OMG! It's December!

I can't believe that it is December! This entire semester is almost over and it's gone by so fast. I've been working with Drew and Jenny on transferring a lot of the curriculum lessons into SmartBoard notebook form. It's been fun and a great way to see how each of us has gotten better and better at making each lesson. It was just a great idea to split up the lessons, otherwise it would have simply been too overwhelming. This website has some great lessons already made up and is a great tool to add to our daily lesson! :) We are unsure about posting these lessons b/c we are using images from the materials.... I think one funny thing that happened this semester is that we had our kindergartners make a video about our PBS system at our school, it was posted on Youtube.... and WE CANT FIND IT! Whoops! One thing I'm pretty impressed with is that my student teacher took the initiative and made up her own SmartBoard lessons! It's hard to imagine teaching without all these precious technological resources. I'm aiming to make more notebook activities for my students to use in the spring (when they'll have become more independent), and updating my blog much more often! :)

21st Century

I have already reflected a little bit about one of my lessons that was focused on students creating digital 21st century products. As I mentioned before, I had my students create glogster posters for our unit on writing and solving two step equations. Each pair of students had to write their own word problem and solve it both algebraically as well as using pictures.

As the students were working there were quite a few different issues that arose. Whether it was students having trouble signing in, using new software, or just having trouble getting the laptops to work. Anyways, throughout these difficulties I was a little stressed because it seemed like every one was having some kind of problem and I couldn't help all of them at once. Also in the back of my mind was I wonder what an administrator would think right now if they walked in...

With that being said, it did end up taking some students longer than others to finish, but they were all excited to finish and they even wanted to come in during their lunch to work. I will be honest there were some finished products that came out better than others, but all of my students worked their way through the project and I believe that the more opportunities I give my students to get familiar with glogster the better all of them will get!

I have attached some amazing work that my students were able to create. Please take a moment to check it out.

Thanks!

http://selenasaurus.glogster.com/glog-5354/?voucher=5b6bb27201f94458251b14b530ad826f

http://aurbina.glogster.com/Elizabeth-Urbinas-story/?voucher=5559bf2d75170b528c240c98c5e89e8e

http://mlerma.glogster.com/glog-1263/?voucher=1022861570b229ff339b2fd5b1651d94

Voicethread

Well, one of my goals this year was to learn how to use Voicethread. Thanks to Jon Fisher, I now know how. Jon and I recently did a project using Voicethread. We read a story in Story Town called Jamaica Louise James, and it is about a girl who "beautifies" the subway station with her art work. We both had our classes work in groups to create a picture that could be hung in a place to make it more cheerful. We then uploaded those pictures on Voicethread and had students read a sentence that they created about the picture using at least two Robust vocabulary words that we have learned this year. We have not yet, but will have each others class comment on the pictures and sentences.
Overall, I find Voicethread fairly easy to use. One problem that I had with it, and found VERY frustrating, was that when it came time to upload it on my blog, it would not let me do it. And yes, I was doing this correctly. I tried numerous times and eventually gave up and just cut and pasted the link in my blog. Oh well, I guess nothing is perfect!

technical difficulties

As I reflect over the year I realized i haven't reflected on my technology projects. It's been a difficult start for me because I didn't have access to my laptop for about 2 months. Now that i have it back I have been taking advantage of every chance i can ge to have student interact with the smart board.Stay tuned for some of the activities I've been working on.

Where is this year flying off to????

1/2 year almost gone. My room and my promethean board... What would I do without them? I love them. My kids love them. They can almost work it better than I do. During the past 2 weeks during transistion time, my students sneak up to the board and leave messages to me on it, draw on it, create using tools. When for some reason or another it stops working for a minute, a few of my students run to the computer and fix the problem. They love it as much as I do.

I have created rule flip charts for each of my blocks of independent work time. At the beginning of the block - I go through instruction and directions, ask for questions and then place the rule page up. The read and reread and go to work. It is wonderful. The students wrote the rules and monitor their and other behaviors. The rules list the consequences and the positive rewards for following the rules, thus when someone breaks a rule, there is no complaining or excuses.

I have started flip charts as an introduction and teaching tool for most of my subjects in science and social studies - I have begun to embed videos and activote exercises. These also become a study guide to review for a test.

I use it to make notes as I teach and save and then students can review by asking for my notes. It helps for students that are absent as I can print them off for the absent ones and it helps catch them up.

I have heard others say that they will not ever teach without one and would buy one if they did not have one.... I now fully agree! Have a good December!

Busy November

November is always crazy as I'm preparing for three winter programs! Technology is so great. I make short videos with pictures and words to accompany the songs and it really gets the kids engaged.
I have also done a little collaborative project with Jenny. I have engineered some of her math songs, removing vocals in parts so that the kids have to fill in without the singer on the cd. We'll let you know how the kids like it.

I have just finished a fall project with Mr. Fisher's class. We took fall pictures here in Center, my students collected leaves and made some leaf rubbings. My class also wrote fall poems which we posted on our wiki site along with Mr. Fisher's class. Mr. Fisher was very supportive in helping me out with this project. I felt like a took a big risk because technology and I do not get along. My class had a good time doing this project. It was very time consuming because of all the other things we have to do as teachers, but at the same time it was a learning experience for both my students and I.
Tita Martinez
Haskin Elementary