Cute Kindergarten blogs to check out

Hi everyone I wanted to post about some cute, colorful, and of course informative kindergarten blogs that I found on  my travels today. 

• Kindergarten center blog - created by Amy who is a teacher. She posts about many different topics related to kindergarten and pre-k. Amy also posts some freebies and giveaways for teachers. If you are looking for some sweet kindergarten ideas check out this site!

• Mrs. Minder's Kindgarten Monkey Business- created by Mrs. Miner. Mrs. Miner posts some good ideas and resources to use everyday objects (like a digital photo frame) in your class. Mrs. Miner also stocks her site with some fun freebies and printables to add to your teacher toolbox. 

• Tickled to teach  - developed by Shannon. She posts some creative and crafty ideas and resources to use in your classroom. She even posts example pictures! If you are looking for a fun and crafty site be sure to visit Shannon's blog!

Cool tool - ABC .. Oh yeah!

I have been using this website for years and I have watched it develop into what it is today. The website is http://www.abcya.com/. ABC YA hosts many free educational websites, games, apps, and resources for parents, teachers, and students. This is a great go to site to find that special game or app you have been looking for! The website is divided into grade level and has a parent/teacher space. 

In the parent/teacher space the creators detail the requirements to use the website successfully and also provides a short history about ABC YA. This website can run on several different web browsers - which makes it easy to use at home and in school!  You are able to click on any grade level shown (K-5). Once you click on your desired grade level you will find activities separated by content  (letters, literacy, numeracy, math, holiday). This website is very easy to navigate and is consistent in navigation procedures. It also provides text and picture supports to help students navigate. 


If apps is what you are looking for just click on the educational apps section. You will find the apps are divided into content by grade level as well - what a great resource.  I highly recommend this website for any teacher, parent, or student looking for that unique and fun website activity or app! Have fun exploring! 


What do you love about ABCYA? Share on the comments section!

All abilities playground

All abilities playground

This is a great space for students who use the computer via many different modalities can learn. There are two playgrounds with the same games, one playground is the mouse and keyboard playground the other is the scanning playground. Each playground offers several different virtual online games to play on the interactive whiteboard or computer. Thank you to Patrick Black who shared this site on Diigo!

Literacy Tools and Resources avalaible 24/7

I reviewed an online archived webinar about Literacy tools that are available online 24/7. This webinar was presented by the Florida Virtual School.  Below are some cool online tools that were shared:

• Prezi
• readplease
• Virtual school library - Great list of resources for librarians, ESL teachers, speech teachers, and English / Language arts teachers!
• FLVS SRC - Florida virtual school student resource center (will be available soon)
• Literacy Instructional support center (will be available soon)

Web 2.0 Technologies for Classroom Use.

   

This morning I attended a webinar through PSU entitled Topics for Teaching: Web 2.0 Technologies for Classroom Use. This webinar was about how how various Web 2.0 tools and can be used to deliver instructional content. Web 2.0 tools are efficient and effective tools for sharing information in a collaborative and fun way! 

This presentation was given by Mark Thomas Meckel of Penn State. The notes taken below were written in  a collaboration doc by  a colleague, Monique MacAllan and I.Welcome in to the wonderful world of Web 2.0 . 

There are several groups of Web 2.0 tools - communication, storage, productivity, management, socialization, and aggregation. Each group has an array of tools and resources to use within each group. There are several levels of cloud applications. to keep in mind when utilizing web 2.0 tools:

• Level 0 app: Doesn’t work in the cloud at all
• Level 1 app: Limited functionality
• Level 2 app: Moderately functional
• Level 3 app: Fully functional in the cloud
• Skydrive-MS tool that stores things in the cloud.

Communication

• Advantages/Disadvantages
• Formative Evaluation-where we make changes along the way
• Diminish amount of face-to-face contact
• Customizable
• Easy to set up and utilize in and out of a classroom

1. Instant Messenger Clients - AOL, Yahoo messenger, MSN, Meebo (aggregator of IM clients)

Advantages/Disadvantages

Can be more direct and relevant

Interactive

Feedback which is immediate

Examples of use

    Monitor discussions

    Ask and answer questions

    Post additional information

2. Back channel such as Todaysmeet  for synchronous (same time) and asynchronous (later time)  discussions

3. Start pages - page flakes, igoogle, yahoo, netvibes

Advantages/Disadvantages

Easy to set up

Focus on what you find interesting

Dynamic

4. Blogs  - Blogger, Word Press, Live Journal

Advantages/Disadvantages

interactive

multiple media imports (video, audio, links, ...not just text!)

longitudinal

easy to make

Examples of use:

    Live journals of daily life or class

    Classroom discussion

    Read/review/discuss topics

    Group journals-let teams develop their own journal

    Feedback on assignments

    Document research articles or summarize articles in a blog

5. Other communication tools

• Micro-blogs such as Twitter

• hybrid tools - mash up of blog and IM feaures (Yammer)
• Audio  - podcasts
• Video - Jing, Captivate, Camstudio, Presenter, Skype, Youtube
• Photo Editing- Picnkik, Flickr, Picassa

Examples of use:

Skype for use in Student Teaching

Searching for images in Flickr for classes

Share images with class that are relevant

Storage

• On-line Storage
• Wiki’s
• Project Management Tools: Basecamp, Google docs
• Zoho, BPWorks, box.net
• Hybrid Web Tool: Drop Box
• On-line office suites

Productivity

• Presentation
• Collaboration
• Informatin
• Question
• Survey

Examples - 280 slides(create slides of upload a ppt), prezi,slide rocket (access to presentations off the web), wolfram alpha (computational aggregate), Harvard question tool, doodle

Management

• Project management
• file storage
• calendars

Examples - basecamp, box.net, 30 boxes

Socialization

• Blogs
• instant messenger clients
• communities of practice

Examples: facebook, Ning, blogs, Twitter, Link’dn, Twitter, Yammer

Aggregation

• RSS Feeds and readers
• Information Collectors
• IM/Chat Aggregation

Examples: Diigo, Delicous, RSS Feeds, Livebinders

Recommended Resources for more info about Web 2.0 tools:

• http://livebinders.com/play/present?id=25123
• http://mach2k.net/web20/
• Go2web20.net - find what you are looking for great web 2.0 tools for many, many different categories!

Enabling Devices Freebies!

Special thanks goes out to Enabling Devices @EnablingDevices for tweeting out a link to some great freebies!

Enabling devices has a free downloadable resource that gives some great ideas about using the following types of communicators:

- Single Message
- Two Message
- Multiple Message
- Sequencing

Here is the link for this great and handy resource! The resource can be found in the website's scrolling updates. Be sure to click download now. You will be linked to a site with 4 pdfs, then pick which type of communicator you would like to review. Each pdf is jam packed full of great ideas for inside and outside the classroom.

Have some great ideas for single, double, multiple, or sequencing communicators? Share!

Fall into Fall

The air is getting crisp and cool, apple fests will be popping up all around..it is time for Fall! Here are some fun fall themed activities to get into the autumn spirit:

Fall Jigsaw Puzzle - Put the puzzle pieces together to form a fun fall picture.

Autumn Slide Puzzle- Unscramble the pieces to make an autumn picture.

Fall simon says - Press the start game button to begin. Copy the computer's pattern.

Fall match game - studehttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifnts match the fall different symbols.


Interactive fall coloring page - interactive coloring pages with a fall theme

For more fall fun in the classroom online and at home check out Wednesdays with Sam