About Me

Telling a story with my iPhone

I had been looking forward to this project for a long while now, because I'd finally have a reason to play around with iMovie on my iPhone. I've had the app for a long time, with great hopes of creating some cool stories, but I never got around to that.

I knew I wanted to use still images combined with voiceovers that I could record. This plan worked great with iMovie, and it was very easy to edit, rearrange, lengthen and shorten image times, and record my voice.

I started the project by gathering images. I snapped some photos of the supply room at school. I had pictures of my classroom on my phone already that I could use. I snagged some stuffed animals from the nursery for a photo. I used the Google Earth app on my phone to get the images of the church and school. For the lists, I used the "Reminders" app that comes with the iPhone.

After I got all the images organized in the order I wanted, I then I started with the voiceovers. I tried to "wing-it" but that led to frustration, as I could never quite get out what I wanted to say. So I wrote out the simple statements, and recorded them with ease. Upon completion of the story I shared the video file to my cameral roll, and from there I uploaded it to YouTube. I snagged the YouTube embed code from the site on my computer, otherwise everything was completed on the phone. I even composed my entire blog post on my phone, but as luck would have it, the app closed suddenly, and I lost the post. I moved to the computer after that.

This story is a brief one, but I am pleased with its simplicity and layout. I am lucky to have had a great educational career from kindergarten through my current educational program. I've been surrounded by positive educational role models, and I hope that my students can look to me as a great role model as well.

I hope you enjoy my story.

Live Broadcasting with Ustream

What a cool experience! Planning started last weekend after we'd finished our assignments. We picked a date and time for our broadcast. We chose Wednesday evening because we thought we'd get it on air at the least hectic time of the week. So I used Facebook and Twitter to share the news:





I shared a friendly reminder on Wednesday prior to our broadcast:





And then, after many, many test runs we recorded this:



We had some issues with bandwidth at the beginning so we had to stop and restart, so our introduction is very brief. Also, the sound or microphone wasn't selected for the opening scene, so no audio there. Otherwise, I'm really pleased with the outcome.

I got some quick feedback via text message and Facebook, here's an example:



:)

Web 2.0 Specialists I Admire

So the first person I thought of when it comes to Web 2.0 in the classroom was Traci Blazosky. I attended a Discovery Virtual Conference several years ago and she was a presenter, and she "wowed" me. She shared tools like Glogster, Voki, Blabberize, and Camtasia. She had integrated glogs into a Google Earth tour, and I was amazed. I had always had a love of technology in the classroom, but she displayed some amazing ways to make it happen in a primary classroom. Traci taught me that younger students are capable of creating some great work, and that technology integration is not impossible with young students. After attending the virtual conference I incorporated some of the things she shared into my classroom. She had an awesome wiki site with links to various Web 2.0 tools, and while she's no longer teaching first grade the site is still online.

My next human filter works next door to me. Brandy Casey has been teaching for 8 years, and during her years of teaching her access to technology has changed vastly. She's now got a projector, smartboard, document camera, and an iPad, all of which she uses daily. While I don't share a lot of the cool Web 2.0 resources I find with all of my co-workers, I do share them with her. She is a great for personal discussion of possibilities, and I value her opinion greatly. She's becoming more and more of a technological guru, and she's loving it! We learn a lot from one another, and I'm grateful to have someone close to me to discuss websites and their potential benefits for the classroom.

My final human filter is an individual I have followed on Twitter for some time now. His name is Steven Anderson or @web20classroom. He's a great resource for ideas, research, resources, innovation, and professional development. While I've never attended a conference where he's presented, I have learned a great deal from him via Twitter. He along with other Twitter friends introduced me to the idea of "back-channelling" and I've "attended" several conferences by reading the back channels that occur on twitter.

There are many others I learn from on a daily basis, but these three people have taught me a lot, and while they may not know it, they have been very influential when it comes to my teaching and my classroom.

MapSkip, LittleBirdTales, and CarrotSticks

Site Evaluations:

By far, the most time consuming portion of this project was finding Web 2.0 sites that I wanted to evaluate for future use in my classroom. I spent a long while checking out the http://www.go2web20.net/ site. There are tons of resources on here, and I finally narrowed my choices down to three.

First up is, MapSkip. I made an account at this site as a teacher, and while the site isn't wildly popular (only about 3500 registered users), it looks like a valuable resource for students and teachers to share stories about different places on the map. I'd love to use this site with my students to share stories about field trips. Mapskip allows you to upload photos, sounds, and YouTube clips, along with the written story. This sight looks promising, and I'd love to see more users check it out. In my opinion, MapSkip is a solid Web2.0 app for classroom use. It gets 34 out of 36 points, and you can find the breakdown here.

Next up, my take on LittleBirdTales. This is an awesome site for youngsters that want to tell a story. This site allows individuals to upload personal artwork, or draw your artwork in the app itself. Text or recorded voice is added for each page of the masterpiece. Once finished students can share their stories via email. If tales are set classified as "public" anyone has access to an embed code, this option is not available for "private" stories. This storytelling platform could be used across the curriculum, which makes it a valuable tool. It's easy to use, and teachers can set up and maintain student accounts. The only downfall is the sharing aspect. LittleBirdTales gets 32 out of 36 and here's the breakdown.

The last site I chose to analyze is CarrotSticks. This site is a simple site focussing on mathematical computation practice. Students can compete individually or with other students in their class, or around the world. This site has a free edition, which allows students to practice addition. There are several options for subscriptions, as well as an educators subscription. The very cool thing about the educator subscription is that it is free, and any students added to the account has full access to the site during school hours! I have never seen such an account, but I think it's such a smart idea! This site doesn't score well on our rubric because it does not allow for any type of sharing, and it is limited to mathematical problem solving. It still looks to be a valuable tool for classroom use, and it does get students working or competing together, but that's the extent of the collaboration. CarrotSticks gets 21 out of 36. Check out the breakdown here.

Using Prezi

This project began as a daunting task, and even after choosing my topic, I was overwhelmed by the numerous resources available within Discovery Streaming. I began slowly by selecting various video segments and images that would help to build my unit. All the video clips and images I selected seemed like disjointed pieces of information, with no connection or meaning. Getting started with this project helped me to realize that I tend to struggle with synthesis.

Most students have great knowledge about the animals that surround them. However, learning and discussing the similarities and differences among various animals as well as among animals and humans requires a disciplined knowledge base. By combining three different content types offered by Discovery, I feel my students will be more apt to synthesize their prior knowledge with the new information obtained from this presentation.

This project serves two purposes, the first one being this assignment, and the second for use in the classroom. The information from Discovery is great, and paired with the five discussion questions after each segment, my students will prove to be the invaluable part of the lesson. It is the individual student responses, and the connections that they share, that will help ensure the synthesis of the material. While this project was very time consuming and challenging, I feel that it will be even more rewarding. I am eager to see the responses from my students as we move through the unit with this Prezi.

The Prezi and the discussion are part of the whole group component of the unit. In order to measure student mastery of the standards there will be extension activities that correlate with the the whole group instruction. Some possible assignments include, but are not limited to:

a wordle about each animal
venn diagrams comparing two or three different animals
a descriptive writing on an animal
a drawing to compare an animal to a human.

This project required a synthesis of ideas on my part. I am pleased with the final product, and even more pleased with the fact that this will be a very useful tool in my classroom. With synthesis, comes a sense of accomplishment, and I hope that with this presentation on animals my students will recognize connections and experience a similar sense of accomplishment.

http://prezi.com/9lqh-hc2pshk/animals/