Foto Flexer

I used Foto Flexer to edit a picture of a tornado.

Foto Flexer was fun and easy to use. I am interested to try out some more things on this website.

Education Podcast Network

I looked at some of the podcasts on the Education Podcast Network. It was interesting to see how many podcasts are out there! I really enjoyed the podcasts that were of children reading. I think my students would really enjoy hearing themselves on the computer.

Podcasting

I found a great podcast about the story, Where the Wild Things Are. This podcast had students reading the story to practice fluency. As the story was being read, pictures the students had drawn were being shown.

I think using podcasts in my classroom would be fun. I like the idea of having the students read a story and then listen to it. This would help them with fluency and I am sure the kids would love it too! I also think this would be a great tool to use during Science and Social Studies lessons.

I am just starting to explore all of the different podcasts. I am excited to see what else is out there!

Where the Wild Things Are

Social Bookmarking

I found this site very easy to use. I am sure I will continue to search for other websites to add to my bookmarks. I could use this in my class by searching for websites that would relate to a topic I will be teaching. It is convenient to have many websites all in one place. This will make using websites or information from websites for lesson planning much easier and less time consuming.

Here is a link to my delicious site.

http://delicious.com/ncordeiro

Document Sharing

I found learning about Document Sharing very interesting. I liked watching the video that we saw in class because it explained what document sharing is in very simple terms. Document Sharing definitely seems like an easier and more efficient way to work with multiple people on the same document. I wish I knew about Document Sharing when I was in graduate school! It would have made group projects much easier!

A way I could use Document Sharing in my classroom could be during a unit I will be teaching about weather. The children could each write a fact they have learned about weather on the same document. After each student added their weather fact we would have one document with many shared facts about the weather. This could be done at the end of the weather unit and it could be a valuable tool for me to see what the students remembered from the weather unit that was taught.

Also, I like the idea of using Document Sharing to write a story. I think the children would have a fun time adding to it. I am sure my students would love creating a story together and would love to hear it after everyone had contributed their idea to the document.

Photostory: Organisms

Photostory

I created my photostory using Animoto. I selected pictures of things my class will be exploring during our upcoming Science unit about organisms. I thought I could use this photostory as an introduction to the unit. During the unit the children will be able to plant seeds and observe how they grow. They will also learn about and help care for live guppies and snails. The photostory will be a good way to motivate students before the unit begins and will help them to understand what our unit on organisms will entail.

Here is the link to my wiki:

http://gradeone.pbwiki.com/

I found the video about creating a wiki to be very helpful. I had heard of a wiki before but never really understood how they were used. I do see how a wiki could be a valuable tool for educators to use in order to collaborate and share ideas. I also think it is a valuable tool for older students. At this point I am still trying to think of some ways a first grade student could use a wiki. Students at this age are at the emergent stage of reading and writing and I believe they need to be able to use these skills proficiently before they are asked to use them on a computer. Therefore, I believe my students could get the most benefit from a wiki through my use of them to gather ideas and lesson plans from other teachers that I could directly use with my students in the classroom.

Flowers

Trial Post: Week 2 Assignments

Assignment 1: Reflection

After reading a few of the articles about blogs I feel that I have a better understanding of how they could be used in a classroom. Even after reading these articles I still believe that the use of blogs would be most beneficial with older students. I teach first grade and students at this age level are at the emergent stage of reading and writing. They are learning how to type in computer class but I do not think their skills are at a level where they could easily type a post to a class blog. If I were to try and have the students make a post to a class blog I suppose I would have them write about a given topic and then retype what they have written onto the blog. For example, my class is starting a science unit on weather. During this unit the students write about their favorite kind of weather. After the students wrote their ideas down on paper they could transfer their thoughts onto the class blog by retyping what is on the written page. This would be rather time consuming but it could be a way to get my first graders blogging.

In the article, Blogging! It’s Elementary My Dear Watson I thought it was interesting that the article mentioned that students would write with greater attention to grammar, punctuation and spelling when they know they are writing for an audience and not just for their teacher. I do agree with that however, I think many students are used to texting and emailing and often use “slang” or abbreviations to quickly express their thoughts. I believe it would be important for a teacher to explain the importance of being mindful of their use of grammar, punctuation and spelling while posting their work and reflections on a class blog. Also, in this article I liked the idea of having a password to protect what is being published on the blog. This would help eliminate posting something that should not be on the blog.

The other article I read was entitled, Panelists: Blogs are Changing Education. This article made me realize that more classrooms are using blogs than I originally thought. It will be interesting to see how mainstream this becomes. It seems Billerica is just beginning to really implement technology into the everyday lives of teachers and students. It will be interesting to see where this takes us as a school system and how this will affect education in general.

Assignment 3: Link to my comment on a blog.
http://davidwarlick.com/2cents/?p=1677#comments