To my surprise, I have really enjoyed my RSS reader. It makes it really easy to keep track of the most interesting articles that are on the sites that I am monitoring. I am getting really adept at skimming and scanning the feeds and picking out only the items that I think will be worth my time reading. I found several things of interest in the past few days. I read about a book recommendation engine that seemed to be quite useful to find books that I will enjoy for school and entertainment. I also found a tool that will take out all the ads and clutter around a YouTube video so that you can safely view it in the classroom. The site is View Pure. It is well worth the visit to this site.
Another site that I think my college students will be able to use is NOOKstudy which gives them online access to over 500,000 textbooks and will allow them to write in study notes etc.. I have already found many useful tools from the readers. I'll keep on reading.......
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Thing #21 Google APPs
I created alerts for news articles concerning Texas Education and Mesquite ISD. I think that it will help me keep up with the news about what is happening in education in my city and state. I think that it will prove beneficial in helping me stay in touch with the education community and concerns that I might have with what is happening that might impact me and my classroom.
Staying organized is always a challenge. I am the events keeper in my household and if we miss or are late for an important event, all fingers point in my direction. I am the one that makes sure that our family stays on track. I think that the Google calendar will assist me with the goal of making every event for my daughter's senior year. I began the calendar and feel that I will use it frequently because it will send me an email reminder that I have an event that I want to attend (or am required to attend). This tool will be extremely useful.
Staying organized is always a challenge. I am the events keeper in my household and if we miss or are late for an important event, all fingers point in my direction. I am the one that makes sure that our family stays on track. I think that the Google calendar will assist me with the goal of making every event for my daughter's senior year. I began the calendar and feel that I will use it frequently because it will send me an email reminder that I have an event that I want to attend (or am required to attend). This tool will be extremely useful.
Thing #20 Google Docs
I created a document for the beginning of the school year and sent it to collaborate with a colleague. Google Docs will be great for sharing documents with the grade level without having to print and send it to each one on the team. Each teacher will be able to look at the document and correct errors and then let me know that they had proofread the notice. It will be very convenient for that use. Occasionally we have letters or forms that have to be sent out in a short space of time and google docs will give us an advantage in getting it printed and out to the parents in a timely fashion.
I uploaded a spreadsheet and a powerpoint. The spreadsheet was easy and quick. It will be easy to access it from school and home without having to carry a flashdrive or hard copies of the document. However, I think that the Powerpoint feature would be very difficult to use. I uploaded one of the Powerpoints that I had already created on my computer and it would not let me show it from google. I had to download it to the computer to get it to play. The templates for Power point presentations would be hard to use. There were so many of them to choose from. I would have to know exactly how I wanted it to look before I even began to search for a format for my presentation. There was also not much storage space before I would have to ask for more storage. I think that for presentations that a flash drive or an external hard drive would be more efficient.
I uploaded a spreadsheet and a powerpoint. The spreadsheet was easy and quick. It will be easy to access it from school and home without having to carry a flashdrive or hard copies of the document. However, I think that the Powerpoint feature would be very difficult to use. I uploaded one of the Powerpoints that I had already created on my computer and it would not let me show it from google. I had to download it to the computer to get it to play. The templates for Power point presentations would be hard to use. There were so many of them to choose from. I would have to know exactly how I wanted it to look before I even began to search for a format for my presentation. There was also not much storage space before I would have to ask for more storage. I think that for presentations that a flash drive or an external hard drive would be more efficient.
Thing #19 Voicethreads
I really like the way that Voicethreads give students the option of adding their pictures and comments to the slides. It will be interesting to see how the students respond to posting their comments about a book that they have read. Is it possible to have them post their comments, but have it remain private? Privacy issues are a main point in determining if something is appropriate for use in the classroom. We now send home a release form at the beginning of the school year to have the students and parents give permission for their artwork to be displayed on the internet. I was impressed with one voice thread about The Series of Unfortunate Events: The Bad Beginning. The students gave their impressions of the book and what they thought of the characters and even mentioned how many books were in the series. It would be a good class project to do something like this in my classroom.
Thing #18 YouTube
I spent way too much time enjoying these videos. I found so many videos to teach content in a way that my students will enjoy. I have to say that this is one of the best things that I have found in this class. I will be using YouTube and TeacherTube often to get across to my students key points that they need to know. I found some kind of amusing or eye-catching video for many of the boring things that my students seem to struggle with. For example, how interesting can you make the Preamble to the Constitution? Well, it is very dry and boring stuff with little meaning to a 5th grader, but I found an amusing video from Andy Griffith that I think will spark their interest.
Also, I found a main idea song to help my students remember the point. I even found a series of videos on how to play the piano. How amazing is that?? In a world filled with movies, video games and high tech gadget; these sites will help me gain and retain interest in what I am trying to teach.
Also, I found a main idea song to help my students remember the point. I even found a series of videos on how to play the piano. How amazing is that?? In a world filled with movies, video games and high tech gadget; these sites will help me gain and retain interest in what I am trying to teach.
Thing # 17 Podcasts
I have used podcast in my classroom for several years now. I have had the students create their own podcast and they have posted it on my classroom blog. The students really enjoy this activity. I have them create/read a script or report and then I post them for us to enjoy. I have used podcast for messages/reading to my Special Ed students who need extra support by having things read to them. Podcasting is a very useful tool in the classroom. I looked at the Webster Dictionary podcasts and subscribed to the elementary word feed for the word of the day. I will be using this at the beginning of Language Arts class to introduce the students to new words and have them expand their vocabulary. I also looked at the History site and enjoyed listening to information about the true story of Pocahontas. I can see that these podcasts would be very interesting for teaching US History. Great sites to use and implement to address different styles of learners.
Monday, July 12, 2010
Thing #16 Library Thing
The library was a great site for finding books to read. Whether for the classroom or for pleasure, the library thing can help you find a book that you will enjoy. I think that it would be a useful tool to use to enter and categorize all the books that I have in my classroom library. As I unpack them this fall, I could enter them online and have a resource at my fingertips to help the students locate a book that they would enjoy reading in the classroom. It would also help me with my guided reading books. I could categorize the books by reading level and number of copies in order to easily assign books to individual student to read and report on. I think it would be useful on a personal level to keep track of the books that I personally have and to know where the books are if I have loaned them out. I think that it was a good experience to look at this site.
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