Apple Distinguished Program Award

Being one of six model technology classrooms in our district has been a whirlwind of a ride. There have been many ups and downs as well as obstacles to overcome and plenty of time involved in everything from syncing devices, to finding apps, to preparing lessons which embed the technology as well as teaching and prepping the kids for technology usage. It has all been worth it as the gains I am seeing in my students' engagement, time on task and creativity has been phenomenal. I've also seen students increase their skill levels in various areas and take a renewed interest in their learning as well. 

Last week added an additional bonus though- we found out that all of our hard work has brought with it another positive. Our model classroom initiative has been named an Apple Distinguished Program for 2012-2013!!  You can read more about it on the district's blog.

Phonto

This was yesterday's lunch at my house to celebrate Groundhog Day. No I haven't changed the focus of my blog to household hints and recipes (I'd be done blogging within a week if that was the case)... so what in the world does this have to do with technology- well, it' the fact that I used a FREE app called, Phonto to label my photo.
Very simply, Phonto is an app in which you can take/upload a photo and then label your picture. I'm sure there are many other great uses, but for my purposes I am thinking this will be a great app to use to reinforce our non-fiction conventions unit.
Students can easily change the font, color, size and rotation of the font and it was easily shared. In this case I emailed it directly to my blog. 


Here's a quick video to show you how easy it really is to use.

5th Annual Pulaski Tech Academy

On Friday, my district hosted our 5th Annual Tech Academy. The theme for this year was, "Apps Away: Google, Notebook and iTunes".  The sectionals focused on utilizing Google Apps, Smartboard apps, and iPad apps for student engagement and learning. All of the presenters got these Kick-app t-shirts which we wore to identify ourselves during the day. Totally love the play on words and the graphic. 

If you'd like to check out the presentations from our various sectionals, click here to find the various presentation links. 

I was asked to do the "There’s an App for That~ K-2" sectional. The info read as follows:

"There are so many apps and so little time!  This session will highlight some of the district iTunes apps installed on your classroom iPads as well as share other iTunes apps.  Strategies will be shared on how to find apps as well as time provided to do so!  The app purchase process will also be reviewed!" 

Our district has specific apps preloaded onto each grade level's iPads so I had to try and highlight a little from each level. I also asked staff if they had any specific requests which is where the multi-player and multi-account apps came into play. Feel free to check out my presentation by clicking on the picture above.

Individualized Spelling

Last week we officially started spelling and in my class each child has their own individualized spelling list. This year we are using an app called, A+ Test, by Alligator Apps to help us practice our words. This app has helped to make individualized lists much easier to manage and has given each child ownership of their lists. 

Student typing in his words
 and recording them.

On Mondays, students first write their words on a paper list to take home. After they are done, they grab their iPad and create their weekly list on the app by typing each word in and then recording each word with their own voice. This has been a neat feature and has taught us that we must speak clearly, loudly, and slowly.

During the week, students have 3 options within the app to practice their words: Practice, Unscramble, and Ace It. Each of these offers a different way for students to practice their words and each utilizes the student's recorded words.

On Fridays we take our test using the app as well. The app will read each word to the student (the student's recorded voice). Students will then write their word on their spelling paper and then enter it onto the iPad. In this way kiddos are still making the transfer of spelling to the written word and practicing their handwriting at the same time, but are also getting practice with their keyboarding skills and how words "look" on the computer. As adults, we often take for granted the simple things such as: when we write we use lowercase letters, however, on the computer the keys are all in caps which can be confusing for our youngest learners. 

After finishing their test, children then send their test to me via email directly from the app which gives me a digital record of their errors which I can track over time if needed. The app also scores their test and gives students the option to go back and retest all of their words or to retest their mistakes. My kids have really enjoyed the immediate feedback of how they did on their test.

Tis the season to be journaling

iDiary app icon

I'm not sure if I've ever written about this particular app, but it is one of my all time favorites for 1st graders (or 2nd and 3rd graders), it is called, iDiary. It's a $1.99 in the app store but in my opinion, so worth the cost. If you are in a 4-5 iPad classroom, the app will allow you to put up to 6 students on the app. 
From iTunes: " iDiary for kids is a daily journal at its core- kids can express themselves periodically: writing, drawing, decorating entries with stickers. They can easily navigate to their old entries and explore their past musings or post entries for future events through an intuitive calendar navigation system"

I use this app mainly in our Daily 5 Work on Writing time, but on occasion we will use it during our Writer's Workshop time as well.  Today one of my students used the app to tell about Timmy our classroom elf (gosh there's another positive for Timmy- I'm telling you, if you don't have an elf, you definitely want to consider adopting one for next year). The best part was, she was also able to upload (easily I might add) a picture that she took of Timmy to go along with her writing. Once she was done with her entry, she was then able to share it with me via email. Email has been a fabulous tool to give students an authentic audience. After Christmas break, students will also be able to share their writing and projects with their parents via email- talk about motivating, they can't wait!!!

It's the little things like this girls writing and iPad usage that make me smile everyday! I am constantly amazed at what 1st graders really CAN do independently and how technology engages them gets them to work on things that otherwise are considered mundane or hard at times. Writing is not an easy thing for most first graders and is something that requires much practice to be good at, but with the help of apps like iDiary, Bamboo Paper, email, and others, students are excited and sometimes begging for writing time. Technology may not be the end all cure all to learning, but the engagement and time on task that it  brings is a definitely a positive... as the saying goes, Practice makes progress and if kids are willing to practice then progress is right behind!!!

Timmy, our classroom elf

It's amazing what an elf on the shelf can do for a rambunctious group of first graders who are eagerly awaiting Christmas break! Our elf, Timmy, has been at the forefront of our learning for the past two weeks. Timmy has helped us to become better picture takers, better email readers, and has helped us learn how to attach pictures to our emails.

2 weeks ago a package arrived straight from the North Pole with a book called, The Elf on the Shelf and a small, cute elf who we have now affectionately named Timmy. As we read the story we found out that our elf will be reporting back to Santa each and every night and that the next day he will be in a different location in our room. We also found out that once Christmas arrives, that our elf will return to the North Pole until next year. For that reason, we decided that we'd better document Timmy's adventures while we had the chance so... each morning when the kiddos come in, they immediately begin to scour the room for Timmy. Once they find him they get their iPad out and take a picture of him. 

Now that we have our email accounts sync'd to our iPads I usually write my kiddos a morning message similar to the one below. Each morning there is some sort of technology task to do such as replying to a question, taking a picture, or attaching a picture to an email. This has been a great way for my kids to practice their technology skills in an authentic way while also improving their reading and writing abilities.

Looking ahead at the big picture, my rationale for having them take a picture each day is that at the end of this "elfie" journey, we will document Timmy's adventures in our classroom by each uploading our pics into the app iMovie. It's my hope to then share our projects on our classroom blog and/or have each child send their project via email to their parents. I had thought about using PicCollage again but opted against it with the number of pictures that we will have and thought that the slideshow format would be better suited.

On a techy, but not really side note, we made these adorable techy Santas today. Being a 1:1 iPad room, these were just too cute to pass up. The kids got quite a kick out of his big black glasses. You can find the project here if you're interested.