Mind/Shift Post: Read, Hear, or Create a Story: Apps for Traveling with Kids", plus a few interesting links!

Today is Thanksgiving, and one of the things I'm thankful for is the opportunity to share interesting ideas and links with readers of this blog! (Cross-posted on the Interactive Multimedia Technology blog.)


The following post was written by Tina Barseghian, who is an editor/blogger at KQED/NPR for the Mind/Shift blog. Mind/Shift  focuses on ideas and technology that will impact the future of how we learn.  
Read, Hear, or Create a Story: Apps for Traveling with Kids Tina Barseghian, Mind/Shift, 11/23/11

Link to other Mind/Shift post collections:
Children and Social Media
Tech Tools
Mobile Learning
Digital Divide
School Day of the Future


RELATED 

Boredom Busters: 50 Fantastic Play-and-Learn Apps, Sites, and Toys
Tina Barseghian, Mind/Shift, 6/17/11

Libraries and Museums Become Hands-On Learning Labs 
Audrey Watters, Mind/Shift, 11/23/11
"A new competition sponsored by the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS) and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation has just announced 12 winning libraries and museums that will receive $1.2 million in grant money to help push the boundaries of what these institutions look like, specifically helping to create facilities that are  better "learning labs" for teens"
Lauren Britton Smedley (Transliteracy Development Director a the Fayetteville Free Library)
IDEO's Design for Learning (Sandy Speicher, Duane Bray, Rachel Switzky)
K12 Laboratory at D. School (Stanford)
Books Should Be Free
Storynory, Storynory iTunes Library:  Podcasted stories for children, offers a free audio story every week, has some online multimedia activities.

Quick Link: 68 interesting ways to use an iPad in the classroom - Josh Fassbind

68 Interesting Ways to use an iPad in the Classroom

CALL FOR PAPERS: Educational Interfaces, Software, and Technology, ACM CHI 2012

CALL FOR PAPERS
EDUCATIONAL INTERFACES, SOFTWARE, AND TECHNOLOGY 2012

3rd Workshop on UI Technologies and Educational Pedagogy

May 5-6 2012

in conjunction with ACM-CHI 2012, Austin, Texas

This will be our third annual workshop in conjunction with CHI 2012.

One of the primary goals of teaching is to prepare learners for life in the real world. In this ever changing world of technologies such as mobile interaction, cloud computing, natural user interfaces, and gestural interfaces like the Nintendo Wii and Microsoft Kinect, people have a greater selection of tools for the task at hand. Teachers and students can leverage these tools to improve learning outcomes. Educational interfaces and software are needed to ensure that new technologies serve a clear purpose in the classrooms and homes of the future.

Since teachers are always looking for creative ways to engage 21st century learners, there needs to be an academic venue for researchers to discuss novel educational tools and their role in improving learning outcomes. This workshop aims at filling this void: combining the pedagogical expertise of the cooperative learning, and learning sciences communities with the technical creativity of the CHI, UIST and interactive surface communities. The objective of this workshop is to become a conference within two years.

We invite authors to present position papers about potential design challenges and perspectives on how the community should handle the next generation of HCI in education.

Topics of interest include:

• Gestural input, multitouch, large displays
• Mobile Devices, response systems (clickers)
• Tangible, VR, AR & MR, Multimodal interfaces
• Console gaming, 3D input devices
• Co-located interaction, presentations
• Educational Pedagogy, learner-centric, Child Computer Interaction
• Empirical methods, case studies
• Multi-display interaction
• Wearable educational media

Submission: The deadline for workshop paper submissions is Dec 20, 2011. Interested researchers should submit a 4-page position paper in the ACM CHI adjunct proceedings style to the workshop management system. Acceptance notifications will be sent out February 20, 2012. The workshop will be held May 5-6, 2012 in Austin, Texas. Please note that at least one author of an accepted position paper must register for the workshop and for one or more days of the CHI 2012 conference.

Website: https://sites.google.com/site/eist2012/
Workshop Organizers: https://sites.google.com/site/eist2012/home/organizers
Important Dates: https://sites.google.com/site/eist2012/home/dates

School Districts on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and More!

A few years ago, social networking and media sites were seemingly frowned-upon by traditional K-12 school districts, but no more.   It is a great way to get the word out to parents, as well as the general public, about the positive things going on in our schools.


Below is just one of many examples.  High school students in the UCPS district sponsor a prom for students with special needs, including those who attend the program at Wolfe, one of the schools I serve as a school psychologist.  Below is a short video from the UCPS YouTube channel that features highlights of the most recent prom, which had a "Hollywood" theme.


(I'm home today with a stomach bug,  so I had a moment to share something positive about the great students in the UCPS district!)