K-12

Welcome to the first of our blog entries on the world of training.  Why blog?

Well, we have a variety of reasons for you to tune in regularly: first and foremost, to connect with peers in a meaningful way, and read about cutting-edge information on pedagogy and best practices in training and be able to answer these questions:

• What are my colleagues and peers doing?
• What new training resources are available to me?
• How can I leverage this training knowledge at my own institution or organization?

What won’t you see in this blog series?

For starters, you won’t read a lot of posts written by me.  You can breathe that sigh of relief now.  The Blackboard Training blog series will be an online forum for our Certified Trainers, training program participants, industry experts, and our very own Blackboard trainers to participate and share their knowledge and experiences.   

Interested in participating?  Excited to begin?  Start by bookmarking the Blackboard Training Blog page and get involved as we begin our grand adventure in blogging!  Next, mark your calendars – Thursdays will be our main posting day, so every Thursday you’ll find new content here.

Want to share your training experiences, tips and success stories here?  You can contact me, the Blackboard Training blog coordinator extraordinaire, at kristen.cooper@blackboard.com.

Don’t miss this opportunity to connect with the training community!

A short post today, to share one of the several thought-provoking and creatively produced videos by Mike Wesch, assistant professor of cultural anthropology, Kansas State University, who with others is compiling an ethnography of YouTube (details can be found here).

Also, I recommend the Digital Ethnography blog kept by KSU faculty members and students.

On the Digitial Ethnography Channel on YouTube, Prof. Wesch describes his video (embedded below), titled "Information R/evolution":

This video explores the changes in the way we find, store, create, critique, and share information. This video was created as a conversation starter, and works especially well when brainstorming with people about the near future and the skills needed in order to harness, evaluate, and create information effectively.

Please let me know what other clips you’d like to see added to the video archives assembled by BlackboardTV.  I can be reached at BbTV@blackboard.com.

Sometimes I get to have a little fun as we gather and share stories of how our clients are using Blackboard solutions to impact teaching and learning.  And that was the story last week as we filmed our promotional video for Blackboard True Stories – our second annual K-12 video testimonial contest.

With the help of (and an extreme dose of patience from) our BlackboardTV team lead, Erik Gillespie, we staged a set in our Washington, D.C. office and filmed a video clip that we hope will encourage our K-12 clients to pick up a camera and share with us, and their peers, how they are using Blackboard solutions at their school.

We are calling all parents, students, teachers and administrators who use Blackboard software to make a short video telling us their story.  The top five video producers will receive free admission to attend BbWorld ’08 this summer in Las Vegas, where we’ll screen the winning video in front of hundreds of attendees.

The topic of submissions is up to our clients, but here are some questions we asked them to consider as they created their video:

• How have you experienced success using Blackboard software for professional development?
• How has Blackboard’s online learning impacted the lives of your teachers, students and parents?
• Describe one of your greatest “a-ha” moments using Blackboard software.  What made it so unique for you, your colleagues and/or your students?

Our 2007 video contest winner, Minnetonka Public Schools, showed us how they used Blackboard software to engage students in and out of the classroom.

Visit www.blackboard.com/k12/truestories for all of the details and check out the latest BlackboardTV clip announcing this year’s contest!

I got an email from my sister Sue last week.  She is a 9th grade guidance counselor at a high school in suburban Washington, DC.  Sue wrote about a family with two children who was looking at an unconventional schooling path:

"The family is pulling the kids (2) out of school and traveling around the world for a year.  They are going to "roadschool" the kids while they do this and have them blog about it on this site.  I am so intrigued that I asked for the site so I can follow their adventures. I thought you’d find this interesting."

She was right.  I’ve become engrossed by the plans that Dani, Craig, Caroline & Conor are making for their year-long around the world adventure.  They leave in July and I hope you’ll join me in keeping track of them, the things they learn and the lessons I hope they’ll share with all of us faithful readers.

BlackboardTV (or “BbTV”) crew members have been filming on location recently, including at the University of Cincinnati and BbWorld Commerce ’08, Blackboard’s annual users conference for campus card professionals, held March 9–12 in Phoenix.

Our BlackboardTV K-12 group also filmed an announcement for the upcoming 2nd Annual True Blackboard Stories Video Contest.  Before the contest begins, see details of last year’s contest and view the winning entry by Minnetonka Public Schools in Minnesota.

BbTV recorded keynote addresses at the conference in Phoenix and interviewed academic computing directors, campus card service managers, CIOs, wired professors, faculty trainers, facilities directors and students.  In dozens of formal sit-down interviews and person-on-the-street mini-interviews, these Blackboard users have shared best practices for, and their respective institution’s innovative uses of, Blackboard software, hardware and services.

In the coming weeks BbTV will post some of these videos here on EducateInnovate.com, add others to the Media Center of the Blackboard website and augment the user-created videos archived in the BlackboardTV Channel on YouTube, and embed a few into e-mails to be sent directly to Blackboard users.

For educators and staff members seeking ways to use video in a Blackboard environment, in classroom teaching and learning, or across your campus, I highly recommend a YouTube Channel created by Grand Rapids Community College (GRCC): GRCCTV.

Located in Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA, GRCC has more than 14,000 students enrolled in over 1,600 liberal arts and occupational courses.  On its GRCCTV Channel, Eric Kunnen and his colleagues post video recordings of campus lectures and courses, and archive thought-provoking and cool education videos.  The school even offers streaming video tours of its individual programs on the GRCC website.

Amidst the 420+ videos in the GRCCTV archives is this interesting little 20-second clip with the description “Student uses mobile device (iPhone) to take a Blackboard assessment in a Business Law class.”

Please help BbTV increase the online video archive we’re building for Blackboard users around the world by sending us suggestions for videos we should feature here on EducateInnovate.com and the BlackboardTV Channel.  We can be reached at BbTV@blackboard.com.