The past week my friend from New Zealand and I have been getting everything ready for our students to begin their online penpal experience. We set up accounts for each of our students on kidblog.org and put our students into groups of 2 or 3. We thought this would make the conversations be more realistic and personable. Additionally, we decided that we were going to focus on economically friendly schools as a discussion topic for our students. Their school in New Zealand is an Eco-friendly school and they go above and beyond to be green. I don't know a whole lot about what they do at their school, but I am anxious to learn. I have talked with my class about the topic, vaguely, and asked them to brainstorm ways that our school is eco-friendly. Additionally, I told my students that throughout these discussions I want them to be thinking about a school-wide project our school can implement to help our school in North Carolina become an eco-friendly school.
Today I checked the blog and saw that my friend's class has made their first posts. My students will go to the computer lab tomorrow, read, and respond. I am so anxious to hear the reactions from my students when they see the words "rubish" (trash), "mum" (mom) and "nude foods" (foods with no wrappers). The whole language diversity/similarity is going to be a new learning experience in itself. This is my first penpal experience with another class, let alone another class across the world. I am anxious to see what comes from this experience!
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Preparing our students for the future
This week a couple of co-workers and I gave a presentation on using I-pads in the classroom and proposed that we make our goal to get each teacher in the school one to use in their classroom. We have such a wonderful and supportive PTA that they agreed to buy 10 right now and work on getting the rest of the teachers one in the upcoming months/years. This is similar to what our school did for SmartBoards and now we are lucky that every teacher in the school has a SmartBoard in our room. How amazing will it be when each classroom also has at least one, if not more, I-pads to use for instruction?
Throughout my presentation I couldn't help but think about The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman. In Friedman's book he discusses how China and other countries around the world are getting ahead of the US. We are not producing enough engineers, scientists, and critical/creative thinkers, which is putting us way behind. Many times the focus of such technologies are used mostly for intervention, which I think is great because they are great motivational tools and there are a plethora of applications that adhere to that group. My focus for my presentation wasn't just intervention, I focused on finding apps that stimulate the mind of our "average" and "gifted" students. As teachers it is important that we don't forget these students because these days, "good" isn't good enough. We have to be the best.
A couple of the apps that I suggested for higher level thinking are:
(1) Crossfingers: Crossfingers is a free app that challenges students to use tangram pieces to figure out a puzzle. The levels are actually very challenging, even for me as an adult. I put about 4-5 students in a small group and allow them to take turns trying to figure out the puzzle. Their teamwork and problem-solving skills continue to get better and better. They watch and learn from each other, but they also learn from their own experiences with the game.
(2) PuppetPals: This is another app. There is a free version but there is a cheap version that allows students to take pictures of themselves, characters from another book, different settings, and cut out what they want to use in their play. Some of my higher level students wrote a script for a book they were reading and created a puppet show summarizing the book. This incorporated so many different skills and objectives, and presented the students an authentic way to be creative and show their understanding of our curriculum.
The applications for the I-pad in the classroom are endless. My hope is that one day we become a one-to-one school.
Check out this school that has I-pads for each student:
Unlocking Literacy with I-Pads
Throughout my presentation I couldn't help but think about The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman. In Friedman's book he discusses how China and other countries around the world are getting ahead of the US. We are not producing enough engineers, scientists, and critical/creative thinkers, which is putting us way behind. Many times the focus of such technologies are used mostly for intervention, which I think is great because they are great motivational tools and there are a plethora of applications that adhere to that group. My focus for my presentation wasn't just intervention, I focused on finding apps that stimulate the mind of our "average" and "gifted" students. As teachers it is important that we don't forget these students because these days, "good" isn't good enough. We have to be the best.
A couple of the apps that I suggested for higher level thinking are:
(1) Crossfingers: Crossfingers is a free app that challenges students to use tangram pieces to figure out a puzzle. The levels are actually very challenging, even for me as an adult. I put about 4-5 students in a small group and allow them to take turns trying to figure out the puzzle. Their teamwork and problem-solving skills continue to get better and better. They watch and learn from each other, but they also learn from their own experiences with the game.
(2) PuppetPals: This is another app. There is a free version but there is a cheap version that allows students to take pictures of themselves, characters from another book, different settings, and cut out what they want to use in their play. Some of my higher level students wrote a script for a book they were reading and created a puppet show summarizing the book. This incorporated so many different skills and objectives, and presented the students an authentic way to be creative and show their understanding of our curriculum.
The applications for the I-pad in the classroom are endless. My hope is that one day we become a one-to-one school.
Check out this school that has I-pads for each student:
Unlocking Literacy with I-Pads
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Gaming
Throughout this week's readings I have really been doing a lot of thought about online games. Most of the articles I read about referred to online games that have realistic characters that go through problematic experiences. Many of the games I have my students play are quite difference. For instance, to practice math facts I have my students go to http://www.arcademicskillbuilders.com/ where they can race car by choosing the correct answer to a multiplication fact (or many other like games). This link doesn't necessarily teach my students how to do something but it's a great way to reinforce a concept that they will need to conquer the next building block in our math unit.
Another game I came across this week deals with literacy. http://reading.ecb.org/ uses a little man and an avatar to help students reinforce and practice reading skills such as making connections and asking questions, to name a few. All of my students were excited to play this game once I introduced it to the class, but unfortunately I didn't have enough computers for everyone to try it at once.
I am not sure of any games like "Oregon Trail" or the others mentioned in our article, that could work with my third grade curriculum, but I know that my students really benefit from the ones we use in our classroom.
*** My principal just gave a co-worker and me i-pads to utilize in our classrooms. Our job is find ways to use them with students and to convince our PTA to purchase one for every teacher in the school. So far, I have found a plethora of games that I can use with my students and several "web 2.0-like" tools that my students can use to create things (plays, scripts, etc). If you have any ideas, I would love to hear them!
Another game I came across this week deals with literacy. http://reading.ecb.org/ uses a little man and an avatar to help students reinforce and practice reading skills such as making connections and asking questions, to name a few. All of my students were excited to play this game once I introduced it to the class, but unfortunately I didn't have enough computers for everyone to try it at once.
I am not sure of any games like "Oregon Trail" or the others mentioned in our article, that could work with my third grade curriculum, but I know that my students really benefit from the ones we use in our classroom.
*** My principal just gave a co-worker and me i-pads to utilize in our classrooms. Our job is find ways to use them with students and to convince our PTA to purchase one for every teacher in the school. So far, I have found a plethora of games that I can use with my students and several "web 2.0-like" tools that my students can use to create things (plays, scripts, etc). If you have any ideas, I would love to hear them!
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Podcasting at Church
Today during church the associate pastor shared the wonderful news that now all of our services from April 2011 are posted as podcasts on our church website. (Furthermore, the entire website has been updated and is much better than before. Woo hoo!) This really made me think about our previous assignment where I read and reflected upon several articles relating to podcasting. Throughout all of the readings I was focused on how podcasts can be used in radio broadcasting and in education; I never once thought about how it could be used in our daily lives. The fact that I see my church taking on this new 21st century technology to share the word with people around the community and the world, is amazing. Last Sunday my husband and I took a mini vacation to the mountains and we unable to hear a sermon that a friend said was "amazing," but now that the podcast is up, I can listen to it whenever I want and as much as I want. Moreover, when I hear a really touching sermon I can share clips or the whole thing with friends, family, or members of my Bible study who go to a different church. Overall, I am just so excited and amazed at how my church is using podcasting. I am eager to see other ways in which podcasting is used in my daily life.
Check it out:
http://www.millbrookumc.org/#/welcome/podcasts
Check it out:
http://www.millbrookumc.org/#/welcome/podcasts
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