Tag: reading

Zoo Whiz

Kelly Tenkely1 Comment on Zoo Whiz3487 views
What it is:  Zoo Whiz is a new education site that encourages kids to be “whizzes” in math, reading and word development.  There are levels and content for students from 5 to 15 years old.  There are over 11,200 interactive activities to help unleash the whiz in every child.  The games and activities go beyond simple drill and skill to build higher order thinking skills and problem solving strategies.  The activities build fluency in math, reading and word development.  Zoo Whiz has kids practice math, reading and word skills through a series of activities and games that gets progressively difficult.  As students play games, they earn Zoo Whiz “money” that will allow them to purchase animals to build up their zoo.  Young students will really enjoy this aspect of Zoo Whiz!
In the math sections, students will learn:
  • Numeration: integers, operations, money
  • Addition & subtraction
  • Multiplication & division
  • Fractions & decimals: ratio, percentages
  • Patterns & algebra: patterns, relationships
  • Data: recording, displaying and interpreting data
  • Measurement: length, area, volume/capacity, mass, time
  • Space & geometry: 2D, 3D, position, angle, transformations, symmetry

Currently Zoo Whiz is in public beta.  There are still some areas that are being developed and released.  There are two versions of Zoo Whiz: a free account and a premium account that provides students with additional content and abilities within the game.  In the public beta, both versions are free.  While the site may have curricular material for students up to age 15+, I’m not sure a 15 year old student would spend any amount of time on this site.  It is definitely more geared for the under 10 crowd.

How to integrate Zoo Whiz into the classroom: Zoo Whiz is a fun new way for students to hone their math, reading and word skills.  Because every student has their own login, they can practice the subjects at their own level and at their own pace.  The site makes a great center activity, providing students extra practice for basic, key skills.  I like the way Zoo Whiz activities present concepts in a variety of ways to ensure that students have a real understanding of a concept (instead of memorization of a fact alone).  Zoo Whiz is a great place for students to build fluency.
I like the way that Zoo Whiz has set up the school and classroom accounts to be linked with a home account.  This makes it easy for both parents and teachers to stay aware of what skills students are working on, where they are successful, and where they could use some additional help.
Students will enjoy earning money to purchase animals for their zoo.
If you don’t have the opportunity for students to play these games individually, consider using a projector-connected computer or an interactive whiteboard to play the games as a class.  Create one class account for students to play from.  Students can take turns helping the class earn money for their zoo and decide which animals should be added.   When I had only one computer in the classroom, I turned activities like Zoo Whiz into a class game.  Sometimes I would split the kids into teams to see which team could earn the most points and others we would work collaboratively to get to a benchmark that we predetermined.  Either way, all students should be involved in game play.

Tips: I learned about Zoo Whiz from iLearn Technology reader, Tania.  Thank you Tania!  Zoo Whiz looks like a fun addition to the classroom.  Be sure to let parents know about Zoo Whiz, this could be a fun way to continue practice at home.

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

Learn Zillion: Learning without limits

Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment on Learn Zillion: Learning without limits2842 views
What it is:  Today I learned about a resource called Learn Zillion in a Skype conversation with Sam Schillace, creator of Google Docs.  Learn Zillion has a tagline that resonates with me: Learning Without Limits.  This is why I love technology, it enables learning without limits.  One of the things I have dreamed about, is a world where the very best teachers around the world could be connected with the students that need them.  Learn Zillion does just that through asynchronous video lessons organized by the Common Core Standards.  Learn Zillion was started by E.L. Haynes public charter school who had a passion for sharing best practices across classrooms and to connect students with just the right lesson, at just the right time.  The site started small and grew along with the passion that every child should have access to incredible teachers and resources.  Learn Zillion is now a place where teachers can learn by “sitting in” on other teacher’s lessons, and students can get a playlist of lessons that meet their needs.  Pretty awesome!
How to integrate Learn Zillion into the classroom: It has always bothered me that I only had access to the teachers I had access to.  Let me explain that a little: I had some really incredible teachers growing up; my first, third, and fifth grade teachers were beyond exceptional.  I think about them often and model my own teaching based on what they did.  I had an incredible creative writing teacher in high school.  I had an Algebra teacher who made me believe that I was a gifted math student (I’m average at best).  I also had years with so-so teachers, teachers who didn’t really inspire the best in me.  That is not to say that another student didn’t connect with them and remember them years later.  It always irked me that I didn’t get to pick ANY teacher in the world to be my teacher.  I knew that there were amazing teachers out there, why didn’t I get to learn from them?  Would my education have been different if I was matched up with the very best teachers in the world?
Learn Zillion is the first step in this direction.  It may not be the rich experience you get from clicking with someone on a personal level AND learning from them, but does give students the ability to learn a concept in a new way from a teacher who may “click” with them educationally differently than you can.  Sometimes it is just a matter of being able to pause, rewind and repeat a concept at will that makes all the difference.  With class sizes that are growing out of control, the ability to work one on one with students is diminishing quickly.  Learn Zillion allows every child to enter their learning at the right level, it is available on demand (day or night), it utilized fantastic educators from around the world, and it helps teachers create custom playlists of learning for students.  Using this technology, students can get the extra support they need with foundational concepts.
Learn Zillion would make a fantastic support center in the classroom.  Students can visit the center to find out where they are in their personal learning journey, watch videos and practice new skills and concepts.  Because the videos are based on Common Core Standards, your students will get extra support for the foundational skills that support additional learning.
Learn Zillion is a nice resource in a “flipped” classroom where homework looks a lot more like preparation for practice that happens in the classroom.  Students can watch the preparation video at home and come to class prepared to practice and explore using the new knowledge.  The great thing about a flipped classroom is the ability to offer students support where and when they need it-in the practice and honing of skills.

Tips: I’m impressed with the quality and organization of Learn Zillion.  Be sure to take some time to explore some lessons and dream up how you might use it with your students or even as a learning tool for yourself.

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

ABC Mouse: math, reading, geography, and science curriculum (interactives/games/books)

Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment on ABC Mouse: math, reading, geography, and science curriculum (interactives/games/books)2936 views
What it is:  ABC Mouse is a complete online curriculum for pre-k and kindergarten students that provides a step-by-step learning path.  There are six academic levels that include curriculum that includes over 350 interactive lessons and more than 2000 learning activities.  As a student completes one activity successfully, they are guided to the next.  The interactive lessons include online picture books, puzzles, games, songs, art, activities and printable activities that relate to different topics and disciplines.  Each lesson offers different ways to learn to meet the needs of a variety of students.  The reading curriculum in ABC Mouse helps students recognize letters and sounds of the alphabet and sight words.  There are hundreds of books build in including fables, fairy tales and non-fiction.  In addition to sight words, students can learn phonics, sound recognition and rhyming words/word families.   The math curriculum teaches students numbers, shapes, patterns and measurement.  Students will play games and activities that help them to recognize and count numbers 1-100, identify and draw shapes, and the meaning of addition and subtraction.  ABC Mouse’s World Around Us is an introduction to science, social studies and health curriculum.  In the World Around Us, students will learn about the body and health, sports, plants and animals, weather and seasons, and earth/moon/sun/stars.
The lesson builder, lets you choose the content and activities for students to interact with based on their needs and interests.  Progress tracking makes it easy to see the number of learning activities that have been completed.  There are a lot of fun goodies tucked away including a virtual zoo, farm, aquarium and the ability to record a book in your own voice.
This is a comprehensive, well put together site that is FREE to public schools in the United States and Canada.  It is a wonderful addition to the kindergarten classroom!

How to integrate ABC Mouse into the classroom:  ABC Mouse is a fun website.  Activities in ABC Mouse are fantastic for center use in a one-two computer classroom (or more).  The activities and games are short enough for a center activity that students can cycle through.

For kindergarten students in a computer lab, this is a great site to get their feet wet with the technology at the beginning of the year.  I often started my students on fun academic sites like Starfall.com where students could practice clicking, navigating, dragging/dropping, etc.  These type of sites build students computer confidence, improve their fine motor skills and provide them with content area learning at the same time.  I wish this site had existed when I was teaching kindergarten computer!

If you don’t have access to computers for the students but have an interactive whiteboard or projector-connected computer, students can take turns interacting with the ABC mouse activities.  The books make great class read along stories on the big screen!

ABC Mouse is a fun way to introduce new concepts/skills, as a place for students to practice concepts/skills, or for review.

Tips: If you aren’t at a public school, sign up for the sample content…the private school dollar amount is reasonable!

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

Draw a Stickman

Kelly Tenkely2 Comments on Draw a Stickman6174 views
What it is:  Draw a Stickman is a delightful site that I learned about from @amandacdykes on her blog Upside Down Education.  On Draw a Stickman, students are prompted to draw a stick figure, the figure they draw springs to life and is faced with several challenges, students must follow directions and draw several props for their stick figure to interact with.  This is a mini interactive story that has students reading and following directions, solving mysteries, thinking creatively and solving problems.  Students will love the hero of the story (the character they created) and the villain (a dragon).

How to integrate the Draw a Stickman site into the classroom: Draw a Stickman is a fun interactive site that uses student creations to tell a story.  Students can complete the interactive on individual computers, iDevices (the site works great!), interactive whiteboards, or classroom computers.

Aside from just fun practice at following instructions, Draw a Stickman would be a great fictional story prompt.  Students have the bones of a story and can fill in details, vivid verbs, adjectives, etc. to tell the story.  Students can focus on fleshing out their hero, the plot of the story, the details, the setting, etc.  Students can come up with a moral of a story that they add in the customized ending.  This link can be sent as a tweet, facebook link, or in an email to accompany the story they have created.  These stories would be fun to share as a class…how many different stories did students come up with using the same base?

On an interactive whiteboard, students can go through the story together, labeling the different parts of the story (beginning, problem, climax, resolution, ending).  This interactive can help students identify parts in a story including setting, characters and plot.

Tips: After you have gone through Draw a Stickman, you can personalize the message at the end and share.  Add any two lines of text that you wish.  This could be a fun way to reveal messages to your students!

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

Literature Map- The Tourist Map of Literature

Kelly Tenkely7 Comments on Literature Map- The Tourist Map of Literature4013 views

What it is: Literature Map is a neat little web tool that I learned about from Samantha, an iLearn Technology reader. Thanks Samantha!  Literature Map makes it simple to discover new authors.  Student’s can type in the name of a favorite author and instantly get a cloud of related authors.  The closer two writers are together on the map, the more likely someone will like both of them.  Any of the authors in the cloud can be selected to see the authors related to them.

How to integrate Literature Map into the classroom: Isn’t it wonderful to find an author that you can’t get enough of?  Literature Map helps students in the discovery of new authors based on authors they know they like.  Tools like Literature Map can act as a catalyst in uncovering the love for reading.  Literature Map would be a great site to bookmark on classroom computers or in the library.  Students won’t be stuck in the “I don’t know what to read” or the “I can’t find anything to read” rut.

In the intermediate classroom or middle/high school classroom, ask students to choose two authors from the Literature Map to compare and contrast.  Students can dig into writing style, genre and author study as they compare/contrast.

Tips: If you don’t find an author listed, you can contribute to Literature Map so that others can benefit from your recommendations.

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

Learning A-Z Teacher Appreciation week open house

Kelly Tenkely2 Comments on Learning A-Z Teacher Appreciation week open house2592 views

What it is: Every year, Learning A-Z celebrates Teacher Appreciation week with an open house where teachers can explore all that Learning A-Z has to offer for FREE!!  Each day you can access another portion of the Learning A-Z tools.  This is one of those sites that I have paid for and used since I started teaching.  I love Reading A-Z because it has books that my students can print off and take home with them for every reading and interest level.

All week: Raz-Kids is a student-centric site where kids can practice reading online anytime and anywhere.

May 2, 2011- Reaing A-Z is a fantastic collection of printable and projectable books and resources that spans 27 reading levels.

May 3, 2011- Vocabulary A-Z has 12,000+ words that are organized by categories and give teachers the ability to create customized vocabulary lists.

May 4th, 2011- Science A-Z has science curriculum resources spanning more than 60 units, all are written to three reading levels.

May 5th, 2011- Writing A-Z has many of the resources you need to teach writing in your classroom.

May 6th, 2011- Reading tutors provides more than 400 reading resource packets that can be used for one-on-one tutoring.

How to integrate Learning A-Z into the classroom: If you teach in an elementary classroom, you should take advantage of these resources during the free open house week.  Find new resources for your classroom and explore what Learning A-Z has to offer your students.  I think you will be impressed by the resources available here!

As a new teacher, I relied heavily on Reading A-Z to help bulk up my classroom library.  Students loved being able to color in and take home the Reading A-Z books.

Set up your classroom computers with Raz Kids for the week, students can have fun practicing those reading skills in a fresh new way all week long!

Hunt down your science units and download resources that teach important concepts while being accessible to students of all reading levels.

Tips: Don’t forget to visit and explore each day this week!  Everyone who registers for the open house will be eligible to win a free classroom license of Learning A-Z, 5 teachers will be selected each day!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using  Learning A-Z  in your classroom!

 

Tiki-Toki: Create gorgeous multimedia timelines

Kelly Tenkely8 Comments on Tiki-Toki: Create gorgeous multimedia timelines6570 views

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!

Virtual book club: Readicide

Kelly Tenkely3 Comments on Virtual book club: Readicide3134 views

 

What: The Michigan Reading Association is hosting an interactive virtual book club for anyone to join via Facebook.   This is an opportunity to network with educators around the world and take charge of your own professional development.  The first book is Readicide by Kelly Gallagher (who will be hosting the book club with the Michigan Reading Association).  If you aren’t familiar with this book, you can read a post I wrote when the book was first released here.  The idea behind the virtual book club is to give educators a place to connect with others, share ideas, reflect and improve your classroom.

Where: It is easy to join just click to view the Facebook invitation and select “I’m Attending.”

When: The book club will meet during the month of May.  Login whenever you are available to browse posts and conversations and add your own thoughts.  Each week there will be a post that outlines a general road map that chunks chapters so we are reading and reflecting at a similar pace.

How: Purchase Readicide, view Kelly’s website and follow him on Twitter, “attend” the facebook invitation, let the fun begin!

I really enjoyed reading Readicide and look forward to reading it again-this time with friends to reflect with!  Who else will be joining us?

Thank you to Erin for inviting me!

Story Time for Me: Digital Children’s Books

Kelly Tenkely5 Comments on Story Time for Me: Digital Children’s Books3945 views

Online Children's Stories

What it is: Story Time for Me is a beautiful collection of digital children’s books for primary students in kindergarten through second grade.  Each story includes charming illustrations, animation and professional narration with music and sound effects.  Activities accompany every story that encourage imagination and creativity (these are coming soon!).  The stories have been developed to teach important values through positive moral themes.   Story Time for Me currently has a library of over 30 books and growing.  Next Friday (April 22, 2011) Story Time for Me will be launching free personalized activity books where students can become the star of a book.

Students can choose to read each story with or without narration, with or without animation and choose to highlight the words as they are read.

I can’t tell you how impressed I am with this free digital story site.  It expands your classroom library, encourages a focus on character development and invigorates children to read more.

How to integrate Story Time for Me into the classroom: Story Time for Me expands your classroom library with winsome digital stories that your students will love.  Story Time for Me makes a great reading center on classroom computers. Because students have the option to read with narration or independently, it meets the needs of both strong and developing.  Each story reinforces positive character education values often dealing with friendship.  These stories are a wonderful way to begin class discussions about friendship and empathy with students.  If you have an interactive whiteboard or projector-connected computer, the stories can be used as a whole-class “big book”.

When the personalized versions are available, give your students the opportunity to star in their own story.  These personalized stories would make a fun beginning of the year activity as a way to welcome students to a new grade, or end the school year with a personalized story they can enjoy all summer.

Tips: I learned about Story Time for Me from @2sparkley’s blog, Bits and Pieces Place.  If it isn’t a blog you subscribe to, it should be!

Story Time for Me is completely free, the more visitors they can attract the more stories they will be able to add to the library. You can help them by spreading the word to family and friends on Twitter, Facebook, and blogs.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Story Time for Me in your classroom!

Zoodles: a kid safe mode for every device

Kelly Tenkely2 Comments on Zoodles: a kid safe mode for every device8908 views

What it is: Zoodles makes it possible to have a “kid safe” mode on every device: Mac, PC, iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch and Android.  Zoodles includes wonderful features for technology use in the classroom and at home.  With Zoodles every child has their own “playground” space (login) that they access by clicking on their picture.  A parent dashboard lets teachers (or parents) customize Zoodles to meet the needs of students. Parents and teachers can clearly see where a student spends their time, what their interests are, and what subjects they have been practicing.  Every game in Zoodles has been previewed by experts and is rated based on it’s educational merit.  Parent play-along mode makes it possible for parents or teachers to guide the learning experience.  The interface is focused on kids and is extremely intuitive.  There are no distracting “extras” in the navigation or URLs where students can get sidetracked or lost.  The content in Zoodles adapts to each child’s age and ability level so they are constantly being challenged and engaged. There are thousands of educational games built into Zoodles…students always have something new and challenging to interact with.  Zoodles also gives students access to fun educational videos.  Zoodles is geared for toddler to third grade (8 year old) students.  You can peruse the games included in Zoodles by clicking on the “Games” tab on the site.  There are games for: cognitive development, creative development, life skills, math, reading, science, and social studies. The games and videos in Zoodles are pulled from several places on the Internet.  What makes Zoodles a great tool is the ability to guide students in their learning, easily find quality educational content, scale as a student is ready, and keep ads blocked and hidden.

How to integrate Zoodles into the classroom: Zoodles is great for classroom computers and devices in the primary classroom.  It provides students with access to quality learning games and content from the Internet without having to sort through the Internet to get to it.  Zoodles is perfect for classroom computers that are used as learning centers.  For the classroom, create 3-5 different accounts.  Instead of basing the accounts on individual students, the accounts can be based on a learning level.  Through the dashboard, teachers can guide the learning that happens in each account.  This keeps your students on task, learning at their level, and engaged in meaningful activities.  Even if you don’t use the Zoodles interface on your computers for students, it is definitely worth a download as a teacher.  The games and videos are broken up into subject areas and age groups.  This makes it easy to find an activity for any learning that you are doing in the classroom.  Use Zoodles as your guide to find great activities and learning games on the web.

Tips: I found Zoodles when searching for a solution for one of the families I teach.  They were looking for a way that all of their kids (2 years old to 8 years old) could use the family computer for fun, safe learning experiences.  This is a great app to recommend to parents who don’t know what they don’t know, but want to provide their kids with virtual learning experiences.  Be sure to recommend it to your students families!  There are premium features that families will LOVE!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Zoodles!