Task 8- Glogster and Google

I used Glogster for the first time last year with my students. They started the year completing a glog about themselves instead of filling out a "Getting to Know You" document and art project. They learned how to navigate the site with great ease. It did not take them long at all to manipulate the program. The hardest part was finding appropriate pictures for them to save that matched the categories selected for their glog, but Sandy's already been helping me to figure that out.

Google Docs is new to me. I've already found a great tutorial for Wordle that had a Google Doc attached to it and was thrilled to use it.

I checked out some other features of Google Docs and realized that when I work with my team to edit and enhance a rubric, set of student directions, powerpoints, or anything else,  we actually do have multiple emails and attachments sent between us, making it hard to forget which copy is the most recent.  It makes a lot more sense to have one document in one location that can be edited and saved.  I love that they've made it so easy to upload current documents and that all versions are saved.  As we enter a new year, I'm looking forward to sharing, editing, and enhancing documents this way with Rhonda and Kristy!

I had seen Google Lit Trips before...and forgotten about them!  Naturally there aren't any novels available at the moment that we utilize in third grade.  However, I started to think about our novels and wondered if we could create something like that ourselves.  Sadly, I don't see it helping us at the moment, since what we read doesn't lend itself to travel.  It would obviously be such an incredible tool to use with books like Number the Stars or Who Comes with Cannons, books I have used in years' past.  Providing such a fantastic visual would definitely help the story come to life.

I'm anxious to look more deeply into Glogster...the teacher controls have changed somewhat and I'm hoping there are a couple of changes...

-Teacher moderated comments so that I can eliminate students messaging each other
-Ability to modify/change usernames easily  (Who thought s009.nea32 would be easy for an 8 year old to remember?!)

Task 7 - Collaboration Tools

Many of the tools mentioned in this task seem absolutely perfect to use in the classroom...when your students all have access to laptops.  Wallwisher would be a fantastic way to require your students to post a(n):

• Reflection about a book, chapter, lesson, idea, or concept discussed in class.

• Prediction for a science experiment.

• Photo/image that represents a mathematical term.

• Opinion on a legal case or controversial topic.

I can also see the benefit of online collaborating with Google Docs or Wiggio.  Students can work in teams and modify the same document.

However, these ideas are best suited for children slightly older than my own.  Gail Driscoll used Wallwisher with my students and asked them to post a definition of CyberBullying.  It was a fabulous idea!  But you can only imagine the difficulty they had finding the site, remembering to add their name to the sticky note, and then...remember what in the world they were supposed to say (and for it to be original).  We struggled to get their attention after posting because they were drawn into something else.  They're still so little.

I attended a conference last month that had a session about classroom clickers.  The presenter asked us a variety of questions that we could answer in a multiple choice fashion.  From there, she could tell who had answered, who had not, and how long it took each of us to answer.  She could also graph our answers to see how spread out our opinions were.  Her question was purposefully difficult (though we thought it was simple enough) and so she told us that some were right, some were wrong...and gave us an opportunity to discuss and change our answers.  It was fantastic!  

It would naturally take planning on the part of the teacher to create and manage just the right kinds of questions to spark discussions.  It would be a way for teachers to more quickly manage student responses than would be possible with Wallwisher.  This might be something more likely to be successful in a classroom without laptops.

I watched about 10 minutes of the Google Doc webinar and from what little I saw, I envision it as another great collaboration tool, allowing groups to work within a document together.  As Sandy mentioned, sharing large files and pictures would be easier this way than with email.  At this point, my students have not put together a group document.  In third grade, we spend a good deal of time getting familiar with programs, improving keyboarding skills, and developing writing skills.  I don't know that they are yet ready to collaborate on a team project of that depth.  We do work in groups, of course, but not with as much detail as the samples shown in this task.  Maybe I'm setting the bar too low for them???  I bet there's a teacher in some remote school  in America with one laptop that has figured out how to get her first graders to use Wallwisher on a daily basis with some magical idea I've not thought of yet.

Up until this month, I've been reluctant to try Skype.  I didn't have a clue who we'd talk to...or what about...or how I'd involve every student.  But an idea is brewing.  I found this...and would love to do something similar to start off with.  A teacher in California would like our classes to work together via blogging or a wiki on possibly state history.  We could develop and share documents about our states/cities, create videos or slideshows...and culminate with a Skyping session.  At first, I'd hoped our students could communicate individually with students from her class, but since the desktops in the labs do not have cameras, Skype will have to be a culminating project done class to class.

I'm almost disappointed these tools are not as feasible with littler kids...but I should be quiet because then, before I know it, someone will move me up!

Task 6 - Digital Storytelling

I mentioned in my last post how much I enjoyed StoryJumper, but I was thrilled to try Storybird this week!  I just jumped right in and tried my hand at it after watching the simple tutorial you can find here.  I was immediately drawn to the "inspired by art" feature, which allows you to select a type of artwork you find appealing to base your story on. Instantly, the bank of illustrations this particular artist has submitted are available on the screen for you to view and use in your story.  That's where I began.  The picture above got me going and from there, I started writing a story (albeit an unfinished one at this point).   I can't even post what I have written yet, because Storybird won't make it publicly viewable since the story is clearly unfinished. In the meantime...there are some points I wanted to note more or less for my own use later on when utilizing this program.

• Though the click and drop feature that allows you to put any one of the available illustrations quickly into your book, I spent a lot of time searching through them to find just the right one to fit my story.  There is no search feature that would allow you to look for specific tags within the group of illustrations provided while editing a book.
• I was able to create a story while simultaneously trying to place the available illustrations into my book, but I know my writing suffered.
• It would be worthwhile to offer students a variety of pictures from the site as story starters, to help get their ideas flowing.  Perhaps they can plan their stories after looking at the picture, write a first draft then use Storybird to add illustrations. 

Zooburst seemed like it would lend itself to be a class favorite. I can tell the kids would love being able to try something so new and inventive.  I would utilize it with individuals who show a love of writing and might benefit from a little enrichment.  I haven't learned how to actually create a 3D pop up book, but I requested more information...we'll see how it goes!
 
One of my favorite finds this past year was the Zimmer Twins.  The students were given a beginning to a movie, then asked to finish it.  I LOVED it!  It is the most age-appropriate introduction to online movie making for my students.  Perfect!!!

I have dabbled a bit with Animoto myself, but this past year was the first time I let students take a crack at it.  Since it was my first attempt with students, it was something only offered to those who were ahead of the game in their National Park studies.  It was amazing how easy they learned how to do it and how willing they were to teach others.  I would like to learn how to add voice to it...that's next. :)

I love the idea of using story boards when planning writing or digital stories.  Gail used them when working with our third graders on the Brain Pop videos they created this past year.  I should ask her for a mini-training.  I have used planning sheets before for story writing, and I think those would apply in the small step my kids could take to online publishing.  When assessing, my students are largely graded on the Six Traits Writing rubrics, since this has been the area of our focus in class.  However, digital or online storytelling involves other key components that need to be managed and evaluated.  

The basic assessment criteria outlined from Jason Ohler was a great place to start:

Short list of basic assessment traits
Writing	Six Trait Standards
Story	Story core clear, articulated, compelling?
Research	Research clear, thorough, integrated (rather than listed)?
Digital craftmanship	Command of the media?
Media grammar	Mechanics of media observed?
Met assignment criteria?	Length, number of elements, audience consideration (poem vs. essay) etc.?
Voice, creativity, originality?	Length, number of elements, audience consideration (poem vs. essay) etc.?

Or...

Example of selective story traits
Story flow	Was it a quality story that made listeners lean forward and wonder what was going to happen next? Did it flow, without bird walks or bumps? If audience members had to work to understand it, was it worth their effort?
Craftsmanship	Was the story neat, clean and complete? Was it crafted with care?
Problem solving and innovation	Is the story original and told with a sense of personal voice? Did the student overcome problems and obstacles to pursue their story?
Effort/Work ethic	Did the student take the time s/he needed to develop his or her ideas? Did s/he use class time wisely?

I think I first need to get comfortable with the media itself...then I will feel better about utilizing it in the classroom.  I'm enjoying "playing" with these websites and look forward to sharing them with my students.

Wikis and Online Writing Tools - Task 5

I started a class blog last fall and have used it mostly to update parents and students on what we are studying in class.  It is a central location for families to find homework, pertinent websites, and missed work.  The students access it regularly, although parents have yet to leave one single comment.  :)  However, I've loved having the control over placing documents and websites in a location my students can access easily.

My students started blogging this past year, but it wasn't with the traditional "blogging" definition in mind.  It was really another location for them to post information learned and persuasive paragraphs.  They enjoyed it immensely, and from the experience were able to learn how to upload videos and pictures to a website.  

Looking into wikis, though...I wasn't sure how I could use them, but discovered a great idea today.  I have tried to create a tangible bulletin board where children could post summaries of books they've read and would recommend to their peers.  You know what happened:  I never gave the kids enough time to do it and the computer tables, being right smack in front of the bulletin board, made it completely inaccessible.  There goes that idea.

Oftentimes, children come to me for book suggestions and I either draw a blank or have a hard time finding the perfect fit.  It seems to me a wiki would be a wonderful place for students to post and share that information.  If you click the stack of books picture above, you'll visit a school wiki with the same idea in mind.

My thoughts are to start the students off by discussing and identifying literary genres and then progress to lessons on how to find a "just right" book.  At my former school, all the books in the library were color-coded by reading ability.  After assessing students for a general reading level at the beginning of the year, they were shown what color code on the spine of the books matched their reading level, making it somewhat easier for kids to find "just right" books.  It might be worthwhile to help our students understand what a traditional "grade level" reading scale means to them.

After that, it would only take showing them how to access and add to the wiki before they could get started.  It might help keep them focused on what information to provide on the wiki by giving them a half sheet of paper, indicating what information is necessary to provide;  Title, Author, Genre, Reading Level, Summary, and Why Recommend? 

MIXBOOK, TIKATOK, SCRAPBLOG

When I used Tikatok with my students, I struggled quite a bit.  The students did all of their writing on paper, and I had to transfer it online myself.  Students could not work simultaneously on a class book.  Plus, the design of the textboxes were not as easy to work with.  I've seen Mixbook used in other classes and it was much more aesthetically pleasing than Tikatok.  Scrapblog was fun for me personally, but not something I can see my students using in the classroom yet.

My students really enjoy interactive writing online (Story Jumper, Storymaker, and Kerpoof), the hard part has been how to balance attention to quality story-writing with the animations.  I've found when they start writing at one of these sites, the quality of their story-writing suffers because they are so excited about the animations.  A few key points:

•  Of the three, Kerpoof is my least favorite, only because the graphic selection is incredibly limited, especially in "story book" mode.  (Kerpoof in and of itself is a LOT of fun, though!)  

•  Story Maker was animated and super fun for the kids, but they could not save their work or go back to it to edit. They were given a code to access their story later, but it was a long series of numbers (hard to remember)...and I really think it was only to have access to print the story, not to edit. 

• Story Jumper allowed for the most variety in icons/graphics that were easy to locate.  Also, you can save your work and return to edit it later...making it my favorite site to use. 

I think to find the best way to balance writing with the joy of animation, I would have to encourage the students to develop and write their stories first...with the online source being an avenue for publishing.  Does that defeat the purpose?

I have been afraid of comics for sometime.  Honestly, it is so challenging to utilize 4-5 frames to create something witty and worth reading!  However, I did allow my students to use the comic creator from Read, Write, Think.  The problem with this program was the limitation in available icons and backgrounds. Then we had issues with one frame repeating itself over and over...with some frames not showing up during printing.  Just a tiny bit frustrating.

I think Toon Doo was the site Mrs. Driscoll let the students play with in the computer lab this past year.  It definitely had more options and the children LOVED it.


So maybe I need an lesson idea that would lend itself to being displayed in a comic strip.  I looked over "26 Ways to Use Comic Strips in the Classroom" and these were some ideas I thought might work:

• Describe a scientific principle using How Toons
• Illustrate a page that was "missing" from The Secret Knowlege of Grown-Ups by David Wisiniewski
• Change the ending to a novel
• Design a background and/or characters for a beginning, middle, and end of a story as a pre-writing activity
• Provide a comic where one of the character's speech bubbles is empty.  Have students write in what would fit the character and compare. 

I had seen Museum Box before but was hit with a great idea today!  Third graders have been studying the zones of the ocean for a few years now and have been presenting their information with hand-drawn art and hand-written sentences.  Although I would still like to offer them the opportunity to draw by hand, I can see a great way to gather all of their research in one location via Museum Box.

After playing with Museum Box for awhile, I see that pictures are only allowed a small caption, and text must have a full side to itself.  With that in mind, I could ask the students to create one box layer with x number of facts about each zone with pictures.  A second layer could be pictures of three creatures with three sides describing the creatures' features.  


I've had trouble going back into my 'box' to edit. I can't quite figure out how to do that.  The link I provided doesn't seem to work and though I want to go back and change the font size and color, I don't see how to do it without having to clear the side and paste in the text again.  I've submitted the cube for review and hopefully you can help me out, Sandy.  :)  I wonder if all the typing, saving, and uploading will be hard for them so early in the year.  Maybe it would be better suited for the spring...Sandy, perhaps you can give me some more direction in our Tech Ten meetings in the fall.  I'd really love to use the program.


Also, with the school being registered already, how do we go about registering our students so that each teacher can access her students' work more easily?  Does this answer my question? 

Task 4- Flickr

Flickr is a site I've used before...and I'm continually amazed at what is available through it.  I was introduced to the site by my brother, who uploads all of his pictures there.  Even with that single operation in mind, I've been impressed not only with the ability to download various pixel sizes so I can print his pictures if I want, but also, how easily organized his pictures are.  I haven't done this myself...I am much too lazy, I suppose!  

Within the classroom, I was excited to read about ways I can use Flickr with my students.  Last year, I asked my students to email me pictures of their families to be used on an "All About Me" glog.  I had to download and save the pictures to each individual child's folder on the H drive, which was time consuming, to say the least.  With Flickr, I can create a class group on Flickr that only the students and I have access to, allowing them to upload pictures in one location from home, providing a way to easily retrieve them at school.  

When creating this All About Me glog, my students needed to find a few specific pictures of objects or activities they enjoyed.  You can imagine, when a child wanted a baseball picture to illustrate his love of the game, even when searching Compfight, there were so many picture to choose from...and not all of them entirely about baseball.  I could do a search of my own and collect 3-5 photos for the students where necessary and post them to the Flickr group page for easy access...and to help limit their choices somewhat, so they are not overwhelmed.  

I like the idea of posting class pictures to the same Flickr Group account so that students and their families can see the photos as soon as they're uploaded, alleviating the need to email individual photos to parents.  Anthony's teacher used Smilebox for that purpose, which was even more adorable, but it was one more step.  I see that I could also create an RSS feed which would allow me to post the pictures to our class blog.  I haven't tried that yet, but it is something I look forward to doing.  I just need to remember to take pictures more often!


 

 I'd also forgotten about the many BigHugeLab applications.  I had bookmarked the site last year, but since the All About Me glog took much more time than completing a similar craft on paper, I didn't get to do the things I'd hoped to.  I am still very interested in utilizing the Movie Poster or Magazine Cover for the students to illustrate their particular strengths after we study Eight Kinds of Smart.  Students would need to find a picture that matches the kind of 'smart' they believe themselves to be and write descriptors that match.  I'm looking forward to it!

 

Task 3- Voicethread and Fotobabble

Though I have used Voicethread a couple of times this past school year, I am by no means an expert!  I fumbled around a bit with the set up...not sure how to get all of my students logged on or, more importantly, how I could organize getting all of them to record their voices in a timely manner.  

This initial project was done to highlight the importance of reading fluency, so the students selected a poem to read aloud and record.  They enjoyed it quite a bit, but it was challenging to accommodate each student.  It took time to scan each picture...and even more time to record their voices.  Only two or three children could be in the room  at a time when recording or the background noise would be very distracting.  Luckily, I have Mrs. Driscoll, who helped me out a lot!

After looking at many of the examples, I find it intriguing that teachers could pose a question to their students and hear their responses here.   The Voicethread on Chernobyl was so thought provoking.  I can imagine upper division students leading a  heated discussion about whether or not to live there.  Students would have to become intimately  knowledgeable about the way of life for people there.  It's not as easy as it may be for us to pick up and move.

Voicethread provides an avenue for each student to be heard...and I'm sure a way for them to respond from home.  Do upper and middle division teachers have their students respond to Voicethread on their own time?  It seems possible since the students have laptops and can learn to manipulate the program so quickly and independently, whereas we are needed to walk our smaller students through the process step by step.  

It's also a great way for students to comment on each other's thoughts and ideas in a place where a teacher can monitor and structure them.  I listened to several ideas at the New  York Public Library site and am intrigued by the idea of posting pictures of early Native Americans and having the students compare and contrast their clothing, weapons, structures, etc. as an introduction to our studies of early Florida people.  There's no telling what kind of preconceived notions third graders have about Native Americans.

I am a bit worried about Fotobabble, only because of the fact that they don't have  an educator account (yet), which often tends to make things a bit more safe, however, with teacher guidance, there really isn't anything that can go wrong.  It would be a quick and easy way for students to post a thought, idea, or reflection on anything we're studying.   I also think what can make a difference in the Web 2.0 programs, is the variety options out there!  Using Voicethread over and over and over would get boring...now I can try something new. :)

COLLABORATION

I am currently planning to work with a teacher from San Francisco this fall, hoping to find ways that our classes can learn about the areas in which we live.  I found a fantastic blog from two teachers who were sharing all kinds of information about their students and their school as a collaboration project.  One teacher is from Los Angeles and the other is from Australia. I snipped this clip from their blog:

These two teachers used Fotobabble, Vimeo, Voicethread, and a site I'd not heard of called Photo Peach.  (I'd also like to explore Blabberize.)  I became really excited after seeing what her students put together.  I visited the American teacher's blog, LOVED the slideshow she put together...click the picture ----->
and can see how I could have each student in my class contribute to a similar one on Florida.

I'm looking forward to infusing some or all of these tools into my classroom in the fall.  I may not be able to come up with the ideas on my own...but I'm a pretty good thief!  I'll keep looking!