Experimenting with a Flipchart, 12.11.12

I uploading a powerpoint and made adjustments which did take some time.  The next day I conducted a review with my class and had at least 3/4 of the class come up to the whiteboard to write, circle something, underline by answering a question.  It seemed a little out of my comfort zone because it seemed chaotic but my students loved it.  Most of them had NEVER done anything like this before.  I will do something like this again as my students liked it but I think I need to make it more technologically enhanced as I feel the graphics and what I had my students do was simplistic.

No more Lemonade Lesson Plans, 12.11.12

I viewed the keynote by Kevin Honeycutt and came away with his comment about "we need to stop doing lemonade lesson plans".  I really liked how he was very excited and motivated about his job! His students seem very, very excited about school.  While these are middle school students I would be amazing to recreate something like this at the high school level.  As I have utilized technology in the classroom I have been recreating new lesson plans and I have gotten rid of the lemonade lesson plans.

BYOD, 12.10.12

This video highlights Carson Middle School's B.Y.O.D. policy.  I am a huge supporter of this program but I do think that more needs to be done in our local school district to fully utilize and embrace this policy for our students.  Some amazing points from the video include  1) Having students register his/her device with technology.  While this may already happen and be monitored I think that this extra step, which could be done at various times throughout the year, could be an opportunity to reiterate school policies and rules and teach students how to log into the system. This could easily be done at the high school during 5th period on early release days.  Second, the comment that if students are not bringing in their own devices that the school district provides the device for this.  This is a policy that Lindbergh schools implement as soon as possible.  For the past five years we have had access to the same number of computers in a shared departmental computer cart and the need is greater but the number of computers is staying the same.  More and more teachers are using technology in their classrooms which is great and speaks directly to our technology department, but the availability of the computers is low.  While the B.Y.O.D. policy has been in place students are limited in access when only their smartphones are being brought to class.  The majority of my students are only bringing in smartphones but tablets, ipads, and laptops would greatly enhance learning. 

Adding to Pinterest, 11.13. 12

It should be no surprise that I like Pinterest.  I have found so many ideas that have helped mainly with my children but I have not been impressed with specific classroom content. I want to have a rotating board that would fit with each unit of study.  I am in the process of creating a board for my next Unit on African Americans and I will be pinning very useful sites for my students. Then I will put the board on my class blog.  At the end of the unit, I plan to assign students to explore and evaluate my pins, plus they must add at least a few of their own. 

What can Students do with Ipads? 11.13.12

Wow! I bookmarked this article for later use.  One of my biggest challenges with technology is movie making.  I tried a video creation project this year and I was very disappointed with the results.  I need specific ideas on improvement and this article provided me with them.  For many of my students I need to be the expert and by creating several, not one, video example will help my students use technology that many already have.  While these specific examples were for English, this specific activities can be used for ALL subjects because isn't the goal to have students learn the story of our subject. 

How to learn from your mistakes? 11.13.12

What a dynamic teacher Diane Laufenberg is!! I got many ideas from her talk:
1) We do a family history project in our immigration unit.  I like the visual timeline that she did at the begining of her talk and she included them again at the end of her talk.  This would be an amazing thing to include in a family history project for student.  Instead of my students doing a traditional paper, they can get family photos and present their family history in their words (voice.)
2) I also appreciated the learning process that she demonstrated that her students and her talk out loud about their presentations.  My students did video projects and that activitiy would have been very beneficial to use in my classroom.
3)  She makes an excellent point that we need to rethink how we teach our students because the focus isn't getting them the information but it is how to get them to interact, learn, and process the information on a higher level. 

Student Devices, 10.22.12

I have had, like the district,  a BYOB policy that I have really pushed this school year with my students.  Unfortunately my students have not taken advantage of this policy, at least not for educational purposes.  I want to make it possible for a student to go 100% virtual if he/she wants to.  So all of my testing is online and assignment sheet are posted on moodle and/or the class blog.  For the 1st quarter we have covered 3 units on the economic history of the United States.  Students are given a paper packet at the beginning of each unit that students will turn in at the end of each unit. This packet has all the materials needed for class, while it makes me and the class more organized, it really doesn't do anything for technology integration.Students are encouraged to use their devices to take notes, but most don't.  Out of 145 students, only about 10 actively used a device in class.  While I am showing you tube video or prezis the class is not utilizing technology.  So to encourage more technology use by my students for the 2nd quarter, each student will get a digital copy of the unit packet.  A student must REQUEST a page copy of the packet.  I am hoping that this will encourage students to use devices on a daily basis. In addition, students that are absent do not get the work from me, but instead he/she must scan the QR code and check out class blog and/or moodle for the work.

21st Century Teacher, 10.22.12

Yes I am writing this in the last possible time but I have really been thinking about this question.  I feel like I have been frustrated with technology lately.  Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love what Lindbergh has done to promote technology in the classroom, but I feel like our students and parents are lagging behind.  The notion has been that students today know more than we do about technology and in many cases they do; but what I am finding is that most students don't know how to use technology for the classroom.  My frustration lies from the technology that I am offering my students in the virtual classroom are not being utilized.  My facebook page, class blog, and chat rooms are rarely being used by students.  The daily QR codes are rarely being scanned unless a student is absent.  So the challenge for teachers today, myself included, is to teach all students to use technology in the classroom to be more efficient, to go green, and to actually learn the content through technology.

Technology in the Classroom, 10.8.12

Very interesting video of the way technology is changing the classroom. I loved the visual image of the printing press. As a history teacher I have always wanted to be in the middle of a revolution and we actually really are in one. Two items that stood out to me were: 1) the bell schedule becomes invisible 2) Teacher is not doing one's job when he/she doesn't teach students about 21st century technology skills. 

This just reinforces how important technology is in the classroom.