the media window

Here are just a few of the signs that my mind is coming back to the media/teaching world and summer’s end is not too far away:

I read a thought-provoking blog entry today at Doug Johnson’s Blue Skunk Blog titled Censorship by omission. It has to do with internet filtering by school districts and how it affects teaching and learning in our classrooms in very real ways. This was evidenced by several twitter responses Dr. Johnson quickly received when he asked for examples of the effects of internet filtering from his colleagues. He asserts that the constant erosion of intellectual freedom is “because individual teachers, librarians, techs, student and parents don’t speak up, take action or ask questions. Internet censorship is a sin of omission because too many of us are just willing to let it happen”. For me, one constraint is the time factor. If it isn’t easy to fix, it stays broken and I usually move on to something else. Food for thought as I near the start of the next school year.

I was checking out the call for volunteers for the K12 Online Conference 2009. The theme this year is “Bridging the Divide”. This is a fantastic resource for any educator who wants to learn more about integrating technology into their classroom. It is free, and the conference is run entirely online by volunteers who are on the cutting edge of new thinking in the digital education world. Here’s a clip from the conference home describing the offerings: “This year’s conference begins with a pre-conference keynote the week of November 30, 2009. The following two weeks, December 7-11 and December 14-17, forty presentations will be posted online to the conference blog (this website) for participants to download and view.” One summer I received graduate credits for attending the conference and then writing and reflecting with others on the great presentations that year. This is an amazing and extremely worthwhile event! You will share ideas with people across the globe!

I shared a great resource I came upon recently with a good friend and colleague Sheila ,  called James Patterson’s READKIDDOREAD.COM. While there are many talented people involved with this great resource that is “dedicated to making kids readers for life”, the two that I immediately recognized were James Patterson (Maximum Ride series)  and Judy Freeman, a well known children’s literature consultant. Definitely worth checking out this website for excellent book suggestions for boys and girls, author interviews as well as a social network component that all can join. Good stuff here!

I took another class on Dreamweaver at TIES last week, and then made plans to get together with another media specialist to explore ideas, tips and tricks to develop and improve our school websites.

Finally, I’m writing a post on my media window blog, but lucky for me I am lounging in my porch swing on a perfect summer Sunday while doing it. Thankfully, summer is not completely over!