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= = =Welcome to College of Staten Island High School for International Studies Wiki!= =[|www.csihighschool.org] (Link to our school webpage)= =[|Inside CSI] (Link to our school blog)=
 * We will be using this space to share instructional resources, best practices, useful websites and professional development articles. With the goal of creating an adult community of learners, I hope that each of you will contribute to and use this page.**



__Use Wikis in Instruction__
==Wikis are collaborative so that students in your class can collaborate and learn with one another as well as with students in other schools. Wikis can incorporate research and writing, allow students to use audio and video, can link to other resources, and engage students in teaching students. You must create the framework for the learning and the project so that students have clear expectations. Keep in mind that any member of the group can edit the wiki. However, you can use the history tab at the top of the page on the wiki to see who made edits and what changes they made. You can also revert back to a prior version of the wiki.==

**Great Idea for using wikis' in a math class!!**

 * Have students use a wiki to work together to create a manual about how to solve math problems! Each night assign a different student to do a particular problem and post the solution and steps for solving on the wiki. This can then become a study guide for students! (Got this idea from an AP Calculus teacher who had fabulous results! He assigned a different problem from the AP exam nightly. A different student was assigned to post the solution and steps to solving each night. The wiki then became the students' study guide for the AP examination.**

**Using Wikis for Notetaking**

 * Assign a different student(s) to post his/her notes on the wiki each night. This can then be added to by other students in the class and can then become a study tool for tests. It will also encourage students to take good notes as they know they will have to post them to the wiki to share with others. This also helps students who are absent from class catch up on work that they missed.**

=**__Resources__**=

Engage Students with Digital Story Telling
This site will help you teach your students how to create digi-stories (digital stories that can be uploaded to the web). It has outlines for the process of writing your script, peer editing, etc. This is a great way to engage kids with technology as they conduct research and write to complete their digi-story. It is also a good way of getting kids to use the language they are studying!!!! Check it out - Give our kids a chance to be creative, to become literate in digital story telling, and to present their learning in a new way. [|Digi-Stories]

[|TEACHER TUBE]
View this student created video about the life of Iqbal Masih to check out the power of a student project using video. Not only did the student learn about Iqbal's life ,child slavery and labor, she was inspired to investigate careers using technology and learned that one person can make a difference in our world. What a powerful learning! Imagine if each of our students realized that s/he can make a difference, the s/he can make the world a better place. Our students can also make movies about people or places of interest, can use video as a tool to practice their language skills, can use video to create public service announcements, etc. I found this one particularly powerful! This is yet another way for our students to demonstrate their learning, to be able to share their learning with a real audience and to meet the requirements of our Graduate Profile. Note that teacher tube is also a great professional development site loaded with "how to" videos, presentations about different types of strategies used to enhance learning, and just about anything you can imagine.

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[|Facing History and Ourselves-New Interactive Site]
This is a great new site that can be incorporated into subject area curriculum as well as into advisory. **BE THE CHANGE: UPSTANDERS FOR HUMAN RIGHTS** is Facing History’s newest interactive website. Developed specifically for thirteen to eighteen-year-olds, and created with the help of student interviewers, the site profiles the stories, influences and motivations of five Reebok Human Rights Award winners:
 * **DEVOTED TO PEACE AND HUMAN RIGHTS EDUCATION, CAMBODIAN GENOCIDE SURVIVOR ARN CHORN POND MENTORED YOUNG IMMIGRANTS IN LOWELL, MASSACHUSETTS.**
 * **DEDICATED TO FIGHTING RACISM, NAACP LAWYER VANITA GUPTA SOUGHT JUSTICE FOR THIRTY-FIVE AFRICAN** **AMERICANS FALSELY ACCUSED OF DRUG RELATEDCRIMES IN TULIA, TEXAS.**
 * **COMMITTED TO THE PRACTICE OF NON-VIOLENCE,PEACE ACTIVIST MARTIN O’BRIEN WORKED TO** **ADVANCE HUMAN** **RIGHTS IN NORTHERN IRELAND.**
 * **ALARMED BY THE AIDS EPIDEMIC, AIDS ACTIVIST** **YINKA JEGEDE-EKPE BRAVELY STEPPED FORWARDTO FIGHT FOR THE RIGHTS OF NIGERIAN WOMEN INFECTED WITH HIV/AIDS.**
 * **CONCERNED ABOUT INEQUITIES IN ACCESS TO HEALTH CARE, DR. ERNEST GUEVARRA HELPED ESTABLISH CLINICS IN BATTLE-TORN AREAS OF THE** **PHILIPPINES.**

In learning about the stories of these five extraordinary men and women, students connect with a growing global network of their peers who care about creating a more just world. Young people interact with the site and each other by posting their thoughts about participation and human rights.

In our “Student Spotlights” section, kids can also read about—or even nominate—other middle and high schoolers their own age who have chosen to participate for positive change. “Be the Change” also offers lists of resources and organizations to help students think more critically about the roles they might play in the world, their responsibilities and obligations towards their communities, and the choices they will make in their own lives.

While the site is designed for any young person to explore on his own, teachers may want to use the site in their classrooms, and the teacher resources area offers a variety of helpful ideas and activities.

MTV Launches Social Networking Site to Fuel Youth Activism
Motivate students to get involved in their communities and to be youth activists. On September 20, MTV launched its youth activism Web site Think.MTV.com in partnership with the Case Foundation, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Goldhirsch Foundation and MCJ Amelior Foundation. The site is intended to build a college going culture that can reach all students—even those in under-performing schools or isolated communities. ThinkMTV, the umbrella for much of MTV’s issue-based work, commissioned a study last year to understand youth engagement. They found that while 80% of young people say taking action to help their community and others is important and the right thing to do, only 19% describe themselves as “very involved.” Think.MTV.com intends to narrow this “activation gap” by providing the tools that young people need to become informed and take action on the issues that matter most to them. The site provides an online community that will link young people to foundation partners and grantees who work on a range of issues from education to poverty and disease—including Strong American Schools to the ONE Campaign. Young participants who develop innovative solutions to address problems can be awarded grants and scholarships or be eligible for other recognition. [|http://www.think.MTV.com]

**[|Wiki Wisdom: Lessons for Educators]**
An brief and interesting article about ways to use wikis to further professional development and share resources as well as wonderful examples of how to use wikis in your classes to actively engage all students in learning and increase student achievement. Check it out!

[|More About Student Created Wikis]
More great examples of student created wikis and how teachers are using wikis to engage students. Great links to examples of wikis and projects students worked on collaboratively. We can do this too! Our kids will love this and it helps them to meet our graduate profile in many areas; they will learn to work collaboratively, they will become technologically literate and proficient; they will become proficient problem solvers as they work together to create their projects, etc. etc.

**[|Global Ethics]**
Link to the Institute for Global Ethics that Don Profitt spoke about at our professional development session on Friday. He recommended looking at the articles on Schools of Integrity as well as at the section on dilemmas which we can use with our advisories as well as with our advisory teams. If you click on Dilemmas on the left side of of the homepage there are a host of right versus right dilemmas that you can use with your advisees after kids discuss and help to establish the core values for our school.

**[|**Protocols**]**

 * Link to the National Council on School Reform for a plethora of protocols to be used in classes or for professional development to give all a voice in conversations. Contains many text based protocols, protocols for looking at teacher and student work, and protocols to help facilitate equitable conversations.**

**[|Globalization 101]**

 * Another great source for lessons, source material and great ideas funded by the Carnegie Endowment. You can also subscribe to their newsletter. I have seen them present at the International Studies Schools Network Summer Institute as well as at the ISSA conference. Great sources from a variety of perspectives about current issues and problems in the world. The Issue Briefs are particularly useful as is the tab for teacher resources. This is also a great site for students for use in classes and in advisory. Let us know what you think and how you use it!** **Great links to international news sources from a multitude of countries - great to incorporate some these into lessons to show students how people from different cultures may see things from a different perspective.**

[|New York Learns]
Link to this wonderful site with resources for all subject areas in all levels. A great sight for finding lessons, resources, ways for students to practice without a teacher, lessons and projects that integrate technology, and more! This site is an amazing resource. I really encourage you to play with it and use some of these resources to engage your students.

[|You Tube]
Engage your students with technology. Check out this video from youtube to see how students in an AP psychology class did their project on sleep disorders. Clearly, they did research on sleep disorders, were able to share this with their class, were engaged in project based learning, and had fun!!!! Go directly to the link to see other projects and look for ways you can engage your students, help them to become technologically literate, present their work to an authentic audience, and learn to communicate their message effectively.

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=**[|How Good People Make Tough Choices]**=
 * We will be using this first chapter of Rush Kidder's book as part of our professional development on Friday, August 31, 2007. For this yearlong program we will be working with Donald Proffit of the Institute for Gloable Ethics so that as a staff, then with our students, and then with our parent community, we can develop what our school's shared core values are and how we, as a school community, can live by those values in our classes, when we discipline students, in our conversations with one another, with students, and with parents. Our hope is that as we work together, we will create a socially just and respectful community. I was fortunate to attend two workshops at Summer Institute with Don Proffitt. I know we will all learn a lot from his workshop and enjoy it as well.**

**[|Schools Realize Students Need to Read Relevant Books]**

 * According to The Christian Science Monitor, contemporary books are more likely to make schools' summer reading lists. As some students begin a frantic rush to finish required summer reading lists, more are likely to encounter books by Alice Sebold or Lance Armstrong, alongside the conventional classics. "Kids want books that they can identify with," said Beth Yoke, Young Adult Library Services Association executive director. "They want to see an African-American character, or a Muslim character, or a strong female character."**

[|UNICEF CURRICULUM TO CREATE GLOBAL AWARENESS - GREAT FOR ADVISORY]

 * EDUCATORS WANTED TO PILOT NEW TEACHUNICEF CURRICULUM In an attempt to bring a greater global perspective to US classrooms, the U.S. Fund for UNICEF is looking to partner with U.S. teachers this fall, to pilot its new "TeachUNICEF" educational materials. These unique lesson plans are based on UNICEF's 2006 "State of the World's Children Report". They examine how issues of poverty, armed conflict, child labor and disability impact the lives of children in developing countries, and what UNICEF is doing to overcome these challenges to children's survival and development. Teachers will be asked to choose two lesson plans to present to their class, which are downloadable off of the TeachUNICEF website. Following the pilot program, teachers will be requested to complete a short online survey form in order to provide feedback on the materials. The U.S. Fund for UNICEF is pilot testing this TeachUNICEF series. If you are a middle school or high school teacher interested in providing feedback for the pilot, pleas!**

[|Bibliographies Made Easy]**
Take the tedium out of creating a bibliography! This is a great resource to help students create perfect bibliography entries using either MLA or APA format. It will make the task painless for them and will provide readers with the information they need to verify sources. This cite is a free, automatic bibliography composer.

How do rubrics help teachers and students?
1. A rubric helps instructors define excellence and shows students what level they must achieve. 2. A good rubric helps teachers to be accurate, detailed, unbiased and consistent. 3. A good rubric provides students with clear expectations for what is excellent, good, midling and below standard work. 3. A good rubric and a teacher that teaches students how to use it, helps students evaluate their own work. 4. A good rubric informs parents and others of the goals for the student and their results.