The last two weeks have been extremely challenging and rewarding.  I was introduced to several different tools, many of which I will do my best to incorporate into my classroom.  When thinking about my class goals on the first day, I said I was hoping to become more technologically savvy. I can honestly say that I am much closer to my goal now, than I was when I started the class. Technology continually changes; therefore, I do not know if I will ever fully be technologically savvy. However, I can definitely work hard to make that an ongoing goal of mine that I will always strive to learn more about.

I truly enjoyed this class. It was necessary for me to have daily practice with all the tools we were learning. It provided me the extra support that I needed. I also thought the class worked well together. Everyone was patient and supportive of each other and I appreciate everyone that helped me….on a daily basis! I also enjoyed working on the class projects. I have always viewed technology as a tool that in many ways broadens the gap and lessons connections among people. In the past, I saw technology in a more negative light; but I think after this class I do have more respect for it and what it can help us achieve and the connections it can help us make. In only two weeks, I already have more online and in-person connections through taking this class.

Not only did I learn about technology during this class, I also feel I learned much from Steve about teaching style. In the past, I have often been in classes where professors preached teaching a certain way and then did not follow their own rules and recommendations. Those classes have always been disappointing and there never existed a mutual respect between the professor and the students. Steve, however, was very much the opposite of what I have often experienced in the past. I thought Steve did a great job teaching this course. His lessons were well planned and differentiated for our various levels, he was extremely knowledgeable, informative, and supportive, he encouraged each student to work at their own pace, and he adjusted his plans based on our levels and what we needed. He recognized when we were struggling and when we were super excited about what we were learning. Because of all these factors, a strong mutual respect was built among the classroom. He also encouraged us to not try to master each tool we were presented. Instead, he wanted to introduce the various tools to us, and then for us to focus in on ones that were working for us and that we felt comfortable learning and pursuing further.

Overall, this was one of the most enjoyable, educational, and entertaining classes I have taken at Marymount and I look forward to continually expanding my knowledge about technology and implementing it into my classroom.

Wow…it’s been a crazy 2 weeks!  I honestly can’t believe how much I’ve learned over the last 2 weeks.  I actually feel as though I’ve gotten the hang of managing my blog.  I know what the difference between my posts and my pages are, and I’m pretty excited about that.  At first, I had no clue!  I’m still having a little bit of a hard time when it comes to uploading products from sites like Vimeo that include additional steps, but overall, I think I’ve come a long way.

I really enjoyed working with my group and putting together our Photo Story presentation.  That was a lot of fun and I enjoyed learning more about Photo Story while we created our project.  I will definitely be using Photo Story in my classroom!  Everyone’s comments were so positive, too, so thank you to all our classmates and our teacher!

For another class I’m taking, I have to do a presentation next week.  I was talking to my group and I said how we could do a Prezi or Photo Story presentation.  They had no clue what I was talking about!  I felt so smart and I told them I could teach it to them.  Who knows if we will use either of those tools because we still have to work out the general ideas and details of our presentation, but I’m at least excited about having a couple new tools to bring to the table.

I’m looking forward to class tomorrow!  Great job everyone!

Raylit is a children’s website with fun learning and educational games, videos, and activities.  It includes analytical games and puzzles, music, rhymes, stories, phonics, reading, writing, numeracy and early math, science, arts and crafts, and knowledge and good habit videos.  It is designed for preschool, kindergarten, and first grade kids to play and learn on their own.

EkoLoko is an educational, virtual community where kids discover the world, virtual and real, through fun games and quests, while absorbing the values, knowledge and skills that will help them become more responsible and involved individuals.

I enjoyed working on the voice threads today.  For my voice thread, I just picked 3 images off of google and used them to show a little bit about Hawaii.  If we would have had longer to work on the voice threads, I would have liked to use actual pictures from my documents to create a longer story where I would then narrate the pictures for the viewer.  I’ve never created a slideshow before where I talked into a microphone to narrate the story.  It was fun to do and after listening to it play back, although my project was so simple, the voice thread made it so cool.  Kids would absolutely love to use this tool!  Whether they used pictures of themselves to tell a personal story or used pictures pulled off the web to present on a research project, adding their voice to the story will help personalize their project and they will love using this technology. This past year, my 4th graders did a similar project where they worked in groups and researched different parts of the Civil War, created scripts to accompany the pictures they found, and then recorded their voices as they read their scripts.  They were creating movies about the Civil War for students in other schools to view.  All the students loved the project and really enjoyed incorporating technology into their research. Students also enjoy learning from their peers and the students that viewed their projects thought they were really neat, too.  Students enjoy new, creative projects to help learn information and voice threads are an easy learning tool to use and implement into the classroom.

For my reflection today, I posted my philosophy.

http://docs.google.com/View?id=ddgdx5b8_12cwqtqwdk

I enjoyed seeing all the Photo Story presentations. Everyone did a great job and put a lot of effort into their products! During last semester, I taught a 4th grade physical science unit. I went through the lesson plans I created for that unit and tried to base my Photo Story on one of my integrated lessons. I really think students would enjoy watching a Photo Story when a teacher is introducing a lesson. I also think students would enjoy creating their own Photo Story after research to help them summarize and retain information. Photo Story is also a great tool to be used as a visual study guide.

With the help of this class and my neighbors, I feel I am getting more of a hang on managing my blog. I also created an avatar today and that was a lot of fun and she turned out good! I can definitely see students loving that site and enjoying creating their own avatar to accompany blogs they may have.

Activity:
1. Choose a standard for a core content area (would be great if you use a standard you are addressing as part of your lesson plan). Find VA Standards here
2. Unpack Standard
3. Create a few essential questions to support the standard
4. Detail a few teaching strategies you would use with your students to address the standard
5. List ways that technology support your instruction
6. Create a post on your blog sharing all of this
7. Comment on at least one other blog post (choose from the Blogroll)

VA SOLs: Language Arts
1. 4.6: The student will demonstrate comprehension of information resources to research a topic.
a. Construct questions about a topic.
b. Collect information, using resources of print.
c. Evaluate and synthesize information

2. Verbs:
Construct, Collect, Evaluate, Synthesize

Nouns:
Information resources, Topic, Questions, Information, Print

3. What is meant by information resources?
What resources could be use to gather information?
What information do you want to learn about your topic?
How do we know what are the main facts and what are supporting facts?
What method works best for you to collect information?
Do you like using a graphic organizer?
What does evaluate mean?
How do we evaluate information?
What does synthesize mean?
How do we synthesize information?

4. The teacher could demonstrate researching information on the internet and print resources, such as books.
The teacher could discuss main ideas vs. supporting details.
The teacher could demonstrate the thought processes involved with evaluating information.

5. Using technology to research the students’ topics.
Use a Brainpop to introduce researching online and print resources.

Throughout the day today, two programs I practiced using were Wordle and Prezi. Both programs are new to me but I definitely think I can incorporate them into my classroom. Wordle is extremely user friendly, customizable, and could be used by students when creating projects, nametags, personal biographies, cards, posters, etc. As a teacher, I could also use this for the above listed items, as well as for introducing background information to accompany literature pieces and discussions for content areas such as language arts and social studies. Prezi, on the other hand, was much for difficult for me to use. I’m hoping I’ll continue to familiarize myself with this program, which is why I am looking forward to researching Prezi for my project. I think students would love to use this in the classroom and would probably grasp it much easier than I am. I was playing with it tonight, and I changed a few things on my Prezi presentation, but then couldn’t figure out how to change them back. I will have to continue working with it because I think the more familiar I become with the tool, the less frustrating it will be for me. Overall, though, I’m really excited about both these tools.

Before this class, I had absolutely no experience with blogging, Diigo, or Google docs.  It has definitely been an overwhelming couple days, but I am already becoming more comfortable with using these tools and I know that my familiarity with them will increase the more I use them.  The main issue I am having is remembering the very first page/link I need to access each time to open up the documents.  I am constantly getting confused and using the “process of elimination” method and opening each link to see if it is the correct one.  I am thinking of creating a document with step-by-step directions for all the links we have been given. 

I am really excited to learn more about blogging and Google docs.  I think they are great methods for sharing information and learning about the various resources other teachers are using and incorporating into their classrooms.   

Hello!  My name is Kim and I am a graduate student in Marymount University’s PDS M. ED program.  Born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, my family moved up to the northern Virginia area in 1986, where I quickly became involved in competitive swimming and soccer.  I earned my Bachelor’s degree in Sociology with a concentration in Human Development Psychology from Roanoke College in 2003.  While at Roanoke, I participated in women’s varsity soccer and the Delta Gamma sorority.

After college, I taught pre-kindergarten and after-school care at St. Luke’s Lutheran School in Culpeper, Virginia.  When I moved from Culpeper to Arlington in 2004, I switched careers and became a realtor and joined Re/Max Gateway in Great Falls, Virginia.  After 4 years in real estate, I concluded that my favorite aspect of real estate was working with first time home buyers and sellers and teaching them the home buying and selling process.  After the realization that I loved teaching, I knew I wanted to work with children again.  Therefore, I decided to go back to school to earn my Master’s degree in Elementary Education Pre-K through Grade 6.

During my PDS graduate work at Marymount, I interned in Arlington county at a Title 1 school teaching Kindergarten and then completed my student teaching at a non-Title 1 school teaching Grade 4.  I am a member of Kappa Delta Pi, the national education honor society and I am currently an Arlington county substitute teacher.  I will graduate from the Marymount PDS program in July, 2009, where I will then continue to pursue a teaching position for the 09-10 school year!