Diary of a Technology Supporter

Make a Movie with Vocabulary

2009-04-12T21:59:00.003-05:00

While cleaning up some old files I ran across some reflections that boys wrote last year after a vocabulary project. The task: Create an iMovie to demonstrate understanding of list of words. I have a few movies that I will upload and join to this blog but I want to share what the 6th graders said from doing this project. It really hits home the idea of making the learning relevant, having a purpose versus the old school write a sentence using these vocabulary words. The creativity and level of work that these boys put in this project was outstanding. I still use the word bemused at lease once a week and I didn't have to do the project! :-)

Using technology made it more fun. To me, the more fun it is, the better I learn. If you wrote something on a sheet of paper, it would be boring. Computers make it fun. You will remember it longer.

This project made vocabulary more important to me because we actually used them in real life situations that we might face, if we are a commercial maker when we are older.

While you were watching your own presentation on the smartboard, you caught some of your errors and you caught things that you could have done better.

Makes learning awesome

In this project, I believe I connected a great deal to vocabulary. I was able to take a modern day genre of music and use vocabulary to complete it. This allowed the project to be more of an adventure than work.

Hands on exciting learning.

I liked that you could make movies. I also like that you could make it hilarious.

Also, doing an exhilarating project like this made learning the words exciting and easy

This project was very tricky. It taught me more about technology. I had a really good time doing it! It’s not as easy as it seems to just make a 5-minute movie!

I think the positive things of doing our type of movie are that we have control of everything. We made the background, music, characters, plot, etc. But the bad part about doing the project the way we did is the fact that we have to put more time and effort in it than regular iMovies.

In this project I built a spiritual connection with these words because at first I studied the words and typed them. Next I had to put all the words in a logical script, using emotion, sound effects, and context clues to help others. After all these steps the words were a part of my everyday vocabulary. If I had to do a boring project with these words, I would dread these words because I had no fun with it. The reason I got a better understanding of the words was because I had fun with it.

I had no regrets with this project. It was probably the most fun I have had with schoolwork in a LONG time. I loved how we got to use our imagination to express our creativity. This project helped me to enjoy learning. My creative juices were flowing with this project and I wanted to make it the best I could because it was exciting editing it!

We had fun making the video and I learn better when I have fun using them in sentences made me have a better understanding of the words. Our group connected with the words and connected with each other in using them on video. The video made us laugh when we watched the video and hearing the words made us understand and use them better. I use many of the words now, not ones like veldt, but I use bemused and others.

This was a very enjoyable project because we all were able to use our creative skills to create it. There were virtually no boundaries, and, as an added bonus, we were able to use technology!

CREATIVE AND ORIGINAL!

This use of technology helps us with our vocabulary because we have to use the words. The more we used the words the better we understood. When you mess up in your movie you have to use the words again and again. You also remember the words because you are having fun. When you have fun your brain is more willing to store up these words.

The project was fun because we were allowed a great time limit. During that time limit, we got to have fun acting. Acting is fun to me because you can be funny, serious, or whatever. Going back and adding pictures was also fun. Learning by having fun definitely helps me with vocabulary.

Ideas for Your Classroom to Use Next Week

2009-04-10T18:55:00.005-05:00

Above is an outstanding presentation for so many great ideas of ways to improve your classroom. I highly suggest panning through it and you will find your mind generating many cool ideas to use next week.

One Part of My PLE

2009-03-24T13:50:00.008-05:00

I am a huge Twitter supporter in the area of education and professional development. I can't even begin to explain how awesome this resource is for me. Every time I launch this site or the program that feeds my twitters to my computer I learn something new. I can ask for help, get advice on lessons I am dreaming up, find schools to collaborate with, and read others blogs, that I may not know about!

It took me about a year of using this tool before I was sold. The first few months I though it was cool, had about 40 followers, but didn't really get the full effect of the device. Now I am participating in conversations with hashtags (Monday nights educators converse using #educhat at the end of their statements - hosted by thecleversheep), connecting globally with others, and much more.

I have never had a rude or crude comment pop up on Twitter, nor have I ever posted an over-the-top gripe, or something on those lines. I don't mingle with my social life on this, following others that have to do with my outside of school interests. I think if I did I would have more trouble with inappropriate tweets.

This is my professional learning environment. And every time I step in to it I learn more than I thought I would.

Get your twitter mosaic here.

Ascent of Man video

2009-03-21T13:19:00.001-05:00

Ascent of Man by Bruce McCall with Smiley Guy Studios @ Yahoo! Video

While searching for videos for a 4th grade History class I discovered the above video. This works great in their History class. The class focuses on a theme: Innovations. They study, for a semester, Innovations, and the positive effects they have on our world. They start with Ancient Greece - the wheel and move through time.

I found this great video from watching awesome Ted.com! If you don't watch Ted you are missing out!

Talks Bruce McCall: Nostalgia for a future that never happened

Future of Education

2009-03-18T19:25:00.001-05:00

Web 2.0 Is the Future of Education

View more presentations from SteveHargadon.

Twitter Silly Stuff

2009-02-24T09:54:00.000-06:00

I just received this funny Twitter email joke. I wanted to share it with others. I couldn't twitter it because it is more than 140 characters. Enjoy the read!

Impress Your Friends With New Twitter Terms (Twerms?)! [Marker]

"Communicating in 140 characters or less? You call that a technological
breakthrough?" scoffed my Aunt Mabel. "Honey, your Uncle Ed has been doing
that at dinner for over 40 years!"

Whether you are as unimpressed with Twitter as my Aunt Mabel, or think
it's the greatest thing since whatever the greatest thing was
yesterday...you gotta be "in the know" about this new social networking
tool. It's so "the thing" that it's developing a vocabulary all its
own...albeit with some notable gaps I have sought to fill here as a public
service. (This one's for you, Aunt Mabel.)

Twitter – a social networking site where users “micro-blog” in posts of
140 characters or less

Tweet –a single post to the Twitter social networking site; sometimes also
used as the verb for posting. Example: Did you tweet today? Yes, didn’t
you see my tweet?

Twittle – a way to kill time waiting for someone’s next tweet

Twick or Tweet – prank posts to your Twitter account

Twattletale – a child who uses Twitter to inform parents of siblings’
misdeeds

Twutter – an incoherent or incomplete tweet

Twuttle – a series of twutters

Tweaty -- a formal agreement between two people to stop arguing on Twitter

Tweety – a little yellow bird who feels cheated about not receiving any
royalties from all of this. “I tawt I taw a Twitter tat!”

Twidiosyncrasy -- odd expressions unique to certain tweeters

Twit – not actually a Twitter or social networking term per se, but if you
have a Facebook account you likely will have opportunity to become
reacquainted with some you had long forgotten about

Retwaction -- a tweet intended to take back a previous tweet

Retweat -- a tweet intended to back off from an opinion expressed in a
previous tweet

Twaster – one who spends entirely too much time on Twitter

Twaining -- the 45 minutes you will spend showing your grandmother how to
follow your tweets

Twele phone -- how your grandmother will inform you she saw your last tweet

Twister – a low-tech social networking tool characterized by very short
communications--generally of far fewer than 140 characters—such as “Ow!”,
“I’m gonna fall!”, “My arm doesn’t bend in that many places!” and “I’m
getting too old for this!”

-----
Thanks Sue for sending it!
------

For a glossary of "real" Twitter terms, see http://mashable.com/2008/11/15/twitterspeak/

Transforming Teachers

2009-02-23T09:15:00.000-06:00

I have been so energized by several of the teachers that I work with who are transforming themselves into 21st Century Educators!

Using Wikis:
I have my 3 grades (4th, 5th, and 6th) all working on PBWiki. The students LOVE getting to work online and collaborate with others. This tool has really added bump in their motivation and responsibility towards their school work, not to mention improving their writing skills!

I also just gave one teacher editing rights to her webquest by moving her files from being housed in Dreamweaver, to it being housed on a wiki. I will no longer have to update the site because now she can do it without knowing webpage software!

Blogging:
Several teachers are also starting to blog, one teacher using her classroom blog as a means to teach. You can tell the students who are about to go in her room and learn because they are SO excited!

Ning:
My school is fortunate enough to have a leader who is 100% motivated for this change or reform in education. He backs us with reading material, technology tools, professional development opportunities, and much more. This year he has gone to the NING! Our school has its private NING, where we are encouraged to hold book discussions, reply to his blog entries, further discuss revamping our report cards, etc...but are also having fun with getting to advise whether we should cancel school for snow day, or play with funny comments on what is going to happen on our school retreat, etc. He has gotten us to start in a comfortable setting to start communicating through this Web 3.0 tool! And since "we" are getting comfortable, several of us have been joining other NINGS. Some of my teachers are getting into Classroom 2.0

Twitter:
This tool is slowly making its way into the classroom. Several teachers jumped on board, but don't have the understanding of the tool quite yet. One even deleted her account. :-( But others have made global connections with other educators, creating collaborative classroom activities. Two teachers are using cutting edge programs and finding great websites to use with the students from the people they follow on Twitter. A few of us are even using Twitter as a means of advertising student projects to allow others to see and comment on the work. It has really improved the quality of the projects since the kids know that others besides the class and the teacher are going to be looking at what they did.

Watching the classroom transform with these tools makes the learning environment so exciting. The kids in the hallway have a completely different attitude when walking into a class where the teacher has transformed!

Podcasting Entry 4

2009-02-15T09:40:00.000-06:00

I am simply amazed at how the students absorbed iMovie 8! This past school week was 3.5 days. There was really no time that I could meet with all the 4th grader experts and 4 teachers to show a new cool trick to the movie program. I was disappointed and wondered how this grade was going to accomplish the weekly news report podcasting task. They had taken the previous week off, since they had their ERB tests. The classes were allowed to work with the students on writing the script. So this past week they were to record about the testing week. None of the classes had emailed me on when we were going to meet, and I was floored with my other techie duties to email them with reminders. Then suddenly on Wednesday, late morning, a kid came into my office and asked if I could come down and help out with the recording. This specific class had only made one video before and I thought that "helping" was going to be very time consuming. When I got to the room the experts had the computer open but not much more. I showed them how to find the program, reviewed how to capture the footage, and then stepped back and allowed the experts to teach to this week's reporters on what to do. They recorded twice. Then the experts showed how to edit the footage, make the new project, taught the newbies about how to make and tweek the title card, and how to add the two transitions. It was pretty simple. The experts had really caught on with only one time of me teaching them! The little sponges! :-) Since they had impressed me with how well they had learned everything I was inspired to figure out with them sitting there how to add a little intro and wrap it up music. We dove into the iLife music packages and found what we liked. Together we figured out how to drop the music in the area we liked, and trimmed the music some. They loved it! After 45 minutes I walked out of their room with the finished project for me to upload to the PDS Podcast page.

Now for the really impressive part! Later that day and on the half day Thursday, I had the 3 other classes come ask for my help. I couldn't help. I was swamped. I was sorry, but then said to go ask the expert boys I had helped earlier. The experts were on Cloud 9! By Thursday mid morning I had the 2 laptops with finished projects on my desk to upload. This new teacher being the facilitator, students being the teacher worked! Without my being there and available, the students utilized eachother's knowledge and blossomed! I am so proud of the work they produced. I am amazed at how easy this task was accomplished. I am pleased with the ownership and "impressed and proud" of themselves feeling these 8 to 9 year old students expressed.

Here is the link to the PDS Podcast page. The latest podcasts are 4C, 4D (Quicktime link not working but will be fixed on Tuesday) and 4A TV - February 11. 4B finished also, but I did not have a chance to send that file up to the podcast page yet. 4D class was the first class, and the class that became the experts for the other 4th grade classes.

(Side note: One of the experts from the 4D class brought his personal laptop to school on Thursday. He recently had a birthday party and wanted help on making his video. He and I played around, showing him how to search on the Internet for free music downloads, download it to his laptop, insert that sound wave on to his movie, and tweak the volume levels of both the music and audio on the live footage. I can't wait to see what he did over the weekend with this!)

Podcasting Entry 3

2009-01-30T14:37:00.000-06:00

OH JOY!!! It all came together and I am elated! There is still fine tuning, but it is working.

The classroom teachers wrote the scripts with student input. This needs work. Here is what I envision...

The class has like a bulletin board or the back of the classroom door where anytime they come across something that they want in the PDS podcast they'll jot it down on a post-it note and stick it on this board. The boys can do this at anytime, maybe something funny happened at lunch, or had a great activity that they liked in art. Maybe a boy won an award. Maybe someone needs prayers for his grandma. Maybe they learned a cool math trick. Whatever they want. Then there is a set day, every week where the class has a pow-pow and they take all the stickies and organize them into categories. Then using, Inspiration, or some web / graphic organizer, they (as a whole group) web out the meat of their news report. The teachers takes this Inspiration web, projecting onto the Smartboard, and shows the Outline feature. Then the class talks about order words, adjectives, etc, and turns their blurbs into sentences. Finally, they copy and paste their outline sentences onto a word document and print out the scripts. Then the 2 chosen news reports practice in front of the class. The class gives feedback, when to give an example, something funny or witty to add, maybe a like acting to spice up the report. The reports jot notes on the printed script. They also can higlight what they have to say using a marker. Another practice..and they are ready to record.

So now my part (the tech coach intervention):
The filming:
This week I used iMovie 08 (Can you believe there is an 09 out already! I am so behind!) gritting my teeth as I unlearn iMovie 6 tricks. I made this move because this put everyone at the same learning curve. I worked with each class on how to find and launch the program. How to turn on the iSight camera and use it to record. That's it. That was all I did with my 2 experts who will work with me always, and my 2 news reporters that will change out each week.

The editting:
Today all 8 kids and 4 teachers met with me to edit their movies. I introduced them to the outline of iMovie 08, what each panel was. Then I showed them how to edit the raw footage. The teachers' eyes were crossed but the kids caught on with a snap! We had to quit clicking when wanting to play the movie, because clicking selects the frame to allow you to edit. That was the hard part, but like I said, the kids had NO problem.

Once editting the raw footage was done, we moved the clips up to the project area and added a title card infront of the movie. This creates a black card. I showed them how to change the font, color, size, etc. The kids want me to figure out how to make the card not black. (So students are giving me homework now, huh?!) We also, as a group, brainstormed images / photos that we could use for the title card...like a news logo or something.

After the title, we add one transition between the title card and footage, and one at the end. I showed them how to set the length of the transition..worked like a charm! That's it! All done! I grabbed the laptops - shared the movies as Quicktimes for an iPhone and threw them up on our school's webpage. :-) What a great way to end the week!

Next week: I am going to show them how to add title cards in throughout the footage to say like MATH, or Way to go JOE! when announcing specific things. I will give them more time on adding transitions between these diffent video parts. Showing them how to upload sections of the footage at a time in order to split the video (command T in iMovie 6...I will give up my love for that program soon enough). They are DYING to learn about adding song. I think in 2 weeks they will need to come with a jingle that they will always use at the beginning and ending of their report. (An example is Mrs. Love wants The Beatles, "All You Need is Love" snippet on her videos.)

Come look at what we created by clicking here. All the podcasts that I am referring to are called: 4_-TV January 29.

Podcasting Entry 2

2009-01-29T09:16:00.000-06:00

The assignment: to create weekly podcast of what is going on in the classroom for grade 4 - 4 separate classrooms involved.

The plan:
1. We choose 2 kids per classroom to become the experts. They will be in every session training the other students.

2. I will be teaching them how to create a movie in iMovie 8. Originally we had made the movies in iMovie 6 because that is the program I know and am comfortable using. But then I started to realize that if I am going to go through a several week process in teaching these guys iMovie then I'd better teach them the newer program. Plus, the teachers who are involved don't know iMovie 6 like the back of their hands, so I can start from scratch with them too. And since I have only poorly, by chance made 2 movies in iMovie 8 then we are all pretty much at the same learning level. (I actually told the boys that we are all like working like PreKindergarteners because we are new to all of this. They laughed.)

The implementation:
Today I will have helped 2 classes just video themselves using the iMovie 08 and built-in iSight camera. The teachers wrote the script, but I am leading them into having the students write the script as a whole group. (Teach the writing process!) My administrator is calling this a great authentic assessment.

By tomorrow afternoon I will have worked, at one time, with 8 students and 4 teachers, teaching the most basic of the iMovie 08 skills. We will edit out the footage that we don't want. Add a title card. Maybe a fade in and out transition. But no music, no special effects. Then next week we should be first graders with our knowledge of the program. I will blog and share the link to the end product hopefully Friday or Monday...most likely Monday.

Starting Out Podcasting week 1

2009-01-22T19:07:00.000-06:00

4 of my teachers have been instructed to have students generate a weekly podcast of what is going on in their classes. Like a "toot your own horn" as my administration put it. The teachers are doing fabulous things, and want the parents to know! So my job is to train the teachers and students how to do this till they can do it on their own. I am going to log my journey, but let's catch up with what already has happened.

Week 1 - 4 teachers - - one podcasted...well I did it. The teacher wrote a script for the boys to read. We used a student laptop with a built-in iSight camera and iMovie to record their "news report". The teacher watched and saw how to record, but was more of a bystander than active participant. Then I took the laptop, edited the footage and built the movie.

Week 2 - 4 teachers - - one podcasted...well I did it again, and it was the same teacher. We used the same program and tools, and will always use them unless we master them and I feel like taking the Garageband approach to podcasting. The teacher wrote the script, but assisted with video taping. Yeah! The students were the same 2 from the previous week, I think... After the taping, I editted and built the movie.

Week 3 - 4 teachers - - TWO podcasted! YEAH!
Teacher 2 wrote the script and helped with the directing, but did not help with the taping (starting and stopping the recording). Then the students sat with me and watched me edit and build the movie for the podcast.

Teacher 1 wrote the script and had the boys record the report before I got to the classroom. There were 4 boys this time (2 from the previous weeks, and 2 new ones). I began to build the movie, but stopped, got up, and parked one of the boys in my seat. Together the students built their movie. I taught them how to edit the footage, split the clips, extract their flubs, record a voiceover, add a title card, add headlines, add transitions. They were pretty ancy by the time we added the little intro and exit song, but were awed over watching me do that part. I told them next time that they would learn more of the "sounds" part. That started the whole discussion of how we were going to help the other students. The small group and I decided that the these 4 were going to become the experts on movie making. I am going to request that they be incharge of next week's movie/podcast. I told them that I don't want to come until they have recorded, editted, and added the titles/headlines and transitions. When that is all done they can get me, I will do final editting touches and teach the sounds part. They are thrilled! We even discussed them being the experts for the other 3 classes. Peer teaching. I can't wait for this group to get to take their laptops home in 6th grade. If they really dive into this project, they are going to be crazy fun by 2 years! Oh the projects they will be making and showcasing! The poor 6th grade teachers, how will they challenge them then? :-) Here is the podcast/movie that was created with this group.

Tumbarumba

2009-01-06T10:08:00.000-06:00

What a weird tool Tumbarumba is. Adding fiction to a webpage and making students read the content for strange information? Like a scavenger hunt...I will definitely look more into this product.

Letting Loose

2009-01-05T15:25:00.000-06:00

I taught the 6th graders about Inspiration 7.6 today and they seemed to like it. One of them was thrilled about the outline view, which shows different learners! My issue though was the fact that the boys are studying a specific beach and mountain and using Google to gather their facts. There are so many adult activities that go on on beaches around the world. How do you feel comfortable about giving them a beach when on the main Google search page the top hits refer to adult activities on the beach. I suppose I should have kept them on the beaches in America ~ more tame beaches, but then that takes the thrill away from them learning about crazy places they have never seen, heard of, or have any idea where it is! That is what I was thinking when I found the list of beaches and mountains. We will see if they can handle the information. I am going to look in on using the pre-searched results Google can do and may use that for gathering of their beach information.

Resolution

2008-12-28T21:40:00.000-06:00

The year is wrapping up and I find myself not very accomplished this year in the Web 2.0 - 3.0 world. I am overwhelmed and excited about all of those who seem to be in this cyberworld so easily. So New Year's resolution (for the professional part of me) time approaches and we will see how I can improve myself. So here they are:

1. Read my blog subscriptions. It's funny. When I thought of this one I thought maybe I subscribe to too many. That seems to be my Web world issue. Too many things ~ not mastering one. I went to my iGoogle Reader and found all of the ones that I subscribe to I want to keep. I moved a few around so the top 3 are on my homepage and in my face.

2. Blog myself. I started this lame blog and have done nothing with it. I am going to start publishing my work. I know that I do good things at work so I will start to write about them even if they aren't just the coolest Web 2.0/3.0 things. I am proud of what my teachers are doing and even though I don't have my own class to play with, I do get some to do exciting things.

3. Use one or two neat web tools per month. This may be hard. January I will use the Google search thing to help gear the students find good resources. This may be a big hit since I work with younger ages (4th - 6th grade). This particular class will then write stories and publish them within MapSkip. . . I believe.

11.24.08

2008-11-24T19:00:00.000-06:00

The Internet Safety parent meeting is creeping up on my calendar. Just a few weeks ago it was to be in January. Now, it is on the administration's team calendar for the first full week in December, early that week. So here I am procrastinating with the clock ticking. Which way do I take this meeting? The parents will have heard from a shrink about the horrors online, the pornography, the predators, all the gruesome stuff. My local independent schools got together 2 weeks ago to house an Internet Safety night open to anyone interested. About 110 people came, 20 were techies from the different schools. I was fascinated by what I heard. I love the new cell phone safety feature that parents can get now...though I can't think of the name. It works by having a list of preapproved numbers that are allowed to send and receive calls, send things to, and text. If a number has not be approved what is being sent or texted is sent to the parent's phone for approval. Kind of like a moderator for the cell phone. How awesome! My husband just started teaching middle school this year and was blown away during inservice. There was a huge 2 hour lecture on cyber bullying and what teachers are to watch for. This new bullying is or is close to the number one cause of teen suicide. How sad. But knowing what I heard, said, saw and all as a kid I could see how this form of harrassment would crush a kid's heart. Kids are kids. They don't know how these little actions can hurt someone over time. - Getting back on track - So this speech / presentation that I have to give...which route do I go? I want to show them tools that their kids are using. Teach them some of the cyber world. My problem? I'm not that swift in that world. I can travel it, leave my mark in it, but think and do as a kid? No. I guess to start off I am going to poll for opions and research. What tools are kids and teens using? Maybe show parents how to find out where to look on pages for content managing. We'll see.

Woices

2008-11-11T18:09:00.001-06:00

I finally got to work with the new English teacher.

At my school we (the technology specialists) are to meet with our teachers every 6th day for about 15 minutes to touch base. Last year was my first year at this school and I failed to make these meetings a routine, but found every day to be very busy. This year I am staying more on track. Now I can't even manage my time and projects because of so many of these tech meetings last for about an hour and with all the great ideas out there I get swamped with "ah-ha's" that I want to do. Now I don't have a class of my own so to use these great web things I have to sucker a teacher in to believing that it is fun and easy. It is so weird, but I get all jazzed up and LOVE interacting with the students. Then I become completely ADHD and creating the end result is so difficult! :-) If only the web and all of its developments would slow down.

So back to the English teacher: She had her students rewrite an Urban Legend for a Halloween-y activity. Spooky story telling always catches a boy's attention. (note: I work at an all boy's school.) I had just heard of Woices and MapSkip from Tom Barrett, who is a genius at his job. This story project could work by giving a location of the legend. I have only tried it out with one boy, and am not 100% finished, but someone commented and I ran to the writer and teacher to share the news.

The Project:
I chose Woices vs Mapskip, because these were pieces of fiction. I felt that MapSkip was wanting more real information on their site. The student and I surfed over to Woices and looked around the map to find where our story took place. Then we read the story, identified the parts that the setting would changed, found where on the map we wanted it to occur, then jotted the area down on a paper. We used a highlighter to separate the story in these new settings portions. Then the student used Garageband to create audio recordings of his story. One recording per setting. He shared them as an MP3. Back to Woices! We went back, found our locations, uploaded the MP3, gave the echo (that is what woices calls 1 recording). We gave all the echos associated with the story the same title but with a number so that we knew the order. Since this was the first set of echos I have ever done, it was easy to group these together to form what they call a walk.

It was SOOO easy! The woices part of the task took about 20 minutes - recording, uploading, and posting each echo. After the excitment of the project set in I ran back to the teacher and grabbed 6 boys to draw me an illustration. Since these echos can have a picture this will dress up the "walk" some. Now I have to acquire the illustrations, scan, and upload them. I hope I can focus to finish this part.

And the coolest part! Ninja user commented that he or she liked the walk! I shared it with the boy - he and I were beaming. And his 62 peers - are envious! yessss ~ hooked 'em!

Next idea: MapSkip with descriptive writing topic: Beach or Mountains?

Persuasive Writing Lesson

2008-11-06T10:01:00.000-06:00

This lesson will use Webspiration and Woices.com

Using the WPPOnline writing prompts the 6th grade English students will write a persuassive essay on Beaches vs Mountains. The students will pick different beaches and mountain ranges as their main point. They will use the internet, encyclopedias, etc to gather information about the particular beach or mountain. They will use Webspiration as a place to brainstorm their thoughts and ideas. The students will share their webs with one another to give feedback and advice. The students will use a word document to write their essay. The students will then post their writings on woices.com.

About Me

2008-11-04T10:12:00.000-06:00

I have been in education since 1996. My first classroom had 6 iMacs, one of which was hooked up to a television that also had a laser disc player, and a VCR. I have never taught without technology. The next cool toy that I received was a flex camera! I thought that I had died and gone to heaven! This first classroom was an interim position and I was told to obtain the classroom for good I would have to have some technology training. That is when I got hooked. After teaching in the classroom for 6 years (grades 1 -3) I left it all behind to become a Curriculum Techology Specialist for the same school system. I was to support 2 schools, grades K - 6. Instead of working on the curriculum side I, along with all the other CTS (as we were called) were fixing printers, setting up servers and airports, imaging computers, and teaching TOC sessions (which I can't remember what those letters stood for) to teachers required to attend 6 hours of technology training. (Needless to say, we were the messenger that was getting all the grumpy attitudes.) Two years in that job the district cut funds and I was sent back to the classroom. So I quit the public school system and entered the world of private schools. I taught at one private school for 2 years in a computer lab servicing PK (3 year olds - 21 of them at a time!) through 3rd grade. My other hat at that school was that of a troubleshooter and technical trainer. This was my first job that I actually worked during the school's summer vacation. This fact and the fact that I didn't really love working with 3 year olds on the computer led me to my current position. I am now an Elementary Division Technology Specialist. I work at an all boy's school, grades 4th through 6th. For these grades the students have a one to one laptop program, with the 6th grade actually taking their computers home. I was able to attend Will Richardson's and Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach PLP consortium professional development and was blown away! WHOA!!! This introduction to Web 2.0 has made me miss the classroom. To be a classroom teacher, to play with all of these tools with the students and their education - how exciting! Now I am trying to calm myself and spark the same fire that I have with the 16 teachers that I support. This blog is going to be my sound board, my focus as to what I want to try, and a place to hopefully showcase what I have inspired others to do.