Hello,
I have finished the concept map of Snow Snakes AL site. We can discuss it tomorrow if we have time for it. See you tomorrow!

Parents

The folks really came through - my dad made a lovely snow snake and I was thinking maybe I could make a few little videos with it to illustrate the steps. I thought that might be a nice little interactive piece. Jim, what format would I need to save them in? Or should I do the You Tube thing? I've also got some pictures that my dad took while in the process and I'll revise the lesson with those stuck in. Jim, will that be complicated to upload? Would it be better to have links to the images in each section or to have them right in the text? My poor little Front Page brain thinks it would be so easy to link them but I'm guessing it doesn't work quite that easily, eh?

So I'll get the two lessons revised before Tuesday (I probably won't make it by 4:15) and let me know if you like the video idea and I can do that, too.

Allison

Today's Work on the Site

I activated the discussion forums today. They seemed to work quite well after some trials and tribulations. This is an essential piece of the site because it enables the registered users to collabarate and upload material.

I also uploaded the video and audio files I received on Tuesday. I'm really not too happy with the time it takes for these items to download for viewing. An alternative would be to submit all of the videos to YouTube and then use the streaming video instead which seems to work much faster. I'm not really sure I want to change anything just yet.

Lastly, there was much ire placed upon the uploading of the 360° image of the U's Mall. I could not upload it to the component we are currently using because it does not recognize the .mov format. The alternate files (.mpg, .avi, etc) could be uploaded, but I could not convert the 360° image to any of these files without losing the features essential to this media. I eventually just uploaded the file to my personal server space and linked it into the menu. I could have changed the component to something that reads .mov files, but the truth is that after we complete this for a grade, Brant will use this site and will not need this class assignment that really has nothing to do with the site, so where it is at now is fine.

Progress?

Anything? I received a packet from my parents, so I'll scan that stuff in and get it all ready to be a slide show of sorts. My dad was going to go out to the cabin and make a snow snake from scratch yesterday, taking pictures after each step so we can include visuals with the directions (good plan, huh?). I'm not sure if it ended up working, but I'll see them today. I'll assume it did since he didn't call to say otherwise. Anyone else have anything to report?

Allison

puzzled

I'm sure it was just a map I created in my imagination, then. Sometimes it gets a little too realistic inside here...

Allison

Tuesday at 4:05 Peik 230

I delved into Joomla today trying to upload a few items. Needless to say I got stuck pretty quick. I would like to spend a little bit of time on Tuesday having Jim show us some Joomla basics. My lesson should be close to final. Did anyone check out the google docs page? Thoughts? We could maybe look at that as well. I have some further lesson ideas and would be happy to look into a climate lesson on snow snakes. I don't recall seeing a map Jim. But I am intrigued. See everyone Tuesday afternoon at my place.

?

I swear I've seen a map of the areas snow snakes were played in some of our research. Does anyone know what I'm talking about? It's entirely possible I imagined it...

I have one pretty long but very rough lesson going. I'll try to get some more done for tomorrow. Can anyone do anything on climate? I was maybe going to incorporate it into my stuff, but I'm not really sure what to do with it. Maybe we can discuss tomorrow. I didn't write anything down...what time did we say?

Innovate: Moving from Theory to Real-World Experiences in an e-Learning Community

Innovate: Moving from Theory to Real-World Experiences in an e-Learning Community

Picking up Steam!

We have two different things rolling at this point. For Aaron's class we had talked about a one month unit during the month of February. This would culminate in a festival of some sort. By having a nice neat month we could build and keep momentum for snow snakes with active collaboration zones, expert chats, etc. This would be done within the school day primarily with after school activities as needed.

For the grant project I am working on, and which is the underlying driving force behind this; a munch lengthier approach is being explored with only after school connotations. For an after school session we are looking at up to two hours a day. And for all practical purposes you could have as many days as you want. I think that approach might get a little bigger and a tad unwieldy for our original AL game plan. So the long answer is lets do it all and then we can cut back and sharpen as needed.

I talked on the phone yesterday to an Ojibwe elder who I was pointed to as someone who knows snow snakes. It was kind of funny because he had to do research much like we are doing to find out about snow snakes. He talked to elders before him and they didn't have much to say about the subject. Anyway, I passed along what we have for our AL project, including pdf articles and book chapters. He will look it over and see what kind of involvement he is interested in. I will be emailing Jim Brickwedde after this post to sit down and put some fresh eyes on our curriculum progress.
I am not much of a cheerleader but a cheer sounds great! Maybe a dance too!

Question

I just hammered out a ton of stuff. It is now past my bedtime and my brain has officially shut down, but I had a question for Brant. How long are these after-school sessions and how frequently do they occur? Of course, I sat down to write a quick little lesson and it blossomed into something kind of huge.

Cool stuff

It's amazing what you can accomplish when you set your mind to it! I called my parents when I got home because they live within the Leech Lake Reservation and they have somewhat all-access to the Cass County Museum, which has a wonderful collection of Ojibwe art. My dad is going to stop by there and hopefully take some pictures and talk to the curator, who is a font of knowledge of all sorts of Native things. After asking about all of that, I thought maybe I should tell them a little about the project and both of them exclaimed, "snow snakes!" like I'd just told them they won a million dollars. Turns out that my dad has made a number of them and conducted tournaments as a Boy Scout leader. So he's going to write up the direction on how to make them (not sure if they kids will be able to do it - depends on whether they're able to use a skill saw and whether they would have access to that...he suggests having them made, but we'll see) and send those to me. It seemed like that would be way better coming from someone who has done it before. My mom is going to talk to the Indian Ed department at Walker-Hackensack-Akeley tomorrow when she subs, so maybe she can get something from them. Once you get my mom going on something, she delivers results. Trust me.

So they're on a mission and I am working on the lessons I decided I'd be responsible for. It is going to be a little history, a little sports, a little art, some shop class and who knows what else.

Allison