A Technology Blog Hop

Spring into Technology with Classroom Freebies!

Several phenomenal teachers, Technology Tailgate Coaches and bloggers are joining forces for an amazing classroom technology blog hop!  As you hop from blog to blog, you will visit some of your favorite blogs and discover a few new blogs too!  Each with a fabulous freebie just for you!

Thank you for hopping over!

Here is your present for stopping by.  This online book report project allows students to report out the important information from a book in a variety of ways.  Students choose the format that works best for them and present their information in an online format, so that they can send you a link (or post it on Edmodo).  With 15 possible presentation choices, from Prezi to Glogster to iMovie, every student should be able find the presentation type that best represents their strengths.  Download your free copy of the Online Book Report Project from Google Docs.

Thank you so much for stopping by and visiting!  If you are new to my blog and liked what you see, don't forget to follow me!  If it’s after 8PM EST (April 30th), than hop on over to your next stop.  If it’s before 8PM EST(April 30th), please bear with us for a momentary delay.  Due to the time difference between Morocco and the US, I had to post slightly earlier than the others.  No matter what time it is, don’t forget to stop by the next on the path - Leah from Learn With Leah

In case you didn't start from the beginning, here is an ordered list of all participating blogs!

The Technology Tailgate

Kate from EduKate and Inspire

Kristen from iTeach 1:1

Heidi from Rakis Rad Resources

Leah from Learn With Leah

Amanda and Aylin from Learning to the Core

Nikki from An Uncommon to the Core Teacher

Karla at The Connected Teacher

Shana at Enchanted with Technology

Kristin at Teacher Playground

Jen at Tech with Jen

Kay at A Little Tech

Melanie at I Luv Twek

Carrie and Caitlin at Table Talk with C & C

Lauren at iWonder

Jan at The Science Vault

A special thank you to Jen at Tech with Jen for designing the blog hop button!

Interested in joining our next blog hop?  Join here!

ISM Spotlight–Happy Earth Week!

This year I am the luckiest teacher in the world. I get to teach at the best school ever – International School of Morocco, with some of the best, most creative, teachers ever. Each time I walk into someone else’s classroom, I get inspired and we just seem to spiral great teaching ideas off of each other. It’s a wonderful place to teach, and since we are all collaborating, it’s a wonderful place for our kids to learn – a teacher’s dream, right? I have tried and tried to convince the other teachers to create blogs of their own to spotlight and share some of their amazing ideas, but everyone is super busy. Instead, they have each agreed to let me spotlight some of their ideas right here on Raki’s Rad Resources. So, each Friday night, I will be posting an ISM Spotlight.

Since Monday was Earth Day, the students at the International School of Morocco have been celebrating Earth Week all week long.  Here’s a peek at some of what we have been doing:

Whole School:

- We watched the movie of the Lorax and created a list of things that can be done to take care of the earth.

- We started a school recycling program for plastic bottles and newspaper.

- We encouraged students to bring fruit and vegetable scraps in for the school rabbits.

- Learning the Jack Johnson song – the 3R’s.

PreK (3 year olds)

- Created crayon shaving globes by:

1.)  Sharpening blue and green crayons.

2.)  Sprinkling crayons onto wax paper in a circle shape.

3.)  Ironing wax paper (done by teacher, obviously)

4.)  Cutting around the outside of the circle.

5.)  Hole punch on the top and string up with a ribbon.

- Created a tissue paper globe and poster for their door.  The kids have been reciting the rhyme each day.

- Painting paper paint globes by:

1.) Squirting blue and green paint onto a paper plate.

2.)  Flipping the plate upside down on a piece of paper.

3.) Twisting the plate around.

 

- Free painting their own globes with blue and green paint

- Coming up with ways to take care of the earth.  Here are some of their ideas:

 

Kindergarten - K4/K5

- Exploring their natural world for things that are dangerous for the earth, including chemicals.

- Exploring the earth and rocks.  They’ve gone on a hunt for rocks and talked about how rocks belong to the earth because they make new soil when they break into little pieces.

- Creating crafts with recycled items.  They have created “precious stones” from old newspaper by:

1.) Tearing the newspaper into strips.

2.)  Dipping the strips into a papier mache mix of flour and water.

3.)  Creating “stone” shaped balls.

4.)  Letting the balls dry.

5.)  Painting their stones.

 

1st – 4th grade

- Doing internet research about the 3r’s – Reduce, Reuse and Recycle.  The students are using the information they have found to create a video about this topic.  For more information about this project – visit the Collaborative Projects page at Global Teacher Connect.

- Creating “Unless” statements, modeled after the quote from the Dr. Seuss book The Lorax: Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, then nothing is going to get better, it’s not!

- Creating Tagxedo globes with the words that make us think about taking care of the earth.

How have you been celebrating Earth Week?

My Flipped Classroom

At the ECIS Technology conference, I attended a workshop on the flipped classroom and was fully intrigued.  The presenter, Heather Martin, teaches Middle School English.  She creates grammar and writing videos for her students and posts them on her You Tube Channel.  Her kids watch a video for homework and respond on a Google Document.  Then, in class, they work on application activities involved in writing, editing, revising etc.  Here is one of her videos:

Mrs. Martin isn’t the first teacher to use a flipped classroom model.  The first flipped classrooms began to show up in the 1990’s and now are showing up all over the world.  In a flipped classroom, all or some of the homework is a video or online simulation that “teaches” what you would normally teach in class.  Then, in class the kids focus on activities, projects and practice problems that would generally be homework.  This way, there is nobody sitting at home stuck on how to figure out a math problem, or even worse practicing doing it wrong. 

After the conference, I decided to adopt a flipped classroom method for my math block.  Two days a week, my students have “video homework”.  I don’t have time to make all of my own videos (although I have a few particular videos I’m planning to make over the summer).  However, there are SO  many videos already available, that I have found what I need for the rest of this school year.  The majority of the videos my students are watching have come from the Khan Academy, which is an online library of over 3,000 videos on tons and tons of subjects.  Other good sources of online videos include: Knowmia, Engvid, Teacher Tube, EDTed, NeoK12, and Math Playground.

All of my students’ homework is done through Edmodo.  So, on the days that my students have video homework (Friday and Tuesday), I post the video link into an Edmodo post and ask for them to watch it and then respond with a good quality sentence or two about what they learned.  Then, the next day in class, (Mondays and Wednesdays)we work on text book pages that would “normally” have been assigned for homework.  While they are working on these pages, I am right there to solve problems and answer questions.  I can spot right away if there are things that need to be better explained, or when they need a hands on example and I either pull them right then for a quick impromptu mini lesson or I plan one for the next day. Whatever students do not finish in class that day becomes their homework on those days. 

On the days where my students haven’t had a video homework assignment the night before, my students work on their Problem Solving Paths, or Math Projects – like the Balanced Checkbook project we just finished.  Again, I am right there to help guide them.  This is the time of the week where I plan specific mini lessons on things that videos won’t cover or on topics that I have seen the kids get stuck on during class time.

Friday is assessment day in my classroom.  We flip flop Fridays.  One week the students will have a traditional test or quiz.  The next week, the students will work on creating a video about one of the topics we have been working on.  My students are currently using the Explain Everything App to create our movies, which we actually paid for.  (If you are a regular reader, you know that I pay for as little as possible, but this one is worth it!)  We have also used Educreations, which I also like.  Explain Everything has 2 big advantages.  1.)  It breaks the presentations down into slides and each slide is recorded separately, making it easier for students to edit their work.  2.)  Videos can be exported as a .mp4 file, and then can be further edited or added to other movie projects. Here is one of the videos my students created this week:

 

I have found that watching the videos for homework has also made my students more aware of what they need to have in their own videos.  They also spend time critiquing each others’ videos.  While creating videos isn’t necessarily a part of the flipped classroom model, it goes very nicely with the ideals.  Here is a cool iconographic I found that explains the flipped classroom model well.

Created by Knewton and Column Five Media

My students are loving the flipped classroom concept, because to them it feels like they don’t have homework.  I am loving the flipped classroom concept, because I have more time to work with them each one on one.  The parents are loving the flipped classroom concept, because they get a chance to “see” how I am teaching and explaining concepts and can be more of a help to their children during homework time.  Since I have many international families, who may have completely different strategies for math (See my post on the many ways to do Long Division.) – this is an extremely important part of the flipped classroom.

Have you considered flipping your classroom?

Happy Earth Day!

Happy Earth Day everybody!  At my school, we are actually stretching Earth Day into Earth Week, which we are celebrating all this week.  In honor of Earth Week, my class is researching the 3R’s – Reduce, Reuse and Recycle and we are creating an Earth Day Video for the Global Teacher Connect Collaborative Project.  I have created a simple brainstorming sheet and rubric for the project.  Feel free to download it free from my Teachers Pay Teachers store and join us in our Earth Day Collaborative project.

What’s your class doing for Earth Day?

ISM Spotlight - Reciting Rhymes While We Walk

This year I am the luckiest teacher in the world. I get to teach at the best school ever – International School of Morocco, with some of the best, most creative, teachers ever. Each time I walk into someone else’s classroom, I get inspired and we just seem to spiral great teaching ideas off of each other. It’s a wonderful place to teach, and since we are all collaborating, it’s a wonderful place for our kids to learn – a teacher’s dream, right? I have tried and tried to convince the other teachers to create blogs of their own to spotlight and share some of their amazing ideas, but everyone is super busy. Instead, they have each agreed to let me spotlight some of their ideas right here on Raki’s Rad Resources. So, each Friday night, I will be posting an ISM Spotlight.

This week, we are spotlighting Jen Kadiri, our Pre-K teacher.  Jen teaches the 3 year old class.  She also has spear headed the nursery rhyme project at ISM.  Since the majority of our students are not growing up in English speaking households, Mrs. Kadiri realized that this means they are not growing up with those common rhymes and stories, which influence so much of our common English culture.  For this reason, she set us up with a nursery rhyme each week and we decided as a school to make it a school wide effort to use the nursery rhyme to explore rhyming, vocabulary, fluency and to build a common culture for our students.

Each morning, before entering the building, our students line up outside.  At that time, the entire school - from K3 to 4th grade -  finds a steady beat, and we recite the rhyme together.  During the day, as we transition from lunch to recess, recess to snack etc., we recite our rhyme.  On Monday, we’re shaky, with mainly the teachers reciting.  By Wednesday, most of the kids have memorized the words, but the teachers are still reciting.  By Friday, the teachers generally don’t have to say anything because the kids are reciting loud and proud (although we still do, simply out of habit).  Here is what one of our kindergarteners sounded like last Friday:

 In addition to simply memorizing the rhyme, each class works with the rhyme in a way that is appropriate to their grade level.  Mrs. Kadiri’s students (the 3 year old class) color pictures of the rhyme characters, order the events with picture cards, create crafts of the rhyme, and pick out the rhyming words.  The Kindergarten class picks out rhyming, word family and decodable words, works on some simple vocabulary, finds sight words that they know in a written version, and creates pictures of the rhyme.  With the “big kids” – Grades 1 – 4, we are have a weekly poetry sheet.  Each day, the kids have a reading comprehension or fluency task to do on their poetry sheet, having to do with the weekly rhyme.  On Monday, we increase fluency by reading the rhyme 4 times.  On Tuesday, we pick out vocabulary words that are challenging or interesting and find the definition. On Wednesday, we visualize and draw a picture of the rhyme.  On Thursday, we make two text connections with the rhyme.  On Friday, we come up with three question that we had while reading the rhyme.  Feel free to grab this sheet from Google Docs if you want to use it in your class. 

How does your school utilize nursery rhymes? 

Come back next Friday to find out what the other ISM teachers are up to.

Online Puppet Show

The new favorite app at the International School of Morocco is Puppet Pals.  It is one of the few apps that we liked so much that our school paid for each of us to have the upgraded version, so that’ll tell you how awesome it is.

In both the free and paid version, students get to choose up to 8 puppet characters and a background scene.  (The paid version gives you more options and also lets you import pictures for both characters and backgrounds.)  Then, the students can move around the puppet characters and add dialogue while recording themselves.  At the end, the students can export their show as a movie file.

We have been using this app in every classroom.  The 3 year olds used it to re-tell the story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff.  The 4 and 5 year olds have used it to create their own stories (no writing needed!).  The 1st – 4th grade students are using it as part of their Earth Day Video Project – they will use it to create a video talking about reduce, reuse and recycle.  Even our French and Arabic teachers have gotten into the action, having students creating stories in those languages too.

At the ECIS conference, the presenter used it herself to create introductions for the videos in her “flipped classroom”.  Since all videos are exported as .mp4 files, they can then be uploaded into iMovie or Movie Maker and edited or added to a longer movie.

Here is a very simple video that one of my students created in our extra curricular English Language Learner class.  He was asked to create something using the verb “to eat”.

How could you use Puppet Pals in your class?

Summer Homework on Google Maps

It’s time for the Wednesday Website suggestion!! For two years, I was the Technology Specialist at a school in Georgia. During that time, I amassed a large collection of websites that I use with my students. You can download my E-Book of Websites for the Elementary Classroom for free from Teachers Pay Teachers or Smashwords, or, you can check back here each week for the Wednesday Website suggestion.

View Travel Map - Raki Family in a larger map

 I use Google apps for lots of things, but I’ve never really played with Google Maps until recently.  I made a map with my 8 year old son, charting out all of the places we have traveled (see above).  This summer, we will be traveling around the US and he can’t wait to see where we can add “pins”.  This got me thinking that it would be a great summer homework project.  Have families create a Google Map with at least one pin a week indicating where they have been.  (For students who stay close to home, the pins could be as simple as the supermarket or the library.)  It would go great with the summer scavenger hunt that I usually send home.  (Download the summer scavenger hunt free from Google Docs.)

My students are studying Ancient Rome and we will be creating a Google Map of places where you can find evidence of the Roman Empire.  Here is how easy it is to create a Google Map:

1.)  Go to Google and click on Maps.  (Be sure to be logged in to your Gmail or Google Drive account.)

2.)  Click on My Maps.

3.)  Click on Create a Map.

4.)  Use the tools to drop “pins” or other symbols on to the places you want to talk about – add specific details and information.

Once created, maps can be shared, edited, and even embedded in blog posts.  Maps can be global or city, state, country specific, depending on your needs – simply zoom in and out.

Here are some possible educational purposes of Google Maps:

- Chart out an important event in history (wars, migrations etc.)

- Chart out the important places in a person’s life (historical figure, book character, author etc.)

- Chart out where fossils of a given animal have been found, or where current populations of an animal live.

- Create a year long map that charts the setting of all of the books you read.

- Create a year long map that charts each time you talk about a specific place (in books, Social Studies, Science etc.)

- Chart and figure out distances between specific distances.

What are some ways you can use Google Maps in your classroom?

Get Families Involved

As a teacher at an International School, many of my students are English Language Learners. Even my native English speakers are living in a non-English speaking country. Due to my unique teaching position, I have had some readers ask for tips on teaching English Language Learners. Here is this week’s Tuesday TESOL Teaching Tip:

The families of English Language Learners are a highly overlooked resource.  Many teachers assume that these parents are unable to help their students in any way because there is often a language barrier.  However, we need to realize that although they may not speak the language perfectly, they still want to be involved in their child’s education. 

For the past two years, I have had my personal children in a school where I can’t speak to their teachers, besides to say Hi, How are you?  It is very difficult to be a parent in this situation, but I do it for the benefit of my children.  I still check homework, even though I can’t read it.  I still attend my children’s performances and teacher conferences. (My husband works as a translator for me, as there are no translators provided by the school.)  But, I definitely feel disconnected from my kids’ overall school experience.

There are lots of benefits of having the parents of English Language Learners involved, including:

- When students know parents and teachers are connected, they are better behaved and more focused.  My ESL students always try to get away with the “You can’t tell my mom anyways” behavior.  All it takes is one call to mom – even with broken up Spanish (or French or Arabic) or through a translator, for them to understand that this will not be a barrier to communication.

- Parents can help explain concepts to a child in their home language so that the kids can focus on learning English when they are with you.  Many of my students review math concepts in their home language with their parents, so that when they are with me they can focus on learning that key vocabulary.

- When parents know what’s being studied in class, they can provide their children with extra-curricular learning experiences, including trips and movies in their home language.  My students are currently studying Ancient Rome.  I have had books and stories about Rome brought in in both French and Spanish.  Another student told me about watching a video in Arabic on the topic.  At the end of the day, I want them to know the facts and understand the concepts and this home support makes them more connected to what I’m teaching.

- If you have a common second language in your classroom, parents who speak that language can provide read aloud and discussion experiences in that language.  During Heritage Week, I had presentations in French and Spanish and I regularly have parents read to my class in French.  For my English Language Learners, this is a time to appreciate the literacy skills that overlap into all languages.

 

Some ways to get involved with the parents (and families – Grandparents, Aunts and Uncles make great role models too!) in your class are:

- Make sure to have an initial contact with each and every family at the beginning of the year.  Find out what their level of English is, and be sure to let them know of your level in their language.  This open communication from day one will lead parents to continue to be involved.

- Invite parents in: to read to the class in any language, to view student presentations, to view student work, to generally be a part of your class.

- Have regular family projects, where parents and children can work on an activity at home together.  My students recently had an activity where they were responsible for building a car.  We designed the car at home and then they were to build the car at home with their family’s help.  This was a great time for my students to gain knowledge from their parents.  Here is a picture of one of our best cars.  The student who designed it worked with her father who speaks no English, but has been at every conference, every performance and every presentation this year.  The car moved with a small motor they build together.

If you want information about the car project for your class, you can find the details in my Exploring and Designing Machines unit.

How can you get the parents of your English Language Learners involved in your classroom?

  

Do you enjoy the weekly TESOL Teaching Tips? Would you like to view an hour long presentation on this topic? I recently presented on Strategies for Teaching English Language Learners at the Everything’s Intermediate Expo. Now you can grab the presentation for just $3.95 from Teacher’s Notebook.


Find more TESOL Teaching Tips here, and come back every Tuesday for a new tip!

Have You Flattened Your Classroom Walls?

On March 16th, I was privileged to see Julie Lindsay speak at the ECIS Technology Conference.  If you’ve never heard of Julie Lindsay, she is the co-author of the book Flattening Classrooms, Engaging Minds.  Julie talked to us about the importance of connection, citizenship and collaboration in regards to technology.  Her program allows students from around the world to “flatten the classroom walls” and “bring in the world”.  Centered in Australia herself, Julie’s projects help students from around the world connect and become global citizens through technology. 

In addition to ongoing projects, like the Eracism Project, Flat Classrooms also has yearly conference.  This conference is different than most conferences in two ways.  First, it includes both teachers and students, having real life conversations about how to increase international collaboration.  The other way that their conference is different is that during the conference you are creating and collaborating the whole time.  The conference also includes hands on creation.  Their next conference is in Hawaii.

Another professional development opportunity offered by Flat Classroom is a Flat Classroom Certification Course, which counts for 2 college credits.

I have missed the deadlines for this round of Flat Classroom Projects, but completely intend to get my students involved in the next round.  In the meantime, I am working with some other teachers at Global Teacher Connect to flatten my classroom walls through our collaborative projects.  Please feel free to join us in our pursuit of collaboration.

Check out her Julie Lindsay's keynote here:

Leave me a comment about your thoughts on ways you can flatten your classroom walls and feel free to stop by next Sunday for more information the other presentations from the ECIS Conference.

Online Timeline

It’s time for the Wednesday Website suggestion!! For two years, I was the Technology Specialist at a school in Georgia. During that time, I amassed a large collection of websites that I use with my students. You can download my E-Book of Websites for the Elementary Classroom for free from Teachers Pay Teachers or Smashwords, or, you can check back here each week for the Wednesday Website suggestion.

 

Right now, my students are studying Ancient Rome.  My kids have no idea of which came first – the invention of the toilet, the car or the computer, so they definitely don’t have an idea of how far away Ancient Rome is.  One way to help students get a good picture of how long ago this was is to put it on a timeline.  However, with Ancient Rome, the timeline is really, really long!  Since we just finished studying machines, we added important invention dates to connect with our background knowledge.  We also added all of our personal birthdates.  Here’s a quick video of my timeline – I had to use a video because I couldn’t get it all in one picture!

While I love the timeline on my wall and the ability to refer to it regularly, I know it’s not for everyone.  That is why this week’s website suggestion is a timeline that anyone can use.  My class and I are transferring everything from our physical timeline to an e-copy on the website Tiki –Toki so that they can have a copy to use at home. 

What do you teach that could be enhanced with a timeline?

TESOL Teaching Tip #47 - Let them Make Videos

As a teacher at an International School, many of my students are English Language Learners. Even my native English speakers are living in a non-English speaking country. Due to my unique teaching position, I have had some readers ask for tips on teaching English Language Learners. Here is this week’s Tuesday TESOL Teaching Tip:

TESOL Teaching Tip #47 - Let students make vidoes
ESL students need to talk.  They need to practice in order to get better at putting spoken sentences together.  For some kids, that’s not a problem.  I have one girl this year who has grown exponentially in English, simply due to the fact that she’s a Social Sue who LOVES to talk and work in groups.  Her brother, on the other hand, has made much slower progress because he tends to be shy and doesn’t like to speak in front of people.  Recently, we started creating movies and screencasts and I realized that he is much more likely to practice speaking when we are using these methods.  When I started thinking about it, I realized that there’s a lot to be gained from this method.

From the students’ point of view:
- They get to plan out what they say ahead of time.
- They can re-record or edit if they mess up.
- There’s no one staring at them, making them nervous.

From the teacher’s point of view:
- The students use their spoken language.
- The students can listen to themselves and begin to identify their own mistakes.
- There is a physical record to show to parents or include in a portfolio.

Now, I know you’re saying – I don’t have 20 video cameras in my room.  Neither do I!  I am lucky enough to have an iPad, which has a built in video camera, and the apps Educreations, Morfo, Explain Everything and Puppet Pals – all which work for recording students.  I also have a laptop with a webcam and sound recording capability.  One thing I quickly realized was that video doesn’t always mean a video of a person talking.  Programs like Jing that allow for screencasts are just as much of a way for students to practice speaking.  Here’s a video one of my language learners created using Educreations.



I hope I’ve inspired you to try video with your ESL students.  If I have – perhaps you should try my Earth Day Video Collaborative Project at Global Teacher connect.  It’d be a great first project!  My kids are already super excited about it.


Do you enjoy the weekly TESOL Teaching Tips? Would you like to view an hour long presentation on this topic? I recently presented on Strategies for Teaching English Language Learners at the Everything’s Intermediate Expo. Now you can grab the presentation for just $3.95 from Teacher’s Notebook.


Find more TESOL Teaching Tips here, and come back every Tuesday for a new tip!

Already to 1,000!

Wow!  You guys really are amazing!  I can’t believe it took less than 24 hours to gain my extra 49 followers.  That was a quick count down.  Stop by my blog to download the following resources for free.  They will only be free for until 5pm my time tomorrow – which is 1pm EST on Monday, April 8th, so be quick and tell your friends!

Enjoy and thank you again!