Technology Plan

Please leave your comments and thoughts as our committee works on the Technology Plan for 2010-2013.

Blogs

For a quick introduction to Blogging see Teacher Tube at http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=66819d763ef9148d4c76

Blogging Ideas for K-12 Education

Post a Prompt - Post a biweekly writing prompt for students to respond to by a certain day. Have them comment on one of their classmates ideas. Foster process writing peer-editing by asking each student to make a suggestion for improvement to content and mechanics (editing) of the other student’s submission. Invite parents to comment back to their elementary children.

The week in Review - Appoint a weekly blog team in your elementary classroom to write that week’s blog entry, describing the events of the week in Room XYZ. Invite moms and dads to comment and watch the excitement grow! Soon you will have students begging to write the summaries.

Respond to a reading - Practice good reading strategies and check comprehension by asking students to respond to an assigned reading, reflecting on how it applies to their own experience. For example, after reading a non-fiction piece about the McCarthy Era, students could tell about their own experiences with labeling.

Find the facts - Post a statement with no supporting facts. Ask students to find facts to support or refute the opinion, using links to reliable web sites and their own persuasive explanations. This could work well for environmental issues, political issues, or any topic that is debatable.

Critique a web site - Post a link to a web site related to a topic your are studying and invite students to give their personal evaluation: Does the site show bias? Does it seem well-researched? Is it a reliable source?

Comment on current events - Post a link to a current events story and ask students to comment on its implications in your local community or their own lives. Even young students can respond to stories from the local paper’s online pages.

Examples of Excellent Blogs include:

Kindergarten blog with videos and quotes
4th Grade Classroom
Fictional history blog on Harriet Tubman by elementary students
7th grade blog as a class organizer and daily “scribe” space for students
8th grade U.S. History class blog and link to class podcasts
8th grade math blog
9th grade English blog
Geometry Class

Sites to Host a Blog

http://www.edublogs.org/
https://www.blogger.com/start

Facilitate Teaching, Writing, and Learning with Wikis

Wikis are free online writing spaces which allow collaboration between authors. The most famous wiki is Wikipedia.

Teachers can use wikis to:

*Provide a space for free writing

*Debate course topics, including assigned readings

*Share resources such as annotated bibliographies, websites, and effective writing samples

*Maintain a journal of work performed on group projects

*Require students to collaborate on documents, such as an essay written by the entire class

*Discuss curricular and instructional innovations

*Encourage students to revise Wikipedia pages or take on new wikipedia assignments

*Inspire students to write a Wikibook

*Support service learning projects (i.e. use wikis to build a website about a challenge in their city)

Wikispaces is one option to Create simple web pages that groups, friends, & families can edit together.