Essay checklists for final drafts are crucial for learners to confirm all the elements the teacher requires are present in their work before submitting it. I give my students a short list right on the submission page in my online course as a reminder. It isn’t a comprehensive composition list; it’s more of a last-minute, …
Author Archives: WPAdminSunila
The Community Value of Indie Bookstores
My town’s beloved children’s bookstore, the Magic Tree Bookstore, is closing at the end of October due to low customer turnout over the last few years. I am very sad to see our village treasure disappear. I’ve bought several of my nieces’ and nephews’ birthday gifts from this store, and I’ve always enjoyed browsing the …
Julia Alvarez – Poetry Reading
Last week, my husband and I had the pleasure of seeing poet and novelist Julia Alvarez read some of her work at Dominican University’s Caesar and Patricia Tabet Poetry Reading, a wonderful annual event for students and staff and a generous gift for the surrounding community. Her poems reflect her life and emotions about growing …
Children’s Lit Scholarships/Grants for Writers and Illustrators – Upcoming Deadlines
Deadlines are approaching for some cool scholarships for writers and illustrators. The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) offers annual Work-In-Progress (WIP) Awards to help writers and illustrators in the publication of a specific work that’s currently not under contract. The deadline for the 2018 submission is March 31, 2018. You must be a …
Create Flashcards and Other Study Tools with Quizlet
Quizlet is a useful edtech tool for creating self-checks. Teachers and students can create sets of cards that the user can then turn into different study modes: flashcards, matching, fill-in, spelling, and even a planet-attacking asteroid game (which is actually pretty fun). I just created my first Quizlet sets; the site was very easy to …
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Press-optimized Images and Web-friendly Images — Some Industry Terms
Anyone working in both print world and web world knows the frustrations of the designers they work with. Preparing images for print or web can involve many steps. Admittedly, I’ve found preparing files for print to be a lot more complicated than for web. That said, once you understand why image settings have to be set up a …
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The Swing (1913) by Robert Louis Stevenson
Right behind our house there’s a pretty park, and during warmer days, my husband and I can hear kids laughing and playing (which are the best sounds of summer, really). It always reminds me of this sweet old poem: The Swing HOW do you like to go up in a swing, Up in the air …
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Using Free Images with Restrictions and Public Domain Images
Millions of free images are available online for anyone to use. Many are in the public domain; many are not. “Free images” are not the same thing as public domain images; they’re usually not free from stipulations. For example, images may be bound by various Creative Commons licensing conditions. Organizations or individuals who post images …
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Public Domain Images Collections
Finding free, high-quality historical public domain photographs or illustrations for personal, educational, or nonprofit use can be daunting. Editors, instructional designers, and teachers know all too well the copyright issues and costs associated with using images in materials. However, over the past decade acquiring images has become a lot easier as organizations have been making …
Use Tackk to Create Web Pages Quickly
Next week, my Purdue advisor, Dr. Staci Trekles, my colleague Kathleen Gordon, and I will be presenting at the 12th Annual SLATE conference in Naperville, Illinois, October 22, 2014. The SLATE conference is an annual learning and technology conference for educators and trainers integrating various technologies with both F2F and online courses. To create an announcement for …