Thing 29: K12 Online Conference

This made me so happy!!!  I found two really amazing presentations in the 2015 drop down menu for "Stories of Connection":

• Worst Preso Ever
• Connecting Creativity

Worst Preso Ever was a very fun presentation about how to teach kids about common slideshow mistakes.  I love that it's done humorously!  I will for sure be using the lesson with my kids to help them embrace the idea of the "rules" of slideshows.  I think the fun approach will help kids retain the information and help them see that it's about practice, not perfection.  At the end of the presentation, the author also offered two "extras" that seem fun:

• Pechaflikr: This reminds me of an old teacher who used to have us pick a random topic from a fishbowl each week and stand up in front of the class to talk about it.  It was on the spot and very exciting.  I'd love to try it!
• Iron Chef Lesson Planning: This was such a fun idea.  Give the kids a topic, tell them they each have one slide of the presentation and ten minutes to get it ready.  Watch them work, collaborate and teach.  I'll definitely try this one too!

Connecting Creativity is a website that offers "quests" to students.  The presenters walked through four different quests they've issued so far.  Each quest challenges students to creatively connect different aspects of their learning.  My favorite quest idea was for "found poetry".  I love the idea of using it with current events!  I think kids would really be able to dive deeply into each of the topics, and I can't wait to see what creative products they produce.

I am excited by the topics that are coming up in this year's conference, and I will probably "attend". The great thing, however, is that the content will be there whether I'm able to attend during that timeframe or not!  This is a brilliant concept and a great way to get PD!

Things 25-28: Flubaroo/Google Forms, Socrative, Kahoot and Padlet

Google Forms is very intriguing to me, and I am starting to allow myself to get comfortable with the Flubaroo add-on.  I'm not huge on grading much of anything, so the Google Forms is really great to me.  I like that it collects my data, and I'm really excited to see that you can now view the data individually as well.  I used it to create a way of collecting new class ideas for AIL last summer, and I'd like to continue doing that.  I'll also probably use it much more with the kids this year as well to get quick ideas of how they're doing after lessons.

Socrative was a little less intuitive for me (probably because it's not Google, and I'm really comfortable with everything Google now).  I want to spend more time with it, and I know that Steve Agouridis from Skokie uses it a lot.  I'll probably seek out more one-on-one training with someone who is a pro because I didn't find it as intuitive, but I know it's got lots of potential.  I'll be looking for PD on this one for sure!

Kahoot is my jam!  This year I plan to use Kahoot for more than just academic purposes.  I want to try to use it for some fun things as well like a "Get to Know Mrs. Warner" quiz and a "What did you do this weekend" game...  I have loved using it for quick assessments of knowledge (especially when we've got vocabulary heavy topics), and now I want to branch into using it to help us become a closer knit community.

Padlet was a little more fun than I had imagined!  I really appreciate the fun color and background options.  I think kids will get a kick out of this.  I could see myself using this often to get them engaged right at the start of a lesson or unit.  And I love that they can see each post as it comes.  I remember finding it overwhelming when we were all together as a staff, but I think with a more manageable number of people, it would be a really fun tool to get information.

Things 23 + 24: Creative Commons and OER

I scored 9/10 on the CC quiz!  Copyright is something I continually worry about as an educator.  I love the CC site and what it offers.  I can see it really changing the way I teach the kids especially when it comes to making presentations.  I know at sixth grade they are not creating presentations that will be shared with the world, but I really love the confidence this site gives me to help prepare the kids for the world they will become a part of in the future.  They'll need to practice these skills, and CC is the perfect site to help me know how to help them do just that!  I'm really happy we got to see this site!

OER was also really fun to explore.  I found etana.org for myself.  I loved the site because it provides some primary source translations from the ancient world.  I'm really excited to explore the site more thoroughly.  I feel like primary sources are hard to come by in the ancient civilizations we teach, and the translations of some texts will be really interesting to share with students.

I found Readers to the Rescue for you elementary teachers!  I had such a fun time with the "game". Basically, you drag and drop fairy tale characters into a Mad-Lib story.  Then the game animates it for you and reads it out loud.  It was very entertaining.  I could see using it as a hook to a fairytale unit or just as a fun game to play during choice time.  Enjoy!

Things 19-22: Prezi, Voki, Animoto and PowToons

My Every Monday Matters Prezi

• Every Monday last year, we took the whole block to focus on helping others.  Some really great research and projects came out of this endeavor, so we're continuing it next year.  This is my Prezi introduction that I'd like to use.

My Iowa Voki

• There's nothing better than being from Iowa!  I'm a proud Hawkeye, and I was so excited to see the corn cob!

My Democracy Animoto

• With this being an election year, I'm hoping to inspire kids to get involved in the democratic process.  We'll study it from a historical perspective (as it all came to be in ancient Greece!). This Animoto will be a launch item for the discussion.

My Narrative PowToon

• My favorite narrative I do with the kids is the scary/mystery/horror story.  I'll use this to help launch us into thinking about these narratives.

I enjoyed each of these to differing degrees and felt differing levels of success with each.  Prezis really do look amazing.  I could see those being very engaging for kids.  I've already started one for Go To School Night as well!  I'm not sure about the Voki.  I'll have to play around with it more.  I could see my kids who hate to present being really into it though.  Animoto really looks awesome.  I couldn't figure out how to simply add photos directly from my drive account, so I couldn't use any real photos without it being a hassle.  If anyone has that figured out, let me know.  I think kids will like telling visual stories with it.  Though I appreciate the PowTooon I made, it honestly took me two hours to create.  I'd love to set the kids on this one because I'm sure they'd figure out all kinds of cool tricks and shortcuts that would make my next PowToon take much less time.

Thing 17: Notability

Notability is my favorite app in the entire world!  And I'm not even being hyperbolic.  I used Notability with my kids last year in place of all paper notebooks.  We had a social studies notebook, a writer's notebook and a reader's notebook.  I love it!

One feature that I really love about Notability is that you can type and use your finger or a stylus to write and add pictures from your camera roll or the Internet all in one note.  It allows kids a lot of freedom for how they get their ideas down.  Kids who preferred to use words could easily do that; others who preferred to use pictures and label with few words could do that as well.  It's so easy to modify to your own specific needs and learning preferences.

I especially loved using Notability to create note templates for the kids to use.  It was easy to type the basic template, and then I'd write in with a stylus to make modifications for the kids who needed it.  I could then upload all of this to Schoology, and the kids could get it from there to put into their own Notability notebooks.  The thing I loved about this feature was that the modified version just looked like the kid had already added some notes in his/her own handwriting.  It really lessened the "I'm different" stigma that can come with the modified work.

The kids loved to use it for notes in social studies.  We did a lesson on how to organize notes.  They loved the colors that they could use.  They also got into the shapes and used those to help them organize as they researched.

The best feature in Notability is the cut and paste feature.  You can easily move any of your stylus written work with a simple circle and drag!  That was another lifesaver for my sixth graders.  They could easily move notes into more organized spots to help them see patterns and volume for each subtopic.

Finally, I loved using it to take class notes as we worked together.  I'd project it on the Apple TV and write or add pictures as we would go.  I could then share those class notes with the kids through Drive or Schoology.  The modeling was really helpful in that way.

I really cannot say enough about Notability and how easy it is to use.  If you'd like to learn more about it, please let me know!  I'd be happy to share what we've figured out so far (I'm sure we're only scratching the surface).  If I can do it, anyone can do it!

Thing 16: Haiku Deck

I'm a really big fan of slide shows, so I thought I'd love this app. Alas, I did not. I used it to create a haiku deck on plagiarism:

http://www.haikudeck.com/p/cdc53d7e96

I don't mind how it turned out, but I wish it could do more. I wanted to add video, use multiple pictures on one slide, manipulate the positioning of words...  So much more! I think I am spoiled by Google Slides and other slide show type apps and the such. This just didn't do it for me, and I think most of my sixth graders would just find it frustrating to use because of the limitations on their own manipulation of each slide. 

I'm curious, however, if teachers of younger grades thought this might be helpful? Maybe it would be good as an introductory slide show app?

Thing 15: Book Creator

I've been a fan of Book Creator for awhile now.  Last year I used it to help me differentiate materials for my kids.  I'd make books for notes that could be uploaded to Notability with pages that looked like this:

and this for modification:

I liked using Book Creator for this because it allowed me to make the notes look the way I wanted. Once they were uploaded into Schoology for the kids to upload into Notability, I could assign them to certain kids.  When they downloaded them, they all looked similar enough that no one really blinked twice at the modifications that had happened.

As the year went on I got better and better at these books (though I found myself preferring to use Notability when it was for notes)!  Later I made one for a geography test that had maps on the different pages.  Once the kids got it from Schoology, they could put it into Notability and manipulate it any way they chose.

The kids loved using the app as a tool for making products.  For any type of notetaking, they preferred to use Notability.  They loved being able to import photos and videos to show their learning.  We'll definitely use it with them again next year!