Standardized Testing - A Student's View

I came across this video the other day on Twitter.  If you are going to watch or share one video about testing I highly recommend this one.  The students speak with such passion, emotion, anger, and frustration.  It is truly how we all should be looking at Standardized Testing.

Watch the video below.  Help it go viral.  In case you are wondering, the video is part of a HBO program called Brave New Voices.

The 2010 Edublog Awards

Nominations for the 2010 Edublog Awards can now be made.  This is the 7th year that the awards are being conducted.  You can view the 2009 winners here.  Nominations are closed on December 13th, Voting ends December 14th, and the Awards ceremony is December 15th.  You can find instructions for nominating blogs, wiki's, and Tweets by visiting the 2010 Edublog Awards site and following the directions.

I was a newbie to the blogging atmosphere a year ago; in fact, this blog was only a couple weeks old when the 2009 Nominations were announced, so it has been a great learning experience in just one year that enables me to nominate more then I did in 2009. Without further ado and with great pleasure, I present my nominations for the 2010 Edublog Awards:

Best Individual Blog: Lisa Nielson: The Innovative Educator

Best Individual Tweeter: Shelly Terrell

Best New Blog: Greg Kulowiec: The History 2.0 Classroom

Best Resource Sharing Blog: Steven Anderson: Web 2.0 Classroom Blog

Most Influential Blog Post: Kelly Tenkely: iLearn Technlogy Blog: Blogging Alliance I and II

Most Influential Tweet/Series of Tweets/Tweet Discussion: #edchat

Best Teacher Blog: Nicholas Provenzano: The Nerdy Teacher Blog

Best School Administrator Blog: Eric Sheninger: A Principal's Reflections

Best Educational Tech Support Blog: Learn it in 5

Best Librarian/Library Blog: Julie Greller: A Media Specialist Guide to the Internet

Best Educational Wiki: Gina Hartman: Twitter 4 Teachers

Best Educational Use of a Social Network: The Educators PLN

Lifetime Achievement: Sue Waters

Not that I am a huge fan of self promotion, but.....

2010 Edublog Awards

SimpleBooklet.com

SimpleBooklet.com is a site that allows user to create easy to read and use booklets.  All the features can be inserted using simple drag and drop features and can then be shared in several different ways.  They can also be embedded onto a web page.  These would be a great tool to use for students and teachers to advertise their club, athletic team, or even the school.  A lot of schools create information brochures to share with new students, this would be a potential option to do that digitally.

What is really great, is that the site requires no sign up.  Visit SimpleBooklet.com and click the create button to get started.  If you choose to sign up you get to save your work.  The negative of the free account will be the advertising.  You can choose from various backgrounds and styles.  They can be any size that you need.  You can embed video, audio, and links within your Simple Booklet.

These make great digital advertisements, but can be used in various ways in the classroom.  Have students create booklets that explain math problems, or tell about a historical figure.  Students could also create one explaining the steps and results of a science experiments.  English teachers could have students create booklets about the books that they read in class.  Foreign language students could create booklets in the language they are studying.  Geography students could create booklets about countries.  The ideas are endless.  SimpleBooklet.com provides another digital tool for students to create using content from your class.

Plagiarism Checker

A free Plagiarism Checker can be of great service to students and teachers.  PlagiarismChecker.com is another option that uses Google Search for you.  It is as simple as pasting your text into a text box and it will search for similar wording on Google.  The site has a specific link for teachers to get assistance using the software with student work and how it can benefit you.  Remember, it is only doing an Internet search though.

If you find yourself really needing to find cheaters you can even sign up for a Google Alert and you will receive an email from Google whenever the text appears somewhere on the Internet.  You can click on the preferences to setup an email account for the Google Alerts. 

There are some other options on the page.  You can insert a web page URL and check it for plagiarism as well, but this aspect is still a work in progress.  There are also several handouts you can use to assist you with using PlagiarismChecker.com and find information about plagiarism in general.  The site also provides an area for authors to report plagiarism for those that are publishers.

Quotista

Quotista is a site that provides quotes submitted by visitors.  It could be described as a Social Quote Site because you can share and follow quotes with other members.  It encourages sharing your favorite quotes from books as well.  You can see popular and latest quotes without signing up for an account.  There currently is no way to search for quotes and the only way to sign up is using your Facebook account, which means providing your information to Quotista.

You can find quotes in foreign languages as well, in fact, you can find a lot, so it would be a neat way for students in those classes to translate quotes.  Just make sure they are appropriate of course.  I would sometimes provide quotes in my classroom for students to write their thoughts on and as motivation for achievement.

I am not a fan of using Facebook to sign up for sites.  You might not care and could get more use out Quotista, so I thought I would share it.