Summer Vacation!

I have four more days with students and then the current school year is over. It seems this year flew by.  But no matter how fast I think this school year went, the summer will go much faster.

What are your plans for the summer?  I have plans to relax, enjoy my family, vacation at the beach, and read books for fun.  I also plan to clean my house from top to bottom and accomplish all those tasks I never have time for during the school year.  And like many teachers, I plan to take steps to educate myself and prepare for the coming year.

This summer I am going to one librarian conference, Camp TASL.  This is a new one and I'm looking forward to what it has in store for me.  I am also presenting at a Technology Academy. I have two sessions on Free Apps for the Elementary Classroom and one Session on SMART Exchange.  I'm still working on my presentations, but when they are finished I will share them with you.

I would love to hear about your plans for the summer!

Conferences

Last November I was invited by SMART Technologies to present a few sessions at the Tennessee Education Technology Conference. It was a wonderful opportunity for me to share more of what I do every day with my SMART products and I got to meet a lot of other enthusiastic SMART users. When I wasn't presenting I was at the SMART Vendor Booth sharing even more.
I presented one session on how to use the SMART Table and two sessions on using your SMART Board to meet the requirements for the new Tennessee Teacher Evaluation Model. I have been asked to present that session as a webinar in April. I'm excited about this new opportunity and I'll let you know when it's time.

Presidents' Day Resources

Monday is Presidents' Day. You may or may not be in school, but either way, here are a few classroom resources you may want to use with your students. And they are FREE!!!



Lessons of the SMART Exchange: http://exchange.smarttech.com/search.html?q=presidents%27+day




http://free.ed.gov/subjects.cfm?subject_id=28






Apple App: US Presidents
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/usa-presidents/id317835093?mt=8








Android App: US Presidents

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.max.USPresidents&feature=related_apps#?t=W251bGwsMSwyLDEwOSwiY29tLm1heC5VU1ByZXNpZGVudHMiXQ..

Changes

I am making some changes with this blog. I have found that a wiki serves me better for various reasons. Therefore, I am posting most of my information at http://librarianne.wikispaces.com/. You can find me over there. I will keep this blog open for occassional educational technology posts.
Thanks for reading!

What is Media Literacy?

 This is the first week of school for me. It is an exciting time as I look ahead to new adventures. As an elementary librarian I decided that I was going to stress "Media Literacy" with my students this year. So, I had to ask myself, "What IS media literacy"? I knew I wanted to talk to my students about being safe online, proper cell phone etiquette, how to effectively search for needed information, but what else? After searching the Internet and finding a variety of definitions I came up with four words that describe media literacy to me:

*Access
*Evaluate
*Analyze
*Create

As educators it is important that we not only teach these concepts to our students, but that we allow them to experience. I want my students to learn how to access all the information they need without asking me for help. I want them to be able to evaluate what they find to determine if it is accurate and reliable. I want my students to analyze all the information and determine what they need or don't need and then decide what they can do with it. Finally, I want my students to take all of that information and create something of their own. This is how they learn. I once had a college professor who told us that his job was to make his job obsolete. He wanted to teach us how to teach ourselves so we wouldn't need him anymore. I have never forgotten that and that is my goal now.


Good luck to all you who are beginning a new school year along with me. Let the fun begin!

Getting Ready for State Tests

It's that time of year again. Teachers across the country are counting down until state testing and making sure their students know everything they need to know. Here are a few FREE sites to help get those students ready. Utilize your SMART Board and do them as a whole-class activity or put your students in a lab and let them work on their own.





1. http://www.qtopia.com/
2. http://www.prepdog.com/
3. http://www.khanacademy.org/

e-days

Today is the 15th snow day in my school system. It is only mid January so it isn't looking good for the rest of the winter. Last year we missed a total of 25 days and I was hoping this year would be different. Of the last six weeks (including Christmas break) we've been in school for five days. It looks like it is going to warm up this weekend so I'm hoping we'll be back in school on Monday.

All of the extra time has given me a chance to think. There has to be a better way than to miss a month's worth of instructional days, causing students to get further and further behind just before state testing. I stumbled across the concept of e-days. Some school systems are looking into the possibility of having students complete assignments online when they can't get to school because of weather.

In this technology age the concept should be a no-brainer. So much can be accomplished via the Internet. Teachers can post their lessons online complete with text, audio, video, and even quizzes. However, the problem is that not everyone has Internet access. At my school about 75% of our students are on free/reduced lunch. A large portion of our student body doesn't have Internet at home. So, what do we do about those students who can't complete online assignments at home?

So then I started thinking about what could be done with cell phones. And I'm still thinking.

There has to be a better way.