My family, my job, friends, my home, living in the USA, yummy food, holiday traditions, my sisters, the internet, cars, my husband, my children, awesome co-workers, KU basketball, public education, books, coffee, learning new things, summer, fuzzy socks, yoga pants, my church, chocolate and so much more!! I am truly blessed! Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!
Google is great. I've always been a huge fan of it. As this school year progresses I'm realizing the full extent of its awesomeness. Up until a few months ago I thought the main purpose for using Google was to call people on their "bull". Google really is the ultimate fact-checker; someone makes a sketchy claim, "I'm Googling it!" Seriously, why do people allow random things to fly out their mouths without thinking about it first? Well anyway, turns out you can do loads of cool stuff with Google! I'm still pretty new to all of the wonderful things Google has to offer, but this year my school district switched over to All Things Google. Bye bye expensive Microsoft Office, hello awesome free stuff. So aside from the basics of Google documents, presentations, sheets and forms (which are pretty much identical to Microsoft, but thousands of dollars less for a school district), you can like, add stuff to them that makes it EVEN BETTER!!! I know, this is for real, I promise, I'm not pulling your leg, you can even google it if you want to!
So, about 2 weeks ago I had a student ask me, "Mrs. Dean, do you think Google is taking over the world?" I'm sure you can already guess what my response was! :) Ok, so now that you've "googled" it, let me tell you some examples of how epic Google can be!
With google drive, you can share any document, spreadsheet or presentation and turn it into a collaborative piece of work. Google "add-ons" for any of the google tools allows you to create anything from movies to cartoons! After browsing some of the super handy templates I found a lot of great resources for the classroom such as project/report starters, lesson plans, rubrics, and syllabuses. My students are your typical 21st century student, they want to create things, collaborate and share their work and ideas with their peers. Google tools for the classroom allows students to do all of these things and much more. Below are links to some great articles with ideas and tips on using Google Drive in the classroom.
This year I started using Google Classroom in all of my classes. I am now pretty much paperless. The majority of student work is done online and turned in online. No more excuses that "the dog ate my homework" or that they swear they turned it in, I must have lost it! I know the exact moment a student turns their work in. They can ask me questions about an assignment from home, or find out what they missed if they are absent. I am able to comment on student work and return it to them quickly and easily if it needs to be revised. Here is a video showing you how easy it is to set-up and use Google Classroom!
I. Love. Lists. I love making lists, reviewing my lists, and then checking things off. I am not an organized person by any means, but I am definitely a list person. So I was very excited to find several list creating websites this week while browsing through digital organizational tools. Remember the Milk and Thought Boxes are two great sites with to-do lists on steroids! Thought Boxes allows me to push my list making habits on others with great collaborative features to use with colleagues or students. And both sites keep track of my lists in one convenient place. As I mentioned before, I love lists, but I am not an organized person. Once, I had a student (who sits at the back of the classroom) come up to my desk, arm extended, holding a little yellow post-it note. As she approached me I got a quick glimpse of the note that was home to words like, "eggs", "butter", and "milk". The student said, "Mrs. Dean, I think I found your grocery list." I need organization in my life, I need tools like Thought Boxes and Remember the Milk.
Guess what!? I got an early Christmas present from my school district this week! I got an iPad!* (school issued and can be taken away from me at any given time) Although I know that "technically" this is not my iPad, I am super excited because it means that my school gets to pilot 1:1 iPads after Christmas break! Woot woot! So, all of the teachers at the Jr. High have been issued iPads to start working with, exploring and researching new ideas and lessons using the iPads, testing out apps, etc. We have a collaboration day scheduled for the 25th for all of the Jr. High teachers to get together share things that are "share-worthy" and learn new ways to use the iPads in the classroom. The goal of course (and the reason I have an iPad before my students) is to go into the new year prepared to have students using their iPads as learning tools rather than just toys. The timing of this seemed to have coincided brilliantly with this weeks EDU 5312 topic of Digital Organizational Tools. I cannot wait to share these links with my fellow educators. Below are a few things I've put together, or discovered, that I want to show at the collaboration meeting on the 25th. The ChatterPix video would be a great way for students to explain a concept or topic (the one below is my cat Sophie and my daughter singing her favorite song, but I can see the educational value in the app). To create the cartoon I used the app "Caption Distraction", and again, I was just playing around, but I can only imagine the possibilities in the classroom! I also looked into PicCollage and I already have ideas for using that app, along with this example of a "ShowMe" presentation (this one is not created by me, but a great sample of what is possible with this app).
To conclude this weekly blog post, I want to talk a little about Google Calendar. My school has switched over to Google accounts, so it is surprising that no one is using Google Calendar yet. What a handy little tool to keep everyone on the same page. Every week there are at least 2 different meetings (IEP, staff, parent), school related events, teachers covering other teachers during their plan periods, etc. I typically find out about these things via email and then I have to search through my emails to remember what day/time the event is. I would love if my school could utilize a shared Google Calendar where all staff could write in school-related events. As I was creating my own Google Calendar for the week's assignment, I was shocked to see that Thanksgiving is just around the corner! Being a history teacher I always like to discuss the history of Thanksgiving with my students on the Monday or Tuesday before break and I am always searching for new resources to use on this topic.
And of course, as a visual learner I love infographics!
Well, on that note, I better start working on my Thanksgiving grocery list!
I'm really starting to get into this whole PLN thing! I signed up for a personal Twitter account a couple years ago, I didn't really understand or care for it much so I stopped using it. At the beginning of this year I got a new principal at my school who required every teacher get a Twitter account as a way to stay connected and collaborate. I find myself using Twitter all the time now and I have found so many great resources for my classroom. Click on the infographic below to check out a Beginners Guide to Twitter for Teachers.
I am really getting into Edmodo. I set up a group for my colleagues who teach in the same building as I do. It is my hope that we can use this site to share resources and ideas on ways to integrate technology into the classroom. I also see this as a place to discuss issues and brainstorm solutions. My favorite thing about Edmodo is having folders to collect resources. I am not an organized person by nature, so having online tools like Edmodo makes life much easier for me! It appears my district is going to a 1:1 initiative with iPads and rumor has it (fingers crossed) my school is getting the devices soon to pilot the endeavor. Here are some awesome links I placed in the group folder with ideas for using iPads in the classroom.
In discovering new PLN resources I have discovered some great lesson plans and activities as well. One of the activities I found was meme making. My students love memes. So I had them create their own Revolutionary War meme. Here are a few samples from students who finished today.
I love all things John Green. I love his books, I love his movies, I am obsessed with his youtube videos, and I love following him on Twitter! For those of you who do not know who John Green is, he is an American author of young adult fiction, he creates educational online videos (Crash Course videos), and he and his brother (Hank Green) video blog, or vlog. If you have not watched any Crash Course videos I would highly recommend checking them out and using them in class. Below is an introduction to Crash Course.
John and Hank Green call themselves the vlogbrothers. Their video blogs are short, 1-3 minute videos that are a great way to start a lesson or get a discussion going. You can find all of their videos on youtube at https://www.youtube.com/user/vlogbrothers. Some of the vlogs are just random updates on what is going on in their lives, but most of the videos are about a specific topic or current event. With election day coming up soon, I plan on discussing one of the greatest practices in any democracy -- voting! The vlogbrothers just posted a vlog that breaks down American's top ten excuses not to vote. This video would be a great way to begin a discussion over elections and voting in America. I came upon this video a few days ago on Twitter.
Twitter has been a great place for me to find resources for my classroom. Teaching at a small school means I have several preps each day. I teach two subjects, social studies and language arts, and I have 5 different lessons to prepare. I love finding new ways to engage my students in both content areas at varying levels. Twitter is the best place to find new ideas. Some of my favorite groups/people to follow are: @edconnectr, @edutopia, @DiscoveryEd, @TheCrashCourse, @johngreen, @GoogleForEdu
I also use Twitter to share ideas with my colleagues, this year I have a new building administrator who has required all staff get an account to be able to easily collaborate with one another. This week in EDU 5312 I explored ways to use Twitter as a professional development tool. I had already been doing this to some extent, but this week I increased the amount of time/effort spent searching specifically for educational purposes and I was pleased to find tons of amazing ideas to use in my classroom and to share with my colleagues. Check out this link to find TONS of great stuff for the classroom!
