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?

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!

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!!