This morning started early with a breakfast hosted by Learning.com with guest speaker Dr. Patricia Agatston, co-author of Cyber Bullying: Bullying in the Digital Age. Her presentation was very impressive and research-based. Dr. Agatston focused on online high-risk behaviors, which she directly correlated to face-to-face high risk behaviors. She also stressed teaching positive online behaviors rather than using scare tactics as a means of reaching most students. As an attendee at this session, I will be receiving a video of her presentation, which I will share with you if you request it. I actually prefer this methodology, which is part of Learning.com's EasyTech Online Safety component to the material offered by iSafe, but I will be checking out the curriculum today when I visit the company's Exhibition Hall booth.
After breakfast, I popped into a Promethean instructional session, one of the many being offered every half hour here. McGraw-Hill has joined with Promethean to provide digital math support for K-6, with 7-12 coming in the fall. CINCH Mathematics provides options for teacher planning, as well as home access for student support. This math program looks like the direction that instruction is taking and is available on a subscription basis.
The CINCH program creates slides for instruction based on a teacher's selections, provides onscreen manipulatives, allows integration of Promethean software options and inclusion of other online resources such as videos or other websites--all in a seamless presentation that does not require a teacher to open a new window or leave the site. The goal is to present a chunk of information and then provide an opportunity for formative assessment (using ActiVotes or ActivExpressions) to allow the teacher to determine if he or she should continue or reteach a section. After a day's lesson, a teacher can customize an online session or homework assignment based on the student responses, individualizing assignments down to each student's needs.
Finally, since CINCH allows teacher to combine elements from different traditional textbook chapters, CINCH provides customizable subtopic quizzes that can be printed or completed online. They will also be adding tests that can be completed using ActiVotes or Expressions in the upcoming months, as well as adding more interactive activities to the CINCH slides.
Tuesday Morning's Site Suggestion: coming soon
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