Great SmartBoard Resources

I have been implementing the SmartBoard into 100% of my elementary math lessons and would like to report some experiences. It seemed to take the kids a while to get over the "wow" factor of the cool things we can do with an interactive whiteboard. Also, it takes a few tries to successfully write on the board for the kids, especially math problems, shapes, graphs, etc. But, after getting into the meat of the school year, I couldnt see myself teaching without one of these things. We now seamlessly go from taking notes, to seeing visuals, to manipulating numbers and shapes, to testing what we've learning without leaving the SmartBoard.

I've posted some lessons I've created on Central's website, and also would like to share some great web resources, where teachers from around the world have created SMART lessons for us to "borrow" especially created for standards-based interactive learning.

www.e-learningforkids.org
http://education.smarttech.com
http://technology.usd259.org/resources/whiteboard/smartlessons.html
http://eduscapes.com/sessions/pilot/pilotmath.htm
www.internet4classrooms.com
www.linkslearning.org
www.kenton.k12.ky.us/SmartBoard

Finally a great success

Well I made it through the day of the internet scavenger hunt and for the first time using the laptop cart I feel it was a 100% success!!! Finally. The hunt kept the students engaged and having them look for images and videos really worked. If you get a chance go to youtube and check out a video called Pythagorean Theorem - The Movie. It's hysterical. Also check out my class blog and read some of the comments the kids made. It seems the next great invention is flying cars!!

Internet Scavenger Hunt

Hi guys, just wanted to share an idea I had today. I am having my Geometry classes do an internet scavenger hunt on Pythagoras and the Pythagorean Theorem. There are about 10 questions on his history and I also ask the students to find a You Tube video. There is one called Pythagorean Theorem - The Movie, check it out it's hysterical. It stars Schwartzeneger and Matt Damon. I am also having them post on the class blog, tomasgeeimatree.blogspot
My first block class responded well. Check out the entries and respond as well.

3 months down....

Hey Global Learners!

As of next week, we will officially be 1/3 of the way the way through the school year. For those of us who are secondary teachers, we are preparing for a new term!

I thought this would be a great opportunity for us to reflect on the past three months and make goals for the next three (or six).

I know that each of us has picked at least one tool that we have crafted into our own and fit it into our classroom. I'm anxious to know what that is! How have you done this? What was the process like for you and the students?

I know that Dave and Joe sent out a survey to gain feedback...but I want the juicy details!

I think our group is fantastic because of our amazing collaboration, so I thought that this would be the best way for me to become better at something that I'm not yet trying.

Please comment or post on your blog and link back here on your experiences and plans for the future!

Thanks! Tonia

iPod as learning tool

I have used the iPod quite a bit this year. I have been experimenting a lot but not publishing much. However, I took the iPod with the microphone to our field trip the other day and published the resulting podcast on our blog. I used the field trip to reinforce a lesson on Lindamood-Bell's Visualizing and Verbalizing program. It uses structure words to prompt students to better visualize what they are reading. We have another field trip coming up. This time I think I will borrow a few more and hand them to kids to record as they go through the Colorado History Museum.

My reading group has been experimenting with recording the upcoming story and then burning it for our listening center. We have had problems staying focused long enough to have a good recording, but will keep trying.

Another thought is to use my class blog to have students reflect on what we learned this week in each subject. The iPod would be a great way for my lower students to post their reflections verbally.

Any suggestions for other uses?

Colorado Software and Internet Assoc. (CSIA)

So I took Dr. Miller up on the offer of attending the evening portion of the CSIA conference last week on Thursday. It was a good conference there were eductional sessions during the day (which I unfortunately missed) but I got to walk about the showcase were companies displayed their products. Here's a list of the companies I liked and what they did.

Acadium, Inc. has a system that combines TV, video phones, and GPS to create a live classroom.

Developing Minds has software serving developmentally disabled children that uses how the student interacts to direct and and adapt the learning for the student.

Kerpoof is an animation company where anyone can create art, stories and animated movies using a kid friendly interface.

Lijit Network, Inc. is a blog search engine. You put it on your blog and tell it which blogs you subscribe to and you and your readers can use it like an advice column where you type in a question and it pulls up information from all the blogs you've chosen to susbcribe to. Kinda like asking a author you've never met for advice or an opinion.

OpenWorld Learning long for OWL is building a network of peer teaching through technology. Several metro elementary schools are using OWL as an after school enrichment/reteaching.

TinyEYE Technologies Corporation enables Speech-Language Pathologists to use a head-set and webcam to connect to clients, caregivers, educators, and colleagues for consultations and therapy services.

With the exception of the last company all of them are Colorado Based. After the showcase was a speech from a Google VP (I didn't even know they had an office here), and he talked about the "9 Notions of Innovation."

1. Ideas come from everywhere
2. Share everything you can (I think the global learners are doing well at this)
3. A license to persue dreams (apparently google allows 20% of the employees day to persue their own interests which is where snowball and adsense came from)
4. Innovation, not instant perfection
5. Don't politic, use data
6. Creativity loves restraint
7. Worry about usage and users, not money
8. Don't kill projects - morph them into something else
9. Technology is no substitute for humanity

During the speech Tim Armstrong continued to re-emhasize that no matter the product you use, the main concern needs to be on the end user and how it affects them.

New Teacher Training - Clickers

Here's my plan for New Teacher Training Clicker Session.

http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dg4hqt7p_63w4jj5