Graphite

http://www.graphite.org/

Graphite is a great site made by teachers...full of great apps and resources for your classroom.

I like it because you can search by subject, type, grade and price.  They also have a "Get Inspired" section where you can collaborate and connect with other teachers in your subject/grade!

Skyping with author Jon Klassen

As I discussed in an earlier post, Mrs. Harder's 4th grade class has been tweeting with their favorite author, Jon Klassen.  We had asked him about Skyping with the class and the students continued to anxiously await and ask everyday if he had replied.  Last week, Jon replied to one of my many tweets and said he would have a few minutes to Skype from Los Angeles.  Of course we dropped everything we were doing and quickly got set up.  He ended up Skyping with us for about 30 minutes.  The kids (as well as Mrs. Harder, Mrs. Yoder, and I) were ecstatic!  He showed us his backyard in L.A., his house, his cat, his favorite book, talked about how to write a book, and even drew a picture for us.  This is definitely at the top of my favorite things that have happened in a classroom!  Please view our video of some of the Skype.  This is truly something these students will never forget!

Jon Klassen Skype Video

Mr. Richardson's Science Lab Report w/ iPads & Numbers

Mr. Richardson's class completed their "Lunar Surface" lab report using Numbers and the iPads.  Students collected the data in a table they created, added a chart, picture of their team, and picture of their lunar surface and craters.  With little tech instruction, the kids did great trouble-shooting along the way and completed this entire process in about an hour.  They saved their lab as a pdf, uploaded to Google Drive, and shared with Mr. Richardson to turn in!  Paperless! 

Next lab we would like to include a video hypothesis before they start and then video conclusion at the end! 

Parts of Speech Music Videos

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrCxcR_EI0dGXVFn6isIlPX0TeppfAdEw

Miss Reed's "Parts of Speech Music Videos"

Students must recreate a current song into one with lyrics about parts of speech.  

You have to look at these! 

They are hilarious and obviously they were very engaged!  

She even had to tell a student to stop singing their song during class, 

however the student definitely knew the parts of speech!  

For an extra smile, be sure to watch "Roar", 

a remake of Katy Perry's song by some of our own 7th grade boys, 

all created on the iPad in iMovie!

Skyping with an Absent Student

Miss Reed and a 7th grader Skype with a student that is home sick for the day.  The students were doing a partner project and still able to work on it from afar!  It could be really beneficial to let absent students Skype into our classrooms!

SAMR Model: Levels of Tech Integration

Our district tech team has been discussing the SAMR Model.  This graphic, I received from Miss Reed shows the different levels of tech integration including Substitution, Augmentation, Modification and Redefinition.  I like this graphic because it gives good examples of tech in each area.  Although there is always a time for all areas, our goal is redefinition.  Think about some of your projects and where they would fall?

Mrs. Harder's class tweets with famous Author!

Mrs. Harder's class loves books by Jon Klassen and has read several, including "I Want My Hat Back".  Being inspired by Jon, several of the students created their own books based on his story.  Mrs. Harder tweeted Jon Klassen from the class telling him about his inspiration to the students.  They have asked him several question in which he has responded to and sent him a picture with a thumbs up in which he sent one back giving them a thumbs up!  We are anxiously awaiting to see if he will Skype with us!  Although his name sounds like he might be local, he is actually a VERY famous author from Canada.  If you get a chance, ask one of her kiddos about this, they are VERY excited to talk to someone so famous!

Tellagmi App

Tellagami is a free App available on iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad devices.  You can view it on a Mac but not create it.  The easy steps are shown below.  How can I use this in my class?  We saw this in a Language Arts classroom Southeast High School.  The teacher assigned each team member a character from their book and they were telling certain sections of the book from that character's point of view.  A good way to do a book review from multiple characters' perspectives.  Mr. Richardson is using it with his debate kids: they are using their gami's to debate topics back and forth.  The kids love creating their character and background and telling it what to say!  They did this with little instructions in about 10 minutes yesterday.  Please look at the examples below.  High school staff:  You saw this from Mr. Rhodes and his specifics about treat day with Ms. Roth :) EASY and ENGAGING tool to use in your class.

CLICK HERE for Gami on why homework should be banned

CLICK HERE for Gami on why lockers should have locks

Podcasting with Mr. Graber

 Podcasting....Mr. Graber's American History students are making podcasts.  See detailed instructions from his assignment below.  Our big task was to figure out how to share them out.  Here are a couple of ways to share podcasts:
1. A free podcast hosting site such as Podcast Garden.
2. Getting them approved to be in the iTunes store!
3. Exporting them out of Garage Band and into QuickTime to change the file type and then uploading to YouTube.  (I can give you specific steps if you are interested in this). Let me know if you are interested in PodCasting and I can come help!

Mrs. Rhodes' PhotoShop/iMovie Landscape Project

Brittni can explain this much better than I can, but this was a truly amazing project completed by HMS art students.  The students first drew a landscape drawing of a city, then took a picture of it and uploaded it to PhotoShop.  After filling it all in with color, they used it to create an iMovie about their city.  The students LOVED the project and learned many critical elements at the same time!

CLICK HERE for iMovie 1 
CLICK HERE for iMovie 2