Twitter in the Classroom

This article is called: Have you Tweeted Today?
By: Diana Fingal

Twitter has proven to be a very useful online communication program. At the beginning they pretty much shot themselves in the foot because they made it look like a gossipy pointless program. Who cares that john just at a pb and j? Well, for educators, this program is actually really helpful. If implemented correctly it would be like an all-day professional development. We could have constant collaboration, we could have instant feedback from our teams on how to carry out lessons, and we could instantly share what we've learned at a conference. Teachers would be instantly informed. It is even a cool way to share any "a-ha" moments that may have happened. Teachers and administration alike need to get with the times. We need to be-come more tech savvy and in the know about media that our students are utilizing. By doing this we can reach and connect with them on a more effective level. You can follow education experts on Twitter and learn from their links and their conversations. You can ask them questions and get responses without even meeting the person. Many teachers complain that they do not have enough time in the day to add another program. I feel that the pros greatly outnumber the cons though and the more you do it the better you get. Once you become good at it, chances are that you will be addicted.

I would definitely love to use this program in my own classroom. I think that it would be so helpful if all teachers at your school was signed in and collaborating all the time. This would also be helpful to have the students following me from home. It could be like a mini-blog that would explain what happened I class and what homework or announcements needed to be said. It would also be a fun way to keep in touch with old classes. Twitter also has a nice tool that lets you write a message directly to someone. If the parents want to talk to me or I need to bring up something to them I can just direct message them. This is very helpful because I could have on-going mini conferences whenever possible and would probably end the need for teachers and parents to make appointments to meet.

Internet Safety

This article was called: Resources Abound for Setting Up Internet Safety Programs
By: Jennifer Hanson

I was very excited to read this article about internet safety because we were just talking to Professor O’Connor about it in class.

This article was mainly different ways to teach internet safety to kids. There were some very good ideas such as: call up local law enforcement, use parent organizations, ask high school leadership programs, or work with district resources.

Calling up your local law enforcement is helpful because they may be willing to send out an officer to talk to your class or school. They probably have someone specially trained to speak about Internet safety for students. “Having law enforcement and teachers present together reminds students of the importance of staying safe online.” This would also be a great opportunity to talk to the students about civil service jobs like police officers and fireman.

Using parental organizations would defiantly come in handy because parents can be trained to present to other parents in the community. Creating a group of trained parents promotes community involvement and classroom involvement.

Asking high school Leadership programs to help out is a good idea because it gives the high school kids a chance to interact with elementary and middle schools aged children. They can act as a teacher and spokesperson for responsible Internet behavior. This also gives them a great experience as a role model for kids.

Creating partnerships with your district departments makes sure the message to students happens frequently and in a variety of different contexts. This also gives your whole district a sense of unity and relief to know that all of their kids know how to handle any problems that may occur. This may help to ease up on the strict rules the district implements on what sites kids can visit.

I would defiantly use some of these resources in my classroom. The article was written to show the steps on how to loosen the hold the district has over the internet in the school but I think that teaching your students internet safety is important no matter what. Just because the district restricts certain websites at school does not mean that the kids can not get to these sights at home. Teaching internet safety would help your children to be safe wherever they are. I really like the idea of having a police officer come to my classroom to talk. This would be such a cool experience for my kids. They would learn about internet safety and about being a police officer. Then I would have them write about what they learned, what they liked the best, and what they might want to be when they grow up.

Using Graphic Design in the Classroom

Article: Graphic Design Online
Author: Jill M. Olthouse

This article was all about on-line creative programs. Normally, if a classroom wants to edit photos or do anything artistic via the computer they would have to spend a ton of money on Photoshop or Fireworks programs. Most teachers, sites, or school districts do not have enough money to spare to pay for such expensive programs. Jill Olthouse has found a free way to do this. She has found some web apps that are free that will do the same jobs for students. Web apps are computer programs delivered online. With these apps students can go online and get started immediately. The good thing about these programs is that children can exercise their creative minds and get their creative juices flowing. This may help them later in life if they decide they want to get into a career like graphic design. This article goes in depth on which apps do what for which students. That is very helpful because if I were to use these programs in my in my own classroom it would help to know what program to use and who can use it. For example, the National Art Gallery’s NGA Kids Arts Zone is an online laboratory of artistic exploration where students can play with art brushes and paint, collage design, 3D objects, and kinetic arts.

These programs are very important for all children. Art in education is a very important thing to have. Children need to be creative as well as book smart. These apps enhance student creativity while meeting national arts and technology standards. I would love to use these programs in my own classroom! For a lesson I think I would have them make a masterpiece of their own, on any of the apps we will have learned how to use, and then write a story about it. This would bring a Language Arts aspect to the art. Hopefully the kids will have so much fun doing it and be so excited to tell us about it that they wont even realize they are learning!

The Best Education Tools

this artical was called: What is Your Favorite Ed Tech Tool? By: Paul Wurster

I really liked this article because it pretty much summed up most technology that can be used in the classroom. The main point of this article was to see what types of technology people think are the most important to have in your classroom. The options were: internet tools such as e-mail and search engines, general productivity tools such as word documents or power points, interactive whiteboards and projectors such as an Elmo, Web 2.0 Tools such as blogs or Facebook, or portable devices such as laptops and I-pods. When polled, the majority of people chose internet tools and resources. The overall feeling on this was that without these basic aspects the rest would not function correctly. We have come into an era where it is odd to imagine a classroom without internet access. I found this pretty funny because my mother is an elementary school teacher and she fought off technology for a long time before finally embracing it recently. The second highest group chosen was general productivity tools. This makes sense from an upper grade point of view, because without word documents or power points how would a teacher lecture? But even in the elementary grades these products are very useful. The other categories were all close for third because many people cannot dream of living without any of this technology. Pieces of each category all add up to make a classroom thrive.

I believe that I will be using much technology when I am a teacher. I really enjoy using the Elmo with my kids already because I feel like it gives them a sense of interaction. They are not just listening to my voice but also watching me demonstrate it or write it on my own paper. This also seems to help some children to follow directions because if they get behind they an just look to see what I have done on the projector. I believe that i-pods are also becoming more useful. I would like to add music to my everyday classroom life and I really like the idea of storing it in my I-pod so that I am ready to play it whenever I want. Dealing with many CD’s is a hassle. All of the items I learned about in this article will come in useful in my own classroom and will help my children to grasp the ideas at hand in any way they need to because it is very important to cater to all different types of learning styles.

Students Chat with Authors Via the Internet

Chatting it Up Online: Students Talk to a Favorite Author, By Pamela Livingston.

I found this article to be very helpful. It was quite interesting to learn about this topic because I had no idea people could even do this. Speaking to authors via the internet is a very smart concept for the classroom because it gives the child another opportunity to become involved in their own learning. The concept of instant gratification for any young reader is fantastic! What better way to get our children even more excited to read then actually being able to discuss the book they just read or any of their favorite books directly with the author? It was really cool how the author wrote specifically to the child when she was answering their question. It must have been a truly unforgettable experience for those children. This experience could open up doors for some children that never considered writing before. Making the author accessible to young kids might show these kids that it is not impossible to write a book and that reading and writing could be a career or hobby for them later in life. Even now as a college student I think it would be a super cool experience to be able to talk directly to a well known author. I think that this experience will stay with the participants forever, concreting their love for reading and enticing them to try out writing as well.

If I were to ever put together one of these chats in my own classroom, this article would be very useful. There were a lot of very useful ideas while doing this activity that other teachers may not have thought of until it was too late. It would be very wonderful if every district was as helpful and supportive to their teachers as this district was. I think that if I were to improve this technology at all, I would add a face to face aspect instead of just typing. If the author was connected to a webcam so that the children could se her or him as well as reading their typed words, it would enrich the experience that much more for them. After the chat I would probably have my children do a quick writing assignment on whatever their imagination cooked up. I might also have the children write out answers to some simple questions like what their favorite part was and how the experience made them feel. This would be a nice reflection for them and a nice thing to show their parents about what they learned.

The ISTE NETS for teachers and students includes NETS-4.