BaslerCast has closed…

I started using this WordPress powered blog with my classes in 2009. At the time, it was one of the best platforms for a class website that allowed students to publish. However, new education specific tools have emerged in the past few years that simply work better for the classroom. This blog is now retired.

Connect with me in Edmodo at: http://aasd.edmodo.com/basler.

Follow all of my work here.

What is this?

As the tag line says, it’s “science class when you’re not in class.”

Ultimately this site is intended to be a community. Like most communities, I anticipate that this one will evolve and grow stronger because of the contributions and ideas generated by its members. It is a place for me to share things with students and parents but it is also a place for students to create their own content and discuss science topics with their classmates.

What’s with the name?

I started a website for my science classes on August 20th, 1998. It was not-so-cleverly titled “Mr. Basler’s Homepage.” At that time there were few classroom websites. However, I was fresh out of college and I thought I’d put my webpage design skills to work for my students.

In 2006, I started a podcast, titled “BaslerCast,”  which provided physics tutorials for my students. The name, only slightly more original than the previous, proved to be valuable in one important way- it was easy to find in search engines such as Google. Because of this, I decided in 2009 to make it the name for my entire classroom website.

Who is Mr. Basler?

I taught science for the Appleton Area School District from 1998 to 2012. In the early summer of 2012, I stepped away from teaching science to take on my current full-time position as Technology Curriculum Integration Specialist for the Appleton Area School District. You can find a more complete biography here.