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!

Oh PBS, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways!

I have a confession-I am a PBS junkie! I love all things PBS.  My love started just about the time Sesame Street first aired on PBS.  Yes, I am that old! I still can sing many of the songs I learned from Big Bird, Oscar, and (my favorite) Snuffleuffagus. I can count like The Count (ah,ah,ah).  I knew Cookie Monster when he ate too many cookies! I cried when Mr. Hopper died. Enough reminiscing!

The best of both worlds!!






The point is I still enjoy finding and watching different shows on PBS. This past weekend I watched the Teacher Channel via PBS. Granted it was early in the morning and not really the time I want to think about lesson planning but the lesson being shown (high school math) was highlighting common core standards.  I appreciated was the enthusiasm of the teacher and that of her students. She made it look fun and so easy to teach. That is what I love about watching a good teacher-they make it look effortless! Here is the link-lots of great things to see! Tell me what you think... check out their blog!

Come one, come all!

Happy Sunday All!  While reading the Sunday paper, I came across an article I thought was important to the class I am currently taking.
Will Richardson, author of Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms, will be at Renbrook School, West Hartford, Tuesday, February 19.
Maybe I'll see you there!

Very cool! No refrigerator needed.

Looking through my Diigo to add information to our class wiki I came across PicLits. It was fun to play on...reminded me of the magnetic words sets that were sold as a theme pack (i.e. travel, family, just for fun) minus the refrigerator.


See the full PicLit at PicLits.com

Fun to do! Older kids might like it.  Something quick and gives good word choice!  What do you think?  Have any ideas how you might use this in your classroom?

Emerging from my snow coma......

Yes, I think it is time to put down the mixing bowls and baking dishes and get back to the real important things...technology in the classroom, of course! My cohort has been busy loading great websites, YouTube videos, creating digital stories, finding great apps, tagging wonderful teacher blogs, and sharing it all!Wow!Thank you to my wonderful partners in education!

Kindergarten response to Animoto!

In a word-anticlimactic!  The students were excited to see their hands and the digi blocks on the screen.  I think I need to add large numerals to it(insert them before or after each slide).  Also, it I could slow it down or put it in a loop for reinforcement.
Our math teacher enjoyed it!  She hadn't seen animoto so this was a new tech tool for her.

Awake at 4:30 am...what to do?

Well, first things first...let the dogs out then make a hot cup of tea.  The house was quiet so I thought this would be a good time to do some research.  On went the computer!
After reading Richardson's chapter about flickr, I decided I needed to learn more about it. Is it similar to instagram (which I  have on my phone)?  Does it work the same way? Load a picture from my phone, share with my followers and wait for some comments?  Well, it is and it isn't.
Flickr is awesome! I immediately became lost.  I went to the explore tab.  I found a map with pictures from around the world, blogs with groups of photographers with similar interests, challenges, galleries, and a page with information about the most widely used cameras.
I have taken pictures since grade school.  I like to think I have gotten better over the years but...well, amateur is a good description!  I found through surfing flickr that I am not the only person who takes pictures of food for fun! Case in point...

So I might be the latest to join flickr!

Voicethread...revisited.

So I used voicethread a few years back in my classroom and wondered if I could access it.  I returned to the site and was pleasantly surprised to find my account still there.  Where would it have gone?  The more amazing thing was I had remembered my login and password!  Here is one of the thread that I created with my students.  This was an Empowering Writers lesson.  The children created the giants then wrote about it.  I used a microphone to record each child reading their piece of work.




It was very easy to use. The children and their parents loved seeing and hearing their voices.
I think the best component to voicethread is the ability for others to leave comments for the students and their teacher.

Classroom Animoto

I've been thinking how I might use Animoto in my classroom.  For vocabulary? With word families? Highlighting high frequency words? Maybe in math? What should I create? One for shapes or solids? Number line? Counting? I settled on counting.  The class has been working with the "tricky teens"- the numbers from 11 to 19. They have used various manipulatives to accomplish this task.  I thought a good use of  Animoto was to create a movie that showcased each number by using digi blocks and their fingers.  Each slide would show the number and the number word.

The children were excited when I told them they would be in a movie!  But they were surprised to hear the movie would be about math!  'Math?!', they said.  Then the questions started. How? Why? When would we do it? How can you use digi blocks-they aren't real?  I explained how it would work and how we would accomplish this task together.

The children worked together to put the correct number of digi blocks in the cases.  I took the pictures of the blocks when they were ready.  Then they worked in pairs to show the number of fingers for each number. Another photo op!  

Finished product:

What do you think?  Should it be longer? Slower?

2 Birds with One Stone

How do I load a youtube video onto my blog?
Step one: look for a video on youtube.
Step two: find one that is an Animoto too!
Step three: Post!!