Thursday, April 28, 2011

Feel Free to Use or Lose

Uses of technology in the elementary classroom;
Type to Learn 3:  Beginning with a strong foundation of the keyboard is important in the fluency in your students technology adventure.  My school uses a program called Type to Learn 3.  However, if you don't have funding to provide this resource there are a ton of free resources on the internet.  These can be given as assignments, or used in the classroom.  This is one free site that I found when googling learning to type.
http://freetypinggame.net/

PowerPoint:  This is a highly engaging program for students.  I use this for their reflection journals; they may write journal entries, type key vocabulary from lessons, and include pictures of their learning.  The students also publish their poetry in a poetry slide show, create books in writers workshop, and even create lessons or assessments on a topic we are studying.

Microsoft Word:  We use this program to type spelling lists, friendly letters, and create timelines or other "smart art" graphic organizers for learning.

I am interested in learning more about blogging, and the use of our district's BlackBoard site.  This is a great tool for discussion boards, access to games we play in class, review of content learned, and update class information, and announcements.

HOW can I make this happen?
  • Seek out other teachers who currently use the BlackBoard site and discuss their uses
  • Attend a professional development provided by the tech team to learn more about BlackBoard
  • Play around on the site, and use my own problem solving skills, or use an online tutorial
  • Ask the students what they would like to see on the BlackBoard site
  • After talking with students, create a top 10 list of favorite learning websites to add to the class list
  • Talk with parents and ask them what they would like to see on the site, and have them create a top 10 list of their favorite parenting sites/homework helper sites/learning sites or resources for their child at home 

Friday, April 22, 2011

21st Century Teaching Skills

My Preparation for 21st Century Teaching/Learning

Kids will always cheer on your effort for improvement!
While on my journey of exploration into 21st Century Teaching/Learning, I came across a website that I find to be extremely teacher friendly.  This website includes resources from other web pages, and even includes templates/tip sheets for implementation into your own classroom.  The authors, Nicole and Donna, give their permission to use these tip sheets freely, and even allow a place for comments for improvement to their site.  It is a must read!

http://www.21stcenturyschoolteacher.com/cool-websites.html


When creating lessons it is important to embed critical thinking skills and problem solving skills.  Begin with something simple that your students can relate to their own personal life.  Building the ability to make self connections to content can only occur when a strong foundation is layed. 

I began the introduction of this by creating a discussion circle format.  We identified the "laws" of an effective discussion; listen to the speaker, respond to their comment before creating a new idea, wait to speak until someone else finishes, praise each other for quality responses, just to name a few.  Having the students define these "laws" will help them take ownership and responsibilities for following them.  After practicing this whole group for several weeks you can trust that the students can follow the laws in small group, less supervised problem solving groups.

I begin and end many lessons with this strategies, and we talk about out strengths and concerns (YAYS, and NAYS).  This is very helpful when implementing cooperative learning structures, and follows closely with the responsive classroom model.  Using these problem solving/critical thinking skills will build an environment where students feel safe to ask for help from the teacher, but mostly each other.  This is easily demonstrated when using our personal laptops.  They share with each other more and more than raising their hand to ask the teacher. 

It is down to the last month and a half of school, and with that being said it is my relief that my class will carry these skills on to the third grade.  Luckily enough next year I will be faced with the same challenges of receiving new students who may or may not have had these skills introduced in their classrooms.  So I will continue to reteach the wheel in the hopes that more and more teachers begin taking baby steps to teaching these skills, so future teachers can focus on implementing this structure vs. teaching this structure.  I am eager to share these ideas with my team because I found out I will be in second grade again next year!  Yahoo, finally a year when I teach the same grade instead of jumping up a grade, and down a grade...No more yo-yo for me...I give that a YAY!



References:

Nicole & Donna.  21st Century School Teacher.  Retrieved from:

eHow Family.  How to Teach Critical Thinking Skills.  (2011)  Article Retrieved From:

Friday, April 15, 2011

Now is the time to begin!

Where do I begin?  Much like standards for students, these standards for teachers will help you know where to begin when implementing technology in your classroom.  My suggestion is to take baby steps!  Don't be overwhelmed.  Just focus on one standard at a time, and if at first you don't succeed, try again!  If you fail to plan, you will plan to fail.
http://www.iste.org/standards/nets-for-teachers/nets-for-teachers-2008.aspx

My first baby step was to begin with my students' interests.  I choose real-life examples that were motivating to them...GAMES!  I would introduce the content standard I wanted them to master, and found great interactive games we could all play together.  Normally I would choose a center rotation, but instead I found I had the "whole group" attention while they were working in small groups to complete games online.

Linking these games into my interwrite lesson plan saved me so much time, and the students were motivated for the drill and practice because I eliminated the need for paper/pencil tasks.  I started with an amazing website called http://www.multiplication.com/.  Here I found great interactive games, and videos that explained the concepts.

Start with these tasks first, and check back frequently because I have many more ideas coming your way.  Remember the key here is "less is more."  Once you develop an understanding and comfort with implementing technology, you will be more accepting for the rest I have to share. 

ROAD BLOCKS:  In the event you don't have an interwrite board in your classroom, or individual laptops, start with just a few computers.  Grouping your students into problem solving teams will eliminate the frustration of not having all of the technology you want to have.  You must be creative with what you have or don't have.  If you don't have any student computers, gather them around yours and show them the game.  Then instruct them that they are going to be creating a game just like the one they saw.  They can create story boards and plans for implementation (while secretly mastering the skill needed).

"Fear Not":  Fear not what you don't know, don't have, or can't understand!  Instead enjoy the opportunity to learn from others, create, and ask for help and understanding from within or a higher power.  You must be the leader of your own steps...and remember...BABY STEPS!

As you can clearly see this was my first blog, and I hope from my class at Indiana Wesleyan will teach me how to better express, and share the new technologies out there so we all can take Baby Steps together :)!

References

International Society for Technology in Education.  Nets for Teachers, ISTE Nets for Teachers: Advanced Digital Age for Teaching (2008)
      Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/standards/nets-for-teachers/nets-for-teachers-2008.aspx