Tech Sites of the Week

Go Math Academy Videos

Here are some great videos from Houghton Mifflin, put out by the Go Math Academy, teaching key concepts and skills. You have to register, but they are free. I just looked a few really good ones.

http://www.hmhco.com/gomathacademy/.

GregTangMath -

GregTangMath - A website with strategies, skills and activities in Math. It includes games, handouts, books and other great resources for struggling students.

http://www.gregtangmath.com/

Here are a couple of resources that you may be able to use. The resource is called Studyladder and has activities for Math, English, Art, Science, Health, and a few others. It is a free sign up for educators.

https://www.studyladder.com/teacher/home

Studyladder - Halloween activities

http://www.studyladder.com/guides/halloween

Chibi Machine

Here is a cute website that you could use with students. They choose a template and upload their photo from the student picture folder (common drive/last years photos). From their they can tweak the poses, head, head accessories, hair, face, skin color, trousers, shirt, skirt, shoes and background. When finished, they would take a screen shot and paste it into a Word document.

Next students would type a five sentence paragraph to entertain, inform or create a 3-step "how to" project.

This may take more than one session.

Chibi Machine

http://www.chibimachine.com/home.php

PBS Learning Media

This site has 30,000 free resources on the site to use, videos and lesson plans that go with them. It is free! You will need to sign up for a free account.

http://www.pbslearningmedia.org/

ReadWorks

http://www.readworks.org/ - This site is aligned to common core and includes lesson and unit plans. Some categories include: skill and strategy units, author’s purpose, cause & effect, character, classify & categorize, compare and contrast, figurative language, main idea, and more…

Items are divided by age, lexile levels, skill, etc…

The site also provides reading passages that correlate with skill categories.

Infographics

If you don’t know what an infographic is, it’s the fusion of graphic design, with data. An infographic takes some data and turns it into an informational poster which uses a variety of data representation techniques to communicate the message that emerges from the data. It doesn’t necessarily have to be done on a computer; paper/pencil works well too. I’d be happy to show you some paper/pencil samples. I also have some nice templates for creating digitally. In the meantime, here is a quick tutorial on the infographic concept. http://www.asmallbrightidea.com/pages/tutorial.html

QR Codes

QR Codes

What is a QR Code? QR stands for Quick Response. It is a bar code that can be generated and then decoded with a QR Code scanner on a mobile device, to take you to a digital destination. When scanned, the QR Code can open a web page, bring up a text message, or read a recorded message. QR Codes are commonly found on posters, signs, menus, signs and even student work.

Step 1) RecordMP3

To record an audio QR Code go to: (no sign up or registration):
http://www.recordmp3.org/
Then go to QRHacker (see above) to create the QR code.

Step 2) grhacker

Create QR Codes for a text message, phone numbers or open a URL - (no sign up or registration - very easy to use)
http://www.qrhacker.com/

Audacity

Use Audacity to record and save file as a .wav file. Then add to DropBox (you must have DropBox downloaded to your computer). Once in Drop Box, right click the file (within Drop Box). Choose the DropBox option from the pop up menu. Select "Copy Public Link".
Now you can use QRHacker to create the QR code.

Step 3) If you need an embed code for your wiki or webpage:

Use this QR Code generator to get the html embed code
http://www.mobile-barcodes.com/qr-code-generator/

Other QR Code Creators that I haven't used: Kaywa - http://quikqr.com
QuickQR - http://quikqr.com
GoQR - http://goqr.me/
Delivr - http://delivr.com/qr-code-generator
Goo.gl - http://goo.gl

What do I do with the code?

Once the code has been generated, simply download it, copy and paste it into a document or webpage, or use the mobile-barcodes website to obtain an embedding code for your wiki or website.

Where to get a QR Code Scanner for your Phone or Mobile Device

Some come with barcode readers that are already installed. If not, just go to the app store and search. You can also Google search "QR reader for Nokia", "QR reader for Droid", "QR reader for iPhone". I use the "free QR Code Reader" for my iPhone".

Educational Uses: {for students with iPod touches (with cameras) or smart phones

* Display student artwork in the hallway. Add a QR code that provides additional info about the student or artist.
* Display student reports. Add a QR code so that parents/others can listen to a child read the report.
* Add a QR code to the back/inside of a book with a student recorded synopsis of the book/book review/info about the author.
* Create a QR code scavenger hunt in or around the school. Each new QR code provides a new clue.
* Create a QR code to take student directly to a website or video.
* Have students create a QR code to provide additional information to their resumes (for a 21st century resume). Not only will this help engage them in technical writing, but also their work will be innovative.
* Students can create the QR codes that link to content they create. If students helped create awareness around bullying or digital citizenship, for example, they might put the codes around the school or in a parent newsletter. They can take it a step further by creating codes for a local business or organization.

.

Big Huge Labs - fun stuff with digital photos

Big Huge Labs

BigHugeLabs is one of my favorite sites where students can make cool stuff with digital photos. For example, using the Motivator, students can make their own inspirational/famous person or inventor motivational posters. With the Trading Card, students can feature people of honor with researched facts and a photo. The Movie Poster can feature a book and include characters, setting, plot and climax, author info, copyright, etc. or feature an explorer. If you would like to know more about BigHugeLabs, just contact me.

http://bighugelabs.com/deck.php

Clonezilla

http://clonezilla.org/

A free software disaster recovery, disk cloning and deployment solution. Allows a user to clone an individual machine or many computers

50 Common Core Resources for Teachers

50 Common Core Resources for Teachers
http://www.teachthought.com/teaching/50-common-core-resources-for-teachers/

ScootPad

ScootPad is free and offers mathematics and reading practice activities to elementary school students and their teachers. ScootPad activities can be played on just about any device including iPads, Android tablets, and Chromebooks. ScootPad offers a lot of features, but at it's core is practice activities aligned to Common Core standards. Teachers can create classroom accounts in which they can manage all aspects of their students' accounts including password resets. The best part is ScootPad allows teachers to monitor how their students are doing on each concept in the practice activities.

http://www.scootpad.com/

Image Burn

Image Burn

ImgBurn is a CD / DVD / HD DVD / Blu-ray burning application that everyone should know about! It is a free download and our teacher laptops and lab computers already have the program downloaded. I have used it for copying audio CDs from disc to disc and for burning computer files to a CD. I have a help guide ready if you would like to learn how.

Podcasting

Podcast

What is Podcasting? A podcast is like an audio broadcast. Here are a few reasons to for students to create podcasts:

* Literacy skills - although each podcast lasts only typically, anywhere from 1-7 minutes, preparation time is needed. The children have to research their topic, music and anything else they add to liven it up (jokes, sounds).They also have to think of questions to ask their interviewees, as well as writing the scripts for the podcast.

* Speaking and listening skills - presenting a podcast requires the development of clear speaking skills.

* Team work skills - Collaborative podcasts require a considerable team effort.

Here are a few tools that can be used for Podcasting.

Audacity: Your teacher computer and cart 1 computers already have Audacity on them.

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/.

Vocaroo: http://vocaroo.com/

This is a very basic way to record a podcast (grades K-3). After the podcast has been recorded, it can be downloaded as an MP3.

Smartboard: Use your Smartboard to record a podcast

~Let me know if you would like for me to help you with Podcasting!

Learning Lab

Learning Lab is a great resource to use when teaching about digital citizenship. The website has short videos to watch on a topic, followed by skills learned, and finally activities for applying what you have learned. Although it is cartoon based, it is appropriate for upper grades too.

http://learninglab.org/