Hangout with Michelle and the VoiceThread TeamTuesday, August 14th 3pm PDT/ 6pm EDTTopic:  Strategies for Increasing Student Voice and Video CommentsParticipation options explained below!Each month, I hold two events for the higher ed VoiceThread community: a webinar showcasing different ways that college professors are using VoiceThread, and an online office hour that is an opportunity to engage in a less formal conversation about teaching with VoiceThread.  Office hours are your chance to ask logistical "how to" questions which I respond to visually using the screenshare feature and engage with other educators about topics related to teaching with VoiceThread. Beginning tomorrow, I am making a change and using Google+ Hangouts on Air as the platform for my monthly VoiceThread office hour.  I'm excited about this change and hope you will be too!  Please join in.  You will have two options for participating.Options for Participating in the Google+ Hangout On AirOption 1: Participate -- Up to 10 people (including me and the VoiceThread team member) will be able to join in on the live, online discussion.  The live participants will have the opportunity to participate in video chat (you can choose to disable your video camera and participate through voice only) to ask questions and share ideas.  First come first serve!To join as a participant, you must add Michelle to your Circles in Google+.Then at the scheduled time of the Hangout, you will see a notification in your Google+ feed that the Hangout has begun. Click "Join Hangout."Option 2: View Only -- While the Hangout is in progress, a live stream of it will be embedded in the "Hangout" page of my blog.   An unlimited number of viewers may watch the live Hangout by visiting that page.

I just wrapped up my first Hangout On Air which was the new environment I'm using for my monthly online VoiceThread office hour.  The archive of the Hangout is embedded below if you'd like to view it and learn!  It was fun!The Event in ReviewI was joined by 4-9 colleagues (the number varied throughout the hour) which was a great number for the group.  The flow of the video could certainly have been smoother and I hit some very rocky experiences with the screenshare function which was too bad but the conversation was great.  I am reflecting now on how great it felt to be joined by so many educators who have successfully completed my Building Online Community with Social Media class (offered through @One).  In that class, college professors are introduced to the key tenets of online community and learn how elements like social presence, collaboration, and personalized learning contribute to breaking down a learner's isolation in online classes.  In the class, students learn to effectively scaffold and support a student's affective learning with VoiceThread, and other social media-related tools, by participating in our own learning activities. Then then they create their own VoiceThread activity at the end of the class which fosters their social presence and demonstrates their ability to develop a collaborative learning activity.  It warms my heart to reconnect with so many of you -- sorry, I'm getting mushy here but it really is a nice feeling -- and see so many of you continue to be tirelessly dedicated to exploring new ways to meet the needs of your students, in the face of our crummy budget mess and the lack of support you find around you.  Pedagogically, our conversations flowed from how to have students share student-generated VoiceThreads with an instructor and then with an entire class to comparing VoiceThread to a discussion forum, and reflecting on how to use VoiceThread in conjunction with other assessment tools (like blogs, traditional assessments, papers, etc.) to scaffold learning up through the highest levels of critical thinking.   Next MonthI'll be making a separate blog post in the coming weeks about the day/time of my September Hangout on Air but if you'd like to plan to join us, I urge you to click here and add me to your Circles on Google+.  This is the only way you'll have the option to join and participate in the Hangout (see option one below).I am taking suggestions about what the topic should be for the September Hangout On Air -- please share your idea in the form of a comment on my blog or reach me on Twitter @brocansky. Thanks!Also, I am interested in being crystal clear about the fact that you have ways to access each Hangout on Air.  I know this is new to most of us so feel free to leave a comment here if you have a question and I'll do my best to answer it.  Option 1: Join and participate in the the Hangout on Air from Google+.  If you join this way, the system's default is to display your presence via your webcam.  After you have joined, you will have the option to turn off your webcam and participate via audio only or you may also participate via text chat if that's your preference.  Of course, I encourage video participate when it's possible and meets your needs.  There are seats for up to 10 participants (including me).Option 2: View the live stream on the Hangout page of my blog.  Each time I launch a Hangout on Air, I will embed the video stream here for live viewers to access it. The archive of the video will remain there until the new Hangout on Air occurs. Moving forward, I'll be establishing a method of storing all the links too. Unfortunately, I am unable to provide live or delayed captioning the Hangouts nor the archives.

Next week I will be presenting at the Learning 2.0 Conference, organized by Steve Hargadon and the great leaders at Classroom 2.0 in support of Connected Educator Month.  I hope you'll join me!Learning 2.0 is a free, online, open conference that begins on Monday, 8/20/12 and runs through Friday, 8/24/12.  Learn more about the conference and view the schedule of events here.  All sessions will be presented in Blackboard Collaborate, a web-based e-conferencing system. All sessions will also be archived.Join me for:Can't You Just Lecture to Me?Strategies for Supporting Reluctant Students when Teaching with Emerging TechnologiesTuesday, August 21st1pm PDT/ 4pm EDTKeynote SessionHow Content and Learning ChangesWhen Students Become the Online TeachersFriday, August 24th12:00 PDT/ 3:00 EDTGeneral SessionLearn more about the conference here:  http://www.learning20.com Twitter hashtag is #learning20Looking forward to learning with you!

Since 2007, I have openly shared my experiences, my work, my ideas, questions, and my frustrations here on my blog.  I know there are many who read but don't comment -- and that's quite ok.  I can't put into words how amazing it feels to me to attend a conference and have complete strangers introduce themselves to me, sharing their gratitude for all that they've learned from my blog.This week my son started middle school and it has been a rather difficult transition for him.  So, as any mom would, I'm doing everything I can to try to help him.  He has been given the task to sell magazines.  Typically, our family buys one or two to support the school and we leave it at that but this year, I thought I'd try something different.  I thought I'd weave this into my blog as an opportunity for my readers to "pay it forward" and send a silent note of thanks or a thumbs up to me if you have learned something from my blog over the years.  I regularly turn down advertisement offers and guest blog post offers for my blog in an effort to maintain integrity on my site.  I feel confident I've maintained a consistent experience here for educators to share and learn together and today, I ask you to give back for my son, Jack, who is truly the bravest young person I know. The proceeds go to Springview Middle School. I hope you'll consider purchasing a magazine subscription or two for yourself or as gifts for the upcoming holiday season.  Thank you!

At last, my book, Best Practices for Teaching with Emerging Technologies, has published! The paperback and hardcopy versions are now available directly from Routledge and Amazon.A Kindle version will be available on Amazon and an eBook option will also be available via Routledge shortly, although I have no exact date about either.This has been a huge project and I am very grateful for all the instructors who shared their practices, ideas, resources, advice and willingness to review the book.  Thank you so much to you all! I wrote this book so it would be relevant to both 2- and 4-year instructors who are both experienced and completely new to the idea of weaving web-based technologies into their classes.  It is packed with practical advice and ideas, always keeping students and learning as the central focus.  Rather than an explosive list of new technologies to check out, you will find relevant tips and showcases from college classrooms, infused with my own personal journey about how social media and web 2.0 technologies revolutionized my vision of teaching and learning.  The book is accompanied with an online resource site, as well, which is intended to augment your learning as you read and encourage you to expand your horizons and use of new tools in your own professional development.I will continue to share related events and discussions about the book on my blog, Twitter, and Google+! Cheers!

Each month, I host two events for VoiceThread's higher education community: a webinar and an online office hour.  The events are geared towards showcasing effective practices of VoiceThread in college learning and providing assistance to educators who are teaching with VoiceThread (or want to learn how).  Recently, we moved the office hour event to Google+ Hangouts!September 2012 Higher Ed VoiceThread Events: Diversifying Instruction in Large Lecture Classes with VoiceThreadFriday, September 14th, 201212:00 PDT/ 3:00 EDTClick here to register for free!  This webinar will feature the teaching innovations of Ginger Shultz, Lecturer of Chemistryat the University of MichiganMany instructors struggle to understand how to use collaborative technologies to support large, lecture-based classes. In this webinar, you will learn how Ginger Shultz employs VoiceThread in an organic chemistry laboratory course that enrolls 350-850 students. Ginger will discuss how her use of VoiceThread has enabled her to foster greater community in her face-to-face classroom, as well as unveil the unique learner perspectives that often get lost in large classes. These outcomes allow Ginger to understand the flow of her students learning and make shifts in her instruction, as needed. Hangout with Michelle and the VoiceThread TeamTuesday, September 18th, 20123:00 PDT/ 6:00 EDTI use Google+ Hangouts on Air to engage in live online learning sessions with college educators who have questions about how to teach with VoiceThread. Bring your questions and topics for discussion!  Up to 10 participants (including me!) can participate in a live Hangout but an unlimited number may view the streaming video on my blog here. To learn how to participate, click here.

Last week, I was a featured keynote presenter for the inaugural Learning 2.0 Conference.  It was a great experience.  My favorite part was just the excitement and magical sensation of knowing I was sitting here in my home office presenting to a group of educators who were tuning in from around the world.  It was a truly global audience -- so very cool. If you missed my presentation, here is the title, description, and link to the archive which will launch Blackboard Collaborate.  Enjoy!  And check out the recordings of the other keynotes here."Can't You Just Lecture to Me?" Strategies for Transforming Reluctant Learners when Teaching with Emerging Technologies Have you heard that line before? Teaching with emerging technologies requires not only a new technical toolkit but also a new set of skills for transforming reluctant students from passive into participatory learners.  In this presentation, I will share stories and strategies from my own classes, showcased in my new book Best Practices for Teaching with Emerging Technologies, to assist college instructors with supporting students who are reluctant to embrace new forms of learning, use social media for learning activities, and play an active role in a learning community.  Links to handy PDF guides will be shared to assist you with building a foundation for student success in your Learning 2.0 classroom. Click here to access the Blackboard Collaborate Recording, when prompted selected "Allow" or "Run" to initiate the session: http://tiny.cc/bfjvjw

Back in 2010, I wrote a post titled "10 Uses of Wordle for Learning" in which I included the idea to use the fun, creative word analysis tool to analyze a transcript of a politician's speech and evaluate what the word patterns reveal about his/her message.  After I wrote that, I thought to myself, "I really need to try that." So, last night after President Obama delivered his nomination acceptance speech at the 2012 Democratic National Convention, I did a quick search and located the transcripts for his prepared remarks and those for the speech Romney gave the week before at the Republication National Convention.  I plugged the transcripts into Wordle verbatim and the created two separate word clouds, using the same colors and font.  Keep in mind, Wordle automatically eliminates articles from the word cloud.If you'd like to use these word clouds for discussion with your students, you might find this handy Google Doc convenient.  It is shared with a CC-BY (Michelle Pacansky-Brock) license. What do these reveal to you?Obama's 2012 Acceptance SpeechRomney's 2012 Acceptance Speech

You are invited to participate in a special Author Book Chat I have prepared in celebration of the launch of my new book, Best Practices for Teaching with Emerging Technologies.  I will be responding to comments throughout the month of September.The book chat has been designed with VoiceThread and is available for you to view/comment in below below and may also be accessed and/or forwarded through this link.  The book chat includes several slides intended to engage college educators in a thoughtful conversation about the question, "Why teach with emerging technologies?"  If you are new to VoiceThread, you'll want to listen to my introductory comments on slide one.  If you are an experienced user, click to Slide 2 to get started.  Please feel free to forward this book chat to your educational networks.Book Chatwith Michelle Pacansky-BrockAuthor of Best Practices for Teaching with Emerging Technologies "Why Teach with Emerging Technologies?"On an iPhone or iPad?  Click here.

VT Mobile. Bridge image by Glam.I'm currently teaching my Building Online Social Media class and I'm seeing a big increase in the number of faculty using iPads.  In the class, faculty are introduced to a number of tools, one of them being VoiceThread.  VoiceThread provides users with the option to access content created with the tool via a regular web browser or through a free mobile app (to accommodate the flash "gap" experienced by iPhone and iPad users -- although an Android app is in development too).  For users who are blind or have cognitive disorders that are supported by a more linear flow of content, VoiceThread Universal provides yet another alternative to the content (note: a VoiceThread must first be "Shared" with a user directly before it is available to him/her through VoiceThread Universal but that's the only necessary step).For those of you who read my blog, you are familiar with the fact that I am a passionate advocate for emerging technologies that support non-traditional learners.  I get very excited when I envision a future of inclusive learning environments in which all of our students can learn together in community and feel good about what they bring to the table, rather than feeling poorly for about how they don't measure up to the status quo.  You can read more about my views on this topic in my new book, Best Practices for Teaching with Emerging Technologies.  I believe mobile learning and emerging technologies in general are pathways to mainstreaming the adoption of Universal Design for Learning.In my current class, I have a few students who had some hiccups understanding how to locate the Doodle function in the VoiceThread mobile app.  Rather than sharing those instructions just with them, I thought I'd post them here so everyone could learn from them. Why is Doodling on a Mobile Device important to educators?  Using the raw gesture of the human hand to control the actions on a mobile device is proving to open a world of new dazzling cognitive leaps for individuals with particular learning differences.  Beyond that, however, giving students the option to Doodle on slide while they are responding to a discussion prompt or having them demonstrate how to work through the rest of a problem set are ways to engage the psychomotor cognitive domain in an online learning environment that nearly always left dormant.   What is the Doodle feature?The Doodle feature gives users the ability to draw on a slide while leaving a voice or video comment on an iPhone or iPad (if you are using VoiceThread on a full web browser, the Doodle feature also works with text commenting). Step 1: Click the "Plus Sign" to comment.Step 2: Select the microphone or webcam icon to leave a voice or video comment.  The Doodle feature is not included with text commenting on VoiceThread mobile.Step 3: The red flashing light indicates that you are now recording!  Click on the white dot to the right to activate the Doodle feature.Step 4: A vertical palette of colors will expand.  Tap a color in the palette to select it.Step 5: Doodle away with your finger! The marks will begin to fade after a few seconds. Step 5: Click Save.For More Help For more help with VoiceThread mobile, please explore the great resources in the VoiceThread Mobile Support Site.How Are You Using It?Are you using VoiceThread mobile with your students?  If so, drop us a comment here and let us know how!