Where Can I Find Legal Music for Videos?

cc licensed ( BY SA ) flickr photo shared by craigCloutier

As many of you already know, I am fan of Flickr's Creative Commons for finding images to use in blogs, websites, wikis, and other online spaces. I blogged about this resource earlier, "Need Photos for Your Blogs Posts."

Now, what about music? One locator is Creative Commons Legal Music for Videos. Of the sites Creative Commons lists, which have you used? What are your recommendations for locating music to use legally in videos?

Involving Parents in a Class Blog and Going Global

One of my favorite teacher bloggers, Kathleen Morris, a primary teacher in Victoria, Australia, created a blog post with advice on how to engage parents in a classroom blog.

For those of you thinking of creating a classroom blog to interact with parents, head over to Kathleen's post, A Guide to Involving Parents in A Classroom Blog. Hopefully, her advice will not only motivate you to get started, but also lead you down the path. Kathleen is an experienced blogging, so don't expect to follow all of her advice right away, but let us know which tips of hers you find most useful for a teacher just getting started with a classroom blog.

If you want to see Kathleen's class blog, you'll find it at: 4KM and 4KJ @ Leopold Primary School. There are plenty of blog posts, pictures, and links to explore and get ideas for your own class blog.  Kathleen loves comments, so feel free to leave some on one of her posts. Note this class blog is really the collaborative effort of two teachers, Mrs. Morris and Miss Jordan, both 4th grade teachers, and, of course, their students.

On the sidebar of 4KM and 4KJ @ Leopold Primary School. you'll find links to class blogs and individual student blogs. The students have made made global friends through blogging.

Mrs. Morris' and Miss Jordan's class have been participants in the QuadBlogging Project. Definitely look into the culmination of one of their Quad projects, The Tale Trail Project. In this project, the Australian students in the two classes collaborated with students from Connecticut, Massachusetts, California, BC Canada, and New Zealand to write a sequential story, which they illustrated, and then combined into one oral reading.

Image at The Tale Trail 

Amazing: Hearing Impaired and Deaf Students Connecting Globally

This morning, procrastinating about shoveling snow, I checked email, and saw an incoming tweet from a Connecticut teacher (Joyce Blum) who tweeted 80% of schools closed in Connecticut for Monday.

To verify the identity of this person, who tweeted a response to another teacher, whom I had already tweeted, which put my Twitter name in Joyce Blum's tweet out, I wanted to ensure the tweet was coming from someone in "the know."

Well, once I got to Joyce Blum's Twitter profile, I saw she was a high school teacher of English for the deaf and hard of hearing.

In her tweet stream, I found a link to a blog. Curious about the blog, I checked the link, and there I found myself exploring a neighborhood of blog posts from students around the world, all apparently hearing impaired or deaf. Not only are these students afforded an opportunity to communicate with the written word, which makes sense, but they are also making connections with peers globally and learning about these peers from all corners of the world. This exploration opened my mind once again to the power of blogging as an amazing tool for communication for a variety of purposes.

I invite you to take a few moments, or linger longer if you like, to see how this blog is unfolding. I am wondering what your reactions will be. The blog is at Welcome to the 2012-2013 School Year. The number of schools throughout the world who have joined and the students who have contributed speak to the power of blogging to connect students in ways not easily possible just a decade ago. As I tweeted back to Joyce,

I also learned that she is using Edmodo as another communication tool.

She calls herself a "rookie," but she is already doing amazing things with technology tools to help her students express themselves and expand their literacy skills and global understandings. 

Well, back to shoveling, but blogging surely can draw us in, as we explore the world through the comforts of our own home. I am just amazed at how this teacher has used the medium of blogging to enhance students' literacy skills: including reading, writing, visualizing, connecting, and gaining world views. For students who cannot hear or have limited hearing abilities, the opportunities to explore blogging as a communication medium seem amazing. What do you think? What is your reaction to Welcome to the 2012-2013 School Year blog?

Snowman Images

My hometown, Long Beach, NY, was devastated by Hurricane Sandy. It's a community with lots of spirit and support. I just caught this new effort. Although many are still homeless or are living in their homes while they undergo major renovations, I'm enamored by their creativity. Project 11561 is just one among many efforts to keep up the spirits of the people.   As Valentine's Day approaches, consider how you can run a similar contest in your classrooms and how you might visually represent the works of your students. 

Blogging Tips

Blogging is for everyone - but there are some pitfalls. Photograph: Juniors Bildarchiv/Alamy

Yes, this picture grabbed my attention, but the post's title is what really caught by eye: Top 10 Don't for Wannable Teacher Bloggers . 

Check the post for some motivation to get going with blogging. 

Which advice in the post do you find the most helpful?

The Importance Of Using Images In The Classroom

The Importance Of Using Images In The Classroom is a short piece that reminds us of the power of images. Check the piece and the use of a famous painting, The Scream, to motivate the writing of a poem.

How are you using images in your classrooms? In reading blogs, do pictures draw you in?

Where would you rather be?

Connecticut, Feb. 8, 2013

Hawaii, July 21, 2012

Literacy Shed

Stuck at home with our snowstorm, I'm on Twitter, Google+, reading class blogs, and just surfing around. One of my Twitter friends, tweeted out about this exciting resource that fits with our course, Integrating Technology and Literacy. The site's title, Literacy Shed, caught my eye, so I started exploring, and invite you to, also. Take a look at what the site offers, and let us know if the site sparks ideas for your teaching or in general. Without further ado, link to the site; just click on the image.

Okay, I know you can get lost in exploring the site, but come back here to post a comment to share what you find and like.

Required Reading

In class this week, in one section of Integrating and Technology, we discussed whether the 4th grader of today will be writing the standard research paper when she enters college in the next decade. This article from The New York Times, "Education Needs a Digital Upgrade," suggests we are teaching students for a world that we don't yet know exists. We can't predict the jobs our young children will have in the future. We don't even know what these jobs will be.

To quote from the article, "According to Cathy N. Davidson, co-director of the annual MacArthur Foundation Digital Media and Learning Competitions, fully 65 percent of today's grade-school kids may end up doing work that hasn't been invented yet." In her book, Now You See It, Davidson urges teachers to stop teaching according to the Industrial Age model.  

The contemporary American classroom, with its grades and deference to the clock, is an inheritance from the late 19^th century.

She claims that the standard research paper assignment, popular in college classrooms, not only yields awful results, but is not even representative of the students' talents.

Check the article, "Education Needs a Digital Upgrade." In addition to what the title suggests, Davidson advocates for a whole new approach to education, not just in terms of technology tools. Do you agree with the statements Davidson makes? If so, with which assertions? In what directions do you believe education should be heading?

Can Teachers Avoid Digital Resources?

In a recent national survey of teachers, conducted by PBS Learning Media, it was found that a high percentage use digital media regularly in their teaching. The landscape of the classroom has changed from the old days of a reliance on printed books and students writing on paper. The following infographic shows the results of the survey.  Review the infographic. Where do you stand?

Do you agree educational technology motivates students?
What do you see as the benefits of educational technology?
What are the tech tools you use most often?
Consider other data available in the infographic. What is your reaction?

image Image via iStockphoto, sturti

On a related note, the House of Representatives is reviewing a bill to increase access to technology in schools and teachers' professional development in this area.  On Feb. 6, 2013, the International Society of Technology in Education (ISTE) posted this information: "Great Start for Digital Learning Policy in 113th Congress: Comprehensive Technology Bill Introduced in U.S. House of Representatives."

Overall, how do you feel about the influx of technology resources in the educational setting? Would you rather see the pace slow down, speed up, or go in another direction?

Digital Story: The Crayon Box That Talked

As you think of ideas for digital stories, this one created by young children to address the theme of cultural diversity might stir your imagination.  After viewing the video, leave some comments. What does the story say to you about the children's creativity? What about their approach to explaining cultural diversity? Does their video give you ideas for digital storytelling? Would you show this video in your own classroom? Would you consider making a similar video using a story such as "The Crayon Box That Talked"?

Kindergarteners Blogging: No Kidding

Listen to these kindergarteners from Ms. Cassidy's class talk about what they think of blogging and how they're using it.  Be sure to leave a response. What do you think of their comments?

Do you think kindergarteners should be blogging? What will happen when they enter first grade? Should they continue blogging? What about when they enter upper grades? How do you see their blogging experiences affecting their literacy skills?

Five Card Flickr Stories

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The Five Card Story is a quick digital story game put together by an educator, Alan Levine, who also goes by the name of CogDog. Check out his site, Five Card Story, and create your own Five Card Story. The images are ones stored in Flickr under the Creative Commons License, free to use.

After reading 31 blogs this weekend and then preparing website notes for this week, I needed a break, so played with Five Card Story  This is an idea you can implement in your class by giving your students any five photos available, and for older students, you can even have them try out the Five Card Story site.

Once you finish creating your story using Five Card Story, you will see a code that you can embed into your blog by switching from the Compose to the HTML tab in Blogger. The URL for the story is also available and that can be shared with others for them to access your story at the site.

In addition to using random photos to stir one's imagination for story writing, the exercise serves two additional purposes:

• It initiates the idea of matching photos to storytelling, serving as an introduction to a unit on digital storytelling
• It helps teach students about what photos found on the Internet they can legitimately use. In Flickr, photos that can be reused are marked as such and have in their posting both the URL to use for attribution and the embed code for converting the photo with its attribution right into a website, blog, wiki, or other online platform. Those using the photo can use either method to acknowledge the source. 

Here are five cards, photos, I was randomly dealt to create a story. Note the attributions for each photo automatically pop up under each.

Five Card Story: Walk on the Wild Side
a #etmooc story created by Midnight Poker Player (that is the nickname I chose since I created this around midnight.)

flickr photo by cogdogblog

flickr photo by cogdogblog

flickr photo by cogdogblog

flickr photo by cogdogblog

flickr photo by cogdogblog

And my masterpiece (joking) story. If I had more time and energy, I would have created a story with dialogue and more.


I escaped into the woods one snowy night. What I thought was a polar bear turned out to be a snow figure. On the run, I looked for a car to escape. On the dashboard, I found a pair of dark sunglasses, perfect for my disguise. Hungry from days on the run, I sought food, but only could find oranges. To my dismay, they were already eaten, and just the rinds remained. I trembled as someone shook me and realized it was all but a dream.

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