Suzanne's Ed Tech Reflections

In a blog post (5/12/11) entitled “How Limited Technology Budgets Failed My Students", teacher/blogger Bill Ferriter discussed the “wonderings” of his students. During a recent class period, his 6 th grade students were wondering about their eyes. Coming up with questions such as: Does eye color effect vision? Does reading in the dark cause eye strain Does vision get worse over time? The class was really energized about their questions and wanting to find answers. Bill felt frustrated because he did not have an effective way for them to quickly find relevant timely answers to their questions. The textbook did not address their questions directly and the information may have been outdated anyway. They would have to wait to schedule a time go to the library or computer lab and by then the excitement would have dwindled; new questions would have arisen on new topics. Two computers in a classroom is not an effective way for 30 students to get their questions answered. They have...

Many of our teachers have used the Free Rice website ( http://www.freerice.com/ ) to help students improve their vocabulary and help feed the hungry at the same time.   Free Rice donates 10 grains of rice to the World Food Programme for every correct answer. Great News! The website also works on the iPods. Here is a screen shot from my iPod with the first 10 grains of rice I earned:

In a recent post entitled “ High Frequency Word Project and Skype ,” I wrote about the creation of a series of (29) high frequency sight word videos that had been created by several third graders completely on their iPods using the Sonic Pics app. Students will be able to view those videos on their Pods but they have also been uploaded to our district webpage for viewing by all students, parents, and staff. It is part of our vision that teachers will be able to use these in their classrooms to help students develop mastery and fluency with these words but also to have them accessible 24/7 for our students and parents at home! Click here to view all 29 videos!