Infographic Assignment

Here is a link to my Infographic Assignment.  I kept mine very simple, as it is something I would use with my 3rd graders.  I have found that too much content for them can be overwhelming, and they don't see everything you want them to!

http://jenn6462.edu.glogster.com/branches-of-government/

Week 5

As we have worked through the digital story telling process, I have found it to be exactly like the writing process.  When we teach our students to write, we teach them to brainstorm.  In third grade we typically give them some kind of organizer to use, although we do teach them how to make webs, much like the one I used to gather my thoughts about my digital story.  They always do a rough draft.  Many of our students will tell you that their story is perfect, but as they learn, we all have to revise and edit our writing.  I personally, do not like writing, so I revise a ton.   My biggest struggle in creating digital stories, is figuring how to make everything work together between the talking, visual, and any music.  In my mind that is a lot of things to coordinate. When we do digital stories at school the kids are able to coordinate all three, so I figure if they can do it, so can I :-)  

Week 4

Many teachers have a classroom website with varying levels of success.  How have you made your classroom website more useful to students, families, and other educators?  What gaps still remain?

Our school requires us to each have a classroom website.  We have made many changes to our websites over the years, but it wasn't until recently that I have found a way to make it work.  In my opinion, our school websites are very lacking.  They are hard to edit, you can't do much with animations, or making them visually appealing, and it is hard to put documents on for the parents to download.  The worst part is that you have to be at school to update your website.  As we all know, finding time during the school day to do something like this is difficult.  Our district has tried several other alternatives along the way, but nothing has stuck.  

My solution to this last year was I started a blogger site.  There is a link on my school website to take parents to my blogger site.  This was by far the best decision I ever made.  I love that I can update it from my phone or ipad wherever I am.  I am able to upload documents that are useful to the parents and students more easily.  It is so much more user friendly.  In order to make my site more useful for parents, I would like to incorporate google calendar and create separate sections for the parents and students with pertinent information.   I still have links on my regular school website that the kids access every day, and ultimately I would like to get all of them moved into my blogger site.  

Week 3

How are you going to incorporate literacy into your content area?  If you are an elementary teacher, how would you integrate literacy into science, math or social studies?  Detail a specific example, including an assessment strategy.  Don’t forget to think about your diverse learners and something you may need to do differently for below or above average readers.

As an elementary school teacher I feel that we incorporate literacy into all content areas without even realizing it.  In math,I think that we mostly incorporate literacy through our standardized test preparation.  We teach our students how to look at a problem and decode it much like they have to decode words when they read.  The students have to pick out the important information, and re-read to figure out what they are expected to do with that information.  Once they have solved their problem the students often have to explain how they got their answer.  Just like when we write, the students revise and edit their explanations to make sure that they were clear and made sense.  We even talk about word choice with them.  When it is possible too, we like to incorporate literature into our lessons.  There are many trade books that correlate with our lessons that we can read as an introduction.  For example: when we are teaching about how to read and write larger numbers we can read the book, "How Much is a Million".  

I also teach Social Studies.  When we do our lessons, especially since my partner teacher has a primarily ELL class every year, we focus on vocabulary.  We make books and drawings to help the students learn what the meanings of the words are.  I have found with this group of students there are many words outside of our basic vocabulary words that we take for granted that they know, when in fact they have no idea.  We use graphic organizers like KWL charts to evaluate what we know about topics.  We also use leveled readers to focus in on each unit.  With these readers the students are learning the same main ideas, however the reading difficulty varies in each set.  This way my advanced readers are being challenged, and my struggling readers aren't having as much trouble comprehending because the vocabulary is more appropriate for them.

Week 2 Reading

Identify a techno-tool, identify an educational setting (perhaps where you currently work), the educational need/goals it will address, the target population (be sure to consider the needs of diverse learners), and how you will assess the value/effectiveness of using the tool.

One tool that I began to experiment with last year is Edmodo.  This is a fantastic site that allows students to post and respond to discussions online.  I used this site last year with my highest reading group to get them motivated to do their small group reading assignments.  This year I would like to use it with all of my students.  It has a Facebook like feel that generates interest in using the program.  I like it because I can control who has access to the groups.  For my higher students, I will use it for discussions using higher order thinking skills.  For my lower students, we can use it to discuss story elements, or practice supporting our answers to questions.  Students with special needs could give their answers verbally and have someone type for them, or do their discussions with a partner.  I will be able to see if this tool has been effective by seeing growth in the students' discussions and answers to prompts and also through their scores on benchmark testing.  

WIKI Project

For this assignment I have selected a reading and a writing blog from 2 very different grade levels.

The first blog I chose was Mrs. McGriff's Reading Blog.  This is a blog used by a 7th grade language arts teacher.  Mrs. McGriff's has her blog set up through edublog.  This blog is very visually appealing.  It seems very appropriate for middle school students.  When you go to the home page there are links across the top with the main features of her blog.  There is also a welcome box with a brief explanation of how to use the site, and the week at a glance assignments.  Her page includes several widgets along the side for further navigation through the site, including the students' individual blog pages.  Unfortunately you cannot see the students individual blogs because Google Reader is no longer in service.  However, she explains in the parent section of the blog that the students can publish their own writing, and they can share reading responses.  I like that she does remind the students and parents about digital citizenship.  I love how she puts the weekly objectives up so that the students are all aware of what they are responsible for that week.

The second blog I chose was Mrs. Baker's Second Grade Class.  Mrs. Baker's blog is very visually appealing and user friendly.  It has several pictures of her class and room.  She offers a great welcome that explains how to use her site, and offers visitors the opportunity to comment on the students' posts.  For the most part it seems that she uses the site as a way for her students to respond to stories they have read in the classroom.  In the main section she explains what story the students have read and what their prompt is.  When you click on the story on the right, it has all of the students' posts.  There is even a section for free writing.  I like how the students don't have to post a lot, but you can tell if they really understood the message of the story from their posts.  It is so great to see that second graders can handle using this kind of resource in the classroom.  They seem interested, and like they are truly invested in their learning.

In a sense I think both teachers kind of used this tool in the same way.  Both teachers had their students respond to literature and assignments through blog posts.  They both did it in a way that was appropriate for their age group.  The middle school students each got their own blog page, and the 2nd graders all posted the responses on a specific page for their assignment.

I also found this blog which had great resources for Reading Strategies in the Classroom that I wanted to share Reading Strategies

Week 1 Readings

After reading the beginnings of both of our text books, it has become very clear that literacy instruction is changing greatly.  No longer are we just teaching students to read and write, but we are teaching them to collaborate, investigate, communicate and much much more.  I found the information about the social-constructivist learning paradigm to be a perfect description of what I feel our school is trying to move towards.  I think that the Pearson book made it more clear and seem less intimidating.  As they said in the Literacy 2.0 book, "Many teachers teach as they themselves were taught-through a transmission model."  We grew up with a direct instruction learning environment, that is what we are familiar with.  It was nice to hear that in a social constructivist model, there is still a place for direct instruction, but that we need to allow the students to take a more active part in the learning.  I am looking forward to reading more about how to incorporate technology into my literacy program beyond simply typing stories and writing projects.  I found this website that shares more information about Literacy 2.0 and how it is being utilized across the United States. http://www.literacy20.com   

Introduction Post

I am starting this course off a little bit behind my colleagues.  Two weeks ago I found out that I was going to have my baby girl via C-Section.  This was not planned for, and neither was the recovery time.  Fortunately everything went well and we are now blessed to have a beautiful baby girl.  

Naturally this meant that I am also starting my job in a chaotic way.  I teach 3rd grade, and was able to spend 5 1/2 days with my new students, getting to know as much about them as possible.  I am a pretty independent person, and generally prefer to do things on my own, so asking for help, and letting my sub help before I left was very hard for me.  Even as I sit here with my sweet Bella in my lap, I am anxious about what has been going on in my room.

As part of the many changes our school is undergoing this year, I am becoming an eMints for all classroom.  As part of the e-mints program we have 6 laptops in our rooms now.  With this course I am excited to learn new ways to incorporate technology into our literacy program.   I feel like I am comfortable using technology in other subject areas, so hopefully this course will continue to expand my knowledge and comfort level.