History LiveBinder

All things History, a collection of great websites. Way to much to investigate in one sitting, but what I saw looked great --

Interactive History on LiveBinder

Here's another place to find a ton o' good stuff: iLearn Technology

http://www.seangrainger.com/

Finding a ton of great ideas here:

http://missnoor.visibli.com/share/SrZfJq

and here:

http://missnoor28.blogspot.com/

Voki Bear!

  ok, so maybe I've played around with these a bit longer than I should have, but I thought it would be a fun way to get my students creative and active on their blogs. Supposedly you can use your own voice and have the avatar speak instructions or lesson clarification.

Press play, and tell me what you think of my new accent!

Voki, as in voki.com       readthewords.com

World Panoramic Photography

http://www.360cities.net/

I'll finish this post when The Wife and I get back from Paris...

Mr. Nauton's Wildcats

Don't shut me down, Blogger, but I went over to edublogs for the classroom website, just seemed a little more appropriate and less apt to get me in trouble when the students start clicking "Next Blog"...

Any suggestions, besides change the darn ugly colors? Do students get anything out blogging? I'm thinking publishing, editing, commenting, internet safety, as well as a place I can post links of interest for them.

Learning is Messy

Great blog, this guy seems like just what I want to be when I grow up. His students are skyping, blogging, publishing, etc. Watch the Digital Learning post video -- very inspiring!

Learning is Messy
 

Vegetable Music: "In the Key of Carrot" *

Our music teacher, the oboe player, showed this video which led me to watch all the other videos -- rubber glove, potato, etc...

You are amazing Linsey Pollack, and I hope I can get the big video board working Monday to show 'em your stuff!

Which in turn led to other people playing vegetables as musical instruments. And why was I surprised there is a Vegetable Orchestra?

I'm thinking this would be cool for studying sound waves, when we'd also make those cool popsicle stick & rubber band harmonicas.

*not my line. sounds like something Bugs would say...

Reporting From the Front Line...

Shhhh... I'm surrounded. My first post from the classroom, live as learning occurs at this very moment ! At least, I hope so.

Actually, they're taking a test. I finally got the printer hooked up to this beat up old Mac I liberated from my former school (since I'm not in the system as a real official teacher yet I can't use class laptop or Promethean Board. ug. grrrr.) and I'm looking up material for topic sentences, research papers, etc.


This has been a useful site for essay stuff. So has this one.
And this one has samples for letter writing.  Purdue U's OWL never disappoints; I know it's college level and slightly over the head of 5th graders, but I don't want to shy away from higher level material. They've probably had similarly simple/corny letters for several years now. Or am risking losing them?

Uh-oh, gotta go. The natives are restless...

Just A Teacher

Certainly not "Just A Teacher" -- inspiring things to read.

Teacher Discounts

save a little sumpin' for yourself... check out BradsDeals.com

Tech4Learning

Check out Tech4Learning

They have it all covered -- blog, FB, apps, even cool usable images like this dude:

 

 

Room 21

An "Online Social Learning Platform" -- the District I'd really, really love to work for is starting to work with this -- has anybody tried it?

Go the "About" link for an introduction video.  I wonder if it;s used Sept through June or goes by the wayside 1/2 way through the year. What grades use it? Good intro to social networks for 3-5 grades?



no connection to Room 222?

The Children's Book Review

...website can be found HERE

ReadWriteThink

great ideas and calendar of historical events at Read Write Think

Math for Two Continents

...well, sort of.

Two sites to check out. One has me stressed out since I read that Math shortcuts are straight from the devil, but that's all I know and love about math -- shortcuts! tricks! ways to get out of actually doing the math!

Math for America

And the other is a great way to clear out extra books

Books For Africa

New Management

Went to a little seminar, an idea presentation I'd call it, by Rick Morris of  New Management .  Not a fan of the name, sounds too real estate or business, but definitely a fan of his philosophy and methods.  Maybe because mostly they fall right in line with how I want to run my classroom.  I remember one of my Master teachers used some of his ideas, but she ended up yelling often at her loud class, so I'm not sure...

I think a lot of my classroom management focus will fall under a few main tenets --

• Teachers* waste waaaaaay too much time dealing with classroom behavior, especially waiting for a class or specific students to quiet/settle down.
• A lot of time is wasted during every school day that could be better spent learning: too long to transition between subjects, classes, lunch & recess; behavior issues; Dairy Association** assemblies that last an hour attempting to teach 1st graders how a cow digests (4 chambered stomach!) when all they want to do is pet the calf and all they will remember is the cow pooping.  And the boy in the second row throwing up.
• Learning and Teaching are one and the same and everyone in the class is part of the process -- we will all learn together and from each other, and we will have fun doing it. It will be hard, it will be a challenge, it will be a lot of work... but it will be worth it.

I loved Rick's line "Teaching is like a crock pot" or something like that -- it builds, simmering and getting richer as the school year goes. Can't expect the perfect class by Sept 15th, right? And I firmly believe that we are not just teaching our students for our year but for the teacher next year (isn't it embarrassing to pass along poorly behaved students?) and for their future bosses, spouses, and children.

Now my challenge is to see how any of this stuff works out on a crowded noisy playground...

Anyway, check out the site, a bunch of instantly usable FREE stuff there, and the iPhone app is just plain cool -- get rid of those popsicle sticks!  I don't even have a class yet but I want one, I can instantly assess my sons for practice...


* I absolutely 100% include myself in this. Sigh...
** I love milk.

Classroom Management Tips

Rick Morris' New Management 

lots of good  little ideas!

Learn Me Good, Gooder, Best!

Another great list of resources from Learn Me Good , free educational games from Elementary up to HS, and they're usable with the interactive whiteboards -- I haven't checked them all out, 'cause I got sidetracked for several hours on the Professor Garfield site, playing games and listening to Mrs. P read to me...



 Speaking of reading, that is definitely one of the things I look forward to  if when I have my own class: reading a book to them, a long book that takes several weeks, a book with several voices and maybe a slightly scary and/or dangerous scene.  No matter what grade I get, they're getting story time!

Mrs. P's Magic Library

Classic stories, Masterpiece Theater style? Right now she's reading me Alice in Wonderland -- the intro was a little long, and I wish it showed more text and less actor, but otherwise a very interesting read-along option.

Anyone know of something like this in Spanish?

Mrs. P's The Magic Library

I found this link, believe it or not, on "Professor Garfield" -- as in the fat orange cat -- and initially thought it would be the usual silly games and cartoons that kids love to play on but don't really do anything educational. From scooting around a few activities though, I'd say they got this one right.  Great graphics, clear instructions, standards-based activities... the lasagna's on me, Professor Garfield, great job! 

Technology Should Make Ya Move!

As I sit here on my ever-widening rear end night after night, searching and reading and collecting Education issues, I am serving as a reminder of how I do not want my children or students to use the computer and internet: It, the computer-centered world, cannot be the be-all, end-all solution to anything, especially not Education.  A computer cannot be the means for engaging, teaching, researching, producing, and assessing (not to mention entertaining) students.  Yet I see in a lot of the work and ideas that herald computer technology as the only future for Education, and concurrently the only way to communicate with any person under 16 years old, the common thread of isolation, of a student linked electronically and wirelessly to teachers, classmates, and the means to receive, practice, and demonstrate understanding of knowledge.

I'm not merely railing against the video game generation that never sees a ball or bike touch real dirt, that's an old argument, nor am I hating on the texting/FB-ing addicts whose thumbs and phones are never separated.  But what I see online and out on the campuses seems to fall into two schools of thought regarding technology:

1. "We're a Technology school, we let 'em use computers!"  These schools/teachers are so hip and with it their students can use Word, then Google up some pictures to really snazz up the book report!  The advanced students that finish class work first, or the RSP students that "don't do" a certain subject, can play cool math games... What's the difference between my son sitting for 2 hours in front of the screen playing Zoo Tycoon and sitting for 2 hours playing Shoot the Geometric Shape?*
2. "We need to relate/connect/catch up -- we Twitter and Facebook and Text our students!"  The emphasis here is playing their game, communicating on the students' terms.  Assignments are available online, questions and answers relayed wirelessly,  entire semesters of work produced electronically.  Is my son demonstrating a mastery of the subject matter or of his ability to collect and merge the correct pieces? 

No Luddites here, I am all for the 21st century and beyond -- I just want there to be balance, a synchronicity between Wikipedia and the dog-eared paperback Thesaurus, between the video camera and real live actors.  Technology assignments should always try to incorporate movement, should have elements of other media involved.  For example: video science reports with real world demonstrations and on location interviews; text message or twitter scavenger hunts that involve reading maps, interviewing classmates, collecting measurable data; history research reports that result in physical demonstrations of knowledge, such as speeches, songs, or re-enactments. Many of these and other ideas can be found at Edutopia's Digital Science and Math Lessons .


* no, I do not let my sons sit for 2 hours playing anything.