Educational Origami

Want to start a new technology integration project in your classroom? Want to use a cool new web application tool to do the project but don’t know how? Well, does Andrew Churches have the answer for you! Andrew is from Auckland, New Zealand. He is a computer curriculum manager and the organizer of a wiki called educational origami. Educational Origami is one of the best wikis I have seen for incorporating Blooms Taxonomy into lessons using technology. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike License, Educational Origami allows teachers to use all the information in the wiki and remix it to fit their curriculums simply by giving Andrew credit.

But not only that, Andrew wants to make it easy for teachers to learn how to use Technology so he has created PDF files that he calls “Starter Sheets” that are just that, sheets that will help you get started with any product you choose. He also has a blog on which he posts videos similar to the “Starter Sheets” that instruct on the use of the most common Web2.0 Applications. This blog post is an instructional video on how to use Voicethread. The blog post even allows you to download the video so that you can share it during staff development time. It downloads as a QuickTime Movie and already has Andrew's name on the opening screen, so it already gives him credit. You also hear his incredible accent.

All in all I am very happy to have come across Andrew Churches wiki. It will be quite helpful to me when I freeze up and decide not to use something with my students because I am afraid I don’t know how. It will give me that little boost of confidence I need to use technology tools when I know it will be a boost to my curriculum. I am also following Andrew on twitter, his twiter name is achurches.

Week 5 # 10, 11, 12

I have been playing around with a couple of cool tools this week. Logo Maker, VoiceThread, JibJab, and I am getting better with Clipmarks. I played some with FlickrToys, check out my grandson dressed as Captain Adorable! I was not happy with some of the cartoon makers. They had some rather rude and innapropriate cartoons and I don't want to expose my students to such things. I think I will wait for something better to come along before I use any cartoon generator with students or at least wait until a teacher makes such an app. FlickrToys is easy enough even for my 2nd and 3rd graders to try. And I am so excited about my Voki. I have been wanting to make a Voki for a while but just have not taken the time to play. The background on the voki is actually my library. It has been so much fun playing.
Something I will use with students and what I think is my new favorite toy is Cool Text because I have used it to create some neat text for a wiki for a graduate class. Check out how Hot Cool Text is for yourself.

I already belong to several Nings including the Classroom 2.0 Ning, Syracuse Alumni Ning, TeacherLibrarian Ning, and the Methacton 2.0 Ning which is just for people in my school district. My next step will be to start my own Ning. I am thinking of creating a Ning for students. I got to Level 6 but don't consider my Travel IQ very good. See how far you can get.

I am very impressed with the search roll of the School Library Journal. Rollyo is a new tool where I create a Search Roll. Rollyo is a new tool for me. I am excited to find it. I can limit the websites my students can use in a search. I can make a search roll and choose only the best sites and then have the students search and find what they need on websites that are safe and the ones I want them to use. I just created this Rollyo with news sites like Scholastic, National Geographic for Kids, and Yahoo kids. Try it out:

Select Search Engine...News for KidsSearch The Web

Powered by Rollyo

Voice Thread I love you...

Ok, so I love that Spring Break is here and I can play with technology!
I am in love with voicethread. Granted, I have not started using it with students. In fact, I just created my first one today for a class presentation I am doing next Thursday. I can see the real benefit from using this tool for educational purposes. I have some fourth graders that will be doing an environmental project in the coming weeks… how cool would it be if they could find pictures and then present their research to go along with the pictures in voice thread? Same for the 5th grade doing a research project on the westward expansion of the United States; it would be a great way to add in some primary source pictures and do the presentations as a voice thread. I am going to present the idea to the 4th and 5th grade teachers after Spring Break. Wish me luck!