Swine Flu Resources
I’m grateful to Tre Greer on Twitter for bringing to my attention this interesting resource for teaching about flu epidemics from the Centre of the Cell in London. With Swine Flu / Hamthrax / Parmageddon in the news right now, it’s quite timely.
Although based on Bird Flu it is very relevant to the current stories in the news about Swine Flu which is causing concern. While the stories are a little worrying, the media are possibly blowing things up a little too much. But it does mean we have a chance to bring some topical news into the Science classroom and discuss viruses, bacteria, the difference between antibiotics and antiviral agents etc.
Students are asked to make decisions at key points, that can change the outcome of the spread of the disease.
Other resources are starting to be be produced – such as this Google Map to show where the current reported outbreaks are.
For some more resources to teach about Swine Flu, check out this post on Free Technology for Teachers, and also this list on Larry Ferlazzo’s blog.
Update – also check out Brain Pop for their Swine Flue Video
Update 2 – The always excellent “The Big Picture” has a series of images on the Swine Flu outbreak that would be good to spark discussion in Science or PSE lessons.
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Smart Table Trials
I’ve blogged before about the Smart Table – this is a multitouch table produced by Smart that moves away from the interactive whiteboard at the front of the class.
If you are interested in learning more about them, Tom Barrett has been given one by Steljes to trial with his class. He has been blogging about his initial observations, and will be blogging more as his class puts the table through its paces.
You can see two introductory videos, including a tour of the Smart Table here.
Tom has also set up a Twitter account for his class where they will be sharing their thoughts about the Smart Table here: http://twitter.com/priestsic5
It will be good to see the table getting actual classroom use. At present they look rather neat, and I would love to have a play with one myself, but I want to see actual learning taking place on them. I’m loking forward to following the news of Tom’s trials and seeing how his class use it.
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Marzano IWB research published
Promethean have now made available a report by education researchers Robert Marzano and Mark Haystead entitled “Evaluation Study of the Effects of Promethean ActivClassroom on Student Achievement,”
The study examined whether Promethean’s ActivClassroom had an impact at different grade levels and across different academic content areas in schools around the US.
The research found that integrating Promethean’s ActivClassroom into lessons can raise student achievement an average of 17 percent. The study determined that student achievement can increase if a teacher has 10 or more years of teaching experience, has been using the technology for two or more years, has high confidence in his or her ability to use the ActivClassroom suite, and uses it 75 to 80 percent of the time in the classroom.
If you want to read the full report – you can get hold a copy via the Prometheanworld site here. or you can read a summary at Eschoolnews.
Here’s Dr Marzano talking about some of his research
I’m still ploughing through the full research report – but it does make some interesting claims. It’s nice to be able to have some actual data to quote on the effectiveness of a coordinated teaching approach that uses IWB’s at the heart of it.
It’s important to note that just dropping in an IWB on a teacher and expecting them to teach with it is not going to get this kind of improvement (or any improvement) but if the board is also supported by decent training for the teacher to make them confident and other support for the teacher then real benefits can be seen.
It’ll be interesting to see what other research projects are being done in this field.
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Magic Fill Reveal
A quick post to point Smartboard users towards a neat little trick with the fill tool and shapes. The Teqsmart people have some other great resource on their site, so check it out once you’ve watched it.
Also check out their page of Smart Notebook files and gallery items here.
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Smart Lesson Toolkit 2.0
Smart have just made available version 2.0 of their excellent Lesson Activity Tookit for Notebook 10. The Lesson Activity Toolkit contains templates for several activities that you can use to keep your students involved and make learning fun. There are over a dozen types of customizable activities including: anagram, category sort, image match, keyword match, multiple choice, pairs, tiles and word guess.
You can read a pdf file about the new version here.
To get hold of it, open Smart Notebook 10 and click on the gallery tab. In the top right corner you will see an icon of a spanner. Click on that and choose Check for Updates, and then Lesson Activity Toolkit 1.0
The software should connect to the internet and give you the option to update to version 2.
Check the box next to Lesson Activity Toolkit 2.0 and click on Next. The rest should happen automatically.
Once updated, you will be able to access the Lesson Activity Toolkit 2.0 from the gallery. For activity and game ideas, open the Examples folder in the Lesson Activity Toolkit.
If the update does not work, you can download the toolkit from the Smart website here. I checked just now and I think it’s still giving the 1.0 version, but keep an eye on that page and see if they put the new one on.
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Vocaroo
If you want to try your hand at podcasting, but don’t want to be fiddling about with sound editors or suchlike, then take a look at Vocaroo.
Basically Vocaroo is a website which will let you record a sound file, and then share that file with anyone who wants to listen to it. You can share the link via email, put the link on your blog, embed a simple player into your blog, or download the sound as a .wav file to your computer.
All you need is a microphone, the website does the rest. You get a single button to click to start recording, just start talking and click the stop button when you’re done. It’s pretty simple.
As a test, here’s a message I recorded with Vocaroo just now: Click to Listen
It will also give you a small flash applet which you can embed into your blog, like the one below:
You (or your students) could record revision information, step by step tutorials/guides, stories, news reports (real or imagined) and much more.
If you want to make a start in the world of podcasting but want a very no-frills way of getting a recording of your voice onto the Internet, then try Vocaroo out.
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Pixlr
A very quick post to make you aware of yet another excellent online painting package.
It’s called Pixlr and you can play with it here: http://pixlr.com/
No need to say a lot about it. Just go and have a play for yourself!
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Four Links
Four quick links to share, rather than blitz 4 new posts.
1. Hunkins Experiments: Loads of ideas for Science experiments you can do in the home or in the classroom. Good for inspiration. Worth a look.
2. Wonder Boards – IWB’s in action: A summary of several of the main IWB’s on the market. Mainly a case study of each board being used in a different school rather than weighing up the pros and cons of each system, but take a read anyway.
3. Florida Citizens for Science – Stick Figure Contest: A quick head’s up about a science competition that may be fun to try with your students. Create a stick figure cartoon about why Science is important (for under 12s) or about the truth behind a false argument (for over 12s)
4. The Big Picture – Alasksa’s Mt Redoubt: On March 22nd, 2009, Alaska’s Mount Redoubt, began a series of volcanic eruptions spewing dust and ash over a large area. The Big Picture continues it’s excellent series of images with a set covering the eruption. If you want some up-to-date images of volcanoes for geography or for an Earth Science lesson, then there are some very impressive ones here.
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Sketchcast is back
Sketchcast was a brilliant website that let you draw onto a webpage and record everything you did as a flash movie file.
You could even record audio to go alongside your drawing if you wanted to.The file you produced could then be embedded into your blog or wiki page and shared with the world.
Sadly, the website vanished without a trace last year, which was a shame.
Happily, it looks like Sketchcast is back up and running. There’s no mention on the site about why it vanished. Maybe that will be explained sometime.
It would be great to combine this site with your interactive whiteboard. Students could produce drawings to show how they have solved maths problems, or balanced science equations for example.
Given that the site has vanished in the past – you might not want to store a large amount of material here, and if you plan to use it in a lesson, do have a Plan B just in case (Smart Notebook and Activ both have built-in screen recorder tools you can use, they just don’t share the file so easily), but it is worth a play.
Take a look at the example Sketchcasts, and have a play to see how you could use it.
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About Me
Danny Nicholson : Educator, Science teacher, ICT Consultant, PGCE lecturer, Author and Web2.0 / SMART Masters/ Interactive Whiteboard Trainer. Contact me for any training requests. 
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