Visual+Literacy

Al Gore - __[|Our Choice]__

Completely digital book. grow pages, embedded video, interactives, photos, maps, Al Gore narrating, etc. Huge jump from paper books.

Going digital is not sufficient. Kids was to see awesome visuals and graphics.

Offering higher thinking applications & software will challenge students and foster critical thinking.

1. [|Scratch:] Scratch club in Lexington Middle School, run by parent after school. Mentioned that this is a particularly useful tool with autistic kids

2. [|WordSift], [|Lingro] [|Visuwords](WordSift - copy and paste chunks of text, organizes words based on use, links to definitions, links to pictures. Lingro - similar) WordSift could be very good for working with ELL kids as it shows them images to go with word definitions--nice way to show different meanings of words

Recommended lots of "guru" sites and videos for teacher professional development--mentioned Todd Rose at CAST and Sir Kenneth Robinson

Recommended sharing with families that Comcast will offer inexpensive internet and Dell netbook for those receiving free lunch as one way to close digital divide

Quest Atlantis is a game that can be used to teach persuasive essay writing and requires a high level of analytical thinking and connects science and writing

Stanford University has terrific resources for ELL students.

Book Builder allows students to build a book online incorporating images, text, audio--developed by CAST. You can also embed avatars to guide you through text. REQUIRES CURRENT FLASH!