Your Feedback, Your SiteAs I have mentioned in editions past, your feedback is incredibly valuable to us. We make changes to Discovery Education based on your recommendations. Since launching the theme pages within Discovery Education, (See Matt’s Tips and Tricks 4/16), we’ve received requests to find a more descriptive, appropriate name for them. The name “theme page” conveys the idea of a collection of content assets focused on a particular topic. However, many people thought that the name fell short in describing the value that the pages offer teachers. You can help rename theme pages by taking the survey located at http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/WEB22FJK7VTSXM. You can select your favorite name from the options provided or submit a new name for consideration.

Getting to the Point - This week’s Tips and TricksOver the past 25 editions we’ve explored a lot of different ways to engage your learners through digital media. We’ve explored how to move with music (see Matt’s Tips and Tricks 1/30), augment your audio by creating audio books (see Matt’s Tips and Tricks 3/19), imagine imagery in new ways (see Matt’s Tips and Tricks 3/26), and a whole lot more. This week we’re going to look at a few of my favorite games and interactive simulations that you can find within Discovery Education.

Getting Your Game On:

There are 160 of games, 19 fun-damentals, 20 interactive science simulations, 40 virtual labs, and 209 skill builders all designed to make learning engaging and fun. These interactive elements cover the range of subjects and grade levels. The easiest way to find all of this great stuff is to use the drop-down menu in the Discovery Education Search Bar and change your media type to one of the items that I have listed so far.

Matt’s Media Tips 4-30Take Teaching to the Next Level Where Microscope and Mouse Meet

Connecting to a Global Community of Educators

The staff favorite game has got to be the Math Dojo series. During this game students have to help Leon the Chameleon become a black belt in math and knock out the right answers. Leon scores points by kicking in the right answer...and gets knocked in the head for choosing the wrong ones. This game is great to use in a learning center, on an interactive board, or even assigned as homework. Remember that you can assign anything within Discovery Education by creating a class (see Matt’s Tips and Tricks 1/18) and/or attaching it to a Writing Prompt, Quiz Builder or Assignment Builder, (see Matt’s Tips and Tricks 1/9).

I also happen to love the Animal Universe Skill Builders. My son and I love to play with the animal cards and choose the different animals that live in different ecosystems. And, try as we might, we just can’t get that Piranha to live in the Pennsylvania woods. I like this skill builder because it is interactive. Has complementary video, a cool parents section with ideas to learn and play at home, and it speaks out loud each animal that you click upon

Why would I ever want to do that?

“According to a recent paper by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), games, when developed correctly and used appropriately, can engage players in learning that is specifically applicable to school curriculum—and teachers can leverage the learning in these games without disrupting the worlds of either “play” or school.”eSchool News. “Can gaming change Education?” Merris Stansbury. December 9, 2009. Accessed April 30, 2012. http://www.eschoolnews.com/2009/12/09/can-gaming-change-education/

But it is not all Math and Science my friend. Check out the great ELA skill builders like the one on writing a Haiku, or placing commas in the right places (Comma Chaos). I also happen to love the Punctuation Paintball, The Whaddaya Know Quiz Show, and Pendemonium series.

Social Studies more your game? Check out the Clue Maps skill builder series where students have to put together the United States! Clues help you choose which state puzzle pieces are needed to complete the map. Learn all sorts of interesting things from the "Did You Know That…?" factoids, the Discover More pop-ups, and videos in this interactive, multimedia game.

And these are just a few of the hundreds of interactive elements that you can find within Discovery Education. So the next time you’re logged in give the games a gander and scope out a few of the skill builders. I think you’ll like what you find.

It just keeps getting better and better

As I mentioned at the top of page one. We love feedback. In fact, we take feedback from educators around the world every day. We use that feedback to improve the features and functionality of Discovery Education over the summer. And we’re super excited about the new school year’s enhancements. So much so that we’re giving you, yeah you on the other side of this screen, the chance to get a sneak peek. If you’d like to see all of the new and exciting things coming out this fall please join us for one of these three special webinars:

Tuesday, May 8 7:00 PM Eastern Standard TimeTuesday, May 15 3:30 PM Eastern Standard TimeTuesday, May 22 7:00 PM Eastern Standard Time

You can register for anyone of these webinars here by clicking or following this link: http://links.discoveryeducation.com/sneakpeek2012

Discovery Education Webinar ScheduleDiscovery Education Webinar ScheduleDiscovery Education Webinar Schedule

Dates Time (EST)

Link

4/30 7pm - 8pm

Discovery Education Builders 101 This webinar will show you how to find and build your very own Writing Prompt, Quiz and Assignment within Discovery Education.

4/30 7pm - 8pm

DE Science Techbook: What Does it Look Like in My Classroom? During this session we will answer the million dollar question - What does the Techbook look like in my classroom? We’ll walk through the model lessons that are an essential and powerful component of the Techbook, discuss strategies for using the 5E concept view for lesson planning, and highlight professional development resources like the 5 Minute Preps. We will also discuss different classroom implementation models based on varying levels of technology access.

5/1 7pm - 8pm

Evaluating Student Knowledge: Formative Assessments with Discovery Education Science Techbook. In this session we will explore different methods of formative evaluation using the Discovery Education Science Techbook. We will take a close look at the rich variety of ongoing assessment tools in techbook including brief constructed responses, online assessments, student worksheets, the writing prompt builder, interactive science journals, and more.

5//3 7pm - 8pm

DE Science Techbook: What Does it Look Like in My Classroom? During this session we will answer the million dollar question - What does the Techbook look like in my classroom? We’ll walk through the model lessons that are an essential and powerful component of the Techbook, discuss strategies for using the 5E concept view for lesson planning, and highlight professional development resources like the 5 Minute Preps. We will also discuss different classroom implementation models based on varying levels of technology access.

Futaba Classroom Games for Kids by INKids. From their description: “This app is the ultimate classroom learning tool for children 4-8 and is ideal for supporting class room activities of all types. For instance, it’s a great way for kids to start learning a 2nd language or they can just polish up on their arithmetic in a competitive, but very fun game environment.

The idea is simple; Each player takes a seat around the iPad and taps in to start. The game begins as images zoom into the playing area. The first player to match the word to the image scores a point. Win three rounds and you'll be awarded a Futaba (a small ‘seedling’).

Futaba Classroom Games for Kids comes with a bunch of great learning sets, including wonderful hand drawn illustrations, professional audio soundtracks and has high quality visuals.”

You can even upload Discovery Education images and/or create your own games with them!

This iPad app costs $3.99 and can be accessed in the iTunes store.

What is a DEN Star Member?

2/6/2012 What did you say? Closed Captioning on an iPad? Getting Closed Captions to play on your iPad, GreenScreens on iPhone/iPad with GreenScreen FX app

1/30/2012 Let’s Give Them Something To Sing About Differentiated Instruction Using Songs, First Student Media Contest of the Year, ShowMe and Educreations whiteboard apps

1/23/2012 Meet the Faces of Discovery Education Get up close and personal with the Discovery Education on-air talent, special student webinar series, Story Kit app

1/18/2012 In a Class of Their Own Setting up Discovery Education Classrooms, Discovery Education Live Webinars, Quizlet App.

1/9/2012 Building out the New Year Five of my favorite things you can do with the Discovery Education Builders, Rover App for DE Students

12/19/2011 Special Holiday Edition 13 Tips from Educators around the US and Canada, Videolicious App

12/12/2011 50 Ways to Use Discovery Education Tips and tricks galore iSwifter - Flash for iPads

11/28/2011 What I am Thankful for Building out your PLN Wordspree and Math Acorn Apps

11/14/2011 Things I Stole From the Community DEN Tips, Four really cool you can do with Google. TED and Animoto apps

11/7/2011 First Six Weeks Aggregated

11/4/2011 Creating an “iCenter" How to create an ePub using DE videos. Spirit of Innovation Challenge

Miss a week? Catch back up here!4/23/2012 Getting the Point with PowerPoint and Keynote. Learn how to trim audio & video in PPT and save both PPT & Keynote presentations as images to embed in Web 2.0 sites. 2 Screens and Joinme mobile presentation apps explored.

4/16/2012 It’s all about the Theme. We’ll explore several different ways to find unique thematic content. Three most voted upon stories revealed. Studyblue mobile flashcard app highlighted

4/9/2012 Scratch and Pop. Six-Word Story finalists revealed. Links between Discovery Education and Scratch.mit.edu, Popplet.com and EduTechr mobile app explored.

4/2/2012 Mi Content es Su Content. Book- marking and sharing your Discovery Education content across your school and district, two great contests, and two text-to-sign mobile apps

3/26/2012 Can You Picture it? Learn how to create a six-word story using iPiccy.com and Discovery Education. Digital Story Challenge! MeeGenius Audiobook app for mobile devices.

3/19/2012 Audio Book ‘em Dano. Eight simple steps for creating an audiobook using iTunes and any computer (Mac/PC). Molecules mobile apps.

3/12/2012 It’s All About The Sharing. Uploading, sharing and accessing your own content within Discovery Discovery Education. Cel.Ly app polling device via any device.

2/27/2012 Teacher Center Treasure Trove of Resources. Interactive Calendar Atlas, STEM Connect explored. Socrative App (student response).

2/13/2012 Special Valentines Issue - Things I love about Discovery Education. Five Minute Preps, Images,Coaches Eye App

The Discovery Educator Network (DEN) is a global community of educators passionate about teaching with digital media, sharing resources, collaborating, and networking. With over 100,000 members providing professional development to over 600,000 educators worldwide, the DEN connects teachers both on-line and in-person. Discovery Educators have exclusive access to a wide range of resources, professional development activities, networking opportunities, exclusive Discovery Educator events and more. Find out how you can be part of this dynamic and supportive community. Become a DEN Star today!

Help Me Make Matt’s Tips and Tricks Even Better

I am always looking for ways to improve Matt’s Tips and Tricks and your feed back is invaluable to me. With that in mind I’ve created a short 15 question survey. I would love to hear your ideas and thoughts. If you can take a moment to fill out this super fast survey it will go a long way to making each edition better than the next!

10/24/2011 Spooky Edition Digital Storytelling, Web 2.0 Piqua City Community Night, Crazy Pumpkin and Halloween Card Creator Apps

10/17/2011 Stick it to IT Collaborative Note Taking Site Educator Spotlight - Jennifer Everett, ToonTastic and PuppetPals Apps

10/3/2011 Opening Up Closed-Captions Closed-Captions for Macs and PCs, 10 FAQs Customer Service Receives

9/26/2011 Common Core, Web 2.0 and DE Three cool sites that integrate nicely with Discovery Education. Administrator Spotlight - Molly Hay!

9/13/2011 Can you Hear what I’m Writing? Embedding an eReader into your Writing Prompts, Getting to know Discovery Education SCIENCE