about money. We have raised over 28,000 dollars. ***I don't even know you and I am just sharing my heart with you...sorry. When we found out that he could not be at the school....I immediately starting working on the technology. We skyped [him] in....and well, tears poured out across our gym. We had 1,000 kids in our gym when he came up on the big screen. He was able to watch the ceremonies and his second grade class sang "This Little Light of Mine"...there he was ....an 8 year old, ....with the biggest smile on his face. Technology IS a power tool. God was diffently there....Joshua 1:9

http://www.abc3340.com/news/stories/0508/518433.html "

These are the stories that make me have chills. Technology can build bridges to places where we have never been able to go before. It brings people THERE who are a part and makes them feel loved. It enables us to connect.

Amanda, I applaud you and the progressive administration that has empowered you and enabled you to do this (how many schools can't because Skype is blocked?) and my personal prayers will be with little Tucker. To experience such pain and hurt at such a young age is truly one of life's tragedies.

I applaud you for sharing your story... technologies are just tools and can be used for good or evil, much like the human hand or anything ever invented. You are using technology for good. More power to you.

tag: Skype, education, teaching

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Previewing Google Friend Connect: Website owners can make any site social

Announcement
May 12, 2008

Easily insert social features to make "any app, any site, any friends" a reality

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. (May 12, 2008) – Tonight at Campfire One at the Googleplex (code.google.com/campfire/), Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) will announce a preview release of Google Friend Connect, a service that helps website owners grow traffic by enabling any site on the web to easily provide social features for its visitors.

Websites that are not social networks may still want to be social – and now they can be, easily. With Google Friend Connect (see www.google.com/friendconnect following this evening’s Campfire One), any website owner can add a snippet of code to his or her site and get social features up and running immediately without programming – picking and choosing from built-in functionality like user registration, invitations, members gallery, message posting, and reviews, as well as third-party applications built by the OpenSocial developer community.

Visitors to any site using Google Friend Connect will be able to see, invite, and interact with new friends, or, using secure authorization APIs, with existing friends from social sites on the web, including Facebook, Google Talk, hi5, orkut, Plaxo, and more.

To illustrate, independent musician Ingrid Michaelson has added music features from iLike with Google Friend Connect and is now able to run the iLike OpenSocial application on her official website (www.ingridmichaelson.com). As a result, starting tonight, fans who visit Ingrid’s site can connect with their friends without having to leave the site. Visitors will be able to see comments by friends from their social networks, add music to their profiles, see who is attending concerts, and enjoy other features of the iLike application, all at Ingrid’s website. With Google Friend Connect, people will be able to enjoy their favorite features with their friends on any website across the web.

"We want to bring ourselves to every eyeball, not bring every eyeball to us," said Hadi Partovi, President of iLike. "Friend Connect is a significant opportunity for iLike, artists, and fans. The iLike Artist Dashboard™ will be the first content-management system that allows artists not only to post their songs, concerts, and videos to every leading social network from one dashboard, but also to simultaneously manage the content on their own websites."

Google Friend Connect has been developed to lower two barriers to the spread of social features across the web. First, many website owners want to add features that enable their visitors to do things with their friends, but the technology and resource hurdles have been too high. Second, people are tiring of needing to create new logins and profiles and recreate their friends lists wherever they go on the web. Google Friend Connect offers a solution to both these issues.

"Google Friend Connect is about helping the ‘long tail’ of sites become more social," said David Glazer, a director of engineering at Google. "Many sites aren’t explicitly social and don’t necessarily want to be social networks, but they still benefit from letting their visitors interact with each other. That used to be hard. Fortunately, there’s an emerging wave of social standards – OpenID, OAuth, OpenSocial, and the data access APIs published by Facebook, Google, MySpace, and others. Google Friend Connect builds on these standards to let people easily connect with their friends, wherever they are on the web, making ‘any app, any site, any friends’ a reality."

For Site Owners: Traffic and User Engagement

Without requiring coding experience, Google Friend Connect gives site owners a way to attract and engage more people by giving visitors a way to connect with friends on their websites.

• Drive traffic: people who discover interesting sites can bring their friends with them, and can opt-in to publish their activities on those sites back into their social network, attracting even more visitors.
• Increase engagement: access to friends and OpenSocial applications provides more interesting content and richer social experiences.
• Less work: any site can have social components without hiring a programming team or becoming a social network.

Google Friend Connect is in a preview release, available tonight after Campfire One on a handful of whitelisted websites. All site owners interested in learning more about Google Friend Connect and signing up for the wait list can visit www.google.com/friendconnect/ starting tonight. In the weeks ahead we will be turning on more sites, adding more social applications, and integrating feedback from site owners and developers.

Google I/O

Learn more about Google Friend Connect, OpenSocial, and other social initiatives at Google I/O, a two-day developer gathering about building the next generation of web applications. It takes place May 28-29 at Moscone West, San Francisco. Register now for Google I/O at code.google.com/events/io/.

Conference Call Information

Google will host a conference call to discuss this announcement. The conference call will be held on Monday, May 12, 2008 at 9:30 a.m. Pacific Time (12:30 p.m. Eastern Time). To access the conference call, please dial +1 (800) 776-0087 within the United States and +1 (913) 312-1509 from international locations. Replays of both calls will be available until midnight Eastern Time, May 19, 2008 at +1 (888) 203-1112 domestically and +1 (719) 457-0820 internationally. The confirmation code for the replay of the call is 7571843.

About Google Inc.

Google’s innovative search technologies connect millions of people around the world with information every day. Founded in 1998 by Stanford Ph.D. students Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google today is a top web property in all major global markets. Google’s targeted advertising program provides businesses of all sizes with measurable results, while enhancing the overall web experience for users. Google is headquartered in Silicon Valley with offices throughout the Americas, Europe and Asia. For more information, visit www.google.com.

Media Contact:

Sean Carlson
Google
+1 650 253 1173
seanc@google.com

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