What Happened to April?

Wow. I lost a whole month!

Usually in April I am blogging about the International Reading Association's annual conference, and how ReadWriteThink is hosting sessions there. And where I'll be so you can come see me.

Alas, I failed. We went to San Antonio, we spoke to the teachers, we had an in-person team meeting. And I got a cowboy hat. And Becky laughed at me.

Here's a way to show this in a graphic representation:

I'm not the only one who fits in the center, though.

Whoa! Look at that! A Venn diagram!

Yes, that's right, after talking about it for a few months now, we have our new Venn Diagram interactive live on the site.

The iPad and Android versions are in production and (fingers crossed!) will be out by the end of May, maybe June.

We have a list of our interactives we are trying to turn in to apps for tablets (to avoid the whole Flash-does-not-run-on-iOS-systems issue) as well as list of interactives to be updated with the work saver. I'll get into more detail with those once we have deadlines and designer approval for our ideas and workplan.

If it all comes together, it will be very exciting.

Next time, I'm going to go in to our summer plans for this year. It's pretty cool, and we are very excited by the partnership we were able to strike up for this project.

But for now, all you get--other than the handy link to the new Venn Diagram interactive--is a picture of me photo-bombing some poor conference attendees. Don't worry, they totally got another picture without me in it.

Wes

Welcome to 2013

Welcome to 2013! We've been here a while now, but still, welcome.

Here at the RWT collective (since we don't have a specific headquarters), we are trying to sort out the year's projects. We have a lot of cool stuff in the works, but its always a puzzle to figure out what we will work on and what might not make it.

For instance, we recently had a survey about making a mobile version of the site. The survey was pretty informative and, I think, will help us make improvements to the main site--but it wasn't overall convincing that we should do the remote site. At least not yet.

Instead, we're going to try to make more of our interactives mobile friendly. That seems to be the direction we need to go.

That's a change we hadn't anticipated at the beginning of the year.

Other times, things just pop up unexpected. Just today, I got asked if I would like to attend the SoMIRAC Conference in Maryland in April--not just attend, but to do a session. Pretty cool getting the request, but it adds something on to my list of projects, and it's right before the IRA annual convention. Time Crunch!

I'm also on interactive/app duty (whichever direction we decide to go), which means coming up with an idea and writing specs.

Anyone out there have any ideas for me?

Next week, I'm going to go more into what sort of content and lessons we are seeking to add to the site to help bulk up some areas we see need improvement...or I'll get someone else to do it. I keep saying this is a joint blag thing, and then doing all the blogging myself.

Wes

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

The Scoop From IRA

September is right around the corner: Back-to-School Time.

There's a lot going on at IRA this time of year, too.

We have the September issues of The Reading Teacher and the Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy coming out after the summer hiatus. The Reading Teacher just went through a complete redesign and has a new academic editorial team, Diane Barone and Marla Mallette. I haven't seen the proofs (hmmmm...maybe I'll go snooping through the publication servers and see if the pdfs are up...), but what I have seen looks pretty neat.

The new Reading Today is getting launched in September. The team has been crazy-busy with that endeavor, and it looks great! I'm excited to get my hands on the final copy. The website should be going live September 6th at www.reading.org/readingtoday. How's that for a little insider scoop? If you click that link before Sept 6th, you will see a Reading Today site, but it isn't the new Reading Today site, so make sure to check back.

On the ReadWriteThink end, we do try to set up some Back-to-School events or lessons or something, but being a website, we're always updating and uploading and improving the site. Summer's not too different then the rest of the year.

Back-to-School time is also IRA Convention time.

Now for the conventions group here at IRA, it is always convention time. It's a lot of work planning out an event that big, getting presenters in order, figuring out keynote speakers, arranging all the events, planning the travel and housing arrangements, working with exhibitors and the convention center. WHEW! I get tired just thinking about it.

But right around this time every year is when convention stuff starts to materialize in other places around IRA. For instance, the new convention website just launched. Very exciting! And if you want a walk-through for the site, we have you covered in the first episode of Convention Insider--where you can get all the inside scoops to IRA's 57th annual convention in Chicago (April 29 - May 2). Convention Insider will be a monthly video episode to give you all the inside information about Convention 2012.

ReadWriteThink has it's own convention projects as well. Not only do we have meetings with out advisory board and our NCTE partners, we try to meet up with some of our contributors and host our own sessions at convention. At the 2011 convention in Orlando, we had two sessions: Globetrotting With Blogs and STEM Poetry. I've heard a lot of good feedback about our sessions so far. If you were there, feel free to drop a comment right here and let us know what you thought.

If you missed out on either session, either because you didn't make it to Orlando or just didn't make it to our session, that's  just fine. We are putting them up online for you! STEM Poetry is up as of right now, and the Globetrotting With Blogs will be up this week, I think.

You will also be able to read more about Globetrotting With Blogs in the new Reading Today when it comes out next week. Our presenters, Laurie Henry and Lisa Zawilinski, have an article in the upcoming issue.

I think that will do it for this bit of blogging. A look into what's new and what's coming up in the new few weeks from IRA.

This is Wes Ford, your IRA (and Convention) Insider--I'll see you next time!

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