After 11 Tools:Reflections

Some of the apps I will use are: GoogleDocs to communicate with team members; Jing which will make communications more interesting by embedding photos an videos within documents; Digital Storytelling;Photo Story; Wikis which allows students to work together.

My thinking about using technology has changed by being introduced to the many apps available that will enhance learning. For my end of the year party last year my second graders brought in technology from home and I watched while they interacted, focused and enjoyed themselves. It made the party easy by the way and they had fun. I can use their enthusiasum for technology to my advantage in teaching the TEKS.

I was surprised by the abundance of quality education materials available to us. I'm glad the district has blocked sites the students have no business going to because we need help in that area. If students have a well defined timed task to complete I feel they will use their time wisely.

Tool 11 Digital Citizenship

To help children understand about being good digital citizens the teacher will need to teach this heavily at the beginning of the school year and continue to remind them all during the year. I found Brain Pop has videos that help teach digital citizenship in a fun animated way. After showing the movie on online safety we will discuss what we learned and give personal examples. Digital etiquette is showing respect when interacting with peers or anyone. Making positive comments to peers will made friends and help create a positive atmosphere in the classroom. BrainPop resources include movies, quizzes, experiments, timelines, activities and more.

Tool 10 Exploring Mobile Technology and Apps.

I went to a district training to learn how to use the iPod. There were several Ridgecrest people there. We will be getting 5 iPods for our classrooms so I can have 5 students work on the same assignment by syncing it to the iPods. I have recently gotten wireless Internet at home so I can word on assignments at home after the business of the day. We received a list of free apps which have been collected and listed by subject areas which will be helpful.

One of the apps I intend on using frequently is Dictionary.com. Students will be able to look up words that they have found in their reading which will help with their understanding. Students can find 5 new words per week and record them on index cards with definitions, pictures, parts of speech, and the word in a sentence. This will put the new vocabulary word in their long term memory.

Other apps I will be using are:
USA Factbook Free-Facts on the states for your grade level are assigned throughout the year and presented as a project grade.
USA Presidents-Can be use in our citizenship unit.
Newton's Cradle Classic-Students can touch and drag the balls and then let go to set the cradle in motion. Tilt your iPod left and right to play with the laws of physics. This will go perfectly with balance and motion unit.
ArithmeTick-Math Flash Cards-Will be a new way to practice math facts and beat the clock.
Tell Time LT-The user chooses a clock face until the correct one is selected.

Tool 9 Sharing Information through Jing & Skype

Jing is a free program that will allow the user to add visuals to online converstions. Students will be able to express what they have learned and add a picture to go with their topic. They will be able to converse with each other on what they have have read and researched. Also, they will be able to give opinions on a book in language arts or impressions on people studied in social studies.

Skype allows you to chat online for free with skype-to-skype calls and have a video conference if you have a camera. Teachers could use this to video students sharing or presenting to share with a parent. Teacher could give an group assignment and groups could respond via skype video. I think they would have fun doing this assignment

Tool 8 Video Resources

Being able to locate appropriate videos and save them to a blog will be a more efficient way of showing videos to my class. I went exploring on uTube and found appropriate videos to begin discussing movement and motion in science.










GO SEE THIS WATER SLIDE FUN video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNCnnx72HlA

Tool 7 Digital Story Telling

Movement is all around us. As we go through this unit we will observe movement and motion, experience it , create it, discuss it and finally we will write about it.

Tool 6 Wikis

I have created a Wiki station Ms. Butler's Wiki Station so I can begin using it this year.

We are all globally connected! I found this great video titled Playing For Change - Don't worry and Playing For Change - Stand By Me it made me feel happier about making the changes we need to make for our kids. We all need to relax and enjoy learning the 11 tools.



These videos came from this site: http://bergmannvikings.wikispaces.com/