Novel Trading Cards

Today, I started working on a project with our 9th grade English teacher. We are having the students create trading cards for the characters from a novel. The novel is The Pigman and there are 12 characters that were assigned. I made a template in Microsoft Publisher and saved it to the network drive here at school.
On the back of the card, the students are supposed to describe the characters' appearance and personality. They were also asked to include any other details they felt were important. Then the student will develop an image of the character in their head. They will find a picture of an actor/actress that they would cast for the role if the book was remade as a movie. The picture is going to be placed on the front of the card along with the character's name, the book title, and an important quote from the character. Once, their 12 characters are finished, they will save them to a shared network drive and I will print them on a color laser printer.
Here are some questions I think you might have and I would like to address them now.
1. Why did I create a template for Highschool kids that a capable of creating it from scratch?
2. Why I am spending time printing them instead of having the students print them?
3. What about the actor/actress photos and copyright.

#1 I created the template because we wanted the students to focus their time and energy on analyzing the characters, not playing around trying to make the card pretty. I have done activities in the past where students had too much creative freedom and they lost sight of the task at hand. If they finish early and want to change the layout and fonts, that will fine. I believe students need creative freedom because it allows them to express themselves and it allow them to take "ownership" of the project. But, we need to make sure they are meeting the objectives before we allow them to "play". At the rate they are moving, I believe that most of the students will have plenty of time to add a personal touch to their cards.
#2 I don't like to see instruction time wasted on "clerical" work. Either I will print them or I will have a student assistant print them. Keep in mind, we are printing these to a color laser printer that has restricted access.
#3 The students are using these photos for educational purposes and they are citing the source directly under the picture on the trading card. These cards will not be sold or distributed in any way.

This is only the first day of the activity and it has gone surprisingly well. The teacher I am working with is having two of her classes complete this activity. In both classes, there was a significant number of students who asked if they could stay during their lunch and free time to continue working on the activity because they like it so much. I was AMAZED! I taught these same exact students when they were in seventh and eighth grade and I have never seen them this excited about a particular project.

I cannot take credit for the success of the activity. I created the template and suggested the activity, but the English teacher has done most of the work. She has spent ample time planning for this activity and helping the students find the necessary information in the novel. If it wasn't for the English teachers dedication, the activity could have bombed.

Embedded Learning Year 2 Course Outline

This entry is for those of you involved with Classrooms for the Future in PA. I created an outline/checklist for teachers taking the second Embedded Learning Course (Teaching Authentic). The reason I did this is because some teachers were clicking continue and accidentally skipping some of the Learning Log entries and/or the Sync Point Discussions. This way, they had a sheet that they could check off after each activity. Last year, it wasn't as hard to catch the thing they missed and have them go back and do them later. But, this year, with new CFF teachers involved with the first class and facilitating two separate "year 2" classes (one for math and one for science), I found it a little harder to catch everything as quickly as I did last year.

I posted the checklist on my wiki as a PDF. Here is a direct link. If you want to use it or even change it, feel free. If you need it as a Word Doc for easy editing, let me know and I can email it to you

Google Mars

I recently stumbled upon a new Google "Lab": Google Mars. This is awesome and you need to check it out. You are able to view some of NASA's best images of Mars in a format similar to Google Earth. Check out http://mars.google.com.

More on Copyright and Fair Use

Here is some more information on copyright and fair use. Keep in mind that I am not a lawyer or copyright expert. You are responsible for your own actions.

Four Factors of that Determine if Something Falls Under Fair Use

• The purpose and character of use
• The nature of the work
• The amount and sustainability of the portion used
• The economic impact on the market value of the work

Just Remember
Simply giving credit to a source does not substitute for obtaining permission.
The work you are showing has to be legally acquired.

Showing Movies
If you are showing a movie in class, do not show the whole movie to your class because you do not have public performance rights. If it is for "face-to-face" instruction, you can show it. But, very rarely will you have to show the whole movie in class to convey the point you are trying to get across. Showing a movie as a reward for a class, is a big violation of copyright even though it is in a school. The phrase "for educational use" does not always shield us from copyright repercussions. If you think someone could construct an intelligent argument that proves that you did not need to show as much as you did, I would seek permission or cut back on the amount that you are showing.

Some Limitations
Time - you may use projects for up to two years after the 1st instructional use.
Portion - Text (up to 10% or 1000 words, whichever is less), Music(10% or 30 seconds, whichever is less), Video (10% or 3 minutes, whichever is less), Photos (No more that 5 images by an artist or photographer), Numarical Data Sets (10% or 2500 field entries or cells, whichever is less). these limits are cumulative. You can 10 second from the beginning of a song, 10 seconds from the middle, and 10 seconds from the end of a song, you have reached your limit. Also, if you use 30 seconds of a song, you cannot loop it. If you use the same portion of a song and loop it 3 time within a PhotoStory project, you are breaking copyright because your total use is not 90 seconds for that particular song.
Copying - You may have no more that 2 copies - only one for reserve. Additional copies can be made for preservation purposes but may only be used to replace the original if it is lost, damaged, or stolen.

Intellectural Property Curriculum
http://ipreducation.com/curriculum.html

New Google Search Trick

If you include ~ before your search term, it will include synonyms. So, if I "googled" "~inexpensive cell phones" it would include results for "cheap cell phones" and so on. Give it a try.

You have to check this out!

I was just introduced to chacha.com. You create an account, tell it your cell phone number, and verify your number by replying to a text message they send you. Then, you are able to text questions and they will answer. I asked many different questions and they were able to successfully answer them. I asked it everything from "What was the name of Forrest Gump's boat" to "What is the mean of the first chapter of Tao Te Ching" to "What is Einstein's Theory of Relativity" and they answered them. It is pretty impressive. It does take a few minutes for them to respond. Check it out. I guarantee you will be amazed.

Trading Cards in the Classroom

At the CFF Boot Camp, I attended a session where a History teacher showed us some trading cards the students made for different historical figures. I figured we could us this activity in our history classes by assigning students different historic figures and having them create cards for them. My idea was to print them and laminate them just like the presenter did. However, I would like to see each student walk away with a full set of all the cards made by their class. I am trying to figure out an efficient way to print an laminate all of those cards. If a class has 20 students and each student makes a card, that would be a total of 400 cards to print and laminate for that class. Imagine if the teacher taught that class during three different periods. That would be 1200 cards. I would alsolike to see English teachers use this activity for characters of a story. Image assigning each student a different character from Romeo and Juliet. I made an example for Juliet. I posted it here. If anyone has an idea for an effective way to print an laminate all of these, let me know.