This is an infographic for March in to Literacy Month. You are seeing a portion of it. Click HERE to see the whole thing.
Here are the sites I am presented at the conference:
Tools:
Resources
Conversion Site
Text Visualization
Visual Language/Design
Collaborative Sites
Screen Cast
Slide Show
Cellphone Polls
Podcast/Audio Sites
Story/Book Creation
Time line
To read more posts on my blog about The Great Gatsby CLICK HERE.
Below you will find wordles of each of the chapters in The Great Gatsby. In case you are not familiar with wordle.net, it takes texts and gives a visualization of the most frequently used words. The bigger the word, the more frequently it is used.
HERE is a link to other posts dealing with The Great Gatsby.
(To see a wordle for “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, click HERE.)
CLICK on the thumbnails to see a larger version.
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Please let me know how you use these in lessons and writing assignments. I think other readers would appreciate it.
Ben Davis
The Palm Beach County School district put this amazing list of iPad apps together. I had to post it.
iBooks - a ereader book store.
Free Books - 23,469 Classics to Go
Dictionary.com - Dictionary & Thesaurus - A dictionary and a Thesaurus.
Literary Analysis Guide - Elements of literature are arranged graphically around three wheels (poetry, prose, and rhetoric).
Kindle - Kindle is an eReader from Amazon.com
Shakespeare Pro - Complete works of Shakespeare. 41 plays, 154 sonnets, and 6 poems. All works can be cross searched for anything.
Jules Verne Collection - Sixteen of Jules Verne’s books
MaxJournal - A simple and elegant journal.
LitCharts - Link to LitCharts website. Each of the LitCharts are available on the iPad
The Ruler - measure things in inches or centimeters
Math Quizzer - Math Quizzer is an interactive and fun way to, not only learn, but also to boost your skills in; Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication, and Division. It offers an easy to understand chalkboard visual, which keeps track of your “score” as you progress.Bloomberg - Bring the power of the most trusted source for financial information to your iPad, along with tools to help you analyze the world’s markets.
Fractals - Move and pinch fractals in real time.
MASTERING MATHEMATICS GRADE 6 - A mathematics practice book for 6th grade students.
MASTERING MATHEMATICS GRADE 7 -A mathematics practice book for 7th grade students.
Geometry Stash - Access the most commonly used theorems, postulates, and corollaries.
Calculators
SpaceTime - Powerful graphing calculator. 2D and 3D graphing
PocketCAS pro - Advanced Graphic and Symbolic Scientific Calculator. Handles every mathematical problem you might encounter in school or university.
PocketCAS lite - Free Graphic calculator. Not as many features as the pro version above.
Quick Graph - 2D and 3D graphing calculator.
U.S. Geography by Discovery Education - Become an expert in U.S. Geography with this app. Dozens of videos and interactive gameplay.
Civil War America’s Epic Struggle-Civil War: America’s Epic Struggle Features over 1,000 high-res photos, more than an hour of multimedia presentations, in excess of 100 authentic maps, dozens of first hand accounts, and numerous text articles and biographies, it provides instantaneous access to information on every aspect of the war.
Beautiful Planet HD - Beautiful Planet is a groundbreaking app that captures the breathtaking beauty of our world and its cultures. Featuring a collection of galleries three decades in the making by travel photographer, author and explorer, Peter Guttman, Beautiful Planet spans seven continents and 160 countries.
World Atlas HD - The best maps available from National Geographic
History:Maps of World - Collection of High-Resolution historical Maps.
The History Clock - An app that converts the current time to a year and gives a fast fact about that year.
USA Thematic Atlas & Facts - High quality maps filled with facts and information.
USA Puzzle - A USA puzzle that needs to be put together. Double tap on the state for information about that state.
Motionx GPS HD - Maps and navigation instruments. Maps from all over the world. Can include waypoints. Can be good for Geocaching.
The World Factbook for iPad - Extensive information of over 250 countries around the world.
WORLD BOOK - This Day in History - Interactive multimedia calendar that features historical events for the day.
The Presidency - Historical information on every President of the United States.
Presidents HD- Historical information on every President of the United States.
Declaration for iPad - A copy of the Declaration of Independence.
Constitution for iPad - A copy of the Constitution of the United States.
MyCongress - A portal to detailed information about elected congress officials. Please note: This is not an official government resource
GeogXPert - A reference app - containing maps which allow you to look up countries and find country information - as well as a quiz app.
3D Cell Simulation and Stain Tool - Learn about the cell and its structures in a 3D tool.
EMD PTE - A highly interactive periodic table of elements.
VideoScience - Science experiments with video.
The Elements: A Visual Exploration - If you think you’ve seen the periodic table, think again. The Elements: A Visual Exploration lets you experience the beauty and fascination of the building blocks of our universe in a way you’ve never seen before. And as the first really new ebook developed from the ground up for iPad, The Elements beautifully shows off the capabilities of this lovely device.
A Life Among Whales - Video documentary featuring the exploration into the life and work of whale biologist Roger Payne
Newtons Laws - Explains Newton’s first two laws of motion and his law of universal gravitation.
Periodic Table of the Elements - Standard periodic table of elements. Free as of May 16, 2010
Molecules - View and manipulate 3D renderings of molecules.
3D Brain - Rotate and zoom around 29 interactive structures in the brain.
Science Glossary - an extensive glossary of scientific terms and biographies.
myArm Muscles - Visually rich and stimulating way to learn about our complex arm muscles.
HD Birds Encyclopedia - Highly graphic encyclopedia that has detailed and comprehensive information about a variety of birds.
HD Marine Life - An encyclopedia of marine life.
Frog Dissection - A virtual frog dissection app.
Astronomy
HD Solar System - Highly graphic encyclopedia that has detailed and comprehensive information about the solar system.
GoSkyWatch Planetarium - Easily and quickly identify and locate stars, planets, constellations and more with a touch or by simply pointing to the sky. Have fun with family and friends discovering the images in the night sky. Go outside and explore the night sky.
Star Walk - An interactive astronomy guide.
Solar Walk - A 3D Solar System Model.
Distant Suns - A database of over 130,000 stars, nebula, and galaxies.
DrakeEQ HD - 3D simulation of the Milky Way Galaxy
GoSkyWatch Planetarium - Locate stars, planets, and constellations.
Magic Piano - Play timeless pieces on spiral and circular keyboards, or follow beams of light – mastery requires only imagination. Play alone, or travel through a warp hole and play Piano Roulette with other performers across the world.
Fashion Sketchbook: The Stylish Dress Up Game - A fashion design application that allows the users to design outfits.
Art
SketchBook Pro - A professional-grade paint and drawing application.
Brushes - Brushes is a painting application designed from scratch for the iPad. Featuring an advanced color picker, several realistic brushes, multiple layers, extreme zooming, and a simple yet deep interface, it is a powerful tool for creating original artwork on your mobile device. The June 1, 2009 cover of The New Yorker was created in Brushes.
Picasso HD - A virtual gallery of Pablo Picasso’s work featuring hundreds of high definition paintings of his greatest works.
Van Gogh HD - A virtual gallery of Vincent Van Gogh’s work featuring hundreds of high definition paintings of his greatest works.
Klimt HD - A virtual gallery of Austrian Painter Gustav Klimt work featuring hundreds of high definition paintings of his greatest works.
Smudge - Finger painting app
Skrambler X - Assemble famous masterpieces like a jigsaw puzzle. Learn interesting facts about the artists and their artwork while putting each piece in place.
Gravilux - an app that lets you draw with stars
The Hot Rod Art Book: Masters of Chicken Scratch - Over 100 pages of hot rod artwork. Over one and a half hours of instructional videos that show the complete process from sketch to rendering.
Foreign Language
TAO - TranslateIt! Online - one click translation of text into numerous languages using Google translate.
AIUEO-HIRAGANA - Touch, Listen, and Learn Japanese.
Japanese Phrases & Lessons - 2,700 Japanese phrases with sound
French English Dictionary & Translator - French - English Dictionary
TouchLanguage French - Learn over 2,000 French words and phrases
BidBox Vocabulary Trainer: English - Spanish - Learn Spanish vocabulary
简明英汉词典 - English - Chinese Dictionary
German English Dictionary & Translator - German - English Dictionary
Italian English Dictionary & Translator - Italian - English Dictionary
Music
Key Wiz - Learn how to play the piano.
Virtuoso Piano Free 2 HD - Learn the basics of music and how to play the piano.
Magic Piano - Play the piano freestyle or on a spiral keyboard.
Air Harp - Strum and pluck the strings for a harp sound.
ESE Modifications/Accomodations
Proloquo2Go - full featured alternative communication solution for people who have difficulty speaking
Speak it! Text to Speech - A high quality text to speech app.
Pocket Picture Planner HD - Use pictures or graphics to create a visual calendar.
Keynote - A slideshow presentation program
Pages- A word processing program
Numbers - A spreadsheet application
iBooks - a ereader book store.
Puppet Pals - Create your own unique shows with animation and audio in real time!
Mobile Mouse - Mobile Mouse instantly transforms your iPad into a wireless mouse and trackpad for your computer.
Bento - Manage things with 25 ready to use databases.
GoodReader - Within moments of downloading GoodReader, you’ll be transferring files from the computer to the iPad. Supports a wide range of files.
Note Taker HD - An app for writing handwritten notes, diagrams, etc.
Sundry Notes Pro - Sundry Notes is the first social note taking application. Write, draw, record and research right within the app - and then share your notes with others.Take notes right within your application, including: Write text (and change font color, size, etc.), draw anywhere in your notes, search Wikipedia, Google, and Google Books - and grab images from them for your notes using two fingers, Import PDFs from the internet, Import images from your photo library, record sound/voice, Change page background to graph paper, lined paper, legal paper, etc.
CourseNotes - Take notes in class and keep them organized by subject area.
MindNode - Mind mapping, brainstorming, organization.
iThoughtsHD - A mind map tool for the iPad
Evernote - Evernote turns the iPad into an extension of your brain, helping you remember anything and everything that happens in your life.
Stick It - Sticky Notes with Bump™ - Sticky notes you can share with other iPad Users
PrintCentral - View, store, and print from the iPad
Educate - The ultimate teacher’s companion providing mobile access to your student’s data, teaching strategies, eLearning tools, and timetable.
OmniGraffle - Brainstorming, diagraming, charts, graphic design, etc.
GoDocs iPad/iPhone (Google Docs™ support) - View, edit, share, and download Google Docs
Office² HD - View, create, and edit Word and Excel files
Cramberry - Create flash cards to study from.
Professor Garfield Cyberbullying - Garfield and Friends share information about Cyberbullying
Professor Garfield Online Safety - Garfield and Friends share information about Online Safety
eClicker and eClicker Host- A personal response system that allows teachers to poll their classes in real time.
Blackboard Presenter - Turns iPad into a blackboard presenter using the VGA dongle. Mirrors iPad screen to the projector.
PDF Reader Pro Edition - PDF reader.
WritePad for iPad - WritePad lets you take notes in your own handwriting with an iPad stylus, pen, or even your finger.
Browser Duo - Designed specifically for the iPad, Browser Duo takes advantage of the iPad’s amazing screen size to enable multi-tasking in the browser.
Discovery Education - Educational videos
This info came from WIRED MAGAZINE. Read the rest HERE.
I was really excited about this article because it made me realize that we need more systems like this in the classroom. How can we create systems that constantly remind students of their goals? I think the answer is constant inquiry into weaknesses in X, but I’d be interested in what you have to say. Please comment. Also, read the whole article.
Feedback loops are powerful tools that can help people change bad behavior. Just as important, they can encourage good habits, turning progress itself into a reward.
Photo: Kevin Van Aelst
In 2003, officials in Garden Grove, California, a community of 170,000 people wedged amidthe suburban sprawl of Orange County, set out to confront a problem that afflicts most every town in America: drivers speeding through school zones.
Local authorities had tried many tactics to get people to slow down. They replaced old speed limit signs with bright new ones to remind drivers of the 25-mile-an-hour limit during school hours. Police began ticketing speeding motorists during drop-off and pickup times. But these efforts had only limited success, and speeding cars continued to hit bicyclists and pedestrians in the school zones with depressing regularity.
So city engineers decided to take another approach. In five Garden Grove school zones, they put up what are known as dynamic speed displays, or driver feedback signs: a speed limit posting coupled with a radar sensor attached to a huge digital readout announcing “Your Speed.”
The signs were curious in a few ways. For one thing, they didn’t tell drivers anything they didn’t already know—there is, after all, a speedometer in every car. If a motorist wanted to know their speed, a glance at the dashboard would do it. For another thing, the signs used radar, which decades earlier had appeared on American roads as a talisman technology, reserved for police officers only. Now Garden Grove had scattered radar sensors along the side of the road like traffic cones. And the Your Speed signs came with no punitive follow-up—no police officer standing by ready to write a ticket. This defied decades of law-enforcement dogma, which held that most people obey speed limits only if they face some clear negative consequence for exceeding them.
In other words, officials in Garden Grove were betting that giving speeders redundant information with no consequence would somehow compel them to do something few of us are inclined to do: slow down.
The results fascinated and delighted the city officials. In the vicinity of the schools where the dynamic displays were installed, drivers slowed an average of 14 percent. Not only that, at three schools the average speed dipped below the posted speed limit. Since this experiment, Garden Grove has installed 10 more driver feedback signs. “Frankly, it’s hard to get people to slow down,” says Dan Candelaria, Garden Grove’s traffic engineer. “But these encourage people to do the right thing.”
In the years since the Garden Grove project began, radar technology has dropped steadily in price and Your Speed signs have proliferated on American roadways. Yet despite their ubiquity, the signs haven’t faded into the landscape like so many other motorist warnings. Instead, they’ve proven to be consistently effective at getting drivers to slow down—reducing speeds, on average, by about 10 percent, an effect that lasts for several miles down the road. Indeed, traffic engineers and safety experts consider them to be more effective at changing driving habits than a cop with a radar gun. Despite their redundancy, despite their lack of repercussions, the signs have accomplished what seemed impossible: They get us to let up on the gas.
The signs leverage what’s called a feedback loop, a profoundly effective tool for changing behavior. The basic premise is simple. Provide people with information about their actions in real time (or something close to it), then give them an opportunity to change those actions, pushing them toward better behaviors. Action, information, reaction. It’s the operating principle behind a home thermostat, which fires the furnace to maintain a specific temperature, or the consumption display in a Toyota Prius, which tends to turn drivers into so-called hypermilers trying to wring every last mile from the gas tank. But the simplicity of feedback loops is deceptive. They are in fact powerful tools that can help people change bad behavior patterns, even those that seem intractable. Just as important, they can be used to encourage good habits, turning progress itself into a reward. In other words, feedback loops change human behavior. And thanks to an explosion of new technology, the opportunity to put them into action in nearly every part of our lives is quickly becoming a reality.
A feedback loop involves four distinct stages. First comes the data: A behavior must be measured, captured, and stored. This is the evidence stage. Second, the information must be relayed to the individual, not in the raw-data form in which it was captured but in a context that makes it emotionally resonant. This is the relevance stage. But even compelling information is useless if we don’t know what to make of it, so we need a third stage: consequence. The information must illuminate one or more paths ahead. And finally, the fourth stage: action. There must be a clear moment when the individual can recalibrate a behavior, make a choice, and act. Then that action is measured, and the feedback loop can run once more, every action stimulating new behaviors that inch us closer to our goals.
This basic framework has been shaped and refined by thinkers and researchers for ages. In the 18th century, engineers developed regulators and governors to modulate steam engines and other mechanical systems, an early application of feedback loops that later became codified into control theory, the engineering discipline behind everything from aerospace to robotics. The mathematician Norbert Wiener expanded on this work in the 1940s, devising the field of cybernetics, which analyzed how feedback loops operate in machinery and electronics and explored how those principles might be broadened to human systems.
Article thanks to Thomas Goetz of WIRED Magazine read more HERE.
This is an idea from DRAGON WRITING PROMPTS.I discovered this site this morning. I bookmarked it in my toolbar because I liked it so much.
“In his book he has a whole series of what he calls poetry warm ups. It’s a way of getting some thoughts down on paper that might with some rearranging, cutting and editing, become a poem or the seed of a poem.
Some are templates, so each line begins the same. Some are the seed to write a series of related ideas. Most have some repetition in them to help get things flowing. Don’t be discouraged if your first dozen lines or more are trite. That’s just the clogs coming out of your creative pathways 
But that stuff needs to get out onto paper so the path can be freed for better ideas to flow more freely.”
In addition to the regular writing prompts, I’ll post one of these warm ups too.
Today’s warm up is comparisons.
Include “like” or “as” in each line. The lines can be all about the same thing, or about one subject, or all different.
Some examples of templates:
______ is like ______.
______ is as ______ as ______.
Here are some examples from kids in Kenneth Koch’s class:
A butterfly is like a flying rainbow.
Clouds are like flying ice cream.
Hair is like spaghetti.
The sun is as red as a fire.
The moon is like an egg.
Slow is like vanilla ice cream.
A moon is like a banana.
Thunder is like bowling.
Black ink is dark as m idnight.
Snow is as white as the sun shines.
A rose is as red as a beating of drums.
