Interactive Whiteboard – Page 2

Fraboom Online Children’s Museum: Online classes, videos, interactive book, games, oh my!

May 4, 2011Kelly Tenkely2 Comments8142 views

What it is: Oh. My. Word. I have just stumbled on gold my friends, gold! Fraboom is an online children’s museum packed full of games, interactive books, creativity, learning and-are you ready for this-LIVE online teachers! On Fraboom students can learn about US presidents while they play games, watch Fraboom TV cartoons to learn vocabulary, read interactive books that encourage creativity and join live online classes with real flesh and blood teachers! Fraboom TV has a variety of cartoons that will teach students content area vocabulary words. Each cartoon on Fabroom TV lists all associated vocabulary words so teachers can quickly find a video that will support learning. Cartoons can be searched by keyword or category. The very best part of Fraboom (in my humble opinion) is the live online teachers. Drawing classes start every hour on the hour. Students can drop into a class and learn how to draw cartoons. There is a new challenge every day so content is always fresh! Students can interact with teachers through the chat feature; students type a message and the teacher responds to them by name. Fraboom cartoon characters introduce the activity for the day and the teachers interact with the cartoon on the screen- very fun! Students learn how to draw step by step guided by the teacher and follow along on their own whiteboard space. When students are finished, they can share their pictures with the class. After drawing, the class completes a mad lib together. The teacher explains a part of speech and requests words for that part of speech from the class. Students can contribute words to the story by typing them into the chat area. Throughout the class, the teacher shares submitted pictures with the whole class. I attended two live classes and was really impressed with the teachers in both sessions. They are upbeat, engaging and fun. Fraboom was created for students six to twelve years old. Content is being added regularly and fresh challenges in the live classes every day. Plenty to keep kids creating and learning!

How to integrate Fraboom Online Children’s Museum into the classroom: With widespread budget cuts and art programs being cut regularly, Fraboom is a welcome new addition to the education landscape. Being able to connect every student in your class with another teacher is amazing. Fraboom could be used on classroom computers as a creativity/art/grammar center that kids can visit throughout the week. Students can get one-on-one attention from a virtual teacher freeing you up to work in small reading or writing groups knowing that all of your students are engaged in learning. Connect to a Fraboom online session as a class using a projector-connected computer or interactive whiteboard. Students can follow along with the drawing instructions and take turns engaging in the chat as a whole class. Students can take turns creating the class picture on the projector or interactive whiteboard while students at their seats create their own masterpiece. This would be a great activity for students to do while you hold one-on-one student conferences in your classroom.

Fraboom TV is full of fun cartoon videos that help students learn a variety of content area vocabulary. Use these videos to introduce a new unit so that students are familiar with vocabulary before engaging in new learning.

The interactive stories on Fraboom can be shared with your class using an interactive whiteboard or projector-connected computer. Read through the story as a class and practice comprehension strategies together.

Tips: Be sure to share Fraboom with parents, this would be a great opportunity for learning at home too!

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

NASA’s 50th Anniversary Flash Feature-best website ever!

April 19, 2011Kelly Tenkely3 Comments4437 views

Have I mentioned lately that I have the most AWESOME readers? No? Well it is true, you all are awesome and you keep me going even when I am running on low. Thank you for that! I’m currently working on starting a school (actually 3) in the next 2 years. This is proving to be an exciting and, oh yeah, exhausting task. Then I get encouraging emails and site suggestions from you all and it puts some major pep back in my step. Thank you! This website is one such recommendation. You know you are a true geek when getting a cool website in your inbox revives you 🙂 Thank you Ryan!

What it is: NASA’s 50th Anniversary Flash feature is a website that is absolutely not to be missed. Seriously, it won’t even hurt my feelings if you skip reading my post and just head right on over to dig in and check it out yourselves! This interactive timeline highlights each decade in our space program from 1950 to 2000. Until we get time travel sorted out, this is a pretty good substitute! The site encourages exploration and discovery as students move decade by decade through the site. I love that this site goes so far beyond just space exploration. While students explore, they will hear music representing each decade, see animations, listen to virtual radio broadcasts of actual news headlines (including NASA news and other news from the decade), original video, listen to speeches of the decade and even launch rockets. I can’t tell you how happy it made me to hear Johnny Cash mixed in as I was playing on this site (in the upper left corner of the site you will be able to change songs on the jukebox, record, tape, CD or mp3 player). First thing I heard when I clicked on the 80’s “Tonight on Dallas find out who shot J.R.”. *LOVE THIS SITE!* This blog post took me about 2 hours because I got sucked right into exploring and playing. The site reminds me of Epcot’s Tomorrow Land, complete with robot guide. This is what online learning should look like, when I close my eyes and dream, this is the experience I imagine for kids. Can you imagine if there was a site like this for history? How cool would that be?!

How to integrate NASA’s 50th Anniversary Flash Feature into the classroom: This is one of those sites that you could let kids loose on just for exploration. Without any guidance from you they will learn plenty! Ideally kids would explore this site in partners or on their own in a one to one computer lab setting. If each student has a computer, headphones will be a necessity. If individual exploration just isn’t in the cards, visit the site as a class with an interactive whiteboard or projector-connected computers. Invite students up to the computer (whiteboard) to take turns guiding the class. The site has plenty of interactive content to give each student a chance at the computer (whiteboard). Unless you have a good chunk of time dedicated to the site, this is one that I would stretch out over a week. Each day students can explore a new decade.

The space exploration component of this site is amazing and could keep everyone plenty busy with learning. With older students, discuss what the music of the decade reveals about that time in history. What does the music tell them about people, community, values, events of the day? Take it one step further and ask students to dig into other historical events in each decade, discussing their impact on space exploration, culture and where we are today. One thing that I missed out on in history was all of the stories that make it so rich. For me, history was reduced to names, dates and places. Give your students the opportunity to put themselves into history and learn about how the events influenced each other.

NASA’s 50th Anniversary Flash Feature would be a great one to use in connection with We Choose the Moon. If your students are like mine, they can’t get enough of this stuff! Obviously I can’t get enough of it either. Full disclosure, I have always loved space exploration. When I was a kid I spent many summers at Black Rock Desert at LDRS (Large Dangerous Rockets) with my dad. My dad built wooden model rockets- first wooden rocket on record to break sound barrier! In answer to your next question: yes, I have always been a complete and total nerd. 😛

Tips: What? Your still here? Go on, visit the site! (channeling my inner Ferris Bueller today).

Please leave a comment and share how you are using NASA’s 50th Anniversary Flash Feature thesauruses in your classroom!

Poetry Idea Machine

April 5, 2010Kelly Tenkely1 Comment4024 views

What it is: April is national poetry month, the Poetry Idea Machine is sure to help you infuse your classroom with some inspired poetry writing. Students learn about different kinds of poetry by selecting from Haiku, Limerick, Cinquain, or Free Verse. The Poetry Idea Machine takes students through the steps of making each type of poetry. The Poetry Idea Machine makes an excellent introduction to types of poetry and will have your students writing their own in no time.

How to integrate Poetry Idea Machine into the classroom: The Poetry Idea Machine does a fantastic job of introducing students to different kinds of poetry. After students learn about the poetry, they have a chance to create their own poem with the Poetry Idea Machine interactive. In my classroom, I use the Poetry Idea Machine with the whole class using the interactive whiteboard or projector. I invite students up to create their own poems as we talk through the process. Choose one type of poetry each week so that students have an opportunity to practice writing the poems. During the week, give your students time to write their poems, allowing them access to the Poetry Idea Machine on classroom computers as an idea center. Let students work in small groups to create unique poems using the Poetry Idea Machine.

Tips: Read poems by Jack Prelutsky, Karla Kuskin, and Jean Marzollo for inspiration. Ask students to determine which type of poem each is based on what they have learned with the Idea Machine.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using the Poetry Idea Machine in your classroom.

Scribble Maps

March 15, 2010March 16, 2010Kelly Tenkely8 Comments6563 views

What it is: Sometimes I use a website and recommend a website so often in my own corner of the world, that I forget to share it with all of you. Scribble Maps is one of those websites. Jonathan Wylie posted about Scribble Maps on his blog, Educational Technology Blog, last week and it made me wonder if I had ever posted here about it. A quick search revealed I had not. That sent me on a search through my blog of websites that I use most often with my students, and many of them have been overlooked here. I guess I assume everyone knows about them because I use them so much. You know what they say about people assuming things… So, I will sprinkle in blog posts of some well known tools (in my classroom) as I realize they are absent! Scribble Maps is a website that lets you scribble, draw, and annotate over Google maps. Scribble Maps even lets you print your maps, save them, embed them on your website, blog, or wiki or save them as jpeg images to your computer. Sweet, huh?! In addition to annotating over maps, you can also add place markers with titles and descriptions, and add images to the map. Maps can be viewed as regular maps, terrain maps, hybrid maps, or satellite maps making it pretty ideal for every classroom need.

How to integrate Scribble Maps into the classroom: The days of bulky pull down maps taking up space in your classroom are over. If you have an interactive whiteboard or computer with projector, Scribble Maps is all you need. (You couldn’t write on those expensive maps anyway!) Scribble Maps is perfect for your every map need. Whether it is a quick reference or an in depth geography lesson, Scribble Maps is easy to use, save, and print. Use Scribble Maps in literature or history and drop place markers with descriptions on a map as students read. Students will have a better idea of what is happening in story when they can visually see places mentioned marked out on a map. Scribble Maps would be a great tool for those Flat Stanley projects that elementary classrooms across the country do each school year. Create a map and plot all of the places that Stanley traveled, attach pictures of Stanley, with those he visited, on the map. Play map games calling out geographical places and having students find them on the map and tag them with the information they know.

Scribble Maps lets you share maps via Facebook, in the high school classroom create a class page that students can become fans of and post homework help, links to educational websites, etc.

My Technology Tuesday tip of the week is for Scribble Maps. Check out Quick Tip 14 here.

Tips: As a side note, if you are not reading Jonathan’s blog, it is one to add to your RSS reader!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Scribble Maps in your classroom.

The Eco Zoo

January 27, 2010Kelly Tenkely2 Comments2576 views

What it is: The Eco Zoo is an impressive 3d environment where students can meet different “animals” that will give them some ideas about taking care of the environment. Each of the critters has a virtual pop-up book that tells a little about the character. Each character has an environmental quirk, like one who is always turning off the lights to save energy, and has a little story that will get your students thinking about the environment. The site is available to view in both Japanese and English.

How to integrate The Eco Zoo into the classroom: The Eco Zoo is a great site to travel through as a class when you are studying the environment, ecology, or eco-friendly solutions. This site is ideal for an interactive whiteboard or projector connected computer. As a class, travel up the tree, visiting each animal along the way. Ask students to guess what environmental issue the animal is passionate about. Have students brainstorm ideas of ways that they could be friendlier to the environment as it relates to each animal. This would be a great site to guide classroom discussion and spark some new ideas.

The look of the site is very unique, students will love the virtual popup books! Students can also explore this site on their own on classroom computers or in a computer lab setting. As they view the different animals, students can create character cards about the animal, listing the environmental passion, and ideas of how they can be more environmentally friendly.

Tips: This site was created in Japan so some of the English is a little awkward, or the humor missed.

Leave a comment and share how you are using The Eco Zoo in your classroom.

iboard: A Day at the Park

December 29, 2009Kelly Tenkely5 Comments7225 views

What it is: A Day at the Park asks students to position characters at a park and then construct sentences about their placement or movement. Students can construct the statements by using a word bank, or the word bank can be hidden. This is a great activity for students to practice describing words.

How to integrate iboard: A Day at the Park into the classroom: A Day at the Park was created to be used with an interactive whiteboard. To use it with an interactive whiteboard or projector, invite students up to manipulate the characters in the park scene. Then ask other students to describe their positions and movements by constructing sentences below the scene. This would also make an excellent literacy center activity. Send students to the classroom computers in pairs where they can take turns placing characters and describing their positions.

Tips: iboard has a variety of activities for the interactive whiteboard that can be purchased. A Day at the Park is one of their freebie samples.

Leave a comment and share how you are using iboard: A Day at the Park in your classroom.

iboard: How Far Away do You Live?

December 27, 2009Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment1632 views

What it is: iboard’s How Far Away Do You Live? is an excellent interactive activity for the interactive whiteboard or for use with a projector. Students create labels with their names and pin them on a graphic chart to depict how close they live to the school. Students can also add places to the graphic such as restaurants and stores. This is a great way to begin discussions about distance and introduce some new math language. When students have finished placing themselves on the graphic, they can compare the results on a block graph.

How to integrate iboard: How Far Away Do You Live? into the classroom: How Far Away Do You Live? is a neat interactive to teach students math language about distance, how to read a graph, and how to describe objects in relation to each other. Begin by defining what it means to live close to the school. What does it mean to be “very close” is that one block away, around the corner, less than a mile, a 5 minute walk, closer than the shop on the corner? Define what each distance will mean on your chart. Then, invite students to the board to add a sticky note where they think their house falls on the chart. After everyone has been added to the chart ask questions such as: “Who lives closest to the school?” and “Who is the furthest away?” Finish by looking at the block graph and discussing how many students fall into each category. This is a great way to teach your students to create and read informational charts and graphs.

Tips: iboard has a variety of activities for the interactive whiteboard that can be purchased. How Far Away Do You Live? is one of their freebie samples.

Leave a comment and share how you are using iboard: How Far Away Do You Live? in your classroom.

iboard: Alien Pairs to 10

December 27, 2009December 27, 2009Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment3643 views

What it is: Alien Pairs to 10 is a fun warm up game for the primary math classroom. Students are given 60 seconds to find as many pairs of 10 as they can. The numbers students have to choose from are written on Aliens, with the target number (always 10) on the spaceship. Students drag pairs of aliens into the spaceship and check the answer to find out how many pairs that equal 10 they can find.

How to integrate iboard: Alien Pairs to 10 into the classroom: Alien Pairs to 10 will bring out the inner competition in any student. To use this site with an interactive whiteboard, split your students into teams. Have students face off to find out who can find the most pairs of 10 before their 60 seconds are up. This site was created with interactive whiteboards in mind but, to be honest, I think this site is best suited for classroom computers as a math center activity. Keep a running scoreboard next to your classroom computers where you post the high scores of the week.

Tips: iboard has a variety of activities for the interactive whiteboard that can be purchased. Alien Pairs to 10 is one of their freebie samples.

Leave a comment and share how you are using iboard: Alien Pairs to 10 in your classroom.

iboard: Crossing the Water

December 22, 2009Kelly Tenkely2 Comments2159 views

What it is: Crossing the Water is a great logic game for the interactive whiteboard that encourages problem solving as students try to get a family across the water safely. Teachers can set up the activity with a set number of adults and children, students guess how many trips will have to be made to get the whole family across the water. If there is too much weight in the boat, it will sink.

How to integrate Crossing the Water into the classroom: Crossing the Water is a fun logic and problem solving activity for students to work out. Use Crossing the Water as an introduction mind bending activity to begin math class. Students can work individually or in small groups to work out their strategy. Call groups up to the whiteboard to demonstrate their solution. Compare the solution with the way that other groups solved the problem. Because you can change the number of adults and children in the problem, each day can present a new challenge. Crossing the Water could also be used as a math center activity on classroom computers.

Tips: iboard has a variety of activities for the interactive whiteboard that can be purchased. Crossing the Water is one of their freebie samples.

Leave a comment and share how you are using iboard: Crossing the Water in your classroom.

iboard: Counting Fish

December 14, 2009Kelly Tenkely2 Comments3668 views

What it is: Counting Fish is a fun sample interactive whiteboard activity from iboard. Students can count fish added to the ocean, add, group, subtract, and compare sets. Click on “Totals” to find out how many of each fish have been added to the ocean.

How to integrate iboard: Counting Fish into the classroom: Counting Fish is a great little web application that can be used in the primary math class. Use with the interactive whiteboard asking questions such as: “Can you count the creatures as I put them into the ocean?” “There are two lobsters already, how many will there be if we add four more?,” etc. Counting Fish can be used to help students visualize complex problems or word problems. Set up Counting Fish on classroom computers as a math center where students can practice adding, subtracting, grouping, and counting. Create question cards to accompany the center that students can answer with a partner when they visit the center.

Tips: iboard has a variety of activities for the interactive whiteboard that can be purchased. Counting Fish is one of their freebie samples.

Leave a comment and share how you are using iboard: Counting Fish in your classroom.