After 11 Tools: Reflections

This has been an interesting journey, learning about all the digital tools available and how to use them. This course has made me realize how important it is for me to stay up to date with the available technology in order to provide my students with an engaging, 21st century learning environment. This is the digital age and I need to know how to guide my students through it.

As a new teacher at a school where I am the only Pre K teacher, I am looking forward to using Google Docs and Blogs to communicate and share with other Pre K teachers. Reading other teachers blogs during this program has been a great source of ideas. I plan to use Photostory to create a digital class book.

As someone who entered the digital age later in life and was somewhat resistant at first, I have seen the light. With time being the only constraint, I look forward to continuing to learn more. Fortunately, with most of the tools, once the "how to" is mastered, they can save you time.

Tool # 11

As a teacher of young children (Pre K), I think it is very important to begin laying the groundwork for my students to become good digital citizens. How to use the internet safely, as well as using good manners and treating others with respect is very important. I liked the idea of using the acronym that I found on Cyber Smart Young Kids: T h i n k
to help teach digital citizenship.

T - Tell your Mum or Dad if you see something online that upsets you, or if someone makes you feel unhappy. You can also talk to a trusted adult like a teacher: they can help.

H - Hide your password. Only ever share it with your parents – never with your friends. Someone else could go online pretending to be you and do something that could get you into trouble.

I - Interesting websites can be fun. Check with Mum or Dad if a site is okay to use before you visit. Sometimes they can set up a good list of sites just for you.

N - be Nice to people you talk to on the internet or phone. Name calling or being mean is not cool. Look out for yourself and for others.

K - Keep your special personal information safe. Never give your real name, address or phone number to anyone you don’t know in the real world.

Besides having a poster at the computer station with the THINK acronym and pictures beside each letter demonstrating that point, I could have the students act out each point after talking about them at large group. Also, before beginning research on the internet, I will need to model how and why I chose certain sites for them to use, instead of just providing appropriate sites, allowing them the opportunity to see the process of evaluating a website. Technology is such a wonderful and useful tool, but it is so important for children to know how to use it safely and wisely.

Tool # 10

My daughter has an iPhone and iPod, but I don't. Consequently, I wasn't familiar with what you could do until working on Tool # 10. After what I've read, I want one. I am really excited about having an iTouch in class because I think the students will be excited about using them and therefore more engaged in what they are learning while "playing" with the different apps. I liked what one of the students said on Video 3 about liking to use the iTouch because it was "more new world than (using) paper." Since I don't have an iTouch to review the free educational apps, it's a little difficult to really know how well they would work for my students. The Shape Builder Lite seemed like a good app for hand eye coordination and working on matching skills and also the Alphabet Tracing for practicing writing letters. At first, the I Puzzle Words-Transportation sounded like a good app for later on when students knew most of their letter sounds because you unscramble the letters to spell the word, but you also have a picture that you are unscrambling (putting in order) at the same time. If you put a letter in the wrong place, the picture will be out of order too. Unfortunately, a comment from a parent said that it had more confusing words like llama and yacht and the app mispelled yacht--yatch. Again, not being able to play the game (and review the words available for the I puzzle) makes it difficult to know how appropriate the particular apps would be for my class.

Tool # 9

I guess I've been living in a cave. I had never heard of Jing or Skype. Jing sounds like a useful tool for creating a narrated video on how to do something. I like what Tales from Room 2 said about using it to create a video for teaching how to use the computer. Also, Skype could be fun to use for my Pre K class to connect with another Pre K class to compare how similar or different their school days are or to discuss different traditions.

Tool # 8

Wow! Never having searched these sites for educational videos or any other kinds of videos for that matter, I was amazed at how many are out there. After about 4 hours, I had to make myself stop searching. There were so many to choose from, but here's a couple I liked. Marmot's Map Shape Song would be great for teaching the shapes and their attributes. We could sing along with the video and add hand motions to go with it. Also, I like the Phonics Song 2 from KidsTV 123 by A. J. Jenkins. It would be another helpful tool for teaching the alphabet letters and sounds. I got both of these videos from You Tube. The visual and auditory aspects of the video along with incorporating some movement, kinesthetic, will help to engage the different types of learners.

Tool # 7

This tool was the one I was most excited about trying. The directions for making a photo story were very easy to follow. The only thing I was confused about, was what format to use when saving to my computer. I think this type of video would be great for demonstrating procedures for work stations. Having the students in the videos would help to hold their attention. Also I like the idea of using them for making class books. Unfortunately, I am having difficulty uploading my video. I will keep trying.

Tool # 6

After reading about Wikis, they seem very similar to Google docs and Blog sites; another useful and expedient way to share and collaborate with other teachers. Before reading Wiki ideas for younger students on Wikispaces, it seemed like something more useful for older students, but now I can see how Pre K might use this tool. I liked the idea of sharing traditions for holidays with students in other countries. Of course, you would have to locate a class willing to participate. We could even do this with a Pre K class at a different campus. Also, I like the idea of a virtual tour of the school at the beginning of the school year. When I looked into signing up for a free Wiki at Wikispaces, it says for K-12. I sent an email asking if Pre K would be eligible and am waiting for a reply.

Tool # 5

After reading about tagging and checking out the social bookmarking sites Delicious and Diigo, I was pretty excited with the possibilities for saving time and getting more organized. I have been bookmarking educational sites I liked, but without any real organization. There is so much info out there; it's sometimes overwhelming. Also, I liked the ability to save the content on a web page so that you don't have to worry about it not being there when you come back to it later on. I used the tag words "early childhood education" on Diigo to find the web site "Cybrary Man's Educational Web Sites." I liked this site because it catalogued educational web sites so that you could look up specific areas like Pre K and sites for info and advice for new teachers. From this site, I found another web site called Pre Kinders that had a lot of resources for Pre K teachers. This site could definitely help me with ideas and advice for setting up and managing my class.

Tool # 4

Google reader seems like another great way to keep up with online educational resources I'm interested in and share ideas and info with other teachers. This would be especially beneficial to me as a new teacher. Google docs would be helpful for collaboration with other teachers, team members and commitees,but also it might be useful as a tool for signing up for parent conferences (for those parents with email). You could email them a link to a spreadsheet containing the days and times which they could sign up for online. If anyone called in, you could check the schedule and type their name in directly to the doc online, keeping it current.

Tool # 3

Although I really enjoyed these sites, Wordle was very time consuming for me because I did not understand how to save my "Name Jumble." I finally figured it out with a little help from my husband, but not before a lot of frustration and searching to find the answer. Randomly mixing up the names of everyone in the class and having students find their names as well as classmates could be a fun way to work on name recognition. Also, Image Chef was fun to play around with. I especially liked the animated pictures. On my blog, I used the growing flowers with the words "Come grow with us" as an invitation to parents and students to explore the site. There was another picture with a bowl of alphabet soup that I thought about using as the cover page for a class book, titled "Eating the Alphabet."

Tool # 2

1. I love the idea of an online education community. When I went back to school, I was amazed at the generosity of teachers, freely sharing ideas and info on the internet. In this rapid pace, technological age, we need to use all the tools available and what better way to help and support each other. As a new Pre K teacher at Thornwood, where there are no other Pre K teachers, a PLN could be very helpful to connect with other Pre K teachers at different campuses.

2. The commenting advice from Vicki Davis about "the power of words" really struck a cord with me. About 3 years ago, I took my first online course, Business English (very intimidating....would rather have face to face). For one assignment, we were supposed to be working for a company that was considering buying laptops for employees. Our job was to do the research about which laptop brand and model would be best and write a paper presenting this to the company. For each assignment my instructor chose a paper that excelled in completing the assignment correctly and posted it. When he chose mine, I was on cloud nine, but only briefly. Another student disagreed with my choice (not a problem) and proceeded to negatively critique my entire paper. Even though the instructors opinion should and did matter more, her words (a total stranger) really hurt. Had she included something positive, it would have been a little less painful.

3. I have commented on Knetsar News, Mrs. Ciso's Blog, Trog to Blog, Kind Kindergarteners and Tales from Room 2

Tool # 1

Learning how to create my blog was fun yet very time consuming. I did enjoy designing the site, but probably spent way too much time on that aspect. I like the idea of using this as a way to connect with parents and keep them updated about what's going on in the classroom and provide fun links for the students that connect to what we are learning. I also like the idea that Kim Kinard mentioned about having the students create their own avatars and they could dictate a message about themselves for me to type.