Looking Back and Looking Ahead

Opening up to Technology

I must admit when I began my "Technology in the Classroom" course I was quite reluctant about having to take this class.   Although I  understood it's necessity, I found it intimidating.  Prior to this course,  I had used some tech tools to complete various assignments in my courses, such as google to search different topics and power point to create presentations but that was about the extent of my technology experience.   So coming into this class and being forced to use so many tech tools felt quite overwhelming.  But I am a person who enjoys learning new things, so I just jumped in and decided I  would make it a pleasurable experience.  After I decided to open up to the new tech tools being introduced I found so many of them very beneficial and extremely fun to do.  

My favorite tech tools

There were many tech tools I enjoyed using once I conquered how to use them.  I found some had very few instructions on the process of making the projects, such as Blabberize and Glogster, but I was able to find many video tutorials on YouTube for any tech tool I was interested in.  Although there were some I  enjoyed more than others.  One of my favorite tools to use was Thinglink, I truly enjoyed being able to creatively express my thoughts and knowledge on a topic in such a graphic way.  Another tool I was quite surprised that I enjoyed was Twitter.  I have always stayed away from social media sites, being a rather private person, I never liked being that accessible to others.  On Twitter, finding various educational professionals and organizations to follow was very educationally stimulating.  I found myself being on this site until the wee-hours in the morning, clicking from educational site to educational site.  I realized that this site could be quite addictive.  I eventually had to develop a separate log book to list sites I'd like to revisit at a later date.  This awakening to technology gave me the incite to realize that technology can and needs to be used in my planning, developing and implementing of curriculum, activities and projects in the classroom.

Technology Today

I've always found myself as a open-minded person, but this class made me realize that my own insecurities in using technology was not allowing me to provide the tools necessary for our 21st century students to expand and grow in a method in which they have grown up on.  Just as my own children have technology in their system (one is a computer programmer and the other just graduated in computer graphics), children today have grown up with these tech tools from a very young age (as soon as they are able to hold a cell phone).  To provide my students with a quality educational environment and curriculum, I must be knowledgeable and experienced in the tech tools that will allow their growth and learning to be done in a global classroom.

Blabbing on Blabberize

Blabbing on Blabberize

Blabberize is the third tech tool I chose to investigate.   Blabberize is an online service that allows you to take a photo or drawing and make it talk.  It's a fun way to enhance your photos and drawings.
It allows you to bring them to life.

Blabbing made easy

The actual process of making a blabber is relatively easy, once you know how to.  The problem with making one, is that they really don't give you much instructions.  My initial attempt, I found to be quite frustrating because they didn't tell you what to do with the various screens that came up.  To find out how to manipulate the Blabberize site, I went to YouTube and reviewed a tutorial on it.  After I completed the tutorial, the process was rather easy.   You first need to have a photo or drawing already loaded to your picture file or have one from the web that you want to use.  After you have loaded it to the Blabberize site, then you need to position where you want the mouth to be.  One large bubble with eight smaller bubbles are used to outline the mouth.  You just place your mouse over the bubbles and place them in position around the mouth area.  There is one final bubble at the bottom of the others that is used to determine how low you want the mouth to open.  Once the mouth is positioned where you want it, you move on to the next screen to record what you want to say.  Now once on this screen you have three ways to record - by your internal microphone, a pre-recording or by phone in.  The easiest way is to use the internal mic.  Now you just talk, check your recording and then save.   Now you have a Blabber.

Blabbing in the classroom

As an example of a blabber, I chose to use it as a homework reminder. a fun way to assure that the students remember their homework assignments.  If you have a wikispace site you can set it up so parents can also review what is required for homework.  This tech tool can be used to make several (eg. book reports, biographies) projects fun.



   http://blabberize.com/view/id/1092019

Working with Wordle!

What's a Wordle?

Wordle is a tech tool which generates a "word cloud" from text that you input.  The more you use a word, the more prominent it appears.  It allows you to alter your word cloud by changing the fonts, layouts, and color schemes.  Since your Wordle is derived from words, it should be obvious that it's use would involve language and literacy.

Wordle's use.

I found Wordle to be an extremely easy tech tool to use, you just type in the content you want and out pops a word cloud.

Wordle in the classroom.

My example of it's use in the classroom consist of taking a story(Just A Little Bit More) from a 1st grade reader and inputting the reading into Wordle.  The story line consisted of repetitive mention of the characters in the story.  I used the word cloud to play a character word find game with the children.  We used the Wordle as a "talking point" (discussion) tool.  (eg. Who do you think is the main character and who is the least significant character?)  I found that this same word cloud could be used to have the children find the verbs (action words) and then write sentences using those verbs.  With the Wordle the teacher has the ability to guide the word search in any direction the content allows and would definitely by beneficial in the classroom.

Just A Little Bit More by Ann Tompert

Tech Tools

Learning, Implementing, and enjoying Glogster!

Over the last few months I've been learning a great deal about various technology tools in my TIE300 course.  Some I liked and thought I might definitely use them again, others not so much.  For my course I was asked to choose three to learn, implement and reflect on there uses in the classroom.
My first choice is Glogster. 

What's a Glogster?

Glogster is an on-line multimedia poster tech tool.  Glogster allows teacher's to create private, safe virtual classrooms with safe logins and passwords.  They are able to design curriculum based projects where students can collaborate on projects and yet work on them independently at any time.  Glogster provides students a platform to express their ideas, artistic creations and display their knowledge with text, photos, videos, graphics, drawings and data attachments.  It provides an adaptable and innovative learning environment for students to independently express themselves regardless of their learning styles.  I believe this site allows students imagination and creativity to lead their learning.

Is Glogster difficult or not?

Initially I found Glogster to be a little confusing, there was very     little instructions.  But after playing around on it, after awhile I found it to be quite easy to use.  On the other hand, I found the embedding process was quite difficult and confusing.  Again there was little if any instructions on how to embed my Glogster to my blog.  I basically had to do it with the trial and error process.
As you can see I finally got it to embed but I couldn't resize it once it was there (due to my inexperience).  But it's there!

How to Use it in the Classroom.

As an example of a Glogster and it's use in the classroom, I designed a "Theme" bulletin board poster.  This virtual poster allows the teacher to post each week's theme, for parents to view what their children are learning each week.  The teacher is able to post the learning concepts, poems, songs, and activities relating to the theme of the week.  It also can have a home/school connection section to inform parents of activities to be done at home.  This could be very beneficial for those parents who don't have the opportunity to visit the school much but want to remain engaged parents.
I believe this interactive multi-media tool will be quite beneficial in the classroom.

http://carlarwilliams8.edu.glogster.com/the-five-senses-glog/