Help from FL

While working on and searching for information for my action research project (and not having very good luck!), a colleague suggested the website FCRR or the Florida Center for Reading Research.  What a great site!  It has lots of instructional materials as well as articles of current research being done in FL.  Love it!

Keep it moving....

I've enjoyed blogging for my  technology graduate class but now that the class is over I'm finding it hard to continue.  Part of the reason is another class has taken up my "spare" time.  But why not use this to my advantage.  Use my blog to reflect on my new class and new learning!The new class is an action research class.  So my first question was: action research...hmmm? The word research scares me....I immediately think of hours spent reading articles written by much smarter people with gobs of percentages and test results.  So I immediately went to the Internet and my fears were abated!

So my question to you is....how do you define action research?  Are you formulating questions everyday in your classroom?

A silly reflection!

So I'm feeling really good about all that I learned these past 8 weeks.  But there are still some tools that I haven't tried! (And I'm sure that there is many more being developed as I type!) I wanted to create something fun and light but also to show what I have learned. Enter Go!Animate. I love the 2 smartphones talking to each other and thought they could have a funny conversation.  As I made it, I realized that I needed to get to the point quickly.
Cell chat by mbhixs on GoAnimate

Animation Software - Powered by GoAnimate.

The most important thing I learned during this class was not to be afraid of technology.( This is how my students must feel when they are learning something new!) I had been apprehensive about putting myself out into the great big world wide web. But as I became more comfortable with all of the new tech tools and realizing that my blog was being looked at and reading the posts from colleagues and new friends-people from all over, I wanted to learn more!

Let's Animate....web 2.0 style!

I wanted to try something different and I haven't tried any of the animation tools yet so...I checked out GoAnimate. Here is my silly first try! Tell me what you think! How would you use this with your students?


The Watering Hole by mbhixs on GoAnimate

Animation Software - Powered by GoAnimate.

DIIGO tools...hmm.....

While playing in my Diigo-by playing I mean adding some articles, webpages, annotations, I wanted to see what else Diigo offered so I checked out the "tool" link.  I'm interested in Tagxedo and its uses so when I saw this on my Diigo (which reminded me of Tagxedo), I had to try it out!  Here it is:

My Diigo Tags

3-D printers?!

After listening to Will Richardson speak on Tuesday night, I began to think about some of the points he brought up. Such as; teaching children globally, using the over 2 billion "teachers" out in the world.  He mentioned how children are learning differently and we as parents and educators need to "learn, unlearn, and re-learn" in today's world if we want to keep up with our children and the larger techno- literate communities.  He also talked about a 3-D printer. A what?  I seem to have enough of a struggle to get the school printer to perform the way I want it to perform!  Now a 3-D printer!  What is that all about?  How will schools use it in the classroom?
Off to the internet I go for some insight and clarification! Right to an article by the NY Times.

Bingo! I think I've got it now!

My first Storybird was created with trial and error and came out ok.  The problem I was experiencing was embedding it into my blog.  But I think I have figured it out!

I had to return to the piece and edit it!  I needed to mark it "For School." This allowed me to get the embedded code!
Eureka!
I hope you like my Storybird about CAT cat.  I was thinking about word families and high frequency words when I wrote it-the pictures are funny too!