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Enter the Fortress of Solid Learning
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Jan 2009, Vol 8, Issue 5
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Favorite Study Tips
Happy New Year to fellow educators,
January is typically a time for mid-year exams. We at Castle Learning want to pass along some study tips that have been gathered from my own teaching experience and meeting colleagues in the field over the past 33-plus years. Can I ask you to share my "tips" with your students and have you add your own?
PROF. BILL'S STUDY TIPS for your students to read.
- Develop your own study method and style. Begin with the right mindset-believe in yourself and trust the fact that you have taken good notes and participated in class throughout the year.
- Think about what you've been doing throughout the year to study. Validate your class and homework notes-they are your own words. Use a highlighter and key in on vocabulary because they are the primary focus of questions on most exams. Along the same lines, remember that homework is not to be dreaded. It is actually a great way to study.
- The more you work at homework assignments, not rush through them as a waste of time, and then use the content of homework to participate in your class as 'practice,' you are studying for those end of course tests that other kids worry about. You are already prepared.
- Figure out your best study time. Is it early in the morning, just after breakfast, before bed?
- Figure out a place to study. Is it in your room or that 'quiet room' at the public library?
- Get rid of all distractions. A boyfriend or a girlfriend can be great people, but they aren't taking your test. They need to give you space and respect your study time. Don't sell yourself short. Let's take this suggestion into the 21st century and remove all distracting technology from your midst-there goes the TV, iPod, Zune, cell phone and emails that say "you've got mail,"
- Don't forget to use www.CastleLearning.com. Select a unit, a section and only ten random questions at a particular level of difficulty. Challenge your knowledge and find your weaknesses that require more in-depth study.
- Don't put off until tomorrow what you should have done yesterday! Remember, those who procrastinate probably can't spell it.
- Study with a friend who shares your interest in learning and being successful! Become each other's tutor and try to "teach the test." When you explain something aloud to someone else, you are 'using the content,' and it becomes more and more a part of your very being.
- Remember how important your teacher is in your study life. Take time to discuss your problem areas with your teachers. Their suggestions will be right on the money.
Good luck everyone!
- Professor Bill
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Focus on Spanish and French 
Castle Learning Online courses in Spanish and French provide excellent review in vocabulary, grammar, listening and reading skills in these two popular foreign languages. These courses take a topical approach to developing language skills, similar to many current textbooks and curriculum resources. Topics include greetings, personal information, time, weather and seasons, technology and communications, food, travel, shopping, the arts, popular media, leisure and sports, personal health and safety, daily routines, family celebrations, friends and school, home and chores, nature and the environment, jobs and money, and politics.
Spanish and French are targeted to students ranging from middle school (basic level questions) through high school (intermediate and advanced level questions). The vocabulary and grammar questions support and complement the reading and listening questions. Both short reading selections with a single question and lengthier selections with sets of accompanying questions are available. By integrating all of these levels into a single course, students preparing for higher level examinations will have the opportunity to review topics that might appear on the exams even though they are typically covered in lower grade levels. 
A particularly exciting component of these courses is the listening selections. Students are actually able to play the audio selections
while answering the questions. We strongly recommend that headphones be
available to students working on these courses in a computer lab
setting.
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New Features
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CONSTRUCTED RESPONSE NOW AVAILABLE IN ALL COURSES
In
order to allow teachers to assign Constructed Response assignments
using content from other courses, the Constructed Response activity is now available in all courses.
This new feature allows the teacher to utilize the content in an
assignment for any course. For example, this allows a middle school
English teacher to create a Constructed Response assignment using
constructed response questions from the Elementary English course and
have the assignment categorized as an Intermediate English assignment.
FLASH CARD ASSIGNMENT MAY BE PUBLISHED
Flash Card assignments can be published as Public Assignments, making them available for importing into assignments by other teachers in the school district.
To publish a Flash Card assignment as a Public Assignment:
Go to the Flash Card Assignments page.
Check the assignment to be published.
Select the Public Assignments tab
Click the Publish link.
Follow the instructions for naming the public assignment.
To import questions from a Flash Card Public Assignment into your own Flash Card Assignment:
Go to the Edit Assignment page for your Flash Card assignment
Click the Import Vocabulary link
to view the Import page.
Select a course from the course dropdown list.
Click the Import link for a Flash Card Public Assignment.
Check the desired vocabulary terms, then click the Import Checked Vocabulary button.
DISTRICT SUMMARY REPORT GIVES DISTRICT OVERVIEW
The District Summary Report, found on the Administrator's Reports page, gives the administrator an overview of course usage for the entire district. This report, available only for District Administrators, shows
the number of questions answered per course in each school in the
district. The data can optionally be exported to a spreadsheet program.
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January Mail Bag
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FOR TEACHERS
Inserting Graphics and Images
Question:
I teach math. I need to use special math symbols such as square roots and fractions in my personal content. How do I do this?
Answer:
We are glad to hear that you are making use of some of the more sophisticated features of Castle Learning Online, in particular, Personal Content Sets! The editor in Castle Learning Online's Personal Content Sets allows you to insert graphics or images into the Question, Hint, and Reason areas of Short Answer content, and into the Definition area of Vocabulary content. A predefined Image Gallery contains many symbols commonly used in math and science courses, conveniently divided into categories such as arrows, currency, fractions, geometry symbols, commonly used names of arcs, lines and line segments, and square roots. Some common science symbols are also included.
To insert one of the gallery images into a personal content set editing area, use the Insert/Edit Image command. Here's how:
- On the Personal Content Sets editing toolbar, click Insert/Edit Image (the icon looks like a picture of mountains and a sunset).
- Click Browse Server in the Image Properties pop-up window.
- Click on the category name in the Image Gallery window to display the available images.
- Click on the image's name.
- In the Image Properties window, adjust any other properties such as the alignment.
- Click OK when you're done. The image now appears at the cursor in the appropriate editing area.
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Image Gallery
Question:
How can I create and insert my own equations and formulas into my personal content sets?
Answer:
The Personal Content Set editor contains a gallery of predefined images that you can insert into the Question, Hint, and Reason areas of Short Answer content, and into the Definition area of Vocabulary content. However, the PCS editor also allows you to upload your own images into the Image Gallery.
Microsoft's Equation Editor and Design Science's more comprehensive MathType are two common plug-ins to Microsoft Word that math and science teachers use to create equation graphics. Equations created in Equation Editor or MathType may be saved as graphics, which can then be uploaded and inserted into Personal Content Sets.
Remember, when you are editing personal content, you are essentially building a web page that will display your question or vocabulary term. Web page content consists of instructions in HTML (hypertext markup language). HTML requires that all graphics be uploaded as separate image files, so you cannot simply copy a graphic and paste it into an editing area. Each graphic must be named, saved and uploaded.
The following steps show how to create and insert an equation graphic using MathType, but the interface for Equation Editor is similar. These directions assume that you have already created a Personal Content Set in Castle Learning Online and have opened an editing area.
- Create the equation in MathType by launching from Word or as a standalone application.
- From the MathType File menu, select Save Copy As.
- In the Save As dialog window, select Graphics Interchange Formula (*.gif) from the Save As Type drop-down menu.
- Give the equation an appropriate name and click Save to save the equation as a graphic locally on your hard drive.
- Close the MathType window and go back to Castle Learning Online's Personal Content Set editor.
- Set the cursor to the place where you want to insert the equation in the Question, Hint, or Reason area of a short-answer item (or in the Definition area of a vocabulary term).
- On the Personal Content Sets editing toolbar, click Insert/Edit Image
- Click Browse Server in the Image Properties pop-up window.
- Click Your Images in the Image Gallery window.
- Click Upload Image Files.
- Use Browse to locate the saved equation graphic on your hard drive.
- Select the desired graphic and click Open in the File Upload dialog window.
- Click Upload.
- Close the File Upload dialog window after the file has been uploaded. The Image Gallery page refreshes and now shows your newly uploaded equation graphic.
- Click on the graphic file's name. Castle Learning Online returns you to the Image Properties window.
- Adjust any other properties such as the alignment.
- Click OK when you're done. You will now see the equation at the cursor in the appropriate editing area.
This method may sound complicated, but after walking through the steps a few times, you should become more comfortable with the process. The Online Help is also available for assistance.
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A Great Way to Integrate the Smart Board
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Tina
Ramos, a New York City ELA Teacher, has come up with a unique way to
review for the ELA Exam using Castle Learning and the smart board as
part of her "Do Now" activity on a regular basis.
Ms.
Ramos assigns a "Set of Critical Lens Quote Questions" to herself from
the Castle Learning database. When the students arrive to class, the
"Critical Lens Quote Question" of the day is displayed on the smart
board. The students independently write an explanation of the quote.
Ms. Ramos also has the students agree or disagree with the quote and
select two pieces of literature they would use to prove their
explanation of the quote. (These are three tasks required in the
fourth essay of the high school ELA exam)
After the students have independently worked with the Quote, Ms Ramos selects four students.
Student 1: The first student takes one of the smart board pens and restates the quote. (including the information from the quote)
Student 2:
The second student uses a different colored smart board pen and
explains the quote in his/her own words. Once the student has written
his/her version of the quote, the student answers the question on
Castle Learning. Ms. Ramos is then able to pull the feedback from
Castle Learning into the class discussion of the critical lens quote.
Student 3: The third student takes another smart board pen and agrees or disagrees with the quote.
Student 4: The fourth student then adds two pieces of literature that would appropriately explain the critical lens quote.
Ms.
Ramos saves the answers from each class on the smart board. Later in
the week she displays the answers from all classes to compare and spark
discussion. This is a great way to integrate Castle Learning Online
and the Smart Board. It's also a quick and easy way to integrate ELA
REGENTS Review into the classroom on a regular basis.
-Contributed by Meghan Farrelly
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See you
Soon |
The Castle Learning Online team will be at these conferences. Hope to see you there.
January
Nassau County Mathematics Teachers Association
NYS Council of School Superintendents
February
Pennsylvania Educational Technology
Drop by our conference booth. We look foward to meeting you!
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Contact Information
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Castle Software, Inc., 626 Layport Dr., Ste. 100, Sebastian, FL 32958
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![snow and students](images-8-5/27.jpg?a=1102384015446")