Middle School Matters

Jokes You Can Use:

When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie

That's amore.

When an eel bites your hand and that's not what you planned

That's a moray.

When our habits are strange and our customs deranged

That's our mores.

When your horse munches straw and the bales total four

That's some more hay.

When Othello's poor wife, she gets stabbed with a knife

That's a Moor, eh?

When a Japanese knight used a sword in a fight

That's Sa...mur...ai.

One day my housework-challenged husband decided to wash his sweat-shirt. Seconds after he stepped into the laundry room, he shouted to me, "What setting do I use on the washing machine?"

"It depends," I replied. "What does it say on your shirt?"

He yelled back, "University of Oklahoma."

A man and his wife, now in their 60's, were celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary. On their special day a good fairy came to them and said that because they had been so good that each one of them could have one wish.

The wife wished for a trip around the world with her husband. Whoosh! Immediately she had airline/cruise tickets in her hands.

The man wished for a female companion 30 years younger...

Whoosh...immediately he turned ninety!!!

Gotta love that fairy!

On Our Mind:

What have you gotten better at this year?

What do you still need to figure out or work on?

What’s keeping your kids from making big time gains (that are within our control)?

http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/2011/03/30/three-good-questions-for-teachers-to-ask-themselves-answer-them-here-if-you-feel-like-it/

Eileen Award

Yvonne. Good luck with the interviews.

Advisory:

Create Claymation Public Service Announcements (Digmo)

If at first you don’t succeed . . .

Middle School Science Minute

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or [email protected])

The World Traveler Dave is unavailable this week. We have hopes that he will return with his uber valuable contributions next week.

From the Twitterverse:

News:

Federal Budget's Approval Sets Stage for Future Battles

By Alyson Klein

Education advocates are already bracing for protracted budget battles in the coming year, even as they sort the winners and losers in the bill approved by Congress on Thursday financing the U.S. Department of Education and the rest of the federal government through September.

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2011/04/14/28fedbudget.html?tkn=VTVFVlNU5PF7n5xlYXH4CSTsWTmv5Wgw15mr&cmp=ENL-EU-NEWS1

Resources:

Memidex

Memidex is a free online dictionary and thesaurus with a simple interface, complete inflections, auto-suggest, adult-filtering, frequent updates, a browsable index, support for mobile devices, and millions of external reference links for definitions, audio, and etymology. http://www.memidex.com/

SuperMaths

A variety of math games.

http://www.supermathsworld.com/

YapTime

http://yaptime.com/

Web Spotlight:

NASA releases sky-mapping archive

By Alicia Chang, Associated Press

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/space/2011-04-15-nasa-sky-mapping-spacecraft.htm

Idioms 4 You

Idioms, um, for you.

http://www.idioms4you.com/index.html

CAST

http://cast.org

UDL Guidelines

http://www.udlcenter.org/aboutudl/udlguidelines

Events & Happenings:

Jokes You Can Use:

A teacher sees a lad entering the classroom – his hands were dirty.

She stopped him and said, “John, please wash your hands. My goodness, what would you say if I came into the room with hands like that?”

Smiling the boy replied, “I think I’d be too polite to mention it.”

Two explorers, camped in the heart of the African jungle, were discussing their expedition. “I came here,” said one, “because the urge to travel was in my blood. City life bored me, and the smell of exhaust fumes on the highways made me sick. I wanted to see the sunrise over new horizons and hear the flutter of birds that never had been seen by man. I wanted to leave my footprints on sand unmarked before I came. In short, I wanted to see nature in the raw. What about you?” “I came,” the second man replied, “because my son was taking saxophone lessons.”

So the bus driver said to the string, "Are you a string?" and the string said, "No, I'm afraid not". (A frayed knot).

On Our Mind:

NMSA Executive Director Search

NMSA Elections: Vote Early, Vote Often

Eileen Award

Eileen!

We heard from Eileen this week! The free hugs are on!

Advisory:

Overcoming Challenges:

The true story of the Panyee Football Club. Video is 5 minutes and 15 seconds long- subtitles in English.

*Notes (explain football (soccer), pitch (field), boots (shoes).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jU4oA3kkAWU&

Get Your Day off to a better Start

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/04/110404151353.htm

Daily Pictures

Pictures from around the world.

http://blogs.sacbee.com/photos/2011/04/images-of-daily-life-around-th.html

Middle School Science Minute

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or [email protected])

It is about the Middle School Chemistry Project which can be found at middleschoolscience.com. By the way, did it on the iPad again. First time I used three tracks. One for voice, one for guitar and one for stand up bass. Good show this week, as always. I enjoyed the interview with Doc Tatom.

From the Twitterverse:

**kelalford Web 2.0 Tools That Will Inspire via DEN Blog Network - Spring has Arrived!! Let’s talk about some Web 2.0 ... http://tinyurl.com/3e47zkq

News:

No Dentist Left Behind

http://www.trelease-on-reading.com/no-dentist.html

Cell Phones and Privacy Risks

http://dearbornschools.org/dtube?v=949NN4oT8MmHj&Itemid=333

Resources:

Google Bloomin’

Google Tools to support the revised Bloom’s Taxonomy

http://kathyschrock.net/googleblooms/

https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0Anw3Hl3DL4wfdG9WR3JQZjJXNFZFcE5pLWhrZEVNU1E&hl=en&authkey=CIf9_uoC# ‘

Civil War Timeline

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/10/29/opinion/20101029-civil-war.html

Civil War 150 years later

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/interactives/_national/civil-war-anniversary/index.html?SITE=AP

Rolls Off the Tongue

http://rollsoffthetongue.tumblr.com/

GeoGames

http://reachtheworld.org/geogames/index.html

Wicked Science Interactives

http://www.wicked.org.nz/r/wick_ed/interactives/science.php

Web Spotlight:

Demographic Chart Book

Provides a wide-ranging audience of persons interested in American history – including historians, other social scientists, teachers, and students – with graphics portraying the demographic history of the United States, as shown by the decennial census of population.

http://www.demographicchartbook.com/Chartbook/

Story Boarding

The more we podcast and have our students create video clips or other digital storytelling projects, the more we need to teach storyboarding as part of the process. Being able to pre-visualize how your story will unfold is becoming a vital skill to have for storytellers.

http://langwitches.org/blog/2011/04/03/storyboarding-pre-writing-activity/

Events & Happenings:

Shawn & Troy talk about jokes, Museum Box, the Middle School Science Minute and more.

On Our Mind:

Museum Box

Interview: Dr. Monte Tatom

Advisory:

Etch-A-Sketch

http://www.cbsnews.com/2300-504784_162-10007223-4.html?tag=img

News:

When standardized test scores soared in D.C., were the gains real?

On the 2009 reading test, for example, seventh-graders in one Noyes classroom averaged 12.7 wrong-to-right erasures per student on answer sheets; the average for seventh-graders in all D.C. schools on that test was less than 1. The odds are better for winning the Powerball grand prize than having that many erasures by chance, according to statisticians consulted by USA TODAY.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2011-03-28-1Aschooltesting28_CV_N.htm

Resources:

Scumblr

Online index cards on a corkboard.

http://scrumblr.ca/

Zen.do

Still in BETA, but an interesting concept. The site turns notes into Flashcards.

From the site:

Students are asked to learn an extraordinary amount of information in a short period of time. When it comes time to review, we have to sort through book and lecture notes to determine what really matters and review it effectively.

As a result, we spend a lot of our study time figuring out what to learn and reviewing stuff we already know.

Start by doing what you're doing. Yes, that's right. Take notes in class (on your laptop) as you do normally.

Just one difference: Whenever you are writing down a concept, name, important date, etc. add a hyphen between a term and definition.

Now you're ready to dramatically optimize your studying. Study you're notes as flashcards. Indicate what you know and how important it is to you and that's all there is to it.

You learn. We optimize your time.

http://zen.do/

Web Spotlight:

Our educational system emphasizes spoonfeeding us knowledge rather than teaching us how to create knowledge

http://www.minddump.org/our-educational-system-emphasizes-spoonfeedin

NMSA News:

Jokes You Can Use:

How did the Vikings send secret messages?

By norse code!

Why were the early days of history called the dark ages?

Because there were so many knights!

Teacher: Where is your homework?

Pupil: I lost it fighting this kid who said you weren't the best teacher in the school

When a teacher closes his eyes, why should it remind him of an empty classroom?

Because there are no pupils to see!

Teacher: How much is half of 8?

Pupil: Up and down or across?

Teacher: What do you mean?

Pupil: Well, up and down makes a 3 or across the middle leaves a 0!

Q. Your riding a horse at full speed, a giraffe is beside you, an elephant in front of you and a lion behind you! What do you do???

A. You get off of the carousel !!!

Bill and Bob, two children, were sitting outside a clinic. Bill happened to be crying very loudly.

"Why are you crying?" Bob asked.

"I came here for a blood test," sobbed Bill.

"So? Are you afraid?"

"No. For the blood test, they cut my finger.

As Bob heard this, he immediately began crying profusely.

Astonished, Bill stopped his tears and asked Bob, "Why are you crying now?"

To which Bob replied, "I came for a urine test!"

On Our Mind:

21st Century School vs 20th Century Assessment

MAMSE 2011

#edchat, #midleved Fridays at 8:00pm.

Next week: iPads with Dr. Monte Tatom

Eileen Award

Eric from Chicago

Advisory:

Rock Paper Scissors

On the computer. With thoughts why the computer picks...

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/science/rock-paper-scissors.html?hp

Middle School Science Minute

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or [email protected])

I just did my first podcast, completely recorded on the iPad, using GarageBand. It was a lot of fun. Just attached my SnowBall mic and played a few chords on the Smart Guitar and out came the podcast.

The importance of Science...

From the Twitterverse:

News:

'Curriculum' Definition Raises Red Flags (Crvena Zastava)

By Catherine Gewertz

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2011/03/23/26curriculum.h30.html?tkn=XQZF8Ew7XPeRb9TDOhxfZzkTiWf%2FZYw5ZU9f&cmp=clp-edweek

What if?

http://bigthink.com/ideas/31604

Resources:

The Noun Project

Simple Graphical Images. Could be used as story starters.

http://www.thenounproject.com/

Thought Boxes

Organize everything you do.

Thoughtboxes is a simple tool that helps to organize your thoughts so you can make things happen.

Keep track of almost anything, and share your thoughts with friends.

http://thoughtbox.es/

PuzzleMaker

http://www.discoveryeducation.com/free-puzzlemaker/?CFID=10757332&CFTOKEN=39482384

EdiStorm

http://www.edistorm.com/

Flubaroo

http://www.flubaroo.com/

66 Ways to Use Google Forms

https://docs.google.com/present/view?id=0AclS3lrlFkCIZGhuMnZjdjVfNzc5Y25zc201Zzc&hl=en_GB&pli=1

Toasted Cheese

Writing prompts.

http://www.toasted-cheese.com/webcal/webcal.cgi

Web Spotlight:

The Civil War:

PBS first episode available for free.

http://www.macnews.com/2011/03/23/psb-stream-civil-war-ios-devices

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

Jokes You Can Use:

A man wrote a letter to the IRS: “I have been unable to sleep knowing that I have cheated on my income tax. I understated my taxable income and have enclosed a check for $200.00. If I still can’t sleep, I will send the rest.”

THE CAT:

One day, a cat dies of natural causes and goes to heaven, where he meets the Lord Himself.

The Lord says to the cat, "You lived a good life, and if there is any way I can make your stay in heaven more comfortable, please let me know."

The cat thinks for a moment and says, "Lord, all my life I have lived with a poor family and had to sleep on a hard wooden floor."

The Lord stops the cat and says, "Say no more," and a wonderful, fluffy pillow appears.

A few days later, six mice are killed in a tragic farming accident, and all of them go to heaven.

Again, the Lord is there to greet them with the same offer.

The mice answer, "All our lives we have been chased.

We have had to run from cats, dogs, and even women with brooms.

Running, running, running; we're tired of running.

Do you think we could have roller skates so that we don't have to run anymore?"

The Lord says, "Say no more" and fits each mouse with beautiful new roller skates.

Week later, the Lord stops by to see the cat and finds him snoozing on the pillow.

The Lord gently wakes the cat and asks him, "How are things since you got here?"

The cat stretches and yawns, then replies, "It is wonderful here.

Better than I could have ever expected. And those 'Meals On Wheels' you've been sending by are the best!"

On Our Mind:

MAMSE

Troy gets an Award and a Surprise!

Competition with MACUL

Great folks at Coopersville Middle School

Congrats on being recognized as a National Schools to Watch school.

Eileen Award

Robert Jackson

From our Listeners:

Advisory:

Latin motto generator: My younger students had great fun with this when designing Medieval Shields - http://bit.ly/h44Be

Middle School Science Minute

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or [email protected])

April EarthKAM project for MS students utilizing the International Space Station. Pretty cool :)

From the Twitterverse:

News:

Feds requiring principals to monitor students’ Facebook and other social media during lunch times and after school.

http://dailycaller.com/2011/03/16/fed-instructs-teachers-to-facebook-creep-students/

“Education Department officials are threatening school principals with lawsuits if they fail to monitor and curb students’ lunchtime chat and evening Facebook time for expressing ideas and words that are deemed by Washington special-interest groups to be harassment of some students.”

School of One

“The School of One is based on the premise that, in a regular school, … there are basically three or four math classes that are going on in any given period,” explains Christopher Rush, the program’s co-founder and chief product officer, who is in charge of the project’s analytics. “So why don’t we take all the kids from those math classes, and all of the teachers from those math classes, and try to use those resources more strategically?”

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2011/03/17/25schoolofone.h30.html

Resources:

TimeToast

Easy to create timelines. Free

http://www.timetoast.com/

Urli.st

Create and share a list of links.

http://urli.st/

Web Spotlight:

Adults with college degrees.

http://chronicle.com/article/Adults-With-College-Degrees-in/125995

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

Other News:

Jokes You Can Use:

Bus Tour

The Elevator

On Our Mind:

Google Phone: A Call from Dr. Tatom

Eileen Award

To Robert in Ukraine

From our Listeners:

Hey guys,

I saw on this week’s podcast notes that someone was talking about screenjelly. I love using screen casts to communicate with staff and parents, so I am always on the look out for the next best thing. However, if your school is like mine, then the firewall might prevent using screentoaster or screenjelly. I did, however, find a great java based site called screencast-o-matic.

http://www.screencast-o-matic.com/

It works well even through the firewalls.

Robert in Ukraine

Advisory:

Share childhood differences:

Middle School Science Minute

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science

From the Twitterverse:

News:

Pay Initiative does NOT Lead to Increased Student Performance:

ISTE Voting is now open

http://iste-listserver.iste.org/t/446353/2089440/2518/0/

82% of schools could soon be labeled as “Failing”

Resources:

Diagramly

Easy to use web based diagraming. Just drag the element (shape, text, image, etc) into the working area. Click on the triangle on an image to add text. Clicking save will allow you to download the image in a number of formats (the default is .xml, but you can also use .jpg or more).

http://www.diagram.ly/

Museum Box

Welcome to Museum Box, This site provides the tools for you to build up an argument or description of an event, person or historical period by placing items in a virtual box. What items, for example, would you put in a box to describe your life; the life of a Victorian Servant or Roman soldier; or to show that slavery was wrong and unnecessary? You can display anything from a text file to a movie. You can also view and comment on the museum boxes submitted by others.

http://museumbox.e2bn.org/index.php

Molecular Workbench

The Molecular Workbench™ (MW) is a free, open-source tool that creates and delivers visual, interactive simulations for teaching and learning science and engineering.

http://mw.concord.org/modeler/index.html

Corkboard ME

Welcome to your own personal cork board. You've been given a special link -- bookmark this page. Click to write a note, click-and-hold to move around. Paste an image link and see what happens? Enjoy!

http://corkboard.me/

Pilot Handwriting

Interesting way to create a font of your handwriting. However, you send email through them.

http://pilothandwriting.com/en/

Comic Strip Generator

Use to use and flexible. The tutorial gives a good overview and tips.

http://stripgenerator.com/strip/create/

Tutorial: http://stripgenerator.com/video/show/1/ (5 minute, 36 seconds)

Web Spotlight:

Code for America

TED Talk - Khan Academy

http://www.ted.com/talks/salman_khan_let_s_use_video_to_reinvent_education.html

Tech Opportunity

Glogster is looking for “ambassadors”. You get additional resources and a full Glogster account in exchange for your time and use of the Glogster accounts.

http://edu.glogster.com/ambassadors/#newAmbassadorEmail

Jokes You Can Use:

Rules of Life:

From our Listeners:

This is Eric in Chicago, I haven't commented in awhile but I still listen faithfully to the podcast and seems to find equal parts enjoyment and information. So thanks for keeping it going.

On another note. I was thinking about attending the Michigan Middle school conference. I am 50/50 right now. It would be a nice time away learning and hanging with others who do this...so close the deal and talk me into it. :) Is it worth the drive from Chicago? What will I get from it?

Talk with you soon.

Peace. eric

Eileen Award

Karen Richmond (via iTunes).

Advisory:

The AIR Car,

Common Good Forecaster,

Read Across America,

Internet “Privacy” ,

Middle School Science Minute - plus a bonus to make up for last week.

From the Twitterverse:

Resources:

Walk a Mile in Their Shoes

This is a great pdf document that spotlights bullying of special needs students.

Parents should familiarize themselves with the different forms of bullying that a child with special needs may experience:

MANIPULATIVE BULLYING: This form of bullying occurs when a child with special needs is actually being coerced and controlled by another student.

CONDITIONAL FrIENDShIP: This form of bullying occurs when a child thinks that someone is being their friend, but the times of “friendship” are alternated with times of bullying.

ExPLOITATIVE BULLYING: This form of bullying occurs when the features of the child’s condition are used to bully them either by other classmates or via technology and social media networks.

http://www.abilitypath.org/areas-of-development/learning--schools/bullying/articles/walk-a-mile-in-their-shoes.pdf

The Generation Project

Web Spotlight:

Diigo Group

Diigo Group for Middle School Matters: http://groups.diigo.com/group/middle-school-matters

Google Cloud Connect

Flipbook

Create an electronic flip book as a unit project.

http://www.benettonplay.com/toys/flipbookdeluxe/ ,

Free On-line Professional Development,

BIL Conference,

Pecha Kucha,

Book Club,

TED Education,

SocioClean,

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

Jokes You Can Use:

Definitions:

BEAUTY PARLOR:

A place where women curl up and dye.

CANNIBAL:

Someone who is fed up with people.

CHICKENS:

The only animals you eat before they are born and after they are dead.

COMMITTEE:

A body that keeps minutes and wastes hours.

DUST:

Mud with the juice squeezed out.

EGOTIST:

Someone who is usually me-deep in conversation.

GOSSIP:

Never tell a lie if the truth will do more damage.

KLEENEX:

Cold Storage.

INFLATION:

Cutting money in half without damaging the paper.

MOSQUITO:

An insect that makes you like flies better.

RAISIN:

Grape with a sunburn.

SECRET:

Something you tell to one person at a time.

SKELETON:

A bunch of bones with the person scraped off.

TOOTHACHE:

The pain that drives you to extraction.

TOMORROW:

One of the greatest labor saving devices of today.

YAWN:

An honest opinion openly expressed.

WRINKLES:

Something other people have. You have character lines.

On Our Mind:

Embracing the Wide Sky

Daniel Tammet in audiobook format

From our Listeners:

No Eileen Award today

Advisory:

Free Rice

* Click on the right answer in the middle of this page.

* If you get it right, you get a harder question. If you get it wrong, you get an easier question.

* For each answer you get right, we donate 10 grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Program.

WARNING: This game may make you smarter. It may improve your speaking, writing, thinking, grades, job performance.

http://freerice.com/

Middle School Science Minute

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or [email protected])

Bonus Day:

* Science Songs

* Plate Tectonics

From the Twitterverse:

News:

Studies Find Language Is Key to Learning Math

Wisconsin

Prepping for Kindergarten Test

Resources:

Find out who is linked to your (or your school’s) web site:

1. Go to AltaVisa

2. Type in link:webaddressIwanttoknowlinks.com (um, after link: type the address of your web site or your school’s web site).

3. Change “Show Links” button to Except this domain - this will exclude your own posts.

EmbedPlus as an educational tool for videos

Our core features could help teachers focus students on relevant parts of existing videos and allow them to add extended material. http://www.embedplus.com/

Free Stuff from 3D Vinci

Sketch-Up tutorials

http://www.3dvinci.net/ccp0-display/freestuff.html

Math Practice - Make 5

Practice using Addition/Subtraction/Multiplication. Students answer questions to get 5 in a row.

http://www.fi.uu.nl/toepassingen/00091/toepassing_wisweb.en.html

TutPup

Welcome to Tutpup, where you can compete in fun, educational games against other kids from all over the World!

Our aim is to provide simple, fun, competitive games that help children learn and gain confidence with Maths, English and other key skills and knowledge.

http://tutpup.com/

Web Spotlight:

TED Conversations

A new platform for sharing ideas. 3 ways to engage:

* Ideas

* Questions

* Debates

Useful to find ideas for discussions.

http://www.ted.com/conversations

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

Other News:

Jokes

Languages

A mother mouse and her three children crept out of their hole into the kitchen and began feasting on some delicious bits of food. Suddenly, out of the corner of her eye, Mother Mouse saw a cat slinking toward them. The cat was between the mice and their hole. The mother muse puffed up her lungs and went, "Woof! Woof!" The cat turned tail and ran. With that, the mother quickly led her children back to safety in their hole. When they were settle and breathing normally, Mother Mouse said to her children. "Now, what's the lesson from that experience?" "We don't know," the baby mice squeaked. "It is this," said Mother Mouse. "It's always good to know a second language."

On Our Mind:

Snow Days - Part 2

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/regional/s_721287.html

From our Listeners:

The Eileen Award: It’s a great hands-on project being sponsored by the International Year of Chemistry for all elementary school and high school students, and according to the IYC there is little to no cost to perform the experiments. They are trying to make it a World Record for largest chemistry experiment ever! I found more information about the experiment itself at http://www.iupac.org/publications/ci/2010/3205/3_wright.html . From my understanding teachers just go to the website and sign up if they want to participate, and they can get lesson plans/walkthroughs right there.

-Alan

Advisory:

Jeopardy Archive

Just place your mouse over the dollar value for the question to reveal the “answer”.

Middle School Science Minute

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or [email protected])

Check out Dave’s Science Explosion Channel on YouTube.

From the Twitterverse:

News:

Schools Tackle Legal Twists and Turns of Cyberbullying

High-profile incidents put legal, policy issues in the spotlight but lack of clarity remains

By Michelle R. Davis

Resources:

DrawIsland

Easy to use on-line drawing program. Nothing to download. You can download images once done.

http://drawisland.com/

Science Animation Gallery

http://ilearntechnology.com/?p=3637

http://www.sumanasinc.com/webcontent/animation.html

Filibustery

Welcome to Filibustery, a website devoted to making the filibuster — and the proposals in the U.S. Senate to reform it — more understandable.

http://filibustery.com/

Reading Concepts

3 resources on teaching reading available to download.:

* How to Generate Interest So Reading Comprehension Improves

* Four-Ply Vocabulary Plan

* LINKING THE LANGUAGE-A Cross-Disciplinary Vocabulary Approach

http://www.cdl.org/resource-library/library_browse.php?type=author&id=75

Planet Foss

Share pictures of science.

http://www.fossweb.com/planetfoss/index.html

TopicMarks

Summary any text

http://topicmarks.com/

SPENT

If you were unemployed, what would you do?

http://playspent.org/

Web Spotlight:

Interdisciplinary Lessons in a Time of Testing

By Anthony Colucci

http://www.edweek.org/tm/articles/2011/02/09/tln_interdis.html?tkn=MMCCEsbljhQJM1zKm5tfb2BhoBNuDlL9x4+s&cmp=clp-sb-ascd

SciTable

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events:

NMSA News:

* National Conference: Thursday, November 08, 2011 —Saturday, November 10, 2011 Louisville, Kentucky.

o Promotional Materials:

+ Crossword Puzzle! (Maryland Conference)

Other News:

Jokes:

Students

The science graduate asks, "Why does it work?" The engineering graduate asks, "How does it work?" The accounting graduate asks, "How much does it cost?" The liberal arts graduate asks, "Would you like fries with that?"

Jail Time

A woman was arrested for shop lifting. When she went before the judge he asked her, "What did you steal?" She replied: "A can of peaches." The judge asked her why she had stolen them and she replied that she was hungry. The judge then asked her how many peaches were in the can. She replied 5. The judge then said, "I will give you 5 days in jail." Before the judge could actually pronounce the punishment, the woman's husband spoke up and asked the judge if he could say something. The judge said, "What is it?" The husband said, "She also stole a can of peas."

Letters

A man who was just married was flying to the Florida Keys for a business trip. His new bride was to accompany him the next day. When he got there he E-mailed his wife to let her know he made it there safely. When he sent the E-mail, he mistyped the address. In Boston, a grieving widow, whose husband has recently passed away, receives the E-mail. She reads it, screams, and faints. Hearing her grandmothers cry, the widow's 18-year-old granddaughter runs into the living room to see the computer on with a message. It reads: Dear love, Just got here. Preparing for your arrival tomorrow. Can't wait to see you. Love, Me P.S. Sure is hot down here.

On Our Mind:

Snow Days!!!

From our Listeners:

iTunes listener Eileen: Thanks for the iTunes comments and rating! We’re glad we’re part of your ride to school every day.

Advisory:

Half an idea: Belly Button Bacteria.

Middle School Science Minute

by Dave Bydlowski (k12science or [email protected])

From the Twitterverse:

Resources:

QuickLyst:

http://www.quicklyst.com/

Brain Teasers, Riddles, Trivia, Brain Exercises, Games, Forums and more...

With over 20,000 brain teasers, riddles, logic problems, quizzes and mind puzzles submitted and ranked by users like you, Braingle has the largest collection anywhere on the internet. Our large array of unique online multiplayer games will keep you entertained for hours, and if you want to improve your brain, check out the Mentalrobics section. If you crave a brain teaser, mind puzzle, riddle or game, we are the place to get it. Increase your creativity, boost learning and become a better person at Braingle. Get ready to have your brain tangled!

http://www.braingle.com/

Web Spotlight:

Project Based Learning:

Welcome to PBL-Online, a one stop solution for Project Based Learning! You'll find all the resources you need to design and manage high quality projects for middle and high school students.

http://pbl-online.org/

The Buck Institute for Education

The Buck Institute for Education (BIE) is dedicated to improving 21st Century teaching and learning throughout the world by creating and disseminating products, practices and knowledge for effective Project Based Learning.

http://www.bie.org/index.php/site/PBL/overview_pbl/

20 Technology Skills that Every Educator Should Have

By Laura Turner

http://www.guide2digitallearning.com/tools_technologies/20_technology_skills_every_educator_should_have

Events & Happenings:

Calendar of Events: