Halloween, Hurricanes, and Las Vegas!

The Delaware-based side of ReadWriteThink faired the recent Sandy storm well. We look around at the destruction that just missed us to the north, and our thought go out to those who were hit hard my the hurricane.

Halloween has now come and gone, and with it, my sugar rush.

And that moves us closer to NCTE's convention in Las Vegas next week! Whoa! I've never been to Las Vegas before, so this is really exciting for me. I not only get to represent IRA, meet with the NCTE team, and have a fabulous and productive dinner with the RWT Advisory Board, but I get to see Vegas! AWESOME!

OK, business. What have we been up to here?

Word Mover (which I have mentioned before) is now out on iTunes! It's free and it's fun, so download it, create some poems, and share them with us.

This week had us preparing a webinar presented by Doug Buehl, one of IRA's authors (DevelopingReaders in the Academic Disciplines and ClassroomStrategies for Interactive Learning). More information about the webinar can be found here.

I've had several chance to meet Doug over the years I've worked at IRA. He's a great speak, very interesting, and I think pretty funny. He's got a great whit. He's also very knowledgeable.

We're still very focused on what the next big thing for ReadWriteThink will be. We are pondering a mobile-friendly version of the site, but we need some feedback. Is it even a good idea? If so, what areas should be mobile friendly? How do we best present information in the mobile format?

We'll have a survey coming out to better help us decide how users will use the information. I hope to have some more info after the group meeting and advisory board dinner in Vegas.

Hmmm? What was that? How did the 5k race go?

Thanks for asking! It went horribly! It was my worst 5k time ever--I'm blaming the 15lbs of gear I had on as part of my costume.

Wes

Mobile, Mobile, Mobile

Guess what the topic of this post is about?

"Gee, maybe how you can't even keep up with an every-other-week posting schedule?"

....... No.

"Really, Wes? Really?"

...... Sorry.

It's about mobile technology!

First, I'm going to wow you with a couple links to a couple blog posts that are all kinds of awesome. A huge Thank You to Julie Ramsay who featured the Trading Card app as part of her post in her blog over the weekend. And even bigger THANK YOU (yes, I actually made it bigger) to her students, who used the Trading Card app in class and then posted about it in their class blog! They included their samples, which was really awesome, being able to see students using something I worked on.

Second, the Android version is nearly in our hands for testing. I'm going to guess that is still a couple weeks at least before it is downloadable.

Third, Word Mover went through beta with flying colors and is well on its way to being out there. I did a poem or two for testing. I suppose I can share one of the masterpieces.

The assignment was to right a poem about a book. I picked my favorite, Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

Does it make sense even if you've read the book Neverwhere? Maybe. But it was a fun exercise, using the limited words to try to write about the book!

Fourth, RedWriteThink is investigating making a mobile site, an abbreviated, mobile-optimized version to make browsing on a phone or tablet much easier, faster, and cheaper on your data plan. This idea is only just being to be floated around the ground, and we have a lot of research to do about what sort of content to put on it, how will it look, and even is this something teachers want?

Which is why I'm writing about it here--is this something you might want? Do you browse for lessons and classroom ideas on a mobile device? Would you if it was made easier and faster? Or is this something that will likely remain a desktop job for a while longer and making new apps and interactives would be a better use of our time?

We want to know what you want! How else would we know what to get you?*

Fifth, I have another 5k run coming up this weekend. I did one earlier in the month, and am looking to beat my previous time (and this time I'm running with friends; the hope is to beat all of them, too!). It's also a costume run. Fun fun! I'll update next time with pictures from that.

Wes

*This argument never flies with my wife when it is gift-giving time. She insists that I should be able to figure something out on my own. Apparently the surprise is part of the fun. I'd rather know I was getting something I wanted than be surprised by something I didn't.

And We're Back!

Minor computer issues have prevented me from updating this before now.

Last time, I think I mentioned my up-coming 5K run. It went well--better than expected even--and I have since done a second 5K which went even better. I'm thinking there might be a third in my future, some time in November perhaps.

What's going on in the IRA offices?

This week, we did a shoot for the next Convention Insider, due out in November. I dropped in on another coworker to ask who she wanted to celebrate as a educator during IRA's Celebrating Teaching initiative for the 2012 convention.

I was also at the Diamond State Reading Associating (DSRA) conference a few weeks back to promote IRA, ReadWriteThink.org, and Thinkfinity (who sponsors ReadWriteThink through grants). I find it fun to get out to the smaller, local conferences and meet with teachers, our users, to see what they like about the site and what theyw ould like to see.

I was surprised by the number of teachers who said they loved and used ReadWriteThink but that they didn't know some of our interactives had a save capability. Why, yes! Yes, they do!

Acrostic Poems
Letter Generator
Essay Map
Persuasion Map
Compare and Contrast Map
Diamante Poem
Resume Generator
Puzzle Me Words

We're still rolling it out on other interactives as the time goes on.

We are also working on what  we want to be working on next year. (Follow that?) So if you have any suggestions for us, let me know!

That's it for now. I'll try to find out something really interesting for new week!

Wes

5Ks, Conventions, Resumes, and Small-Group Reading Instruction

So my last post was a "September is right around the corner" post. Jeez, was that really 4 weeks ago? Feels like less, and I didn't even have vacation in there!

OK, so now October is right around the corner. Teachers and students are kind of in their groove. The first issues of The Reading Teacher and JAAL are out. The first Reading Today was sent (and it does look good!). The IRA Convention webpage is up and running. Did you check out the Convention Insider? You should. <wink, wink>

So what's up around IRA for next month?

Well, first off, I'm going to tell you about what I'm up to. Oct 1 I'm running a 5K. It's not my first 5K, but it's over a really large bridge, so likely it will be my hardest 5K.

See the big bridge? Over that!

What does that have to do with IRA? Well, nothing, but it is my blog, so I thought I would mention it,

In other news, I will be at the Diamond State Reading Association conference in Dover, DE, on Oct 7th. I'll be there to talk about ReadWriteThink.org and IRA. I enjoy it because it gives me a chance to interact with local teachers on an one-to-one basis, and I like supporting the state affiliates. I'd love to go to more! (I'm sure I can be booked for state affiliate conferences in some way or another, if you really want me there.)

What else have we got coming in October? Our Resume Generator will be live by then. The second new interactive, Puzzle Me Words, will be live, we think. I suppose I could link to the current, beta-version here in the this blog. Sure, why not? I doubt my boss will read this. Here is the link to the beta-version of Puzzle Me Words, a word-sound game for very young students.

It's not finished yet; we still have some bugs we are working on and some improvements, but if you want to play around with it and let us know what you think, enjoy!

The Interactive K-W-L Chart Creator is in early testing, but it looks good so far. I'll share a link to that when it's a bit further along.

As for IRA, we have a new book publishing in October: Small-Group Reading Instruction by Beverly B. Tyner and Sharon E. Green. Beverly I've had the pleasure of meeting on a few occasions--she's talked a few times at the IRA Marketplace at convensions. I don't think I've had the pleasure of meeting Sharon.

And that is pretty much that for now! I'll see about scoping some new info out in Oct for you for my next update...and I won't be delayed a whole month to get the info to you!

Wes