Symbaloo Website for Masterpiece Project

Well, I created the website for the masterpiece project and now we are diligently working to add sites to each strand.  Dr. Heigle had mentioned adding guidance for the sites so that parents and students would know the function of each site.  I am not sure about how we could do this.  Any suggestions?  There are going to be many sites and I am unaware of any way to add information about sites on Symbaloo.  I will keep everyone posted.

Here is the link to the site: http://www.symbaloo.com/

Masterpiece Project and Google Docs Discussion

I was so excited and proud of myself for creating a smaller discussion group on Google docs for our masterpiece project.  I have said this many times before, but it seems that every week I learn how to do something new with technology and I am becoming very proficient in using different tools.  I just spoke with Jason and it seems that we have decided to create a Symbaloo site that includes all of the middle school science strands.  We are envisioning a site that has resources for both parents and students that can be used by all middle school students.  I am soo excited about creating this site and being able to provide this to my incoming 6th graders and science team members.  Since I am more familiar with Symbaloo I will be setting up the site and both Jason and I will be working together to add simulations and high quality websites.  I will keep everyone posted through my blog.  Let me know if anyone has suggestions about making this Symbaloo for our masterpiece project.

Symbaloo and Weebly

I haven't blogged for about a week, but I have been busy working on the projects for my two classes.  I wanted to write about the success I have had with using two of the web 2.0 tools that I learned about this quarter.  For my teacher leadership class I was assigned an action research project and decided to incorporate a web 2.0 tool into this project.  I had my team at school complete a survey monkey to show a need for a common website that we could all use and add to with our favorite websites.  The team agreed that this would be a great idea and I started the Symbaloo website.  Here is the link to the website: http://www.symbaloo.com/

The other web 2.0 tool that has been a huge success is the weebly website that I created for parents and students.  In just one week I have over 100 hits to my website!!!  The parents and students have found it helpful to have the plan for the week posted to the site along with the homework information.  I have discovered weebly to be very user-friendly and have suggested it to many of my colleagues.  Well, that's all for now!

ISTE Article: Save the World with Web 2.0

I enjoy reading the ISTE articles because I gain a wealth of information from them.  I decided to read the article titled “Save the World with Web 2.0” in the November issue.  The article first explained that students can use the social web 2.0 tools to participate in our global society.  Experts then discussed the five problems facing global citizens today and asked teachers to help students with these problems.  According to the article and Neil Postman, global citizens need to improve on stewardship, spirituality, democracy, diversity, and language.  For each of these five categories a panel led by Walter Parker created six questions that global citizens should try to meet.  Two of the questions that stood out to me include:

1.  How should we balance the right to privacy with free and open access to information?

2.  How should we develop shared global values while respecting local values?

The article then went on to provide examples of how teachers can use web 2.0 tools to promote these categories and questions with their students.  Since I am a science teacher I enjoyed reading about how teachers can incorporate Earth stewardship with their students by having the students read and comment on blogs, such as, the “Green Thing,” “Groovy Green,” and “Daily Green.”

I thought this article presented a lot of great information, but I think the suggestions may be too high level for my 6^th graders.

Dan Meyer: Class Needs a Makeover (TED video)

I enjoyed watching this video as I am certified to teach math, but do not teach math in my current teaching position.  I agree with the speaker, Dan Meyer, that many math students struggle with math reasoning and being patient problem solvers.  Dan included 5 symptoms of students that tell teachers that they are teaching math reasoning wrong.  These symptoms include:

1.  lack of initiative
2.  lack of perseverance
3.  lack of retention
4.  aversion to word problems
5.  eagerness for formula

Dan went on to explain in his lecture that teachers need to take textbook questions and turn them into questions that promote math reasoning along with patient problem solving.  Dan also stated that we need to insist on better math curriculum for our students and include the following five suggestions into our teaching to help our students be better at math.  Dan's suggestions are:

1.  use multimedia
2.  encourage student intuition
3.  ask the shortest questions you can
4.  let students build the problems
5.  be less helpful

What a great informative video and captivating speaker!

I just made a new Voki. See it here:

Do Web 2.0 Right

I have been so fascinated by all of the Web 2.0 tools that I have learned about so far in our technology class and I wanted to read an article about how to better incorporate the tools into my classroom.  The article I read was about a study that was done to see what teachers have found to be effective when using web 2.0 tools, such as, blogs and wikis.  Most teachers have found that is best to use the 2.0 tools as a daily practice instead of using them for a specific project.  It is important to note that the tools were not used the same way that adults would use them in the “real world,” but instead were used for communicating and sharing ideas.  The article then went on to talk about individual and classroom blogs.  It discussed that having a blog that was private between the student and the teacher seemed to be best.  However, classroom blogs proved to be effective when used to explore prior knowledge and /or generate interest in a topic.  Lastly, the article explained how essential it is that students understand to display appropriate behaviors when typing on a blog or wiki.  It is the goal of the teacher to strategically set up strong in-class communities for students to share ideas and respond to others.

Thought this was a great article and I just wanted to share!J

Here is the link to the article in the “Learning and Leading: With Technology”:

http://www.learningandleading-digital.com/learning_leading/201102?pg=1&pm=2&fs=1#pg12