It was a dark and stormy night. Pascal awoke with a start to the sound of knocking upon the door. “I have a bad feeling about this,” the muttered to herself.

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This is a Guest Post by Adaptive Learnin’. If you are interested in submitting a guest post, you can contact us on Twitter @GlogsterEdu, or comment with your Email Address below (email addresses will not appear publicly). 

A Discovery I Made Recently

On my blog adaptivelearnin, I just started participating in this fantastic free writing idea that only takes five minutes every Friday, called Five Minute Friday.  The idea is to write freely for five minutes without distractions, without worry, and without focus on any of technical aspects of the writing process.  If you mess up, you don’t stop.  Poor spelling? no worries. If you make grammatical mistakes, no problem. You keep going, unleashing a flood of ideas into your writing.  The purpose is to be free from all the worries that normally cause writing anxiety or “writer’s block.” 

Five Minute Friday was started by a blogger named Lisa-Jo Baker. EVery Friday at 12:00 AM EST Lisa-Jo posts a writing prompt on her blog.  The prompt she posts is what all Five Minute Friday participants are supposed to free write about on their own blogs -five minutes without stopping.  Participants write their posts, then link back to Lisa-Jo’s original post.  Participants then scroll down to the bottom of Lisa-Jo’s post and comment on other posts because all posts are linked for viewing.  Five Minute Friday participants want you to comment on other posts.  It’s a part of what the writing community is for.

So, here is where Five Minute Friday, teaching, blogging and Glogs come into play.  After doing a Five Minute Friday for the first time last week. I was sold on promoting it to teachers, who could use it with their students!  It’s easy and simple for teachers to implement, and it’s fun!

Why You Should Try 5 Minute Fridays

An unplanned free-writing assignment can assuage the anxiety that many students (particularly ESL students), have about writing. For students who are still experiencing intellectual development, brainstorming and thinking creatively can be a source of stress. It seems to take forever, and the harder one thinks, the less sure one becomes of oneself; and this is as true in writing as in any academic subject.  When students do come up with ideas, they become so focused on the requirements of the assignment and the details of diction and mechanics, that they struggle even to put thoughts on paper -they soon forget their ideas, and are back at square one.  Implementing a simple and fast-paced free writing task like Five Minute Friday once every week will give students practice with uninterrupted and anxiety-free brainstorming and creative writing.  Wow, I thought when I first heard about it. This is huge. 

Perhaps I don’t look exactly like Johnny Depp

Give it a shot

I started Five Minute Friday writing last week on my blog and did another post today.  As I wrote my post today on my personal blog, Glogster EDU came to mind. Five Minute Friday could so be connected with creating Glogs for various purposes in a writing task or process.  That’s why I’m here now writing to all of you on Glogster EDU’s blog.

Five Minute Friday is based on blogging.  You can write a Five Minute Friday post for demonstration on your teacher blog, and then have students write a post on their classroom blogs.   You will have to model and teach them how to do Five Minute Friday.  (You can find the details on what to do, on Lisa-Jo’s blog.)  Once students get the process, doing it every friday will be easy.  I believe with practice week after week, their writing anxiety will diminish. and their ability to brainstorm quickly will drastically improve.

5 Minute Friday and Glogging: How it Works

Once students have composed their Five Minute Friday posts on their classroom blogs, you can follow-up by having them use their writing to kick-off new creative tasks and/or extended writing assignments through Glogging on Glogster EDU.

Here are my thoughts on how to incorporate Five Minute Friday with Glogging:

• Carry out a 5 Minute Friday writing assignment. Do this a few times so that students get comfortable with the concept.

• Divide students into groups and create Glogs with links to all of their Five Minute Friday classroom posts.  Then have student groups share their Glogs on the SmartBoard, or have students walk around and share their Glogs on Touchscreen Tablets or Computers.  Have students comment on each other’s Glogs or Five Minute Friday blog posts to encourage students to learn how to offer positive writing feedback.

• Pick some of the best Five Minute Friday posts for the current week on Lisa-Jo’s blog with students.  Then have students create Glogs, individually or in groups, about their favorite posts.  Students can then share their Glogs in the same manner as outlined above.

•   Have students create Glogs linking their personal Five Minute Friday post for the week.  Then on their Glogs have them create links about what they learned from the comments and positive feedback other students have left for them on their Five Minute Friday posts.  

• Once you’ve successfully implemented Five Minute Friday, you can have students create Glogs displaying their best or favorite Five Minute Friday blog posts.

• Remember to use the Project tools in Glogster EDU to assign the Glogs, and then store finished Glogs in student Portfolios.

More Tips: 

• You could then have students take the Five Minute Friday post they write and use it as a full extended writing assignment.  

• To make the writing process less anxiety-driven and more free, as Five Minute Friday promotes, you could have students map out their writing plans in various steps by creating Glogs.

• Try a “My Writing Process,” Glog, and students can define for themselves, how their writing process works (and what problems they have with it). This Glog can be adjusted over time to reflect new discoveries.

• Have students create Glogs as graphic organizers to map out their next steps in the writing process.  They could start with an outline, and slowly add paragraphs to it, for example.  Eventually students would have to write full assignments, but by starting the writing process with Five Minute Friday, followed by brainstorming ideas using technology students love, it will help them get excited about writing instead of making them feel anxious, as they usually do.  

• If you are working with English Language Learners, you could have students write a Five Minute Friday post. Then you could have them create a Glog with vocabulary and/or grammatical ideas to incorporate in an extended writing assignment using their Five Minute Friday post.

• This will help them have an outline of vocabulary and grammar in their extended writing so they don’t become repetitive. It will also focus them on learning the vocabulary they need to express themselves fully. The Glog helps to define the need, and remind students of what they have learned.

Related articles

• Writer’s Block? Try Freewriting (storywritingstudio.wordpress.com)
• Top 5 Reasons to Free-write (projectworkingtitle.com)

If you’re Interested in Subscribing to any of Glogster EDU’s Content Streams, Sign up here!

What say you?

How do you help your students gain enthusiasm for writing? How to stop writing anxiety, and conquer writer’s block? Share your tips and tricks in the comments below!

Searching “public domain” in the search window on Pinterest allows you to quickly find images that have been categorized or tagged as such.  While this will lead you to images that have been listed as public domain, doing so doesn’t assure that the images are definitely public domain. You need to click on the image and be redirected to the original website to double-check that the image is actually a public domain image (as well as to be able to save the image to your computer.)

Searching public domain images on Pinterest can save hours of time because many of the images have already been categorized or tagged as public domain.  Therefore, the accuracy of finding a website that has public domain images is much higher than searching images through search engines.  Once you have found one website that has a public domain image, there is a higher likelihood that the website has other public domain images as well, which can be used on your Glogs.

Here’s how to search Pinterest for public domain images, how to save the images, and how to upload them to your Glog.

First- Log-in to Pinterest.

Second- In the search window type in “public domain”.

Third- Scroll through the images and find the image that you would like to use as your Glog wall.

Fourth- Click one time on the image you would like to use.

Fifth- Click on the large image to be redirected to the original source of the public domain image. 

Sixth-  Check the original source to make sure the image is definitely public domain.

Seventh- Review the instructions to download and “save” the image to your computer.  

Eighth-  Once you are on the original public domain image, right click and “save image as”.

Ninth- Chose the location you would like to save the image to.

Tenth- Go to your Glog and click on “Wall”.  Next click on “Glog Wall”.  Then click “Upload”.

Eleventh- Find the image you would like to upload and double-click on it.

Twelfth- Click on the setting for how you would like to use the image as your Glog Wall.  Then click “Use It”. 

Thirteeth- Make sure you chose the correct option you wanted for how to display the image as your Glog Wall.

Fourteenth- Next set the image for your Page Wall.  You can use a public domain image or use one of the images that Glogster EDU provides.

Fifteenth- Use Pinterest to find other images to place inside your Glog.  Follow the same search instructions as listed above.

Sixteenth- Click to the original source to make sure it is definitely public domain.  Save it and upload it to your Glog using “Images” on Glogster EDU.

Seventeenth- Finish your Glog and voilà.   

Glog by Beth Crumpler

You can find us in booth 2008. Come visit the booth (and receive a special package) by following this map!

Our schedule

The program is full of some wonderful sessions and GlogsterEDU will be presented in at least 6 great workshop sessions, come see us at a few or all!

6/25 8:00-10:00am Primary Sources Meet Web 2.0 Tools
6/25 8:00-10:00am Teachertechvids.com: Simple Tutorial Videos for Great Digital Tools
6/25 2:30-3:30pm Digital Books for Digital Kids: Created by Kids for Kids
6/25 2:30-3:30pm  GlogsterEDU: Engage, Create, Innovate, Demonstrate, and Problem Solve

6/25 4:30 – 4:40pm Chrome Apps for Education Glogster EDU demo slam at the Google Theater.

6/26 4:00-6:00pm Leveraging the Web for the Common Core- Curation vs Aggregation
6/27 8:00-10:00am Going…Going…Glog!

Last but not least, we would like to invite you to test your vocal skills at the Edtech Karaoke Party at ISTE on Tuesday night, June 26 on the Andaz Hotel-Rooftop. The party starts at 7:00pm, and everyone is welcome to come, but space is limited so sign up ASAP!

We look forward to seeing you there!

GlogsterEDU Academy

If you are unable to  attend ISTE, or simply are interested in having more access to white papers, presentations, webinars etc…please sign up here to join our Glogster EDU Academy!

This month, Glogster EDU Ambassador Lisa Parisi will demonstrate how to use Glogster EDU to address Universal Design for Learning principles, and top reseller Joli Barker will share her sales tips and strategies. Registration is free and open to all.

1. Glogster EDU & Universal Design for Learning

Tuesday, May 8 at 5:00 pm Eastern

View a recording here

Today’s teachers are faced with more and more challenges. While our curriculum gets fuller and more strenuous, our students come in with more struggles. All teachers now need to learn to work with children with learning difficulties, emotional difficulties, social struggles, and/or physical struggles. One lesson for all children just won’t work. Find out how UDL and Web 2.0 tools like Glogster EDU can help us reach all children and make learning more fun for everyone.

2. Glogster EDU Resellers – What Works!

Monday, May 21 at 4:00 pm Eastern

Register here

Mike from the Glogster EDU sales team will provide an overview of the reseller program and provide his own best practices and tips. Glogster EDU reseller Joli Barker will share what sales strategies have worked for her, and show you how to increase your earnings. If you’re a new reseller, or are interested in becoming one, this Webinar is for you!

Hope to see you there!

Thanks to everyone who joined us for yesterday’s Webinar on Mary Carole Strother’s ISTE award winning project, “Maybelle the Cockroach!” If you couldn’t make it to the live presentation, you can view a recording here.

Maybelle has travelled the country getting students excited to read and learn. Have you met Maybelle? Take a look at her adventures here:

Maybelle the Cockroach: http://maybellethecockroach.wikispaces.com/

The Maybelle Literacy and Multimedia Festival: https://maybelledigitalfestival.wikispaces.com/home

Want Maybelle to come to your school? Click on the Glog above for Mary Carole’s contact info.

Our next Webinar on is next Thursday, April 19 at 4 pm. Instructional Technology Specialist Andrea Gardner will discuss how to use Glogster EDU to address Common Core State Standards. Learn more and register here.

Hope to see you next week!

1. Using Glogster EDU for Project-Based Learning on Wednesday, April 4 at 3 pm EDT

Register here. 

Glogster EDU + PBL = A++! Project-based learning is more than just “doing projects.” Glogster EDU makes effective PBL easy. Help your students develop inquiry, research, time management, communication, presentation, leadership, and reflection skills on a fun and engaging platform.

Mike from the Glogster EDU Team will show you how to start a Glog project, create a template, assign it to the class, monitor progress, and provide feedback with Glogster EDU Premium. He’ll also provide you with plenty of example Glogs and lesson plans to get you started.

2. ISTE Technology Innovation Award winning project,”Maybelle the Cockroach” on Wednesday, April 11 at 4 pm EDT

View a recording here. 

Mary Carole Strother will share her 2011 ISTE Technology Innovation Award winning wiki, “Maybelle the Cockroach.” This collaborative project combines Glogster EDU with other Web 2.0 tools like Blabberize, VoiceThread, Mixbook, QR codes, Animoto, Vokis, and Photobabble. Get inspiration for your own digital learning adventure!

Meet Maybelle the Cockroach: http://maybellethecockroach.wikispaces.com

Read about Maybelle in Coverge Magazine:
http://www.convergemag.com/classtech/Maybelle-the-Cockroach-Sparks-Digital-Learning-Adventures.html

3. Navigate Our Digital World Through Glogster EDU Eyes & Make Connections to CCSS (Common Core State Standards) on Thursday, April 19 at 4 pm

View a recording here. 

Hosted by Andrea Gardner, Instructional Technology Specialist at Westford Public School in Westford, MA.

According to their mission statement, the Common Core State Standards “provide a consistent, clear understanding of what students are expected to learn, so teachers and parents know what they need to do to help them. The standards are designed to be robust and relevant to the real world, reflecting the knowledge and skills that our young people need for success in college and careers. With American students fully prepared for the future, our communities will be best positioned to compete successfully in the global economy.”

During this Webinar, we will:

•Understand how technology is part of the Common Core Standards
•Identify specific examples of where technology is located within the CCSS
•Share what that looks like through Glogster EDU eyes
•Review and discuss technology, multimedia and the 4Cs
•Present possible options for moving forward with integrating technology into the classroom

4. Glogster EDU in Higher Education on Tuesday, April 24 at 7 pm EDT

Registration closed.

Hosted by Dr. Torria Bond, Instructional Designer at California Baptist University.

Ideas will be presented for using Glogster EDU to enhance your face-to-face and blended courses; and to build community in your fully online courses. Learn creative and pedagogically sound ways to engage your learners.

View a calendar of all Webinars and events. 

Hope you can make it!

Much has been said (and debated) about the “flipped classroom,”  a pedagogical model in which the traditional classroom structure — lecture in class, homework at home — is “flipped.” Students watch or listen to prerecorded material at home, and engage in collaborative exercises, discussions, and projects  in class. (If you’re not familiar with the idea, this is a good overview.) 

The concept is simple, but in practice, an effective flipped model requires a great deal of preparation upfront. Fortunately, with Khan Academy quickly becoming a household name and the launch of Youtube for Schools, teachers now have access to tens of thousands of quality recordings to help them “make the flip” without necessarily creating all of the instructional material themselves. The question then becomes one of delivery — how to make those resources easily accessible to students and motivating enough so that students actually do the necessary preparations at home.

We hope that Glogster EDU provides you with the answer. It’s quick and easy  to embed instructional videos in a Glog, which students can view from home or wherever they have internet access. The creative format is completely customizable and visually engaging for students. You can embed a podcast in your Glog, link to online resources, or use the data attachment tool (with Glogster EDU Premium) to attach a short quiz to check for comprehension. Students can leave their questions in the Glog comments, so you know exactly what to focus on in class the next day.

There are pros and cons to the flipped classroom, of course (as with any learning model, once size never fits all), but the basic philosophy is one I think we can all get behind: students taking control of their own learning. When class time is reserved for active learning rather than passive note-taking, students get the opportunity to collaborate with their peers and engage with the material in a hands-on way that will lead to authentic, meaningful learning.

Or that’s the goal, anyway. This is where you come into the discussion! Glogster EDUcators, we want to hear from you. Are you a proponent of the flipped model? How do you put it into practice? Do you use Glogster EDU to make the flip, and if so, how?

We’ve asked a few of our Glogster EDU Ambassadors these questions, and next week I’ll be sharing their stories, resources, and sample Glogs. I’d love to include your stories, too — feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments.

Stay tuned!

Image from David Truss’s “3 Keys to a Flipped Classroom.”