My Podcast

Violin Video

Trish Edwards' Podcast

My Brother's Wedding

Trish Edwards' Podcast

Technology Plan

For the rest of the school year my plan is to continue blogging with my students. I would like to post at least two blogs a month for students to respond to when they are not with their guided reading group. If I find I am having problems getting everyone an opportunity to post a comment, I will try to sign up for the computer lab. Then all the students will be able to blog at the same time.

I would also like to make more animoto videos for students on topic we are studying. I think these would be great for introducing a new topic to students and grabbing their interest. Another thing I would like to do is whenever we go on a field trip or have a party or special activity, I would like to make an animoto video. I then can decide if I want to embed them in my class blog and have the students write about the activity.

The students really seemed to enjoy recording their voices on voice thread, so I would like to use it with writing assignments. For example, we will be studying weather and butterflies. So, I could upload images about these two topics and let students record their opinion. Another activity is to have the students make pictures for the life cycle of a butterfly and then I could choose the best picture for each stage. Then I could have a different student for each stage record their voice. This would be great to use for the following year in order to introduce butterflies.

Now that I know I can use my Kodak camera, I would like to record my students doing different activities such as readers theater. I would like to also record my students doing the spelling activities we do in class. These are the same activities the students do for homework. It would great to link to these spelling examples on my class website. Then, if parents are confused they can view the pod. This spelling podcast would also be good to show at Open House.

Everything I create, I would like to share with parents at the end of the year and at Open House. This way they can see what we did all year and if it's the beginning of the year they can get an idea of what their child will be learning.

I just received an active slate, so I would like to use it every day. I plan to start by finding flipcharts on http://www.prometheanplanet.com/Promethean Planet.

More Voice Threading

In my second grade class, we made our version of the three little pigs. I put the class story on voice thread. Now I plan to put it on our class blog so the students can view it easily and blog about it.

Podcasting

I decided to make a podcast with my son playing the violin. I used pictures from my brothers's wedding this past May. Here are the two that I made: Matthew's Marchand Twinkle, Twinkle, Little StarI decided to create my podcast on podomatic. I tried to use their recording device, but I couldn't get it to work. It would play only 3 seconds back of what I recorded. So, I decided to try audacity to record. I first had to download it to my computer. It is much better than recording with podomatic. You have more options with audacity and can make it unique. When I used audacity, I had problems saving it. Finally, I figured out that when I was saving I had to go through the following steps: 1. export as a wave file 2. go to free cd to mp3 converter (which was already on my computer) 3. click on file and do wave to mp3 4. upload the mp3 file. Now, the first time I did this my podcast would not play the music on podomatic once it was published. I kept trying to redo it, but nothing would work. So, the next day I created a new podcast and rerecorded my son again playing the violin. This time it worked. So, again I tried to go back to my first podcast and redo the audio. It still wouldn't work. I decided to delete it and just start that one completely over.

I learned that I can use my Kodak camera to video and then I can download it onto podomatic. Here is my video of my son playing the violin. My first two episodes were pictures with audio.

Interactive White Boards

I found when using your smart board you can go to a web page and make notes and then they can be saved. A tutorial can be seen at Touch, Write and Save. Later you are able to pull up the screen page with your notes. This would be great to do when you are showing students how they can do research on the internet. For example, my second graders are going to be learning about Africa. I am thinking about having them choose an African animal, answer some questions about their animal and make their animal in it's habitat. So, this would be a great way to introduce the research project.

I looked up the price range of a smartboard and that they are pretty pricey. They range from $3400-$10,000.

I do not have an interactive whiteboard. I did just receive a projector and active slate, but I am waiting to get it hooked up. Once it is hooked up I would like to start using some of the flip charts from Promethean Planet. I found some flip charts that could be used for mini lessons during writing lessons. I downloaded these flip charts onto my flash drive, so I can use them once I am all hooked up. I found flip charts on Common and Proper Nouns, Capitalization and Main Idea and Supporting Details.

Animoto

After seeing how cute Animoto can turn out, I decided to try it out. I used the same pictures I used for my Fall Centers Photostory. Then I embedded it into my class wiki. On Monday I am checking out the laptop cart and I'm going to have the students post a blog about the fall centers after they watch the animoto video. I can't wait to see their reactions. They get very excited any time we use technology.

Voice Threading

I used voice threading with my students. Over the past few weeks we have been writing a lot about fall topics such as pumpkins and what do they like to do when it is fall outside. For the voice thread I chose a fall scene and titled it Autumn Activities and had the students write 1-2 sentences with describing words about what they like to do in the fall. I also had the students draw a portrait of themselves and used this for their identity. I recorded each child reading their sentences. I did not realize this would happen, but students noticed mistakes in thieir writing when they were recording. The quickly corrected their mistakes. This is a great proofreading exercise.

Photo Story

I created a photo story with pictures I took of my second grade class during fall center. I downloaded it onto a wiki page that I created. Click on Photo Story-Fall Centers in order to see it.

Assistive Technology

I have a student with diabetes this year. She has an insulin pump too. We just met with the nurse, who is only at school once a week too, two weeks ago to go over her diabetic care plan. The nice thing about the pump is it is suppose to be not as harsh on her body as insulin shots where there can be more extreme highs and lows.

Online Grade Books

I choose to sign up for engrade. I teach second grade, so we do not get to use the NCWISE online gradebook, which 3-5 teachers were just trained on. They are suppose to be able to use it for progress reports also. K-2 teachers are still required to send out the paper progress report every two weeks. Since I am not able to use NCWISE, I like having engrade as an option to record grades. When I taught second grade in Guilford County 8 years ago, I had an electronic grade book. We gave letter grade third and fourth quarters. I loved it because I didn't have to average grades. In Forsyth County, we do not do letter grades, but only determine if the child is above, on, or below grade level. So, we do not always use the traditional grades to determines a child's success. If I ever change to an upper grade level, then engrade will be very helpful.

Social Bookmarking

I have a delicious account. I was first introduced to it this past summer in a workshop. I use my account for my own use and do not share it with my parents. It is nice because I can be at any computer and pull up my bookmarks. Also you can share your bookmarks with others and use other people's bookmarks.

My Class Webpage

I have a webpage through my school.We have a program called School Center that we use. I use it to relate information to parents. It is also required by our school system to keep it updated.Before this class started, I did not have a lot on my webpage. I only had my front page with just a picture and Welcome to Second Grade! on it. I had a blog linked to my website, but there was nothing on it. I had not used it with my students yet. From this class I was able to see how I could use my blog and I started to play around with how my school website works. So I added several things to my webpage. I put information about what we have been learning and working on in class. I also have a calendar of events on the main page. I have created tabs for parents to click on with other information, so they don't have to scroll down too much on the main page. My tabs include: class schedule, spelling homework, class blog,science fair and handwriting. I am trying to keep updated what we have been working on in class and the calendar of events. I added for the first time a science tab. Since my school is a science school, the science fair is a big deal. So, I made some links for parents so they can start helping their child think about a topic they may want to do. The science fair is at the beginning of February, but it isn't too early to start. My goal is to have most of my students participate in the Science Fair. My goal for my website this year is to keep it up to date and add more useful links for parents. I would like to add some math links that deal with addition and subtraction fact practice.

Edmodo

How I Used EdmodoI decided to use Edmodo in my second grade class because Ning was blocked and Edmodo is a little more private than Twitter. When I went to use Edmodo on my classroom computers, I found that I had to download Explorer 8. Since I only have three computers in my classroom I decided to check out the mobile laptop cart. The downside was the technology facilitator had to download Explorer 8 and several of the computers would not accept it. In order to get ready for my lesson, I set all of my students up with usernames and passwords. I did not use any last names in order to protect privacy. I decided for our first lesson using Edmodo I would help them choose their avitar and their assignment was to write at least one sentence about the Revolutionary War. In Social Studies we have been learning about the Constitution and the events that lead up to the Constitution. This was all in connection with Constitution Day on September 17. I decided to have two students per computer. The students were very excited. Some a little too excited. They had a hard time trying not to press the keys for their partners. The other downside to the laptops is the students were not use to that type of mouse. That is where most of our problems came from. Once we finally choose our avitars they were able to type their sentence and send it to the class. They really seemed to enjoy reading each others responses and were complimenting each other out loud. Since most of our time was used explaining and setting the laptops up everyone didn't get a chance to type a response. I think next time I would like to try and schedule extra time in the computer lab, so everyone has their own computer. The only problem is I would have to download Explorer 8 on all of them. I would like to use this as a center during guided reading time where I post a question and the students can answer it on Edmodo. The other problem is the students were so excited they wanted to go home and try it out. They asked if they could send messages to each other. I told them right now it is for only assignments.

How I Use Skype Personally

I talk to my family in Ohio using Skype. My entire family and my husband's family are in Ohio. My brother and brother in-law have been bugging me to get on Skype for awhile. This class finally forced me to join. I should have done it a long time ago. It isn't as complicated as I thought it would be. My brother came to visit a few weeks ago and his wife was in Japan at the time. We were able to talk to her using Skype. She tried to show what it looked like outside her hotel window but it was dark and we were not able to see anything. I like how it makes me feel more connected to my family.

How Other Teachers Use Skype

I found a teacher who used Skype to promote community. This particular teacher had just found out that they were getting a new student, but this student would not be present at school because she had leukemia. The teacher decided to connect with the student through Skype. The students in this class made a video about how they communicate with their homebound classmate.

Skype

I am able to use Skype in my classroom because I attended a workshop on it through my school. When I first tried to load it on my computer access was denied. I found out that I have to have the Technology Facilitator load it for me. I was able to get her to do that for me, but she told me the school does not have any video cameras, so I decided to purchase one. My second grade class was planning to Skype with a fifth grade class. The fifth grade teacher may only have a microphone, so we may only be able to hear the fifth graders. Since second and fifth grade study weather, the fifth grade teacher and I thought it would be a good idea to buddy class together.We will also be integrating Social Studies into our lesson. Second grade studies Kenya and Japan so we will find out about the weather in those two countries from the fifth graders. It will be an introductory lesson for the second graders on weather and it will be a review for the fifth graders. The fifth graders will read a story to the second graders about clouds and the second graders will ask the fifth graders questions about weather in Kenya and Japan.I have already introduced Skype to my second graders. I walked around and showed them what the camara looked like. The students were waving at it and thought it was hooked up. I had to explain that it wasn't connected yet. Most of them were not familiar with it, but they were all very excited about communicating over Skype with the fifth graders. As of today I am still waiting on the other teacher. Now, my computer with the video/micophone is acting up. I have tried to unplug it and plug it in again. The computer will not let me log into the system either now. A box keeps popping up that an item is not recognized. So, I have put a request into the technology facilitator to check it out.

What I Wanted to Learn About Technology

When I first started this class, I was feeling a little out of the loop. I had just returned to teaching last year after a 7 year break. I wanted to learn more about how I can use technology with my second graders. I do not have a smartboard and I only have 2 computers in my classroom. So, I feel a little limited at this time but I know in the future I will have a smartboard. So, I want to be ready. I am currently taking a technology class through my school too.When I first started this class I wanted to look more into using blogs for my student's writing and making class books with voice threads.Now that the class is almost over, I feel much more confident with technology.