Public Knowledge

My portfolio is something that I had though I fixed several months ago and made public for all of you to make fun of.... check out, I mean. I just received another message saying that all of you could not access my projects and products.... At long last, I have added all of you and not you can share the glory and satisfaction of rifling through all of my work. I hope that you gain a little bit of knowledge from its content and enjoy yourself!

Pinnacle

Pinnacle Movie Maker is my most recent venture. For my final project for this class Teri and I decied to work together to make a short video. We created the video by taking a lot of pictures and compiling them all together to create a time lapse type video.
Pinnacle Movie Maker was pretty easy and could be very useful in the classroom. I can see myself using this frequetly uf I had a camera with a remote. It would be fun to put up posts like this on my website of lesson that we completed during a week or even in a day.

Flip Video

I am excited to say the least. I never thought that I would have the opportunity to working with a flip video camera! I am a little bit nervous but looking forward to the challenge and the opportunities that it will offer. I am going to play with the tool and use it in a practical and academic setting.
I will update everyone as soon as I have something interesting to talk about...

Zoomerangers

As I sit in class I cannot help to overhear my colleagues talk about their surveys and a cute little website called zoomerang. If you have the right mind set and have a set of questions that you would like a target population that you need to obtain information from then a survey is a great way to collect data.
I would like to set up my class with a survey reflect something in the near future. I am not sure what I would like to collect data on but I am looking forward to trying it out.

Fun vs. Hard Work

My students equate fun with using laptop, playing games, and participating in center. They look at hard work as being a teacher-centered class with tests, worksheets, and quizzes.
I have fooled all of my students... I am so proud!
Through a plethora of websites, games, question, and a check list I have fooled the students into thinking that they were just having fun, but they were actually completing assignments, providing data that reflect their personal knowledge and the knowledge of a group.
A great example of this is the use of Study Island. The children are asked to complete and obtain a ribbon on a specific topic. Then they are asked to individually answer questions on a worksheet that reflect what they worked on and they level of completion. I, as a teacher, am able to check each students progress and understanding of a topic as well as an entire class' am able to reinforce topics that may not be understood. I also collect the check list and provided feedback to each individual.

NJ ASK

I am not a big fan of standardized testing. It has thrown a huge monkey wrench in my teaching, enthusiasm, and my students' excitement. Trying to juggle a masters, end of the year assessments, field trips, surfing, school unity day, and all of the other day-to-day activities is difficult enough and then to have this ASK test makes life no fun!
Now that the ASK is over the children are DONE! They are treating every day as if it were the last day of school and not putting much thought or emotion into what they would normally do in school. The days are getting longer...
I am not a fan of the ASK...

I know that~!

I have found a site.... iknowthat.com and it is great! I put it up on my favorite list and the children are really benefiting from the tutorials that are offered as well as the games. I love that the children are getting excited about learning. This is a good way to grab their attention and get them interested in what we are learning in class. It is also a bargaining child... if they are behaved then they get the opportunity to work on I know that.
This has helped and given support and enrichment for my class!