After visiting the 2009 Teach21 CapstoneExpo at the new CCSD Technology Center, I am amazed at the progress with which the whole Teach21 process and the participants have advanced and grown, further enabling the engagement of students through the Georgia Performance Standards in our schools.  The world class presentations I saw in the exhibit hall displayed such varied approaches to student engagement that I wonder where we will end up next.

I am wow’ed with the fact that this blog is still alive and being read. The honor of being in the first Teach21 Cohort has resulted in so may grand opportunities to advance the abilities of so many students as well as to encourage and spur the creative aspirations of wonderful educators with whom I have the pleasure of serving.   Keep ‘em engaged!

The students have really stepped up and are doing a great job. Their projects have great information and are looking great. This capstone just might work. (ramblings of a tired teacher).

These students are amazing. They are flying through the project and are doing great! The first group completed their video, and I posted it on the Johnston Website. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED! More groups will be completing their projects and posting will follow.
The FIRST totally student produced Animoto / Audacity / Upload is posted at…
http://www.cherokee.k12.ga.us/johnston-es/Pages/Class_Pages/grade0_K.htm
It’s a start!

The students working on items for the website are becoming more focused and are reaching their goals. The utilization of Animoto and Audacity to produce intro slideshows has been a hit.  I am looking foward to seeing thier finished products.

The students are writing, editing, taking photos, and organizing their grade level projects to be included on the new website! We will be posting them on our current website until SharePoint is released. Thier excitement is encouraging. They want to stay in from Recess to work on the photos and animoto movies!

The challenge for the students is to record their text into Audacity, mix music, and produce an mp3 to upload as background music on animoto. They are taking the challenge, head on!

Capstone Shift!
Students have been working hard. Pieces and parts of the new website are built. Sharepoint is still in the future. So, my capstone will be a work in process, as all web sites are.  The continuous change of information affords a constantly moving target. We are in the chase. The capstone presentation will be snapshot of a cross-section of the ongoing project.

My plan for the capstone is to complete it with the students who do not attend AIM on the days when the AIM students are served as a pullout.  Great plan.  Unexpected complications. Due to various complications, AIM has been cancelled on more than one of the Mondays when I was planning to implement the plan, and the capstone is on indefinite hold. If I can have two more class sessions I will be able to complete the project.

I will, over the next few weeks, put my capstone into motion. The actual unit will be completed on Mondays during our AIM time when the AIM students are away. I am left with around 20 students who will be able to complete the tasks. The other benefit of this time slot is that it is a full 90 minute block of uninterrupted time, from 8:45 until 10:15. I will also have the assistance of our reading teacher, Mrs. Cooper.

My only conecern at this point is that the ultimate completion of the capstone is dependent upon our school website being moved over to SharePoint. I have still not received an expected date for that switch.  If I do not hear soon, I may change the “outcome” of the unit into another type of product.

I have been dealing with an issue that has been rather frustrating. The distance of my projector from the Promethean board does not allow me to reduce the size of the projected image to fit within the “usage” brackets on the board. I am able to have the Start button and bottom task bar in the usable space, or the top of the screen where the buttons to minimize, reduce, or close are located. I have been able to place the image halfway between the two extremes and can actually use half of the start line and half of the top line. Moving the projector is not an option as there is an air vent in the way. The board is mounted on a wall and cannot be moved forward. The brackets of this older board do not allow the use of the Promethean pen outside of the brackets, hence the board has unusable margins around the edges.