Thing 20 – Use Google Docs to create and share collaborative documents, spreadsheets and presentations
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I must admit I don’t use Google Docs as much as I should or plan to do. I guess you could say old habits are hard to break when it comes to creating documents. I am still using desktop publishing software and often times find myself needing a document that I don’t have access to when not on my work laptop and promptly kicking myself for not uploading or creating documents on Google Docs in the first place.
I see tremendous potential and countless possibilities for using Google Docs not only in the classroom but across the entire school community. A few possibilities and ideas for using Google Docs (because I could go on for hours) include:
Student collaboration on a class project
Faculty / staff collaboration on curriculum planning and department discussions
Parent conference sign-ups / scheduling
School event schedule sign-up sheets
Student / Teacher homework collaboration –
the student can complete their work in Google Docs and invite their teacher as a collaborator to evaluate the work, or
the teacher can create the assignment in Google Docs and invite their students as collaborators to complete the assignment (of course the students would need to save the “default” document with their user id or initials at the end in order to complete assignments individually – obviously this doesn’t apply to group work)
Parent communication and classroom event planning among the parents of the class
School, Department, or Team Meeting Agendas could be posted here and designated attendees (several) could edit and add “live” notes during the meetings for others to reference later
Multiple school collaboration – for example my school’s Instructional Technology Team could collaborate with Woodward’s Instructional Technology Team on planning Internet Safety Week for our respective schools. Thus, sharing ideas on events, presentation files and such among various schools. I for one would find this benefit incredibly useful…although the same could be accomplished through the use of a wiki, with the exception of exchanging files.
Thing 19 – Intro to Video Sharing; Explore YouTube and TeacherTube
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I enjoy exploring video sharing sites like YouTube, Google Video and TeacherTube; but I am far from being an addict like many students and adults that I know. I definitely see integration possibilities for using such sites within the classroom environment, provided the content used is in alignment with the curriculum goals and objectives. Too many times I have seen fellow educators showing useless videos and other multimedia content in the classroom as an attempt to integrate technology into the classroom. However, their efforts are misguided and highly ineffective as the content does not do anything to deepen or enhance the learning experience for the students.
One area of caution and concern surrounding these public video-sharing sites is the danger of exposing your students to inappropriate material via the links and previews to additional content available at the end of the selected and viewed video. These links are often completely irrelevant to the video you previously viewed and can expose the students to any number of things that would be deemed inappropriate for school-aged children. It’s much like the “next blog” feature in Blogger, where you have no idea where it’s going to take you. In a way, I guess it’s like playing Russian Roulette.
However, while exploring with YouTube this time, I came across a rather hilarious video about how to bath a cat. Now, if any of you have ever had the experience of trying to actually give a cat a bath you will no doubt be able to relate to the humorous, yet in “oh so true”, depiction of the experience.
Podcasting truly is easy, engaging and fun once you have experimented with it a few times. My former students engaged in multimedia recording activities throughout the school year and they loved the experiences. Seeing the pride in their eyes and the happiness through their smile assured me that it truly was a valuable learning experience for them…which only encouraged me to create more podcasting and vodcasting activities aligned with our curriculum goals.
My Ideas for Podcasting in the Elementary Classroom:
Creative Story-telling – record student narrating an original story; great for very young students who have not yet developed reading and writing skills
Build Reading Fluency – record student reading a story passage and then allow the student to listen and critique their recording
Foreign Language Lab – students listen to a prompt recorded in a foreign language and then respond to that prompt in the same language of study
Author Studies
Reporter for a Day
Fieldtrip Reflections
Historic Radio Shows
Book Talks
Poetry Readings
Short Story audio recordings
Reader’s Theatre – a great way to incorporate video as well, thus creating a Vodcast
Research/Book Reports
Oral Reports/Presentations – great for students who have a hard time speaking in front of an audience (like I did in school)
Thing 17 – Intro to Podcasting; Explore some educational podcasts
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I have been a podcatcher and a podcaster for over three years now. I subscribe to over fifteen different podcast series using iTunes and often listen to them during my daily commute between school and home. The podcasts I find the most interesting and useful are those that help me to stay in touch with emerging trends and technologies.
Conference Connections, produced by Apple Distinguished Educators, delivers some of the most innovative content from the most exciting workshops, forums and discussions at leading technology conferences across the USA and around the world.
David Pogue, The New York Times personal-technology columnist, reports weekly on new technology in the video series Video: Technology | David Pogue. David Pogue Presents a fun, unbiased look at new technology. His reviews openly point out the things that we have all longed for the world to catch on to in a very humorous and clever way. He has a way of transforming a less than exciting topic like streaming or routers into something hilarious and understandable. Many technology reviews that I have come across have placed me into a sleep induced state of activity, it’s great to finally find one that is unique, interesting and humorous.
While I was teaching in the classroom, before coming to Trinity School to assume my role as an Instructional Technology Specialist, I produced a series of podcasts, entitled HighTech2, with my second grade students. I say that I am a “classroom podcaster” as I always produced episodes that involved and focused on the students in my class. Each and every time it was a very rewarding experience not only for myself, but also for my students and their families. My only regret is not having created them more often with my students.
Over the past few weeks, Mrs. Stafford and I have co-produced a series of student created podcasts entitled TrinityMD. The TrinityMD project was originally developed by Mrs. Stafford as part of a technology infused unit in correlation with the sixth grade TabletPC Program. The focus of this year’s project-based learning unit targeted diseases and disorders that affect the human body. We worked together to publish the series of podcast episodes on our school’s Project Source wikispace. I encourage you to visit the TrinityMD wiki and listen to the student’s final projects. You can view the TrinityMD podcast feed and subscribe to the series here.
Although I have heard talk about 43Things many times before, this was my first experience actually snooping around it. I say “snooping” because I felt like I was invading other people’s private thoughts and ideas by reading their personal diaries. I have to say I don’t think I would be comfortable publishing my goals, or in some cases my dreams and fantasies, on such a public domain. I am generally a very private person in RL in that I very rarely (if ever) discuss my true feelings, thoughts or ideas with others – even those closest to me – for fear of being not accepted or ridiculed. This all may sound absurd to some who think they know me and would immediately venture to say that I hold nothing back or that I sometimes share too much information. However, what they fail to see or realize is that everything that I haven’t held back or have divulged are not really my personal thoughts and feelings but rather facts or obvious realizations.
However, I do feel this site would be very useful and a wonderful tool for departments, teams and/or classrooms for tracking group goals.
LibraryThing is a fantastic place for users to catalog and connect over their personal media libraries. I spent way too many hours exploring the site and starting my own personal library of books. I noticed that it also had a feature where users who utilize the software program Delicious can upload their book list. This will be especially useful for me as I have the program and using my macbook’s webcam as a “scanner” I can import my books more quickly. Maybe that will help me save some time that I so desperately need lately. I also enjoy the social aspect of LibraryThing and how it connects you with readers who share similar interests. It’s almost as if you have your own personal book club with people around the world! I can see this site being incredibly useful for keeping my classroom library books cataloged, helping me to avoid purchasing duplicates of books I already own but have forgotten that I do. J
Although my LibraryThing catalog is no where even near complete (maybe less than 1% at this point), you can see my catalog of books here: http://www.librarything.com/catalog/dklaus.
As I have been using del.icio.us for some time now, I didn’t expect this “Thing” to introduce any new to me. However, I was surprisingly mistaken! I was familiar with tagging and adding descriptions, as well as, adding another’s account to my network. I have been using these features since I first opened my del.icio.us account. However, for some reason I never noticed that you could “subscribe” to a tag that interests you. This was a new discovery for me and I have to admit I am very excited!
As far as my del.icio.us links, I will admit that I am a sloppy and over-exuberant tagger. My tags were a mess and I was slightly embarassed at the idea of posting a link to my del.icio.us page in this blog post. The “mess” was created by numerous redundant tags (i.e. social-bookmarking, social_bookmarking, socialbookmarking), lowercase tags mixed with uppercase tags (yes, I know that may sound silly – but I will admit, it drives me insane!) and countless “unfiled” links. Therefore, I spent hours cleaning up my tags – changing the uppercase to lowercase, deleting instances of redundant tags, and bundling groups of related tags. It’s still not perfect, but at least it is much more “presentable”.
Jigzone:
What it is: Jigzone allows you to turn your own photos into online jigsaw puzzles that you can share with others. You have the ability to choose the level of puzzle difficulty from a simple 6 piece puzzle to a challenging 247 piece puzzle.
How to integrate Jigzoneinto your curriculum:Jigzoneis perfect for use on any interactive whiteboard. Jigsaw puzzles promote logical reasoning and problem solving skills.
Tips: You don’t have to use this great tool with the interactive whiteboard, it would also be a great center for the one or two computer classroom or even for use in the computer lab.
Gliffy:
What it is: Gliffyis an online diagramming software that allows users to create and share professional-looking flowcharts, diagrams, technical drawings, organization charts, floor plans, idea webs and more. Users can save their work to Gliffy’s server or download it to their computer.
How to integrate Gliffyinto your curriculum: One of the hardest concepts to teach elementary school students is effective outlining — taking ideas and organizing them in a logical order that flows. The ability to visually represent concepts, ideas, and related pieces of information graphically reaches learners at a deeper level than simply using text-based descriptions. Gliffyis a great tool for those who want to take graphic organizing to the next level by involving collaboration among students. Since this tool is collaborative, students can work together to develop a mind map and invite collaborators to work with them in a password-protected environment.
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