Current.im: a private daily journal 140 characters at a time

What it is: Current.im is a site I learned about from @MZimmer557 on his excellent blog, The Weekly Pursuit of Technology Integration HappinessCurrent.im let’s students keep a private online journal 140 characters each day.  The journal couldn’t be easier to use, students login with a username and password that they create, and type their 140 characters for the day.  Current.im keeps a daily record of these bits of writing along with a time stamp.  The Current.im is truly private, this isn’t a social sharing site where students (or teachers) are writing for an audience.  It is a wonderfully simple tool created for one thing: recording daily thoughts.

How to integrate Current.im into the classroom: Current.im is an easy way to record writing daily.  The limit is 140 characters making it easy to keep up with and add to everyday without being overwhelmed by the blank sheet of paper.  Current.im can be used as a journal where students reflect on daily learning, a year-long creative writing project that students add to 140 characters at a time each day or a personal journal.  Because students are only responsible for 140 characters a day, this is a fast activity that could be completed as a center on classroom computers.  If your students don’t have access to computers where they can keep their own Current.im accounts, keep a class journal/story/reflection by compiling thoughts together using an interactive whiteboard or projector-connected computer.

One of my favorite year-long projects in the computer lab was having students take a picture of themselves using PhotoBooth every computer class.  At the end of the year, students took all of their pictures and created a stop-motion type video combining all of the pictures into a movie.  The result was a short movie where they could see themselves grow up that school year.  Current.im would be a fantastic addition to this project.  Students could start each class period with a picture of themselves and a quick 140 character update to go with the picture.  At the end of the year not only will they be able to see their growth, they will be able to read reflections and thoughts they had throughout the year.  This is great for one school year but can you imagine doing this EVERY year of school from k-12 as part of a digital portfolio?  How neat would that be?!  This is truly a 2 min. time commitment each day.  Easy.

As a teacher, Current.im can be used to reflect on teaching practice, to record daily classroom (or student) observations or to record daily success (we all need to record those!).  I always joked that I should write a book about funny student antics.  Of course I never wrote all of these funny stories down so alas, I have no book.  Had I known about Current.im, I could have recorded these stories everyday and had the book written for me by the end of the year!

Tips: Current.im doesn’t include any terms of service so I assume it is okay for all students to use.  Registration for an account does require an email address.  The email address doesn’t need to be confirmed so if you have students without email addresses, they can use an @tempinbox or @mailinator account (just add tempinbox or mailiator to the end of any word to instantly create an account).

Please leave a comment and share how you are using  Current.im in your classroom!

eduify: virtual writing coach making writing easier

What it is: eduify is an online tool that acts as a writing coach for students.  As students write they have immediate access to tutorials and writing examples, the built in ability to discover and cite sources automatically, the ability to verify citations and safeguard against plagiarism, the ability to store, share and edit documents online, and the ability to get help from friends and experts.  eduify takes all of the guess-work out of writing and puts the focus back on…well, writing.  Students can focus on getting their thoughts out and expressing learning, eduify helps take care of those little details that hang students up.  Students can even find quotes and additional sources for their writing directly within eduify.

How to integrate eduify into the classroom: eduify acts as another teacher in the writing classroom.  Because we don’t have the ability to work one on one with every student at once, eduify steps in and guides students until we can offer personal support.  Students don’t have to wait around for coaching, they can get help as they need it.  Students working on writing from home also have access to that support.  In my experience students are hindered in sharing their learning through writing by the writing “rules” and process itself.  They are so stuck on form that they lose the content and passion about a topic along the way.  eduify gets them out of the writing rut, giving them the freedom to focus on content and ideas first and form second.  Like a writing wingman.  Awesome. Where on earth was this when I was in school?

Use eduify as a writing platform in a one to one setting where every student has access to a computer.  Students can store their papers safely online for easy access both at school and home.  Papers can share their papers for review online with the teacher or with other students.  In a one or two computer classroom, set up computers as an eduify center that students can visit for writing support as an editing center.

Tips: eduify is in beta right now.  Students (and teachers) can request a beta invite code, mine came right away.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using  eduify  in your classroom!

Books Should Be Free: Free Audio Books from the Public Domain

What it is: Books Should Be Free is a fantastic collection of audio books that students can download and listen to for free from the public domain.  Books are easily searchable by genre, keyword, title or author.  Books can be downloaded as MP3 files, iPod or iTunes format.  Each book includes a description of the book, full text from Project Gutenberg, a Wikipedia link, and the audio download.  Students can play a snippet of the audio before deciding to download.  The collection is pretty impressive, including my favorite classics.

How to integrate Books Should Be Free into the classroom: Not every child has an extensive collection of books at home, or parents who model a love of reading.  Books Should Be Free expands every classroom and home library by giving students access to some of the most loved books of all time.  Students can download both the audio and accompanying text for a read along or simply listen to the audio file.  Audio books help students build comprehension, fluency and help students develop a love for story.  Books Should Be Free is a great way to start a Reading Buddies program at your school with some MP3 players or iPods that can go home with students loaded up with good books.

Tips: Looking for some more ebooks to expand your classroom library?  Check these out!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using  Books Should Be Free in your classroom!

Tiki-Toki: Create gorgeous multimedia timelines

What it is: Tiki-Toki is an absolutely GORGEOUS multimedia timeline creator.  The results are truly a work of art-no joke!  Tiki-Toki is very easy to use, after registering for an account, students are guided step-by-step through creating an interactive timeline.  Students can add text, images (Flickr) and video (YouTube or Vimeo) to a timeline.  Images can be uploaded from a student computer or found through a search on Flickr.  Throughout the creation process, tool tips pop-up to guide students through creation.  Students can share saved timelines with a unique URL.

How to integrate Tiki-Toki into the classroom: Tiki-Toki is a fabulous new way for your students to create and share online.  Timelines are an obvious choice for history projects but can be used throughout the year for a variety of subjects and learning focuses.  Students can reflect on and share learning using a Tiki-Toki timeline.  Students can begin a timeline at the beginning of the year sharing videos, links, pictures and reflections each unit, week, month, or semester until the end of the school year.  This is a nice way to encourage students to reflect on learning while providing them with a record of what has been accomplished throughout the year.

Students can create timelines based on books or literature they are reading.  Young students can create a timeline with information about beginning, middle and end while older students can add supporting details, action, climax and concluding thoughts.  A timeline book report is a welcome change for your logical/analytical thinkers- seriously, offer it as an option!

Timelines can also be used as KWL charts (Know, Want to Know, Learned).  At the beginning of any learning, students can list the facts that they know about the topic. Next, they can brainstorm and write about what they want to know about a topic.  At the end of the unit or semester, students can detail what they have learned including any relevant videos or images.

In science, students can use Tiki-Toki to detail an experiment or scientific method process they go through in a lab.

Tiki-Toki is probably too advanced a tool for primary elementary to use independently, but it can be used with an interactive whiteboard or projector-connected computer to create a timeline as a class.  This is a good way to teach students about timelines while recording learning.

Create an account on Tiki-Toki and record a few pictures of your classroom along with a description of the learning that happened each day.  At the end of the week the timeline can be sent to parents and administration to share what you are working on in your classroom.  This is a fun change from the traditional newsletter and, because it is added to a little at a time, it will give you a break from the Thursday mad-dash-to-finish-Friday-newsletter thing you have going (oh, is that just me?). 😉

Tips: The basic Tiki-Toki account is completely free and contains enough features to keep kids creating with no problem.  The paid accounts include features like shared timeline creation which would also be useful in the classroom.  I’m hoping that Tiki-Toki catches on to the uses for education and comes up with an education version just for us!

A minimum age for use of Tiki-Toki is not specified in the terms of service.  If you work with students who do not have an email address to share, consider using a tempinbox account or mailinator.

A BIG THANK YOU to @anderscj for mentioning Tiki-Toki on Twitter, I have a new favorite timeline creator!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Tiki-Toki  in your classroom!

The Bookshelf Muse: Emotion, Setting, Color/Shape/Texture, Symbolism Thesaurus

The Bookshelf Muse

What it is: The Bookshelf Muse is a must add blog to any writing classroom toolbox.  On The Bookshelf Muse, students will find several thesauruses: emotion, setting, color/shape/texture, weather, and symbolism.  The emotion thesaurus offers alternatives for showing character emotion through physical action.  The Setting Thesaurus offers sensory descriptions that can help paint the picture of a setting.  The color/shape/texture thesaurus helps students include sensory information that helps convey images in specific ways.  They symbolism thesaurus helps students utilize symbolism to leave a lasting impression on their readers.  To use a thesaurus, scroll down and choose an emotion, setting, color/shape/texture, weather, or symbolism topic from the right side bar.  Suggestions will appear as a blog post.  Each thesaurus is regularly added to, there is something new each week!

How to integrate The Bookshelf Muse thesauruses into the classroom: The Bookshelf Muse thesauruses are a must add to a writer’s toolbox.  All writers experience periods of writers block.  The Bookshelf Muse thesauruses can help students break through that block.  Bookmark the thesaurus on classroom computers for quick access during writing as a writing/publishing center.  Students can access the center as needed to help fire up the creative writing process.  This blog will have your students thinking carefully about word choice and how different parts of speech color writing.

Before students begin using the emotion or setting thesaurus, visit the blog as a class using an interactive whiteboard.  Using the annotation feature, invite students to the board to highlight words based on the parts of speech.  This will help students identify vivid verbs, adjectives, and adverbs that add life to writing.

Consider creating a writer’s toolbox for your students using a tool like symbaloo or weblist.me.  Add writing tools like rhyming dictionaries, The Bookshelf Muse Thesauruses, writing prompt generators, a Flickr picture dictionary , Color in Motion, Tag Galaxy, Lightning Bug, What if Questions for Stories, The Story Starter Jr.PinBall-bounce ideas around, Poetry Idea Machine and other writing resources.  Create another Symbaloo page or weblist.me for web tools that students can use for writing (Little Bird Tales, Kerpoof, Figment, Picture a Story, pic lits, Story Bird, Zooburst, Myths and Legends, Glogster, Graphic Novel Creator, My Story Maker and Picture Book Maker).

Use the Bookshelf Muse thesauruses as a launching point to create a class thesaurus.  This can be done for setting, emotion, senses, weather, etc.  Make the thesaurus easily accessible by creating it as a blog or wiki.

Tips: The Bookshelf Muse has just started adding to a weather thesaurus, so far the only entry is blizzard but it should get your students thinking about how they can describe weather.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using The Bookshelf Muse Emotion thesauruses in your classroom!

Class Blogs: Blogging, virtual classroom, LMS, and more!

What it is: Class Blogs is a fabulous new way for you to easily create and manage FREE classroom blogs!  What makes Class Blogs so wonderful are all the extras that are built in.  For example, with Class Blogs you can create a virtual classroom space.  With just a few simple steps, you can create an online meeting space for your students to learn and discuss in.  Blogs can be used to post assignments; when you post an assignment to your teacher blog, students can submit the assignment and a pingback will be sent to your blog.  Class Blogs even has features that utilize SMS so that you can send a text message to students and the ability to host lesson plans complete with supporting resources!  Class blogs really offers more than just a blogging platform, it offers many Learning Management System (LMS) solutions making it a great all-in-one tool!  Here are just a few of the ways you can use Class Blogs:

  • Class Blogs – Teachers and students can create blogs to help facilitate classroom learning or the blog can be an extension of the classroom conversation.
  • Learning Logs – Learning logs are sites created by teachers for the purpose of creating online assignments for students. Students can then answer the questions and submit the assignments once they are completed.
  • Learning Management System (LMS) – Teachers can create a blog and use it as a learning management system. Teachers can post online courses and students can submit their assignments (through blog posts) for the course online as well. These assignments can be viewed by the instructor, the instructor can submit feedback, and the instructor can grade the student’s assignment online. Both the teacher and his/her students must have blogs in order to create a successful LMS.
  • Electronic Portfolio (E-Portfolio) – An e-portfolio is a valuable learning and assessment tool which includes but is not limited to a collection of resources and accomplishments that represent the individual. Moreover, it is the author’s personal reflection on the work included in the e-portfolio that creates a meaningful learning experience.
  • Web Conferencing/Virtual Classroom – Teachers/professors have the ability to create meeting rooms or virtual classrooms from the backend of their site. You can upload your presentations, chat with students, public/private chat, webcam, and even share your desktop.

How to integrate Class Blogs into the classroom: Class Blogs has features that make it wonderfully useful for any classroom.  Blogging gives your students a place to write where they have an authentic audience.  An audience of one (the teacher) is SO 1995.  To limit your students to that audience is a disservice.  I find that when my students write in blog form, the enthusiasm to write increases, the richness of language increases, and the ideas are communicated clearly.  Obviously that is a bit of a generalization, I have also had students who don’t want to post for an audience, it makes them nervous to reveal themselves to their classmates in that way.  I let those students blog about topics they are “experts” on as they are building confidence in their learning process.   Students can blog to reflect on learning; write creatively; write as if they were a historical character, famous inventor, or a favorite literary figure; to chronicle learning (e-portfolio style); or to invite others on a journey of inquiry with them.

Using this type of social media in the classroom is important. It helps students learn digital citizenship, Internet safety, and netiquette in an authentic environment that goes beyond the rules and actually lets them practice it.

The additional features of Class Blog make it the perfect place to organize your classroom.  Post assignments in Class Blogs as a learning log, as students respond, your original post will get a pingback making it easy to track students progress. Class Blog also makes it easy to extend learning beyond the four walls of your classroom using the virtual classroom features.  Create meeting rooms to extend classroom discussions, offer additional learning support, or as a place to prepare students for learning.  Class Blogs makes it easy to include podcasts, videos, webcams, private chat areas, desktop sharing in your virtual classroom.

Tips: Class Blogs does not have an age requirement, this means that it is available to k-12 (and beyond) education.  Registration does require an email address.  If your students do not have email addresses, you can create accounts on their behalf.  With Class Blogs you can create unlimited class and student blogs, unlimited free classes/courses, and unlimited free virtual classrooms.  Be sure to check out the feature page for a comprehensive list of the awesome features on Class Blogs, you won’t believe what all is included!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using the Class Blogs in your classroom!

 

Sophia: learning made social

What it is: Sophia is a site that I have been playing around with for the past few months in their invitation only, beta space.  Now that the beta has been released to everyone, I’m excited to share it!  Sophia is a platform that connects teachers, learners, experts, and parents. This is an academic community that supports and enriches the traditional classroom.  Sophia is a social network of sorts that connects everyone in meaningful ways so that knowledge, help, instruction, standards-aligned content, and experts are available for learners everywhere.  As an educator, Sophia will help you to share your knowledge and make it available to anyone, anywhere.  Sophia can help students by offering them support in areas of weakness, opportunities for deeper learning, and the ability to follow areas of interest that aren’t being met in the classroom.   Currently the Sophia subjects include the arts, business, English/language arts, learning strategies, mathematics, science, and social studies.  Each of those subject contain several sub categories as well.  Packets of learning can contain text documents, slide shows, videos, and useful links.  In addition the packets are rated by users as to how academically sound the resource is.  Individual users of Sophia get scores based on how well they contribute to the community.

How to integrate Sophia into the classroom: As a teacher, Sophia can be used to supplement instruction, for blended learning opportunities, for “flip” learning (remember that Fisch flip I mentioned earlier in the week?), and for private personal learning networks (PLN).  Students can use Sophia for additional classroom support, homework help, to participate in study groups, and to help others in their learning.  Use Sophia to facilitate study groups between students, to create an online learning community for your team to create and share resources, and to create groups that include other classrooms for collaborative learning opportunities.

Tips: Sophia is best for middle, high school, and college right now.  I hope that they will scale this down for elementary students as well!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Sophia in your classroom!

 

Word Girl Definition Competition: Live vocabulary game show!

What it is: Mark your calendars now for the Word Girl Definition Competition on April 27, 2011; this is a live vocabulary event being hosted by Scholastic and is free to participate in!  You must register by April 22 to recieve your webcast event kit, participate in the definition competition, and be entered for a chance to win books and Word Girl prizes.  The Word Girl Definition Competition is a fun way to engage students with vocabulary words in a fun, interactive context.  The competition includes a 30 minute live webcast where students will enrich their vocabulary and have fun.  This will also be the kick off to the Scholastic summer challenge to get students excited about books and reading throughout the summer.

The competition is made up of 3 rounds plus a bonus round.  The competition will be in game-show format, students will be challenged to work those vocabulary skills as they answer questions pertaining to word usage, definitions, using words in different contexts, and reading comprehension.  Your students will play along with the game in real time by submitting answers online during the webcast and may be called out during the event.  This event will help your students understand the meaning of words, use context clues for correct word usage, leverage visuals to define words, draw on existing vocabulary knowledge, and present vocabulary words in varied and interesting ways.  Fun right?!

How to integrate Word Girl Definition Competition into the classroom: This one is a no brainer, if you teach elementary students this is an event that your class should participate in.  Word Girl making vocabulary fun as it is, combine that with a fun LIVE game show format and you have got yourself a winner.  This would be a great event to involve your students in and will have them flexing those vocabulary muscles.  I love that this competition isn’t just focused on definitions but on helping students learn strategies for decoding words using visualization strategies and context clues…those are skills that can be easily transferred!  Sign up your students today to participate in this fun, friendly competition!

Prior to the competition, build up some excitement and squeeze in some extra vocabulary practice by giving your students the opportunity to play on the Word Girl website.  This could be done as a center in the classroom or in a one to one environment.

Tips: If you aren’t familiar with the Word Girl website, be sure to check it out here.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Word Girl in your classroom!

Little Bird Tales

What it is: I am late on this post, but it is too good to skip a mention!  Little Bird Tales is a new way to digital story tell with primary students.  With Little Bird Tales, students can upload their own artwork, record their voice, add text and email their finished creations to family and friends. Sign up on Little Bird Tales requires an email address for verification purposes.  This can be a parent or teacher email address (the site is geared for 3 to 14-year-old children so a student address is not necessary).  Little Bird Tales includes a built-in art pad where students can create pictures online.  They also have the option to upload photographs and images they have created offline.  Each page give students a place to add a picture, text and voice recording.  Finished books can be saved and accessed online or sent via email.

How to integrate Little Bird Tales into the classroom: Little Bird Tales is a brilliant option for digital storytelling in the primary classroom.  I love that it includes both online and offline student creations, as well as student voice recordings.  Students can use Little Bird Tales for creative writing and imaginative stories, as a way to reflect on learning, or as a keepsake for parents.  Students can take pictures of science experiments and create a digital science journal detailing the experiment with text and student voice reflections included.

Use Little Bird Tales to create whole class stories where each student contributes a page.  This type of book can be made over a few weeks using classroom computers as a writing center.  This would be a fun way to create an A to Z type book of learning, reflections by students after a unit, a 100 day book, fact vs. opinion book, an interactive glossary, a class book of poems, a phonics book, or a class book about a field trip that students took.  The finished product can be shared with parents and families easily through an email. For a back to school night activity, take a picture of each student to add to a class book and record students sharing what their favorite part of the school day is.  This same idea could be used in preparation for parent-teacher conferences. Students can upload pictures of their best school work, record thoughts about why they are proud of the work they did, and add reflections in the text field.  These can be shared as a starting point for conferences, at the end of the conference, parents have a keepsake.

Because of the voice recording capabilities, Little Bird Tales, would be a great way for students to practice a foreign language.  They can illustrate a word or phrase accompanied by the audio.  Classes could work together to create a “living” digital glossary.

Do you have a planned absence coming?  Why not create a digital story that your substitute can share with students?  Upload pictures that support learning, text, and your voice.

Tips: If you have parent email addresses in Google, Yahoo, or Outlook, they can be directly imported into Little Bird Tales as contacts.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Little Bird Tales in your classroom!

Announcing: Voki Education!

What it is: Voki is a free web tool that let’s students create personalized speaking avatars that can be used in a variety of online formats (blogs, email, direct link, social network profiles, etc.).  Now, Voki has released an exclusive education edition of their service.   Voki Education has some additional features that make it even more useful for the classroom.  Sharing is now easier than ever.  Students and teachers can embed their finished Voki in webpages, email, and social network profiling, they can also share using a “Voki link” which will allow students to share a simple URL to a Voki page.  Students no longer need access to a website or blog to share their Voki scene!  Voki also provides custom links for educational partners like SymbalooEdu, very handy.  A new lesson plan database provides teachers with a searchable database of lesson plans that utilize Voki for learning.  Teachers are encouraged to share their Voki enhanced lesson plans.  In the new Teacher’s Corner, teachers and “expert” users can discuss anything related to Voki.  There is even a Newbies corner with a series of discussions in Q&A format.  Voki is now ad-free, this makes it an even sweeter deal for the classroom!

How to integrate Voki Education into the classroom: Voki lets students create custom characters that they can personalize and make speak.  These speaking avatars can be used in a variety of ways in the classroom, now that Voki Education includes the ability to “Voki Link” it is easier than ever for students to create and share.   Students can make their characters speak by recording a voice via phone, text to speech, record by microphone, or upload a sound clip. Students can use Voki to create characters modeled after historical or literary characters.  Students can bring those characters to life-a virtual wax museum of sorts! Those finished Voki’s can be embedded in a class website or blog, or shared by a Voki Link.  In math, students can create Voki’s that speak a riddle or word problem.  The Voki’s can be shared with other students in the class with a challenge to solve the problem.  At the beginning of the school year, students can create Voki’s to introduce themselves to you (the teacher) and classmates. Are your students learning how to speak a second language? Voki’s are a fun way for your students to practice that second language.  They can record by classroom phone or built-in microphone.  Throughout the year students can add characters to their new language and hear the progress they have made.  Voki’s make a great accompaniment for the beginning reader.  Students can create a virtual character and record themselves reading.  They can play back their Voki to listen to their fluency, pronunciation, and annunciation.  Once again, these recordings can be collected throughout the year as a way for students to track and hear their progress.   Students can use Voki characters to summarize any learning (how about a summary of the State of the Union Address?).  Have a science fair coming up that needs a little tech infusion?  Have students create a virtual scientist that describes their experiment or the science behind it.

In my last post, I talked about how I integrated technology in my 2 computer classroom with a tub system.  Voki’s would be an outstanding way to record instructions for students that can be played back.  Because they can be saved with a Voki Link, the speaking character can be open along side other activities.  It will be like having a virtual teacher there next to them!  Voki recordings are perfect for transitional instructions. These can be put up on a projector-connected computer or an interactive whiteboard to be played back for students.

Tips: When students publish a Voki they can choose to login or register to save it, or click “No Thanks” to go directly to the published Voki with embed codes and links.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Voki Education in your classroom.