What will you create...

that will make the world awesome?

 I came across the following YouTube and was seriously inspired. Check it out!



What will you create that will make the world awesome?

Over-prepared Teacher

Although I do not yet know where I am teaching, who I am teaching, or what I am teaching, I am still slowly becoming obsessed with ESL lesson plans, activities, multi-media resources, and units. I have found myself surfing the web for hours, creating hypothetical lesson plans that may never get implemented because of my placement. In general, I've really begun to enjoy thinking up lessons that would (hopefully) help ESL students learn and enjoy English. My two current favorite websites are ESL Kids Stuff, which has lesson plans, flash cards, videos, and worksheets, along with Everything ESL. Everything ESL serves as a database to hundreds of other websites, specialized in certain age groups. This website will certainly come in handy once I know where my placement is.

Epiphany

Yesterday, as I was writing a paper for my TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) Course, I realized that I could be using this blog to help me accomplish and achieve my goals instead of simply fulfilling graduate course expectations. From this point on, you will see that everything posted on this page will be relating to my journey to South America in less than one year from now. Not only will I use this blog as a form of preparation, but I plan on also using it to share my experiences and adventures when I am teaching abroad. This can serve as a form of consistent communication for my friends and family, along with serving as entertainment and professional development for aspiring TEFL teachers.

iPad Integration

With technology quickly surrounding the teaching profession, I believe that it is important to keep up with how to exactly incorporate these technologies into the classroom. I, myself, have had trouble in the past navigating through blogs, wikis, and iPad applications. Luckily, some fellow teachers have noticed this breakdown and created blogs to help us turn these breakdowns into breakthroughs. Two blogs I particularly like are iPad Apps 4 School and Free Tech 4 Teachers. Both of these blogs are authored by Richard Byrne. Flip back and forth between these two blogs and you'll be a tech pro before you know it.

Diigo = Deal

After months of Arzt encouraging Diigo, I have finally taken the plunge, and must thank her! Since my last class with her I have continued to tell myself that the Bookmarks bar is enough and that Diigo is unnecessary. When I heard her suggest that we all use Diigo in this class, I figured there was no out this time, I'd have to check it out. What I've found is that it is really just a massive folder for work. As of now, I've only added minimal pages; however, I am looking forward to adding more! Here's My Diigo Page. Do you have any suggestions in regards to how to organize it further?

Peer Pressure Possibilities

I've created my Animoto! This Animoto will be used as a hook or introduction to our Peer Pressure Unit. Students will be reading articles about the negative effects of peer pressure as well as researching positive actions students can take to avoid peer pressure. We will be talking about drinking, drugs, bullying, and cyberbullying within this unit. Students will be participating in a cyberbullying webquest as well. In regards to the NETS standards, teacher standards that are met include digital citizenship and student learning. Student standards that are met include research and information and critical thinking. One aspect of the program that I was disappointed in was that I couldn't add everything I wanted to it! I guess that's part of the purpose of the Animoto program. Because of this breakdown, I have decided that I will make a supplemental SmartBoard slideshow of other areas of the topic I'd like to expose my class to. Hope you enjoy Peer Pressure Possibilities !



Try our video maker at Animoto.

RSS > Overwhelming?

I love the idea of having all of the sites you follow send you updates, but is this too overwhelming? I just set up my Google Reader and added a few sites and am already confused and overwhelmed. It's just too much! Especially when all of the information seems interesting and relevant to my life! I need help! How do you bloggers stay on top of everything streaming into you? How do you manage to still be productive? I'm not sure if I need to organize my feed better or what, but I'm in need of some help. HELP!!

Exposure Central

I must say that since I began taking this course, I have really grown as a teacher. Not only have I explored various teacher and classroom blogs, but I have already made the connections (even if it is just following a site/blog) that will continue to help me grow as a teacher in the future. With the upcoming year filled with firsts (including teaching in Argentina), exploring the net and the blogging world has only helped with my endeavors. I've diigo-ed many useful ESL sites along with begun following a classroom blog in Argentina! Just goes to show that the internet really DOES have everything!!

Animoto-ing Real Issues

I've found that many of the Animotos I've viewed were light and "fluffy". Many include cartoon characters, wording, or songs. I've decided to take a different route and create a statement piece on the power of peer pressure; our next sixth grade unit. One animoto that has given me many ideas is this Civil Rights animoto. Check it out! Another example is below!!

Global Friendships

I found the online article, Online Collaborative Inquiry, extremely informative for the 21st century teacher. Not only did it state numerous statistics measuring how the technological classroom has been proven to be more effective in teaching, but it also recommended and discussed numerous ways to incorporate technology into the classroom. One quote that I believe sums the whole article up is, "Students should not be mere consumers of technology. They should be composing and creating effective communications with the tools to develop advanced literacy skills." The author of this article explains that we need to teach students to build relationships with others through posing and solving problems collaboratively and cross-culturally. She wants educators to design and share information for global communities in order to meet a variety of purposes. I think this author is right on the money. We need to make sure that the technology we use in the classroom has a real meaning, not just using technology because it's there. Technology can be used as a bridge to other classrooms, communities, and cultures. 

Here are a couple of great ideas for today's technological classrooms.

• The Global Read Aloud
• This read aloud is completed by more than 30,000 teachers and students yearly. Classrooms across the world read the same novel within a five to six week span. As they read, classrooms communicate with others through blogs, wikis, twitter, skype, edmoto, kidblog, and other tools.
• Quad Blogging
• This blogging system sets your classroom up with three other classes. Each week, a different classroom is in the "spotlight" with the other three classes commenting on that class's blog. This assures that blogs are constantly being viewed and commented upon.

Animoto Intros

After watching many, many, many animotos, I've come to the conclusion that animotos can be used for virtually anything. As a middle school special education teacher, I have been hesitant in creating animotos for my students. Animoto obviously cannot be the main form of instruction for my classroom. With the wide array of ability levels and personal preferences within my classroom, I was unsure where to begin or what to focus my animotos around. Now that I have viewed various animotos, I feel as though they would best be used as an introduction to a unit/hook to a lesson. By creating an animoto with stimulating pictures, key words, and questions, I feel as though it could work as an engaging introduction to any unit. 

Teachers Teaching Teachers

When exploring the web for classroom blogs, I found that there are equally as many classroom blogs as there are "teaching" blogs. What I mean when I say teaching blogs are that many teachers are posting their instructional strategies, struggles, and successes through blogs. When investigating these blogs, I found that many teachers are doing exemplar work within their classrooms involving technology. One blog I definitely recommend all teachers to take a look at is Tech for Teachers. Not only does this blog give information regarding classroom blogging, but also talks extensively regarding iPads in the classroom, progress monitoring, student engagement, and how to check website validity before sharing sites with our classrooms. It seems to me that the major setback for most teachers is actually getting the technology into the classroom, not actually using it. So I pose this question. How can teachers be proactive in getting the latest technology within their classrooms?

Technology Within Technology

Richardson's chapters three and four only reinforced the idea that we need to expose our students to technology in the classroom. It also reinforced the idea that blogs and wikis can be easily and safely implemented in most classrooms in a variety of ways. I, myself, was hesitant at first to implement a blog within my classroom. Especially being special education, I wasn't sure if it would be successful at all. After reading Richardson's chapters and browsing the web for ideas, I can confidently say that my classroom blog is a success. Some of the classroom blogs that I found particularly engaging and productive were Mr. Avery's Sixth Grade Blog and Ms. Chaffey's 3/4 Grade Blog. I found that both of these blogs incorporated other technology within their blog, which only strengthens the educational use of technology in the classroom. What do you think?