iPads and Preschoolers?

I found this really interesting article today called "Incorporating iPads in Preschool Classrooms" and it talked about how some schools are using iPads in preschool classrooms. Because I am an early childhood/elementary education major, this caught my attention and I wanted to learn more. According to this article, the iPads are making kids excited to learn because they essentially are learning from playing with a "toy". There are numerous apps for the iPad that are appropriate and helpful for this age group including ABC Tracer, iWriteWords, Pencilbot Preschool, and many more. These apps will engage students for longer than pencil and paper activities, and will make them excited about learning. I would love to see this in action to see how the kids actually respond to it, and who knows, maybe by the time I'm a teacher there will be iPads in every classroom.

(Photo used with permission from Flickr.com/cafemama)

I May Have Found the Solution

It's been awhile since I've posted, but I'm back! A couple posts back I mentioned that I thought Twitter could be useful in the classroom, but being able to follow friends could (ok definitely would) be a distraction for a lot of students. Well, I have found the solution...Edmodo! A few weeks ago in one of my classes, my professor had us use this site and it's great. To me it is a combination of Facebook and Twitter, but without all the distractions because it is made just for teachers and students. This seemed to work great in my college course. The teacher posted a question, set a timer, and we all had 2 minutes to respond to the question. Because he had this projected up front, we could all see everyone's responses and it was a great discussion starter. I think that this site would be great in high school, and even middle school, because kids don't always like to raise their hand in class. This way, the teacher can get immediate feedback about where their students are at with the lesson, and every students can "vocalize" what their thoughts on the question are...it's a win-win situation!

(Picture used with permission by iClipart.com)

From Chalkboards to Promethean Boards

I've decided to talk about the development of technology in the classroom through the evolution of "the board." I can remember back to kindergarten when all that my elementary school had were chalkboards. One of the jobs of the helper of the day was go to out and clap the erasers at the end of the day. Now, I'm not really a big fan of chalkboards - they make your hands gross, and the dust is less than appetizing, so I was happy when my school moved on and got whiteboards. Back in the day I thought they were the coolest thing. I couldn't wait to be a teacher so I could choose what fun color to write on the board with! I had whiteboards all the way through high school, but around my junior year my high school did invest in a few Smart Boards for the math and science classes. This new technology almost blew my mind. You could basically run the computer on the projector board, plus there were a bunch of cool new programs to play with! I got to mess around with them every once in a while, but they were treasured items in the school, so not many students got to mess with them.

This year, when I got to college, there were these crazy boards that looked like Smart Boards in some of the classrooms, but that seemed way "smarter" than the Smart Board. When I arrived at my field experience at the elementary school, I noticed they had the same things - Promethean Boards.  It blew my mind at how much the elementary kids knew how to use these. I had never used one before, but after observing in the 3rd grade class seeing the students and teacher use the board for everything, I've decided that they are definitely the future of all classrooms. They can do so many things that many of us never thought would be possible to do with younger learners, and they are a great way to incorporate new projects and activities into the classroom. I am definitely looking forward to creating fun and interactive projects for my future students to use on Promethean Boards...or whatever the latest technology is when I start teaching!

(Image used with permission from iClipart for Schools)

My Thoughts on Twitter in the Classroom...

Hey everybody! Today I'm going to talk about using Twitter in the classroom. I personally LOVE Twitter, but not everyone is familiar with this new phenomenon. In my Educational Technology and Design class we were introduced to a video that was posted by a teacher who uses Twitter in his AP Biology class. If you're not familiar with Twitter, you can find many videos (like the one posted below) that give you an overview of how it works and what you can do with it. Anyway, this video that we watched got me thinking about how Twitter could actually be very useful in high school classrooms. I personally have a Twitter account and check it all the time, but even if I didn't go on it a lot, I could have Twitter text me when there's a new tweet from a specific person or even everyone I follow. This being said, I think that high school students could really benefit from this. Have you ever seen a high school kid without their phone glued to their side? Me neither. By having the students follow the class (or teacher) on Twitter, they would be given instant updates about assignments, test reminders, study sessions, or whatever! I think this could be a really effective way for teachers to communicate with students, especially those who don't always write their assignments down and then "forget" what they were supposed to do for the next class. I sure wish some of my teachers had done this while I was in high school, I definitely would have utilized it because I don't always remember to check my email, but I always read new text messages!

YouTube Video: Twitter in Plain English

Newcomer!

Hey everybody - I'm somewhat new to the world of blogging, but I'm excited to share my ideas with you all! I am an avid Twitter user, but other than that I don't have much experience with blogs, so bear with me!