Reports on Read Around the Planet

Thanks to Google Alerts and other sources, the reports about Read Around the Planet are streaming in.

• My personal favorite came via email from René Carver, from his teacher Leslie Stackhouse at Spencer-Van Etten Elementary in New York. “One of the Kindergarten kids said…when it was their turn to do their part…”How do we get in there?” Out of the mouths of babes!!
• A photo from Rural Hall, NC, the partners who send packages!
• Creating a Passion Quilt in California
• A news report from Battle Creek, MI
• Songs from the Waco and Houston areas in TX
• A Megaconference and Read Around the Planet feature Pittsburgh, PA
• Mr. H’s class assignments
• Merit Network Announcement

Read Around the Planet Evaluation

Quicklinks: Read Around the Planet website and CAPspace login.

The Read Around the Planet evaluation surveys are ready now. The questions are mostly about Read Around the Planet, but there are a few questions about the Collaborations Around the Planet website as well. Please take a few moments to give us feedback so we can continue to improve this program!

• Teachers: Use this RAP evaluation form
• Tech/coordinators: Use this RAP evaluation form

In addition, if you want to report a problem connection with a school or partner that was due to possibly the other school being verified incorrectly, please use this form:

• Tech/coordinators: Report a problem connection

We intend to mass email all participants the week of March 10, but some of you may wish to complete the surveys now.

Read Around the Planet Final Numbers

Quicklinks: Read Around the Planet website and CAPspace login.

While Read Around the Planet isn’t done yet, we do have final participation numbers.

People who made it happen
Read Around the Planet would not be successful without support from many organizations.

• TWICE, Michigan’s K12 videoconferencing organization, started this project in 2002 and continues to invest volunteer time and funding to make the project sustainable.
• This is the second year of corporate sponsorship from Polycom. This funding allowed TWICE to contract with Sue Porter to be our RAP coordinator, also known as the TWICE RAP Star. The project has grown so large that it isn’t sustainable without sponsorship, so we really appreciate Polycom’s support.
• The Verification Partners lay the foundation for this project in the fall with all the test calls and assistance getting buildings entered into the system and connected correctly to their coordinators. Many of them have been involved through February in helping with test calls and fixing connections.
• Building, district, and regional level coordinators and techs have worked so hard coordinating, dealing with tech problems, encouraging teachers, following up on communication problems, and generally smoothing the way for successful connections.
• And of course, the teachers who plan creative interesting presentations for their partner classes and who weather all the little glitches and quirks that can happen in classroom-to-classroom connections.

A big thank you to EVERYONE who makes this project a success!

Read Around the Planet Stats
RAP2008 Registrations: 1632
Using 30 students as a rough estimate of class size, that means RAP impacted about 50,000 students this year!
Pieces of Equipment: 869 (of which 865 are verified)

Countries
US 1435
CA 196
UK 1

States and Provinces
Interestingly, even though NY and TX had state testing conflicts, the numbers for those states still increased. Click on the graph to examine in detail.

Equipment Types
These numbers show how many sessions were scheduled using the different equipment manufacturers. Compare to last year (2007).

Avaya 21
BNI 26
Codian 1
Other 37
Polycom 1,111
Radvision 6
Sony 42
Tandberg 315
VCON 14
VTel 59

Other CAPspace Numbers

Friends
Friend Relationships Confirmed: 409
Friend Relationships Pending: 525
Have you logged in recently to update your CAPspace friendships? Go to Projects.TWICE.cc and login. Look on the home page to see if you have any friend relationships pending. If so, click the person’s head/icon and click Add Friend. Or, go to Search to find friends and add them.

Active CAPSpace Accounts: 1039

Just think of all the people you could partner with to create additional projects! Login to projects.twice.cc and check your privacy settings. If you want others to find you, check Full Access.

Keep checking the blog throughout the rest of 2008 to see what other tools and opportunities are available through TWICE!

Read Around the Planet: Snow Days, Weather, Sick Teachers, etc.

Quicklinks: Read Around the Planet website and CAPspace login.

Scheduling conflicts with partner
If for some unforeseen reason (i.e. snow day or unexpected illness), your connection cannot work on the date and time assigned to you, please work with your partner(s) to reschedule in March. Remember March is Reading Month! Your connection will be just as successful and fun on another date! Sometimes RAP connections happen all the way into May! Be flexible and patient with each other!

Snow Days, etc.
In addition, if there are weather related reasons you can’t connect on the day of the videoconference(s), please call all partners as soon possible to alert them. Remember that some students take buses a long distance to participate in the RAP videoconference. Don’t forget to contact your respective tech people to let them know if a videoconference has been cancelled.

Some coordinators get home phone numbers the night before a conference and let partners know there might be  snow day. Just keep communicating with each other!!

If you can’t work it out….
If, after every effort, you cannot work it out with your partner school, then try the following in order:
1. Try a connection with a local school.
2. Contact your regional educational service agency for assistance in finding another partner.
3. Use the listservs and other resources to find another partner.

Take a deep breath.
As a coordinator, it can be frustrating to deal with rescheduling, technical difficulties, and other issues that cause problems for the connections. Take a deep breath. Remember the joy on the students’ faces from your last connection. It will all work out!!

Time to Prepare for Michigan Week Connections

Quicklinks: Michigan Week Exchange website and CAPspace login.

Registration for Michigan Week Connections is right around the corner – March 3 through April 4, 2008. This year, Michigan Exchange Project participants will register at the new CAPspace site, Collaborations Around the Planet. The registration process will be the same as the one used for Read Around the Planet, so if you registered yourself or others for RAP 2008, you’re already several steps ahead of the game! (Note: this process does not apply to Where In Michigan? participants.)

VERIFICATION: prior to registration, all Exchange Project sites must have their videoconferencing equipment verified to ensure compatibility of equipment between partnering schools. If your site was verified for Read Around the Planet, you are already verified for Michigan Week Exchange and can skip this step.

If your site equipment has not been verified, here are the steps to follow:

• If you are a building/district/site videoconferencing coordinator, you will need to have a Collaborations Around the Planet profile. Click here for instructions on how to set up a CAPspace profile. Teachers: check with your videoconferencing coordinator to make sure they have a CAPspace profile.

• Within 48 hours of creating a profile, the coordinator should receive access to an Admin button on the CAP menu. The profile narrative must mention that the person coordinates videoconferencing – that detail tells us to “promote” the coordinator in the system so the person can access the Admin button. If we miss promoting the coordinator, email Debbie Glasgow at dglasgow@mcesa.k12.mi.us and let her know that Admin access is needed.

• When the coordinator obtains access to the Admin button, he/she can then add the site equipment and list the Tech contact information. Adding site equipment alerts a verification coordinator that a verification test needs to be done, and a verifier will contact your coordinator and Tech contacts to schedule a test. Click here for instructions on how to add equipment.

This is just the beginning of the process. You will get the chance to pick your dates and times and when registration opens March 3rd.

ASK Author: Clever Beatrice

Yesterday and today we have another set of ASK sessions with author Margaret Willey on her book Clever Beatrice. The book is a French Canadian folk tale retold in the Michigan Upper Pennisula setting. Students worked very hard preparing their questions following the ASK process. Here is a  sample of some of the interesting questions from today.

• Why did Beatrice have any brothers and sisters? Weren’t they a lonely family?
• Why didn’t you let the giant win at least one bet?
• Have you ever fooled anyone when you were younger?
• Why didn’t you give the giant a name?
• What voice do you imagine the giant having when he talks?
• We have been learning to write leads to hook the readers for the story. Did you write several leads before you chose one?
• Why did you choose the Michigan Upper Peninsula as the setting?
• How long did it take to write this book?
• Why did you make Clever Beatrice a girl?
• Are you friends with any of the illustrators you work with?
• How did you come up with such clever ideas for Beatrice?

We still have room in some of the March TWICE ASK programs, so sign up if you want to join us. Non-TWICE members are welcome too!

The End of Matches

We have just finished the last straggling matches that needed to be done. There are a few language matches that are still in limbo, but we’re basically done.

Now that we’re finished, we’re posting the “leftover helpers” online.  These are coordinators and teachers who wanted to participate and indicated their interest AFTER registration closed on January 16. We used as many as we could to help with the “leftovers” and these are the rest that don’t have a match but weren’t officially registered.

We encourage you to work with each other to match up if you can. We cannot assist you further other than giving you this list.

Recommended procedures: We highly recommend that coordinators work with each other to negotiate times. We also recommend that you delete the row with your contact information once you’ve found a partner so no one else contacts you.

Use the Edit button to write on the wiki page. The password is read. Hopefully you can help each other find partners for your remaining interested teachers.

Thank you for working with each other to make successful events for your teachers!

TWICE Sessions @ MACUL 2008

The schedule for the TWICE sessions at the MACUL Conference 2008 are posted online now. If you’ll be attending MACUL, please stop by the TWICE room in Gallery Overlook H, Upper Level, DeVos Place and check out the HD videoconferencing provided by Polycom and the interesting sessions we have scheduled! Hope you can join us!

RAP Test Calls and Matches Still Coming

Quicklinks: Read Around the Planet website and CAPspace login.

Communicating with Partners on Test Calls
Kay Hauck posted a great tip as a reply to Jan. 30′s RAP update.

Just a note to tech coordinators: When corresponding to set up test calls (and on all correspondence, for that matter) it is very helpful if you include the last names of the matched teachers in the subject line. Some of us are dealing with 40+ people and it gets a little tricky trying to keep everyone straight.

We had hoped that the number in the subject line of the match email could also be used as a reference point when communicating with your partners. However, some of the match emails went out twice (John Doe and Mary Smith; and Mary Smith and John Doe). Those pairs, while referencing the same pair, have different numbers. So you can try that but it may not work perfectly either. I like to reference the names of both teachers just as a way to keep remembering which one it is!

Leftovers/Unmatched
We’re still not done with the leftover matches. We’re getting close to having a partner for everyone, but haven’t been able to enter them yet so you get emails. So please don’t give up yet and thank you for your patience. We will let you know if we absolutely cannot find a match. If you don’t hear from us, then we are close to having a match. Stay tuned! If you haven’t already, please read the previous posts about the matching process and keep checking the blog!

• Dealing with Leftovers
• Status on Matches
• Imperfect Matches
• RAP Matches Update Jan. 30

Thanks again to everyone who pitches in and makes this project a success!