NWP

Teachers Teaching Teachers #210 - Eywitnesses to the largest oil spill in U.S. history - 07.21.10

The series of podcasts about the Gulf oil spill that we started at the beginning of June continues on this episode of Teachers Teaching Teachers.

We are joined by Alicia Blair a 5th grade science teacher from Mississippi who has been an important voice on many of these podcasts this summer.

It was also a delight to listen to Ann Dobie, author, professor, and former Writing Project Director from Louisiana.

The series of podcasts about the Gulf oil spill that we started at the beginning of June continues on this episode of Teachers Teaching Teachers.

We are joined by Alicia Blair a 5th grade science teacher from Mississippi who has been an important voice on many of these podcasts this summer.

It was also a delight to listen to Ann Dobie, author, professor, and former Writing Project Director from Louisiana.

 

Ann Brewster Dobie taught at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette for thirty-eight years, where she is now professor emerita of English. She directed graduate studies in rhetoric and the university’s writing-across-the-curriculum program. She is the author or coauthor of six college writing textbooks and author of numerous articles on literature and composition. She is the editor of Something in Common: Contemporary Louisiana Stories, Uncommonplace: An Anthology of Contemporary Louisiana Poets, and Wide Awake in the Pelican State: Stories by Contemporary Louisiana Writers. Ann received her doctorate in the teaching of writing from Columbia University.

Biography on http://anndobie.com Given our interest to work with teachers in the Gulf to collect the stories of students there, take a look at this description of Ann Dobie’s newest book, Fifty-Eight Days in the Cajundome Shelter, which was published in 2008.
View at Amazon.com

Fifty-Eight Days in the Cajundome Shelter

Hurricanes Katrina and Rita destroyed thousands of homes, schools, and businesses across the Gulf Coast and changed the face of southeast Louisiana forever. However, nearly a hundred miles northwest of New Orleans, in Lafayette, Louisiana, a different story was unfolding. As men, women, and children waited on their roofs for rescue, executive director Greg Davis hurried to prepare the Cajundome in Lafayette as an emergency shelter.

The workers and volunteers in the Cajundome provided food, showers, and medical care to more than eighteen thousand evacuees that came to Lafayette. From the first busloads of newly homeless to the disasters caused by Hurricane Rita, “Fifty-Eight Days in the Cajundome Shelter” shares personal accounts of heartache and joy, tragedy and triumph. For the first time, here is a collection of the stories of the volunteers and evacuees. Their heroism, courage, and despair are etched into these stories as they endured the first few weeks in a hurricane-ravaged world.

Retold here is the bravery and leadership of Donald Williams as he took charge and led a convoy of handicapped and elderly to safety. Readers will also be captivated by the unforgettable story of the Prevost family as they climbed their way to the roof of their home and their heartbreaking journey to dry land on I-10. The author includes her own personal accounts of what really happened in the aftermath of Katrina and the bravery and selflessness of countless people who struggled to make a difference.

We are excited about the number of teachers who have joined us this summer for this exploration into how we can be good neighbors with our friends in the Gulf Coast. Al Doyle, a NYC teacher of gaming, joined us from the woods of a summer camp in Maine, and a new teacher Rebecca from Pennsylvania, had some things to say as well.

Some of the things to listen for in this podcast are some of the reasons we have been working with Bill Fitzgerald at FunnyMonkey to build an extension of our Youth Voices site. Two quotes from this podcast help define our mission for Voices on the Gulf:


I think sometimes when your there at that Ground Zero, if I can borrow that phrase, it's a little overwhelming. But I talked with several people and got together with our [Writing Project] director, and we just had a real brainstorm. And we went back again to our experience with Katrina. What did we end up doing? Not that we ever planned any of these things. It was more the spontaneous improv sort of thing. So we went back and we looked at the things that had been successful, and thought about what we would like to do for the oil spill. This time planning, with the goal being: We want to publish! We would like to do that this time.... This whole experience that we've had this summer in trying to brainstorm how to bring student voices out has really inspired us to take the initiative, instead of waiting until we see it through like we did with the hurricane, to make those efforts.
--Alicia Blair, high school science teacher and member of the Live Oak Writing Project, University of Southern Mississippi, Gulf Coast


In Louisiana after Katrina and Rita our [Writing Project] sites published any number of anthologies of student writing about those hurricanes, and about what it meant to live through the hurricanes, but even more so, through the clean up and the rebuilding. I have no doubt that that's going to happen again because our teachers always capitalize on those things which are happening in students' lives and their families' lives, and use those as sources of writing and a kind of catharsis. I have no doubt that it will happen.
--Ann Dobie, professor emerita of English, University of Louisiana, director of the Louisiana Writing Project State Network and former director of the National Writing Project of Acadiana


Also, please read:

Click Read more to see a copy of the chat that was happening during the webcast. 

Teachers Teaching Teachers #207 "We've been taken over once again by something that we couldn't stop, can't stop." - 06.30.10

This the fourth week of a summer series in which we have focused Teachers Teaching Teachers on the BP Gulf Oil Spill. Our guests included:

  • Matt Montagne, who has been collecting materials, such as: October 28th, 2010 TEDxOILSPILL Talks
  • Diana Laufenberg, a history teacher from Science Leadership Academy who joined us on this topic 3 weeks ago will try (from her family’s farm) to join us again.
  • Natasha Whitton, one of the three teachers from the Southeastern Louisiana Writing Project two weeks ago, hopes to join us again
  • Andrea Zellner, a biology and English teachers from the Red Cedar Writing Project in Michigan will be with us again!
  • AND NEW to our webcast: Catherine Tibbs, a former high school English teacher who works for the Live Oak Writing Project in Mississippi joined us. (She is also invited colleagues who will be heard on future podcasts. Catherine wrote on Monday of this week:
     I don’t know if you know this or not, but oil reached the MS beaches this weekend. We had been fortunate so far to avoid this mess. From what I understand from the media, the manpower was not coordinated in the Gulf to skim the oil that is now reaching us. Isn’t that always the case?
  • Also new to the podcast is Jeff Mason from Penscola, Florida, a biology and technology teacher. We met a Twitter, and we look forward to a continuing connection. (Jeff came on the webcast last week as well, so look for more from him on future podcasts.)

We hope you will be able to join us in this ongoing project. Help us know how to respond as teachers—and with our students—to this monster that will continue to reek havoc for weeks? months? to come!

Join us to talk about what's happening in the gulf every Wednesday at http://EdTechTalk.com/live at 9:00pm Eastern / 6:00pm Pacific USA (World Times). 

This the fourth week of a summer series in which we have focused Teachers Teaching Teachers on the BP Gulf Oil Spill. Our guests included:

  • Matt Montagne, who has been collecting materials, such as: October 28th, 2010 TEDxOILSPILL Talks. The Google Doc that Matt can be found at http://tinyurl.com/voicesonthegulf - And stay tuned! There much more to come under the domain: "VoicesOnTheGulf." (We also eventually agreed on the common tags: "voicesonthegulf" and "edoilspill"
  • Diana Laufenberg, a history teacher from Science Leadership Academy who joined us on this topic 3 weeks ago will try (from her family’s farm) to join us again.
  • Natasha Whitton, one of the three teachers from the Southeastern Louisiana Writing Project two weeks ago, hopes to join us again
  • Andrea Zellner, a biology and English teachers from the Red Cedar Writing Project in Michigan will be with us again!
  • AND NEW to our webcast: Catherine Tibbs, a former high school English teacher who works for the Live Oak Writing Project in Mississippi joined us. (She is also invited colleagues who will be heard on future podcasts. Catherine wrote this on a Monday late in June :
     I don’t know if you know this or not, but oil reached the MS beaches this weekend. We had been fortunate so far to avoid this mess. From what I understand from the media, the manpower was not coordinated in the Gulf to skim the oil that is now reaching us. Isn’t that always the case?
  • Also new to the podcast is Jeff Mason from Penscola, Florida, a biology and technology teacher. We met a Twitter, and we look forward to a continuing connection. (Jeff came on the webcast last week as well, so look for more from him on future podcasts.)

We hope you will be able to join us in this ongoing project. Help us know how to respond as teachers—and with our students—to this monster that will continue to reek havoc for weeks? months? to come!

Join us to talk about what's happening in the gulf every Wednesday at http://EdTechTalk.com/live at 9:00pm Eastern / 6:00pm Pacific USA (World Times). 

Click Read more to see a copy of the chat that was happening during the webcast.

Teachers Teaching Teachers #191 - Katherine Schulten and the Learning Network AND "...making the case for the NWP - 03.10.10

n the first half of this weeks episode of Teachers Teaching Teachers, we had an inspiring conversation with Katherine Schulten editor of The Learning Network at the New York Times.  Our theme for this week's Teachers Teaching Teachers was about increasing teacher voice in public debates. Katherine suggested how we might use The Learning Network for that.

In addition, we were joined by:

  • Elyse Eidman-Aadahl, director of National Programs and Site Development at the National Writing Project, University of California, Berkeley
  • and Andrea Zellner a leader at the Red Cedar Writing Project, Michigan State University's site of the NWP.

Andrea and many others in the chat room during the webcast gave witness to why we want to maintain federal funding for the NWP to continue -- an example of a time when we need to get our voices to be heard!

In the first half of thKS1larger.jpgis weeks episode of Teachers Teaching Teachers, we had an inspiring conversation with Katherine Schulten editor of The Learning Network at the New York Times.  Our theme for this week's Teachers Teaching Teachers was about increasing teacher voice in public debates. Katherine suggested how we might use The Learning Network for that.

In addition, we were joined by:

  • Elyse Eidman-Aadahl, director of National Programs and Site Development at the National Writing Project, University of California, Berkeley
  • and Andrea Zellner a leader at the Red Cedar Writing Project, Michigan State University's site of the NWP.

Andrea and many o

thers in the chat room during the webcast gave witness to why we want to maintain federal funding for the NWP to continue -- an example of a time wh

en we need to get our voices to be heard! 

"It's been a heady week for teaching and learning discussion on the Times site," writes Katherine Schulten, our first guest on this podcast. One of Katherine's jobs as an editor of the New York Times Learning Network is to moderate the comments that come in on education-related articles.

A Student Opinion post from earlier this week, "Where Do You Stand on Unconcealed Handguns? "received many lively responses from "students 13 and older," who "are invited [to the Learning Network] to comment on questions about issues in the news."

If you just clicked on those links, your head is probably spinning: so many issues so little time! That's what it feels like to have a conversation with Katherine Schulten, who before she became an editor for the Learning Network was a NYC teacher and a consultant for the New York City Writing Project. Katherine was worried that she was talking too much, because she is so excited about managing the Learning Network.

We'll turned Katherine loose, then we interrupted her with a few questions. We think you'l learn a lot about the New York Times Learning Network on this podcast:

Currently, they are offering these features:

  • Lesson Plans — Daily lesson plans based on New York Times content.
  • Student Opinion — News-related questions that invite response from students age 13 and older.
  • Word of the Day — Vocabulary words in the context of recent Times articles.
  • 6 Q’s About the Newss — An activity in which students answer basic questions (Who, What, Where, When, Why and How) about an article.
  • News Quiz — Interactive daily news quizzes on current top stories.
  • Student Crossword — Topical puzzles geared toward teens.

The award-winning Learning Network was created in the fall of 1998. In October 2009, they re-launched it as a Times blog.

Click Read more to see a copy of the chat that was happening during the webcast.

Teachers Teaching Teachers #185 - Did Educon 2.2 Make Us Smarter? - 02.03.10

On this podcast a few of us who attended Educon 2.2 reflect on our learning there. Appropriately enough, we were guided in this reflective conversation by:

On this podcast you'll hear what four teachers, three of us from different Writing Projects, had to say just a few days after ther conference. You'll hear from:

  • Paul Allison, New York City Writing Project
  • Joe Conroy, NWP at Rutgers University Writing Project (Don't miss Joe video, below.)
  • Gail Desler, Area 3 Writing Project in Northern California
  • Dolores Gende, Academic Technology Coordinator and Physics teacher from Dallas, Texas

On this podcast a few of us who attended Educon 2.2 reflect on our learning there. Appropriately enough, we were guided in this reflective conversation by:

On this podcast you'll hear what four teachers, three of us from different Writing Projects, had to say just a few days after ther conference. You'll hear from:

  • Paul Allison, New York City Writing Project
  • Joe Conroy, NWP at Rutgers University Writing Project (Don't miss Joe's video, below.)
  • Gail Desler, Area 3 Writing Project in Northern California
  • Dolores Gende, Academic Technology Coordinator and Physics teacher from Dallas, Texas

If you were at Educon, we hope you'll be able to compare notes with us. If you were not able to make it, perhaps this podcast can suggest why there's so much interest in Educon!

Here's how the organizers of EduCon 2.2 describe the conference:

What is Educon?

EduCon 2.2 is both a conversation and a conference.

And it is not a technology conference. It is an education conference. It is, hopefully, an innovation conference where we can come together, both in person and virtually, to discuss the future of schools. Every session will be an opportunity to discuss and debate ideas — from the very practical to the big dreams.

The Axioms

Guiding Principles of EduCon 2.2

  1. Our schools must be inquiry-driven, thoughtful and empowering for all members
  2. Our schools must be about co-creating — together with our students — the 21st Century Citizen
  3. Technology must serve pedagogy, not the other way around
  4. Technology must enable students to research, create, communicate and collaborate
  5. Learning can — and must — be networked

Enjoy Joe Conroy's Video!


Watch What is EduCon? in Educational & How-To  |  View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

Click Read more to see a copy of the chat that was happening during the webcast.

Teachers Teaching Teachers #177 Reflections on the National Writing Project's 2009 Annual Meeting at a Seminal Moment - 12.02.09

This podcast, co-sponsored by the New York City Writing Project and the NWP Technology Liaisons Network, featured:

  • Robert Rivera-Amezola, Philadelphia Writing Project
  • Joe Conroy, NWP at Rutgers University Writing Project 
  • Chuck Jurich, High Desert Writing Project (New Mexico) 
  • Paul Oh, the coordinator of the technology liaison program for the National Writing Project 
  • Seth Mitchell, Maine Writing Project

Before the Thanksgiving turkey there was…

After coming home from these conferences in Philadelphia, we invited a few friends from a recent show —

TTT #175 - Looking Forward to the National Writing Project’s Annual Meeting with 3 Presenters - 11.04.09

— to join us again, this time to reflect on the workshops, presentations, meetings, and conversations in the hallway that might still have been fresh in their memories. We wanted to find out what they had learned at the NWP's Annual Meeting this year, and what they were planning to do with all of the connections and ideas they had brought home with them.

This podcast, co-sponsored by the New York City Writing Project and the NWP Technology Liaisons Network, featured:

Click Read more to see a transcript of a chat that was happening during the webcast.

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