Students,
It has been an interesting week, a great deal of new information has been brought forth from the wikis, blogs and new Adobe Flash. It has been very interesting to see the varying levels of adeptness with the new information; some students hesitant to go too quickly (which is perfectly ok) and others trying to see as fast as possible what will work (which is perfectly ok). Everyone learns and adapts differently and we are still feeling our way through on building a class 'team spirit'. As we learn and grow roles will be established, who's good at this, who's good at that, ways for us to work together and build a repertoire of knowledge that everyone can tap into. The number issue for me as a classroom teacher is to make sure that you are being safe on the Internet. Go to Ingrida Barker's blog at http://ingridasblog.blogspot.com:80/ and read her posting and review the two short movies that are posted there. She also has some good links to places to get information about working in Flash and the Web. Look those over and write in your blog about these entries.
Happy blogging!

Good Intentions!

My intentions were good, I have everything planned out on what and when and how we would begin and then wham!... We arrived back at school to find our new schedule had major problems. The first 3 weeks of school has been a constant stream of schedule changes for many students so we (coteacher Angie Leef) didn't want to begin Globaloria until we had our class roster set in stone.
It really worked out ok though since we also needed to create two 3 minute videos for another school grant proposal. It will tie in well though with some of our Globaloria projects since the grant proposal concerns environmental components and I know that some of our students will be leaning toward games that are about the environment.
It all works out doesn't it?
And maybe that is the thought that we (I) need to keep in mind. That if we keep a positive attitude and the thought that 'it will all work out', things usually do work out. I can remember my mother and I talking about the fact (and this is a fact!) if you start out the day thinking that it is going to be a bad day; things go wrong in the morning and we get the mind set that everything else is going to be bad... then YOU WILL HAVE A BAD DAY! Whereas, if you decide that you aren't let things get to you, your day will usually improve. If my students would keep that thought in mind I think they would enjoy their days more. I'm certainly not saying that they have to verbalize it to me or to others but just keep that positive thought that 'things will usually work out' in their own minds, then things will go better.
SO I close this post with the thought - What can you do to make your day go better?

Welcome GWHS Globaloria Students

This is a special posting to my Globaloria students at Greenbrier West High School. I am so excited about the upcoming year. We have a great new schedule that will allow us a great deal of time to work on projects each day. The class is now a 2 period block occurring each day! We will have time to really concentrate on a topic without having to shut down so quickly. That will enable us to work on Globaloria, Videography, Photoshop (we are supposed to be getting this!) and other computer related art programs. Hopefully, you are as excited as I am even though as students you don't always feel that you can show that excitement. I am going to assume that you are all excited inside anyway.
Another exciting addition is that we will be having Mrs. Leef in the classroom also. She has great computer skills and is hard at work learning all about Flash. She and I have been in some very helpful training sessions this summer and we are planning on really being able to start into everything very quickly.
Want to get started? Begin looking at games and jot down some things that appeal to you; the components, the type of game, the graphics, etc..
Lookings forward to working and learning with you!
Mrs. Neal

August session

New Flip Cameras! Yes, teachers love to have new toys but in this case, toys that will be very useful in the classroom. We had some great training on Tuesday and except some new things today. The presentations by the new people just blew me away, they were so much better than what we did last year. So the training is definitely on the right track. I feel so much more capable this year and I'm looking forward to a great school year.

most memorable moment of learning?

As a teacher, I believe that we often assume that students 'get it'. I always try and go back and remember when I was taking a Ceramic Glazes class in college. I had no prior art class experience when I entered college so while I could produce what the teacher was asking for in the visual art classes, I would not have the knowledge base of the terms and medium. Therefore, I would have to wait, hang back and see what the other students were doing after the assignment was given so that I could understand what the assignment actually meant.
So, when I entered the Ceramic Glazes class, I was very intimidated. I had not had a Chemistry class and, of course, that is what you need to have before you begin working with the dry chemicals.
Always before in school I was able to keep pretty good grades with relatively little effort. I could study the night before and pass tests.
So, to make a long story longer, the day we had our final in the Ceramics class, I had studied really hard the night before and thought that I was prepared. When I sat down and opened the test, I realized that I was not. I could actually feel the blood in my whole body drop to my toes and then flush up to the top of my head. I just knew that I was going to bomb on this test.
I tried my best though and actually earned a B on the test.
My point is, I always try and remember that experience when I work on my assignments for my students. Never assume that the students have the prior knowledge that you think they should have.

thoughts on technology

Again, I am not a writer. I am an artist, a teacher, a facilitator, a mentor and most of all, a learner. It seems that I am constantly finding out things that I don't know, or perhaps it is that I have forgotten things that I should have remembered. I say this because it is intimidating to me to read other participants blogs and to read such good postings. Maybe it is being an art teacher; I think art teachers are more competitive than other content teachers. Oh, well, I'll try to do better.
My work here at the Globaloria will be on the simplest of terms. The computer that I brought from school reinforces the idea that I need to 'bite the bullet' and buy my own new laptop. THis one is sooooooooo slowwwwww. I would like to embed links to other sites but it takes about 4 minutes to load onto another site and I am afraid of losing my connectivity. I did read the wv designdiva's posting and it was awesome. Bill DOrsey had some good ideas and Patrick's had a link about photography that I will be sure to check out. Rachel's art links about gaming is definitely one that I will begin with because after all, I am an art teacher.

Charleston Workshop

June 23, This should probably be titled "Call for Auditions". Jeremy is planning a new film and he is looking for a few good men, or is it women; I'm not sure. We'll have to wait for the movie premier to see what he comes up with.