As a teacher in the twenty first century I feel it is important to stay up with the latest technology and whenever possible, use it in the classroom. It is becoming increasingly difficult to motivate students. I have found that with technology, the once "boring" lessons become exciting and even "cool!". In my classroom I use Smartboard, United Streaming videos, Teacher Tube, iMovie, Microsoft Movie Maker, Interwrite Workspace, PowerPoint, and the Internet frequently to enhance my lessons.
Below are links to several videos that I have created. The first is a video that I show at the beginning of school that helps separate my rules and procedures from the many other teachers' rules that students hear those first few days. The second video plays at the beginning of a PowerPoint that my team uses on Curriculum Night as an opening. The third link will take you to my teacher tube site that holds the instructional videos the other seventh grade teacher and I have created. We post links to these from our school web pages so students can view these if they are absent, if they need more help, or to study for the test.
My procedures video on Teacher Tube
My Team 1 video on Teacher Tube
Instructional videos on Teacher Tube
Central's Struggles
Last year one of my language arts classes took on the challenge of creating a video to portray the unique struggles our district faced. One of the buildings in our district flooded displacing the fifth and sixth grade students and staff. We mailed our video to several TV shows in hopes that someone could help in the funding of a new school. It was very exciting to answer the phone last summer and hear Extreme Makeover's Home Edition on the line. They were not able to help the school, but did inquire about individual families that they might be able to help.
This project gave the students a chance to write and conduct interviews with several people, including our superintendent and a school board member. They then wrote thank you notes and began developing a storyboard focusing on the five parts of a story. During the design process students worked together to write and record the narration, clip and rearrange video and pictures, and tell Central School's story.
Smartboard
Below is an example of what a smartboard lesson might look like. With the smartboard I am able to add simulations, such as coin tossing or rolling a die, to a probability lesson, or shapes that can be manipulated to show how they change with a rotation or a flip. I am able to use it in Language Arts to make some of those grammar lessons a little more fun and easier to visualize by using the different highlighting tools. There are also many smartboard lessons online that can be downloaded and used for a wide range of ages and subjects.
