I feel that I have a much better grasp on this now, as well as a plethora of resources available to find any information and tools I may need. It is important for learning to be seen as a continuing process, rather than a "drill and kill" where students are simply expected to regurgitate information. Students (and teachers) need to see the importance of collaboration and critical thinking in every day success. The use of technology can make these things much more efficient and meaningful in and out of the classroom.
I have definitely come down to the wire on getting the 23 things posted! Luckily, I did not wait until the last minute to actually try the things...rather have been "fiddling" with them all along the way. I have found the sheer number of resources (mostly free, by the way) to be almost overwhelming. Organizing them all has been a challenge, but I have a pretty good system worked out by now. I have tried to disseminate information to colleagues to the best of my ability, with some mixed results. The 23 Things module did give me a chance to experiment with reosources and tools in a non-threatening, self-paced way, which is very nice. I learned many many new things, and found some very easy ways to incorporate technology into my own classroom. I also found some great ways to share tools with others, which is kind of why I wanted to do the TIS thing in the first place. The ISTE standards include include the ability to: "Demonstrate creativity and innovation, Communicate and collaborate, Conduct research and use information, Think critically, solve problems, and make decisions, Use technology effectively and productively (http://www.iste.org/standards/nets-for-students.aspx)"
I feel that I have a much better grasp on this now, as well as a plethora of resources available to find any information and tools I may need. It is important for learning to be seen as a continuing process, rather than a "drill and kill" where students are simply expected to regurgitate information. Students (and teachers) need to see the importance of collaboration and critical thinking in every day success. The use of technology can make these things much more efficient and meaningful in and out of the classroom.
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The most memorable session for me from the Statewide Technology Conference was Anne Meadows's presentation of Brain Honey. Brain Honey is a free program that facilitates blended delivery in the classroom. Using Brain Honey, Teachers can incorporate the idea of online learning to enhance student access to classroom materials, visual aides, remedial resources, etc. The format can also facilitate classroom communication. Brain Honey is relatively easy to use, and once a class is set up it seems to be easy to maintain. I had hoped to schedule a training at my school and another school with Anne as the presenter so teachers could get an idea about online learning, but the year went to fast! I plan on re-visiting Brain Honey in the coming weeks and months and trying to incorporate it into the classes I teach and the ones where I co-teach. Anne had a lot of wonderful unformation, and is very easy to work with...hopefully she can still help us in the future if the other TIS I was working with and I decide to try the Brain Honey again!
The Twiddla took longer to finish than expected because of my "partner's" hectic schedule...But I needed some resources for water ecology for my science class...my husband teaches agricultural education, so I figured he'd have some ideas. He pointed me to a website from Annenberg Media. I have a screen capture below, which links to the session.
VoiceThread is a neat, easy, free tool that allows people to create their own slideshows to share with others online. Here is a voicethread that my daughter and I created together. A Day In My Life I have also embedded this into a blogspot blog.
I have always wanted to incorporate more "student teaching" into my classroom...and Mathcasts could be just what I was looking for. I have seen some impressive student podcasts/webcasts/etc on TeacherTube and have been curious as to the best way to approach trying these in my own classroom. Mathcasts is a webcast that provides a wealth of information about how to incorporate this activity in the classroom. There was also a link provided to a website with an abundance of ready-made mathcasts for use! Kim Caise, Peggy George, and Lorna Constantine were the presenters for this session.
Creative commons is a very easy way for people to "share" copyrighted material so that everyone can enjoy it! Flickr has a vast collection of shared images, videos, etc. This one, taken by Ken Colwell is just a sampe of the many flower photos available for sharing
I think that with the current trend towards distance/online learning communities, Skype really has a lot of potential in classrooms. I know that I would love to collaborate with other schools from around the county, country, and world. One application that might be good for using Skype to get teachers' feet wet would be simply using it to collaborate with another classroom in the building. For example, my husband teaches vocational agriculture and has much more knowledge about some topics than I do (say, effects of fertilizer types on plant growth, water runoff, etc)...my science class could have a Skype session with his classes when he is covering this topic to enhance my lessons on ecology, biology, etc...his classroom is way downstairs after all! Silliness aside, it would be an excellent, non-intrusive way for teachers to collaborate and build upon their own expertise
The county's acceptable use policy is here. The school technology coordinator maintains copies of the acceptable use policies on file. If a student does not have a copy in file, then they are unable to log on to the county server. If the class is working on a
I would like to have students inmy Science class use Twitter to research/find updated research on biodiversity and technology relating to maintaining biologically diverse habitats...as well as evolution and ecology in the past and future. They could find leading researchers to stay abreast of new developments relating to research and conservation of resources, and then blog about it or create an informative website.
We are getting ready to work on distance formula in Algebra, so looking for tutorials on TeacherTube has proven to be somewhat daunting...as there are so many! This one does a good job of breaking down the concepts...though the accent might prove difficult for some to understand the speaker....
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23 THINGS Amanda
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