Thing 6: Curation Tools

My head is full of new information! I started by reading the article" Teaching Kids to Curate Content Collections", which led me to the NYC soda ban resources in Scoopit which I shared with a 9th grade English teacher who is researching local interest topics.I looked at Learnest and thought this would be perfect for an English 11 teacher who runs a flipped classroom. I joined Scoopit and looked at Chris Gibson's page which I ended up sharing with a 10 grade Global Studies teacher who is researching Ancient Civilizations.I looked at the conversation threads in Mentormob and plan to follow them more closely.I also joined Diigo and am following Cool Tools for Schools and Teacher-Librarian. In reading through the class information, I think I am more in the "Digging for Gold" category---collecting information and passing it along.I completely understand how these curation tools will be beneficial for students to put together resource lists for research projects. I may play with Scoopit over the stummer to make resource lists for the main projects required at the high school where I work. Right now I just have lists of websites that have accumulated through the years, and I would like to reorganize my webpage to make it more appealing.

Thing 5: Digital Storytelling and Presentation Tools

I skimmed through many of the tools mentioned this week, but the ones I spent time on are VoiceThread, Photopeach, Zooburst and Storybird, as well as the information about Creative Commons. I really like the idea of having the students create booktrailers using VoiceThread. I may do this with my library book club students next year. (There is no club this year). I absolutely love Zooburst and wish I was working with elementary students to utilize this tool in my library. There is a way to view the stories on a regular PC if you print out the 3D "tool" and hold it up in front of the webcam. I made a little slide show of my Maine vacation pictures using Photopeach. It was fun to choose the pictures and music. I would love to do this for all my family get-together photos! Here is the link for it: http://photopeach.com/album/131a7y1 Presently, I have 2 Freshman English classes that are coming to the library to use Windows Movie Maker to design a book trailer. The students have finished reading and studying Fahrenheit 451. They have chosen a book that they have read in the past that left an impression on them. They are to create a book trailer about that book to convince the other students in the class why this book should not be banned/burned. They are using images and music through Creative Commons. I can't wait to see their final projects.