Monday, June 17, 2013

Reflecting on my Technology Journey

What a year it has been! My goal when starting out on this journey was to learn about the different web tools out there and how to use them with my students. Throughout the year, my focus shifted to how to use the technology to improve my students learning and not just for fun. While technology certainly is fun and exciting for the kids, I really tried to focus and understand WHY it would be better to use a certain tool instead of a traditional method. There was a lot of reflecting in my work this year. Another aspect that changed my teaching this year was Twitter. Twitter opened my eyes to a community of professionals who are out here, sharing their work and views with the world. They are inspiring. I have learned so much from following great educators on Twitter. For my final project, I put together a presentation for the staff at my school to show them what I did, what is out there, and what they can do to start to integrate technology in a meaningful way. My school has given me some weekly hours next year to work with teachers from my school who are interested in learning how. I am looking forward to it and to continuing my own professional development in this area. Good teachers know that they always have more to learn!

Monday, March 11, 2013

Wordle


I love wordle (www.wordle.net)! You simply copy and paste in your text and it creates an amazing word design.I tried it out with my students today. We are working on a biography unit and learning how to summarize information. We worked on a class summary and then we put it in Wordle! The kids were amazed when they saw which words came out bolder than others and we had a great discussion about which other words we felt should be bigger to represent more of Robert Munch's life. My kids are going to do a wordle activity next week for a biography that they have read independently. Here's a link to our class' Robert Munch Wordle.
http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/6472209/Munch

Saturday, February 23, 2013

And the best free web tool award goes too....

I just watched an wonderful session form ISTE 2011 on the the best free web tools in the different categories. Having spent the past six months learning about different web tools, I was amazed by how much I still have to learn! The presenter showed examples of what he feels are the best in each category. For example, the best search tool for kids went to Searchy Pants, the best social web tool went to Schoology. This session was informative and entertaining as well. He even had an "in memoriam" segment for web tools that no longer exist. I was excited to try Jaycut, a video editing site that he recommended, but it no longer exists. I'm excited about Capzles, a timeline site, that I'm going to try with my students when we are studying biographies. Goanimate also looks amazing for creating animations. He also gave us a link to his website which also looks great. It is a free site to explore and offers a ton of great resources for teachers (www.edutecher.net). I have a list of new things to explore! It was well worth the hour I spent watching this session!
http://www.isteconference.org/ISTE/2011/program/search_results_details.php?sessionid=60632303&selection_id=82537289&rownumber=4&max=54&gopage=

Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Why Wiki?

One of my goal's out of my Ed Tech course, was to try to get a better understanding of the differences between, wikis, websites, blogs etc. They all seemed to do the same thing! While I still notice that many of their purposes overlap, the shared editing aspect of the wiki is fascinating to me! I tried using a Wiki for the first time with my third graders and it was a huge success! I wish I could have taken a picture of their faces when I taught them how to use the wiki. They were so excited! Later on when I had them write a reflection about the assignment, that was their favorite part. They loved that they could access it at home, show it to their parents, see the other ideas of the children in their group, and build on those ideas. It was very motivating for them and really pushed them to put their best ideas forward.
Looking through lists of Educational wikis available, I feel like I can get lost forever into researching them! I am amazed by the amount of materials out there and by the generosity of teachers and coordinators who share their ideas with the world! I'm looking forward to the exploration!

Sunday, February 3, 2013

Visual Tools

Visual tools were always something that intimidated me. I always loved the idea of creating digital stories or videos with my classes but it seemed like too much to take on considering the young ages of my students. I just imagined that I would end up doing all the work. This week, while trying to look through all the resources in my text book on Visual Tools, I came across Animoto. Since you can make a 30 second video for free, I decided to try it. It was so easy and so much fun! I made a short video of pictures of my first graders on Teddy Bear day.
Since then, my mind has been racing with ideas on how to use the technology with my students for more than just displaying pictures of them (although I'm sure the parents will love it when I link it to my class blog). Next week I am starting a new Unit on Biographies with my third graders. I think they would LOVE to make short videos with captions of someone that they read about! I'm looking forward to trying it with them. Again, I have to acknowledge the wonderful teachers and coordinators who are part of my Ed Tech class for their inspiring work and ideas. I am learning so much from all of them.
http://animoto.com/play/GoDowz01Z8LBsvj2TD7krA

Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Social Media

Ok, I'll say it. I love Facebook. I have been on Facebook for quite a few years now and I love how it reconnected me with friends and acquaintances from so  many years ago. I love seeing the pictures of their families, sharing in their Simchas and their lives even from a distance. I love posting pictures of my own family, my sons' bar-mitzvah pictures and some of my own special family memories. I love the different groups I have been a part of. Sometimes I hear news from Facebook even before I hear it on CNN! I love the little jokes that are posted and hearing so many great stories from people.
What's new to me though, is using Facebook for advancing my professional development. I created a k-3 Technology group and have already had people asked to join. I started searching educational pages and was surprised by how many were already on Facebook. Someone in my Ed Tech course started a group for us on Edmodo and I think it was an amazing idea and a great way for us to share our ideas and our professional resources. It's been very enlightening to use social media sites for professional communication.

Sunday, January 20, 2013

Productivity Tools

I am slightly overwhelmed by the amount of productivity tools that I was exposed to in this week's lesson. I feel like it will take me weeks to really go through all of them and see how I can use them effectively. I've been told that using Google Docs is a great way to always have access to your documents. As a person who has always used Microsoft Word, I was reluctant to make the change. The arguments make sense: always have access to documents, don't have to worry about saving on a usb, able to collaborate on one document etc. Today someone in my group posted about Google Cloud Connect, and he absolutely made my day! Google Cloud Connect allows me to continue to use Word and then sync my document into Google Docs. I feel like I have to best of both worlds now. I can continue using Word and still have all the advantages of Google Docs. I am very grateful to the amazing educators that I am learning with in this Ed Tech course.

Saturday, January 12, 2013


When  I first started thinking about this week’s lesson, using podcasts and vodcasts in the classroom, I guess I was thinking about it more as a teaching tool to use with my students and not as much as an instrument for learning. I imagined myself making vodcasts to attach to my websites. I thought about videotaping myself teaching a certain math concept that my students could refer to if they were studying or having difficulty with a concept. I thought I could also find vodcasts online that I could send them to if they wanted to learn something. This week, while researching for this assignment, I came across some great podcasts done by first and second grade students. I was listening to them read their stories online and I began to think differently about podcasts and their uses. What a great way to practice reading and improve fluency for young readers! As a first and third grade teacher, I’m always trying to find ways to use technology with my students that is grade appropriate. During this course, I often started out the weeks thinking my kids are too young to use this technology. But the more that I research and look what others from this course are doing, the more uses I find for my little ones.  I am looking forward to seeing what everyone else is doing with vodcasts and podcasts. 

Saturday, January 5, 2013

Twitter in the Younger Grades?

This week I was reading about microblogging and Twitter in particular. While I had a Twitter account from a year ago or so, I never accessed it. I only signed up to see what my teenage sons were talking about. Now that I've had to revisit Twitter for my Ed Tech course, I'm seeing it in a new way. I guess I never realized that there was more to Twitter than following Oprah! Our assignment for the week was to come up with a Twitter lesson plan that is relevant to what we teach. Being a first and third grade teacher, I was stumped on how I could possibly use it with my students. I decided to aim for a lesson with my third graders as I thought I would have more success. As I was searching on google for inspiration, I was quite surprised by the amount of blogs out there with ideas for using Twitter in the class. Although, most of them were geared to higher levels than I teach. For the younger grades, Twitter seemed to be used more as a communication tool with parents. I use a blog for that so I didn't feel that would be useful for me. I didn't want my third graders using Twitter for personal information so I decided to have them created fictional Twitter accounts for biographical figures that they were reading and "Tweet" from their character's point of view. I hope it's a lesson that I will be able to try, as I'm going to have to speak to administration as well as the parents on their feelings about using Twitter with 8 and 9 year olds. I would be curious if anyone had any experience they could share about using Twitter with younger students.