Instructions For My Digital Notebook

When Michelle Heidenrich Barnes invited Liz Steinglass to Today's Little Ditty, an intriguing ditty challenge evolved. One of Liz's favorite poems, "Instructions for the Field", in her new book, Soccerverse, became the mentor text for the project.  For the writing challenge, each writer was asked to write a poem giving instructions to an inanimate object about how to do its job.

Since I am designing several digital galleries of artistic expressions, I decided to write a poem about an interactive digital notebook. My digital notebook in Google Docs is a companion piece to my poetry journals. It is my sacred space to record thoughts, add images, and create digital inspirations as a risk taker of thought. It is the place where I ponder, reflect, and "find my voice". Because it is an important part of my writing life, I have created templates for other writers to hone their writing skills during professional development.

Stage 1: Create the poem after many drafts in my digital notebook. 

Stage 2: Create a digital inspiration, an image poem, to add a different perspective.  I decided to change the name of the title and add one of my nature photos as a signature logo.

Digital Tools Used: 
Google Docs-Interactive Digital Notebook, Blogger, FotoJet, PicMonkey, iPhone, iPhotos, Preview

Question:
Do I keep the simple design in pink or the swirled background digital inspiration with the signature logo to submit to the challenge?

✎

Not only will I offer this post and poem to Michelle Heidenrich Barnes' challenge at her May 2019 Padlet but add it to the Tuesday Slice of Life at Two Writing Teachers.

My other blogs on digital design that I referred to when writing this post:

https://beyondliteracylink.blogspot.com/2015/05/digital-design.html

https://beyondliteracylink.blogspot.com/2015/08/digital-poetry-in-classroom.html

https://beyondliteracylink.blogspot.com/2015/08/digital-expressions.html

https://beyondliteracylink.blogspot.com/2016/08/crafting-digital-media_18.html

https://beyondliteracylink.blogspot.com/2016/09/play-think-write-digitally.html

https://beyondliteracylink.blogspot.com/2017/04/digioetry-is.html

Creating Digitally for NCTE 15

In a world of fast-paced communication and interactions, we need to slow down and reflect upon ways to power up our classroom practices. As awakeners of learning, teachers and leaders are guides to a future ready world. Using collaborative protocols and digital tools, they engage learners in cultures where risk-taking is honored. A variety of resources are available to educators to power up classrooms but it takes time to discover which ones to use. Appropriateness and ease of use are two important considerations when choosing digital tools for passion projects or writing.

In this digital age, students are trying to find their identities, offline and online. Technology allows them to discover and explore their world. Through the use of appropriate digital tools, students notice, wonder, discover, and explore topics of interest. From choice, voice rises leading students to own their learning.

While preparing for the NCTE 15 Roundtable presentation with my team, Debbie Diller, Blanca Duarte, Paul W. Hankins, Trudy Ludwig, Holly Mueller, Margaret Simon, and Terry Thompson, I utilized a variety of digital tools to bring us together. Through digital means, we were able to collaborate with each other from our homes across the United States. 

Digital Team Tools Utilized to Prepare for NCTE 15

• Google Hangout for collaborative conversations online
• Google Docs for shared writing
• Google Slides to prepare our introductory presentation 

Am I personally ready to present at NCTE 15? Since I am not quite there yet, I will dedicate the afternoon to complete my roundtable presentation.

Digital Tools I Am Using to Create my Roundtable Presentation

• Google Slides 
• Blogger that hosts my digital global galleries of artistic expressions
• PicMonkey along with Waterlogue
• Sketchnote 

My sketchnote on writing was a labor of love that I created for a workshop last Monday. I shared it with a group of teachers and would like your feedback as to its merit in the classroom. 

The experience of designing a NCTE presentation digitally with a team from across the country was an amazing one. Without the advancement of technology, we would not have been able to collaborate online and seamlessly merge individual slides into a group presentation. We are now ready to bring different perspectives on the topic of igniting wonder in students and teachers to NCTE 15 participants. It is our hope that individually and collectively, we will fuel the fires of creativity and independence in classrooms. 

Stay tuned to next week when I be tweeting from NCTE 15 in Minneapolis. I will share the link to our presentation, Igniting Wonder in Students and Teachers: Fueling the Fires of Creativity and Independence in the Classroom. 

If you are at NCTE 15, please join our session. 

Until we meet again online, please visit Margaret Simon's DigiLit Sunday site to read other posts on digital literacy. 

Digital Tools to Power Up Instruction

As I prepared for the #NYEDChat conversation tonight on "Digital Tools to Power Up Instruction," I happened to find the perfect start-up conversation to let my creative juices flow. #BFC530 this morning opened my day with this question: "Authentic #art integration is important. How do you melt the arts into your content area?" What followed was an exciting multi-level conversation that began at 5:30 am ET. That's right! Educators around the country were having an engaging conversation before their educational day started. 

At the onset of the conversation we discussed "the journey." My response to that was "Passion inspires the journey. There is a quest for knowledge, curiosity to explore and discover, and relationships to develop along the way (of course, this was shortened to 140 characters). Throughout the conversation there were inspiring thoughts and leads to digital tools to bring art to life. One tool that I never explored was Piktochart. Paper was also mentioned. Being inspired to create, I chose Piktochart as my one area to explore this morning before #NYEDChat. This digital platform served several purposes for me, beside being the medium to let my inner voice flow. Since I am preparing for the opening of the Finding Fall Gallery, I wanted to create an advertisement to send out via social media sites that would create interest and inspire others to submit a late autumn offering. I also wanted a new go to site to mention during the #NYEDChat conversation tonight at 8:30 pm EST.

Join Margaret Simon,
the host of DigiLit Sunday

Lastly, I wanted to have a different approach for DigiLit Sunday's blogging site (even though this is a day late in coming). Conversations always spark my thoughts and today's #BFC530 did just that. 

Connecting a digital tool with an image from a fall walk in the trails in my neighborhood, allowed me to create a haiku for my advertisement. I hope you find my first attempt at Piktochart engaging. 

If I was to introduce this poster to a class of young writers, I would like to introduce music to allow for another medium to engage my learners. The song, Some Call it Autumn, Signs of Fall for Children, is a delightful song to inspire observation. 

 

I will leave you with two final thoughts this morning: 

Autumn, the year's last, loveliest smile.

William Cullen Bryant

Be observant,

savor the moments of this season, 

let your voice fly to inspire others. 

cvarsalona 2014