I am currently reading the book titled Choice Words by Peter H. Johnston. In the beginning of the book he included a poem by Herb Warren called Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones. Growing up, I frequently heard “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words could never hurt me,” but I feel that this is very untrue. I would like to share this poem with other educators who will then share it with their students, colleagues, etc. I agree with Herb Warren, and I like the way in which he changed the original poem.

Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones

“Sticks and stones may break my bones

But words could never hurt me.”

And this I knew was surely true

And truth could not desert me.

But now I know it is not so.

I’ve changed the latter part;

For sticks and stones may break the bones

But words can break the heart.

Sticks and stones may break the bones

But leave the spirit whole,

But simple words can break the heart

Or silence crush the soul.

Herb Warren

I recently finished the Literacy and Technology course that I was taking at Mount Saint Mary College in which I was required to start this educational blogging site. Before taking this course, I was not aware of many of the incredible Web 2.0 resources that can be used to enhance student learning in the elementary classroom. Now that I have slightly more time (I am still working at a preschool until June 12, 2009), I am going back and looking through many of the Web 2.0 tools that we learned about or at least touched upon in this course. I am also learning more of the features that these programs offer teachers, students and parents. As I look through these sites, I will be writing a blog post for some of my favorites and how I plan on incorporating them into my classroom when I have one of my own which will hopefully be soon! I love teaching, and I cannot wait until I have my own classroom and students to share my love for teaching and technology with.

Today was the first day of the Internet Curriculum Project (ICP) presentations for my Literacy and Technology class. Eight students were presenting their topics today, and I was one of these eight. My presentation was on the sites Scrapblog.com and Glogster.com and how these sites can inspire creative writing in students. The other presenters did a great job presenting today, and I learned more about microblogging (Twitter, Plurk, Edmodo, etc.), Linked In and Facebook as a professional networking sites, problem-based learning, digital storytelling and information, media, and information communication and technology literacies. This following link will bring you to the powerpoint presentation that I created and presented to me class. I hope you enjoy it, and feel free to leave comments or suggestions. Thanks, Carolyn.

http://www.slideboom.com/presentations/61893/carolynheldron_scrapglog 

Three facts about digital storytelling are:

1. They allow students to creatively publish their assignments

2. Photo Story 3 was a GREAT program to use

3. They can be shared across the internet which motivates students to do well

I have been and am currently working on a presentation that I am supposed to be conducting on Monday in my Literacy and Technology class. This presentation is on the use of Scrapblog.com and Glogster.com to inspire creative writing in students. I feel that both of these sites have great features, but so far, I find Scrapblog to be easier to use. Something that I have noticed about this site is that it takes a very long time to upload pictures from my computer though. There is an option to take pictures directly from another internet site such as Flickr or Photobucket which does seem to work more quickly, but I did not have all of the pictures that I had wanted to use on this site. I have included two of the pages that I created in this post, but there are only three pictures due to the amount of time it takes for each picture to upload. I have really enjoyed creating these pages and I hope to create more in the future. I have been working on scrapbooks for the past couple of years, but I was not familiar with any online scrapbooking sites before taking on this topic for my presentation. I am excited to use this is my classroom someday, and I think that it will be very motivating for students.

I created my first online quiz using the site ProProf.com. This site was free and easy to use. I signed up and created a very short (five question) quiz in just minutes. I like this site because it gives the user the option of creating a quiz containing multiple choice, fill-in and/or essay-type questions. I also like this site because teachers can search through a collection of quizzes to get ideas for their own classrooms. One thing that I did notice while I was using this site is that when I clicked to create the final quiz, my computer began running very slowly. This could have been due to the other programs that I had open at the time, and I will try creating another quiz at another time to see if this is a recurring problem with the site. Overall, I liked this site and I would recommend it to others. The following is the link to the site that the quiz I created can be found on: http://www.proprofs.com/quiz-school/quizview.php?title=states-matter_2 

Engrade Snapshot 

I recently created an account with Engrade.com where teachers are able to keep track of their grades online. This online grading software was very easy to use and when creating an account, you are walked through step-by-step. My favorite thing about this site is that it is completely free!!! 

Some of the features that I liked about this site are that parents and students are able to access grades from at home. Student grades can be viewed within three hours from when they were posted by the teacher. Each student is given a unique code by the teacher and this is how the grades are looked up. This would be a great tool to use in the classroom because it would provide feedback that the parents can access at any time. Teachers can use this site to make sure that parents are seeing the grades that their students receive, and it is not a shock by the end of the class what grade their students have earned.

I played around with the site for a while, and I cannot find anything that I do not like about it. I liked this site very much, and I highly recommend that other teachers look into it for future use in their classrooms! I think that parents will love it too!

 

I recently used the program Photostory 3 to create a digital story for my Literacy and Technology class. I greatly enjoyed creating this, and I am looking forward to creating more in the future. This program was extremely easy to use, and it was free! I know that with some of the other digital story programs out there, you must record your voice from beginning to end, and I really liked that with this program, you are able to record your voice for each individual picture. This is nice because if you make a mistake, you do not have to go through the entire presentation again from the beginning, you are able to correct just what you wanted to say for that particular picture. I would highly recommend this program for use with students in classrooms, and I think that it is very easy for them to get the hang of pretty quickly. I think that it is fun and motivating for students who like to display their creativity in various ways.

This is a mind map that I created using the program Inspiration. I downloaded a free 30-day trial of this program, and I was experimenting with some of the features that it has to offer. I felt that this program was extremely easy to use, and I love that it has many pre-made graphic organizers that can be printed out and used in the classroom. It was extremely easy to add notes, images, and pictures. I like that you can easily include hyperlinks to any sites that you wish, and that you can search within the program for extra images that can be added to enhance the appearance of the graphic organizer.

Here is the url for the first mind map I created using Gliffy. I enjoyed using this program, and I am looking forward to learning more of the features it has to offer. This mind map includes information on my schooling, family, and it also lists some of the many hobbies that I have and enjoy doing in my spare time (not much right now).

http://www.gliffy.com/publish/1622727/