The Movies are DONE

I have been a delinquent blogger. May and June have been very busy months. But my students have finished their movie projects. You can find them here:
There are 6 categories,

1. Best Script,
   
2. Best Use of Images
3. Best Production (watchability)
4. Best Direction
5. Make a Difference Award
6. Best Picture

The top 25 movies made this list. On each page you will find a google form. Fill out the check box and submit. Your voting will be passed on the the film makers.

It is June. For us in North America the school year is winding down. If you find yourself with time on your hands and a class needing something to do..... watch some movies.

Thanks for your time.

Kids need Passion

I just wrote a post for my students. It is hopefully going to light a fire under some of them. Spring fever has hit and school is not a priority. Perhaps in the near future something will come back.

Here is the post I gave them....

Learning is about passion.

Flickr attribution http://www.flickr.com/photos/tyla/3196687667/ by Tyla'75

You need to have this passion to succeed in life. In recent weeks I have seen many of you get spring fever and lose your will to learn. Many of you are going goldfish,

not asking questions and just wanting answers. This passiveness needs to disappear and you need to rekindle your passion to learn.

We only have a few weeks left in school. Take everyday as an opportunity to find new things to learn and use this knowledge to succeed on your final assignments and exams.

Watch this video and listen to these Grade 5 students. They are part of a noon hour club in New York City. These kids have passion. They want to sing, learn be active in society. Watch their faces as they sing and the passion in their voices. The students have sung onstage with many performers and will be singing with Fleetwood Mac at Madison Square Gardens infront of 18 000 fans on June 11th.


Find your passion and succeed.

Harbeck

2minutes Final Instructions

Here is a post I have just given my students. The movie project is finally coming to an end. I hope that there are some films to share with my network. From how the kids are talking we should have a few to share.


Oscar Wagon by grebo guru

The time has come for you to have a completed video. So the logical question is now..... Where do I put it!

You must upload the video to

or There is a spmath login for both of these sites. The password is the same at both. Email me if you do not know the password. Please use it so that I can create a channel and keep all videos organized. Both sites allow HD uploading so please use youtube if possible.

Once you have your video uploaded please embed it at your blog. Create a post

• Title ________ 2 Minutes to Make a Difference
• In the body give a 2 to 3 sentence explanation of your video.
• Embed your video
• label your post in the usual way, name, 2minutes, spinquiry

Your movie is to be 2 minutes in length. I will give you an extra 30 seconds to add the credits at the end of the movie. The credits are important because it informs the viewing audience about your sources of music, photos and information.
Please make sure that you have added into your credits all information about

1. photos
2. music ..... make sure you have permission to use the music you are using. If you have asked for permission and no one has replied back use up to 30 seconds and you should not have too many issues with copywrite. Make sure you state in the credits that you asked for permission.
3. websites Inform the viewing audience where you found your material. They could then go and learn more about the topic.
   

Last Movie Post

Here is the last post for the Grade 8 students on their Inquiry Project 2 Minutes to Make a Difference. It is posted at the Mathzone. The movies will be posted on a youtube channel and hopefully at itunes.


The last stages of your 2 Minutes to Make a Difference are almost over. You should be making your movie as we speak. The final deadline for your movie will be on May 20. On that day I need access to your movie, you can burn it to a cd or use a flash drive.

Your movie projects will be marked on the following criteria, Length of movie, script, do you make a difference, production quality, direction and credits. Here is the rubric that will be used to mark your movie.

The final part of the movie will be a day where we will watch all of the movies as a grade. On June 15 we will use periods 2 and 3 to screen the movies. You will have a chance to vote on the ones you liked the best. Following the screening you will be served lunch and we will have an awards ceremony during period 4.

Red Carpet by jeffbalke

This will be a great way to get ready for your math exam which will be on June 16th!! Be sure to study!!!!!

You have had many months to create these masterpieces. Please take time to finish them to a standard of excellence that will make you proud. Following the ceremony we will unveil your iTunes channel and youtube channel. You will be able to

2009 Student Led Conferences

Student-led Conferences have been a staple of Manitoba Education for over a decade. It is a valuable experience for parents. Student-led conferences put the student in the drivers seat. They show their parents a portfolio of their work that shows how they have grown as a learner. I love student-led conferences. Students and parents interacting about learning. Think of these conferences as intensive dinner conversation answering the question, "What did you do in school today?"

Dinner Table
http://www.flickr.com/photos/niinac/2873854975/

Participation in Student-led conferences are higher than in traditional parent-teacher interviews. Students enjoy showing their learning to their parents. Parents enjoy seeing what their students have done. Many more parents are able to attend Student-led conferences because of the flexible timetable. We provide access to the school and the parent and child pick the 30 to 60 minute slots that they need. Often we will see up to 90% of the parents on these nights.

For the Grade 8 students they have created Electronic Portfolios to showcase their work and learning. This provides flexibility for parents. Those who cannot come into the school have access to the portfolio at home. Now these conferences are available to all students. Having access available to parents at home is important because many of the parents at our school work shift work or multiple jobs and freeing themselves up for up to three hours if they have more than one student is hard. Believe me I know with three children of my own.

The conferences are over and 24 of the 35 students attended from my home room. Overall we had over 110 students attend out of 145. The remaining students will receive a letter home explaining the student led process to parents. Students will participate at home and bring back confirmation to us that the conference took place.

Now to finish the year and prepare for next year. A job well done.

Windows to the World

A fun evening of Cheesies and Licorice Nibs was had by all listening to some of the greatest edutecnologists around. Ben Hazzard, Lisa Kolb, Rodd Lucier, Ryan M, Clarence Fisher and others all skyped into a room of eager and raw teachers. Now by room I mean at least there were 20ish of us. But hey we had twice as many people in the ustream chat room.

It was a nice culminating event of the rant that I had a few weeks ago. Following that rant Andy and Darren met me for a coffee. From that conversation Windows to the World was born. I would like to thank John Evans and Andy for working so hard to make things work out.


Here are some of the tweets using the #wttw.


For the people in the room it was nice for me to see some new faces. I set up a wiki for Manitoba teachers who use twitter. I called it http://mbteacherswhotweet.wikispaces.com. It is the same idea as the terrific pbwiki twitter4teachers You will find all of the participants from the f2f listed there. Also at this wiki you will find the chat log from the ustream.

I still find it amazing that an evening like this will bring together over 40 people in the ustream chat room and in a city of 700 000 people and a gazillion teachers we are only able to find about 20 to partake in the evening. I personally tried to get 5 people to come to the evening. None showed up. Some had legitimate excuses but still one would think that learning and experiencing this Koolaid is important to teachers today.

I have not stopped trying but it is getting frustrating when so few care about changing their pedagogy. I guess I will wrap myself up in the fuzzy blanket of happiness that is my PLN and the knowledge that WE get it. Thanks Andy, John, Darren, Ryan and Clarence for joining me in understanding the importance of what we do for the future of education.

Kids get it, we get it...... when will THEY get it. A Monty Python song comes to mind



Something about Always looking on the bright side of life!!

I love my students Part 2

This is how it all started

This is too cool. I am here Windows to the World and I have a student chatting with me. This is a true story. Really it is. I am not making it up.

Student: Harbeck!

8:17 PM me: Hey

Liem: I have a really cool idea

8:18 PM me: Ok what!!

Student: http://www.youtube.com/user/NationalGeographic

I was wondering if we compose a letter of everybodies ideas to make our community a Greener PLACE

8:19 PM theres a prize for $20,000 but i don't know this could be fun

me: Hey yeah lets do it and talk about it

8:20 PM Student: okay cool tomorrow?! in class.

8:21 PM me: Sure or before. YOu could make a blog post about it and post it. I would add it to all the other blogs. What do you think. Make a blog post and see if people want to do something!!

Student: Okay Yeah!

me: thx for learning

Student: haha, your welcome.

8:22 PM its cool, how your can take learning outside of school(:

Wow I get paid to teach these kids ;) Life is good


Here is the students post. I cross posted at the other student blog and the mathzone. Let us see what happens here.

A Post From Liem

The Green Effect!

Okay guys! I found this really cool idea! Its called the green effect.National Geographic with Sun Chips are joining forces to inspire people to make a change in their communities. We need to compose a letter to National Geographic of 250 words or less explaining what we can do to make our community a GREEENER place. The five best ideas will win $20,000 dollars to help make their community a greeener place.

Some ideas would be like making a garden, putting recycling boxes around parks, making our school more green and other stuff! Imagine if what we can do with $20,000 dollars to make our community more GREEN







For more information please visit http://greeneffect.nationalgeographic.com/
Online voters will choose one winner, and a panel of judges will select the remaining four.