For the length of this course I wondered how I could get 5 year olds to implement technology at the level being requested. I realized that not only can they do it, they love to do it. Teaching these young minds helps them to broaden their knowledge base for years to come.
I think public education needs to consider the fact the children today are faced with so many issues. They need more support than ever before. Using technology in the classroom in an effective safe manner would allow them greater opportunites at home.
The work in this course has allowed me to share new tools for use by our Kindergarten team. I have shared many things with families at home that are interested in supporting their child's home connection. Our staff has benefitted from the many links shared on twitter (something I never thought I would use). All in all, we were made aware of countless tools; I just continue tagging what works in my classroom.
Saturday, October 23, 2010
Final Activity
I really enjoyed learning and teaching new technology tools to my students. I think seeing my students enjoy the web tools and wanting to use them was a great feeling. Each new web lesson that I have used I will need to change. That is the cool thing about it. If you don't like it then change it. I have really tried to spread my new tools to other teachers in my building. I have decided to take small steps to introducing new tools to my students. This class has made me realize how important technology is in the classroom. My students are craving for more technology tools and I will be introducing more tools because of this class. Technology Rocks!!!
The biggest thing to change in the public education is to me technology. I have realized that the kids are different and are learning different then when I was in school. I'm 29 and education has changed since I was in school. We need to change our teaching strategies to fit the kids of today. This class has opened my eyes to education and how it is changing non-stop.
The biggest thing to change in the public education is to me technology. I have realized that the kids are different and are learning different then when I was in school. I'm 29 and education has changed since I was in school. We need to change our teaching strategies to fit the kids of today. This class has opened my eyes to education and how it is changing non-stop.
At the end!
Image via WikipediaThe class presentations were wonderful and be viewed on the Edmodo public feed. This may be the end of the course, but it was easy to see how much was learned and how it is actually the beginning of more great things!
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Scratch
So, you may have noticed that I am doing all of my blogging at once!! Yes, this is because I have no time anymore to do anything but interventions of some sort!!
Scratch - I thought that I loved this program, and could talk about this program for hours! Well, the more hours I spend using this program to create my game, the more hours I spend thinking - what was I thinking!!! This program is neat to create one game, however, when you are a dork like me and want to create a game with 4 games, it gets a little nutty. It also enlighted me to how much my kids have no clue about keyboarding or where keys are located. During one of my play testing, the kid was key happy, and my game took a turn for the worse! In my game, you get to choose 1 of the 4 games to play. Each game is separate, however, I had to code it so you push certain keys for this game...then other certain keys for this game, so that no keys over lap. Because, if you hit the letter a during one game, it could ignite a sound, speech, or who knows what from one of the other games. When a kid pushes a few keys at once, like my play tester decided to do, many sounds occur at once! Which equals me going....oh no! I have no idea how to freeze those keys, so that they can only occur a response during it's individual game. My guess is, there isn't a way.
On the plus side, I was able to use different text to speech tools to add voice to my game, so that I didn't have to record my voice over and over again. That part was fun and cute. Scratch also allows you to have movement of characters either around the screen or even to do a dance. It allowed me to have many different backgrounds and images.
Bad side - it has taken me hours that I can't even count. My guess is about 30. Which is because when you play it to review it, you have to start from the beginning. I like to play it, then when it makes me mad, I have to change it. Or when I get a cool idea when I'm sleeping, then I have to add it to the game.
I am very glad that we had to have play testers that were students. I had tons of adults play my game, but they didn't have that many suggestions. Now when I had students play it, quite a few light bulbs light up because there were many things I had to change.
The really neat thing is that there is a scratch website in which people post projects, games, and discuss on the forums. You can ask questions on there, and get a response by the end of the day. That was very helpful. So were the projects. I had a really hard time with my matching game, and there were 2 on that website that helped me solve it. If you really like a game you see, you can download it to your own computer and save it as well. There are some really great games on there, that are wayyyyyy above my skill level!
Scratch - I thought that I loved this program, and could talk about this program for hours! Well, the more hours I spend using this program to create my game, the more hours I spend thinking - what was I thinking!!! This program is neat to create one game, however, when you are a dork like me and want to create a game with 4 games, it gets a little nutty. It also enlighted me to how much my kids have no clue about keyboarding or where keys are located. During one of my play testing, the kid was key happy, and my game took a turn for the worse! In my game, you get to choose 1 of the 4 games to play. Each game is separate, however, I had to code it so you push certain keys for this game...then other certain keys for this game, so that no keys over lap. Because, if you hit the letter a during one game, it could ignite a sound, speech, or who knows what from one of the other games. When a kid pushes a few keys at once, like my play tester decided to do, many sounds occur at once! Which equals me going....oh no! I have no idea how to freeze those keys, so that they can only occur a response during it's individual game. My guess is, there isn't a way.
On the plus side, I was able to use different text to speech tools to add voice to my game, so that I didn't have to record my voice over and over again. That part was fun and cute. Scratch also allows you to have movement of characters either around the screen or even to do a dance. It allowed me to have many different backgrounds and images.
Bad side - it has taken me hours that I can't even count. My guess is about 30. Which is because when you play it to review it, you have to start from the beginning. I like to play it, then when it makes me mad, I have to change it. Or when I get a cool idea when I'm sleeping, then I have to add it to the game.
I am very glad that we had to have play testers that were students. I had tons of adults play my game, but they didn't have that many suggestions. Now when I had students play it, quite a few light bulbs light up because there were many things I had to change.
The really neat thing is that there is a scratch website in which people post projects, games, and discuss on the forums. You can ask questions on there, and get a response by the end of the day. That was very helpful. So were the projects. I had a really hard time with my matching game, and there were 2 on that website that helped me solve it. If you really like a game you see, you can download it to your own computer and save it as well. There are some really great games on there, that are wayyyyyy above my skill level!
Day 6
Oh my gosh! I just realized I never commented on Day 6. I am terrible at blogging!! I left thinking I had a great idea for my project, but not really all of the pieces to go with it, since I didn't know what my job was going to look like this year!! My job has been a nightmare! Anyways, I am incorporating all of the amazing web 2.0 tools in some way... I created the Google Earth tour of wineries and shared that with many colleagues, who now want to go on the tour with me:) I'm going Nov. 13 in case anyone is interested! I have been helping teachers at NOE create wikis for their classroom. I helped present 2 wikis on parent night/back to school night. We shared things such as: info about the teacher, links to spelling resources, math resources, homework policy, field trip pictures from previous years, daily/weekly homework assignments and tips (updated weekly), and ways to contact the teacher. Many parents were grateful for this, as papers often get lost on the way home from school!
Since I have had to train so many aides on different interventions, I almost ditched the idea of teaching technology to students, and just created a jing/movie maker training on one of the interventions. Oh by the way, I had to learn 6 different interventions and then train these aides!!
I have also recently (well, within 3 weeks) become a facilitator for a 1st grader who is participating in K12 online schooling. This has been extremely interesting communicating with this student yet never meeting him!
Since I have had to train so many aides on different interventions, I almost ditched the idea of teaching technology to students, and just created a jing/movie maker training on one of the interventions. Oh by the way, I had to learn 6 different interventions and then train these aides!!
I have also recently (well, within 3 weeks) become a facilitator for a 1st grader who is participating in K12 online schooling. This has been extremely interesting communicating with this student yet never meeting him!
Checking in
My students have been working on our project. The students are creating Glogsters on using reading strategies to self-correct their errors. The students have been video recording familiar reads, letter sorts, and reading new books in which they attempt to engage their reading strategies to both figure out words they don't know and self correct errors they have made. Self-monitoring (knowing when you are wrong), searching for more information (via meaning, structure, or visual information), and then self - correcting are my goals of this project. The students also have been using Vocaroo to record their greetings, strategies they use most often, and additional thoughts. They are also using Glogster and Flickr images to enhance their Glogs. These Glogs will then be added to my wiki for their parents and them to view.
Time has been extremely tight:( I have been under so much stress with trying to handle 3 jobs (learning support, intervention specialist, and literacy lessons teacher in training).
I have also been working with teachers in helping them create wikis for their classroom.
Time has been extremely tight:( I have been under so much stress with trying to handle 3 jobs (learning support, intervention specialist, and literacy lessons teacher in training).
I have also been working with teachers in helping them create wikis for their classroom.
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Checking In
Jen and I are pretty far into our project. The students have been posting on Kidblog various safety rules they have learned in our safety unit. In a culminating activity, we have been using video/pictures to depict certain safety (bus, bike, stranger, road) rules. We will use a web tool to put all the videos and pictures together for a presentation to share with our grad class. But then we will be able to use the videos in future years. We are excited to see everything come together.
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